Sex talk.
Sure, we do a lot of talking about sex, but do we ever talk about sex talk? Not the standard “dirty talk,” per se, but more just thinking in depth about conversations we have in bed. Or on sex in general. I was recently talking about the idea, and found myself unusually captivated by the thought. And moreso, wondering about kind of conversations I’ve had about talking in bed, as well as the conversations I’ve had in bed with partners.
Once, I had a man tell me that I was “better in bed than him.” He told me that I intimidated him because he’d never been with anyone who was. I don’t know why the comment struck me so forcefully. Beyond the implications (that I certainly lapped up and am letting my ego run with, of course), it just struck me as a strange thing to say. Or talk about. Sure, we assess our own abilities in our heads, compare past kisses, past caresses, and past partners - and in a way, that’s okay, because it assures that we can continue to discover what we really want out of sex - but it’s generally something we keep to ourselves or in our immediate circle of friends. It’s not a conversation that creeps into a realm of interaction between partners, for risk of…whatever. Many things.
The other thing that took me aback about his statement was the idea of comparing partners against each other, especially in a heterosexual interaction. My instinct was apples and oranges, but maybe that was too quick of a judgement. I’m not sure. Can you compare the passion of a kiss from one to the other, or is it simply too shared? Can you compare acts of sex if your focus is necessarily (anatomically) different?
The thought has me wondering about chemistry, as well. I had a conversation the other night trying to describe an incredibly unique, perhaps once or twice in a lifetime chemistry I had with someone. My inclination would be to start trying to describe it here, but the amount of time that I’d spend erasing words and picking through my stream of consciousness simply wouldn’t be worth it. Why is sexual chemistry, something for which we seem to be on a never-ending quest, so incredibly difficult to pin down to words? I grasped at straws under a deep cerulean sky to try and describe the way he had talked to me, the way I was able to talk to him, the way he constantly lifted me up and placed me down…anything. Anything that would resemble this outrageous intensity that I can’t for the life of me dredge up anywhere but my gut.
We should be programmed to handle these types of things. In a world where so many of our interactions are boiled down to imprecise digital instantaneousness, we should either become better at finding the words that work, or merely have garnered an ability to summarise the bigger ideas into succinct generalities. With Internet dating so prominent, and laced with the built-in expectation for conversations about sex when trying to track down a potential match, why is sex talk such a strange thing, still?
It’s late. In too many senses of the word.
M
