My friend Eric recently told me about the stream of women--average age 55--who have been sharing his bed since his divorce. "I've never had so many one-night stands in my life," he said wonderingly.
For someone who came of age in the seventies, that's a big statement. I've been thinking about why (other than his irresistable mojo) so many people are jumping in the sack with Eric.
More magazine would attribute it to the knows-what-she-wants/doesn't-care-what-you-think attitude women acquire as they take control of their lives, usually in the second half. There's a lot of truth to this. Just as I no longer worry about female friends stealing my man--having long ago weeded out anyone toxic enough to consider it--I've got a better handle on my own needs, and have learned to allow them to carry weight in the decision-making process.
There's also a logistics element; it's easier to stay out all night after the kids leave home.
On the other side of the ledger, I've noticed some interesting changes to my body since the flings of my youth. Not to put too fine a point on it, I have skin tags. Age spots. More chin hair than Karl Marx.
My muffin top has risen into a soufflé. Sometimes I look in the mirror and completely understand why so many women stay in miserable marriages--it's easier than taking off your clothes with someone new.
And yet, like Eric, I'm not averse to casual sex. If I meet a decent guy with a good heart and a witty turn of phrase, I think "Why not?"
Perhaps it's because, at this point in my life, lovemaking isn't so fraught with subtext. It's not about procreation or self-validation. It's simply dessert.
The men I know have mastered a kind of lighthearted flirtatiousness that makes no demands, but lets me know sex with them will be more fun than an order of crème brulèe. One life lesson I've fully absorbed is never to skip crème brulèe. Who knows when something that delicious will be on offer again?
Follow Deborah Gaines on Twitter: www.twitter.com/deborahgaines
It's important to know that the benefits from casual NOT reckless sex - and that's an important point.
Just another objective nail in the coffin of moral Cassandras who continue to make pronouncements about how 'damaging' sex outside of a relationship is. When I healthy, vibrant, emotionally stable person makes a choice to have a pleasing, mutual sexual experience with another person *THERE IS NOTHING WRONG WITH IT.* In fact it seems there are good things to be had, outside of an 'o'.
:)
However, as someone who has sowed her wild oats in her 20s and early 30s, I learned that I wasn't interested in a "fast and loose" type of lifestyle. I'm much saner and happier holding out for a man who's willing to get to know me FIRST before a stitch of clothing gets removed. Call me old fashioned, but I'm someone that considers s/ex as something a lot more than simply the physical act. I want not only the physical, but the emotional and the spiritual connection that only comes from a partner that you are not only physically intimate with, but emotionally intimate with as well.
He did all the crap including affairs, cheating, lots of sexual partners....Now, as he has ED, he has become a "family" man. Hmmm, I wonder what happened? He even has the flipping nerves to criticize me.
If you spent over two decades being "fast and loose" why the need for "emotional and spiritual" connection? No being a jerk. Just looking for an answer.
I continually read and hear women talking this "emotional" stuff yet engaging in booty calls, one night stands, hookups.... Oh let us not forget our "comfort sex." How do you explain it?
I thought women needed an emotional connection to have sex? Or maybe that only applies to married women and their poor husbands.
But your reply is very funny!
Or maybe it's just me ....
It is funny, right?
Happy Holidays!
But people simply cannot be honest with themselves let alone anyone else. We have become America the Fake.
I'm now 77 and shared more than turkey this Thankgiving with an wonderfully slim and trim 88-year-old widow.
Both were warmly receptive and deliciously eager to please.
Somewhere, I suspect, there's a 100-year old with some warm desires. I'm available.
Thanx for the insight Pops!