Free your mind, and your ass will follow

By Polina Yamshchikov
Oct. 14, 2008

I have been single for one year and nine months now. Most mornings I wake up alone, in time with the rising sun, but never intentionally. The light gets to be too strong in my eyes.

And what? Lifting the sleep from my face, I stretch, flip on "Morning Edition" while the house is quiet like a tomb, with nary a distraction. There is no awkward dual fumbling for the coffee pot, no goodbye pecks given before shared time spitting toothpaste into the drain.

Nearly everyone I know is pairing up, nesting, coupling together in ways that are equally alarming as they are inevitable: "I" becomes the standard "we" after more than two weeks. It's an easier unit of measure, after all, and there's no "I" in team.

So we have come to my self-imposed spinsterhood. I have few regrets about the way I have chosen to live. I rarely lose track of myself on those roads I wandered down freshman year: when I meet people of the opposite sex, I am never sizing them up for dating material like I used to. I'm listening to what they have to say if that interests me or I'm telling them that sometimes I stay home at night and read Vanity Fair in bed or do crosswords in boxers on the floor because I don't give a shit anymore. And if they dig that, OK, and if we end up hooking up later in the night, that's OK too.

I like fun. Everybody likes fun. And sex is fun, and that's fine. I feel unashamed while telling my best friend that I slept with someone but won't be dating him because he bores me otherwise. It is a rare twist of fate to meet someone with whom you develop a mutual captivation. It's a rarer twist of fate to get a person like that to stick around.

Say what you will about me (preferably to my face) but, to liken sex to candy, it's true what they say about strangers. They always have the best kind.

Don't misunderstand me here. I am not advocating promiscuity on a grand scale with everyone you meet on Friday night at The Heidelberg. I would probably not recommend sleeping with anyone there, actually. But I will say that, coupled with cautious measures including using protection every time, those playing-the-field instances can be a good time with few repercussions - if you do it right. Please, for the love of God, do it right.

I'll pause for whatever judgment I have garnered here. It's okay; go ahead.

I often wonder what life would be like if we all were to drop whatever rules of modesty and morality we've been, largely unconsciously, subscribing to. Hello world, meet the human body. It's built to like, even to need, sex. It's biology, all right, but it doesn't have to be so clinical. Those girls who eat dessert and then admonish themselves for it just end up hating themselves later. It's just so much better to own your desires, to hold their sharp edges in your hands and decide what you will do with them other than to stamp them down. It feels a lot better, too.

I don't expect this regime of rowdy Saturday nights met with quiet Sunday mornings to end soon, but I wouldn't be alarmed if it were to. You can still end up winning the game if you aren't playing it - despite what they may have told you in kindergarten - because, in a way, you'll still be the one holding all of the cards.