In response to an entry in
He was nice and intelligent, but sometimes I find that two peoples’ personalities don’t exactly fit, though not for any particular reason. Am I the only one this happens to?
Not by a loooong shot. This typefies the bulk of my dating experience out here. And it’s probably why a number of friends have [wisely] recommended that one do the vast majority of one’s dating from within the field of people you’ve met through friends. That seems to be how most successful relationships form. Its main flaw is that cultivating relationships (of the pants on sort) with no romantic intent to them is indirect. It can also lead to accusations of using people, but if you aren’t forming good connections along the way then you’re doing it wrong.
As for the hookup thing, well, I think I’m probably the person you know best who has done similar things, and maybe I can offer some insight. I generally prefer not to expose my cohabitants to such, though I’m not totally rigid about that. Abram has seen it once or twice. For me, it’s mostly hormones and habit. Maybe it all started because I got a late start on masturbation (I was fooling around with someone else before fooling around solo, oddly enough).
But, I usually hold out some hope for something more from my one night stands. Example: when first meeting the first two of my three past bf’s, well, pantslessness occurred before our first dinner together. I could easily see hormones, and even more so, habit, leading me even further down that road, but given my desire for greater emotional connection, that would seem to be foolish. My relationship with Josh was a definite anomaly in this pattern, and one I do not regret for a second.
Frequently, going in to a hookup, one doesn’t know what will come of it. I’ve had a couple bf’s, a few regular, though non-romantic, sex partners, and a handful of friends where we afterwards kept our pants on, a large number of guys that I never see again, and some people that it’s uncomfortable to see again, oh yeah, and lots of sex, with a standard bell-curve-esque quality distribution. Playing the odds, any given trick is not likely to turn into something more, but stranger things have happened.
You’re thinking makes sense to me. I understand the “well, I might as well do this now, and hopefully something will come of us” thinking… it’s the wham-bam-thank-you-maam-goodbye, without any desire or hope of anything futher that is beyond my comprehension. I would have to at least have to kid myself that I may be interested in someone. Things like… conversation… knowing something about them… seem minimum prerequisites. Without the person giving any evidence that they are in fact a person, it would do absolutely nothing more for me than a picture, if not less.
The wham-bam stuff is mostly when the hormones and habits start overwhelming the hope for something more, in my experience.
i know i don’t have much of a right to post this comment seeing as how i haven’t been single since, well, before i was legal. anyway, i agree with you about the hormones thing (or is it just being good old fashioned horny?). i made a huge mistake by the name of prince (yes his parents named him prince) and i think it all boiled down to my desire to not be single (read “i didn’t want my next orgasm to be self-induced”) and hoping that a one night stand would go somewhere (read “i wanted many of my future orgasms to come from someone else”). man, i should have just woke up and said, “get out.” i am so bummed i can never get that two weeks of my life back.
That whole personality thing… yeah… strange. While there are many many example where I can identify the incompatibility, it’s the ones where I can’t that are interesting. It’s like there is some intangible factor. Maybe just getting off on the wrong foot? Huh.
yes, to me that line of thinking does makes sense. Perhaps, according to some of your reasoning, that’s why the casual quickies for me have slowed down, significantly. It’s not to say that I don’t try to meet guys. Such activities, or finding ones appropriate to my person have been a point in great contention — since I’m not your “stereotypical homosexual male” (whatever the hell that is), I don’t frequent clubs or bars, the mall, i.e., I don’t really go to all the places many people would describe as gay hangouts.
So yeah, the Internet does still provide some meeting opportunities, and surprise surprise, it’s NOT on gay.com. And sometimes it is true, you don’t get to pick who feels that you are a cool and wonderful person. In my case, it’s a nice young man in Ohio who just finished his degree, looking for a job wherever — location is a little less important, from what he says. (Not that he’s going to move out here, mind you.) And so we’re clicking really well. Just interesting how personalities over 2200 miles apart attract each other, and how I seem to have zilch serious admirers in the bastion of gay populaces, the SF Bay area. Mea culpa.
Why moralize? What difference does it make if you have sex with someone before you know much about them? If the sex goes well, you know that works. For me, a relationship is like a puzzle and all the pieces have to fit. Why say sex can’t come first? OK, I have to admit that this all back-fired on me once when I had great sex with a guy and then found out he was a Republican. This leads into a whole other discussion, the ethics of the grudge fuck.
I saw it more as a pragmatic analysis. I don’t condemn people for hooking up. It’s about ultimate goals. Will I be happier doing this or that? It seems that our desires do not always serve our ultimate happiness. Hence the amoral value of restraint. =)
Gosh. I didn’t masturbate until after I started having sex with my second lover, as it were. He told me it was ok to masturbate. ; )
This is a much longer and more interesting story, but probably your LJ is not the appropriate place for it….