Sex +

This weekend my ever-politically conscience house hosted an event called a "clothing swap." Participants are encouraged to bring unwanted clothes and exchange them for others' unwanted clothes. Our clothing swap also included other activities, like hair-cutting, in an effort to encourage donations (a CISPES & Critical Resistance fundraiser).

If you entered the Hamilton abode on Sunday morning, you would have seen a clothing dozen piles throughout our three common areas. Shoes and other accessories were in the back "workroom" where I prefer to study. I was wading through shoes when I literally stumbled on a plastic bag.

I had tripped on a dildo. A dildo which looked eerily similar to the one I used to own. (Hm.)

As always, when in doubt, I ask Cyres about life's befuddlements. I ask, "Whose is that?" To which he replies with his usual unimpressed expression, "That's yours. We dug it out for the swap but since no one knew what it was made of, no one wanted it."

I looked down: I was still a less-than-proud owner of an unwanted dildo lying on the carpet beneath me. (I have real complicated feelings about dildos. More on this...sometime.)

At the Metta House, we call ourselves a "sex-positive" household. I was long-familiar with the idea, yet never fully knew what it was. So in an effort to be hip I did what any other curious but (at times) painfully shy person would do. I anonymously asked my housemates on our communal whiteboard: "How would you describe 'sex positive'?"

Of course Cyres wrote a reply (manifesto) that took up the entire board. His gist was that sex positivity was the affirmative response to a sexually repressive culture. I go through the checklist. Do I support comprehensive and age-appropriate sex education? Definitely. Do I acknowledge the broad range of sexual desires and choices that exist beyond heterosexual monogamy? For sure. Do I believe that consenting adults should inform and empower themselves about their sexual choices? Absolutely. Do I think that we, as a cultural collective, should encourage and facilitate sexual health? No doubt.

I've passed the test. But have I?

I often am very reserved and shy concerning the topic--sex. Although I gave a sociology presentation on "S&M" in college, suggested visiting a sex shop for a date this summer, and recently had a thoughtful conversation about sex, body image and gender, some people may consider me reluctantly sex-positive.

I've outed myself as a sexual conservative on more than one occasion. On a personal level, monogamy is my only option with my partner (with the expectation that I will have a life-partner); sex is contained within a monogamous relationship, in which sex is a means of reaching spiritual communion; sensuality usually prevails over sex; and a variety of sexual acts, like viewing pornography or masturbation, are never my recreation.

What's more is that I have trouble embracing certain types of sexual liberation. Indiscriminate sex, for example, or possessing many sexual partners, just confuses me. I have an intellectual understanding but I have never felt sexual liberation as independent from psychological, spiritual or psychic pain. I'm honestly not sure what this tension means.

I'll continue to reflect. Sex has been absent from my life for some time now and I do not intend to change this fact in the near future.

I am, however, surprised that I wrote this blog ;)