Just how many cultural biases can you pick out of a subspecialty called seniorsex?
In my conversation with Joan Sewell I said I call my blog “Real Adult Sex” because I think we base too much of our sexuality on a) reactions, often evasive reactions, to our parents to our parents efforts to regulate our emerging sexuality and b) reactions to the intense conformity pressures of peers in late adolescence (call it high school) that, say, Eric Erickson believed is critical to the formation of adult identity. I believe that in most other areas (with the notable exceptions of personal finance and intensely personal hygiene habits) we’re able to continue discussion into adulthood and thus continue to bring further, and more mature, distinctions that aren’t centered around recalled reaction, evasion, denial, and adolescent pressure to conform. Sex? Not so much.
Not convinced? Let’s ask one question: what’s your first reaction to the suggestion that your parents had sex? If your answer was like most peoples it was either “cover my ears and go ‘la-la-lal-la’” or “I threw up in my mouth a little.”
Sorry. Chances are exceedingly slight that the gleam in your father’s eye when you were but a gleam in your father’s eye did not involve making you. Chances are also exceedingly slight that your mother laid back and “thought of England.” Instead they, like your over-30 non-hot teachers, like your fusty principal, or ministers, or the craggy old grocery store manager had sex pretty much exactly the way you do and pretty much for the exact same reasons. Even if you think what you do is pretty kinky. Yup, your mom sucked your dad’s cock. Your dad gave your mom fat, juicy orgasms with his tongue. They tied each other up. They at least experimented with members of their own sex. They took pictures of each other with old-fashioned Polaroid cameras. They at least tried anal intercourse and maybe enjoyed it often.
More to the point, they didn’t only do it till your last sibling, or cousin, or schoolmate was born either. Nor did they do it only when they were 19, or 22, or (a stretch here, I know) 31. Nope. Chances are better than even that if they’re still alive and still together they’ve done it in the last 45 days.
Uh oh, where’s everybody gone? [Crickets?] Then I rest my case.
But here’s the thing. If they had stopped when you were born, if they had stopped once, say, they left college, if they had stopped at age 29 when, according to way too many fashionistas, the “bloom is off the rose, if they had stopped after they gained a little weight or started to turn gray or their skin started sagging a bit…
... you’d have to as well. At least “for the children” if not outright common decency itself.
Right?
Heh. I don’t think so!
And neither do you.
So from whence this idea that sex for seniors should have it’s own Faith-Popcorn©-style appellation “seniorsex?” At what point, exactly, does sex become “seniorsex?” If one partner is more than a few days older than the other then there’s going some point in their lives where one begins having specialized “seniorsex.” But not the other.
Bizarrely, considering it’s got it’s own appellation and all, neither partner is likely to notice the transition. Certainly not at the point when it begins to happen.
‘Member how I said we form our primary ideas about sex in response to our parents and high school? And how unlike most other activities that continue into adulthood we rarely bring further distinction to it? The notion that there’s such a thing as “seniorsex” is clue number two. (Clue number one being covering our ears and going “la-la-la”.)
I’m just saying.
Note: In the US, anyway, the American Association of Retired People mails you an AARP membership application when you turn 50. That suggests that, in at least some people’s minds, if you’re over 18 you’re no more than 32 years away from “seniorsex.” It also means that quite a few of the 70 million baby boomers are already having it. Unless you plan to stop having sex, plan to lose interest desire for those your own age, or plan for everyone your age to lose interest in you then it’s probably not too early to start thinking about how you want people to think about you when you pass that magic mark.
Submitted by 1264 (not verified) on Thu, 2007-03-22 10:59.
you know, after the age of about 12 i didn't have any question that my folks had active sex lives. heck even before that. i think the penny dropped when i was in about 4th grade. their sex lives just weren't with each other since they were divorced but i was quite aware....
my education came when i had 3 little kids around my ankles and my grandmother came to visit with a carload of her girlfriends and i spent the afternoon hearing tales of the sex lives of 70 and 80 year old widows. rock on grandma! i sure gave me hope!
[Yup. And when you consider the alternative... Thanks, Lime. --fl]
Submitted by 1264 (not verified) on Thu, 2007-03-22 11:35.
Where to start?! Well said? Absolutely (as ever). Those seniorsex sites? How patronising can you get! If you're not young, you're 90 or more. Twilight years = over 60. Some of it is jaw-droppingly awful.
I remember very well when I first noticed my parents' sexuality - I was about 6 years old at the time. Somewhat surprisingly my mother is, within her particular limits, relatively frank with me about sex. Whether that has had any effect on my thinking I don't know.
As for the AARP, my husband has had a major battle with something equivalent to them who attempted to send us a magazine every month when he hit the magic age (he worked for an American firm which has to be significant because nobody else I know has had the same). We have finally won - it no longer arrives, but it took some considerable effort.
Great post figleaf! You knew I was going to say that didn't you?
[I think even indirect conversation with adults can make a big difference, at least once we're out of the woods of adolescence. In a way I was fortunate to have had a... sort of... advisor in the form of an astoundingly profane paper-route manager who, while I wouldn't do a single thing he thought was fun, still gave me something to work with. (That I'm *still* unlearning some of the nonsense he tried to inculcate is another story. But it's the process, not always the content.) As for those seniorsex sites? They're gonna have a whole 'nuther outlook when all 70 million of us boomers are over 65! (The best piece of forecasting I've ever heard is "retirement for boomers will be nothing like their grandparent's.") Thanks, A. --fl]
Submitted by 1264 (not verified) on Thu, 2007-03-22 13:15.
There was a time, maybe in my early teens, where the thought of my parents having sex was horrible. But sex sort of sounded gross then anyway. Once it didn't, I didn't give a crap about my parents. Hell, I HOPE they have an active sex life. I mean, I bought my mother a vibrator and my brother condoms. I am pretty much okay with everyone having sex.
[Thanks for that point, WG. Yeah, at that point where we realize *we're* starting to get sexual? Thinking about our parents then is just, like, the end! I remember when I was just about to turn into a pre-teen my dad told me about masturbation and said it was ok to do. Which promptly kept me from even thinking about doing it for maybe two more years! It's funny now to realize he was a lot younger then than I am now, and how hard it probably was for him to tell me, and to know now how important it was to him that I not be as messed up about it as he was raised to be. Now I can think how cool it was for him to make that effort, but back then? Ewww! :-) Thanks, my dear. --fl]
Submitted by 1264 (not verified) on Thu, 2007-03-22 15:48.
Ah! I'm close that senior whatever it is... We love so much to put people in boxes... with huge sticker on each...
I refuse to be limited in any way.. If ever I find myself at 75 having sex with a 17 year's old (who knows, it can happens, no??) how are we gonna be called??? pedo-senior whatever???
Anyway... I know for sure that my mom never performed blowjob... so my dad never get any... unless they lied... Shy themselves??? Maybe... they are catholic a generation before me... so it is possible...
[It really is possible they didn't, ever, not even once. And I'm not saying that facitiously. It's also likely they absolutely weren't going to share anything they did together with anyone else, especially their children -- that's a bit more common. But what I really wanted to say is good on yer for keeping an open mind about aging. None of us know how we'll really feel at that age, so why start limiting our possibilities before we get there? Thanks, SeaRabbit. --fl]
Submitted by 1264 (not verified) on Thu, 2007-03-22 17:20.
I can't recall the point at which I realized that my parents had to have been having sex (there were six of us after all). It must have been in my teens, not any earlier, since sex was not discussed in our house. Ever. I know that my reaction was not eww, but more likely disbelief. My mother is about as close to a Puritan as you could find in the 21st century, and definitely one of the 'close your eyes and endure for queen and country' types. It was beyond the scope of my imagination to picture my father doing anything with her that she would find enjoyable (no oral or anal sex for sure, and probably no orgasms either). Sad, really, but the consequence was that all my knowledge of sex was picked up on the streets, and in my late teens/early twenties, from guys at work . In my case, it was the line cooks and dishwashers at the bar where I worked - an incredibly obscene bunch who had no compunction about discussing/revealing/bragging about the nitty gritty details. I just know that I and perhaps many of us who are now reaching a certain age (the AARP age) have made a concerted effort to move away from, in particular, our parents' notions of sex.
As for the 'senior sex' labeling issue, well, I'm with you - who's a senior? I equate 'senior' with really old, like my mother. Not that that's bad, and unlike her, I hope I will still be having and enjoying sex when I get to be her age. I know this sounds sort of crackpot, but I think it's another effort to create a niche market (like 'tweens') for more unnecessary products and services, like, for example, labioplasty.
I remember quite clearly the day about 15 years ago when I saw a Deadhead sticker and an AARP sticker on the same car (a VW bus BTW; not a bug bus, but still...). I thought it was the end of the world as I knew it, as it meant that the generation I belonged to was now becoming 'them' instead of 'us'.
Good thought provoking post, Figs.
Oh and nice fingers on the squash!
[I sort of gave up on the Dead when I learned that a lot of Gingrich's "Freshmen of '94" thought they were into them. As Bob Weir once said "Jerry's been through a lot of changes, man." But I digress. :-) Anyway, I agree that the "seniorsex" thing seems to appear mostly as a kind of *porn fetish!* Which is like totally out of touch with, um, reality. I talk sometimes about how children shouldn't be rushed into sexuality (something I really, *really* believe in) because if they have a chance to mature first they'll have the whole rest of their lives to enjoy themselves. Well, the same thing seems true about sex in older age -- why make a huge fuss over what will later come naturally for almost all of us? Thanks, Janeway. --fl]
Submitted by 1264 (not verified) on Fri, 2007-03-23 08:22.
Sex and the single senior.
That's the title I want to see.
[The last thing you want to hear is "just wait," but you're bound to see it before long. Thanks, Five. --fl]
Submitted by 1264 (not verified) on Sat, 2007-03-24 19:21.
Woot! You so rock
I find the "lalala" reaction to parental sex highly amusing, but also annoying. I mean, come ON
My partner is SO straight in some ways, and this is one of them. He's 40, has grey hair, has been sleeping with me since I was 18 and he 36. How much of a hypocrite is he??
I periodically make fun of him, because beyond being disgusted at the idea of his parents having sex, he's disgusted at the idea of his ex-boss (older woman, could be a bit of an ogre as a manager but not unattractive) having sex, or even his good friend from work (the only woman I know who's 5'11" and enjoys wearing heels so she can make fun of shorter guys lol)
I mean, how childish is this attitude? I've hassled him a bit about Liz (boss) because she's not that much older than him, they got on fairly well, she looked stressed a lot, but was not unattractive. Sure, he wasn't personally attracted to her, but gets physically uncomfortable and makes me stop when I ask him WHY he's so horrified (as well as giggling behind his hand practically) at her sleeping with her swimming coach. He himself said she was a much happier person when she was getting laid!
*sigh* He puts up with my fascination with and ranting about sex and gender roles, sexism and how depressing it is that everyone's so hung up about sex that no one can have fun. But he really doesn't care :P
[To be honest I think it's fine to go la-la-la about our own parents, but that's because we have a lot of history with them, not because they're old. (I still think it's better to get over it, at least a the abstract level that for that admittedly significant history with us they're just people to everyone else.) Fretting about what other people do just because you'd rather not do it with them, though, is worth working through since... well... unless we're hit by a truck chances are we'll be doing it too when we're their age. Thanks, Dana. --fl]