Fantasy interrupted
28 November 2010 08:50 PM Categories: Quotidian existence | Writing prompts
The other night it was an acquaintance, someone I've known peripherally for a few years. He is an attractive man, truly tall, dark, and handsome, and I’ve always had a bit of a crush on him. There he was, in the flesh, soon enough half-naked. Things were progressing when I put a stop to it: my husband would be there any minute. The acquaintance kept coming up with schemes to get together at another date, every one involving bringing our children somewhere for a rendevous.
It wasn’t going to work and I felt horribly guilty about it anyhow. I don’t have it in me to be unfaithful. I woke up, in fact, still feeling that warm tingly make out feeling that comes with new love intermingled with guilt. Although desire and guilt are a classic combination, I prefer to experience them separately. But the thrill of it all . . . not just the physical thrum of kissing someone new – it was the emotional thrill of being attractive, the idea that this person liked me and wanted to kiss me, too.
I love my husband and what we have together. Keeping my family intact and spending the rest of my life with this man are important to me. I can't imagine my life without him. But then I get these crushes, have these dreams, and I think: I am alive, I want the rush, the fluttering heart, the chance to kiss someone new. I want just a little taste again of falling in love and I want it without any of the fall-out, the doubts and worries followed by mundane reality, the clashes, the little irritations, the chores. Each relationship starts with the threat of loss, the end is written in the beginning, and couldn't I just skip all that and go for the endorphins?
So I develop crushes (long term, generally -- I am faithful in these, too), which isn't particularly satisfying, but allows me to indulge in escapist fantasy, where I am the object of desire, but also a paragon of virtue and fidelity. Sometimes I distract myself from the slog and drag with imagined scenes of a different life, exciting and dysfunctional and fueled by pursuit. In this life, I would yield to melodrama and romance. I would love and hate and fight dirty. I would experience fleeting joy (and intense sadness). I would stomp out a path of destruction, but surely life would be interesting.
I've been thinking lately about what purpose these crushes serve. A way to escape reality? Yes. A method of distraction? Of course. Compensation for the fact that, as a stay-at-home mom, the only males I've hung out with for the last five years are my husband, son, and cats? Yes: I miss men. But some of this feels like an attempt to recreate my father in other men. I want to be seen, to be noticed, to be interesting to certain kinds of men, incompatible ones who ignore me, despite my desire for attention (just like my father? well, close enough). My long-term crush was cool, unemotional, truly unreachable. My (imaginary) pursuit of him was fueled by a desire to be seen. His coolness kept my interest at a low burn for years. It was a relief when I finally figured out the mechanism and let the crush burn out. Fantasy interrupted.
I soothe myself with the idea that I tamp down these desires because of a stronger desire to do no harm, and because I already have love. I experience more moments of happiness than I often feel I deserve. Still, a small part of me wonders if I haven't taken the darker path because it isn't an option, because I am not attractive, a boring little wren of a woman, not worth the pursuit.
So I write about desire thwarted, evaded, rekindled. I duke it out in my mind. I pick apart the impure thoughts as I push them aside. Nothing is simple. The thoughts have a source, the source has a reason, and over time I uncover it and cover it up again. I file my wants, I organize them and pack them up.
I focus on the beauty of life outside me.
From a few prompts: I woke up, Down to the wire, and the photo, which is by the talented Jane Underwood.
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