Tag: sex

Pickin’ and Grinnin’

Why would you have sex with a chain-link fence? 

I didn’t understand it. I couldn’t see how a man would do it, and I didn’t understand the attraction. I later learned the man was drunk, and thought the sex was a female.

That’s the thing with picking fruit: you have time to think.

blackberries

h/t to Fables and Flora for the photo

Information was exchanged yesterday that the blackberries were looking good, and there were a lot. We were welcome to come and pick. We took up the offer this morning, driving the short distance to the property on the border between Talent and Phoenix.

As mornings go, it was normal, and glorious with sunshine, blue skies, and budding clouds. Summer’s heat had withdrawn to re-organize and energize, so the air was a comfortable seventy degrees. Most of the area’s wildfire smoke had hitched a ride out of the valley on the wind.

I’d heard about the sex with the chain-link fence on the radio during the drive. Neighbors had it on video. Seeing the video isn’t on my bucket list.

Starting out your berry picking is about looking around to find a ripe offering, sampling them to confirm your visual assessment, and then embracing the mechanics. Like blueberries, the key is color, and its easy release. If the berry is ready to be picked there’s no effort. Just a slight tug, and it rolls off the bush and into your hand. If they don’t come off like this, the product is likely to be sour.

Differences arise between blackberries and blueberries. While I enjoy their sweet juiciness, the largest difference from a picking point of view is that blackberries are in thorny brambles. There are many gorgeous gems hanging there, but getting to them is challenging without sacrificing some blood. Unlike my wife, I’m not a person willing to reach for a berry too far. That’s probably why she’s a better picker than me, collecting about one hundred and fifty percent of the produce that I acquire in the same period.

I’m not jealous; she’s just a better picker. Besides, once we get home, they belong to us, and are shared.

Shouting, “You’ll never take me alive, picking man,” the blackberries sometimes leap to freedom as I approached. The blueberries do it the same, so I don’t take it personally.

Unfortunately, some strange streams empty into this vacant space of thoughts. We had three television stations in southern West Virginia, where I went to high school for my final three years. All three stations featured a show called “Hee Haw.” It may be my imagination, but “Hee Haw” seemed to be on thirty hours a day.

“Hee Haw” was a syndicated variety show that featured country and western music, buxom women, and corny puns and jokes. Roy Clark and Buck Owens were the show’s hosts. One segment was called, “Pickin’ and Grinnin’.” Naturally, out there, my mind invited the segment in: “I’m a pickin’,” Roy or Buck would say, and the other would reply, “And I’m a grinnin’.” Then they’d play some music, stopping for a joke before resuming. They’d do this three or four times.

My mind mercifully cut the stream off after a while. Thereafter, I turned resources toward scenes I was contemplating, character development, and pacing and plotting.

It was a short pick, about an hour. We ended up with twelve pints. Of course, it was the year’s second pick, so we’ll freeze them, and be set for at least a few months.

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Today’s Theme Music

Today’s music, from two thousand eight, is by Lady Gaga. When I hear a song, I try understanding what’s being sung and the words’ meanings. “Poker Face” seemed ambiguous, at once about sex and gambling. I liked the combination because sex and love is a gamble taken, a roll of the dice, and relationships often become efforts in reading others’ expressions to discern agenda, meanings, and truth.

I later read that Lady Gaga wrote the song about her rock and roll boyfriends. That knowledge didn’t answer all my questions about the lyrics. Still, it’s a good song to stream as you beat the street in the heat.

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The Hormone Effect

The promises.

Harvard and Yale are considered in her junior year of high school. Speaking five languages, a prodigy with several musical instruments, in advance placement classes, we’re pleased, proud and envious of who she is and her potential. But the boy has changed everything. We don’t see and feel what he brings to her but she’s modified her plans. A small local college is the goal, with a degree in international business.

Our pain of our lost dreams want us to urge her, think again, please, think ago. You wonder how this will work out. What will she be in ten years? Will they still be together? You try not to color her life with your experiences but you understand. You remember the warnings they gave you. You ignored them as she is ignoring them, because it was you, and things were different.

Life worked pretty well, you reassure yourself, but you remember the potential you tasted before the hormones struck.

Oh, the promises.

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Sex, Memory & Imagination

You’re living a long time. One hundred and five is now the average age of a human. That average is creeping up. We’re all living longer as medical technology monitors and addresses issues 24/7. People aren’t being born, and some children are being kept as children.

Thereby is an argument: if a child is kept physically, emotionally and intellectually at six years old because that’s the age their parent(s) prefer them, but they’ve been alive for forty years, how old are they? Most planets, corporations and governments hold that if they’re maintained at an age, they count at that age if it’s an age whereby they’re somebody’s wards or in a protected status. So, for example, some are adults (which varies mightily in the future) but look like they’re twelve, because they liked how they looked then, so they’re counted as their true age. But if they’re twelve and are treated as twelve years old even though they’re fifty, they’re treated as twelve.

Civilization is more complicated in the future.

One decision many face is what to embody. As memory is augmented to provide greater storage and enhance recall abilities because people are living longer, people typically embody their memories as an avatar that can be compiled as a physical presence. That way, instead of just engaging in internal dialogue with themselves, they can call out their memory and invite them to have a drink or share a meal while they discuss their recollections. Brett’s memory is a tanned blonde woman in a red dress (who doesn’t have a name) and Handley’s memory is a pirate named Grutte Piers, based on the real Piers Gerlofs Donia. These aren’t their first memories but they’re their current memories in ‘Long Summer’.

Something similar has evolved for sex. Many people have decided that fake sex with an avatar of their design is more enjoyable than having sex with another actual person. People have foibles. Foibles can be very irritating. The foibles can be mitigated to some degree but people are a bit unpredictable. Many people have learned that they don’t like their sex partners to be unpredictable.

To solve these issues, people often create one (0r more) sex avatars (sexatars?). Like the memory, it’s an embodiment that’s compiled to exist for a period. People can decide exactly who they resemble and how they’ll act. If they want, they can create animal avatars and have sex with animals as a human or compile or modify themselves to be animals and enjoy their sex. Whatever creepy depravities humanity enjoys can be indulged by creating sex avatars. A few people have married their sex avatars. Avatars are people, too, my friends, except they have different rights.

Sex and memory are the two main items people have embodied as avatars but a few people create others. Some have their intelligence or imagination embodied as an avatar that they can call out for visits. Brett has created an embodiment of his personal computer and communications systems, and calls it Carl. Others have gone the good and evil routes, creating twins of the opposite end of their moral spectrum (as they see it). A few enjoy themselves so much that their have avatars that are exactly like themselves created so they have themselves as company. Most find this doesn’t work well, that as people, they’re not the wonderful companions they thought they are.

All of the avatars are as that as anything humans create. Maintenance is needed or the avatars break down and cease functioning.

With all these facets acting in parallel, the population of humanity is slowly cresting, and the average age is creeping up. The oldest humans are upward of three hundred years old. Despite proliferation of new communication technologies and people living longer, people are living more and more in isolation, with only their memories, sex and other embodiments as avatar companions. Sometimes, they miss family or friends and have ideal avatars of them created, too. It makes for happier holiday meals. Meanwhile, Mom, Dad and Sis are alive on other worlds but never hear from Bro.

Yes, it’s an interesting and complex civilization, in the future. Another day of writing like crazy is in the books (ha, ha).

This post has been brought to you by coffee. Coffee: it’s good for thinking (and bowel movements).

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