Day 10: Babies of All Sorts

"Hold That Exhibit For Me!" For the lover of all things art-related to show you're a sophisticated student of the world.

I realize we can't have it all in this life, but is a little politeness at your favorite local coffee shop too much to ask for? Today, after weeks of scrimping on lattes in order to save money, Hank and I decided to pop down to Pablo's on 6th, the only non-gay coffee shop within five blocks, and indulge my non-instant coffee craving. Notorious for its great beans and baristas, the place draws a magically huge crowd for not having the internet. Today was no different. Perhaps to escape the chilly Sunday weather, people had come from all corners of Capital Hill to commune with friends and read. Every table was full. We decided to get the coffee to go.

"What can I get you?" asked the cashier. "Um, can I get a split shot latte with 2%, please? With a little Amaretto in it, but just a splash. Thanks," I said. It's a version of what I always get and have had no problem ordering for the last 10+ years. He looked at me with a lazy expression. "What's a split shot?" He asked. "Oh, half-caf," I said, "It's the same."

Then the guy making the coffee drinks--tall, spiky-haired, emo, coffee guy--blurted out, "Oh great. Could you possibly add anything else to this drink?" He said it loud enough for the whole line behind me to hear. Here's where things descended into customer hell, and my memory goes a bit foggy, presumably from all the fury pulsating through my system. "Wow," I said out of shock. My mind felt numb. But coffee guy was on a roll and wasn't going to stop there. "Well, I guess you could mix a bunch of flavors too," he scoffed. The cashier apparently saw my unease. "Oh, don't worry about it," he said. "He's been crabby all day." But it was too late. I was already plotting my revenge. Fucking coffee guy was going down.

Waiting for my drink, I became unusually quiet, my eyes glazed over as I thought of what I should have said and what I could still say. Hank noticed and told me to breathe. He gave me some arm rubs. "How rude," I kept whispering. It's all I could muster. I was having fantasies of throwing coffee on coffee guy and asking for the manager as loud as coffee guy had coffee-shamed me. I couldn't get off it. I understood that a split shot required a little extra personalization, but wasn't personalization what coffee drinks were all about? Besides, it could have been worse for him. I could have ordered a white chocolate/raspberry, split shot, quad, lungo, skinny, wet cappuccino. He would have really blown a fuse.

As he handed me my drink, he nearly spit the words, "Here's your laaaaatte." That was all the goading I needed. "Gee, thanks, that seemed so difficult for you," I barked, flames in my eyes. We stared each other down. "But you know, I guess I'd feel the same if all I did was make coffee all day." He said nothing, and Hank hurried me out. I don't know why I said what I did. It wasn't particularly mean, even though I said it with pure hatred. And it's not like my life is any more exciting at the moment. But I felt I had to say something, and it was all I could think of. Even so, as we left, Hank said, "Hon, you're stooping to his level."

Then it hit me. That's how wars start. That's the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in a nutshell. You hurt me, so I'm going to think you're scum and am going to hurt you right back. Coffee guy may have deserved it, but did I really have to react? Does the world need more reacting?

Enter episode ten: "The Baby Shower." Carrie's period is a no-show at the same time she and the gals get invited to a baby shower in a wealthy Connecticut suburb. Their newly-pregnant, once-hard-core-party-gal friend, Laney, announces that she is naming her girl Shayla, Charlotte's secret baby name--the one Charlotte was saving for her future daughter and had told Laney in confidence back in the day. Laney then criticizes the gals for never growing up, even though she misses her former lifestyle. After having watched kids smear chocolate cake on the carpet and scream at their coddling mothers, the women leave in a huff and decide they will be cool mothers or no mothers at all. They won't give up their lives or careers like these women. They won't pick their children over their men. Most importantly, of course, they won't move out of the city. Laney decides that the friends live in a dream world without any meaningful responsibilities. The girls decide that Laney's a bitch.

There it is again. Reaction. The friends react to Laney and what they see at the shower. Laney reacts to what she was and no longer can be--a single girl in the Big Apple. It seems we decide what kind of people we want to be by seeing other people who are what we don't want or can't be. We judge. We don't care who we are, as long as we're not them. And that makes them bad.

When I worked in customer service at a flower shop, I once spent 15 minutes with a elderly female customer picking out the right ribbon for a poinsettia. I didn't mind. I'm particular, so I can appreciate it in other people. For me, there are too types of customers--easy ones and interesting ones. But to coffee guy at Pablo's, I was just plain annoying. Maybe he thinks people should stick to plain lattes and not be so high-maintenance. Maybe he thinks decaf-coffee drinkers are losers. Maybe he hates women. So he scoffed at me. And I scoffed right back. How could anyone treat a customer--or anybody, really--like that? We warred. We butted. Sadly, it happens every day, on both minute levels and unimaginably large ones.

But maybe that's just how it has to be. We form our place in the world by deciding what we like and what we don't. Sometimes we change over time and learn to see some things from different perspectives. But even if we allow for an open mind, there are parts of ourselves that are too ingrained to change--like my desire for politeness and coffee guy's desire for something else. To him, I'm difficult. To me, he's rude. We can hide these small judgements, but when we've had a long day of making complicated coffee drinks or are PMS-ing and tired of feeling like an unemployed idiot, they come out. And they turn us all into babies.

Maybe Hank was right (he often is). Maybe I didn't have to react. Maybe I could have just taken a deep breath, accepted my differences with coffee guy, and enjoyed my latte. I should practice that, I suppose. Maybe this is a start. But it's never easy, not for any of us. I hope you'll be back. I will.

Day 9: Vibrators and Vanity Couplings

"Save Me Some Sand, Jamaica" is today's ensemble. As the weather gets colder and the job hunt fiercer, my thoughts turn to 80-degree days where my only responsibility is to keep my tan even. I'll take another mojito, please.

I think the SATC writers came up with the title of the episode, "The Turtle and the Hare," before actually figuring it out. This is the only rational explanation for this installment, which casually throws together two completely different issues--vibrators and settling for mates we don't love. After ten minutes of being mildly confused about how these two things are even loosely related (and I had already seen it--imagine Hank), I was laughing so hard at the dialogue that I no longer cared.

The Rabbit--a high-tech pleasure device to which "the Hare" in the title refers--takes center stage. Miranda is hooked and encourages the women to buy this marvel of sexual exploration. Charlotte, fearful of the toy until she sees that it's pink, gets hooked until her friends stage an intervention that forces her back into the dating world. As usual, Carrie doesn't have much interest and remains a skeptical bystander, aloofly gathering info for her column. Samantha has no need for a toy when she has the real thing--and lots of it.

I don't have much to say about vibrators. Boring, I know. I've never used one, but I can see why women do. If I were single, I'd definitely buy one. Maybe I still will one day. They could be quite fun even within a relationship. But I'm not at the point of needing one yet. Nuff said. Be jealous if you must.

Now, the issue of settling. We've probably all been in unions where it seems our mate loves us more than we love him. Often it's the other way around. In the dating quest to find equality in love, there's a lot of teeter-tottering that goes on. Somebody always has the higher ground. Even within long-term, vibrant relationships, equal love between partners at all times seems like a tall order. Besides, how can there ever be an exact equality of something that can't be measured?

That said, when things are really uneven, you feel it. I was once in a relationship with a man who seemed to adore me. We'll call him Travis. Travis addressed me as "La mia princepessa" (he was learning Italian and very proud of it) and travelled to China with me on my independent study just so I wouldn't be alone. For whatever reason, I was always lukewarm and couldn't figure myself out. We had a lot of similar interests and studied the same thing at school. He was funny, smart, and kind of cute. But I just wasn't in love with him. In fact, when he put his hand on my leg, I always had to suppress my impulse to cringe.

When I expressed my doubts to my mother, she suggested I marry him and quit analyzing everything so much. I thought maybe she was right, so I kept dating him. After two and a half years, he wanted to ask me to marry him. I kept telling him to wait. I wasn't ready. That Christmas with my family, he pulled out a jewelry box in the middle of unwrapping presents. Everyone got quiet. Dad had just opened an oxygen machine, and, in a desperate grab for humor, I asked if I could borrow it. I knew I couldn't say yes. What the hell was I going to do? In the end, it was just a pair of earrings, and my heart resumed its normal pace.

That summer I went to visit my sister in Peru and cheated on Travis with a local artist. I decided to move to South America to be with him. It was terrible for Travis. While I felt angry at myself for hurting him, I knew that my biggest mistake was that I didn't break up with him sooner. I should have trusted myself and my doubts. The artist and I didn't work out (in a fair dose of karma, he broke up with me in an equally painful manner), but I'm thankful now for what happened. I needed to learn a lesson about myself and don't know that I could have learned it any other way. The lesson was simple: I needed to feel butterflies for someone for it to last.

I realize I'm not everyone. In some relationships, imbalance seems to work. Some people don't mind being the one who "loves more," and it's awful hard for the adored one to give up being adored. One woman in the episode says to Carrie, "Always marry a man who loves you more than you love him." Later, a startled Carry watches as Samantha turns to an investment banker with bad breath (nickname: "The Turtle"...ah, at last the title becomes clear) to satisfy her need to feel loved. Carrie herself contemplates an open marriage to Stanford, her best gay friend, not out of love but so they can share his inheritance. Things are all messed up, and it's all because of a vibrator. No wait, it's because of marrying for money.... No, unrequited love. No, well, anyway, they're messed up.

Carrie finally decides that she wants kids, so marrying the gay guy won't work. Besides, she loves Big. But is it reciprocated? That's her big worry. I guess the best we all can do is be responsible for ourselves. We can find someone we love and hope they love us back--just as much, a little less sometimes, a little more at others. Whatever as long as there's love.

I hope you'll be back. I will.

Day 8: Threesomes

This is an exercise I like to call "An outfit a day keeps the blues away." Here's my first ensemble; we'll call it "Night at Bolero," because that's obviously so much more interesting than "Night at the Opera." All of the pieces are pulled from a mix of websites--modcloth.com (Thanks, B!), Aldo, Neiman Marcus, Victoria's Secret, etc., and that's just the beginning. What's more, nothing--except for a pair of shoes here and there--is over $200. When putting things together, I imagine I am Cher on Clueless and have a virtual closet at my fingertips. Of course, these clothes don't correspond to real pieces in my closet. Nevermind. It's almost just as fun this way. Let the dreaming begin. Now threesomes....

"How well do we ever know the people we sleep with?" says Charlotte.

I like this episode. It deals with the issue of human fantasies--well humanity, period--very honestly. All of the women have different takes on the threesome. Samantha is, of course, highly experienced. Carrie's never had time to consider it amidst her relationship struggles. She can't even stand the thought of Big's exes, much less someone else in their bed. Charlotte doesn't think blow jobs are proper, but she's suddenly willing to consider a threesome to please her new boyfriend. As for Miranda, she just wants the sexual validation of being attractive enough to be asked to participate in one.

I think it's safe to say that threesomes are one of the most common human fantasies. In some parts of the world, sharing partners, adding a guest, and other sexual combinations are quite normal activities. For example, there are over 20 clubs for swingers in Montreal, Canada. About every other guy whom I've dated has either had a threesome or fantasized about it. So what's the allure?

Proponents have their theories, and so does SATC. It adds spice to a relationship. It's a fantasy, and it's healthy to explore fantasies to keep them from growing into full-blown sexual obsessions. Heck, even Socrates would contribute some argument in favor of a threesome every now and then, just as long as Eros wasn't allowed to take over the person's life. As for the show, Samantha, not inhibited by morality nor sentimentality (at least that's what she would have us believe), just does it for fun.

But are these arguments enough? Is there an underlying draw toward a threesome that expresses some deeper, unhealthy psychological desire within us all? This is Carrie's central preoccupation. By the end of the episode, she decides that the threesome is actually what keeps two people from nurturing intimacy between themselves. It provides an 'out,' a way to keep from fully putting one's heart and mind into the relationship. As she says, "The real allure of the threesome? That's easy. It's intimacy that's the bitch."

I've never had a threesome, and I never will. I consider myself a mature sexual adult and very much okay with my sexuality, desires, and fantasies in all their complexity. And a threesome has always been on an internal list of sexual escapades I think would be interesting. But that's all. Interesting. For me, a threesome is on par with sky diving and eating cow testicles. Sure, I could do them given the right circumstances. They might even be exhilarating in the moment. However, that doesn't mean I think they're good ideas.

What's more, like Carrie, I've always been in relationships. One relationship at a time has always been enough of a mystery and responsibility. Maybe if I had been single for most of my life, a manage a trois would have come up. But I wasn't, and it didn't. See, if you're in a relationship, threesomes are only okay if you're fine with the consequences, because there are always consequences. That's the part the fantasy doesn't take into account. If there is a deep love between two partners, the consequences could be disastrous. If I love someone, why would I really want to take a chance on f-ing that up? I prefer to spend energy trying to get closer to my mate. Sometimes I wish life were longer just for that.

I knew a couple once that had an open marriage. Maybe that's different than a threesome, but it's still sharing your guy or gal. One day, I was talking (okay, gossiping) with my hairdresser about the couple's lifestyle. She immediately said, "It will never last." I asked why and said that it seemed to work for them quite nicely. She said that humans aren't meant to share partners and that something was bound to happen to make the couple drift apart. For example, one of the two would meet and fall in love with someone else. Not two months later, that very thing happened. The girl left her husband for another man, one with whom she just had a "better connection." Go figure. How can you have a good connection with your partner if you're actively working to destroy it or keep it weak?

I'm not saying being curious about threesomes is bad. In fact, I think it's completely normal. After all, human sexuality is a very powerful thing, and thank heavens for that. But we have a choice about where to direct that sexuality. For me at least, I want a threesome to be something that remains an oddity. I want to wake up each morning knowing that I'm doing what I can to further my knowledge of my partner, enjoying and appreciating him for everything he is.

I hope you'll be back. I will.