Game Theory

Talking about relationships lately... triggered by the most common trigger for such conversations - the dissolution of one.

But amongst my group, the angle of that conversation that has been most consistent across the last many years is not "why didn't he love ME," but rather, "why didn't I love him? Am I too selfish or unrealistic or cold?"

During the most recent conversation on this topic, I expounded on my take on it - which revolves around relative power distribution.

But first, more background. This particular variation of the "relationship discussion" is about rejecting men who are decent and kind and trustworthy - GOOD men without commitment issues or heavy emotional baggage or other "major" flaws.

Of course, the answer might be as simple as "we didn't love them." But what lies beneath that rather facile explanation?

Since I only remember 40% of what people (including myself) say, it comes as no surprise that I need my friends to recount certain conversations to me. SK and IC have both independently reminded me that they once asked me if I loved my ex-husband. Apparently, I answered, "No, but I trust him."

Putting aside the possible explanation that we are a cold-hearted bunch incapable of loving, why did we not appreciate what we had or could have? Optimistically, I choose to believe that we just haven't yet met the "right" men - specifically, men whose opinions we care about, men for whom we will make the continued effort to make happy, men we respect. (At the end of the day, what we choose to respect, TRULY respect, is highly personal and sometimes inexplicable. )

But to drill deeper, it comes down to power, specifically in the inequality of it. With most of my past relationships, there was no equality vis-a-vis power. I held all of it. And that never held my interest for long. According to SK, witnessing my marriage was like "watching a mountain lion trying to date a stuffed animal."

So if a balance of power is important, desirable, even... that opens up another can of worms.

To quote SK again: "that's when relationships get scary."

Chanel N°19

It's not even 6PM and it's dark dark dark.

This only surprises me because somehow I completely missed summer.

I'm taking a short break from work right now and listening to my favorite movement from my favorite symphony: Dvorak's Symphony No. 9 in E minor, the Largo movement.

I remember the first time I heard it - at music school. My string-instrument friends all played in the orchestra so I went to a performance. Students, you say? You are probably imagining something awful. It wasn't professional, certainly, but re-tune what you are no doubt hearing in your mind's ear. Their performance was surprisingly good. So much so, that I remember "forgetting" where I was. Instead of sitting on the edge of my seat out of nervousness for my friends on stage, I sat back and closed my eyes.

If you've never listened to it, do.

It's beautiful. It's complex overall, simple in parts, and sweet and triumphant and sad and wistful and happy. I listen to it frequently, but most especially in the winter. Maybe because it was winter when I first heard it.

I have this belief that innocence has a surprising ability to remain untouched. (Of course, I'm precluding all manner of dark innocence robbers from this statement). For example, you can tell a dirty joke - if it's understood, then you were hardly the one to mar that particular innocence. If it's not, well then, it's not, and innocence remains.

I was always a voracious reader. I grew up reading everything I could get my hands on. Which meant that as a small child I was reading books that would be considered shocking for adults. (Let's ignore the fact that my parents' library contained such variety). But what didn't make sense to me, simply didn't. And it was only upon rereading those same books when I was much older that I thought to myself "WTF?!?"

But this piece was different for me. And I'm not relying on memory here. I read it in one of my old journals the last time I was visiting my parents. When I first heard it, I was 14 years old. And I wrote, later that evening, that listening to it made me "feel... grown up, as if I had been in love - not just having crushes. And that being in love hadn't always gone well. And although I was sometimes sad, everything was still... ok."

Yes, laughable. Nothing is quite so pretentious as a young teenager.

But the thing that struck me as I was rereading that journal, was that I WAS struck. Not just because the music was "pretty" or "sad." It made me think outside myself and my experiences to date. Which I suppose all art is intended to do. So maybe it's just me, and that during a certain period of young adulthood, I had a surprising ability to remain unmoved, untouched by what happened around me. Except for the first time I listened to this piece of music.

Oddly, I'm now thinking of Chanel N°19. It had me at the first whiff. But I've never worn it because I decided that I wasn't yet complex and interesting enough to do so.

But maybe one day, I'll wear it and go to the symphony and see if listening to a world-class orchestra performing this piece makes me think of being absurdly young, as if life were just about having crushes and playing my piano and reading books I don't understand.

The Stomach, The Expressway To The Heart

I'm not exactly a foodie.

First of all, I'm a grazer. I don't often sit down for a meal; I'm all about interval snacking. And for me, food is primarily a socializing tool, not an end in itself.

Don't get me wrong, I love a good meal. But in the "eat to live" versus "live to eat" divide, I fall squarely in the former. Actually, more accurately, I eat to drink. 'Cause far more than a foodie, I am a girl who loves her wine.

Last night may have changed that.

Six of us went to Momofuku Ssam Bar last night, and immediately following the appetizers, our entire group proposed to the chef. He graciously accepted and sent over steamed pork belly buns to our table to celebrate the engagement.

Have you seen the movie, Ratatouille? About the rat that dreams of being a chef? In the movie, Anton Ego, the gaunt, bitter food critic who loves food so much that he only swallows when he LOVES it, sits down to a meal, prepared, unbenownst to him, by a rat.

And with his first bite, he is immediately transported to his childhood - a warm, glowing childhood with a mother who cooks lovingly for him.

Biting into those pork buns last night produced an emotional response of the same intensity.

It was love.

It was warm, comforting, delicious, decadent, sweet, salty, tangy, satisfying love. It was get-weak-in-the-knees, slide-off-your-seat, love.

We lingered at Momofuku long after our meal was finished, wondering if we could just spend the night there and have breakfast in the morning. We then considered following our new fiancee back to his place and gazing at him raptly, expectantly, hungrily, until he continued to feed us.

We did neither of those things, but we did stand outside the restaurant for a long while, doing our respective "happy tummy" dances out on the sidewalk.

And this morning?

I'm hungry. And fairly certain I dreamt of pork buns.

For those of you reading this post, the chef, Francis Derby, is OURS. So back off.

This Is The Way It Should Be?

Ergo recently posted about songs that describe how she would like to be in love, and those that describe how she's actually been in love.

That got me thinking about it as well.

Of course, of late, my love life might be best described by The Sound of Silence.

But aspirationally, what would it be?

I went through my iTunes music library, and found and rejected a number of songs that I love to listen to. Basically, the songs I love to listen to describe love as dark and painful, or wistful and filled with unrequited longing, or just plain naughty without any depth. What can I say, I like what I like.

But then I found this:




According to Paul McCartney, "this is the way it should be."

I'm not sure I believe it. Or in it. But it's a nice idea, isn't it?

In the meantime, I'm going to listen to something naughty. Perhaps Nina Simone's I Want A Little Sugar In My Bowl.

Are You A Player?

CL and I met for drinks last night and we had an interesting conversation which culminated in a "revelation" I am not quite willing to accept. So I asked TO to weigh in on the matter, as he was refilling my wine glass. TO replied, "Darlin', you don't KNOW this about yourself?" So I went home to my source of All Information and found a quiz which could settle things. Somewhat to my surprise, I found it explains quite a bit, because I SUCK at chess.

You Are a Total Player!

Congratulations, when it comes to the game of love, you're a pro. Not only are you an expert player, you are a highly evolved one. For you, dating is like a game of chess - with a much happier ending.

When It Comes to Men, Are You a Player?

High Brow Smut

My mother is a genius. This is an objective statement of fact, not colored by love or familial respect. Earlier this year, she finished her second PhD, in Religious Philosophy (her first was in Computer Science - those of you enjoying mp4s can thank my mother - she built much of the technology involved). She also has a deep seated suspicion that her only child might be retarded since I have yet to earn my first doctorate and didn't go to Harvard. But whatever, Daddy thinks I'm smart.

Because she gave birth to me, I have been editing her dissertation to ready it for publication, gratis. And we have been arguing about the appropriateness of applying different philosophies of the scientific method to her thesis. Her thesis aside, our most recent "discussions" (where most commonly repeated, on both sides, is the accusation of sloppy thinking, and I usually lose) has led me to apply these philosophies to dating and sex and love.

There is a "well known" conflict between the opposing views of two twentieth century philosophers of science - Karl Popper and Thomas Kuhn. In this post, I will argue that their views are not conflicting when applied to the topic of sex and dating and love and that the specific stage of dating determines the prevailing paradigm followed. Note that I am not being prescriptive, merely descriptive, based on the data points I have gathered from my experiences and those of my friends.

Initial Stage - Dating:

Popper's theory of Falsificationism states that scientists should give up a theory as soon as they encounter any falsifying evidence. He maintains that theories should be held very tentatively and that basic assumptions should be continually questioned and criticized. Commitment, for Popper, is a crime.

Consider the prelude to a first date when online dating. Even after the picture and the written profile pass muster, and the initially formed, tentatively held assumptions appear promising, there's many a slip 'twixt the cup and the lip. The guy who looks cute in his profile pictures can suddenly email pictures of himself in his underwear which is just plain creepy. Or the guy whose written profile suggests the completion of a college education might send emails rich with tragic mistakes: "it's vs. its", "further vs. farther", "less vs. fewer".

Even when the prelude to the first date is successfully completed with no horrifying falsifying evidence, there's the first date itself: the guy who eats with both elbows on the table; the guy who licks his butter knife; the guy who says, after asking for the check: "I feel strongly that we split the bill because I don't want you to feel obligated to have sex with me."

Later Stage - the Relationship:

If all the preliminary stages of dating are successfully completed and an actual relationship ensues, then Thomas Kuhn steps in.

Kuhn describes science as consisting of periods of "normal science" (the relatively routine, day-to-day work of scientists) during which theories are held tightly, with great tenacity and commitment, even in the face of anomalies, and only questioned in rare times of crisis.

Sort of like: "Ok, so he can't run for President because of the felony conviction, but I don't need to be the First Lady."
Or: "He's 20 years older than I am and balding and impotent, but hey, doesn't every relationship have its problems?"
Or: "He doesn't really know what the hell he's doing in bed, but he makes a mean omelet."
Or: "He's really annoying when he talks and walks and eats and breathes but at least he's not a sociopathic alcoholic."

The Intermediate Position:

Now, there is a philosopher who sought a methodology that would harmonize the stances of Popper and Kuhn. Imre Lakatos proposes an intermediate position: commitment to a "hard core" of central ideas which are protected from conflicting evidence by making adjustments to the "protective belt" of auxiliary hypotheses.

Rather like: "He's thoughtful and sweet, and hey, what guy DOESN'T lick the butter knife?"
Or: "He's handy around the house and listens to more than 50% of what I say to him, and as for sex, that's why they invented vibrators!"

But Lakatos has an interesting twist: he doesn't ask whether a hypothesis is true or false. For him, the important question is whether the entire research program as a whole is progressive or degenerative. A progressive research program grows, and that growth is accompanied by the discovery of new information. A degenerative research program either stalls, or grows in a way that does NOT lead to new information.

I think this is a good point to close this post. Here's to the promise of a progressive Lakatosian research program for dating, sex, and love!

Mixology

I stayed in today. Far too cold and wet and dreary outside to get me out of my apartment, not even for the inducement of boozy brunch.

So I turned on my newly acquired electric heater that looks like a wood-burning stove, curled up on the sofa and re-read Hemingway's Garden of Eden this afternoon. From the back cover:

"Set on the Cote d'Azure in the 1920s, it is the story of a young American writer, David Bourne, his glamorous wife, Catherine, and the dangerous, erotic game they play when they fall in love with the same woman."

Well, that pretty much sums it up. Catherine decides to bring another woman, a gorgeous young vibrant woman, into the marriage. That seems singularly ill-advised, if you ask me. And it ends as much as you'd expect it would.

Hemingway was exploring the dynamic between two damaged people, and what better than the addition of a destabilizing third party to forcibly reveal what might be strange and confusing or even ugly. Add destabilizing ingredient, throw in some Bollinger Brut 1915, stir, serve very very cold.

But I can't help but think that there must have been an element of self-indulgent prurience on Hemingway's part as well. Don't ALL boys fantasize about having more than one beautiful woman in their lives?

But then again, there is nothing wrong with a little self-indulgent prurience.

There is a scene I particularly like: David (the husband) is drinking cocktails with Marita (the "other" woman). David, having finished his own drink, reaches for Marita's and drinks from it. As he sets the glass back down, he realizes that his lips touched the glass at the exact place where Marita's had touched. And that thought gives him pleasure. That is the moment he realizes he's falling in love with her.

I must remember to try that one day.

Intimacy

I was told recently that the best blogs are intensely personal, and that with those blogs, there is no effort apparent in the writing because the process is not self-edited or self conscious, it's an unchecked outpouring of one's secrets and true self. This was all a precursor to telling me that my blog does not elicit that voyeuristic thrill of peeping into a stranger's windows late at night.

With my new obsession with blogging, I've been doing my research, studying others' blogs, comparing and contrasting. And I see the point. I find myself drawn to blogs that seem to provide a direct line to a person's deepest secrets. But I also find myself drawn to those blogs that describe the trivialities of everyday life with sensitivity and humor and Good Writing.

(Of course, this person might have been trying to tell me that I am simply not a good writer, but... PSHAW!).

So these are the conclusions I have drawn regarding the level of intimacy shared in a blog, or at least, in MY blog:

1. If people are onions and occasionally (or often) "hide" beneath layers of humor, jokes, bluster, flirtation, or whatever... those outer layers are no less real and true than the more tender layers that sit below. We ARE our layers. Peel back all the layers of an onion and what's left is nothing but a strong smell and tears.

2. I have this belief that I can't shake: that great intimacy shared indiscriminately dilutes the intimacy deliberately shared with people specifically chosen to receive it.

I had a conversation with a priest once, who told me that he loved me, with all his heart. I was a bit taken aback by this. He went on to say that he loved EVERYONE with all his heart, that his love was universal. I understand the point he was making but my immediate reaction was to think that universal love for all, translates into meaningful love for none. Shouldn't love, of all things, be specific and highly discriminate?

"Love consists of overestimating the difference between one women and another."
- George Bernard Shaw

3. I will continue to read and enjoy the blogs written by people far more courageous than I am. And I will continue to do what makes me happy with mine, and right now, that's to type again with all caps: TITILLATING.