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Monday, July 31, 2006
The Dog Ate My G-String
It was the baby-blue one. The one with the lace around the top. Really, can you blame her? If you were a dog, and you were going to eat a G-string, wouldn't it be the baby-blue one with the lace around the top? Stop lying, bitches. You know it's true.
She's a good dog, really. This is the first time she's done anything like this. She's never even so much as eaten a sock. But again, if you were a dog, and you were going to eat an article of clothing, what would you choose: the sock or the G-string? That's right, bitches. The G-string.
The remnants of the baby-blue G-string were discovered very, very late Saturday night, when we went out for our middle-of-the-night potty break. There were the telltale signs of the G-string, right there in the shit. I thought to myself, Now what the hell is that thing sticking out of the shit? Oh. It's my G-string. In the middle of the shit. Of course.
There's a lot of shit in the world. It was really only a matter of time before my G-string ended up in it.
Arguably, I had been sitting in a pile of shit all night. Sometimes it just gets flung in your face, and then what are you going to do? It's not like you can always avoid it.
He said, “How boring does your sex life have to be if your wife enrolls in a pole-dancing aerobics class? How boring does it have to be if you have pull in the pole dancing?”
All I said was, “First of all, pole-dancing should be included from day one, and second of all sex is so expansive, there's just so much you can do. It just seems like there's no reason to ever get bored.”
And he went on to say that he's dated some “heavy hitters,” some really knockout women, and sex got boring with them, and if those women had a hard time keeping it exciting, then sex is just hard to keep exciting in general.
I mean, really, if the “heavy hitters” can't make it a thrill a minute, then we plebians must be doomed.
Of course, the conversation quickly turned to anal sex. Frankly, that happens to me quite often. Occupational hazard.
Within minutes, I had the details of his experience with women and anal sex, right up to bending a girl over a car and giving it to her.
The thing is, he was running game on me. That was his game. The “heavy hitters” and the anal sex over the car. In his defense, that kind of game is a bit of an occupational hazard with me. Like I said, a person asks what I do, I tell them, and the next thing you know, we're talking about anal sex. I think it's the heavy-hitters line that got me. You can't be talking about all the hot women you've boned when you're running game. It's an automatic foul.
’Twas mere hours later that I discovered the G-string in the shit. That's when I realized, it had only been a matter of time before bowel movements started to mimic life. My ass had been sliding around in shit all night.
Stealing
Choosing that seat was no accident. It wasn't even a coincidence, or even an incident of chance. There were other open seats on the fairly full bus, but of course choosing that seat was a very calculated move.
When I sat down, I could feel his arm hair brushing up against my skin. He didn't notice, as far as I could tell. Of course I noticed. It was such an intimate thing, a proximity usually reserved for lovers. And there I sat, all the way to work, stealing a little bit of intimacy from a stranger on the bus.
What a lovely way to start the week.
Friday, July 28, 2006
It'll Be Syphilis
From: Melanie Boyer
Sent: Friday, July 28, 2006 3:18 PM
To: Million Dollar Multi-Orgasmic Male
Subject: RE:
Do you think I'm going to die alone and single in the old folks’ home?
This is me at my worst; don't hold it against me in the future.
From: Million Dollar Multi-Orgasmic Male
Sent: Friday, July 28, 2006 3:34 PM
To: Melanie Boyer
Subject: RE:
we all die alone sugar, it's being together when we're alive that makes life beautiful
and it won't be an old folks home, it'll be syphilis
Subject: Re: What are doing at work right now?
From: Melanie Boyer
Sent: Friday, July 28, 2006 10:27 AM
To: Million Dollar Multi-Orgasmic Male
Subject: RE: he
You know, sometimes I think I'm an oddball because I'm not dating a million people (said the sex columnist). I'm always flabbergasted at people who are dating this person and that person, not in a judgmental way, but in a “how did you do that?” kind of way. And when I'm one of a harem of girls the dude is dating, I'm always flabbergasted at that too, like, how are you making time for this? How are you working out the logistics? And then I am continually flabbergasted when they choose just one- it's like, hmmm, how did you end up choosing her? How much of it was right place/right time? That usually leads to some sort of negative self-reflection, as in, what's wrong with me that's right with her?
The truth is usually a combination of right place/right time/right person, and that I didn't really want the dude in question, because he wasn't right for me, but it's just so easy to slip down that negative self-reflection slope. But either way, it always sucks just a little bit to find you weren't enough for a person, for whatever reason.
Whelping
There's a couple pushing what is probably about a 15-month-old little girl in a stroller. Daddy is kicking a ball around, and every time he does his best David Beckham, the little girl giggles and giggles. She's waving her Elmo doll around.
There's a two-year-old balancing her tenuous walking skills on the deck of the ferry to Cape May. The Pirate of the Ferry, all dressed up in costume with a blue head, waits patiently behind her. She turns, and she chooses the flight response. She runs to her Daddy, because she knows he'd fend off the devil for her.
So much talk of children, and only two paragraphs into the post. What is the affliction today, is a girl just turned 30 feeling her biological clock tick-tick-ticking like Peter Pan's crocodile?
Hardly. Don't be childish.
Of course, the girl-just-turned-30 would like to have children. Oh yes, she would very much like to whelp, and watch the little flower tattoo on her right hip stretch and bleed into a rose garden all over her belly. All the side-view photos of the pregnant version of me would have to be taken from the left, or the child will be asking, mommy, who puked Technicolor all over your belly when you were pregnant with me? The answer would be something like, Oh, no one honey, just look at this ink-stained stretch mark here, it's clearly a flower tattoo. Want to go get one for your fifth birthday?
I thought about that when I was 17, when another wise 17-year-old and I ditched school to frolic off and get our second tattoos. It seemed like a good idea at the time. No tests that day and one tattoo was not enough, no, no. At the time I thought, I am going to have children sometime within the next decade and this thing is going to stretch around my entire waist. That's when I was suffering from the 17-year-old-I-will-get-married-one-week- after-I-graduate-from-college-just-like-my-mother vision. It's been more than a decade, and I haven't whelped yet. Different visions these days.
The whelping-talk is to men what Black Flag is to roaches. Makes ’em flip over and play dead, no matter where you are. No disrespect meant to the male readers—you boys take some serious shit on this blog from time to time—but from what I can tell, the minute a woman says “children” in your presence, you're convinced that not only do we want to have them, we want to have them with you, and that we want to do so sometime in the next six months, because we've figured out how to speed up the human gestation process. God bless your little souls.
Yes, of course I want to have children. When sex reaches that point that it's not selfish pleasure, just for me, me, me, when it's with someone I love who is also a good sperm donor, I'd like to have sex for its ultimate purpose—I'd like to do my duty to Darwin and the Catholic Church and procreate. Because the species will not die out, no, no, not on my watch. For that reason, and for the joy of little baby smiles and the genuineness in baby hugs and kisses. One-hundred-percent selfish reasons, have no doubt. You hope, I suppose, when you whelp, that the child will take 100 percent joy in the life you have given it, as to not make it a completely selfish gesture. You hope they will never look at you and say, “I didn't ask to be born,” just like I said to my dad when I was 13. Oh, how that must have slain him. With a new little niece in the family, I have a small inkling as to just how much my parents must love me. Oh, how that must have slain him.
Yes, of course I want children, for sharing all the joy with them that it is to be two years old, and know that your daddy will fight off the devil for you. But is that really it? Do I really want to create that for them, or do I want to recreate that for myself? Because when I die, should I be so lucky as to go to heaven or Palm Springs or wherever, that is what it will look like: The two-year-old version of me, zipped up in her yellow footie pajamas, sitting on her Daddy's lap while he reads her the Adventures of Some-Such-Thing-or-the-Other. And that I knew, even before he died. I knew that would be heaven for me, and that everything between here and there is just Styrofoam filling.
Thursday, July 27, 2006
Gasp
When we are arranged around the table at Thanksgiving, I wonder. I think, what would they think? What would they think if the knew the number? What would they think if the knew the length of the Roster, this gathering of my family?
Would they step back and gasp? The Roster isn't particularly gasp-invoking—it's not very long, and doesn't include any scoundrels or cads (although I wouldn't be opposed to adding one), but the family consists of people who have been in committed relationships since they were about 20, with one exception other than me. Would they get it? Maybe. Possibly. Would they cock their heads to the side and lift their ears when they heard the grand total? Probably, out of fascination more than anything. How did she get to that number? Who were they? Where was she? Did she know them? Did they love her? Did she love them? Is it weird to amass a total like that? Is it weird to be naked and intimate and contorted into circus-like poses with multiple men? It would be, I imagine, just like it was when I came home from Africa. The question was, “How did you do it?” And people look at you like you just stepped out of a nuclear reactor.
The family would not, in any way, pass judgment, I think. There's always that chance, when you reveal a Roster that takes more than one hand to count. The residuals of Puritan values and the Salem witch trials still rumble around in our subconscious—while we've shaken them on the surface, they are there, for a lot of us. What's the acceptable number? What are the acceptable circumstances? Do you have to love each and every one of them? Does that make it OK? What if you're a man? Does that make it OK?
The first one, I was sure, would be the only one. We were going to get married, so it was OK to have sex. That's how the little 18-year-old mind worked. The second one was a reality check—we didn't love each other, but, oh, how I was so taken with him, how I wanted nothing more than for him to deem me worthy of his attention, because he was so cool, and all the girls wanted to sleep with him. And they were, I discovered, throughout the course of our relationship. But before I knew that, even the first time I hit my back in his bed, I knew that he would not be the last. We were having sex for sex's sake, for a little selfish pleasure. The 20-year-old brain wasn't quite sure how to process that. Was this OK? Did this fall into the parameters of OK, if didn't love each other?
But the third, I did love, for a long time. When he got married, to someone who wasn't me, I thought, isn't that odd? That's a bit odd. I didn't want to marry him, but I loved him. When we had sex for the first time, I cried, because I thought, he will not be the last. I don't want to marry this man. He will not be the last. That's when I realized that sex could be selfish, and have nothing to do with your partner, and everything to do with you. That realization has become more and more tangible, even in the last year. There are times when your partner is just jacking off with your vagina. The 18-year-old brain, and the 20-year-old brain, even the 25-year-old brain, would have found that very, very sad. Is it sad? I suppose, if you cock your head and look at it one way, it is sad. If you cock your head the other way, and ask yourself what you are getting out of it, you see that it isn't sad.
Where are the rest? Where is the rest of the Roster? Here and there, scattered mostly throughout this city, because this city is where I finally figured out how to cock my head the other way.
How to explain that to a woman who slept only with the man she married and buried? How to explain that to a couple that has been together since they were 18? No need, really, everyone will make of the number what they want to make of it, based on the angle at which they cock their heads, and if they think that angle is the only proper angle. If there is a proper angle, anyway.
But I wonder, when I look around at the Thanksgiving gathering. Do they want to ask me? Do they want to know the salacious adventures of the single girl? Do they cringe, because I'm the little sister?
This is new, for everyone to have a Roster as opposed to just a few random “sluts,” oh we hate that word these days. We've redefined it, with our Rosters and our hook-ups, and given, or taken away, a whole different meaning to sex.
Wednesday, July 26, 2006
The Roster
Today, there is a sadness. It's heavy and awkward; difficult to balance. A bit like trying to carry a sectional couch up a flight of stairs.
Today, I'm thinking about jobs and careers and home loans and car repair. I'm thinking about Labyrinth, because it's playing at one of the movie theaters. I'm thinking about that line where David Bowie says, “Just fear me, love me, do as I say, and I will be your slave,” and Jennifer Connelly responds with, “You have no power over me.” She's a tough broad, that Jennifer Connelly. I'd do anything David Bowie told me to do.
I'm thinking about the Roster. In college, I thought the Roster was very important. I thought that the Roster absolutely needed to be shared at the beginning of a new relationship, so everyone was on the same page with their sexual histories. This is also when I thought that one "made love” in a relationship and that “fucking” was morally reprehensible. I thought that if a couple didn't share their complete Rosters with each other, including one-night stands and threesomes, it was a sign of poor communication. I also knew everything in college, in a patronizing and unyielding manner. Now I don't know anything. Although I do tend to be patronizing and unyielding about it, particularly when faced with people who think they know something. Nobody knows anything. Everybody knows that.
At any rate, we're all just doing the best we can.
I don't care so much about the Roster anymore. I am fascinated by it, though. I think it's a result of living in the hook-up generation. Everyone has such long Rosters, and it's populated by a run-in with so-and-so, or meeting someone at a bar, or a brief stint with that person and a tryst with this person. I never cease to be amazed at people's ability to get laid, so frequently, and yet in such a random fashion. It's like a girl always needs to shave her legs, no matter what, because what if she ends up having sex tonight with someone she hasn't met yet? It's best to be prepared for these things, because sex is always an option. And you have to think about sheets. If you're going to get into a man's bed, you have wonder when he last washed his sheets. Does he wash them after every girl? Doubtful. In the hook-up culture, that would be a lot of washing.
The ability to hustle a little ass whenever and wherever you want is also fascinating to me. I was a late sexual bloomer—when one-night stands were happening left and right around me in college, I couldn't figure it out. How were people doing all this? How were they convincing people to have sex with them on such short notice? How do you even begin the conversation?
It's not such a mystery to me now, but I still find the simultaneous frequency and random nature of the hook-up culture to be fascinating. The sheer size of the average Roster in the hook-up culture is pretty impressive. There is no social commentary here, no questions about self-esteem or diseases or intimacy or “How have we reached this point and what does it say about our values and relationships?” None of that. We get enough of that when we hear about the Gen X and Yers and how we play too many video games and we have too much debt and we're self-absorbed, and we're this and we're that. Let's take a break from all that shit; passing qualitative judgment is tiring.
Let's just reflect on the Roster. Compiling it has been an interesting ride, hasn't it?
Tuesday, July 25, 2006
The Million-Dollar Multi-Orgasmic Male
He calls at 10 a.m. on a Saturday. Who calls at 10 a.m. on a Saturday? That's just bullshit.
“Is it too early to call?” he asks.
“No, it's fine. I'm awake. I'm just lounging in my bed being a lady of leisure.” He's lucky. Rare is the Saturday morning that I'm awake by 10 a.m. On any other Saturday, I would have been forced to pee in his eye sockets.
“I'm calling to brag.”
“Brag? About what? What happened?” I'm thinking he must have slept with a lingerie model or been accepted to grad school or something.
He tells me he's achieved the mythical art of multiple orgasms. He's even achieved it multiple times.
Now that's not the kind of thing you drop on a girl at 10 a.m., particularly when you just narrowly missed the wrath of pee in your eye sockets. While the claim is incredulous, I believe him. He's been working on this for awhile, with the help of an instruction manual. I took a great interest in the instruction manual the last time I passed out at his house. Occupational hazard. Both the interest in the book and the passing out.
Now he's telling me he's achieved it.
“What? You did? With who? Tell me everything. Can I blog about it?”
He tells me that yes, he did it last night and this morning, he was with himself, and he'll tell me more about it later. And can I blog about it? Maybe.
Now what the shit is that about? Why do you call a sex columnist at 10 a.m. on a Saturday and tell her you've achieved multiple orgasms multiple times unless you want her to:
A) Sleep with you
B) Write about you
C) Watch
D) A and C only
E) All of the Above
I'm guessing it's B and hoping it's E, but I blew the SAT, and GRE for that matter, so what the shit do I know about multiple choice? Not a goddamn, which is further demonstrated by the fact that he chose the option of a fully-clothed and non-contact tutorial on men and multiple orgasms. Granted I did not present A, C, or E to him as options, so there's still a possibility my multiple-choice skills are not complete shit. They may be just a little bit shit.
The Multi-Orgasmic Male: A Fully-Clothed and Non-Contact Tutorial
Presented by the Million-Dollar Multi-Orgasmic Man Himself
1. Multi-orgasmic men really do exist. In addition, all men have the ability to become multi-orgasmic.
2. Delaying the orgasm is not the way to go. It always ends badly. For example:
He says: “Are you done yet? Did you get there?”
She says: “What? What do you mean?”
He says: “Did you have an orgasm yet?”
This is always a confusing situation for women. We always think that we're just having another frolicky romp in the hay and everyone's enjoying themselves, when really, you're about to pop a blood vessel in your forehead from delaying your orgasm so much. Then you're fighting off penis desensitization and you're having a hard time orgasming at all, and we're thinking, “Oh, he must be having a hard time because he thinks my butt is fat.”
See, it's lose-lose.
3. Being multi-orgasmic means separating ejaculation from orgasm. It's possible. Women have been doing it for millennia. Ejaculation-orgasm separation means he never cums too fast or waits too long, only to suffer penis desensitization. It means he's orgasming just as much as she is, and can keep going, just as much as she can. It means that you too can start to explore tantric sex, just like Sting. It means that you could possibly have sex with Sting. Not really. But it does mean there's a brand-new side to sex that we (or at least the majority of us) have been neglecting, only to bring about our own suffering.
4. Sex is instinctual—just because you can master the pelvic rhythm doesn't mean you're hot shit. Mastering the multiple orgasm takes practice and apparently, a manual. Of course, it also includes being in touch with your sexual self and your energy and your partner and all that other crap. The Multiple-O takes skill.
Dear God, please forgive me for writing that last line. He just read that and now needs to pull up an extra chair so his ego has a place to sit. He's going to be unbearable.
But, dear God, I'm still hoping the answer is E. How's a girl supposed to pass up an opportunity like that? For shit's sake.
Monday, July 24, 2006
Integrity?
Blank, to say the least. Not even an instinctual tug as to what my feelings are, let alone how to put them into words.
He says, “I'm not at ease with the way things ended. Your request of me was reasonable. I responded with fear and insecurity, and I didn't act with integrity.”
Blank. We're driving home from the beach. I'm sharing the backseat with a two-year-old, who's putting her My Little Pony to bed inside her pink-striped hat and singing what seems to be the ABCs, but we can't be sure.
“I don't like the way you communicated your request, and it doesn't excuse your actions before my response, but your request was reasonable, and I responded poorly.”
A little bit of a twisting blade between my ribs on that one. It triggers a little bit of the urge to pick up the old fight. “Oh, you don't like the way I communicated? MY actions weren't excusable?” There's no value in bringing up the old fight, and that's not the purpose of the phone call, so I just listen.
“I don't feel good about the way we ended things, with emotions running so high. We haven't really talked since then, and I thought I would let it lie, because I didn't really feel the need to continue anything, but just to let it be what it was. But I want to end this with integrity, and be forthcoming about my mistakes...Is there a party going on in the background?”
No. Just a two-year-old singing her version of the ABCs.
We talk a little bit, as much as one can around this kind of phone call. I don't say much, because I'm not sure how I feel. I do tell him that this is the bravest phone call I have ever received, and displays a great deal of self-awareness and integrity.
Integrity, that thing that is so lacking but that we all pride ourselves on possessing. I think about my own relationships. Do I conduct them with integrity? If you asked my closest girlfriends, would they tell you that I act with integrity towards them? There's a sour wince at that thought, the kind that usually comes when you put your face in front of a magnifying make-up mirror. Because honestly, really honestly, do I? Do I act with integrity?
The two-year-old's father says that when it comes to men and women, no one ever acts with integrity, unless they are really in love. If you are not in love, integrity isn't a requirement. Everyone is just out for themselves and you're playing the game without any rules.
That's probably the most acute assessment of the game I've ever heard. No integrity required. Have I displayed integrity with the men I've played the game with? Nope, never have. How many times have I not returned phone calls instead of owning up to a lack of interest? How many times have men done the same? What would it look like if we did require integrity? How would our interactions change?
Friday, July 21, 2006
Vow
Vow
Function: noun
Etymology:.…akin to…Sanskrit vAghat sacrificer
: a solemn promise or assertion; specifically : one by which a person is bound to an act, service, or condition (Merriam Webster online)
The last month, the sickness was everywhere. You could grasp handfuls of it from the air, you had to make room for it on the couch, and it followed you to bed at night, where you were still looking around for an escape hatch.
So that's what it means when you promise “in sickness and in health.” That's what you're committing to; it's not the flu or cold or a minor surgery here and there. It's 20 years of illness that occupies the last half of your marriage. So that's what that means. I wonder if that's what they thought of when they took that vow. I wonder if they realized what they were promising. I wonder if she realized what she was promising.
It was, in the end, a choice to keep the vow. She could have walked away, she could have said, “This is too much for me, I didn't realize what ‘sickness’ meant.” She stuck with the vow, so there are no medals or awards, there is no elevation to martyr status for staying. It was a choice, and it was part of the original bargain.
But I still wonder if they thought about what “sickness” meant.
When I made my third of four appearances as a bridesmaid, the bride and groom vowed to “stand by you on the days when I am proud of you and on the days when you disappoint me, and remain loyal to you on the days when I love you and on the days when I don't like you.”
That's a big promise. That's one you have to stop and think about, and say, “Am I really up for this?” That's a big vow.
And they said the sickness part.
After saying that they would be loyal to each other, and stand by each other, 100 percent of the time, I wonder if they about what sickness meant.
That's a big vow too.
Thursday, July 20, 2006
You Guys?
"Boyer? Boyer, you guys, are you there?"
My brother and I think it's hilarious to call each other Boyer, and to call each other 'you guys.' Because it's just one person--when you call just one person 'you guys,' that's hilarious. Obviously.
"Boyer?"
Silence. Dishes clanking in the background. Sigh. "Yeah. I'm here." Voice is weak.
Aha. I see.
"I miss Dad, too, Boyer."
Goofy Little Boy
His eyes shouldn't be that blue. They shouldn't be that clear—he has olive skin and chestnut hair, so his eyes should be brown, or hazel. The ice-blue color set against the dark background is arresting. He's never been on my bus before. I would have noticed the eyes.
He's on the phone, clearly with a girl. He grins, blushes, looks at the floor, pulls at his pant leg. When he flips his phone shut, he keeps smiling. There's a lucky girl out there who just hung up her phone.
I bet he was a goofy little boy. Little boys are usually a little bit goofy. Before his jawline became so defined, before his shoulders broadened, before he stretched to his full height, before his baby fat was pulled across his frame—he must have been a little goofy. Chubby cheeks, feet too big for his body, curly hair and missing teeth, chasing around soccer balls and basketballs and other boy-like things. What a goofy little doll he must have been, with ice-blue eyes that looked like they belonged to someone else.
The full-grown man version of him is on his way home from work, with his button-down shirt untucked, the neck undone, the sleeves rolled up. Men are seductive in this state, when they are exhaling.
They certainly make a nice backdrop for the bus ride home.
It's those eyes.
Wednesday, July 19, 2006
I'll Take a Dozen, Please
The Platinum Blonde discovers a lovely little thing; it’s a rose-flavored Turkish Delight, just like in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe. She thinks, I should send some to my boyfriend, because this is such a lovely little thing. She sends it to him with a little love note that says, “Guess what flavor this is?” He thinks and thinks and thinks. He calls her up. She asks, “What did it taste like?” He thinks and thinks and thinks.
“Pussy?” he asks.
Oh, you lovely little thing. We always knew pussy tasted just like roses.
Getting Pissed up in Here
What the goddamn is wrong with you people? For shit's sake, why do I keep running into shit like this in the middle of the city, in the middle of 2006? You people are slaughtering my entire system of universal truths; I thought this kind of shit only existed in the backwoods. What are you gonna do now, tell me I didn't learn shit in kindergarten?
Step back, a girl's about to rip out your eyes and pee in your eye sockets. I'm pissed. We've bitched about this before, but there's nothing I love more than peeing in a dead horse's eye sockets.
Why the goddamn do you all still think that your penis entitles you to keep your name for the rest of your life? Why do you think it gives you the great, almighty power to brand whatever woman you want with it? Does it have magical powers? If you beat us over the head with it in the middle of the night, will your name show up tattooed on our foreheads? What about my vagina makes you think I'm just dying to give up my name, my name for shit's sake, and take yours in its stead? I'll tell you right now, unless you're a Kennedy, I'm not doing it. And why would I do it for a Kennedy, you ask? Don't be childish. Higher credit limits, my friend.
Before you get your shit all in a tizzy, just keep in mind that's a joke. Take a moment and laugh at it. It's funny.
What sort of marriage fantasies do you boys grow up with? We know you had them—you don't have to lie here, the computer screen can't hear you. We grow up with dreams of white dresses and big golden horse carriages and true love and all that other bullshizz. What the hell is going on in your little heads? It's like you imagine that you have a big job and a big sports car and a wife and kids, all that you got as a part of a package deal at the corner store. This is MY car and MY wife and MY kids and you can tell because they all have MY name on them. Here, look at the car title. Look at MY wife's driver's license. She's MINE, MINE, MINE.
Just to set the record straight, women can have two different types of orgasms, while men can only have one. In addition, there loads more nerve endings concentrated right there in the tip of the clitoris, much more than in the penis. Compared to the clitoris, the penis is practically numb. How you like your almighty name-branding penis now, bitch? If we're measuring by ability, then step aside and take my name. That's right, take it. You know you want it. TAKE IT, BITCH, TAKE IT.
Here's an idea: let's flip a coin. Heads, I take your name. Tails, you take mine. Would you do it? If it landed on tails, would you do it? Would ya? Huh, huh?
You wouldn't, would you?
Pussy.
Tuesday, July 18, 2006
Temptation of the Classic Devil
This is all disturbingly familiar. It is familiar in the way the last meal you had before you puked is familiar.
He, and men of his kind, seem like such angels, but keep in mind that while Gabriel and Peter are angels, so are Beelzebub and Mephistopheles.
Oh, how she is feeling so melodramatic today. How the right combination lust, weakness, and insecurity will make us wax lyrical. How it will make us turn all his flaws into poetic injustices, saying that, “He’s just not in the same place I am, he’s still figuring things out.” Lust, weakness, and insecurity have front-row seats as you impale yourself on all the excuses for his behavior.
This one was sent by the universe as a temptation. Come here little girl, look at this pretty man, see his broad hands and smell his neck, you know how you love those things. See how he dips you in the middle of the sidewalk and kisses you, you love that. Come here little girl, listen to all the dirtypretty things he says, you know how you love that. And this one will be different. I promise this time. Why would he behave this way if he didn’t adore you?
This one was sent as a temptation, to see if I remember the last time, to see if I’ve learned, to see if I’ve grown and if I’m ready for the real thing. Here she goes; this is the first of 40 days and 40 nights.
Does anyone else want to poke their eyes out from all this melodrama? Let’s have a good, ugly reality check.
I have the worst panty lines today.
How’s that for a reality check?
Here’s the rundown:
Oh, how he is so delicious. How I would like to wrap my legs around his waist and become completely mesmerized by his potent, poisonous charm. You know the type: He is just so yummy; you sigh every time you see him, and he flirts with you, oh, how he teases you. And you love every minute of it. Every. Last. Minute. And so does he, dahling, have no doubt, he just thrives on it. But don’t make the mistake of thinking he wants you—no, no dahling, he doesn’t want anything to do with you. He just likes the way you look at him when he’s on the other side of the room, the way you flirt with him, the way you lap up every last bit of his attention and then beg for more.
He the Classic Devil, the father of the Alpha Pussy species, he is the most dangerous of them all.
His profile: He is gorgeous. He’s seductive. He’s charming. He eye-fucks you from across the table and grabs you when you don’t expect it. That’s his bait. He appears to be sensitive, to be in touch with his feelings, and he talks openly about them. He probably does yoga. That’s his hook, line, and sinker. You will never shake him now—you can learn to control your urges, but you’ll never be rid of them. That’s his goal. Once he’s got you hooked, he’s done with you. He sees women as more of a charm challenge: How long will it take me to get her in bed? Just how much of a stud am I? The worst kind of Classic Devil has a girlfriend. He baits and sinks you, and you are completely aware the entire time that he will not commit to you, but you’re sunk, regardless. He probably never even touches you, just renders you helpless with his charm. Alas, you are just another victim. No matter how experienced you are, he will fool you every time.
“It’s not like he’s inherently evil,” I said.
“Yes he is.” The South African Siren. “He is inherently evil.”
She’s usually right about things. She’s definitely right this time. He is inherently evil, with his pretty face and his deadly charm and his bait-and-switch sensitivity. And that being said, I’m just dying to give in to him. Men like this are a problem for me. I just can’t get enough of them. They’re my version of crack.
What to do, what to do? Run the other way, little girl. This is all disturbingly familiar, in the way the last meal you had before you puked is familiar.
Monday, July 17, 2006
Shower
Men, when they are just out of the shower, are disarming. It's that scent of clean skin and the softness that is usually reserved for intimate, privileged parts of the body, like bellies and the backs of knees. When they aren't covered in the wear of every day tear, the softness spreads to their hands and their backs and their arms, and all you really want is just one minute to press your face into their necks and breath, breath, breath. There's no cologne or aftershave—just their bare skin. The scent is akin to taking warm towels out of the dryer—it's comforting, like being snuggled up with a blanket and a man and a movie during a snowstorm. It's enough to for you to relax, to release everything, and just feel. And if they will allow it, to give them a soft, slow, open-mouthed kiss on the neck, just a little one, just to take it all in.
23-Year-Old Dick
For the love of God, how could we have gone so wrong? It's shameful, practically scandalous. So shameful it's embarrassing to say out loud.
In short, what the goddamn is wrong with us?
We rationalize it like this: There is an age deficit in this town. For some reason there are just gaggles of sweet, precious little things under the age of 26, and then there are herds of financially stable men over 38, with salt-and-pepper hair and laugh lines around their eyes that are just irresistible. And then there a contingent of 28-year-olds that are still fucking like 22-year-olds and live their lives like a bad sitcom, but that's another post, now isn't it?
We had bitched, oh, how we had bitched. "They don't even know how to fuck properly," the Platinum Blonde had said. Being surrounded by all these interns was such a burden.
But no, no.
"What were we thinking?" The Platinum Blonde has seen the error of our ways. "When I'm old and in the old-folks home, and I'm chain- smoking and lighting up joints, what am I going to say, 'Oh, I was surrounded by all these 23-year-olds when I was in my 30s and I complained?' Or am I going to say, 'I was shagging 23-year-olds when I was in my 30s?' Why didn't we see it before? What am I doing complaining about 23-year-old dick?"
Yes, it's so clear. The 23-year-olds are not a burden, but a population to be exploited. They're just so, so?energetic, if you will. And what will we say when we are chain-smoking and getting high and drinking in the old-folks' home? That we passed up this fine opportunity because we had an attitude problem? Because that is our plan: The Great and Powerful Best Friend and I are going to live in the old-folks home together and become alcoholics and get stoned, and the Platinum Blonde is going to live next door and chain-smoke and get stoned, and we are going to have sweet young men deliver our groceries while we spin tales of 23-year-old dick. We can't wait. Everything before that is just busywork.
Dear God in heaven, thank you for blessing us with this bounty of 23-year-old dick. We are eternally grateful and vow not to squander this opportunity.
Amen.
Friday, July 14, 2006
She Thought
He said, “Gimme a call so we can hang out.”
She said, “OK, sounds good.”
She thought, You know my number, you little shit. Why don't you let me know when you want to catch up? Because if I call, then you'll think I'm chasing you down, and by the way you've been acting lately, I think you might want me to chase you down, only because you like to flirt with me, but not because you want to be caught. You think I'm going to call you? Spare me.
He said, “I want to nurture our emotional connection. And I'd like the option of seeing other people.”
She said, “Are you motherfucking shitting me right now?”
She thought, Are you motherfucking shitting me right now?
He has been calling a lot lately.
She knows she should run in the other direction. But he's just sooooooo delicious.
When she was five, she thought she would be married and a housewife by age 25. She thought, There are lots of things to do during the day. I could sit and read magazines and wait for my husband to come home, which is an odd thought, considering that is absolutely not the model she got from her own stay-at-home mom. In the magazine-reading vision, she was wearing white slacks ("slacks” is such a foul word), a baby-blue sweater and a string of pearls, sitting in a baby blue arm chair in a room with stark white carpet and a curio full of crystal.
When she finally turned 25, she was single and navigating the dirt roads and questionable utilities of an African village, wearing a muumuu, a big straw hat, and Tevas. No magazines. Except for the Newsweeks that Peace Corps provided six weeks after the publication date.
When she was 17, she thought, What if I don't have a boyfriend by my sophomore year in college? She figured she needed a boyfriend by then, because they should date for at least a year, then get engaged their senior year, and get married a week after graduation, just like her parents did. That's how it worked, and what if it didn't happen? How would she ever get married?
A week after she graduated from college, she and her boyfriend took a road trip through the American West, and he was the last person she wanted to marry. It was a nice road trip, but she knew that even then.
They went out for the first time on a Sunday. They slept together on Monday. She thought that of course he would ask her out for the weekend.
She couldn't figure it out when he didn't. Because isn't that the way it works? Aren't you supposed to go out every weekend?
Now she knows there's a different set of rules to when you're playing singles.
She looked at her thighs and thought of her mother. Her mother's thighs were much bigger when she was this age. But her mother had given birth to two children by this age. That's the difference. The only thing she's got on her side is relative youth and a lack of pregnancies.
He disappeared from the house for four days after they had that fight. On the fourth day, she e-mailed him and said, “If you don't come pick up your shit by noon tomorrow, I'm donating it to the church.”
He said, “When I leave the house you need to assume that I am taking my time sorting through things. You have no right to get angry.”
She said, “Are motherfucking shitting me right now?”
She thought, Are you motherfucking shitting me right now?
She said, “I love differently than I did when I fell in love at 19. It's not as pure. It's loaded with all the past loves.”
Her mother said, “It's a different love. It's a more relaxed, realistic love.” Even though it came from a woman who got married at 22, it made sense.
When she was 18, she said, “Sex is OK only when you're in love. Then it's making love.”
When she was 30, a man said to her, “I want to make love to you,” and she thought, Oh, Jesus, can't we just fuck?
When she was 15, her father could do no wrong. When she was 25, after her own relationships, she saw her father in his incarnation as a husband, as opposed to just a father, and realized that while he was doing his best, he could definitely do wrong. We all can.
He said, “Gimme a call so we can hang out.”
She said, “OK, sounds good.”
She thought, Oh, dahling you're so incredibly wrong for me; there's nothing I'd rather do more. She thought about the other boys who were also, oh, so wrong for her, and she thought about the five-year-old vision and the singles game and the 17-year-old-vision.
And knowing all that, she hasn't decided if she's going to call him yet.
Thursday, July 13, 2006
Four Minutes
Why am I having this experience? I am 30 years old; why am I having this experience? Why does my pulse jump every time your name pops up in my e-mail box? Why am I checking my e-mail every four minutes, just to see if maybe you sent me an e-mail, if maybe you hit the send button three seconds after I hit the refresh button last time, and maybe I'm wrong and you have e-mailed me back, and you're sitting at your computer wondering why three minutes have passed and I haven't e-mailed you back, and then maybe you start thinking that maybe I don't want you, and this could be the moment where everything goes downhill as opposed to the moment when your heart sings and you decide you want to marry me, and all that could change simply because I hit refresh 30 seconds too early? Better check the e-mail again.
Nothing. Heart deflates.
Maybe you took my last e-mail the wrong way. Maybe you were offended by it. Because sarcasm doesn't always come through on e-mail, maybe you were really insulted by what I wrote. Oh Jesus, better send another e-mail explaining. Or maybe you think that I want you too much, and you are getting flipped out and running away, better wait for you to respond.
Better take a Valium before I completely transform into Bridget Jones. Jesus, that woman was irritating.
"Why don't you just F this guy?" Amelia doesn't get what the problem is.
Because it would be strange, now's not the time, you might get all freaked out about commitment and then neither of us would enjoy it, blah, blah, blah.
"So wait, why don't you just F him? Because it would be weird? Just F him and don't spend the night."
Because now just isn't the time. It wouldn't be all that great right now, I don't think, anyway. Not yet. Because you would freak out about commitment, because you would be bad for me in your current state, blah, blah, blah, so now's just not the time.
"Oh. OK. Then don't F him." Things are so simple with Amelia.
But oh, how I want to. How I want to have unlimited access to you, for at least one night. How divine that would be to just fuck you to pieces, all in the name of lust.
I bet you want the same thing. In fact, I know you do. But now's not the time.
"How are you doing with your dad?" Amelia is past the simple stuff now.
How am I doing with my dad? I don't know. I don't know how to keep him as a regular part of my everyday life, I don't have any rituals in place to remember him, so that he's there, every day, so that I don't lose him, so that I don't learn how to build my days without him. So I cry for him every day. I sit down and I look at his picture and I smell his pipe tobacco and I cry, because that's the only way I know how to keep him with me, every day. My mother has started writing letters to him, every day in a journal, but I can't do that, I just sit and I cry and I cry and I haven't run out of tears yet. That is how I'm doing with my dad.
You don't seem to be comfortable with the topic of my dad. Every time I say something about him, you sort of say, "hmmm, yeah," and move on to something we can be witty and funny about in a very surface kind of way. That's another reason I don't F you right now.
And all that being said, I still wish you would get it together and e-mail me. It's been a whole four minutes by now.
Wednesday, July 12, 2006
P.S.: You Rock Talk Radio Like a Mofo!
Dear Steve Inskeep,
Thank you very much for waking me up every morning. I love your show on NPR. It is totally the best ever, and my favorite mornings are the mornings when I just lie in bed and listen to Morning Edition for two hours, and I don't get out of bed until you say, "This is Morning Edition on NPR. It's 29 minutes after eight," and then I think, Damn you, Steve! How could you have let me lull me into fantasyland with your voice for that long! Now I'm going to be late--AGAIN, just like I am EVERY DAY. Didn't you and I talk about this? Didn't I tell you to make me get my shit out of bed? Don't you listen to me? And then I relax, because I know that all of the men in the world, you always listen to me. You would never let me down. I love you Steve. You are the greatest.
Anyways, those are my favorite mornings. Those mornings are totally hott.
Remember that one time when Amelia totally thought you were letting us down, when really it was just me and her being goddamn space cadets? It was that one time when Amelia was staying with me, and my alarm went off, and we were still so mega-tired, and my first thought was, Goddamn them anyway, I'm staying in bed and they can just deal, and Amelia's first thought was, Well, I guess I need to get my shit out of bed and go to work even though I'm still goddamn tired, and she did. And she took a shower and blow-dried her hair and put on her makeup and everything. And then while she was getting dressed, I was like, "Where the hell is Steve Inskeep?" because it was some goddamn choir singing hymns or something. And Amelia said, "I don't know, maybe he called in sick today." And I was like, "Bitch, please. Steve would never do that. He's Steve Inskeep. It's not like he can just call in sick whenever he just can't handle the idea of work, like you and I do. If he did that, the world would stop turning. For shit's sake."
And then she put her watch on, and realized it was 1:30 a.m. My alarm clock had completely malfunctioned. She had gotten up in the middle of the damn night to get ready, all because of her dedication to work. But not me. Nope. I guess I showed them. But secretly, I didn't get out of bed because I knew that when I didn't hear your voice, something was amiss, like it was Armageddon or my alarm clock had malfunctioned or something. And if it was Armageddon, I knew that you would come on the air and tell me what to do, so I just decided to sit tight. Actually, that's a total lie. I didn't get out of bed because I'm a lady of leisure and cannot be bothered before 10 a.m. But the point is, I never lost my faith in you. I knew you would wake me up when the time was right. Because you that's the way you roll, Steve. You never let a girl down.
So I know that you're married and have a baby or whatever, but don't worry, I don't mind. I lived for two years in a village in Africa where polygamy was practiced, so I'm cool with the whole second-wife idea. We can work it out.
So, anyways, thanks for waking me up every morning. You're the best.
Lovin' you is easy 'cause you're beautiful,
Mela
Tuesday, July 11, 2006
Fuck It Out of You
This is what I would like to do to you, if I had you to myself for a few hours, better yet a few days:
I'd like to hit my back with all of your weight pressing on top of me; I'd like to tumble onto your bed and get all of our limbs tangled up and twisted around each other; I'd like our skin to be pink and overheated before we even get our clothes off; I'd like you to push me and pull me and throw me wear (Jesus, I can't even spell "where" thinking about all this) you want me and I want you to use a little bit of force, and then I want to rid you of all those clothes and just look at you, stretched out on your bed; I'd like to caress every last sinewy muscle your body and then start over again with my tongue, and when you beg me to stop, when you beg me to fuck you, I'm going to keep going, until you flip me on to my back and our limbs get all tangled up again and then I'd like to fuck it all out of you, this overflow of lust, I'd like to fuck you breathless 'til I get it all out of my system and then--
I'd like to start over again.
This always happens. Every time I get a fresh dose of him, this happens. Every time he get within striking distance, with his broad back and his narrow waist, his expansive palms and his powerful arms, my thighs start to quiver and my skin starts to warm beneath my dress. He is very potent this one, and lust is an imposing mistress. I have to repeat the above fantasy over and over again 'til I work out all the kinks, and then I can breath again, and I have to put some space between this time and the next time I see him again.
Because then it will start all over again.
It makes me nervous, the fantasy. I start to wonder, is he really attracted to me? How could he be attracted to me? What about my far-from-perfect-body and how it suffers from my unflappable hatred of sit-ups. How could I possibly ever get naked in front of him? How could he be attracted to me if he ever saw that? And then I think, what would we do afterwards? What would we do after we fucked it all out of each other, once and for all (if that's the way lust works)? It would never be the same. It would be a little bit of a waste.
And then I couldn't have this fantasy all over again. And that would be a little bit of a waste, too.
Monday, July 10, 2006
Epidemic
The variety of good ideas I had on Friday night are lined up like a row of suspects on my credit-card receipt. Oh, look there's that round of shots. Actually, that wasn't such a bad idea. A round of shots never killed anyone. And there's that round of beers to chase down the round of shots. Now that really may have been a good idea--there's not a whole lot wrong with a solid round of imported beer. And alas, another round of shots. Yeah, that was definitely a brilliant idea.
It's Sunday, two days later, and I'm arriving to retrieve my credit card, which I left here at the club for safekeeping. They did a stellar job of guarding my credit card, much better than I usually do. But I suppose that's clear at this point.
He rifles through what must be about 40 credit cards. Apparently, everyone knows about the credit-card vault here. It's a free service, so no wonder it's so popular.
"Oh yeah, I think I remember your name," the bartender says.
Now there's something you never want to hear at a bar. Must have been that pole dance I did upon hearing my favorite Prince song. What's a girl to do? I mean, doesn't everyone do a pole dance when they hear their favorite Prince song? Doesn't everyone become the sexiest, most talented singer/stripper on the planet after a few drinks? Bitch, please. It's practically a fucking epidemic.
John, I'm Only Dancing
He could, of course, slay me right now. It would take nothing at all, the smallest little thing, and I would be crushed. From the outside it looks like we're only dancing, but now he's standing too close to me, he's behind me, his hands are resting on my hips and he's pressing up against me, he steps away from me, and I think, did I move wrong? Did I press back too much, and he thinks that means that I think that there is an emotional value attached to this dancing? Does he think I want this to be the beginning of something? Do I? Do I want this to be the beginning of something? Don't look at him, dance with someone else so he thinks you don't care, let him come to you. And he does, he takes you by the waist and pulls you around, pulls you against him, and he's resting his face in your neck, and your arms are holding him just a little too close, and this is all either of you have wanted to do since the first uncomfortable "How are you?" at the beginning of the evening. He made a joke about how things were going, and you responded by saying, "My dad just died," and throughout the first glass of wine, he found any reason to touch your knee, and you responded by rubbing his calf, which was propped up on your chair, and then you leaned into each other, so you were only talking to each other, and you were alienating the other people at the table, and dancing is just the excuse you needed to get close to each other, because you couldn't do this normally. This blurs the lines of friendship, and people would talk, and people would say, What is going on with them, and worse yet, the two of you would think, what is going on with us, because you are just friends and friends aren't supposed to want to press up against each other and lick each other's necks for the salt before a tequila shot, and did he just lean forward and kiss you? He did, but there wasn't any tongue, it was just a kiss, so here, while you're dancing in a bar and he's had a Long Island and you've had a glass of wine and a beer and a cocktail, you can say that friends do that- and you both can pretend that you don't remember anyway, so here, under the cover of a crowd and loud music and booze, you can press up against each other and memorize each other's landscapes, because that's all you've wanted to do since the first uncomfortable "How are you?' And you can't do that, because you are only friends. And friends don't do that. But this friend, whom you have been with before, on a limited number of occasions, when the two of you tried to date, this friend is built to perfection, just like a man should be built, and when he stretches in his chair, the long, lean lines of his body look the way an ice cream cone looks to a three-year-old. And the energy between you two is charged. Even though you're just friends. It's not supposed to be, but it is. Maybe you just didn't have enough time together during that five minutes of dating you did. Maybe you needed more time to fuck it out of each other. Because now here you are, just friends, and you're loving every second of this excuse to get just a little closer to each other.
You pass out together, but he doesn't make a move, for which you are eternally grateful. He spoons you, and holds you all night, but he doesn't make a move, and neither do you, because this is it. This is the extent of it. This is all you need from him to fill your cup.
Really. No fooling anybody, not even yourself.
Two days later, you call him, just to be clear. "I know you know this, dahling, but I just want to be clear that I didn't crash with you on Friday because I wanted to sleep with you. I wanted just what happened."
"What?" he says. "What do you mean you didn't want to fuck me? How can that be? There must be some mistake." He's laughing.
"Oh, dahling, of course I wanted to fuck you, don't be ridiculous." You're laughing.
If you thought I had emotional issues before this point, this post is basically a ticking time bomb shoved straight up your ass. This is one of those situations that is very human, very common, and very messy. It is easy to label as "insecure" and "I would never be in that situation." But you would. Because we are human, and our relationships don't always stay inside the lines.
Do they?
Friday, July 07, 2006
I Think I Can Hear You
I'm standing on the street corner, waiting for the walk signal, because I'm the only pedestrian in D.C. that actually does that, and behind me, a little boy says, "Dad, do you know how to use the Force?"
I turned and stared straight at him.
His dad said, "The Force? What's that?"
And he said, "The Force, Dad, like in Star Wars. Do you know how to use the Force?"
Daddy? Are you there? I'm listening.
Mid-Summer Interns
In the beginning, they flood through Union Station in a steady stream, as though Sorority Rush Week were being held in the Food Court. They come in their tight black pants and their fitted button-down shirts that are a peep show of young cleavage. And all is well, because in college, those are your nice clothes. Never, never will you be frumpy mid-level professional. Never will you wear a skirt below your knees. You will grow up to be Anne Coulter or Katherine Harris.
June in Union Station is like a barely-legal porn site.
And by mid-summer, it becomes clear. The little ones have learned the way of the office. They are clip-clopping through Union Station in their pumps and their Ann Taylor suits. They have been told about appropriate office wear. They have begun the transformation into young professionals, who will soon morph into old professionals, and we all know what old professionals look like. A word to the self-important young professionals of the world, with the pride you take in your long office days and Irish-immigrant-like* work ethic, before you know it, you will look into the mirror and see you have become a white-collar Gollum; you will see that you don't sleep enough and it shows under your eyes, that you haven't seen the sun in years and that you slouch profoundly. Emblazon this image in your brain and start leaving the office by 5:30.
And then there are those interns who are not morphing into the young professionals. They continue to lend a XXX-rating to Union Station with their daily work attire. Those, dear friends, those are the interns who work for sleazebags. And worse yet, they are sleazebag-Gollum old professionals.**
God bless, they are young, they know not what they do.
Probably.
Hopefully.
*Check the red hair, the white skin and the blue eyes. I have carte blanche to say whatever I want about Irish immigrants. It comes with the heritage. Erin Go Bragh, you guys.
**A shout out to the Union Station Spies for calling the obvious to my attention.
Give it to Me Dirty: The Collegiate Edition
Comments that prove only Jedis read this blog:
On Gender Equity:
"...My relationship with my boyfriend has taught me that, while he can be a complete jackass, I can be a unrestrained self-centered baby. And--oddly--it's kind of refreshing. One of the residues of empowerment is the ability to make big mistakes. So if we women are going to demand to be equal with men, let's suck it up and admit that we're going to screw up, too..."
On Grief:
"...I hope someday your accepting the grief to get the love doesn't feel like an even trade. I hope someday it feels like a steal."
On Cultural Diversity:
"...a 25 yr old American boy is a wretched, despicable creature, and you are right to doubt their merits as monogamists, human beings, and charitable givers.
But a 30 yr old American boy (still a "boy", as we're using the term here) is, by and large, a bring-him-home-to-momma paragon of devotion to spouse and honor to country.
In those five years, we, in short, become European ...loving, appreciative and ruthlessly ethical when it comes to affairs of the heart..."
On American Literature:
"...I like my women to be like a Henry James novel; challenging, articulate, a little thicker than what sits next to it on the shelf, with a rewarding streak of naughtiness..."
On Constructive Communication Methods:
"...F him if he doesn't like your arms. They're strong and toned enough to rip off his head and shit down his neck. And, of course, your fabulous legs and ass would hold you up while you're squatting over his body to shit down his neck."
Thursday, July 06, 2006
Giggling in the Afterglow
I'm in bed with a delicious man, and we're cuddling in the afterglow, when I start giggling. He says, "Why are you giggling?" And I say, "I'm not giggling, I'm coughing." Which is a lie. Because in reality, I was thinking about the Cat-Coming-Back-To-Life story that another man told me. And how am I supposed to explain that?
No, It's Not Me. It Really Is You.
Everyone loves a good man-hating session. There's nothing anybody loves more than sitting around and just hating the shit out of men. We love to beat up on our boyfriends and talk about how they had better come crawling back to us and beg for our forgiveness after they have wronged us with their dog-like ways. It is the man who is warned to "Treat her well or I'll kill you." It is the man who is the evildoer and the woman who is the doe-eyed innocent. Women have it not in us to wrong one sweet soul on the planet. Men are insensitive liars.
Everybody knows that. And then we wonder why we have fucked up communication patterns.
But when you look at a man on the second date and say, "I'm in it to win it," in reference to your take on relationships, and believe him when he dumps you and says, "No, it's not me. It really is you." He will be telling the truth. Because you are acting like a goddamn douchebag.
When you are out in public with a group of people and you look at your boyfriend and say, "Honey, you know how I feel about that. We talked about this," you are again acting like a douchebag. Nobody likes couples like that. And it makes your boyfriend look like an asshole in front of other people. Granted there are times when we all need to run a little relationship interference in public, but consider having a code word for such occasions. For example, perhaps we could all just look at our boyfriends and say, "douchebag," and he would know that means, "Honey, you know how I feel about that. We talked about this." Or perhaps a less negative word like, "bicycle." Bicycle is a nice word. Everyone loves bicycles.
And allow that sometimes he will call bicycle on you, because while men do suck ass sometimes, we do our fair share of ass-sucking. Women sort of have a Get-Out-Of-Jail-Free card because we are currently living in a relationship paradigm that positions men as the aggressor/controller and women as the helpless victim. Removing ourselves from that role means abandoning the ball and chain idea because it's archaic, and ditching the wedding toasts that say, "Your wife is always right," because it identifies women as disempowered nags. It's easy enough to write these things off as irrelevant humor, if only it didn't underscore the foundation of how we relate to each other. To be equal-opportunity about the whole thing, women are perfectly capable of being complete bitches, thank you very much, and every now and again will need to beg for forgiveness, because men are sensitive and capable of being hurt.
That makes for an even playing field, which is really what we need here. Because aren't we all just in it to win it?
Wednesday, July 05, 2006
Love's Fine Print
When the sickness comes, there are limits and boundaries to your sadness. You can reach out and touch the walls, you can see the ceiling over your head, there are windows labeled "surgery" and "chemo," and one big escape hatch labeled "hope." You are waiting in the sadness room, staring at the escape hatch, and you're covering your head and holding your breath, because the roof is not stable, and the sadness room could implode whenever it wants.
But after the sickness, after the hospital and the passing and the funeral, there are no limits, no boundaries, no walls or ceiling. Your sadness stretches and stretches; there are no walls to hold you up, there is no gravity to hold you down, and you know that this is the deal you made when you decided to love-the love for the grief, the love for the grief-and hopefully, after the sickness, after the hospital and the passing and the funeral, you can say it was an even trade.
Beauty Is in the Eye
Mela the American: I put on 20 pounds when I was in Peace Corps.
The African man: Oh, you must have been very beautiful.
That's what a girl is talking about.
Monday, July 03, 2006
Correction to If Fuck's on First
It was actually an African man. An American woman, a European woman, and an African man. So the makings of nice little threesome, U.N. style, if you will.
If Fuck's on First, Nobody's on Second
An American woman, a European woman, and an African woman walk into a bar:
The European: American relationships have these phases that I don't understand-it's like you meet, you wait awhile before you fuck, and then when you start fucking you have to wait two or three months before you have some big discussion about whether or not you're fucking each other exclusively, and if you don't have that discussion, then you can fuck whoever you want. I don't understand it. For me, if I am fucking someone, then I focus my fucking on that one person--I can't go around fucking other people. In our relationships, if you fuck someone, then you are only fucking them; it's understood. You don't have to have some big discussion. And we don't wait to fuck someone like you do here. If you like them, you fuck.
The African: I don't understand this either. For us, when you are fucking someone, you are only fucking them; you can't go around and fuck other people. You don't have to have a big discussion about it; you just understand that that's the way it is. Even if you kiss someone, that means that you like them, and you are only kissing them--otherwise, why do you even kiss them in the first place?
Mela the American: I don't really know a lot of American boys who would go for that plan.
On Losing Love
Very self-righteously I thought, this will hurt my brother and me the worst. Because he was our dad. I thought, we will feel this loss the most.
Then I talked to my mother.
Seeking Love, Must Have Brazilian Wax
Each day, this ad promises me true love. It promises me that my destiny awaits me on their website. In the form of this girl.
Each ad features a different bikini. It beckons me to live, love, learn. In a bikini. No Dr. Phil on this website. Only true love, in the form of wonder-twin-power-activated bikinis. Because that is the face of love, yo. This woman is clearly selling true love.
And what happens if buy true love from her? What happens if I join the site, and I show up for a first date, and the dude is like, "Ummm...that's not what it looked like in the ad. I don't feel like I could live, love, or learn much from you. I mean, isn't your body supposed to be bikini-ready? Did you even get a wax?"
And that's when I have to say, "I'm just big-boned. So stuff it."
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