Yesterday, my good friend had a wicked time convincing me I was going to die alone because I don't necessarily link sex and affection. Incidentally if we're related you might be more comfortable looking away now. I'm not going to do any sketches, don't worry - not least because that would most likely just be me drawing on the computer screen as I have no idea how to get a picture into the computer - but I would like to explain why I'm not mental for having this opinion.
It's not that I don't enjoy affection - affection is absolutely lovely - I just think it's quite a different thing from getting it on with someone. This doesn't mean I don't have feelings for the men I've ever slept with, I just don't really enjoy dusting them off and singing about rain drops while I'm getting PHYSICAL.
Now, last night my wind up merchant of a friend had a wonderful time telling my disinterest in cuddling and or eye contact made me an automaton who would one day bark at small children. I'm not that adverse to the concept of barking at small children, but I refuse to admit it's because I like my sex with a backbone.
And, yes, obviously his winding up of yours truly has worked to the point where I'm still thinking about it this morning - but - well, I have no defence of this. I just want to check that I'm perfectly normal for thinking you can switch off the more sensitive side of yourself when you want to have a more industrious evening? Do the affection after! Cook a lasagne whilst singing along to Tony Bennett and brushing various people's hair - just keep your feelings out of my sex please.
Incidentally, I'm not a terrible bed hopping slut - I have made it my life's ambition to try and limit the number of people who might be able to do a startlingly accurate representation of where my body deviates from the normal shapes of humans. That way, when the internet suddenly springs up a page called "Shapes No Man Should Ever Have To Deal With", I will have a decent starting point as to who is responsible.
I don't think sex has to necessarily ruin friendships either; I'll never quite understand people who have an awkward fumble and then find it impossible to look each other in the eye afterwards; get over it. I'm not sure why some people think sex has mystical properties. Of course it's great - why do you think we consciously and sub consciously spend the vast majority of our days trying to make other people want to sleep with us - but it just a thing. It's not like once someone's had sex with you they all of a sudden hold the key to all your inner secrets and can use them against you whenever they see fit.
I'd feel far weirder with someone if I woke up next to them with a banging hangover having just sung along to an entire Celine Dion album and told them about every argument I've ever had with my mother whilst showing them my scrap book entitled "Smells I Shouldn't Have Been Able To Make", than if I woke up to find we'd had some sex but he knew nothing more about me than he did 12 hours ago.
I'm not sure if I've gone wrong somewhere in my opinions on this... it seems quite logical to me: sure, you have to be very careful with sex and I certainly don't advocate sleeping with everyone you meet. But, if you want to, and you do it safely (and brilliantly) why be embarrassed about it? Why have to pretend it really meant something? It did mean something - it meant you felt great... don't feel you've got to ladle on some deep and meaningful to go with it.
So there we go. There were some thoughts on that. Family members can resume normal scanning of my daily life to check I'm alive/not in a cult/still got 4 limbs. Consider me successfully wound up.
I think there are few things that mean people see things differently to you.
ReplyDeleteThere's the fact that sex has become a massive symbol, to many, of what the nature of a relationship between two people is.
The nature of most platonic relationships is that state of being "friends" which comes with all its associated baggage.
The most common, I will suppose here, sexual relationship between people is that of the "in a relationship" with its different associated baggage.
There are some key differences; one is less well defined in terms of its starts and end, one is traditionally defined as exclusive and the latter is traditionally associated with a long standing contract to make some sort of household and make more little people.
None of this is what I believe things "should" or "should not" be but you seemed genuinely perplexed by why some people find the transition of friends to "friends who have had sex" difficult - it makes less clear where they fit into this supposed structure that is at least perceived to exist.
Also I imagine it becomes weird for some friends because it means they have no idea if said thing might happen again. With the more traditional friends sex is off the table, with more traditional relationships it may well be a more standard thing whereas the "friends who have had sex" thing again provokes gray areas.
Now all of this extrapolation on my part from observation, so I might be wrong, but I think but be an observed insight.
How dare you be a woman and have a non-stereotypical attitude to these things! You never know what's coming next on this blog.
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