a monogamous mind?

I had a strange realization today. I was walking up the stairs behind a colleague and wasn’t really too taken with looking at his butt. So I looked to the left and there was a fine pair of breasts there. Half-involuntary I started to imagine how those breasts would look freed from their cage of cloth. But alas, all I could think about was Kitty’s breasts and instead of thinking about what it would be like to fondle the breasts to my left on the stairs, I found myself thinking of what it was like to fondle Kitty’s breasts.
After some introspection, I think that this has happened a lot. It just never seemed unnatural or worthy of notice.
I suppose that most men drool over the actual breasts that they see.
This does not have any conclusion.
“We can merely describe here and say: “This is how human life is”. Wittgenstein, Remarks on Frazer’s The Golden Bough.

mixed pickels I

Yesterday I got a paper back from correction and graded that I had delivered in June. Yeah, that’s what I thought, too. I had a long – almost 90 minutes – talk about it with my professor, who happens to also be my boss. I got a 1.3 grade, which is just south of perfect (1.0) and while the Professor had some clear criticism – most of which I understood and agreed with – mostly the impression was positive. He did say that I was talented and quite good and that I sometimes was too ambitious and overstreched myself by trying to fit too much into one paper. But despite the positive comments and the quite good grade, I felt very doubting of my ability to succeed afterwards. I think I’m already getting over it, but I felt really bad about it yesterday. What bugs me today is that I can’t be happy about even such a good grade and I wonder why that is. Maybe because it could have been a 1.0 instead. Maybe because the Professor seem to have a rather negative opinion about it some hours before we sat down to talk about it and the good grade did little to afterwards ease the feeling of “I will get a failure notice” that I carried around for most of the afternoon. Anyhow, if you ever feel like you want to know whether the apparent fine-tuning of the physical constants of the universe constitute evidence for the existence of a creator, feel free to ask me about it.

Another pickle: Some time ago, when I was thinking so much about finding some new sexual partner, I posted on a social network, asking whether there was anyone willing to have hard and perverse sex with me. I fully expected to only alienate people with this and the only reply I got was someone asking whether I was alright and that I sound seriously underfucked. Duh!
But last night, I met a friend of mine, who’s also part of that network. She was working in the kitchen of a local medieval themed tavern. When we got the opportunity to talk a bit, she also asked about that posting and said that she was thinking about replying “Yeah, me!”. I was flabbergasted and really didn’t believe that she was serious. I did remember that, back when we did theater together, she used to always stroke my shaved head, something I find particularly nice. Back then I wondered what her boyfriend thought about that, but she never seemed bothered by him being there when she did it. So I figured it meant nothing, she just like how it felt and since I too liked how it felt, I just enjoyed it and that was that.
Later that evening, she corrected herself saying that she wanted to post “Whaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaat?” in answer to my posting. *shrugs* Whatever.

The final pickle: I kept my weight since last week. I also got two new pairs of pants, which already don’t fit as well as when I tried them on and the one I wore yesterday kept on slipping. Annoying.

on observing me

Yesterday I watched Inglorious Basterds – which was awesome – and afterwards I had a beer with friends at a local irish pub. Apart from noticing the nice detail that there were two tables with metal people, we also talked about polyamory and love. First off, I was told “polyamory” is wrong. It should be either “multiamory” or “polyphilia”. That thought had never occurred to me, but it does make some sense and can claim a right to an existence as funny piece of trivia for polyarmoric nerds. Lingual purity, especially given two dead languages, is an unrealistic and silly demand anyhow.

But I do have a serious point to make. It has to do with the question what love is and how we recognize something as love. There are, I think, two plausible answers to this: A phenomenological answer that focuses on private experience and a sociological answer that focuses on the de facto social structures that two or more people construct by “doing love”. We recognize roles and structures in our society by being engaged in and observing certain repeated, structurally distinct behavioral patterns. These may be as simple as identifying the bank teller by where (s)he usually sits and as complex as recognizing from posture, expression and subtle words that someone is trying to flirt with you.
Love as a love relationship is a socially constructed reality, it consists of nothing else but repeated actions, formed and fulfilled expectations and the understanding that this whole package “yes indeed is a love relationship.” As a society, we aim to structure our common social reality in ways that make it easy for us to navigate it. That means, we strife for recognizability. It’s important that relevant aspects of the social reality – such as who are your betters, who is the doctor and with whom can you safely mate – can be easily spotted and interpreted correctly. As with any social construct, we hand the ability to engage in its construction and to navigate the social world that it generates on to our children in the many ways that children learn from their parents. I would suppose it’s mostly emulation, but I’m no developmental psychologist.
I guess, by now you see where this is going: In my 30 years of life, I have learned and internalized how a love relationship looks, what kind of behavior patterns should recur in it and to find deviations from that form mildly disturbing. While my expectations are probably less conservative than those of the majority, I cannot deny – and neither can you, I’m sure – that there are certain taken for granted things that you use as heuristics in spotting who’s got a love relationship with whom and how it’s going.
And in many ways, the relationship I’m in does not conform to that.

On the other side of this divide is what you could call inner experience if you want to. But it’s not just “how I feel” or anything esoterical about soul-mates or what not. This, too is an empirical category, but it is not concerned with a social construct “out there”, but with myself. It is about me and my behavior and emotional experience. What I experience here is in parts emotional: how I feel towards Kitty in various situations – it’s not like there is one feeling throughout, but it’s a fractured multiplicity that only through cognition gets integrated into a whole – love. It is also an observation of my own behavior – how I act towards her in various situations. I think an important marker was sticking with her during the whole affair with the threat. Much more than a sense of why I did it, the exprience of doing it makes me see that I love her. You could say that by observing myself acting in accordance with my idea of how a lover acts towards another – and more specifically how I act towards those I love – I find reassurance that this complex of emotional experiences does indeed constitute that I love her.

Thus, while I feel very strongly that I love Kitty, I have problems seeing our relationship as a love relationship as I habitually and unquestioningly “define” it. I think that this is mostly due to three things: Polyamory – which was not even in my dictionary before a couple of months ago, the absence of sex and – at times – tenderness and intimacy and finally, going back to our early time together, BDSM. I have spoken about the first two parts extensively and I think it should be obvious why that would be difficult to integrate into any construct that I would want to call a love relationship. The last part is less obvious and I’m not sure how to best explain it. But I’ll try.
Before meeting Kitty, I’ve been in a seven year relationship, where I always wanted BDSM, but it was never part of it. I had acquired certain anticipations regarding “what women want” in a relationship, based on what the nurse wanted. These included “no BDSM”. During the early days of my relationship with Kitty, we would try to have a D/s in our relationship and it was quite difficult for me to get into that, to learn that kind of thing. And before I managed to do that, the problems that lead to the absence of sex started to creep in. Leaving me with half an experience of how it should work and in a difficult situation with a difficult girlfriend in which to complete that learning.

So much for the analysis, now what do I make of it?
For one thing, I do think that coming to terms with how a love can look in a relationship is on the agenda. I’m not sure how it will turn out, but I don’t think that my learned pattern is what I will always be stuck with. On the other hand, there are things that might turn out to be important to me that I’ve never considered before. I do think that I will come to some kind of integration and idea of a love relationship, that will work within the polyamory framework that it seems I will move within. And as far as BDSM goes: “difficult” might be just another word for rewarding.

I ordered clothes

Not very noteworthy, is it? There is one detail that I find interesting – apart from my nice new clothes: I got the shirts in the largest size they had available, thinking that nothing else is going to fit me anyway and now they are too big . Does this mean I perceive myself as unrealistically fat, that I have no clue about the size categories for clothes or that I really should be telling you about this neat paper on the semantics of talking about video games that I finished?

“Questions, questions. Many you ask. Some of the future and some of the past.”
Whoever recognizes the quote gets a cookie.

On my prejudices about polies

I has them.
I do feel a bit like am about to come out as a racist or something like that. But I want to make an important point first. I am aware that these are prejudices and blanket judgments that most likely do not mash up with reality too much. I am also aware that this might hurt some people, including my girlfriend, who is of course aware of my feelings. On a side note, are Poly/Polies and Mono/Monos acceptable terms? They are quite a bit less awkward than “poly people” et al.
This is going to be extreme and I will not pull any punches as it were. Dear polies, poly people: I apologize if it is too offensive. But writing this, setting it down and getting it out is part of dealing with it and I am hoping and working to develop a more positive stance to it all, which is not always easy since some of these things are very deeply ingrained in my emotional response patterns. It did hurt a lot.
That said here we go, straight into my black and rotten little heart.

1. Polies feel that they are superior to Monos
   Polyamory is seen as more advanced, more developed, more human, better, more natural or in some other way morally superior to monogamy. Correspondingly monos are then thought of as bad people or at least as underdeveloped people. The logic seems to be that because polies had to shed the chains of the mono-world, they feel superior to those who still feel mono.

2. Polies just want to go with their spur of the moment feelings, they don’t know what commitment means.
   I think is kind of self-explanatory. Part of monogamous commitment is not following up on feelings of attraction to third parties. The good old “in sickness and health” thing.

3. Polies are egocentric and egoistic and don’t care about anyone but themselves.
   I think this comes from my general anti-individualist leanings and in my first confrontation with polyamory I felt a lot like I was very much unimportant to Kitty as obviously all I that she saw me as in her life was a block to full-out poly-goodness. Along with this comes a sense that polies always put themselves first and would never sacrifice anything for their partner.

4. Polies have lots of sex with lots of people, often in groups.
   I suppose this is something a positive prejudice. But I feel that it entails that polies are physically attractive and that, too, makes me feel excluded. Kitty recently had a very nice experience with two girls – I’m sure she will blog about it, so no details now – and while I was happy that she was so happy about it, I was also jealous. Not jealous of the other girls, but I felt strongly that something nice like that could never happen to me.

Which brings me to some kind of conclusion. I think part of what scares me about polyamory is that I will be inadequate. That Kitty will go, have tons of lovers and she’ll experience tons of amazing things while I will be outside, forever excluded from the best parts of her life and completely incapable to achieving the same thing for myself.
And I am very sure that such a situation would be the end of our relationship. I don’t think I would be able to copy with the feelings of inadequacy that that would cause.
Thus, I am trying how I feel if I do it myself, if that is even a possibility and how I could make it work, if it is possible. Because I want this to work. Because I love Kitty. Because I want to be happy. Because it does sound intriguing and kinda sexy once you get used to the idea.
And somewhere along the way, I think the prejudices might go away and get replaced by justified opinions.

Weightloss?

Two weeks ago, I bought digital scales and started monitoring my weight. On Monday 14.09.09 I measured 106.6 kg. Didn’t measure the week after that, because I was at Kitty’s place. Today it was 104.8. I wonder how much of that is substantial and how much is circumstantial.

I renewed my okcupid account

send out two messages and got a reply from someone in California. That’s unlikely to lead to quick and easy, kinky sex but it’s a reply for starters.

TMI Tuesday

1. Have you used put anything edible on (or in) your partner’s body and then eaten it?
Yes, I have and I won’t repeat the experience. It was whipped cream on a pussy and it neither of us liked it.

2. Have you ever had an AIDS test due to reasonable suspicion or hyperactive imagination?
No. My circle of sexual contacts has been very small and the nurse was a nurse and got tested regularly.

3. Have you ever fantasized about someone else other than your partner while you were engaged in sex, oral sex, or mutual masturbation?
I think so, yes. It’s been some time and it was mostly when I was with the nurse, who was less than satisfying sexually.

4. Have you ever engaged in sex, oral sex, or mutual masturbation while in a moving car? A car being driven by someone not engaged in the sex, oral sex, or mutual masturbation?
No, only kissing or standing cars.

5. Have you ever had sex so many times or for so long that one or both people involved runs dry?
Yes, I once had sex 8 times between sleep phases and it wasn’t nice the last two times. I don’t think my partner complained, but that doesn’t mean much.

Bonus (as in optional): Name 5 things an unplanned (or planned) visitor would find in your bedroom?
I have a one room apartment, so people would find a fridge, food, my computers, lots of books and two african woodcarvings.

Are you free and in the area?

I have to preface this, I suppose with the caveat that this is interior perspective only. It’s not like I won’t do nice and intimate and maybe SMish things with Kitty in the future, it’s merely that I feel that I want sex and that I have decided to try and do something to make that come about.
Now, here’s the original post.
I have not had sex in almost 10 month, when masturbating I notice that I don’t remember how it feels to have someone by nice to my genitals. I feel pathetic, half a man or less, I have always been a very sexual person and I feel an ever stronger need to do something about it. I also love more than anything a woman who does not want sex and might not want sex – as in anything involving genitals – ever again. Since January I have worked as hard as I could on letting go, just letting her decide on when and what and how. I have ignored my own needs and urges and desires and over time have grown to find them creepy and bad and obviously not nice. I think the general structure is this:
I feel arousal. I anticipate that my arousal will only bother her, because the chance of her also feeling aroused and attracted by me is nil. Thus I try to hide it, making me feel rather uncomfortable. Repeat. Get the feeling that my arousal, my sexuality is bad and bothersome.
For most of the last ten month I had the feeling that Kitty wanted to change things, wanted to want to have sex again, basically. But that has changed and maybe that’s necessary and very good for her. It’s hell for me. I don’t know what to do with my feelings. Everything intimate and nice that I do towards her is somehow colored by that sense of not being wanted, not being desired back, being creepy, scary, even abusive – it’s not that she wouldn’t love me back, she certainly does – but it’s simply that whenever I feel like kissing, cuddling, stroking or anything else, I get that association that my wanting or needing this is bad and not allowed and that I shouldn’t want anything from her, much less anything sexual.
Scares me.
Thus, I want to feel good about myself and my sexuality again, I would like to be in someone’s company who does not make me feel that my sexual attraction to them is bad and creepy and something to be escaped. And thus I have decided to look for someone like that.
I love Kitty a lot and I will not break up with her, but I need to do something about this and since I can’t with her, it will be with someone else.
Scares me, too.
I have no idea how to do this, I am very bad at flirting, I have never picked up a woman and I am not very close to the general ideal of attractive males. And now I have to somehow do this while navigating the fact that I have a girlfriend, whom I love deeply and will not break up with. Friends with benefits, please. Benefits best include perverse, kinky and D/s-ish sex.
Feeling creeped out already? I know I am…

Creepy

Found something that fits the theme of the last post before the long silence:
Creepy guy on xkcd