nine months in and blah blah blah

So, we're nine months in and three to go.

Long enough to gestate a baby.

And, I'm kind of over it.

I don't have much interest in sex recently. Which is, under the circumstances, an unequivocally good thing!

And biding my time doesn't seem a challenge any more.

I kind of feel like it's all downhill from here.

I can kind of just turn my mind off and wait.

But... that thought is a bit of a worry. Turn my mind off to this whole issue? To tune out to sex and the whole area of emotional and physical intimacy seems so much like tuning out of our relationship in general.

I don't know. I just don't feel like I have the energy to get all worked up about the whole thing any more.

What's a boy to do?

To My Coy Wife

To his Coy Mistress

by Andrew Marvell

Had we but world enough, and time,
This coyness, lady, were no crime.
We would sit down and think which way
To walk, and pass our long love's day;
Thou by the Indian Ganges' side
Shouldst rubies find; I by the tide
Of Humber would complain. I would
Love you ten years before the Flood;
And you should, if you please, refuse
Till the conversion of the Jews.
My vegetable love should grow
Vaster than empires, and more slow.
An hundred years should go to praise
Thine eyes, and on thy forehead gaze;
Two hundred to adore each breast,
But thirty thousand to the rest;
An age at least to every part,
And the last age should show your heart.
For, lady, you deserve this state,
Nor would I love at lower rate.

But at my back I always hear
Time's winged chariot hurrying near;
And yonder all before us lie
Deserts of vast eternity.
Thy beauty shall no more be found,
Nor, in thy marble vault, shall sound
My echoing song; then worms shall try
That long preserv'd virginity,
And your quaint honour turn to dust,
And into ashes all my lust.
The grave's a fine and private place,
But none I think do there embrace.

Now therefore, while the youthful hue
Sits on thy skin like morning dew,
And while thy willing soul transpires
At every pore with instant fires,
Now let us sport us while we may;
And now, like am'rous birds of prey,
Rather at once our time devour,
Than languish in his slow-chapp'd power.
Let us roll all our strength, and all
Our sweetness, up into one ball;
And tear our pleasures with rough strife
Thorough the iron gates of life.
Thus, though we cannot make our sun
Stand still, yet we will make him run.

a time to talk (but no time to write!)

I have lots of things I would like to be writing here, but so few chances. I don't really feel I can be writing this when Sue is likely to walk in on me ("Hey, honey, what are you doing?" / "Oh nothing, dear, just spilling the very most intimate aspects of our respective lives into the public doman for strangers to read and pass judgment on. What's for dinner?")

So, thanks to Rae and Sungold for their email and comments respectively. I want to get back to both of you soon. But first a few thoughts on an article I just read:

This article on sexless marriages was published in the New York Times just a few days ago. 

I am intrigued to read that, on average, married couples have sex 58 times a year. Is that all? 

I am also intrigued to read that a whopping 15% of married couples have not had sex in 6 months to a year. 

Wow! I didn't realize I was so . . . mainstream! 

But most thought-provoking of all was that sexlessness in a marriage is a largely one-way street. Most couples do not get their lives in the boudoir back to what they once were.  Apparentlythis is  because, "it’s hard to get a couple talking once they’ve established a pattern of non-communication." 

I have certainly found it hard to get Susan talking. It's great when we do talk. It feels like there's intimacy there. But it also feels like I am pulling teeth. Susan doesn't do it willingly, and she cuts it as short as possible as quickly as possible. 

Today, this whole idea of "a year without sex" seems really, really stupid. 

I feel hobled in any ability I might have to open things up a bit, to get communication going. 

But perhaps it's just a pessimistic moment. 

On the whole, like the woman who gave her husband sex every day for a year, I think it is adding depth to our relationship. She found a deepening and richening in their love, committment and closeness. And not just because of the sex, but rather because of the mindfulness that that committment to sex brought to their relationship and to each other. 

Similarly, by making a very mindful choice to act like a eunuch around Sue, I am much more aware of our relationship, much more mindful of my own sexuality, and much more present with the degree to which she is emotionally open or closed to me each day. 

Just doing something different has,  I think, made a step forward for us. 

But I am sorry to hear that the odds are stacked against us. 

I guess I just need to redouble my efforts to engage with Sue in an emotionally (but very asexually) intimate way. 

Time to go to the dentist! 

a kiss, perchance?

We caught a bit of a ro. com. on tv tonight. And at the end, Hugh Grant held Drew Barrymore's face in his hands. She beamed. He kissed her. She kissed him back. 

And I wished I could do that. That simple, loving exchange, with my wife. The woman with whom I've lived for nine years. the mother of my children. 

Sex -- well, we all know that's loaded. All kinds of baggage and implications, and libido can be affected by so many things. 

But a kiss? 

Why is she not interested in holding or being held by me? 

Why is a kiss too much for her? 

She didn't have any trouble that first night, nine years ago. 

What's changed? 

Why won't she tell me? 

Why is she dragging her feet to resolve it? 

Would she let things drag on like this for another 40 years, if I let her? 

They say marriage is supposed to kill sex. But romance? Sure, familiarity and routine sap it out a bit, but wouldn't most women be chomping at the bit to get some romance back into their lives? 

We take a vow to foresake all others. Breaking that vow is said to be being "unfaithful" or to have "cheated". And yet now I find myself foresaken. And on some level it feels like that means she is being unfaithful to me. Not for her feelings, but for her lack of interest in doing anything about how she feels. 

If only there were a map, so I knew where we were going, or a timetable, so I knew when we'd be likely to arrive. 

They say these things sort themselves out, eventually. 

But they don't tell you how to manage until they do...