Leftover sex…things I didn't have room for in my last post


First, there were some words by Schopenhauer (pictured), whose thoughts about most things reflect my own better than anyone else I know. He was looking back when he wrote:

“…after sixty, the inclination to be alone grows into a kind of a real, natural instinct; for at that age everything combines in favor of it. The strongest impulse—the love of women’s society—has little or no effect; it is the sexless condition of old age that lays the foundation of a certain self-sufficiency…


Then there was this poem by Edna St. Vincent Millay, a woman who had her own share of loversof both genders. I memorized two of her poems, including this one. It too was written while looking back.  

“What lips my lips have kissed, and where, and why,
I have forgotten, and what arms have lain
Under my head till morning; but the rain

Is full of ghosts tonight, that tap and sigh

Upon the glass and listen for reply;

And in my heart there stirs a quiet pain

For unremembered lads that not again

Will turn to me at midnight with a cry.

Thus in the winter stands a lonely tree,

Nor knows what birds have vanished one by one,

Yet know its boughs more silent than before:

I cannot say what loves have come and gone;

I only know that summer sang in me

A little while, that in me sings no more.”


Finally, there was a song by Shakira. Nobody celebrates sexuality like Shakira. I wonder what she will have to say, looking back.


19 comments:

CreekHiker / HollysFolly said...

Mine is nothing but regrets... In choosing men so wrong for me; nothing seeing how scared of my strength & confidence some of the good guys were; and in giving up on my self (life?) when I realized I would never have a child.

julie said...


Snow, quite a post. Brings up all kinds of things for me. Having come of age in the San Francisco in the late 60's I may have a different vision of sexuality than many women. I understand the feeling of being completely caught up in excitement of sex without all the attachments. The complete joy of a long weekend of sex with someone I would never see again, and really didn't want to. I enjoyed the total abandonment of the role society has given women to be chaste until Mr. Right seduces us with promises of forever or something like it. Even that anonymous, no promises, love making could offer up the wonder of intimacy and connection. That said I also understand the feeling of emptiness that can come from the very same act. Sex and intimacy...we want it, seek it, but it seems we are supposed to pretend we only want it with one person for all time...at least that seems true for women.

Strayer said...

I had some wild encounters in my time. This one guy still contacts me and tells me he can only think of me for the encounters we had and tells me it was the best and wildest sex of his life. He apologizes saying he can only think of me that way, but I tell him back that is some kind of a compliment, to be known in the mind of at least one man as the best lover he's ever had.

Strayer said...

And how strange, that the man (in my first comment) would obsess so about our encounters, ten years after they happened, when I can barely remember them and don't particularly remember them, when I do, with any affection, outside of as an experience, not even a particularly memorable one. Not even comparable to a day hike up in the Mt. Jefferson Wilderness area.

Stafford Ray said...

My impression of you, Snow is that you will never so feel that inclination to be alone that you will no longer welcome intimacy and the sex that nurtures it.
Reading some comments leads me to wonder how many realise that satisfaction (or not) is generated from within. Any stimulus still depends on one's reaction to it and I am confident you will never cease to react. Lucky you, and lucky Peggy!

julie said...

hello again...I was sitting outside a bit ago thinking about my first husband...he was a man who could not seem to keep out of other women's beds. And since you are being so open here I wonder...when a man has that strong of a desire to be sexual with so many women is it Woman Worship..or is it addiction, or is it all about the conquest. I knew a man not too many years back who was in treatment for sex addiction and he was guilt ridden, filled with remorse and regret... suicidal in fact..the was no joy for him in making love. I wonder...do most men fall in the middle somewhere?

lotta joy said...

My sexual history started out with being molested and my mother telling me to shut up and don't tell anyone about the man. My first husband moved away from me for 12 years, due to a disfiguring surgery that saved my life.

I spent those 12 years yearning for his touch that would never come.

Too late in life, I found a man who loved me and wanted me - still does - but as they say "if you don't use it, you lose it".

I can only sigh as I see the irony that was my life for 50 years.

Snowbrush said...

"when a man has that strong of a desire to be sexual with so many women is it Woman Worship..or is it addiction, or is it all about the conquest?"

If I don't use the word addiction to describe my behavior, some might say I'm in denial, but I simply don't believe I was to that level, and neither was I oversexed. I was obsessed to the point that thoughts of sex and behaviors stemming from these thoughts had a large and negative impact on my life, and I also had a mythology built around the female body and sexual relations. I really don't know if this mythology is common among men, although I would guess that it is. As for the conquest, it was important, not because I enjoyed it but because I had to succeed to get what I wanted. I was usually successful, but this wasn't because I have got a velvet tongue but because I looked for signals from the woman to guide me, and if the signals were missing or ambivalent, I backed off. I don't think I'm answering your question very well, but this is because I can only speak from my own experience. Once I try to talk about men in general, I mostly have guesses to guide me because I haven't read anything that would help, and because it's a rare day when two heterosexual men (at least) talk to one another about sex in any intimate way.

Anonymous said...

That poem by Edna St. Vincent Millay is beautiful.

Elephant's Child said...

Oh my goodness. Shakira is raunch on legs. Thank you for the introduction.

Charles Gramlich said...

I remember reading how Freud said he was happy when the impulse for sex finally went away. He was younger then than I am now. I still don't get what he was talking about.

Helen said...

Both posts leave the door wide open for candid response. For 'lotta joy', I believe no matter how long it's been since you used it, you never really lose it. I was married for 20 years .. first time. Four children, very few fireworks. Second time, the love of my life in terms of the connection, the sex, the everything. Over for complicated family reasons ... lasted eight years. Dating and a few relationships followed .. nothing since 2000! Still looking for that special man. I know he's out there looking for me. Snow, I love how you gently force us to take deep long looks at ourselves.

julie said...

Thank you for your honesty as always..in AA & NA it is said that if if drink or drugs have a negative impact on your life in a big way, you probably need a 12 step program...but no everyone would agree with that rule of thumb...
and my apologizes here, I don't know if I will be following proper blogger etiquette, but I have to respond to the ''raunch on legs'' comment in regards to Shakira...I just can't see her dancing as anything but a beautiful and joyful expression of sexuality....certainly not lewd or vulgar or explicit...

Snowbrush said...

"Shakira is raunch on legs..."

I've seen her that way, but I didn't get it from this number, which I found more playful than sexy. I actually pictured it as being appropriate for the Garden of Eden in terms of the innocence that I thought I saw in it. Maybe if I were turned on by Shakira I would feel differently, but that's not the case, although I respect her for being a very smart, level-headed and gifted singer and dancer. I think she might be Peggy's number one choice for current woman performer, and I guess I would have to say the same.

Elephant's Child said...

A quick response to julie. When I said that I found Shakira to be 'raunch on legs' I did not mean that I thought she was crude, or lewd. Rather, I meant as you yourself said, that I found her dancing to be 'a joyful expression of sexuality'. Perhaps we use the term raunchy different. Sexual it certainly was. Vulgar? Not from my perspective, and I am sorry if I offended you.

A Plain Observer said...

Interesting post as usual, Snow. Not much I can offer here for I am one to see enjoyment of sex fulfilled when there is intimacy, anything else leaves me empty.
Now about Shakira...that's una barranquillera linda.

Snowbrush said...

"I am sorry if I offended you."

I wouldn't care if you said she dances like a rhino with diarrhea and sings like a hyena with strep throat. Say what you think, really. I prefer that people be respectful (of me, not my ideas) when they disagree, but I can't even imagine you being otherwise. You've never struck me as anything short of a pedigreed sweetheart (instead of one of these mongrel sweethearts, like myself). Trust me, it's really okay to take strong exception to anything I say, whether you really feel that way, or else we're just defining a word differently as we've done twice in two posts.

"I am one to see enjoyment of sex fulfilled when there is intimacy, anything else leaves me empty."

I see intimacy (and the familiarity that produces it) as being THE major obstacle to good sex. When I first proposed an open marriage, Peggy, like a lot of women would have, assumed that I was disappointed with her, but I would have wanted the same thing no matter who I was married to. Sex is better where there's romance, but romance has very little to do with intimacy. Intimacy comes when you've seen all the warts, and you're still in love. Romance is when you're under the delusion that your beloved walks a foot above the ground.

lotta joy said...

When Joe had the unreturned hots for me, and said it was love, I told him it was lust and would pass.

When he was still there two years later, I decided to put an end to his fantasies and gave him every piece of literature - including photos - of an ileostomy and how I was damaged goods.

One day he just walked up to me, placed his hand over the area where the ileostomy was and just stood there. He said "I love YOU, and I'm not afraid of THIS."

I melted. It WAS love after all.

I've had sex without love, or feelings involved, and they were always extraordinary due to the fact we owed nothing to each other than a great encounter.

When love IS involved, the dynamics change and it's more of a mutual obligation to make each other enjoy the sex.

Personally, I feel that depersonalized sex - while not a 'joining' of commitment, allows more ENTHUSIASM and pure animal selfishness for one's self. What I'm trying to say is, it's pretty darn exciting.

Unknown said...

aahh... Snow, your comment on my blog left me in fits of laughter. The image is a tad disturbing I'll admit but its important you know its not me, no way. I would never dye my hair that colour. lol lol
Lisa xxxx