Sex: How Vanilla Are You...
...If you know what "vanilla" means?
-Dan Savage
I spent this weekend helping a friend of ours move. Jumping from island to island; plotting out overnights; squeezing work in as necessary... down time was fairly limited. During one of the breaks when she stayed overnight at our home, she found our copy of The Ethical Slut, got 63 pages in before falling asleep, and demanded a copy of her own the next morning. You see, before she moved to a small town, settled down and got married, she was a very successful touring stripper (her legs are still something incredible), and it seems she misses that aspect of her life. It's not why she got divorced, but now that she is, she's going to enjoy her freedom. During this, my wife was down in Victoria at an S&M play party.
She is not going to have to wait until divorce before she can enjoy her own freedom. Which, I've always thought, is the point of loving someone: a stability-plus deal, where sexual and emotional exploration is an inclusive option rather than an exclusive one. Not everyone agrees, and that's fine by me - the number of people I'd like to have sex with is rather limited anyways...
But I do get the occasional question about what exactly the nature of our relationship is. I am personally very confident in the stability of my marriage, and have no fear of it breaking up, or that I'm missing some part of life that is passing me by. Unlike our friend, there isn't some part of me that I'm being forced to subvert in exchange for my relationship. There have been changes, certainly: if you've ever had a roommate you know some of those changes! Demands on money; space; attention; time. But none of them have been forced upon me. My wife put it this way: when you love someone, they are worth every sacrifice that they won't ask you to make.
The best part of our relationship, I suppose, is our ability to communicate. We've known each other for about twenty years at this point, and we've got highly attuned bullshit detectors, so it's not like we could get away with anything anyways. She does occasionally accuse me of being Zen and I tell her to piss off, but other than that, the honesty has come very easily for us. So maybe I'll go with that for now: love is honesty.
"But, dammit man," you say (or would say if you were Bones McCoy), "where's the Romance? The Poetry?"
Well then.
In honour of such, I will now present what is perhaps the worst poem in history, as written by my esteemed wife and her brother many, many years ago (1991):
The Worst Poem Ever
Come back to me, and bring shampoo
Bring toothpaste, and bring razors too
On these things I am running ... leeeew
Bring underarm deodourant
So as to not malodours grant
One hundred thousand voices chant
"Bring soap!" Without it, wash I can't
And while you're at it, bring some bread
Some butter, and some sandwich spread
Without these, how will I be fed?
Through my sweet pleas runs a lone thread:
Come back to me, I'll give you head
Come back to me, I beg of you
Come back to me, and bring shampoo.
And let that be a lesson to you, next time you think Romantic thoughts here.
-Dan Savage
I spent this weekend helping a friend of ours move. Jumping from island to island; plotting out overnights; squeezing work in as necessary... down time was fairly limited. During one of the breaks when she stayed overnight at our home, she found our copy of The Ethical Slut, got 63 pages in before falling asleep, and demanded a copy of her own the next morning. You see, before she moved to a small town, settled down and got married, she was a very successful touring stripper (her legs are still something incredible), and it seems she misses that aspect of her life. It's not why she got divorced, but now that she is, she's going to enjoy her freedom. During this, my wife was down in Victoria at an S&M play party.
She is not going to have to wait until divorce before she can enjoy her own freedom. Which, I've always thought, is the point of loving someone: a stability-plus deal, where sexual and emotional exploration is an inclusive option rather than an exclusive one. Not everyone agrees, and that's fine by me - the number of people I'd like to have sex with is rather limited anyways...
But I do get the occasional question about what exactly the nature of our relationship is. I am personally very confident in the stability of my marriage, and have no fear of it breaking up, or that I'm missing some part of life that is passing me by. Unlike our friend, there isn't some part of me that I'm being forced to subvert in exchange for my relationship. There have been changes, certainly: if you've ever had a roommate you know some of those changes! Demands on money; space; attention; time. But none of them have been forced upon me. My wife put it this way: when you love someone, they are worth every sacrifice that they won't ask you to make.
The best part of our relationship, I suppose, is our ability to communicate. We've known each other for about twenty years at this point, and we've got highly attuned bullshit detectors, so it's not like we could get away with anything anyways. She does occasionally accuse me of being Zen and I tell her to piss off, but other than that, the honesty has come very easily for us. So maybe I'll go with that for now: love is honesty.
"But, dammit man," you say (or would say if you were Bones McCoy), "where's the Romance? The Poetry?"
Well then.
In honour of such, I will now present what is perhaps the worst poem in history, as written by my esteemed wife and her brother many, many years ago (1991):
The Worst Poem Ever
Come back to me, and bring shampoo
Bring toothpaste, and bring razors too
On these things I am running ... leeeew
Bring underarm deodourant
So as to not malodours grant
One hundred thousand voices chant
"Bring soap!" Without it, wash I can't
And while you're at it, bring some bread
Some butter, and some sandwich spread
Without these, how will I be fed?
Through my sweet pleas runs a lone thread:
Come back to me, I'll give you head
Come back to me, I beg of you
Come back to me, and bring shampoo.
And let that be a lesson to you, next time you think Romantic thoughts here.
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