Whatever happened to slut?

From this morning's handwritten journal:

Just now there is a man leaning over in the parking lot of A&M Variety stuffing leaves in green bags. The morning light straying across the back of his jeans is gorgeous. I want him to turn so I can see his face, but when he finally does it is hooded and I can't see his features through the shadows of morning contrast. But what does it matter, really, I ask myself. He could be the ugliest pig who ever walked the earth. His face could be bloated, pockmarked, pitted, scarred, burned into a puttied mass. But in the solemn light of morning, he has a glorious ass.

I have been thinking lately about sex and sexual attraction. Okay, honestly, we all think about it all the time, little bits and traces flying across the screen of consciousness while we drive, eat, blog, presumably while we work. Actually, I don't think about it as much as I used to. And if you believe ad campaigns claiming men think about it every few seconds, I am not like other men. Maybe I used to be.

For a few years I was a regular coming-out-of-the-closet, boy-in-a-candy-store, couldn't-keep-it-in-my-pants slut. I enjoyed my delayed adolescence, discovering great sex in my 30s, sometimes regretted having wasted the best years of my body on celibacy, but hey, as I've said before, it kept me alive.

Nowadays I have few partners besides my lover, and rarely get it except on weekends, not every weekend mind you. Four years ago that would have bothered me, but these days, huh. Sometimes I wonder what's wrong with me. Is it the meds? No, I started experiencing this two years ago before going back on antidepressants.

It just seems like I've become a lot pickier about who I sleep with. And honestly, when I really need attention, it isn't that kind. The lonely man wants another human being to acknowledge and appreciate his existence, not just fuck his brains out. I know the many textures of loneliness.

When people tell me I'm sexy, well, it used to flatter me. But nowadays I'm more likely to think, cynically, he just wants in my pants. Hey, why not pay some attention to my mind? I mean, what would you rather see, another poem, or a photo of my ass? (Admittedly, if you really understand me, you can probably figure out how to have me both ways.)

I've been asking myself these questions, even wondering what I do to set myself up as a sex object and why. I'm still given to exhibitionism. Yes, it turns me on. And yes there are photos filtering through cyberspace, you may have seen them. I have rarely used them to meet people; I trade them for porn. Hey, masturbation is the safest sex.

I'm writing about this because it's the thing I self-censor most. I might not think about sex all the time, still I think about it far more often than I talk about it.

It all comes down to is this: my sex life is pretty good right now, honestly. What I get is mighty satisfying.

I just wonder where that sexual adventurer has gone, the one who used to love heading to Toronto for a weekend with no agenda except to get laid. He seems long ago and faraway. I miss the spontaneity, the intrigue, even the sensuality. I keep thinking I might devote a weekend to that, just for fun.

But really, I don't miss the loneliness. Because casual sex requires a lot of time and energy, which in the end detracts from my relationships with other people and myself.