Dearest Marita:
It's important at the beginning of a relationship to establish ground rules lest we meander down the path of compromise and confusion. One such useful ground rule would seem to be: use language in its proper context. No Humpty-Dumptyesque "words mean just what I choose them to mean," for us. ("When I use a word," Humpty Dumpty said, in a rather scornful tone, "it means just what I choose it to mean - neither more nor less." "The question is," said Alice, "whether you can make words mean so many different things." "The question is," said Humpty Dumpty, "which is to be master - that's all." Through the Looking Glass. )
This diatribe is prompted by your statement that "your foreplay of words is so seductive." Foreplay is one of the most precious gifts that God has ordained for man to have. Indeed, foreplay is the bone that gives the marrow form and substance. It trivializes the word to believe that mere words can constitute foreplay. Words can describe foreplay but words alone cannot be foreplay.
Foreplay is at core the physical and psychological set of conditions that prepares one, indeed preconditions one, for the most exquisite of life's quintessential moments. To be clear, perhaps I should provide an example of foreplay.
Suppose on Friday night the 31st day of March, after we return from the Environmental program talent show, I asked you to get me one of your scarves, silk preferably. Then I ask you to be seated in a chair with only a back and no sides. And I ask you if you would enjoy it if I covered your eyes with the scarf. "Why, what are you up to?" you reply. Trust me I say, foreclosing sight will heighten all the other senses. I want you to focus like a laser, inputting scads of information into the part of your brain responsible for evaluating the things that make life special. Quizzical, intimidated, but intrigued, you say yes, even though this seems like a request one asks for and contemplates giving only after many more evenings of intimacy and trust have been laid as the foundation for such an audacious request.
But you realize, this relationship will not follow the normal rules. This relationship begins with a set of intersections that is unique and literally irreproducible again in the history of the world. A man (yes even a short man though I never saw myself as such in my minds eye) and a woman who have known each other for three quarters of a score, share an intense interest in a subject so obscure and boring that one would almost believe it artifice for something deeper and more alluring. But it is not. It sustains the relationship until the stars align and it is possible to contemplate moving the relationship to a level never believed possible.
But I am hesitant to ask that question that will ignite the new direction for the relationship: Can I have dinner with you? But you are inspired by the cosmic connecter of all things blessed to take the first step. I am thrilled. We agree to spend a weekend together as our first date, skipping all the normal mores that govern relationships. We are both battered and burned by life's shoals and ruts. But this adds to the uniqueness of the relationship. Gone is the ignorance and immaturity of youth replaced by the dignity and satisfaction of having met and overcome hundreds of life's challenges, and come out the other side a more profound person.
So you say yes, you will trust me. You say you will trust me not to hurt you or to force you to do something that offends your deeply contemplated moral framework. But you understand that this is all about boundaries. Establishing new boundaries. Reconsidering old boundaries. Thus you recognize that one must be open to new experiences.
But the ritual of romance includes feigned hesitation, coquettishness, line-drawing as a dare to cross it, genuine doubt, and fear. So we establish a word that signals that no means no. "No" outside the context of this word actually means try harder to convince me or even ignore my protestations and seemingly violate my freedom to decide, despite the normal opprobrium one would feel in denying one that precious liberty. So the word is one we both smile at, since it is the match that lit the spark that ignited this unique moment in history. The word is Senate. You hope you will never have to use it and you understand that it should only be uttered for the most serious of reasons since it results not only in an immediate cessation of the mystery and anticipation of the budding minuet but it also evidences a decision that you have met your limit and refused to experience the joy and exhilaration of going beyond your comfort zone.
So you agree to have your eyes dulled in the hopes that it will liberate your other senses. I tie the knot so softly and slowly that you are literally interested in viewing in your minds eye the tension and color of the material, the shape of the knot, the texture of the silk on the bridge of your nose.
And so it begins. My first advance is to bend so that my lips can touch yours. A touch that would be almost imperceptible in life's normal circumstances. But a touch that is magnified a thousand fold by the intimacy of the moment and concentration of the senses. We have kissed before, last night for the first time in fact. But this is different. This signals the willingness of two people willing to trust that the other can teach them something about the mystery of life and shelter them from the day to day realities that rip at our souls, if only for a nanosecond. The touch of our lips is exquisite.
Then I push your hair back to expose your ear. I take the lobe between my teeth and grate against the skin oh so delicately. You are surprised by the tenderness. You realize that this is one of life's special moments. I kiss just behind your ear and begin a trail of small pecks that traverses your long slender neck. I breathe deeply the aroma of another human being and marvel that a million dollars could not purchase such intimacy, intimacy borne of a dozen phone calls, the cackling laughter of banter, and desire from afar. At the bottom of the trail, my progress is denied by the coarse material of your blouse. I lift my head to your ear and whisper "would you enjoy it if I unbuttoned your top button?" Enjoy it! You demand it!! If only to relieve the tension imposed by the confinement of the cloth, tension that has always been there but has never before been acknowledged or even contemplated.
