i can hang, but i’d prefer the firing squad.

by dorarandom

i should tell you more about Tread-Lightly. as he’s caused me all kinds of woe this weekend. he hasn’t himself, of course—my own mind has. (an old acquaintance wrote to me recently and asked how i was. i said i thought i might be falling in love. ‘well tell me more about that!’ he said. said i: ‘uh, it’s horrible and painful! surely you know about this….i mean you’re french.’)

i have been skanking around town for almost a whole year now. i’m tired. i don’t think i’d easily find anyone that suited me better than Tread-Lightly. now even if i weren’t a burned-out skank, i still don’t think i’d find many men who suited me better, but i mention that because recently i find that i really want someone conclusively. my wild oats are sown. (an odd expression…how can you sow them if they’re wild? i should look into this.) and now suddenly i have found someone to want. that’s a lot of emotions there.

i believe—(though i could very well be wrong! i have no idea why any man does what he does ever)—that he assumes we’re dating. sort of exclusively. our mutual liking-each-other-a-lot has been established. he says romantic things about admiring me from afar and how the summer has turned out well for the two of us (because we’ve started going out). (last wednesday he said something to me along the lines of ‘hasn’t this been a pretty good summer for you, too?’ and i said ‘well not really. i mean my grandmother died. you know i was really close to her. and all my mother’s relatives acted so crazy and greedy afterwards.’ ‘…’ ‘uh but yes there have been bright spots, certainly!’) he’s sincere, warm, and profoundly midwestern—i mean he talks about ohio like it’s the garden of eden—he’s not some crazy lothario or anything like that. (why would your mind even go to such a place, dora? we-elll….he says such nice things! i’m never inclined to trust people who say nice things—or i should say, i’m more inclined to trust grumpy antisocial people.) but yeah, he genuinely cares for me. and he’s made me feel it physically…it’s probably the best sex i’ve had. i mean it’s way, way up there. it’s also very different from any other sex i’ve had…i think it’s smarter! he has a beautiful method. he starts very slow—whispers that i feel so good, he wants to feel every stroke, or words to that effect—he doesn’t chatter but he isn’t silent either—and what he does say is, you know, pertinent—without being vulgar!—he lasts a good while, he changes things up, and it ends in a wonderful frenzy. i feel like i’ve written a yelp review here. well. i don’t know that i can admit to myself how wonderful it makes me feel to be with someone so tender and solicitous*, so i focused on the technical aspects there. i mean this is the kind of thing that i feel like i can’t live without now that i’ve had it—terrifying.

oh, that’s the good stuff. the woe is that, after a lovely date and excellent sex and all that, all cuddly, i mentioned something i wanted to do in the future (i forget what it was) and i said, ‘i mean, we’re going to keep going out, i assume.’ ‘well i want to keep going out with you. and you want to keep going out with me?’ ‘well yes, of course.’ ‘but…you can hang, right?’ ‘what?’ ‘i mean…i’ve been so depressed since i moved to baltimore, for the past six months, and i’m only just now coming out of it and making plans to do stuff and figuring out everything i need to do for my job.’ etc. etc. (a bunch of confused shit about being really busy on the weekends and positivity and music festivals and visiting old friends!) ‘uh yeah i can hang. but those are mostly things that you can share with another person, anyway.’ and then he was sort of apologetic. (‘ooh, mercy. you did not like when i said that, did you?’)

i did not. i mean, what the fuck is that shit, can you hang? it has troubled me all weekend. and so i have presented the scenario to several of my top experts and sympathizers and they all agree that men should not be saying that shit—they differ in their interpretations. i believe it basically means that he wants to know i can entertain myself while he pursues his new career and his own interests.  and i mean, it did take him months to ask me out, i guess it makes sense that he’d want to go slow with relationshippy stuff too. and i’m fine with that myself. but it’s a troubling kind of phrase for the infatuated miss random. but! it’s just too me to fixate on that one phrase—just one unhappy phrase in three happy weeks. i should go do the dishes or something. make my space happy. order some fresh crisp bras. not languish. this is a man to keep. i should try my desperate level best to hang…to at least pretend to be an adult woman…to pretend that i’m not a girl with a diary.

______

*  as part of my perpetual efforts to not romanticize/idealize people, let me add here: Tread-Lightly has a number of real talents and has had a number of jobs in his life. (he is 36.) currently and very recently employed as a Folklorist (!). (yes, that is a job! a state job, in fact! this is my tax dollars at work!) but on wednesday night he told me he’s better at writing than at anything else. all right. i believe(d) it. later that wednesday night, post-coitally, he said: ‘i hope i wasn’t too rough with you?’ and i said, ‘my God, no. how could you ever think that? you’re so tender and solicitous.’ ‘…i don’t know what “solicitous” means.’

i’ll quote the BFF here: ‘i’m sure it’s possible to be a good writer and not know what “solicitous” means, but probably not as good a writer as you think you are.’

i will also admit that ‘solicitous’ is not the sexiest word. though i think it has a nice ring to it! insert smiley emoji here. i surely could have chosen better.