With Love and Squalor

One cold, windy, rainy morning, camping on the Gulf of California near Bahía de Los Angeles a couple weeks ago, I was lying in my tent and heard a strange but vaguely familiar sound. "What the hell is that? Seal? Coyote? Dog? Bird?" I realized it was the sound of the woman in the camper about 200 yards away, having sex. I felt a modicum of a sort of combined aversion and curiosity as her cries mingled with the cold air. The curiosity was voyeuristic. The aversion was because it all sounded exaggerated, somewhat fake, and definitely performative. And I felt bitter about that, thinking about people and sex and bad faith, manipulative, fake ass fucking. 

I mean, who knows, maybe this guy was the best ever, the love of her life right?, and maybe it was just real and fierce and amazing and she'd never, ever forget it and either these two would live happily and faithfully ever after in animalistic bliss or maybe she'd go on to fuck dozens of other guys but she'd never forget this one amazing guy who fucked her on a cold, rainy, windy morning camping on the Gulf of California. 

But my thoughts (as her wild vocalizations continued) went much more toward cynicism. Fake ass fucking, cowardice, betrayal, duplicity, lies and more lies, convenience, manipulation, heartbreak and 100% bad faith. Of course, this says a lot more about old Percy Hades than it does that enthusiastic woman and her way of responding to whatever her lover was doing, oh yes, oh my god, yes, yes, oh god. And so, it offered an opportunity to take yet another look at my history, my heartbreak, my jealousy and pain, my "trust issues," and my own resentment, grief, sense of betrayal and abandonment. Hooray!

Sex is so awful, in a lot of ways. Like, both Ye Olde Definition, as in awe inspiring, and the new one, as in gut wrenching and terrifying. At that very moment, camping in a remote spot where I was looking for some peace, I was truly annoyed by being reminded of the whole squalid and lovely reality. The first thought I recall having was "Huh, I wonder who she is cheating on." Haha. Dude, really?

One obvious thing that presented itself is just how much suffering, guilt, hurt feelings, abandonment, betrayal and bad faith sex has brought into my life. I'd say that sex is the nexus of most of my own dishonesty, lack of integrity, duplicity and shame. In the Big Book, there's the famous reference to alcoholics leading a "double life," and I'd say that the most double of all of my lives have always been around sexual dishonesty and betrayal. The front that couples present to the world so often covers all sorts of sexual shenanigans. People who are capable of "just having sex" in order to "get their needs met" but without becoming emotionally attached amaze me, for example. I have never really been able to do that, even though I have tried. Ironically, I have also tried having utilitarian sex within a dead partnership, and I can't really meet that obligation very well, either. 

So I find myself celibate now in spite of a great many opportunities to connect sexually. The Catch-22 is: I cannot be emotionally available right now, but sex always pulls me into emotional connection, so, no sex. I have only recently identified how angry about this I am. I have at various times of my life been livid that I can't just fucking fuck someone and be done with it. Hit it and quit it. I have been so resentful at this plain fact that I have tried, and ended up punishing myself, and causing harm to others. The big lie for me is that I don't care, although of course the other big lie is that I *do* care, which makes it even more complicated. 

Meanwhile, people just go about their duplicitous, rationalized, manipulative, selfish, fake ass fucking as if there's no problem. And I suspect there really is no problem, for most. Compartmentalization, ephemera, existential fucks, weird little flings and temporary, superficial fake drama, tiny little pangs of guilt, but hey, that's the way it goes, move along folks, nothing to see here. Insufferably grotesque yet completely human and understandable. 

My last thoughts as the woman's cries subsided were, may all sentient beings be happy, well, peaceful and at ease, and full of loving kindness, and may these two lovers be happy and well, and may my own bilious, enraged, cynical and stone cold heart forget all of this fucking nonsense.