And if anyone tells you all their sexual partners were utterly fantastic, brilliant in bed, completely attuned to their particular sexual tastes, and always ready for it, who's seriously going to believe them? Sex is a complicated business and we all make a mess of it from time to time.
And if we're already a bit nervous about our sexual skills, who wants to hear about the wonderful ex who always knew exactly what to do and how to trigger total bliss in ten seconds? Or for that matter the hopeless ex who hadn't a clue and inspired a new world record in faked orgasms? Who only makes us feel even more nervous.
Do we really want to be told how stunningly attractive they were (prompting immediate thoughts of our own over-large bum, wrinkles and disastrous hair)? Or how amusing and witty they were (reminding us of our habitually catatonic and hatchet-faced disposition)?
No, unless the other person is supremely self-confident and quite happy with their body, any distant tales from the bedroom are asking for trouble. Better to keep them to yourself along with other mood-dampeners like heavy periods and false teeth.
The often ham-fisted and blush-inducing details of our chequered sexual history should only be divulged to very close and trusted friends who won't be phased by our failings or excesses but will remind us of their own sexual quandaries and give us the shared understanding we need.
So don't even ask about the woman with breast implants or the woman with the hand mirror or the woman with the very long tongue. My lips are sealed.
Haha! Like the last sentence!
ReplyDeletei have never been silly enough to ask about a partner's sexual history and they usually dont say too much.
ReplyDeleteMy husband and I are in no danger. That's one benefit of being old-fashioned and square. (If they still use that term anymore.)> :D
ReplyDeleteI like to feel that uncomfortable jealousy!
ReplyDeleteGawd it's all so individual isn't it, someone's fish being another one's poisson 'n all that.
ReplyDeleteXO
WWW
Jenny: It's the truth. Some things can only be told to those you truly trust with such intimate revelations.
ReplyDeleteKylie: Very sensible. You could be entering a minefield.
Monk: You mean in no danger because previous sexual experiences are way back in the past?
Leah: Oh, that's very perverse of you! But it does prove how important your current relationship is to you.
ReplyDeletewww: Yes, it's a very individual thing, I guess. Which is why it's often best to keep quiet. What wouldn't bother one person could devastate someone else.
I misread 'dicey topic' as dicky topic...
ReplyDeleteSx
What is sex? And what brought this on? Did Mary Roach approach you for an interview?
ReplyDeleteNick, Ramana knows the woman with the mirror.... He saw her in the jogger's park in Pune!!
ReplyDeleteScarlet: Your filthy mind running amok again, sweetheart.
ReplyDeleteRamana: What is sex? Don't tell me you're a virgin, ha ha. Had to google Mary Roach and her sexual intercourse experiment. I like her comment that her husband found it more embarrassing than she did.
Grannymar: He does? Then she must get around a bit. I last saw her in Islington.
I don't completely agree. Sure blabbing on about a succession of formers who were superlatively this or that is a bad idea.
ReplyDeleteBut mentioning specifics that worked well in the past could be good. If bliss has previously been achieved, why squander the knowledge and the chance to experience it again.
Coyness can be attractive - alluring even - but information wins.
Of course, how to broach that sort of discussion is a whole other topic.
Nick,
ReplyDeleteYou forget how archaic I am. I still remember when people didn't believe in premarital sex. That plus the fact I was a physics major and we spent a lot of our time in college working. :D
Paul: Recalling specifics, as opposed to recalling a particular person, is fair enough. That way you can improve what you're doing without the invidious effects of comparing actual bedmates.
ReplyDeleteMonk: Ah, I see what you mean. The uncomplicated era free of premarital sex. Yes, no danger of previous embarrassments there.
ReplyDeleteBut then again, I can recall plenty of premarital flings even in the days when they weren't supposed to happen.
LOL at the last sentence. Pure comedy. What I see a lot of, sadly, is folks willing to talk about the skill of ex lovers but feeling shy about asking the current person they're considering sleeping with about an HIV test. I don't understand it.
ReplyDeleteLiz: No, I don't understand that either. Or not asking the guys to use a condom. Or not asking about sexual infections. They're asking for trouble. But I guess a lot of people are still shy about posing such direct questions.
ReplyDeleteI clearly live in a different universe, Nick. I do not know anyone, no one, who talks about their sex lives the way you describe it. No one.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Kylie; and with Paul that to divulge likes and dislikes is desirable - as not to leave a new partner in the dark. But you do so not with reference to what went on before.
If anything, and I am sure this will ring true with most of your readers, your new love will tell you that all that went on before was never as good than what the two of you have now.
Am baffled by your post. Nothing NEW there then.
U
Ursula: Okay, no one you know ever talks about their sexual history. That's very sensible of them. But I know it does happen, particularly saying that an ex-lover was useless and your current partner is oh so much better.
ReplyDeleteI suspect you're right about people always saying their present bedmate is the best ever. Another variation on faking it.