In the spirit of the profusion of “Apologies to Women” that sprung up on Facebook a while back, I thought that as a species, we women were remiss in offering a response. Poor guys, taking the brunt for all of it! No way! Here you go guys, a response. May all sentient beings now have very good sex.
It is with deep regret and sadness that I write this letter. It is to every man that I have ever dated (or something of that nature) and I want to say the most difficult words that will likely ever cross my lips: I apologize.
I apologize for the fact that I did not do the work to recognize that – despite whatever delusions I desperately indulged in – there is no way around it: nothing but everything from you will do. I know I told you it would be alright if you bought me another pair of shoes, or if we spent the next seven hours processing. I know that I made subtle promises that you didn’t have to do anything but be there, hang out and let me love you, or that once we “settled down” I would be happy. I lied.
I apologize that I was unwilling to answer this question of what women want, leaving you frustrated and confused. I left it open-ended and murky because I thought you would say no. I want you, all of you, wide awake and ready to play. I want you to handle me, so that I can stop “taking care” of everything. I want you to tell me to stop, just stop, lie down – and to know that you are totally capable of taking over. I won’t believe it at first (and at second and at third). I won’t believe it until you show me repeatedly. I want you to be willing to subdue my doubt with your conviction.
I apologize for all the smokescreens I put up, trying to cover my one simple yes-or-no question: do you want to go deep, throw all of our chips in the pot and see what we come up with, or not? I let my fear drive: fear that you’re a guy and as such, scared of commitment – not the commitment of marriage but the commitment of soul – to go all the way to see what you, what I, what we, are made of. (Yes, I know how to push your buttons, how to activate that fear, and then be like, “Who me?”) I am here waiting for you to commit, that is all. I didn’t say that I am just as scared as you even though it looks like I am the one who is pushing for it.
I apologize that I did not ask the difficult questions at the beginning. That I was essentially a drug dealer and hoped to get you so hooked that you had no way out. Rather than just asking you if you wanted to go deep, if that turned you on, if you were prepared. I hoped that we could deal with that issue when we came to it. Invariably when it did, when the bill came, you felt duped and upset. Rightly so.
I apologize for the times when I used my sex as a bargaining chip – to get you to love me, to want me, to claim me. And then, when I had you and no longer needed to bargain, stopped having sex. I apologize for seeing you as a security conquest, giving you the best sex of your life right before you gave me the commitment.
I apologize for the big fat lie I intimated, that I was a “finite game,” and that after you completed the following tasks we would now return you to your regularly-scheduled programming – that you could return to the peace and comfort of your mind, and I would leave you alone in the sanctuary, away from my chaos and unpredictability. I am sorry that I did not say, I want all of you and I want you to have all of me, and if we are going to be in a relationship of that nature, it will require never-ending engagement on both of our parts – it’s not a one-time shot. We don’t win each other and then check that one off the list, moving on to more productive things. The getting each other is not the end but the beginning of the game. And that game never stops. I misrepresented myself as “easy.” (The free razor-blade handle.) My confession is that I am anything but easy and get more, not less, challenging. This is not the bunny slope. Beware.
And I apologize for playing “nice” – because as a woman, the only way I am going to be nice is to shut down the rest of me. I was not clear with you that I am like a game of obstacles, and you get the temporary respite that is nice under two circumstances: when I give up on you, or when you figure out the Rubic’s cube and handle me. My kindness is the most cruel thing I can do to you, because without challenge you become a mediocre man.
I apologize for believing that my only power with you was withholding and withdrawal. For believing you too weak and fragile to withstand my power and wrath. For walking on eggshells with you, careful never to bruise your ego, lest you leave me for “an easier woman.” I will tell you that at the root of quiet kindness is a rage of everything I believe I cannot tell you. And that where it has come down to the options of either fuck-or-fight breakthrough, or the learned-helplessness that results from kindness, all too often I have chosen the latter. I have not had the courage to be a great woman, the kind of woman who can make you a king, only a good woman who will “support” you, not the queen who would compel you, propel you, forge you.
Yes, I apologize for not admitting that I am the one who holds the power and you the authority to carry out the laws. I apologize that I did not learn to hold or wield this power in such a way that the benefit of serving it was obvious. I apologize that I did not recognize that this power was rooted in my sexuality – that I left you there holding the sex piece on behalf of both of us, and then was victimized when you reached for me. I did not hold up my side of the sexual bargain in terms of holding that much hunger and desire, projecting it all onto you. We both lost in this equation. Because I want nothing more than for you to be inside of me, but admitting that, fully owning it, means that I have to accept the full responsibility of citizenship in womanhood rather than girlhood. And it often looks like I lose a lot of the perks like being cute and sweet and easy.
And I apologize for the fact that I sold both of us out, that when I hit that state of H.A.L.T. – hungry, angry, lonely, and tired – I lost faith in you and settled for food, arguments, fucking, and crawling under the covers and hiding out, rather than trusting that you were capable of offering nourishment, power, the kind of sex where I lose track of who I am, and waking up. There IS no excuse.
I apologize most of all for ever believing that I could be that woman and then trying to sell you that big fat lie. I tried, I donned as many mental and emotional corsets as I could. I tried to smile and laugh and be easygoing, like a 70’s song where you would see me walking on the beach in a white dress with long straight brown natural hair, tossed by a breeze. Or changing a baby’s diaper, glancing over at you, so proud that you could be my baby’s daddy. I even tried to be sad and sick so that you could feel strong and protective, so that you could feel like society’s definition of a man. The only problem is that I don’t want that man. (And I am sick of all the ace bandages and Kleenex boxes.)
I tried also to be good prey, to hold back my secrets, my desire, my passion and hunger, my unbearable hunger for sex so that you could chase me and I could squeal and you could pound your chest and come and get it. I just can’t help it, my desire is unruly and wily and untamed, and I see when that part of me comes out how you think I am a madwoman, a little scary, and how you don’t quite know what to do with yourself, and you start perusing good housekeeping the way that a man who hasn’t encountered one so feral and had the shit scared out of him looks at hardcore porn, just to get a taste of what it would be like to be normal again.
I am sorry that I settled for love without passion.
I am sorry for all the times I let you off the hook – you know, like when you got scared and didn’t call. Or when you didn’t know what to do with me and shuffled into the other room onto the sanctuary of the computer, or into your office into the sanctuary of another woman. When that happened I fell under the same tyranny of fear that held you, and I was not willing to trust that you could actually hear the truth, that it hurt, that it sucked, that I missed you, that I love you. I believed that you were actually incapable of showing up. And in that I made you less of a man.
I apologize for going out with you when I knew that I was way out of your league, but happened to be lonely and bored… and then pumped you up, boosted you up and then fell in love with my own creation – only to discover that when I pulled the plug on all the juice I pumped in, you deflated back to who you always were, feeling resentful and confused that I was no longer interested, and that you no longer were getting your free fix.
And I deeply apologize for translating feminine language for you. I know it’s like cuneiform or something, but in translating it for you, I treated you the way an American is treated in France when everyone writes you off immediately as a stupid American and coddle you by speaking in English. And a year later you still haven’t learned the language, you remain a foreigner. I bought the story that you told me that you were dumb and simple and don’t get it. That is how my superiority manifested itself. And it isn’t fair to you.
I apologize for not saying to you, please-please-please stop with the “divine goddess” schtick, and the sensitivity, and meeting me with the perfect complement of “deep masculinity” – if I wanted that man I would find him. I want you in all of your weird, quirky, imperfect, totally unpolished self. That is where I fall in love with you. I am sorry that I was so unwilling to give you any fucking clue about how to be with me that you had to listen to other men who are equally clueless, and turn into a caricature of yourself.
Lastly, I apologize for trying to protect you from feeling how much, how deeply I love you. How deeply cannot be fathomed.
Dear Nicole, I particularly enjoyed this piece and the entry you made called “Men, this is what you’re up against.” From what I can tell, neither men nor women have to be victims of their relationships, but nowhere in your writing do I find that you’ve found there are men who look at all of the challenges of relating with women and say “Bring it on!” Why do some men feel that way? It’s because they love women so much (and, if they’re fortunate, they have at least one special, soulmate kind of relationship that transcends all others.
By you own admission, you have resorted to all kinds of lying and deceit in your relationships. Hey, don’t worry about it…so have just about every other man and woman I’ve known, including myself. In a recent post, I said that women underestimate how stupid men are, and I only have to look back at my own experiences and think “What was I thinking when I did that to that woman?” Being stupid doesn’t mean you have to stay that way, and, for many guys, the realization of their own idiocy is one of the first steps toward having ever-better relationships.
There are some guys who get it that they want to be around and involved with strong women. Those guys are called strong men, and they recognized that loving acts are composed of many elements, including acting with honor, loyalty, respect, compassion, gratitude and so on.
It’s wonderful that you want to apologize to allthose men, but, in my experience, such things as apologies and finding forgiveness are much more for the individual doing the apologizing and forgiving than they are for the person they’ve supposedly fouled. OK, I’ve got to go. I hope you’re having a spectacular weekend! LaMont
Ok, LaMont, full disclosure. Your comments were among the precipitating factors that inspired this letter. It was while reading your comments that I had the thought, “dear god, this man is so superior, so arrogant, so know it all, so with his own myopic agenda that I have no idea how all of these ‘women friends’ of his let him get away with this”. Until I realized that in my silence, I was one of those women who was more attached to looking nice and not stirring the pot and not just saying come on man, I see what you are doing, just stop. If you want to contribute, really contribute. You can drop the omniscience deal and the whole sales schtick that you and the men where you come from are more evolved. And you can play, deeply, personally, vulnerably and without hexing or any of that crap. But then, and here is where you are absolutely correct, the apology is for the person apologizing, I had to look at my own accountability. I have had this thought for what, ten years or something like that, and never said a word. I just withdrew and avoided and hoped beyond hope that I would not encounter this in you or your friends so that I would not have to address it. I was ruled by a kind of fear that I would be seen as a bitch, that there would be retaliation, that people would talk shit about me, that, god forbid I would not be liked or seem appreciative. Or that the speaking of it would eclipse the deeper genuine love and appreciation I do feel. Ultimately though I was willing to sell out my experience and in doing so preclude any possibility of genuine intimacy. It was a place where I was not free and no one could grant me the freedom, I had to declare it which is what the letter was.
This response to your comment is my way of saying, I don’t want to hide from you due to the fact that when I am in your presence virtual or otherwise it hurts and I am too whatever it is, prideful or vain to say anything. Ultimately, I think we are on the same team, with the same goal, which is to share what we have learned to the best of our ability about love as a way of paying it forward. I’m sending this with my genuine hope that we can be allies in this endeavor.
Dear Nicole, First of all, if I have treated you in an arrogant manner, or I have done you any harm in any way, I sincerely apologize for that. You say that my comments have been a “precipitating factor” in what you wrote. Well, I offered my services to you, and, if in some small way I have been of service, I feel we have both profited from this experience.
For the record, Nicole, I think you are very attractive, quite intelligent, articulate, an extremely entertaining writer, ambitious, enthusiastic, and I’ve always thought we were friends and allies. What’s also true, is that we have had some of the same teachers in our search for truth, but there is nothing that compels us to agree on everything. I hope that there is room for that in our friendship.
I’ve also never used the word “evolved” or said that the guys I know are more “evolved” than anybody else. I do seem to run with guys who think that love is more important than sex. That doesn’t mean that we don’t love sex or that we don’t want to be around strong, turned-on women. We do.
In closing (and this will be my last entry for the time being), I did not ask you to write an apology to men, but I am now a man who is asking you to apologize to those women you badmouthed. In your journey, you have met quite a few of those women, but that’s it; you met them, but you hardly got to know them. Those women you disrespect because they freely choose to spend time with assholes like myself have been social pioneers and revolutionaries in the truest sense of the word since before the time you were in high school. They have all played a part in making possible what you are doing today; in a very real sense, you stand on their shoulders. You say you want a revolution…we all want the world to change…but we all have a better chance of manifesting that change if we acknowledge those who have come before.
Perhaps we will re-connect somewhere further on in our journeys. In the meantime, I wish you love, happiness and continued success! Your friend, LaMont
Thank you, La Mont. That is a beautiful response.
With respect to the women, I may have a different view.
Not in that some of the women you know are in fact revolutionary,
or that their good works have contributed to the quality of
my life today or that they are some of the women who’s shoulders
I stand on. And you are right, that while I do not know them,
I do recognize the contribution that every fearless woman has
made in my life. Without question. And if an apology is in
order, truly, I am happy to apologize. But perhaps my point
there was unclear-I was writing about recognizing something amiss
and saying “why did they let this happen” and then realizing that
“they” is “me, that the work starts at home.
Anyway, in that terribly odd way that has been my interaction with
you, I enjoy the play much. Thank you. And yes, I wish you love,
happiness, continued success (and sex!) as well.
Your friend too, Nicole
i was here. feeling resonances…
Every single line. Thank you for putting words to it. For permission. Wild, messy, difficult. All the things I tried so hard to submerge you say yes to. Thank you. It’s finally getting in.
Congratulations Nicole! It is amazing the heights to which we can rise if we have the courage to look with honesty deeply into our own souls. You are an amazing and enlightened woman and you inspire me to look inside myself with equal honesty. This is how the world is changed! bobc
Oh YES! My favorite paragraph is the one about the “finite game” lie. Huge apology to my husband and other guys too, but mostly to him. I’m sorry! That klutzy little goof you met on the bunny slope was actually an expert, off trail, back-country, extreme heli skier from hell! Yikes! And thank you for being so courageous and willing….again and again and again….there is no end. There most likely is no prize. But….you do have rosy cheeks and look so ALIVE! Maybe that’s the prize.
WOW!
I just want to say how great this post is. Normally I’m kind of lukewarm on such things, because people who write them typically try to speak for “men” or for “women,” and about “men” or “women.”
You did what a friend of mine, Martin Hannon, did in his response. You made it personal. You stripped out that preachy tone that these types of pieces usually have by making it about what you’ve done. You owned your shit from the past from your real relationships, rather than trying to speak for your entire sex, or speak to my entire sex.
I can’t overemphasize how authentic and powerful your words felt. I have been on the receiving end of a few of these behaviors in my own relationships, so it really means a lot to me to read your words about them.
Three cheers for making this personal, rather than general. Three more cheers for the tough look in the mirror it must have required to write it. Bravo!
And oh yeah…..”like a 70s song, where you would see me walking on the beach in a white dress with long straight natural brown hair, tossed by a breeze…” Oh God I am so busted! I even pulled that one on my guy pals. So sorry!! I’ve been laughing at myself hysterically all day over this but I really do apologize!
I just love your words here Nicole.
I don’t think this apology is just for the individual making it. I felt my heart fly into my mouth on several occassions reading this as you have verbalised so many things I have felt and never had the words for. So your ability to be so honest with yourself and put that out there is for the benefit of so many more than just yourself and I thank you for that.
Forgive the soundbites from me! But…WOW the paragraph on the question of what women want just electrified my whole system. Just had to say that.
HOLY MAJOLY thisis so good. It all hits very close to home..
Ahhhhhh……
This is one of the ways that knowing you has changed the course of my life.
Great piece Nicole! And long overdue…thanks for stepping up to the plate for women everywhere. Wow…I believe we are breaking through some paradigms and actually finding the truth!
Let’s forgive, release, and get orgasmic with each other!
I vote for healing the planet through pleasure medicine!
When a relationship becomes permanent men want a woman to remain the same and she wants him to change. The inverse is what we get. I am continually amused with women thinking we couldn’t survive without them. I have 93 people (currently) that rely on me every day for their livelihood and futures and we manage very well.
I enjoy your posts keep up the good work!
So, I read through this and came away unsatisfied, though I do sincerely appreciate the impetus toward reconciliation. There was a lot of it that I think would make complete sense from a woman’s perspective, but to me it still talked around the core issue. The very last sentence came close, but I still didn’t hear about _why_ all of those behaviors that you want to be accountable for seemed so necessary to you.
In my experience, there appear to be two stances that women typically alternate between with respect to men. They either fear us as a class and project that fear onto individual men who seem strong, or they disdain us as a class and project that disdain onto those of us who appear weak. This alternation occurs in both traditional and feminist moralities, so it cannot be attributed to ideology. It is visceral. Perhaps it is a meme that gets communicated in well-meaning ignorance from older sisters to younger sisters.
Both the fear and the disdain appear to arise from a fundamental and acculturated mistrust of men among women. I understand it. The prospect of being physically brutalized by a woman I am intimate with is something that I don’t have to contend with, but I know that most women seem to accept that a plausible risk. So, when you say that you want to apologize for protecting _men_ from feeling how deeply you love us, it just doesn’t ring true for me.
If you had said that you want to apologize to us for protecting _yourself_ from feeling how deeply you love us, that would be an apology that I could truly understand. Because from over here, that’s how it looks. And to me, the knowledge that women go to such lengths to protect themselves from loving us–in all the ways you list–has been as confusing and heartbreaking as anything you could possibly imagine.
So, I do want to thank you for giving men the memo that genuine play cuts through the mistrust so that we can all be safe to love each other as fully and deeply as we do, even when there is fear in the mix. Your willingness to be honest about what works when the wires are crossed is a breath of fresh air. And that’s where I want to leave it. No apology is needed. Now that I get it that the love is there underneath the mistrust, it’s all good. I can hold onto that truth no matter how convoluted things appear and bring it back to play. That was the clue I needed. Thank you!
Thank you! It’s funny one another challenge I think men and women face is a (cultural) masculine tendency to want to reduce something and a (cultural)feminine tendency to what to show all of the various elements. I will tell you that no, it is not merely a fear of feeling how deeply I/we love you (although of course I do and of course it is scary)-it is concurrently a fear of taking on the responsibility of loving which is a key element for me as woman. The sweetness and love aspects of love, both in the giving and receiving are scary, but the truth telling aspect is the real killer. I return again and again to Chogyam Trumpa Rimpoce talking about “idiot compassion” which I happen to think women (not all) specialize in-this kind of flaccid love that lacks a certain ferocity and in turn leaves many women feeling desperate, needy, like supplicants, at the mercy of-all of the terrible sterotypes that are a result not of men but of our unwillingness to be whole and fierce in our interaction-not fierce cruel but the kind of ferocity that you see in a mother who can lift the car off a child in an emergency. That aspect of love in a woman has laid dormant for far too long and I think we see the results in our relationships: no sex, no passion, plenty of “love”. And it scares the living daylights out of me because I know of few immune responses in our culture greater than to fierce women other than receiving men. A fierce woman is called angry, masculine, arrogant, condescending, hyper-sexual etc. But what we don’t get as a culture is that those qualities need to be developed in a woman for women to be able to hold our own sex without men holding the sex in this culture and having to take responsiblity for it and then have women be “victimized” by it while the men who, in my mind were lovingly holding it, are baffled and confused about what the hell to do.
I loved this: “I have not had the courage to be a great woman, the kind of woman who can make you a king, only a good woman who will ‘support’ you, not the queen who would compel you, propel you, forge you.”
Hello My Dear Queen,
I loved reading your “Apology to Men”. Exquisite timing when I read it. It has landed deeply in the soil I have been planting in my soul for quite some time.
This line in particular “I apologize for not admitting that I am the one who holds the power and you the authority to carry out the laws.” I made an agreement a year ago with K and my friend C that anything they requested I would do unless it violated Truth. They had total dominion over the gray areas of life. What a fucking ride that has been! This decision to surrender in this way was inspired by a dream I had of a past life where I was king. The scepter that I wielded was empowered by the high women of the land. My job was just to execute the direction that was honored and blessed by the women. The belief that yin and yang are equal is a delusion. The yang can only express itself in harmony if the yin is fully fed and sunken into the field of our lives. It is why the Tao Te Ching says “Know the male but hold to the female”. The man made search for “equality” denies the natural order of the Universe.
with so much love,
MonkingIt
I was here. Nice read.
“I apologize for going out with you when I knew that I was way out of your league, but happened to be lonely and bored… and then pumped you up, boosted you up and then fell in love with my own creation – only to discover that when I pulled the plug on all the juice I pumped in, you deflated back to who you always were, feeling resentful and confused that I was no longer interested, and that you no longer were getting your free fix.”
- As the male I did that to my ex. At the time I thought leagues didn’t matter (even though my friends told me otherwise). I thought it was a cruel way to classify people. And even though she was at the top of her league, I later found out she simply wasn’t ready to move up. Her mindset still lacked confidence after being around my friends for a year. I figured with new surroundings she would grow into it. I was quite wrong about the league thing not being important.
It’s obviously possible to grow with someone, but I don’t think it’s possible to grow someone to catch up with you.
Could you expand on the importance of leagues? Is it confidence? Looks? How do leagues affect relationships and sex from your perspective?
My current girlfriend is in my league; I really feel the difference everywhere.
My 2 cents is that a league is mostly confidence…a girl in a higher league has experience seeing a guy deal with hotter girls, even as friends, on a regular basis. But she doesn’t show it affecting her so dramatically. The maintenance is handled internally. And it seems to carry to the bedroom too.
Tangent over
Yes! Thank you for not being the hippy egalitarian politically correct we are all the same one love Jah man.
Higher league, to me, is confidence and play and willingness to include more experience. It’s like not seeing
someone who is green, throwing them into a lion’s den because they are cute and watching them flail because
their heart is indeed really loving, so loving that they are willing to give it a go, but in the end it is like
they are in a constant avalanche and that avalanche is evidenced by chronic gripping. And yes, in the bedroom and
yes business is an internal affair. No bad audioman
this piece brought up such heat in my chest. your words have pierced me and i hope for some change in me…as i keep showing up, honestly in all my vulnerability and great need to be met. you said it so well….the words made huge spaces in my chest…….
So, how does one show strength when at the moment weak—momentarily perhaps, but hobbled nonetheless?
How can a man be truthful about his weakness, when he knows the woman he pursues craves strength, nay, demands it? A conundrum: does it take strength to show weakness? How does a soul regain strength? What if one has flown to close to the sun, and doesn’t want—just now—to fall back to earth?
Enchanted and perplexed–K
Good questions. I can’t say I know the answer as I have had men at my door asking similar questions about me and just as a barber cannot cut their own hair as a woman, I could not tell them how to “hold” me. And, I have my own questions about the earth and sun. I don’t know how all souls regain strength but I know how I did. I stood at a turning point and I said, “god if this is it please take me now, and if not then show me” and then grabbed onto the tail that was presented me and was taken on the ride. And with respect to weakness-weakness to me is agreeing to be under the tyranny of fear and to not speak the truth-the trut IS power, whatever it may be. And perhaps, she is not the woman for you-these women can be wily, you know. And if she is demanding strength, it sounds like she is the sun and not the earth. And yes, suns do burn.
Nicole,
I felt myself both getting turned-on and wide-eyed afraid as I read this… and inspired. (Is this what getting a new MacBook inspires? No wonder they’re selling like umbrellas in a NYC downpour.)
As a man, thank you. I feel a new depth of women’s struggle. You’re doing all that… ALL THAT! Wow. I’m humbled. And you’re so good at it, it looks easy! I believe you.
What a twisted, tangled, thorny olive branch you offer. Although we try, men’s (my) version of all you ‘admit’ to is often some version of ‘get a bigger hammer’ or ‘try hitting it on the other side.. harder.. softer’. Replace the carburetor… or the woman. No way most of us could pull off something this complex and nuanced. Amazing… and I admit being happy I’m a man inhabiting his side of all this!
Yet there’s so many times I’ve met women in all this – colluding and collaborating to keep us clothed, separate, unempowered… and alone. There’s few times I haven’t.
After reading, I also feel all the indirect, convoluted, Rube Goldberg male machinations I too have built in relation to women. Hearing you not only willing but sounding as strangely compelled to do all that as I am, ultimately I’m left with.. It must mean you want us as much as we want you. Whoa, I get it. I’ve lived much of life believing my desire for you was more, and at times still do.
I’ve had many seminal turning points in the process letting go of this schtick. (kudos to R&R for some of these) Yet it’s not as if women (or men) have a buried on/off switch where after fully seeing and apologizing how we’ve hidden, compromised, care-taken, and out-and-out lied — say ‘no more’ and stop all this to meet the other fully. Oh how I’ve looked, dug, and searched for that switch though!
For me what you describe IS the heated, mud-caked dance – oozing sex, a flinging food fight, the tender spooning as we lick, coax, and groom the layers of all this off each other… the apology the part of the dance where she disrobes, removing each layer you describe, at times even for a second, only to quickly cover herself in shyness, protection, uncertainty, and all you write. Again. Yet I get glimpses of this naked powerful woman, and reflections of myself as a man and at my best am inspired to love all of it… and drawn by desire (or abject fear!) further into the dance. Again.
What draws me irresistibly in (& OMFG makes me run for the hills), is to be invited close to this dance/struggle, to meet her (us) in it, to feel and see her in it. All you describe is to me also the beauty of women, and her fierce, chaotic, tender struggle with all this her Picasso-like art (when I’m clear and solid enough to see it).
Although as a man your words felt right, so truthful, & so freeing, it’s all ultimately nothing to apologize for. Is all you describe just the natural geography and a loving testament to the grit-earth-bound incarnation of being flesh and blood woman? Including apologizing.
Special thanks for the last paragraph. Yes, one stop on my man-train has been the ‘worship the goddess, embody the perfect strong deep masculine’ edifice. It’s been a hero’s journey – desperate to find the alchemical magic key for you to open your heart and legs. (I’ve tried everything from a crowbar to ostrich feathers.) Every day I’m still practicing un-believing that other smarter, more handsome, more roguish, more purposeful, more spiritual, more sexual, more practiced, more committed, more steely-eyed, even more fucked up men have that key. And if they did, that they could bequeath it. It’s a good practice.
I’ve learned there’s a huge difference between a fierce, fully sexual, loving woman and one who’s just pissed-off, demanding, arrogant, condescending, or hyper-sexual. Though they often look the same, they don’t at all feel the same and are very different animals. Even when they’re in the same woman. Yet to hear that under it all, women also feel a fathomless love… to find that although as a man I too cannot know its depth, that women’s desire matches my own for her… feels like grace and excitement (orgasm). What a different game than the one I’ve been playing! We can futilely attempt to fathom this, plumb its untamable erotic mystery, in moments bridge the chasm – together. Even in the lightest touch of the pad of my finger.
-Ken.
Ken, this is…I am moved. I would like to use the last paragraph in the next book. You okay with that? Love you. N
Thanks Nicole. I’d be honored. -K.
I hope to meet a woman who can apologize like this, or that all the women I’ve been with could apologize like this, for their own personal foibles, just as you have, Nicole.
What I love about your apology is how personal it is- I had to read it a few times to get that you were very much YOU apologizing for YOU in the particular situations of your life. It’s not a generic “womens’ apology to men” but a personal offering, and I love that.