Dear Exes: I Want To Be Your Friend

When I first started having sex, I promised myself that I would make sure it would never be awkward to run into someone I'd slept with on the street. Over the years, I've occasionally thought back to that promise and chuckled about how abominably naïve I was.

But recently, I decided to go through the sex list I keep in my iPhone (what, you don't have one?), imagine running into each of them on the street, and crunch the numbers. The results weren't bad at all. Of my 25 partners, I'd be downright pleased to run into 9 of them. Those guys range from good friends, to people I occasionally exchange a friendly g-chat with, to people I've lost touch with but would be genuinely happy to run into. It would be slightly, but not terribly awkward to run into 7 of them- I'd probably make up a fake doctor's appointment after 10 minutes or so, but it wouldn't be a miserable experience. There were only 5 guys I would really hate to encounter; 3 guys who treated me awfully, 1 I made an awkward mess of breaking up with, and 1 I really should not have slept with for reasons that will not be delved into today.

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