I remember the love letters I wrote in my young man days. The ones that have survived are truly lovely. They sound clearly as a bell in the wind, of a young man in his prime, in heat, and in search of lasting love; a quest for the Grail that is rarely found. Still, the letters wax poetic with imagery of beauty as found in young ladies eyes, hair, bosoms, voice, and lips. The metaphors abound with and soar to the heavens with longing and promise and comparisons to the clear blue skies, the colors found in varieties of flowers, and rushing streams. All that survive, and the ones I can remember, hiding, no doubt, in several middle aged lady's hope chests, sound very much like the longing howl of a hound scented in to a bitch in heat. The letters use clever monkey words in combinations designed to elicit a favorable sexual response from the female in question, but make no mistake; the letters contain human male animal calls on a level we as a species have come to understand and to perfect; not much different really from the wild calls one hears in the Central American isthmus from howler monkeys and their ilk, with one possible exception perhaps. The letters contain another sort of call; one of union on a spiritual, emotional, and physical level.
As I have relearned through a small kitten my household rescued from a remote wood pile in these strange mountains of Northern New Mexico; all of us furry ones need love to survive. We need union with other furry ones. We cannot live without it. We need to be touched. We need to be held. We need to find that close warmth in another's arms, paws, or nuzzle. We need reassurance and encouragement. We need love. Plain and simple. If we cannot find love, or if we loose love somewhere down the line, we die or we continue breathing stunted, small, dark; only half alive.
Another male I know told me, “Men are the romantic ones. They write the love letters, they write the songs, they send the flowers; we're the romantic ones. Women aren't romantic or loving. They're ruthless and know just what they want, and it ain't us.” He also jokes about starting a class action suit representing all men throughout eternity against the transgressions of women through the ages. When he jokes with other men about it, they all laugh and agree to sign on to the suit. Deep inside all men have already signed on and secretly hope someone will really do such a thing. One only needs look at history to know women have used men to further their agendas for as long as there have been men and women. Remember Helen of Troy? Need I say more?
All men, whether they admit it or no, long to return to their mother's womb through whatever vagina is available at any time. No time like the present is our collective motto, even if we don't know it. We want that feeling again; that slippery slide through the passage, but this time, we want to go into a warm place, protected by our mother's thin belly skin. We don't want to be spat out into a glaring, loud, cold place with too many hard surfaces. We want soft. We don't want to worry anymore. We want to be safe, secure, warm, and to float along in warm juices being fed automatically, whenever we need feeding. We want to hear the world through that drum of mother skin and sleep when we feel like it. It'd be nice if we could slide out once in a while, have sex with our hostess and get so deep inside her that we disappear again into that warm wet retreat. Maybe we could hide out in the womb for a few decades to emerge into a better world. Maybe we could go back in time in the womb to a “better” place. Maybe the womb is a time portal. Who knows? All we men know is that, if we could just fool around with the vagina enough;get inside it, ejaculate into it, put our fingers in it, lick it, and smell it enough, we might figure it out and find the way back to paradise. Women aren't much help unfortunately. They have different agendas none of us males really understand.
There is that other thing though; we long, like any other furry creature, to be in union with others of our kind. We want to love and to be loved in return. We want to appreciate and to be appreciated. We want to grow old in familiar surroundings and with someone familiar. Sure, we all die alone, but before that time comes, we want to belong. We want to be treated with kindness and familiarity, and we want to treat others with kindness and familiarity. We don't want rough surprises. We don't want to be eaten in the night by hairy monsters, and we'd like to protect others of our kind, preferably female, from being eaten by hairy monsters in the dark. We feel good about protecting and providing, and it helps us not to be afraid. Yes, we do these things so that our unions with others may be lasting and we live in fear in the Western World that impermanence will take our happy unions away from us. It will, and it does; constantly. Impermanence is the only constant in life. Once we learn this, we learn to live in peace and understanding. Knowing that nothing is permanent allows us not to be taken by surprise when change takes place. Change becomes an expected guest rather than a nasty intruder. We can invite change into our understanding of life and live in peace with it, loose the fear, and have a shot of obtaining joy. We still howl occasionally, but less and less so as age dims us and teaches us to listen.
The energy of the metaphors of youth turn from lusting for that warm, dark, furry, wet place to a vision that becomes longer and broader with age. We remember still, but the pain of unatainment lessens as time passes. We learn to accept, and therefore, to cope with the uncertainties of life because we know finally that life is uncertain and filled with change. That's the fun of it really. How we deal with change progresses from fear to understanding and creative challenge. We learn to live within our means, physically, spiritually, emotionally, and sexually. And then of course; we die, hopefully in the peace of understanding, not in regret or misunderstanding. We, as men, start to focus more on other things besides the passage back into the womb, and find how big the universe really is. We slowly learn how to enjoy life, or at least how not to fear it, and the journey becomes easier and easier.
Some of us are slower than others, but none of us truly forgets the quest for the vaginal grail. We still want it in our senses and in our hearts, and in our dreams especially, but the field has narrowed and the plumbing becomes less and less reliable as time goes by. I don't remember being attracted to my Grandmother sexually as a young buck, but all the “girls” my age now look like my Grandmother did back in the day. Having sexual relations with someone who looks like my Grandmother is something I don't find attractive. I'm sure women feel the same about us. Finding the beauty and the sexiness inside a person is the key. Loving someone for who they truly are, rather than for a good breeding partner is tantamount for peace, joy, love, and understanding in our older years. Finding real love is only possible when we drop the egotistical yearnings of youth and give in to wisdom. When we learn to truly trust our gut while still listening to our heart, our perfect mate will be there in front of us. She was there all along.
Michael
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