They were astonished when I told them that our neighbor, a large, handsome American man, was lusting over me. Mei, 54 years old and a mother of three, still tall and erect, laughed outright.
"You are hallucinating, my dear," she said. "We are past that age."
"No, trust me," I insisted, "We are not -- not in the eyes of these American men."
We were gathered at the basement of my house, old members of the Mao Daughters group, having our monthly Saturday meeting and talking about the same things we usually talked about: our children, our husbands, and our health. Harry was upstairs, taking his long Saturday afternoon nap.
"They lust not just for me but for all of us -- all of us older Oriental women," I insisted.
They all burst out laughing, Bao so hard that she farted, which triggered another round of laughter.
"You laugh," I said, "but it is true."
"You know," I added, "they look at our ass when we walk around."
They laughed again.
"I know they looked at us with greedy eyes when we were young and fresh," Chun, our old leader, put in thoughtfully. Chun was now a 55 year old woman with saggy breasts, thinning hair and tired eyes.
"We used to get those eyes all the time," she added, "but not now."
Everyone nodded in agreement.
"That is not true," I whispered with determination. "We are still very desirable. We are just not paying attention. We are the ones who have decided to shut down our sensual life, sacrifice it for the sake of the health and education of our children. It is our doing."
"When was the last time you made love with Gao," I suddenly turned to Lin, the one amongst us who married a large, handsome Chinese man who was famous for his oversized sexual appetite.
Lin blushed a little and said, "I can't remember."
"Has Gao really lost his sexual drive that much?" I asked sarcastically.
Everyone laughed, including Lin. Gao was famous back in Grad school for chasing women, all women and any women he could get his hands on. He slept with white women, black women, Asian women, and any type in between. He went to bed with very skinny women and very fat women, young undergraduate girls and old, respectable ladies in their fifties. And, according to Harry, who roomed with him for three years, he masturbated every day and kept a thick stack of porno magazines by his bedside.
"If you can't remember the last time Gao slept with you, then there must be something wrong with you and not Gao," I said, looking straight at Lin.
"We just don't take the trouble," she answered, shrugging her shoulders.
