Sex, Sensuality, and Intimacy

One of my widow friends called this morning to vent. Normally, when she vents, it's pretty funny stuff and I have a hard time not laughing a whole lot. Today was a little bit different.

Upon picking up my phone she yelled, "What's wrong with me? No period, no possible pregnancy....and now I get lousy sex. It just isn't fair! Everything we do is so perfunctory. Nothing I do seems to spur him on to greater action. The fornicating I'm getting isn't worth the fornicating I'm getting!"

When she starts quoting PIPPIN at me, I know one of us is in trouble. As best I could make out, the guy she's been seeing since before COVID is not doin' the job. It's not like this guy is seriously old; he's healthy, kinda buff for 60+,  but he's not breathtakingly exciting between the sheets. 

Finally. she stopped, waited a beat, then yelled, "What's wrong with you? You aren't laughing and you haven't said a thing! You have no filter. What are you thinking?"

I thought about that for a moment. "I haven't had a hug 11 years, ten months, and 6 days, give or take. What would you like me to say?" 

Well, that was a conversation stopper. "Shit," she eventually sighed, "I hadn't thought of that." 

And then we got down to the nitty-gritty of what she was really complaining about. It wasn't about sex at all; it was about sensuality and intimacy.

I don't remember what I was thinking in the early days of widowhood,  but it certainly wasn't that the last time Ziggy could manage to go up the stairs to the bedroom would be the last time I would share a night beside a significant other. We'd had an "active" marriage; did I stop thinking of myself as a sensual human being once he left the building? Was this some kind of auto-response? An out-of-loving message? I never gave it much thought.

Until recently. And then I did. For all the strangest reasons.

One of the unexpected joys (and I use that term loosely) of cataract surgery is that your eyesight changes. Mine sure did.  My old trifocals are basically useless, and I am playing musical glasses with them, my midrange "computer" glasses, and a pair of cheaters that are close to the new prescription until the eyes settled down enough to get a new prescription and my new glasses are ready. For the last 3 weeks, writing anything, including the blog, has been a total slog. No one has gotten an email longer than two sentences and I've been dictating my texts. 

I can, however, read on a tablet with the cheaters. And when a friend asked me to read a book written by one of her friends, I discovered trash romance. OMG! I did not know people actually wrote, much less read, this stuff. They do! I thought the sex scenes I wrote were graphic....HA! There are no words to describe some of the stuff I've been reading these last few weeks....except maybe to call it lady-porn. 

Never mind the incredibly graphic sex (I blush just thinking about it) I have read some of the funniest internal and external dialogues I could possibly imagine. Snappy, witty, screamingly exactly what I would think in those situations, and I laugh myself right outta the chair. The stories are all basically the same: the men are all excessively well-endowed, hot, hunky, buff, all with Andre Androfsky rippling thighs (see Mila 18 chapter 1 by Leon Uris) and the women are all shapes and sizes (yeah, really,) strong, independent, and highly intelligent. Not a nitwit amongst the protagonists. And that's what makes it all work.

The women are sexy in a variety of ways, always described as hot, but the brain takes down the brawn every time. That alone makes those stories attractive because even in those I-can't-believe-I-just-did-that moments, they all come out swinging; they are not rescued, they are fixers and survivors; they learn from their missteps. Not mistakes, missteps. The women take charge of themselves and their environments in ways one might never anticipate. They almost all become saviors. And there's lots of hot, graphic sex just to make reading more fun.

There is nothing wrong with a woman who expresses a sexual and sensual need in her life. It's natural, it's healthy, and probably a whole lotta fun. But for the most part, living, breathing women over a certain age are denied that class of pleasure. Expressing a physical-need is hushed up, too embarrassing to talk about. Our breasts become pillows on which our grandchildren's heads rest, not nipple-puckering pleasure conduits. Our lady-parts are far from dried up; they are simply waiting for the secret password. 

Men of the same age want younger, more youthful models. Older men are, all too often, looking for a potential care-giver. Women over the age of 60 are doomed in the dating market unless they are willing to change themselves up to look like a younger model. Plastic surgery, body sculpting, hair dying...we all know what I mean. Whose idea of what a woman should be are we emulating? Certainly not our own.

And wanting a hug...or daring to admit to wanting to get laid? Ha! Scandalous!

Wanting. There's a fun term. I don't even know what that means anymore. Admitting to wanting someone's arms around me? Desiring to feel desirable? Verboten topics. Why do we need code words to discuss this? Granted, not everyone can be Sophia Loren who looks terrific at 86 and still works. Aging happens, even to men. Why does a 75-year old think he's going to attract a 30 or 40 year old woman? Like their parts don't droop? Age and experience in women doesn't have to mean old, shriveled, and out to pasture, yet that notion continues to thrive into the 21st century.

I will be the first to admit I would like to be wanted....for something other than being the nanny every other Friday which I love. I get lots of hugs and snuggles from a certain Young Sir but that doesn't mean I wouldn't appreciate a few from someone closer to my age. I would love to sit not-so-socially-distanced while bantering with a witty, urbane, savvy, intellectual kinda guy. You know....someone who knows what dialing a phone means, but embraces technology. Taking a walk while talking about age appropriate stuff...NOT medical? Sure. Laughing about love beads, anti-war demonstrations, and bra burning? Absolutely. Sharing popcorn while watching a movie? I may have forgotten how, but I think I could re-learn that skill. 

This is all about intimacy.

The desire for intimacy does not suddenly stop with the loss of one's partner. If anything, give it a couple of years and that yearning comes back with a roar. The loss of arms about us, the feel of a warm body beside us, the sigh in our ears, the brush of lips against one's temple, and the desire for dancing in the kitchen never really go away. Intimacy is missed, replaced with longing not necessarily for the lost partner, but for a need to be touched. To feel touch. To feel alive and human. 

Sure, lots of us peek at those golden-age dating sites...seriously depressing because the ones our age want the 40-year olds, and the ones who want us....well, let's just say they can't drive at night.  A guy friend who is divorced explained it to me in these terms: "There are just so many unattached women out there who are looking. You get a choice. Why not go for an ambitious, independent, newer model?" I asked him if he was describing a date or a car; I wasn't completely sure which. He laughed. He knew exactly what I meant, and was not embarrassed to admit that's exactly what it sounded like: a shiny, new machine. 

Some of those smart, witty, hunky men probably exist and behave accordingly. Near as I can tell, those cover-guys from my kids' generation are the ones who benefited from having mothers who came of-age during and after the sexual revolution. Good for them. Maybe the next generation of widows will have a better shot at a second or third act. 

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, I am comfortable in my own skin. I love that my hair is really long and really grey. That I still blush when that hunky National Guard guy flirted with me last week. I yearn for the snappy, witty, screamingly funny dialogues like the ones I read in those books. I am fully capable of holding my own...and maybe someone else's too. 

In other words, I am not dead yet. And the new glasses will be ready next week. 

The Wifely Person's Tip o'the Week

If you want to read some trashy-sexy novels, go for Claire Kingsley or Lucy Score books.

TL Swan doesn't do her homework and clearly has never been to Manhattan.

Just sayin'.