kethrai's Diaryland Diary ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The Sex Rant...what does this have to do with writing, again? I’m getting a little tired of apologizing for being monogamous. I suppose it’s inevitable, given the crowd I hang with –geeks, freaks, rennies, pagans, fen, and other folk who don’t fit the Cleaver demographic. The majority of the folks that I hang with are many things—artistic, witty, fun…. and for the main, rarely 100% het or 100% monogamous. Which is fine with me, because it’s a boring old world otherwise. But folks—I’m not part of the game. Everyone I’ve ever met who practices an “alternative lifestyle” –whatever the hell that really means, when I was growing up it meant eating pesticide-free veggies—had arrived at that point by examining their hearts, checking out their own architecture, and tracing back the wiring. Eventually they came to the conclusion that they were simply hard-wired to be gay, or straight, or poly-straight, or poly-gay, or attracted only to young men dressed in chipmunk costumes under the full moon. Whatever your preference, celebrate it, I say--—though the New Englander in me automatically adds “as long as you don’t do it in the street and scare the horses”. (I understand the political need for alternative lifestyle folks to be out and in the faces of the folks that make the rules—I thoroughly understand discrimination and hate crimes, as much as anyone could—I just keep feeling like a) it’s none of anyone’s goddamn business what your orientation is and b) wouldn’t it be nice if everyone minded their own? And wouldn’t the whole issue of discrimination be dead in the water if folks minded their own BEESWAX?—okay, digression over.) As my adored and admired mother says, “When I am the Empress of Everything….” sigh. And don’t get me wrong, I truly do adore my friends, every one and every crease and kink of them. They’re darling, intelligent, creative people, whose company I enjoy and time spent with them is precious. But I am getting very, very tired of being treated like a backward child because I’m monogamous. I’m not going to make many claims to anything extravagant here. I’m not 100% hetero, I’m just as capable of crushing on women as well as men, but after years and years of my adult life pondering and studying my own architecture and tracing back my own wiring diagrams, I have concluded that I am, whatever else I’m not, 100% serially monogamous. If the current partner found me in bed with someone else, it’s a clear sign that my heart is already out the door and the body is on its way. Nonetheless, I have people ARGUE this with me. “Have you ever kissed a girl? Did you enjoy it?” Yes, and yes, and no, I didn’t sleep with her because a) she wasn’t my type and b) I’m MONOGAMOUS AND PARTNERED. “If you tried it, you’d like it”. Um, no, my mother tried that on me with boiled onions and I still don’t like them. Besides, I’m MONOGAMOUS AND PARTNERED. “Sex doesn’t have to be an intimate experience, it can be just for fun. If it’s just for fun and all partners are agreeable, why not do it?” For me, it is ALWAYS intimate, and when it’s not, it’s just plain BAD. I’m not arguing with anyone who has sex as a purely recreational activity—dang, the times when I wished I COULD regard it that way amount to years out of my lifetime, and the fact is, I just DON’T. And I’m MONOGAMOUS AND PARTNERED. Welcome to the world of hard wiring. I would never, ever insult the emotional intelligence and history of someone who has come out to themselves and others as gay or poly or whatever else. I assume that if they had the courage to announce that, they’ve pretty much traveled a hard road to get there and I’m not about to argue with them about their internal identity. Why then, would someone automatically assume, that I at the age of 32, am “only” married and in a committed partnership and monogamous by default? That I chose this without checking out—or at least thinking about--the alternatives? Do I really give off such a vibe of mindless Cleaver Clone that I would just proceed down the aisle because that’s the June Blueprint? That I chose a man for my partner because that was what was expected? That I simply went a to b to c without ever questioning? Can you see a lobotomy hole somewhere that I’m unaware of? Being who we are and what we’re like, as a couple the Darling Husband and I have gotten a few offers. Hey, he’s a longhaired hippie-freak with tats and piercings, and I’m a short-haired butch-looking fat chick. And we are obviously committed and obviously kind, and everyone wants a piece of that—not necessarily us, per se, but you know, kindness and commitment of some kind—even if it’s to honesty, or whatever—and some variety of love. It's not that I mind the offers--I actually find them flattering. And it's not that I'm secretly crawling with all sorts of phobias and squickiness with the lifestyles of others, or anything gruesome like that, because I could not care less. A friend of mine once said "Sex has really ruined the world for me"--not because they didn't enjoy sex, but because once having had it, it seemed that everything, every friendship, operated in reference to sex in some way. In the crowd that I hang with, I have come to understand this all too well. You can say anything to me, and I will accept, unless it involves something nonconsensual. I want to know why I can’t simply say “Thank you, I’m not wired that way so we don’t” and have it be accepted. Instead, it seems to unleash a whole list of are-you-sure-have-you-tried-I’d-be-really-different-heavens-above-why-not-and-what’s-wrong-with-you’s. Let’s review. I am MONOGAMOUS and PARTNERED. I suppose it would be easy to make the assumption, in some ways, that I am simply unsophisticated and need to be educated to become properly poly, or bi, or whatever someone’s trying to talk me into this week. I’m a New Englander who has never moved out of this region, lived in a major city, or otherwise been exposed to “cultchah”, unless you want to count the BFA. I’ve never been off the East Coast, in fact. Never been to Europe, only made it to NYC for the first time this spring. Tend to be a bit of a homebody who enjoys sewing. The kind of person who tends to look blank for a second when you make a sexually loaded comment. I don’t drink (much) and I smoke cheap cigarettes and I wear what is cheap and pretty. I tend to get excited over things like a new gauge of wire or a new tool for my jewelry-making. I’m as blunt as the proverbial instrument. But you know what? Surprise… I do know who—and what—I am. And I am a well-read, highly educated, deeply-thought-out MONOGAMOUS and PARTNERED female. I would never, ever make the assumption that someone gay or poly or bi or straight needed to be “educated” to change their point of view, and I find it patronizing and insulting in the extreme that some folks assume that I’m like this because I don’t know any better. Check your assumptions at the door—otherwise you’re making an ass out of you and Umption. For instance—while I don’t exactly stand on the het end of the Kinsey scale, bi does not mean poly. And even if I were poly, poly does not necessarily mean “up for a casual boink with any passing stranger”….although, not being poly, I honestly don’t know enough to say. That’s the impression I’ve gotten, anyway. Any more than MONOGAMOUS and PARTNERED mean “dull stupid little unenlightened idjit.” And I don’t consider it ANY OF MY BUSINESS what you do, or who you are, unless you WANT to talk about it with me, and I’m getting a little tired of the assumption that like a wobbly-legged end table from Goodwill, a little paint and polish will fix me right up into suitably sexually liberated form, free from the chains of MONOGAMY and PARTNERED. Tell you what. When the Darling Husband drops dead of one of his many bad habits, (probably choking to death on a strip of bacon, while his cig sets the house afire) I’ll start taking applications. Men, women, indeterminates, (although I’m really not into chipmunk suits) and what-all. I cook, I sew, I’m fun to be around, I really like coffee in bed, and if you fetch it for me I’m yours forever. But if you once…. just once more… make me apologize for who and what I am…. Well, then I’ll be advertising for YOUR replacement, hmm? 10:21 p.m. - 2002-07-09 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
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