That kid to the left there has just completed 56 years on this planet. It’s one of those “nondescript” birthdays – not a decade or decade and a half milestone, but it feels kinda like it ought to be a major one.

That’s because it’s got me thinking about sex. Yes, sex.

Or, more precisely, the last time I engaged in that bit of pleasure with another person. And I’m a little worried. Not so much because it’s been a shocking* while, but because the memory of the last time isn’t that great.

The guy was an internet acquaintance who’d e-mailed me because I had listed quantum physics as an interest in my AOL profile. After engaging in several e-mails and a few AOL chats we got the nerve to exchange a phone call or two and then decided we needed to meet.

He was pretty brave and made the trip to Oklahoma from Iowa, opting for a hotel. But he only stayed there one night. There was a bit of a physical spark and we pursued our impulses upon returning from an afternoon at the zoo. There weren’t exactly any fireworks, per se, but there was quite a loud siren. A tornado warning siren, to be precise. Timed perfectly to… well, you can guess.

About a month later, over the fourth of July holiday, I trekked to Iowa to visit him. There were no fireworks then, either. Both literally and figuratively. Somehow we managed to miss Independence Day fireworks. We did have a moon, though. Which was bright and vivid as viewed each night from his tree house… The sex, though, was perfunctory. We weren’t exactly clicking on other levels either, so when I left Iowa, we knew that was it.

I’m not keen on having that as my last memory of sex if it is to be my fate never to roll naked with another person for the rest of my life… or if I were to be hit by a bus next week. I am able to reach back a little farther, though, to a time when there was some damn fine sex going on – you know that scene on the train when Diane Lane is thinking about the illicit sex she’s just had in Unfaithful?- it was that good. But doesn’t long term memory get shakier with age?

See my problem here?

Now one might suggest I go for a grab and bag, but that’s not how I roll. At least… not now. I am fascinated by the evolution of the casual sex my generation propagated, though. I hear terms today like “friend-sex,” “fuck buddy,” “cuddle pal” and such. Even anonymous sex. It can certainly fuel some intriguing fantasies. However, my generation ultimately discovered, I believe, that casual sex is an oxymoron. There’s nothing casual about it.

So that is what I’m pondering on on this, the 29th of April 2007, the day of my 56th birthday, and perhaps pining for a special, er, um kind of package to come knocking on my door?

Oh, well. I guess I’ll just have to be happy with a fresh set of double A batteries and….

Sigh.

——

*I’m not going to say how long – each person has their own measure of “shockingly” long – for some it’s a week, others months… or a couple of years… or a decade… or whatever… so, I’m not going to say and don’t ask.

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