Sexuality and Commercialism

A commercial for a "male enhancement" product just came on TV, right?  All these sexed up couples giving testimonials intersperced with an attractive blonde shrink-wrapped in a caricature of a business suit lecturing the sexually frustrated out of their money, and, therefore, their common sense.  Well, this one man, all flush, and, judging by the shit-eating grin on his face, fresh out of the sack, proudly tells the camera, "She actually bought it for me!"  Pretty much the equivalent of handing a list of breast augmentation-performaing surgeons to a woman on a national broadcast on esp-fucking-n (well, kind of, but even worse–whereas breasts are good for foreplay, they are like a mime opening for a symphony, and in no way essential to sex, whereas we’re talking about the male main attraction here, the headliner), and just as pointlessly insulting, right?  Dude, if you’re feeling lighter these days, don’t worry–it’s not your penis shrinking.  That dropped weight is more likely your pride, dignity, and/or one or both testicles.  Don’t forget–those are just as vital to the process.  The next commercial?  "Diamond Jim’s Isabella Queen," or some other absurd name for a strip club.  Outside of the moral/idealistic objections of my hyperactive superego, is it evidence of a superfluous self-awareness to shudder at the prospect of a random woman gyrating her naked crotch within inches of my face?  I can only imagine me, totally weirded out and fighting off the biologically inevitable, looking her in the eye and saying something totally ridiculously inane, like, oh, I don’t know, maybe, "I can see your vagina."  Question is: who’s more ashamed?  Me or her?  In the process of typing this paragraph, the same commercial for male enhancement has played twice.

Now, don’t get me wrong–I don’t find sexuality shameful.  Quite the opposite, in fact.  It is a basic component of animal life, and possibly the best sort of recreation/procreation one could ever imagine…right after competitive eating, of course.  Consenting adults should pursue whatever they find sexually fulfilling; let’s face it, that’s one hell of a wide spectrum, from black leather to velour purple and onwards, and if a person can’t admit there’s one or two "fantasies" they have that’s at least marginally out there, then there’s a deep-seated seed of shame within them that they can’t confront.  Sex is a part of life, but I kind of view the commercialization of sex as I do the commercialization of Christmas–unnecessary and wholly demeaning.

My hair is the shortest it has been in a very long time.  I got it cut today; I still go to the place my mother would take me when young, which is, by all accounts, a "beauty salon," not a barbershop.  It was pretty hilarious, seeing as how the place was nearly empty, and there I sat with a bunch of older ladies, chatting happily about gardening, and which types of flowers were doing well this year.  I’ve always prided myself on my ability to hold my own on a diverse range of conversation topics.  Sports?  You bet.  Politics? I can do okay.  Pop culture?  I only wish I couldn’t.  Literature?  Check.  That horrid orange dress Scarlett Johansson wore to the Tonys in ’05?  Eh, only when drunk and watching E!  Even then a dozen beers is better and much kinder to my brain cells then a minute of Wild On!

Last weekend, drunk Mark and I spent fifteen minutes arguing with a gas station attendant over the difference between elves and gnomes.  Our rhetoric skills, considering the circumstances, were decidedly lacking.

You know, the first handful of entries in this diary took an entirely different tone than the rest.  I was at the top; the world got worse and worse, less and less enjoyable.  I’m on the way back up now.  The anxiety of growing up has effectively melted away.  Life is good, and I am in no position to waste it away feeling sorry for myself.  The world can be beautiful.

I feel like a romantic tonight (belied by the opening tone of this entry, I know.  To summarize, I guess I always felt sex enabled the deepening of an established emotional connection, and not vice-versa.  There.  I put it to bed).  I guess I am a bit of a romantic; lofty ideals leavened with little tidbits of wisdom (which makes it much harder).  Themes I haven’t been able to avoid in the longest time:  Wind, water, ships, trees, flowers.  I’m starting to think I can’t avoid them. 

Smooth skin.  Ancient cathedral walls
Buttressed by circling seraphim,
Tired wings of cellophane,
Flamiing swords of harmless tin.
A gilded altar of saltless soil
Feeds the holiness within,
Brilliantly lit, the monarchs flit
Beneath the croziers in the wind.

Contralto unfaltering.  Psalms sound
A soothing alarum in the belfrey,
A voice to rejoice and consecrate;
And the brimstone sea
Breaks in baleful waves,  
Harmless and unseen,
Banished demons in the warmth
Curse her as they freeze.

A pride of lions prowl peaceful Zion,
And she in protest leaves;
She reads a book in the crook
Of a secluded tree.
She adorns that stout limb
Like a choir of singing seraphim
Made quiet by the holiness of
Comfotable silence.
She decorates that dividing branch
LIke a ripened, perfect peach;
Succulent and out of reach.

She exists–doesn’t she?

We stop believing in happy endings because we, discouraged, stop reading.  Keep heartened and keep reading, and you’ll get there.