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women never have our own damn sexual needs; that it's wrong or wicked or dirty for women to negotiate any sexual exchange for pleasure; that women are meant to trade sex for "commitment" or "support" (though, bizarrely, never outright for money). If we assume that I can get something great from sexual relationships without Being On The Path To Marriage. That I understand and honor my sexual desires, that those desires are worth fulfilling in themselves. And if we assume that men have something wonderful they could bring to the sexual exchange; that they aren't always "using" or "exploiting" or "winning" some kind of sick war-of-the-sexes, every single time they fuck.

But even if the fears don't make sense, sometimes they still come out and whisper at the back of my neck... I'm selling myself short. As if I should have bargained better, should have traded my sexuality for far more than "mere" pleasure with someone I "merely" liked, was "merely" attracted to, who "merely" respected my boundaries and "merely" was fun to hang out with. Would some people see it as ironic that I prefer relationships with real emotional heft, even when short-term or casual? Even with that said, though, there is no description of how reasonable, safe, or awesome my relationships are that will matter to our slut-shaming society -- or to the fears it's hammered into me. Society, whose judgment of whether a girl is a "slut" can be sudden and devastating, stupid and stereotypical; a lightning strike that lands based on absurd factors like how non-normative or straightforward or aware of her sexuality she is. And once I'm a "slut" -- if I dare dance over that ever-shifting line -- then I'm beyond the pale. The world always seems to be outdoing itself in finding new ways to tell me that once I'm a slut, no man will ever respect me again.

* * *

I went home. It was raining, all across my cypress city; raining so hard, I had to take the bus instead of walking. The rain struck me as an insultingly obvious metaphor, as did the fact that I was scheduled to attend a wedding that afternoon. It seemed strange that hallucinatory San Francisco would throw such tired tropes at me. (I should have trusted the city more. It was with me, still.)

I was sad. Not devastated. Just sad, and a little bit scared. I'm such a screwed-up perverted slut, no man will ever care about me. However, I'm an adult, so I tried to recognize my emotional baggage, give myself some time to process, then eat a proper lunch and get some work done.

I took a very dear, very blunt friend out to dinner recently. (Yes, I paid, and yes, he felt objectified.) Over Indian curries, I tried to explain my fears that All Men (who are of course a monolith) will pigeonhole me as "too much", "too extreme." A "slut." Whatever. My friend listened, savoring his delicious lassi as he thought about what I was trying to say. Then he said, "Look, you shouldn't worry about it. You're extreme. You're also tall. You couldn't be un-tall for a man, and you can't be un-extreme. There are men who will like you just fine for it, so just keep an eye out for those men." I could detect the edge under his words: Come on, Clarisse, you're the one who always says that People Are Different, why do I even have to tell you this? A fair point, but I can't help it -- stories like this still shake me.

As it happens, though, this story has a happy ending.

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