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My husband used to make me feel like the sexiest woman alive. Now his idea of seduction is "Wanna do it tonight?"
Oct 22, 2002 | Dear Reader,
Last week this column was made Premium. Many of you expressed disappointment and outrage; many others signed up for subscriptions; some probably did both. There was a considerable venting of feelings, particularly because it was done without notice -- which was a mistake on our part. To all those who responded in whatever way, I want to say thank you for your passionate engagement with Salon and with this column.
This week, the column is free once more. But there are more changes planned, starting next week. On Monday, "Since you asked ..." will be relaunched as a daily column. Three days a week the column will be free; two days a week it will be available only to Salon Premium subscribers.
These are business decisions, and I stay out of all that. I just write the column. It's best that way. I leave it to the hard-working business people here at Salon to keep the lights on.
Let me just restate the obvious: I love doing the column, and I love hearing about you and your lives. It's without a doubt the most remarkable experience of my writing career. I continue to be humbled and amazed by the depth, variety and sincerity of the real-life tales you tell. The only way this can go on is if Salon does well as a business. Ergo, whatever it takes. I hope you can support that.
P.S. This is No. 50 and the column's one-year anniversary; it premiered Oct. 17, 2001.
Dear Cary,
My husband and I have been married for nearly eight years. We have a preschool-age son and another baby due in a few weeks. We have a wonderful marriage, and he's an excellent (quite nearly perfect) partner in all areas but one -- the seduction.
When my husband is feeling amorous, he usually communicates this with the oh-so-romantic line, "Wanna do it tonight?" He will make this proposal while looking at his e-mail or sweeping the floor or some activity equally unrelated and unsexy. At times he shows even less finesse, pointing to his crotch, tilting his head and whining about how horny he is. This makes me roll my eyes and want to run in the other direction. My usual response is, "Gee, no thanks." If I am trying to be a good sport (or if he has been a nice guy lately), I will follow up with, "How about another blow job, honey?" This takes only five to 10 minutes of effort on my part and will get him to shut up for a few days, but it is always followed by the same lousy approach later.
He was so wonderfully flirtatious earlier in our relationship. He could really make me feel like the sexiest, most beautiful woman alive. Why is he so lazy now? I have tried to tell him that his standard line isn't working for me, but I don't think the message is coming across. And I don't think it's just because I'm pregnant now, because this has been an issue for some time (as I recall, even before our first child was born). When we actually do have sex, it is great for both of us. But it is ridiculously infrequent, and I have to really focus to get into it, because my husband has not done anything to help me get in the mood.
I have asked a couple of my most trusted girlfriends about this, and I was surprised to hear that they had experienced this in either their current or past relationships. Is this just a guy thing? Are all men like this?
You've Gotta Be Kidding
Dear Gotta Be Kidding,
His approach does sound crude, but the pattern you describe is so pervasive that it's probably not fair to single him out. Reluctant as some of us are to admit it, domesticity, for all its benefits, can be passion poison. We accept it gladly because we want safety and routine, we want comfort and security, we want to raise kids and keep order in society and care for someone we love. But it's poison nonetheless.
The routine of life in a busy house gives birth to a kind of distracted emotional shorthand, a system of spiritual triage. Sonnets are reduced to Post-its on the refrigerator. Whatever is most urgent is what gets our attention, and romance gets neglected in favor of money, education, housing and other immediate concerns.
Bit by bit we get careless. We make short-term decisions that have long-term consequences. We have little unsatisfying moments whose sting lingers and works to further erode the passion that once was the life-giving center of the relationship. And all the time this is happening, the relationship is moving inexorably forward, developing a language, a collection of habits and a context all its own.
Sometimes you have to break the routine. It helps to get away somewhere, to be reminded of why you're together. And it helps to find a way to reintegrate the act of making love into the larger realm. I'm not sure quite how to explain how to do that, but if you break the routine that's killing the romance, the romance seems to reemerge, like a plant that's been deprived of what it needed.
You can go to counseling too, if you can't break the routine on your own, or if you're lost and can't focus, or if you're lost and he can't focus. You can use more candles at dinner and turn off the TV. You can send the kids to camp. You can camp yourself, in the back yard. But there's no doubt that being a couple in America and working for a living can drain your once consuming passion until the dark, wild and ageless drama of seduction is reduced to a snapping of the fingers and a pointing at the crotch. There is no simple solution. It's a fact. It's the way we live. It's who and what we are.
We ought to be better. But we're not. We're Americans, we rule the world, and we go to sleep hungry, restless and alone.
