The End, beautiful friend.
Today I read a small sex scene in a favourite novel and it left me cold. I have completely lost any interest in having sex with another person and frankly I don’t care a jot. I still like erotic images and even ideas occasionally, and sex with myself feels just as good as ever. The fantasies that accompany the body-shaking orgasm though, melt into a strange notion of otherness that I don’t relate to. When I’ve drifted hazily back to normality I find I’m perfectly happy with being alone and the thought of being with anyone sexually does not seem worth the effort.
In the two years since leaving my wife I’ve had sex three times, each time a dull disappointment. It would be hard to match the sex my wife and I had though. It was never less than utterly spectacular and left us both gasping and laughing at how good it was. Now I know that’s unusual. For most of the rest of the world there’s some drop off, but in the eight years we were together, though the frequency may have declined, the sheer punching stellar quality never did. I doubt I’ll experience that again, and now I guess I’ve taken that one on board. That’s why I read that scene in the book with a degree of sang froid that I thought was notable. The realisation hit me in that moment that sex is never going to be like that again. It certainly hadn’t been anything near like fun in the one two three times since. Just have to have the emotional involvement. And where would I get that?
Right now, my social life is virtually nil. That’s OK. I’ve got through the dreadful loneliness. I’ve become used to my own company and having a flatmate again is actually a drag. I can’t muster much enthusiasm for social interaction. I like movies and plays and pictures and books and music, and unlike the Paul Simon song there’s no self-protection there, it is simply that which I’ve enjoyed since I was young. I’m glad I still have that enjoyment. I still love working and I still hate doing dirtbag jobs, so being on this study/career path that I’ve undertaken is a great source of happiness and fulfilment. I still feel the pain of loss. The separation from my children is especially acute. Generalising ever so slightly, my generation felt duty towards our parents, and it was expected that we make the effort to stay in touch with them, to write letters, to ring up, to visit. I have this feeling my children don’t find it difficult to do this with their mother. I am the one who left, after all, so what should I expect? What I have is the residual pain of having left and the ongoing pain of being the one who is less thought of and thought less of. The only cure is to swallow this hurt and make the approaches myself so I get some contact with these amazing young people I am so proud of and love so much.
I still feel pain about leaving my wife too. She took her wedding ring off very quickly. I couldn’t take mine off, not for ages. Then I wondered what the hell I was hanging on to, so off it came. I hung it on the left hand of the Chief Blue Meanie figurine Eva gave me. I kept looking at it and looking at it, so I gave in and put it back on. I love my ring. It’s the only ring I’ve ever really loved and I’m happier now I have it back on. I just feels right.
It’s funny about instincts. There are several relationships in my past when I’ve recognised final moments. Twice known when the last lovemaking was, and known it at the time. Last week when I saw Meeks, when she offered to pay for our divorce and took the signed papers away with her, I clearly saw it as the last time I would ever see her. That’s a new one. Always seen other lovers after the end. This time I understood it would be the last time. I was so focused on her face, her hair, the fact that she didn’t really want to see me, that she didn’t want to so much as sit down, that when she left the house the second time, papers in hand, I knew I would never see her again, and yet I can’t remember what she wore. I can only see her face. I can only see how quickly she wanted to go and sense the relief she felt when she was going. How I could tell that she knew too. She knew it was the last time too, and that for her the book had closed. Sex? No, thank you. Not now. What’s there now, but the dry chitinous, rattling shell. That carapace that looks like the living thing that was, but now is pithed, hollow, lifeless.
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