That expression, 'Good one, God' seems to be my default saying when I become aware of the human and divine comedy of my life, Not that I'm divine, by any stretch, quite the contrary, but I find that there are frequent occasions when I am made aware of that Spanish proverb, 'El hombre propone y Dios dispone' (Man proposes and God disposes). And quite often I think it's funny, as in, 'the joke's on me'.
Take yesterday for example, when I wrote a fairly halfhearted little poem about not being afraid of all the 'world is coming to an end' nonsense that some wacky Christian guy is rapturously promoting. It's in the news a bit, and I made a fairly lame attempt at writing about it, in verse form. And my theme was 'I'm not afraid'. So how is it anything but funny when I find myself, half a day later, clutching my heart in fear at 4am, hoping that I'm not having some kind of heart attack. It was as close to a panic as I've experienced in many a year, and uh yeah, I was afraid for a few minutes there. But there's way more to the story.
This little tale started while I was on my return trip from Thailand a few months ago. I was in the LA airport when I struck up a conversation with a woman who was also waiting for a flight. We had a cup of coffee and a conversation, checked each other out a bit, traded our contact information and that was that. A few weeks later I got an email from her wondering why my blog was out of date. I had told her that I was writing a lot, but when she went to check on the website, there were only old postings. I had forgotten to mention that I was writing more personal stuff on this new site, so I passed along the current address. We had a couple of emails back and forth, and I got the feeling that she was somehow very interested in me. I think she saw me as some kind of avatar for some of the changes that she was wanting to make in her life.
A couple of weeks ago she wrote and asked if I had any time on such and such a date, because she was going to be in Eugene. We made plans to meet for lunch, which turned into a walk and a lying in the sun in the park, and then a more intimate connection back at my place. It was the first time that I was ever in the role of 'surrogate'. (not that I know anything about it really, but it just seemed like she was wanting to explore some stuff in the sensual/sexual realm, and I felt able to provide an experienced body to roll around with (so to speak). I felt very clear that it was different from a typical boy-girl interaction when both people are looking to fall in love. Maybe she is, but I know that I'm not, not in this case anyhow. I'm open to it in my life, but I didn't have that kind of mojo for this particular woman.
But through some kind of compartmentalizing process, I felt OK about being available for other kinds of connection, especially considering the fact that I haven't been kissed or held or etc etc for a while now, and my body could really use some attention. So I was working on the theory that there's something in it for me and there's something in it for her, let's try. We had a pretty positive experience last week, I had a little spring in my step the following day, so 'no harm, no foul', right? Uh, maybe, maybe not.
Because it does trigger a question that is often in the back of my mind, having to do with 'casual sex, is it possible?' It often seems like a good idea, but usually doesn't turn out that way. It's like playing with dynamite.... hey, what could happen? (he said whistling past the graveyard).
She was coming through town again this week and we talked about getting together. Her idea was to come over in the evening and then leave the next morning at 5am, this all had to do with the timing of her work and errands and needing to be back home in the morning. My initial reaction to that timing was 'bad idea'. It's one thing to have a little 'afternoon delight', quite something else to spend the night, at least the way that I'm constituted. I'm all about the escape route, I like to sleep on the outside of the bed as opposed to the wall side; I like to visit the woman at her place, and then be able to decide at what time the visit is over. Here was a challenge to my orientation, and it made me nervous, which I shared immediately. (we're both pretty good about saying what's going on inside, that's part of the charm).
We left it as an open question for a couple of days and I came around to thinking, 'well, let's see what happens, maybe there's something for me to learn by putting myself in a more vulnerable position than is normally comfortable'. So we made the plan and she came over last night. Had some dinner, retired to the boudoir, (hey I spelled it right, first time :-) and got down to the business at hand. No, I won't give a blow by blow description (see what I did there?) but we did what people do in that situation. And it was all OK.
But here's the thing, and the fatal flaw in the interaction. It means WAY MORE to her than it does to me. She's on a big quest to get comfortable as a sexual being, a place that she hasn't had a lot of experience so far. It's huge, it's life changing, it's deep. For me, I'm looking to get my rocks off (not to put too fine a point on it). And in that disparity, my sense of guilt and responsibility are activated and it starts to not work for me. It's the age old problem of me feeling responsible for someone else, and not wanting that responsibility. It brings up a lot of fear, along the lines of 'somebody wants something from me, and I can't deliver', which in a nutshell is the pattern that most of my failed relationships follow. Here, we got to do it at hyper-speed, got right to the dilemma without spending months or years to arrive there. Wham bam sorry ma'am.
After our 'connection', which was nice, I was ready to sleep. I had had a physically demanding day and it was 11pm. But H was all fired up, ready to snuggle, pull an all-nighter, fall in love, all of the above. Uh, sorry, no can do, I need to sleep. She accepted that, I don't know how happily, and I drifted off. But we were awake at 4am and she said something along the lines of 'could we continue where we left off a few hours ago?' Certainly a fair request, but my heart totally clenched up then and I got an intense surge of fear and anxiety, as if God was saying, 'look you fool, you can't put yourself in this kind of position'. That was the feeling I had, that it was a message from the universe saying 'abort abort' don't fool yourself into thinking that you can pull this one off. I shared that news with her, and in my mind, it was a done deal; all that's left is for her to get dressed and get on the road. I did try to be as nice as possible; we spent a few minutes on the couch talking. I hope I didn't cause any undue pain.
I asked her if she would mind if I wrote about the experience, keeping things confidential, of course. She said, 'fine', so I'm not violating any trust in writing up this encounter. It seemed so laden with meaning that I guess I had the need to try and capture it, not necessarily share it, but apparently that's what I do.
In case anyone is wondering about M back in Thailand.... as per our agreement, I wrote her an email saying that I had 'done some homework' (code for 'sex') right after the initial interaction. I didn't have to tell her, how would she ever know anyhow?, but I try and keep defaulting to the truth. It keeps things more simple. I don't always succeed, but that is my intention. I haven't heard from her in a week or so, so who knows, maybe she's doing some homework herself...
