The Age of Innocence

Last night after my husband had gone to bed, I sat up and played around on my computer.  One of my common “playgrounds” is Facebook.  I found a new function (at least a function I hadn’t seen before) that allows one to search for members sharing common schools, workplaces, or cities.  Not only could I search for common places that I had listed in my own profile, but I could plug in other schools and workplaces.  I decided to see what would come up if I plugged in past employers and schools that friends went to.  In my own particular situation, this could prove useful in finding old classmates because my Catholic high school underwent a merger at the start of my senior year.  For reasons that are not entirely clear to me, this scattered many of the students at the all-girl Catholic high school that I went to.  A junior class of 94 students was reduced to 23 returning students at the newly merged school, the scattered students going to the public high schools in their area or to the formerly all-boy Catholic high school that saw an opportunity to acquire more students by opening their doors that fall to girls.

Okay, so I’m playing around with this and find a former student who went on to graduate in 1974 from that newly-coed Catholic high school.  She was a year behind me.  We went to parochial grade school together.  Even though we were a grade apart, that sometimes had little bearing on relationships.  A Catholic grade school back in the Baby Boom years had siblings in families throughout many of the grades.  For instance, my good friend, Mary, had her sister Becky a grade behind her.  My classmate, Carol, had her sister Patti following on her heels.  Marie’s sister, Linda, was in that younger grade as was Susan, Sharon younger sister.  Ruthann had her brother Andy in the room next door.   It was common to know what was going on with everyone else.  And if we didn’t see each other enough during the school week, there was always mass on Sunday where the families would gather together and the kids would hang out.

Patti was tagged in a photo that a classmate posted on her profile.  It was a group shot taken in the classroom in 1966 shortly into the new year when school reconvened.  As the story goes, the girls were allowed to bring a doll that they had gotten for Christmas, hence the group of Catholic school girls who all look like they’re playing the role of the madonna.  It brought back piercing memories, memories that I no longer have in photo form.  Even though the photo was in black and white, I could see in my mind the red plaid uniform jumpers with the mandatory gray sweaters that all the girls wore.  The knee socks would most likely be gray and most of the girls wore those white and black “saddle” shoes.  There was a lot of commentary under this photo about the uniform length, teachers, and other students, both those present in the photo and those absent.

For me, the kicker was seeing the little girl right in the front of the group, kneeling on the floor.  That was my neighbor, a girl who lived eight houses down the block from me.  I barely knew her until I started at the parochial grade school in 5th grade, the same year that this photo was taken.  However, during the course of the next couple of years, we became very close.  We walked to and from school together, something she had never been allowed to do before I became her friend.  She had always been driven by her father or the parent of another classmate.  However, her mother saw me as a responsible “big sister” figure and allowed Lori to do things in my company that she hadn’t been permitted to do earlier.  If she was with me, it was often okay!

We spent a lot of time together over the course of our remaining grade school days together which continued through 8th grade for me.  I went on to the high school in the same building and she joined me the year after.  We spent tons of hours together on the weekends, and summers were spent in a constant state of travel between her house and my house.  For a time in our lives, we were inseparable.  We called each other “twins.”  I loved her, and I think that she loved me.  I remember going away for a few weeks one summer in Pennsylvania, and she wrote everyday.  (This was 1968 — much, much before the age of cell phones and e-mail!)  Often she would write things like, “I miss you!  It’s not the same here without you!  I picked up the phone to call you last night but then remembered you weren’t there.  How many days until you come back?”

Of course, as soon as I set foot back home after that vacation, I was out the door and down the street to Lori’s house!

We spent less and less time together as the high school days went on, and the most significant factor was boys.  She had a boyfriend and I had a boyfriend.  My boyfriend became my fiance the summer before the start of my senior year in high school.  Lori was going steady with a boy a grade ahead of her and they were talking about getting married when he was finished with college.  So, yeah, things like that have a way of taking girlfriends away from each other. I think it was soon after I was married that I felt a need to reconnect with Lori.  I felt her absence in my life.  I valued her friendship.  I realized what I was letting slip away because my focus was so much on the newness of my situation.  I reached out to her to resume a closer friendship again and she seemed to welcome that.

Fast-forward another year or so.  I was a young woman trying to find out where my sexual orientation fit into my life.  I knew that I was bisexual.  (I was one of these women who never considered my bisexuality as a stepping stone to becoming a lesbian.  No matter who my primary relationship is with, I am and will always be bisexual.  How I act on that is another matter.)  It was a tough matter.  There was no one other than my husband to talk to.  With the exception of a couple of gay young men I knew, I had no  one to talk things over with, no one to be myself with.  In a nutshell, I was lonely and frustrated with the ” in the closet” situation.

I fumblingly attempted to tell Lori.  It took several tries but I eventually came out with it.  I wanted her to know because she was the friend closest to me, and I cared that I could be myself with her.  If I couldn’t be myself with her, then I was losing a great deal in the process.  I think that she was confused and didn’t much know what to do with that information.  After all, why would I be telling her these things unless I was trying to put the moves on her?  I knew she was straight and I knew what lines not to cross, but I don’t think that she understood that.  It always seem to come back to the response, “I accept you for who you are as long as you realize I’m straight and not interested.”  (Okay, got it!  Do you get it?)

I moved several states away from our home city, and we conducted a long distance relationship via the U.S. Mail over the next several years.  As I began a new life in a much more liberal city, I opened the doors to the possibilities inherent in my orientation.  I wanted to know more about it.  I wanted to examine the issues.  I wanted to know people who had been in my shoes, who were dealing with the same kind of issues.  As I got involved in groups and activities, I told Lori about it.  She quit signing her letters “Love….”  She no longer wanted to be that close to me.  I had given her too much information.  No, I was not free to be myself with this person.

I seldom made trips to my hometown, but my husband and I did the summer of 1982.  I asked if we could stay with her for a couple of nights as we were heading back home.  She agreed and set us up on an air mattress in her guest room.

The following day after our arrival, we had plans out and about, and she asked if we’d be around for supper.  I said that we would be.  She took some chicken out to thaw.  I went out for a lunch date with a friend and my husband spent some time in other pursuits, and we joined up again around mid-afternoon.  We went back to Lori’s apartment.  She wasn’t there.  We hung around, expecting her to come home soon.  She didn’t.  Suppertime came and went.  No Lori.  I put her chicken in the refrigerator.  We waited until about 6:30 and then called out for a pizza.  We ate our pizza, hung around the apartment, and finally went to bed around 9:30 or 10:00.  We heard Lori come home sometime between 10:30 and 11:00.  We didn’t bother to get up.  What the hell was going on?

The following morning, we were up and dressed when Lori finally got out of bed.  The phone rang soon thereafter.  She said, “My mom needs me for something.”  (Her parents lived a couple of blocks away.)  She left the apartment.  After an hour-and-a-half, I said to my husband, “Let’s blow this pop stand.  She’s not coming back.  I don’t know what’s going on but I’m not going to stand around playing this game.”  We left the apartment keys she had loaned us and got on the road to rack up some miles towards our return trip.

There was never any explanation.  I’ve kept track of her from time to time through telephone listings so I’ve had an address.  On a few occasions, I’ve sent a letter or a card.  Now she’s on Facebook, and our paths are coming precariously close to crossing if we wanted them to.  However, she has never responded to any of those cards and letters.  There has never been any further acknowledgment of my existence.

I’ve always blamed it on “TMI.”  She couldn’t handle the sum of myself that I wanted to share with her.  I didn’t have a grasp of the situation at the time.  I didn’t know when to keep my mouth shut.

I have never brought it up with her in those letters and cards I’ve sporadically sent.  I’ve always blamed it on my bisexuality, but perhaps it isn’t that. Perhaps her complete withdrawal was something more personal to her life and she was too embarrassed or ashamed to share it with me.  I don’t know.   All I know is that I’ve carried the burden of the guilt for whatever happened to destroy this friendship.  I blame myself.

Some people are never forgotten.  She will always be one of them.

On My Own Terms

Often, when my husband is traveling on business, I will rent a movie from Netflix that may be something he wouldn’t particularly be interested in.  Usually they’re suspense or horror films that don’t appeal to him, but sometimes they’re “chick flicks” or a movie from the GLBT genre.  Last night’s selection was Chasing Amy, a movie released in 1997.  It showed at some of our indie theaters at the time, and it was recommended to me by a friend who saw it, but I hadn’t seen it until last night.  And it wasn’t quite what I expected.

My friend who recommended it to me back around the time it came out said that it was about bisexuality, a subject near and dear to my heart — and to my friend’s as well!  I suppose in a certain sense the movie could be about bisexuality, but not in the stereotypical sense of a bi woman freely having partners of both sexes.  (That is the stereotypical version of bisexuality, and that isn’t often the reality of people’s lives!)

It is about a young, gorgeous woman, Alyssa Jones, who is very out as a lesbian.  She and this guy meet because they are both involved in writing and publishing their own comic books.  They travel in the same circle of acquaintances.  They hit it off and start hanging out together as friends.  Holden is very aware that Alyssa is a lesbian because Alyssa is open and honest about it and invites Holden’s questions and comments.  Holden falls in love with her and finally tells her of his love, in one of the eloquent scenes I have ever seen.  Alyssa freaks out, but within minutes after the freak-out, she and Holden are in each other’s arms.  A sexual relationship develops.

Holden and Alyssa have just made love and are lying together when this dialogue takes place:

HOLDEN: Can I ask you something?

ALYSSA:  Don’t even tell me you want to do it again.

HOLDEN: Why me – you know?  Why now?

ALYSSA: Because you were giving me that look, and I got wet…

HOLDEN:  You know what I’m talking about.

ALYSSA: Why not you?

HOLDEN: I’m a guy.  You’re attracted to girls.

ALYSSA: I see you’ve been taking notes.  Historically, yes, that’s true.

HOLDEN: Then why this?

ALYSSA: I’ve given that a lot of thought, you know?  I mean, now that I’m being ostracized by my friends, I’ve had a lot of time to think about all of this.  And what I’ve come up with is really simple: I came to this on my terms.  I didn’t just heed what I was taught, you know?  Men and women should be together, it’s the natural way – that kind of thing.  I’m not with you because of what family, society, life tried to instill in me from day one.  The way the world is – how seldom you meet that one person who gets you… it’s so rare.   My parents didn’t really have it.  There was no example set for me in the world of male/female relationships.  And to cut oneself off from finding that person – to immediately half your options by eliminating the possibility of finding that one person within your own gender… that just seemed stupid. So I didn’t.  And by leaving my options open, I was branded ‘gay,’ which to me was no big deal – labels are labels, you know?  They define what you do, not who you are, I guess.

But then you come along.  You – the one least likely; I mean, you were a guy.

HOLDEN: Still am.

ALYSSA: And while I was falling for you, I put a ceiling on that, because you were a guy.  Until I remembered why I opened the door to women in the first place – to not limit the likelihood of finding that one person who’d compliment me so completely.  And so here we are, I was thorough when I looked for you, and I feel justified lying in your arms – because I got here on my terms, and have no question that there was someplace I didn’t look.  And that makes all the difference.

HOLDEN: Shit.

ALYSSA: What?

HOLDEN: Well, you took the luster out of it.

ALYSSA: What luster?

HOLDEN: (joking – in case you didn’t get it)  Of how I brought you back from the other side.  How all you needed was the right man to turn you around.

ALYSSA: You’re not the right man. (kisses him) You’re just the one.

This was powerful stuff to me because I know exactly how Alyssa feels in this scene.  She is embracing her fluidity, her range of emotions and desires, her complexity, in spite of what labels she may have previously accepted about herself. She recognizes that if she refuses to allow her feelings for Holden on the basis that she is a lesbian, then she has done the exact thing that she rebelled against as teen and young adult when she refused to accept heterosexuality as the path of least resistance.

Exactly what I did, except I never declared myself a lesbian.  And because I didn’t but remained steadfast in my acknowledgment of my sexual attraction to women, I was not accepted by and large by my peers who identified as lesbians.  I was called a “fence-sitter,” one of those who are stuck in that phase of not being able to make up their minds.  I heard more times than I can recount, “You’re just afraid to come out as the lesbian you really are.”

No, I’m not afraid to do anything.  I always said that it would be a hell of a lot easier to come out as a lesbian, to be one of those woman for whom a relationship with a man just isn’t even a consideration, than to be very aware of my sexual fluidity and choose only those labels — bisexuality, pansexuality, fluid sexuality — that embrace what I am.   I’m not going to say I’m a lesbian if I’m not.  Furthermore, I don’t tell anyone that I’m straight, either, because I’m not.  I’m just about anything but that!

I’m not afraid to be a woman who finds joy in loving someone of my own gender, but nor am I afraid to make a committed life with the one person who really “gets me,” even if that person is a man.  He “gets me,” and I have all that I really need.  It’s more than many people have even after a lifetime of searching.

Highly Disturbing

Once more, Facebook has connected me with a part of my past.  Probably a year or so ago, a person who was a high school classmate of mine for a couple of years joined Facebook.  We became “friends” on Facebook, even though I haven’t seen her in person since I was in my teens.  I exchanged a couple of letters with her in the late 1970s/early ’80s, and that has been the extent of any contact with her.  Through Facebook, I’ve also reconnected in a sense with her twin sister and another high school classmate.

And then there is Jayne, my best friend in high school and my first female lover.  Cathy, Carolyn, Becky, Jayne, Mary Ann, and I were all a little clique in high school, a group of people who were maybe a little “fringy” in our own way.  Cathy and Jayne have remained close over the years, both deeply religious and completely submerged in a hardcore sort of Catholicism, even though neither of them was when I knew them in high school.

My best friendship with Jayne spanned all of high school, and we were lovers from the end of our sophomore year to halfway through our senior year.  I know that both of us struggled with the meaning of that at the time.  After all, we were mere teenagers with a lot of life and a lot of wisdom and perspective to gain.

My relationship with her ended on a very bad note, one that I don’t care to elaborate on in this post.  Let’s just say that it ended with me destroying all my photos of her, tearing up letters, and returning every gift she had ever given me, including the little gold pinkie ring with the small diamond in the center of the band that I always wore.  She had a matching one that she bought for herself.

I felt very weird when I saw that Jayne had become Facebook friends with Cathy, Carolyn and Becky last year.  I could see her comments on their updates.  I’ve been able to see status updates on her profile.  I haven’t engaged her in any way, wanting to keep my distance that I’ve maintained all these years, but it felt odd and uncomfortable just having her as close as my “friends” on Facebook.

A shocking thing occurred, though, when I glanced at her profile page and discovered this link she had posted:

The Three Myths
About Homosexuality
Myth #1
Homosexuality is normal and biologically determined.

The truth…
There is no scientific research indicating a biological or genetic cause for homosexuality. Biological factors may play a role in the predisposition to homosexuality. However, this is true of many other psychological conditions.
Research suggests that social and psychological factors are strongly influential. Examples include problems in early family relationships, sexual seduction, and sense of inadequacy with same-sex peers, with resulting disturbance in gender identity. Society can also influence a sexually questioning youth when it encourages gay self-labeling.

Myth #2
Homosexuals cannot change, and if they try, they will suffer great emotional distress and become suicidal. Therefore, treatment to change homosexuality must be stopped.

The truth…
Psychotherapists around the world who treat homosexuals report that significant numbers of their clients have experienced substantial healing. Change has come through psychological therapy, spirituality, and ex-gay support groups. Whether leading married or committed celibate lives, many report that their homosexual feelings have diminished greatly, and do not trouble them as much as they had in the past.
The keys to change are desire, persistence, and a willingness to investigate the conscious and unconscious conflicts from which the condition originated. Change comes slowly, usually over several years. Clients learn how to meet their needs for same-sex nurturance and affirmation without eroticizing the relationship. As they grow into their heterosexual potential, men and women typically experience a deeper and fuller sense of themselves as male or female.

If some homosexuals do not wish to change, that is their choice, yet it is profoundly sad that gay-rights activists struggle against the right-to-treatment for other homosexuals who yearn for freedom from their attractions.

Myth #3
We must teach our children that homosexuality is as normal and healthy as heterosexuality. Teenagers should be encouraged to celebrate their same-sex attractions.

The truth…
Scientific research supports age-old cultural norms that homosexuality is not a healthy, natural alternative to heterosexuality. Research shows that gay teens are especially vulnerable to substance abuse and early, high-risk sexual behavior. It does far more harm than good to tell a teenager that his or her attractions toward members of the same sex are normal and desirable. Teens in this position need understanding and counseling, not a push in the direction of a potentially deadly lifestyle.
A 1992 study in Pediatrics found that 25.9% of 12-year-olds are uncertain if they are gay or straight. The teen years are critical to the question of self-labeling, so the facts must be presented in our schools in a fair and balanced manner.

It is never too late…

________________________________________________

I’m in such shock that this could possibly be the same woman I knew in high school, the one who wrote in a letter to me at the beginning of our senior year, “I love you. It is as simple and as complicated as that. I know that my life is meant to be with you….”

How does a person go from being willingly and apparently joyfully involved in a same-sex relationship to something like this?  Denial?  Rationalization?  Brainwashing?  Actually, any words of understanding would be greatly appreciated!

Amongst the jumble of things that I feel about this, I am grateful that I did not continue a relationship with the person who holds the honor in my heart of being my first female lover.  I was at that time and have continued to be a woman who respects those feelings, who finds pleasure and beauty in those feelings, who upholds the rights of others in the GLBT community to be fully who and what they are.  I am so totally on the other end of the spectrum from this person who was many years ago one of the closest people to me.

I know that many years and many experiences have separated us, but it still is incredible to me how these wildly divergent paths could exist, considering that we walked the same path at one time, our arms around each other.

Happy Birthday, Lauren Grace!

Happy birthday, Lauren Grace. Today and always, I’m wishing you a lifetime of rewards and riches, peace and happiness. I’m so proud to call you my friend!

A Mixed Up Life but Whose?

As some of my friends on WordPress and MyFace know, my husband and I recently offered our home to a 42-year-old friend whom I met through a blog about a year ago and her 11-year-old son.  For purposes of this post, I will call them Vickie and John.

Vickie has had a life full of challenges.  She comes from a dysfunctional family where there was a history of childhood physical, emotional and sexual abuse.  Her father abused both her and her younger sister.  The younger sister, Vickie’s only sibling,  died some years back of cancer at the age of 32.  Vickie no longer has any contact with her parents.  The dynamics were just too dysfunctional to deal with and she did not want to expose her son to those dynamics.

As is often and sadly the case, Vickie married a man who was abusive.  She was married to him for 14 years.  The final straw was when he started to beat up on their young son.  At that point, Vickie loaded up everything she could into a rundown Toyota Corolla and set off on her own from Fort Worth, eventually settling in San Antonio, Texas.

During the time preceeding her divorce, she met a man through an Internet group who lived in the U.K.  A longterm relationship ensued, with Mike making many short visits here to the U.S. and Vickie and John spending six months at one stretch in England with him.  However, Vickie and John couldn’t stay in England as much as they wanted to because of custody issues concerning John, a minor, even though his father really had no role in taking care of John.  He’s a gameplayer and a manipulator and just wants to make sure that no one else gets what they want.  Vickie and John returned to the U.S., leaving Mike in England. 

Vickie and Mike married when he was in Texas for a visit a year ago.  He’s been back for one visit since then.  The plan was to begin the legal immigration process in earnest after the first of this year when Vickie got her income tax refund and could afford to hire an immigration lawyer to help them move this process along with as few glitches as possible.  They were trying to get Mike here on a spousal visa, requiring that the U.S. spouse be gainfully employed.

Vickie lost her job the end of January when her company eliminated 300 jobs nationwide due to the severe recession that is going on in our country.  She was living paycheck to paycheck with no substantial savings to speak of.  She received a month’s severance pay from her employer.  That and a tax refund she had yet to receive was what she had to fall back on short-term.

She wanted to leave Texas and put some miles between her and her ex-spouse who is psychopathic and skilled at playing tormenting mind-games, leaving her constantly on edge and vigilant about her and John’s safety and wellbeing.  The bottom line is that Dave and I offered her and John our home until she could get on her feet again.  Dave flew to San Antonio on February 23, rented a U-Haul truck, and drove Vickie, John and their possessions to Minnesota.

They have been here two weeks now.  All is going well.  John started school on Monday this week and loves his new school and his classes.  Vickie is applying for jobs.  We have shopped for interview clothes for her.  There have been a steady supply of hugs and “love you’s” in our home.   We’re all working together as a family, as a team.  For the first time in Vickie and John’s lives, they feel like they have a family, a support system.  It’s been an awesome feeling to watch them take all this in, to realize that they’re not alone in the world to struggle with their issues, that there are others right there for them, ready to lend a hand.

The response from family (mostly Dave’s) and friends has been overwhelmingly supportive and positive. However, yesterday I received this email from my 73-year-old cousin in Ohio:

Fiction: Breaking the Rules, con’t

She supposed that she should have been surprised when their lips met that first time at the conclusion of a Friday evening at her house spent talking, sipping wine, and contemplating the approaching Christmas holiday, her first as a single woman again.  It had started out with an impulsive good-bye kiss by the door leading to the garage before he faced the cold night and went home to Vince, the man who had shared his life for seven years but had gone alone to his work group’s Christmas party that evening, ever worried that coming out as a gay man to his fellow teachers would jeopardize his job.    One gentle kiss had led to deeper kisses, until they were necking like a couple of teenagers and out-of-breath from the sudden and unanticipated excitement.  Eventually they were back on the living room couch, hands roaming underneath sweaters and fingers furtively exploring waistbands, trying to decipher the combination of buckles, buttons, snaps, and zippers that might eventually pose an obstacle.

As his hand stroked the bare skin of her smooth belly and finally reached up to cup one bra-covered breast,  she had wondered briefly if she would be called upon to teach him about a woman’s body, a role she had never assumed before.  She had married the first man she had slept with, and he had been the older, more experienced partner, assuming the dominant role in their sexual relationship at first.  She hadn’t been with a man since moving out of the house a year earlier that she and Terry had shared.

However, Randy hadn’t been shy or hesitant as he undressed her that night, his hands caressing her with slow, langorous strokes as he removed her sweater and her bra, his fingers deft as he reached behind her to unfasten the row of hooks.   His lips seemed experienced as they left a silken trail down her neck, followed the curve of her collarbone, and nuzzled the cleft between her breasts.    In no rush to move heatedly to other things, he drew  each nipple gently between his lips, coaxing first one and then the other into taut, swollen arousal.  When she thought she could stand no more, he cupped her breasts with both hands and brought them together, his tongue dancing over one hard, aching nipple and then the other.

She had arched her back and whimpered, the intensity of her pleasure nearly painful.  “Please, Randy!” she had pleaded, her voice a husky whisper.  “It’s been so long!  I can’t be left hanging like this tonight.”  A wave of confusion and hopelessness washed over her at the blatant desperation in her voice, and she closed her eyes against the hot threat of tears.  What did she possibly expect him to do about her plight?

He took her warmly into his arms, his bare torso electrifying against her own fevered skin, and murmured, “Don’t worry, we won’t leave you hanging,” and then eased her back on the couch.  She drew in shuddery breaths as he unfastened her jeans and slid them down her legs.  As he drew her panties down and dropped them beside her jeans on the floor, she expected that he would move to lie on top of her between her splayed thighs in response to her pleas for release.  And she was prepared to let him.

But, no, this was no typical man!

He had slid off the couch and to his knees beside her, kissing her belly, the curve of her waist, moving lower, and lower still.  His hands coaxed her legs apart as he kissed the soft inner surface of each thigh, moist with the abundant fluid of her arousal.  And then his mouth was there, hungry and eager.  His tongue probed and explored all of her secret places,  savoring the textures and flavors.  He sucked and tugged gently on her, caressed the center of her with swirling, penetrating licks, and finally, at long last, sought her most sensitive spot, making broad, rhythmic sweeps over it.

She had shuddered violently and cried out as his mouth sent wave after wave of incredible pleasure surging through her.  His tongue did not stray from its mark until every last spasm had had its way with her.  And even then, he continued to nuzzle her gently with his lips, those soft, sporadic kisses wringing unexpected tremors from deep within her.

He seemed content to stay where he was, and she had closed her eyes, holding his head gently in her hands and stroking his hair as his lips continued to move softly and slowly against her.  She had already had a very powerful orgasm, but those kisses bestowed so tenderly, so intimately, on the most sensitive part of her being were exquisite beyond words.  So giving, so loving, so undemanding…

She gave herself over to the pleasure gently radiated through her, her head falling back against the couch pillows, her thoughts not on whether or not she would come, whether or not he would come,  whose turn it was to do what to whom.  Her babbling mind uncharacteristically silent, she just felt the warmth, the sensuality of it all, and immersed herself in it.  There was nothing else for those moments but the feel of his coarse hair beneath her hands, the delicate sound of his caressing lips, the incredible sensation of his mouth covering her and gently drawing her in, holding her for a moment, then letting her slip away between his lips.  Drawing her in, oh so tenderly, letting her go, again and yet again, very much like she might do to him.  His tongue then lightly brushed her clitoris, so engorged and amazingly, unbelievably more sensitive than before.

Her hips began to move with abandon, and he was there with her, instinctively quickening his pace, taking his cues from her writhing movements like an expert dancer.  A second, even more intense orgasm exploded inside her, and she cried out again, her eyes wide with the sudden,  startling force of it.  Once again, he rode with her to the finish, bringing her down gradually from the dizzying heights.

As the room around her came back into focus, she realized the tears streaming from her eyes, and she opened her arms to him, wanting to hold him tightly to her.  He had eased back onto the couch, covering her naked body with his own and stroked the damp hair from her forehead,  kissed away the trail of tears on her face.  His penis was rock-hard against her thigh…

Sorry to leave you hanging, dear Reader, but the section that followed needed a little work.  I’m chipping away at it!

Fiction: Breaking the Rules

On the surface she led a quiet and conventional life, at least conventional for a woman in the 1980s.  Adding that qualifier meant that her mother disapproved, and that qualifier had been added to more than a few things in her life!

She was divorced, had just turned thirty-six, and shared her suburban townhouse with two cats, Cassidy (frequently called “Mama Cass”) and Jasper, an undemanding, affectionate gray tom.  A sedate dark green Honda Accord sat in the two-stall garage, recently paid off after three years of payments.  Her closet was full of conservative sweaters, blouses, and skirts, emphasizing her role as a serious-minded, gainfully-employed professional.  She was still a practicing Catholic – earning her mother’s approval for at least one thing! – and attended mass on most Sundays.  Her freezer contained a carton of single-serving  cheese pizzas for a quick-to-grab lunch or supper for those remaining Fridays during the current Lenten season.  Until a couple of months ago, she had been a member of a Catholic Singles group which met on Wednesday evenings.  The topic of annulment came up frequently at these functions, the only way a divorced Catholic could marry again and remain in good standing with the Church.  Unless, of course, the ex-spouse had died.  Hers hadn’t, the last she had heard.  But, then again, she hadn’t spoken to the man in better than five years.

Peggy eased herself from underneath the covers and padded softly to the bathroom.  She could sleep in a little this morning since she was not required to be at the clinic until 11:00.  Unfortunately, her bladder didn’t like to sleep in much past 6:00!  Jasper silently jumped off the bed and trotted behind her into the bathroom, knowing that enough weaving between her feet and meowing would probably secure his breakfast before his human companion returned to bed.

This had been part of her unchanging routine for a number of years.  She facilitated a group therapy session every Tuesday evening and had for most of her years as a nurse-psychotherapist at Franklin Behavioral Health Center.  She was almost never home before 10:00 on those evenings, and a later start on Wednesday was compensation for the late night before.

She made a quick trip to the kitchen to pour a cupful of kibble into Jasper’s empty bowl (the one with Psycho Kitty printed on the side, although it had been purchased with “Mama Cass” in mind) and then returned to the bedroom.

 ”‘Morning, love,” Randy murmured, reaching out to her as she slid in beside him.

 It was still dark, wouldn’t be full light outside for almost another two hours, and the house was cool.  The bed was comforting with the warmth of his body next to hers.  She molded herself against him as he drew her close, pressing her buttocks into that perfect “chair” made by his hips and slightly-flexed thighs as they spooned on their sides.  He tightened his embrace as she settled in, and she felt him begin to swell and lengthen, the growing firmness nuzzling her backside.  She knew that this Wednesday morning would begin as so many had in the past: drowsy cuddling and whispers, warm fondling and caresses, his expert knowledge of her body bringing her to several effortless climaxes before he finally allowed his own.

All so conventional.  All so routine.

But just on the surface.

 

 

Her mother didn’t know about Randy in spite of their longstanding relationship, and perhaps never would.  Her pastor had been introduced to him as a “friend” after an Ash Wednesday mass several years earlier, a morning service that they had attended together before departing in separate cars to drive to the same office building to begin their workday.  Randy, in fact, had co-facilitated that Tuesday evening therapy group with her for quite some time, and they functioned well as a team, consulting on cases with each other and acting as co-therapists in family counseling sessions.  Their mutual coworkers realized that they shared a warm friendship, but given the nature of their jobs, that was hardly a surprise.  It was not fodder for clinic gossip, and they were not considered a couple in the personal sense, just a well-tuned and sensitive professional team.

Mainly because Randy was gay.  Openly gay.  Out and proud!  as the saying went.

She had encouraged his honesty when he came to work for the clinic as a young man with the ink still wet on his Master’s thesis.  She respected him for his courage, his intelligence, his insight.  Everyone there had accepted and liked him.

Likewise, he had supported her when she made the decision at about that same time to end her nine-year marriage.  That had been a very tough time, and he had been there for her, with a joke, a funny card tucked in her desk drawer, pieces of her favorite candy planted in her coat pockets.  Sometimes it was just his caring silence and the warmth of his hand in hers that comforted her.  Unlike so many of her friends, he wasn’t afraid to just shut up and be with her!

He was different from the other guys she knew.  He was different from the other friends she had.  A part of her had attributed this difference, this breath of fresh air, to his gayness.  She had never felt so open, so honest, so completely herself as she did when they were debating an issue,  winding down after a late Tuesday night group over a chili-burger and a beer at Hinkel’s Grill, or improvising an upbeat piano duet at a coworker’s holiday party.

A gay man had become her closest friend.  It was as simple as that.

Or was it?

(Continued here but password-protected to prevent sensitive individuals from unwanted exposure to adult situations, nudity, and frank descriptions of sexuality.)

Tucson on My Mind

Tucson Sunset 2-11-09

Skyhigh Saguaro

Created by Disney?

Unique Saguaro

On May 9, 2008, a reader of this blog introduced herself.  I began to read her blog and she remained a consistent reader of mine.  We became friends since miles do not matter when one is using the internet to communicate.  She asked if I’d want to consider getting away from a cold, Minnesota winter and come to visit her in Tucson sometime.  Well, I decided that sooner was better than later and took her up on her offer this winter.  I flew out to Tucson on the morning of February 11 and returned on Monday of this week.  (A day later… but that’s another story!)

The Tucson Symphony Friday evening was delightful.  Watching the sunset from “A Mountain” overlooking Tucson was inspiring.  Magpie’s Gourmet Pizza was just about the best pizza I’ve ever had and deserves “The Best Pizza in Tucson” award it has gotten for 19 years in a row.  I enjoyed authentic Mexican food, my friend’s cats, and eating chocolate cake while watching riftgirl videos on YouTube.    I met new friends, gazed at a starlit Sonoran sky, and received a personal guided tour of both the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum and the Amity Circle Tree Ranch by friends employed by each of these organizations.

But what I enjoyed most was the uninhibited joy of being accepted and loved for the unconventional, liberal woman I am.  Those four days were the boost my soul needed. 

In my day to day life here in the BiCities, I’m… well, my real name isn’t Kinsey.  I’m in my early 50s, married for 35 years and happily so, and am professionally employed in a scientific, intellectually challenging field.  I work with a bunch of other married ladies in a field comprised of at least 75% women, and they all know me as that coworker who has been married since forever, and they don’t know anything else about my personal life.

I leave it at that because bisexuality and polyfidelity are too complicated for most people to understand.  In day to day interaction with people I work with, I don’t say, “Yes, I’m married, but I’ve also had female lovers throughout the years of my marriage, and I’d really, really like to have a long-term, intimate relationship with a woman.”   No, no, I don’t go there, understandably!  I’m out to two gay coworkers who know I’m far from straight and narrow, and that’s as far as that sharing of my personal life goes.

Other than those two gay coworkers, though, I’m just a conventional married woman to everyone else.

That IS part of me.   The married part, the part that finds men attractive (well, okay, an occasional one now and then!),  the part of me who has been in a long-term heterosexual relationship for most of my life now is a valid and recognized component of who I am.  I’m not playing a role.  I’m not cleverly disguised as someone I’m not.   I’ve found fulfillment and pleasure in my marriage and I will continue to do so.

However, I am so very attracted to women as well.  I love my friendships with them.  I derive energy and emotional fulfillment from their laughter, their beauty, their gentleness and wise insights into the world, their valuing of relationships.  I take strength from their resiliency.    Physical intimacy with a woman takes me to places of exquisite joy.  All of this is an important and vital part of me, intricately linked within the tapestry of who I am.

Can I bring this out for the world to see in the course of my daily life?  Not too often!  Perhaps if I’m out for an evening on the town with a LGBT friend.  Then, certainly.  If I’m at a meeting or a conference pertaining to a GLBT topic, then of course.  If I’m at our Pride event in June, I’m OUT.    Day to day, though, with people I work with, with straight friends who know only what I’ve told them, with family… no, not OUT so much.    I’m that married woman, presumably straight.

But then there are these interludes: Pride, the BECAUSE Conference, a vacation away with GLBT friends and their allies; hell, a trip away to stay  with my lesbian cousin in Pennsylvania!  All these things bring out a sense of well-being, if not downright euphoria, because it’s acknowledging and embracing the part of me that doesn’t get much recognition and acceptance.  It’s a bringing together of the pieces, a unifying of the whole.  Exilarating?

Ya, you betcha.

Much love to my Tucson friends.  Don’t forget about me now, you hear?

Cherry Hill Park

I had my first sexual relationship with a girl who was my high school best friend. We were best friends during 9th grade and until the very end of 10th grade. In May at the end of that sophomore year in high school, we made love for the first time, nervous about what it potentially labeled us but reveling in the pleasure nonetheless.

Early in our senior year of high school, after I had been engaged for several months, she wrote me a letter, written on stationery that I had given her as a gift. (Yes, it was somewhat of a gag gift. She had constipation problems, and I found this stationery at Spencer Gifts with a box of Ex-Lax printed on the header.) I remember that it began, “I love you. It is as simple and as complicated as that.” It went on to say, “I know that my life is meant to be with you, but if I can’t be with you, then I will marry Steve…”

The truth? Steve aside and Dave aside, we could not have made it together as a couple. We were both from heavily dysfunctional families. I was trying to keep my head above water and later earned myself the title “survivor.” She was going under for the third time, very depressed, periodically suicidal, turning to marijuana, alcohol and street drugs as self-medication, and refusing any encouragement to seek professional counseling. I would not have lasted long in such an intimate relationship. That’s the bottom line and the truth when people ask, “What happened to that high school girlfriend you speak of?”

I still do think of her from time to time, even though 35 years has passed since the last I saw her. Every now and then, something will trigger a memory. For me, it often is music. I was playing some CDs this evening after Dave went to bed, the headphones clamped on and the volume up. I selected some compilations that had hits from the 60s and 70s on them. One of Jayne’s favorite songs was “Cherry Hill Park” by Billy Joe Royal, and I remember being up in her bedroom one evening, pleasuring each other, while the phonograph played this 45 over and over again.

“Oh, Mary Hill sure was fun down in Cherry Hill Park.
Playing games with everyone ’til way after dark…”

I hope you’re okay, babe, and I really do wish that things could have been different.

Impressions of Women Circa 1960s

I wrote this little piece about ten years ago. I have taken it from my “archives” and reprinted it here because it addresses another facet of my personality and development as a woman who was born in 1955. It is as follows:

I have been a writer since early adolescence. That was when I began to express my fears, anxieties, and frustrations about my chaotic homelife, and just the generally chaotic business of growing up, by way of short-story fiction. I needed a strong, guiding figure in my life so I created my own “parent” in the fictional guise of Michael James Peters, a pediatrician who was at that time in his early 40s with a wife and six kids. I started out writing about his interactions with his adolescent patients, adolescent medicine being his specialty area, and left no area off-limits. (I seemed to be particularly fascinated with 16-year-olds contracting STDs. Considering that this was 1969, I was a little before my time!) I delved into a highly sensitive area when I created one of Mike Peters’ patients, a 13-year-old boy by the name of Randy Kelly who was in an abusive home and took Mike into his confidence. When Randy was assaulted by his stepfather and required hospitalization, it was Mike and his wife, Gloria, who stepped up to the plate to take Randy in as a foster son. (Can you imagine my mother’s horror when she discovered this story, penciled in a school notebook by her eighth grade daughter? The original draft somehow just *vanished!*)

I made many discoveries about myself through this writing over the years and let my therapist read some of those stories some years back. Since my own self-esteem issues were part of the therapeutic discussions, he asked me, “Why did you make Gloria this nonexistent character? What’s up with that?” This is what I wrote in response to that question:

In the original “Behind Door #3″ story, Gloria is a nonexistent character. All the interaction takes place between Mike (her husband) and Randy while Gloria typically sleeps through these major episodes. Bruce [my therapist] was the one who pointed this out to me. He observed that Mike is this strong, sensitive, professional, intelligent (and good-looking) man, and he’s married to this woman who apparently has no personality and no major contributions to make. Bruce asked me if I really thought that a man such as Mike Peters would be married to such a nondescript woman. He further pressed me to think about why I had developed her that way to begin with.

I thought long and hard about it and realized that I did not have a very positive impression of womanhood. I really didn’t have positive female role models in my personal life when I was growing up. I wanted to be exactly the opposite of my mother, as a matter of fact! My father was my supportive parent, the one I turned to for understanding, comfort and strength.

The social climate at the time I was growing up further reinforced my impression of women as ornamental rather than functional, as weak rather than competent. Of course, a lot of it was gleaned from television: the early sit-coms of “The Donna Reed Show,” “Leave It To Beaver,” “Ozzie & Harriet,” “Father Knows Best.” The husband and father was always going off to work at the office to accomplish great things and provide for his family, while his wife just stayed at home in her dress, high heels, and pearls and put wonderful meals on the table for her family to enjoy when they came home. If anything serious happened on the show, “Dad/Dear” had to be called in to the rescue to deal with the crisis.

The commercials, however, were the worst of all. Women fretted about such important things in life as “ring around the collar” and “ugly wax build-up” on their kitchen floors. They were devastated if their husbands complained about stale sandwiches in their lunchboxes because she didn’t use the right plastic wrap or their glassware came out of the dishwasher with water spots. My personal feeling was, “If this is what women do with their lives, just take me out and shoot me now!”

Likewise, my upbringing and my Catholic schooling reinforced this message that women were weak and dependent. Even though I was a straight-A student and began talking about being a doctor when I was about twelve, my mother would look at me like I had my head up my butt and advise, “You’d better take typing and shorthand, anyway….just in case your husband is ever out of work. Then you’ll have something to fall back on.”

Of course, the nuns thought it great when a Catholic girl had the noble aspirations to be a good wife and mother. Academic performance didn’t really count for much. The straight-A college preppies got no more encouragement towards career goals and personal achievements than their average counterparts in Home Ec and Secretarial Skills 101.

I realize that I did not like the messages I was getting about women’s roles in our culture. Unconsciously, I aligned myself with the male world where I felt more emotionally comfortable, where individuals were encouraged to achieve and succeed, where it was expected that one would show strength and competency.

It took me quite awhile to realize that women are strong, competent, intelligent people, too. That was when I consciously began to work on developing the character of Gloria Peters, trying to turn her into a woman I could be proud of. Of course, in the process, I was trying to change my own attitudes about myself and my perception of the female role…