Not Tonight, Darling!

Today's Washington Post has an article about the rush to create a "pink Viagra". I bet men are behind it. Men will never understand what turns women on -- and off.

Until I married, sex and food were the chiefest joys of my life. Now, after 30 years of sleeping with the same man, and becoming diabetic, I can only dream of both. Oh, my husband is happy, even eager, to have sex with me every night (which, at 62 and fat, I should suppose is a compliment of sorts), and I know he is bewildered that I decline his advances. "I can't sleep" is his idea of a sexy come-on. Bloody hell, I usually think, am I a sleeping pill? Or, trying for subtlety, "Is the K-Y Jelly on your side of the bed?"

Let me stress that my husband is in many ways a truly lovely human being. But one of the world's greatest lovers he is not, nor has he ever been. And he is completely unaware that there is any problem : he achieves erection and climax quickly. It's my problem that I can't keep pace with him, or that I think making love involves more than the friction of tissues. And since he has no problem, he's not about to get any counselling. Never underestimate the male ego.

The first years of our marriage are very foggy in my memory, I was that exhausted with having three children in the space of three and a half years (all by C/S), getting over the death of my mother and acclimating to life in a different country and in a different language. I know the lack of sexual compatibility deeply distressed me for years, until I managed to stop becoming aroused. At first it was a conscious thing, to imagine I was numb from the waist down, and then it became automatic, so that, by the time Dr. Ruth's TV show came to Israel, and hubby began to be intrigued about improving his technique ("Do you know where your clitoris is?" he asked me once. "Yes", I replied, "we learned about it in anatomy class in nursing school") I REALLY did have a problem.

"Pink Viagra" is completely the wrong approach. But I guess popping a pill is a lot easier than teaching a man some sensitivity (flowers, champagne, a nice meal someone else has cooked, "I'll do the dishes tonight", or not saying "It's half-time --we've got 10 minutes; you get ready while I take a leak") and some technique. Fortunately, by the time something is FDA approved, maybe we'll both be past it and a good cuddle can be just that. But then I think of Mme. Maitenon who complained to her confessor that Louis XIV was still going at it twice a week when he was more than 70, and could she please tell him "no" because she found sex painful? The priest told her that she could not refuse the king, that it was her "conjugal duty" as a wife (morganatic in this case).

A woman's work is never done...coming, dear...

A Geshrei

The past couple of weeks have been a real bitch. First, I manage, in my inimitable style, to sustain a Colles' Fracture of my left wrist by falling off a chair in the kitchen while tring to get some old dishes down from top-tier cupboards.

I'm left-handed.

So, while it's nice not to wash dishes, I can't do anything else--knit, crochet, embroider, write, or type with more than one finger, during my 6 weeks of being in plaster and off sick from work. This really cramps my style, as I normally touch-type quite rapidly. There is absolutely nothing to watch on TV. Thank God for my iPod. (More on that another time...)

I've never broken a bone before, so the experience is entirely new to me. Suffice it to say that setting the fracture was less painful than I anticipated, but the discomfort, at night, of the first week left me exhausted. Because I've got a bad disc problem in my back, I turn from side to side all the time. Now, repositioning my arm each time makes me wake up.

Moreover, I never realized how many activities take two hands. Putting on a bra and pulling up one's underpants (or getting them down fast enough!) is one. Slicing bread is another (you need one hand to hold the loaf). The Curly-Haired Monster thoughtfully made a giant pot of potato soup and put it in the fridge for me before going to work. It might as well be on the moon. It's too heavy to remove with one hand. It would be pleasant to report that my enforced diet is having a good effect, but since I'm not getting any exercise my daily caloric requirement must be about 500 calories and what I am eating is well in excess of that.

Adding insult to injury, about a week ago I developed the Mother and Father of All Sore Throats. Since I am a medical professional, and know the chances are it's viral (and does not need antibiotics), I merely contented myself with symptomatic remedies for about 5 days until the coughing and congestion and the inability to swallow became intolerable. Then, in violation of all good medical practice I started to take penicillin, without having done a throat culture.. I guess it wasn't a viral infection, after all because, while I'm still congested and coughing, my throat doesn't feel like it's on fire.

You cannot imagine the state of my house. I have heard it said that the 11th commandment (the one Nixon forgot to keep "wholly") is Don't Get Caught. That's wrong. It is: Mother Shall Not Be Ill.

More Political Incorrectness

(click here to view)

Chuck Asay Creators Syndicate Inc. Mar 9, 2008 EditorialCartoonists.com

I'm still trying to understand why our government allowed the parents of the terrorist who attacked teenage students studying Torah to erect a mourning tent, but the Jordanian government forbade it (some of the murderer's family live in Jordan)