Category Archives: Life 101

Reader: Should I Stay or Should I Go Now?

I had a reader question a week or so ago. Pretty short and sweet:

I was wondering what your take is on couples who have a peaceful, mutual breakup (stay good friends) and continue living together until their lease is up.

What, in a nutshell?
“Good luck with that” is about what I think. Good fucking luck.
Yeah, okay, somewhere over the rainbow, bluebirds sing and rivers are made of chocolate, and couples who break up really truly can be friends. Yes, Toto, they can! Even in Kansas!
In my twisted little worldview, though, friends after breakup is a whole lot easier said than done. There’s all those weird little remembrances you have to get over. Like, “watching a movie” means a whole other thing if you’re “just friends.”
“You mean I can’t start nibbling your torso when there’s a boring bit?”
Well, there’s always popcorn, honey.
We’re human beings. We’re silly things with opposable thumbs and convoluted ideas on what constitutes civilization. We want to pretend we’re all smart and brilliant when it comes to problem resolution. The problem is, this ain’t no problem to resolve. The death of a relationship is, well, a death.
It dies. Six feet down, all bets off. It’s not a simple change of state. It’s a change of being. You used to fuck in frenzies. You told each other everything. You had dreams and goals and plans. And then, one day, it all went poof in a little whisp of smoke. You sorta saw it coming, yet there you stood still in a state of utter disbelief.
Because that’s how it all goes.
Now you want to think that a little piece of paper that says you have a lease is going to be enough to keep it on an even keel. Let’s hope you’re right. In my world, it just doesn’t tend to work out that well.
I’m a smart person with big brains and long memory, and pushing aside a past in order to have a present seems to be one of those equations I have a difficult time solving. Not that I wouldn’t try to solve it.
But surprises happens. Luck tends to play its hand. And sometimes odds get defied. Me, I err on the side of probability and statistics. Numbers meaning what they do and all.

On Freedom and Fallacies

This is take two on this topic. I’m starting fresh a couple hours later, after a glass of wine and homemade chicken pot pie.
It’s the second take because this topic is really important to me and I don’t want to fuck it up.
Thank god I have quality guidance like that of Fame. Yes, you heard me, the ‘80s arts school drama. It’s on, and I’m chilling. Defragging my mind, as I like to say. Watching fluff is exactly the right fit, and has given me some interesting perspective as I crack this nut for a second time.
Funnily, a girl in this episode of Fame scoffs at the notion of writing her private thoughts and dreams in a diary at the teacher’s urging.
“If I wrote down my dreams,” she says, “I’d get arrested.”
Yeah. Huh. Ironic.
To that end, take note of the week that was in the world of the wide web. Proper fucked, indeed. It’s like a crash course in What Not to Do in the Intertubez.
A Montreal guy writes some shit in a forum then figures rifle + college = a good afternoon’s plan.
Like the motherfucking coward he was, he went out and tried to kill a bunch of people. Realizing he couldn’t even do a massacre right, he deprived us of the fun of letting cops kill him. The coward took his life. Fucking better off dead, anyhow.
But he wrote in forums.
We shoulda seen it coming.
A dickhead in Seattle decides he’s going to act like a fucking 13-year-old and reposts another city’s craigslist ad by some dirty-minded femme, and gets a couple hundred responses or something, then figgers he’s got rights to publish that private correspondence in an attempt to expose those apparent sickos to the world.
But they answered a public ad.
They shoulda seen it coming.
A young mother in Florida writes her secret other self dark thoughts on a public blog, and then her child goes mysteriously missing, improbably snatched from their window. Young mother kills herself 16 days into the toddler’s absence.
But she wrote dark shit on blogs, then her kid vanishes.
We shoulda seen it coming.
A video diarist on the world wide web is exposed as a professional actress working off a script. The show is produced, directed, and written, yet has duped the majority of its viewers, primarily through YouTube.com, into believing the so-called lonelygirl15 was a teenaged girl locked in her bedroom and homeschooled by orthodox religious parents. Doh.
She’s a fake.
“Like ohmigod. But she, like, really talked to us, man!”
You shoulda seen it coming.
It’s happening. It’s really fucking happening.
You know what I’m talking about.
For some godforsaken reason, it’s starting to occur to people that this, like, internet thing might just be a way of seeing what’s really going on in the noggins of little people everywhere.
And, um, uh-oh, but what’s going on in those little people’s noggins everywhere is something that’s not very pretty.
Some people, it would seem, are angry.
Some of them even feel disenfranchised. And, look. They’re acting on this shit.
Yeah, well. When the odds are stacked, you ought not be surprised at the outcome. Probability and logic being what they are and all, yes?
I’m part of the generation that got schooled in Orwell’s classic 1984. We were raised to believe that someday, one day, the government would hear every word we would utter, and freedom would be a thing of the past.
I’ll be honest, the Digital Age scares me.
The ease with which people can access information about me is frightening. It should frighten you, too. Unfortunately, the time is coming nigh where voices on the web are not just an anonymous blur with little impact on the real world. Now, we’re not so anonymous, and now this world is more real than it is virtual.
There’s coming a time where what you say here is going to come home to haunt you. This is the age of insinuation, and anything you say can be manipulated and used against you. Decide now if you plan to live in fear of that, or if you have the balls to play the game my way, and own your ability to say what you think and how you feel.
In forums such as this, someone such as me might decide to write a little bloggie in which the entire contents of our deepest darkest other selves are posted up on virtual walls for the world at large to indulge in.
In essence, it’s a voice. I have a voice, you have a voice, we all have voices.
It’s idyllic. A virtual Utopia in which we’re all given voices and identities, something that ironically clashes with our seemingly democratic lives – lives spent living in societies that claim to be governed by the people, of the people, for the people.
Only they’re not like any people I’ve ever known.
And I don’t feel like I belong.
And I’m tired of feeling this small because I’m just an ordinary gal.
I thought I’d take my voice and use it. I’m not alone. You’re doing it too. And him, and her, and hey.
We all took our existences online, where we thought we’d have the right to say what we think whenever the fuck it pops into mind.
Unfortunately, when such vocal freedom is enjoyed by a world at large, some of those voices will be beyond dissent. They will be voices of rage and fury and vengeance. Or maybe they’ll be coolly quiet.
And that’s a risk we take by allowing open dialogue.
Every now and then, though, those voices will be warning signals. Intervention might occur, and it might segue to prevention.
Just because assholes and the disenfranchised like these can use the web to serve their fucted means doesn’t necessitate that the rest of us should have to watch our words.
Sadly, the voice of reason doesn’t seem to resonate these days. I fear that the talking heads of today might soon decide that there is such thing as too much free speech and they will indeed succeed in legislating the internet.
In which case now might be the time to, like the good hunter Elmer Fudd suggests, be vewwy, vewwy qwiet.
Only we’re not hunting rabbits.

Should Irwin Have Changed After Kids?

So, earlier I asked if you have the right to ask a risk-taker to tone down their lifestyle once you get hooked to them.
My opinion? No. You do not. And if they tell you you can go ahead and tell them how to change; don’t. You’d fucking with what oughtn’t be fucked.
In a nutshell.
My posting was inspired by the death of Steve Irwin. There are those who apprently think he should’ve “settled down” since he had kids. Yeah, as a kid, the first thing I wanna know is that my father gave up almost everything he loved so he could raise me — sit in a fucking armchair with a remote and tell me how he “used to be like that” once.
Terri Irwin got a precious gift that most of us might never, ever, ever receive: She fell in love with someone who kept all the qualities that made him so loveable as the person he was when they first met. Bloody sweet, that. And she had it for a while. And then it got snatched. Love happens, death happens, it all is what it is.
Life’s a truckload of hurts some days and there’s no getting around that.
The point is, it’s hard enough to be ourselves in the face of everyday life. It’s harder still to remember who we are when we get lost in the arms of someone else. To be able to hang on to your identity despite your love for someone else and your wish to be with them, why, that’s as downright admirable as it gets.
To hell with those who think otherwise.

_________________

In other Croc-Hunter news, let me go on record to say that, while Germaine Greer periodically says something intelligent, I:
a) think she can be a complete twat who has done as much to hinder feminism as she has to further it. She’s arrogant, dismissive of men, flighty, inconsistent, hypocritical, and far too militant for my tastes. (Despite my believing I’m a feminist, thank you very much. Ain’t no fucking eunuch here, baby.)
b) think she’s a far bigger bitch than I’d thought before now that I’ve read her comments on the death of Steve Irwin.
I do not believe that to be a strong woman I need to demoralize men. I believe that, as a strong, independent chick, I can exalt men in my life and cater to them as I wish, because I fucking well know who I am when I go to bed at night (most of the time; we all get a little too lost in our relationships some of the time). I take no backseat to any man. But I’ll hold the door open for ’em if they’ll let me, because I have nothing to prove. I’m empowered by the mere fact that I don’t need to seek power, all right?
I’d get into my whole beef about how feminism has been executed, but I’m too tired and it’d take too damned long. Suffice to say that while I fight for my equality, I don’t think it needs to come at the cost of emasculating men. There’s room enough for us both, and I don’t think chicks like Greer understand that concept, but then I don’t like her enough to read her work. I listen to others gripe about her and praise her, so I’m ignorant, but by choice.

Where are the manners?

Every now and then an email comes in that’s the exact right email for what’s going on in my life. That happened Friday. I’d had an incident earlier in the day that had me seething with rage, and his email hit right home. So, first, the email, then I’ll tell you what happened, and then you’ll get my two cents. Sounds like a plan, no?

I was wondering if there was a certain age where teenagers or adults realise that manners are important and can learn to appreciate them? Because I’ve been trying my whole life (I’m still a teenager, but still) to be a gentleman (opening doors for others, asking if the elderly need help, speaking politely, etc.) and to be helpful as much as possible, but it seems that it is not appreciated at all. So far throughout a few years of high school, I’ve tried to help others boost their marks with assistance on their homework, but they can’t seem to understand that others have morals and won’t cheat for them. (again, turning into a rant i suppose..)
I guess I’m really just sending this email to ask another’s opinion about manners and whether or not it is truly appreciated in today’s society. I’ve asked a few teenage girl friends and they say that it is good to have manners and it’s something important they look for, yet I see them going out with lowlife guys who are despicable and need to learn manners. Is this just a teenage thing to do that you overcome later on and realise it’s importance and learn to be grateful for it? Or is it completely dependant on the people’s standards they’ve set.

Now, what happened to me the other day was when I was riding over to my brother’s place. He and I live in absolute opposite ends of the city — he in the most northeastern section, I in the most northwestern section. I work smack dab in the middle, downtown, and between there and my brother’s is 30-square blocks of what’s essentially some of the poorest and most underprivileged in Canada. If you know where to avoid, you can go without ever seeing any of these people.
I don’t try to avoid it, I just go through. I always see really tragic things when I do and it keeps me appreciating the little I have. This time, though, I was stopped at a light and this old guy, about 70, was in a wheelchair, completely unable to use his hands, and could only pull himself forward using the toes on his right foot. He was literally moving about 2 feet a minute. Naturally, the light turned red with him in the middle of the street, and I got a solid green light to go. Meanwhile, he’s stopped, looks like he’s about to cry from exhaustion, just can’t go any further, and all these fucking people are walking past, ignoring him.
I was in a RAGE. I pulled my scooter over, got off, cursed, “You people ought to fucking help! Where the hell are manners gone?” Then I leaned over to the man and said, “May I push you across the street, sir?” And he went soft with relief. He just sighed, “Please?”
I had a bit of an argument with a couple punks on the corner after that, who seemed to think I was flaming them, and yeah, you know, I was. Just fucking standing there, doing nothing.
When I got over to my brother’s place, I saw my nephew standing there, and I sat him down. I said, “If you ever see a little old lady or a little old man who can’t get across the street or they’re taking too long, you HELP them. You hear me?”
I made sure he knew the distinction between “stranger danger” and helping a senior citizen who really does need the help. After all, that’s how I was taught.
In MY world, I was raised to help people. I was raised to give a hand and do the right thing. I was taught to say please and thank you, and I was told to hold doors open for others.
And I KNOW life moves fast, and I KNOW people are more rushed than they used to be. You know what? I don’t give a fuck. *I* find the time to still be polite. I find the time to thank people and make pleasant small talk. Why the hell don’t they?
So, kid, I say keep going. The thing about being a polite person and not behaving politely just because you’re not getting it in return is that you start to get bitter about it. It changes you. Cynicism finds you and apathy makes a home in you. Stay true to the person you are. Help others, be polite. You’ll one day be surrounded by a better class of people, by people who appreciate that in who you are. It will be a deciding factor on the kinds of engagements you’re invited to and the kinds of experiences you have. You’re still a kid, you’re in high school, and you’re stuck in a social world you have little say in. In a few years, that all changes.
I know I will not date a man who has no manners. I will watch how he behaves and treats others, and I’ll note whether he expresses gratitude for the little things I say and do for him, and if I don’t like what I see, I will walk.
Life’s too short to be with people who just don’t understand basic human decency. I figure that eliminates about 60% of the world from eligibility for my bed, but whatever. I’m fine with having high standards. Are you?

Of Trappings and Traps

So, I was watching Oprah for the first time in a long while, which is nice, and the Big O had Dave Chappelle on. I suspect it’s a re-run, so I’m probably behind the times, but ask me if I care.
For those who’ve been on a desert island, Chappelle baffled the world at large when, just after signing a contract for $50 million and two years more of his show, he up and disappeared, just fucked off to Africa for a sojourn, and didn’t tell anyone but a family member where he’d gone.
To hear him talk of it, there were dozens of reasons, but most of all, it was simply that even $50 million wasn’t worth the hassle he was facing or the pressure he was under. Some people out there probably think it’s clear he’s a fucking nutbag for walking from a steaming pile of cash like that, but I applaud it.
In order to protect my rep and all, I won’t tell you about the situation that occurred when I was 15 that left me thinking often about the phrase “Money isn’t at the end of the rainbow.”
Every time my life gets out of control, every time I start working too much or forgetting about myself, I step back and remind myself that it’s not about money. It’s never, ever about money.
Recently I was in the situation where I went from possibly losing my apartment because I was about two weeks away from running out of money as I needed to get a job ASAP (one of the scariest experiences I’ve ever been through, and something I wouldn’t wish on anyone) to suddenly being so in demand it hurt. I had the opportunity to work full-time at my new job, part-time at my old job, plus do some private work on the side, WHILE trying to keep this blog and my other blog afloat, WHILE trying to learn podcasting, WHILE trying to come up with a new website, WHILE trying to stay present with friends and family.
Is it any fucking wonder then I went off my nut?
It was early last week when I just snapped. I lost it. Totally without question mentally AWOL, or the closest I’ve ever come. Then and there, I cancelled all extra work. Forty hours a week is all the soul I can offer to the gods of social productivity.
Money’s nice. God I wish I had more of it. I’d be an exemplary rich person. My taste in the aesthetic dance of life is hard to beat, and I understand what’s worth a mighty dollar and what is not. Funny thing is, I’m not sure I ever want to be rich. I’d be happy with a hundred grand a year. That’s all I ever need. I kind of want to be famous, but only if it’s the “Yo, Steff, you rock!” kind of fame and not the stalker “Oh-My-GOD-it’s-STEFF!” kind of fame. That’d be fucking whack. Thank god I’m just a chick with a blog, man.
If you were ever in my apartment and I wasn’t around and you wanted to play Det. Snoop, you’d sooner or later find this small pewter book charm on my bookshelves, hidden away, on which a Virginia Woolf quote can be read that says, “If you are losing your leisure, look out, for it may be that you are losing your soul.”
In the battle between my self, my soul, and my leisure, money will always, always come last. A couple years back, I read this book called “In Praise of Slow” by Carl Honore, all about the Slow food, Slow sex, Slow life movement in which people deliberately choose to take a different path in order to slow down the speed of life and enjoy the moment. Then and there, I chopped just 3.5 hours off my work week, worked one hour extra a day, and managed to have three-day weekends every week. Smartest thing I ever did. Too bad that job started to slowly kill me, ‘cos now I’m stuck in the 9-5 M-F hell that most of the rest of the world lives in.
We live by the clock and we live in the age of irony.
For a century or more now we’ve been fed the lie that technology would make our lives easier. Maybe it did, once. It doesn’t now. Now we have no time. We have no silence. We’re constantly in a race against time because we’ve bought the myth of the sands slipping through the hourglass and we stupidly believe that the more we work, the more we live. I don’t subscribe to that, but sometimes I forget just how much I disagree with it. With palm devices, laptops, cellphones, DVD players in cars, and more, we’re so wrapped up in the digital age that we forget there’s organic life around us.
Life’s crazier than ever before. Makes me remember the line from that brilliant philosopher Ferris Bueller, “Life moves pretty fast. If you don’t stop and look around once in awhile, you could miss it.” Ever ridden on one of those bullet trains? I haven’t. I probably will, for the novelty of it one day, but then I’ll never do it again. What’s the point of going anywhere if you can’t see where the fuck you’re leaving?
You know something? I don’t own a microwave. Every year someone offers me a free one. Every time, I say no. You know why? Because I figure that if my life ever gets so fucking maddening that I don’t have ten minutes to make a meal or reheat leftovers, that I’m gonna use my third-floor balcony as a springboard to the afterlife, all right? Fuck, man. Life’s short and I wanna be present for every goddamned minute of it, come grief or come glee.
I want nothing more than to be able to make a living off my writing and my spoken word. A living. Not a killing. What comes with the killing is a loss of self, most times. You see it all the time, celebs who reach the pinnacle in their professions and then come toppling down from the heights. They have breakdowns, they collapse into drug abuse.
It’s strange how high the price can be for success.
I have nothing but admiration for a man like Chappelle who decides that he can’t play by the rules of those in power, and doesn’t want himself to become just another commodity traded by those with little or no respect for the price he’s paying.
Yeah, I like money. I like the trappings of success, but I’m wary of the trap. I’m staying the fuck away from the trap, man.

Broken: Hearts, Minds, Vows, and Man

One of the things that’s simultaneously good and bad about this gig is that people tell me things from time to time they wouldn’t even tell their shrink.

Just the other day one such letter arrived in my in-box. As is sometimes my habit, I entered into a knee-jerk response and was about to tear the woman apart. Something made me stop and think, and instead of writing something savage, I sent her an email back. Her last question in her initial email was, “Am I a white trash whore?”

My response then was, in so many words, no, but you’re a liar and a cheat. I do stand by that, but with a massive, monumental, intergalactic caveat.

But let’s not get ahead of ourselves.

Due to the fact that there’s so incredibly much riding on her admission to me, I’m taking great liberties to change a good deal of the particulars that could identify who this poor goddamned woman is, because her life is filled with enough shit right now and I’ve no business adding to the pile by doing anything that could in any way come back to haunt her.

Here’s the gist of what you need to know.

  • She’s a mother.
  • She’s been married a decade-plus.
  • She’s in her mid-30s.
  • She’s been madly in love with her husband for all the years of their marriage, and still loves him, but things have changed.
  • He suffered a life-changing stroke of great severity that has rendered him child-like and frail. His mental capacity is nothing of its former self and his personality has been completely reformatted. Physically, he needs constant help. Sexually, he functions, but there’s no attraction left for her.
  • She’s been having an affair with a close friend of the family, in which the sex is incredible. Unfortunately, both she and he are married, and neither have the intention of abandoning said spouses.

That’s it, in a nutshell, that’s what a volley of eight emails has yielded to me.

Like most women under great strain, she’s perceived by others to be an incredible trouper. Strong, coping, able, yada, fucking yada.

The truth is, she’s coming apart at the seams. She hates herself for her betrayal of the husband she loved with all her heart, the husband she stayed with even though she learned he had cheated on her. She despises herself for loving sex with this other man. She’s angry about the loss of her love and best friend and the passion that came with. She doesn’t feel she’s able to speak to anyone about it. My guess is, she’s drowning in this life of woe she’s found herself enveloped by.

And my heart goes out to her.

Yes, she’s lying to her husband. Yes, she’s a cheating ho. But ask yourself: What would you do?

I know a lot of people would judge her for cheating on a guy who’s been sent into this horrible new reality by this unfortunate eruption of blood in his brain, but what about her? She’s still among the living. All of a sudden, she’s expected to give up everything that defines her life to provide 24/7 care for a man who can’t care for himself. She’s young, in her sexual peak, and what’s more, she needs an outlet for all the things gone wrong.

When my mother died seven years ago this week, I turned to books on grieving. I went through all the topics on mourning, everything from poetry to prose to essays, and I distilled from it a great deal of information on what to do to get through it all. The thing was, they said “mourning” and “grieving” are misunderstood. They’re not just necessary in times of death; they’re necessary in times of great change and loss of any kind.

For all intents and purposes, this woman’s husband died. When those blood vessels ruptured and filled his head with pools of blood, the soul of him just faded away. He’s but a shell these days, though he lives and breathes and walks and fills the space of their home with a friendly face and eyes that once mirrored the love she showed him.

With every moment in every day, she’s confronted by the struggle of caring for him, of helping him, of getting him through to the next day. Then there are the kids. And the doctors and medical procedures. Then there are the quiet moments. The moments in which she should be able to have the time to think of herself and her needs and the things she ought to do with her life… but that she can’t. Because every waking moment is spent caring for others and forgetting herself in the process, and when she’s not caring for them or coping, she’s formulating plans for keeping that circle rolling. In a life like that, there is no “down time.”

I believe one of the most important things for women (in particular) to do is to remember the them they’re forgetting, and to consciously make themselves more important in their scheme of things. But how does she do this? How is it possible?

I lived with my mother when she was dying of cancer. Any time I thought there was something important for me to do for myself, I consciously remembered that she came first. I couldn’t do that for myself; what about Mom? But then I was let off the hook. She died. My heart shattered to a million pieces, and one day I began to Krazy Glue myself back together. It took time, it took work, it took a conscious remembering that it was her that died, and not me.

This reader has none of that time, none of those options, and as far as I can tell, no Krazy Glue.

What’s the point of all this, of her letter, of this posting? I’m not really sure there is one. There’s no easy answer, no pat solution. It’s broken heart upon broken heart, and no matter what she decides, she’s in for a constant world of hurt because that’s her new reality. She can continue being sexually satiated by her lover, and lie to the man she loved but whose lights are no longer shining, or she can do the moral thing and give up the sexual release in order to do “the right” thing and continue caring for that shell of a man.

Either way, she’s in for a hard life.

So I say, whatever gets you by, sister.

The thing she needs to watch out for, sadly, is the fucking obtuse people out there who think morality trumps reality; those who just don’t get that some kinds of adversity just aren’t the kinds you can put your chin down to and barrel on through. Some kinds stop you up inside and make you hurt six ways to Sunday with no relief in sight, and this is that kind.

She could walk on him. Leave him hanging, and therefore no longer be unfaithful, but then what happens to him? Broken brain, broken body, plus broken heart?

Or she stays with him and gets her pipes cleaned by her new plumber man from time to time, and enjoys the illusion of affection and love, such as she once had with her husband?

I really don’t know. It’s quite possibly the original lesser-of-evils dilemma, and I’ve had some sad moments thinking of what her existence must be like.

I feel badly that she feels so alone, as I know I refuse to be the voice in the night that listens at all hours and says everything’s gonna be all right, baby, ‘cos I don’t even have a voice like that for me right now, so how do I provide it for others?

She’s not alone, though. She sees a therapist, but she’s too afraid of feeling like a failure and a liar in confessing her recent moral choices to him. I say she must. If there’s any one thing I do know, it’s that. She absolutely must confess to him, because he’s not a fucking idiot. He’ll understand, and he might even provide her with the closest form of absolution she’ll ever receive.

This is hard, baby. Harder than hard. It’s diamond-hard. Confess. Take a load off. Print off these emails we’ve exchanged, and this posting, and drop them off at your shrink’s a few days ahead of the appointment with a note saying, “These are a conversation I’ve had with a complete stranger. We need to talk. We really need to talk.” At least it’ll let you know the issue’s finally getting confronted, but it’ll let you sit back while he plays the ball that’s now in his court.

I wish I had a magical Band-aid for you, but all I’ve got is empathy. You do what you got to in order to get through. You may feel like shit and you may feel like a liar and a cheat and trash, but you’ve got my admiration. You’re doing what’s got to get done, and if it so happens that you’re a little human along the way, well… that’s just the way it goes.

But what do you think, readers?

The Brave New Single World

I got out tonight, off my single ass, and met some new people.
The trouble with this city is just how entrenched everyone is and how hard it can be to meet new people.
I joined a social organization a year and a half or so ago, when my self-esteem was only beginning to be picked up off the floor, and tonight I finally made it out to my first event.
Meetup is a place where you can go and find “meet-up” groups that do things you like. Kayaking? Sure! Hiking? Sure! Photography? Sure! D&D? Sure! Dining? Sure! They’re all there. And unlike joining a group where you do varied events all the time, you can go to as few or as many different Meetup groups that you can find to appeal to your sensibilities. (The only fees tend to be a $1 – 2 drop-in fee, since the groups cost money to run each month. Pay and be quiet.)
(The organization is worldwide. Check the website out. More than 2.5 million international members, and more than 14,000 groups.)
The folks there tonight were all in their 30s and 40s, and were all smart, good conversationalists, funny, friendly, and so forth. It wasn’t just one of those things where you know the underlying thought is “who’s coming home with me tonight?” It’s genuinely about just meeting people.
But, hey, betcha some sex happens. I ain’t no bookie, but I know a thing or three ’bout odds, baby.
Naturally, I somehow managed to mention I wrote this smutty blog, so maybe they’ll say hi or something in the comments. (Hi!)
The point being: If you’re stuck in single, annoyed at your now-married friends, tired of seeing the latest “adowable!” stream of drool pouring down their kids’ faces, wishing your college friends had managed to evolve by now, or anything like that, then this is an awesome way to meet new people.
When you sign up, sign up for the email as well, so that you get the weekly digest that lists all the events happening that week. That way, you don’t just get notices about the Meetup group you joined, but about everything happening in your city, and on what days. That’s how I saw the listing for Clerks II when I shoulda been working and not checking email, and decided to get off my apathetic ass and head to the flick. (C II rocked, by the way. I’ll be writing about the pussy troll sometime. Laughed my ass off. Great fun.)
I’m not a joiner. I don’t wanna join a fucking team or take an art class or do some pottery, because it’s redundant. Same shit every time. I like variety. This way I have it.
Anyhow, some people have asked in the past how you meet new folks and how do you Be a Good Single Person. Well, not by hanging out in bars, not by sitting on your ass at home, but by doing something that allows you to engage with others in a safe environment, and this is that.
I would actually DISSUADE you from just joining a class or something. Couple reasons: One, you don’t liek the people, you’re fucked. No variety, same thing every week, no change in people, and it probably costs a lot more. This is an endless array of meets that occur on a plethora of topics, with a wide variety of people. Can’t beat it.
Check it. You might like it. I did.

A Fondness for Figments

I’m feeling a little blue. I’m getting a stiff back, so I know my mattress needs flipping. I’ve just done that, and have changed my sheets besides. If anything reminds you you’re single, it’s changing the sheets.
You’re changing them because it’s been long enough. It’s time. Not because you got hot’n’sweaty and did wrong-but-so-right things.
It’s sorta sad, but not because I can’t handle being single. Been here, done this.
What makes me sad is having to remind myself that I’ve made the right move. We both decided to end the relationship, for somewhat different reasons. My reasons are not really ones I wanted to express to him, but that I’m sure he’s aware of. It’s kind of hard for me to admit it, though. I’m getting a little chokey just thinking of putting it down, because it feels like casting judgment, but the judgment’s long been done, so I might as well.
See, the guy I’ve broken up with isn’t good for me. In fact, he’s somewhat bad for me. He’s depressed, he’s self-obsessed, constantly distracted, and inattentive. It’s not good. It’s also not who he really is. But it’s who he is today. And I can’t begrudge it as I know what’s preceded it.
The trouble is, I’m trying to keep alive a memory of who he was before all that shit. A guy who was an upbeat skeptic with weird quirks and a cute smile, who won my trust and a bit of my faith for a while there.
The latter guy’s still around in ever-so-brief flashes, but they’re not the present. They’re animated flashbacks, maybe (hopefully) flash-forwards.
Keeping that memory alive is fucking with my resolve that the right choice has been made. The guy I just broke up with, well, he’s not really good enough for me. I’m a caring, attentive, loving woman, and I need that back. For his own reasons, he couldn’t provide that. I may understand, but I can’t live with that. No one really ought to have to.
I really, really hate having to choose between who a person is versus who they once were, but we all have to make those choices. I don’t believe in staying in a relationship longer than I have to, because if I do, it eats away at me. I’me constantly reminded I’m less attractive to them, for one reason or another, than I used to be. I’m forever wishing we could talk like we did in the old days. A whole lot of thoughts run rampant, all the time. I find when I’m unhappy in a relationship, I don’t live in the present. I get analytical and think of anything but that moment.
At this moment, I hope that old guy makes a return and when we revisit things, it’s a hit. That’s what I hope today. Do I expect it? Um. Hope ain’t faith, ‘nuff said. Get it?
Six months from now, who knows where the fuck I am. Six months from now, what if I’ve landed the job of a lifetime after what is, inarguably, the most challenging time I’ve ever faced? Who is THAT woman, huh? Who’s she? How’d she get there from here? That’s what I wanna know. I ain’t got no answers, and they’re a damned long time in coming.
I just don’t think this shit’s going to keep me down. Nothing’s ever done so before, but I’ve never stood all the way up after a fall-down, you know? I’ve never WANTED it this bad before.
How do I go from who I am today to who I am then, to wanting someone I was with a year before? I don’t know. I don’t know the path to take for that journey, and I don’t know what my life holds.
I know that I feel sad. I mourn for what mighta been, and what now might never be. At the moment, I hope I feel like I can go there again. It was a comfortable relationship when it worked. It was funny, irreverent, open, playful, and good. Then it changed. Sigh. I digress.
Now I’ve gone way off point, so let’s just get out that big ol’ hammer and nail this one down.
If your relationship is shit, and you spend more time thinking about then than you do of tomorrow, then maybe it’s time to admit that the person you’re with isn’t the person you fell for. Put on them boots and walk the fuck on. Life’s too short to live in the past. Don’t be scared of your future. Respect it, cherish it, ‘cos soon it’s gonna be your past. Futures, you can change. Pasts, well, they become baggage or cocktail-party stories. If you’re in love with a memory, you’re making a mistake.
Simple.
I saw my mom die at 57, and the last thing I need to forget is just how short life is. Why spend it doing the wrong things, right? That’s my motto. (I’m also opposed to doing the right things wrong.)
So, this I need to remind myself every time I’m sad I’m alone again: Beats the shit out of hanging out with an almost-boyfriend who’s depressed and can’t let me in. As a friend, I’ll cherish him. As a boyfriend, I was sometimes wanting to smack him good. And the future, well, who knows. I think, either way, some good stuff’s on the road and is headed to me. I’m just gonna keep up the good fight and hang on to the faith. Cogito ergo sum.

Revisiting: "You Can Make Me Come, But…"

I’ve not been in my right mind this week, literally. So, I’m about to do something I don’t often do, which is to qualify and revisit an opinion piece; the one I posted in response to an anonymous question yesterday.
I’m human and flawed at the best of times, but this week I’ve been plagued with migraines, sleeplessness, and a few other symptoms as a result of an acute sinus infection. I’m beginning to get well, thank god, but it’s made me irritable, angry, unpleasant, and really, really bleak for the last few days, and I think it’s been showing a little too readily in some of my writing, and in this piece in particular.
First off, I’m not doing a 180 here, okay? The reader asked if I thought she was a hypocrite for doing everything but sex. No, not for that reason. I think honesty’s the most important facet of any relationship – be it with a parent, lover, friend…honesty’s EVERYTHING.
If you’re not sleeping with someone because you’re nervous, because you think you want to wait, or whatever your flavour is, then be honest. Say that sex is a really, really huge step for you, and you make no promises, and you may even wait until marriage, but that you really don’t know what your sexual future holds for now, and they can’t have any expectations of it, no matter how much you might be enjoying playing with them as you head down the road together. And if it’s confusing for them, tell them it’s far more confusing for you, because you know that’s the truth.
Don’t take the easy way out, don’t choose some simple pat answer like, “I’m waiting until marriage,” when you know deep down inside that’s not what it’s about.
Besides, you’re selling a lot of guys short. No, they may well not wait until marriage, because marriage is a huge, huge thing, but they might wait one hell of a long time for you, and you’re not giving them that opportunity to honestly consider what it is they would or wouldn’t do for you.
It’s such a hard topic, that of when sex is the right move to make. I have no qualms with abstinence until marriage, but whatever the reasons you’re choosing not to have sex, you need to be honest about them. You need to be honest about every aspect of your life, and I truly believe that.
Honesty shouldn’t be some lost virtue, or something we pull out when it’s convenient to us. It’s hard to be honest about our fears and our emotions, and sometimes being honest about them leads to hard places and difficult roads to travel because it can be so damned confusing to admit what lies behind our poker faces, but the cliché of it being the best policy is true for a reason.
It’s only through that honesty with each other that we can face challenges and adversities. If you’re being dishonest, even about something that’s “kind of” true, like waiting for the right person, you’re setting the groundwork for yourself to tell little white lies when it makes things a little easier for you to process.
I disagree with that to the very core of who I am.
Did I handle the question well? No. I’ve been in a really dark place this week and I’ve not been comfortable facing it. I’ve been dealing with things somewhat passive-aggressively, it turns out, and while I have reasoning for it, it doesn’t really excuse it.
And while you have reasoning for stretching the truth, it never excuses it, either. These are the simple truisms behind living a good life, and you are trying to choose how you want to live. Don’t commit one transgression to stave off another. Clearly, by asking the question as you did, you’re already somewhat uncomfortable with how you’re handling the situation, so maybe it’s time to reconsider.
As for abstinence – feeling guilty about it, questioning it… Abstinence is a hard, hard road to choose. You’ll have weak moments. You’ll feel pressured. You’ll feel like you’re alone in a big, sexy world. And if abstinence is really important to you, then you need to be strong and hold your position. Don’t compromise just because of all those pressures out there in that big, scary world. Do it when it’s right for you, because it’s not something you’ll ever get a chance to revisit.
Personally, I thought I waited for the right guy. In the end, we stayed together too long because I didn’t want to admit he wasn’t the right one after all. You need to be aware that waiting for rightness doesn’t necessarily mean you’ve made the right choice, and it may still go wrong, and you may eventually realize you made a mistake, and if/when that should happen, you can’t hold it against yourself. The majority of our relationships are bound to end, and many of those will end badly, and that’s why they say that all is fair in love and war; because sometimes love is war. Sometimes it’s wrong. So, if you’re holding out, be realistic, and know that your intentions are what counts, not the end result of your actions… if that makes any sense.
Anyhow. I wanted to edit that piece as soon as I posted it, but my mindset had gone to a darker place and I couldn’t conjure the genuine sentiment I needed to do the job right. I hope I have now. For whatever it’s worth, sorry it was harsh. I still agree with some of what I said, but I wish I’d said it better.

Q & A: "You Can Make Me Come, But We Can't Fuck"

I was sent the following question in a comment this morning, and yes, they were right, it is an interesting topic to write about. Time’s not on my side today, so this is a quick take on the question… a question that could unleash some interesting discussion, and I hope it does.

I decided that I want to wait until marriage to have sex, but I’m still a chronic masturbator and ok with doing stuff with guys that doesn’t involve penis-in-vagina sex. I guess I just don’t really trust anyone enough to go “all the way” with them. Do you think I’m a hypocrite?

You want the short answer? Yep, I do think you’re a hypocrite, more or less. Thanks for putting words in my mouth.
There is nothing that makes me snicker more than religious types (which I don’t know if you are one or not) who tell me they’re abstaining from sex until marriage, but that they’ve done nearly everything except things involving penetration.
It’s the same reason why Bill Clinton was lambasted for claiming he “did not have sexual relations with that woman!” I mean, come on. You’ll get them off, they’ll get you off, but when it comes to insertion, you’re gonna play the morality card? What the fuck is that?
Oral sex, manually-induced orgasms, it’s all intimacy, and it’s all banned off primetime TV, all right? It ain’t for the kiddies and the after-school special, y’know?
If you’re not comfortable having sex for one reason or another, fine, but be honest about why you’re not. Don’t claim you’re some sanctimonious person waiting for the right person or whatever. Admit that you’re scared. Admit you have trust issues (which you have done here).
It’s all right be to scared, but don’t cover it up with some vow of chastity. Don’t run from the situation just because you haven’t got the sack to ante up and face it. I think it’s dishonest to be chronically masturbating, allowing men to get you off, trading favours, but then claiming you’re “abstaining” from sex. Why? What’s the point? You’re already doing all the intimate things a person can do. You’re already investing in carnal pleasures. You’re already sinning in the eyes of most religions.
It’s the sexual equivalent of someone being issued a restraining order for not going within 100 metres of X person/place, and instead of just staying the fuck away, they stand day in and day out at a distance of 101 metres, toying with the allowed limits. How is that possibly honouring the spirit of the situation? It’s not. It’s a crock, is what it is.
I could be all nice and say, “Oh, I understand the ambivalence of not having sex,” and all that, but honestly, you’re already feeling guilty and like you’re breaking some code, or else YOU wouldn’t have asked if you’re being a hypocrite. If you have to ask, then you are. Pretty simple.
If you were abstaining from sex and not letting men finger you, not masturbating, not exploring oral, then you would not be a hypocrite.
But, you, honey, are a hypocrite, any way you slice it. I’m sorry if the truth hurts, but it is what it is.
You’re scared of intimacy, you’re hoping like hell you’re being Just Good Enough to be virtuous, and you know, deep down inside, that you wish you could be fucked silly, but you don’t have the courage or the backbone to go there, because you’re scared that once you give them what they’re really wanting, that they’ll walk right on out on you.
And maybe, just maybe, they will. And maybe, just maybe, those fears are valid.
When it comes to morality, religion doesn’t tend to offer shades of grey. Things are sins, or they are not, and you don’t get to have the decoder ring to decide just how much of one particular action equates a sin. It doesn’t work that way. So, if you’re toying with it anyhow, why not just fucking buy the full-meal deal and get on with it? You’ve not started to go up in flames with the fires of Hell licking all around you yet, so what are you so scared of?
Again, I don’t know if religion plays a part in your decision, so the “you” in regards to anything religious is rhetorical, not specifically YOU.
I just wish people were more honest about their actions, and this duplicitous “well, you can get me off, but you can’t come inside of me” behaviour is symptomatic of all the hypocrisy that surrounds us. I grow tired of it, that’s all.

(Feeling that I may have sounded a little harsh in this post, I decided to revisit it, as I know there are some “virgins” out there who are trepidatious about their sexuality, and I don’t want to add too much fuel to that fire. Check out my second take here.)