"I want to talk about intimacy. I want to talk about desire. I want to talk about fucking. I want to talk about touch.
I want to talk about how Black and Brown bodies are denied these things. I want to talk about how Black and Brown bodies thirst for these things. I want to talk about how Whiteness constructs Black and Brown bodies in opposition to these things.
I want to talk about how Black and Brown bodies are rejected by other Black and Brown bodies. I want to talk about how we can't always find comfort in each other because we're so busy finding comfort in Whiteness.
I want to talk about how Black and Brown bodies tear themselves apart for these things. I want to talk about how Black and Brown bodies struggle for these things. I want to talk about how it's never enough.
I want to talk about intimacy. I want to talk about desire. I want to talk about fucking. I want to talk about touch."
is when we learn that we're both hug people, or both kind of touchy-feely with our friends in general. This can take a little while to occur. It is always better to err on the side of not touching people, because consent and body issues must always be respected. As such, this moment might not happen the first few times you hang out. You might need an excuse the first time, like taking a picture together--suddenly arms are around waists and this barrier is broken. Later, when you tease him and he pouts, you feel emboldened enough that you can hug him to cheer him up again. You're not sure what to expect, because it's your first hug, and many people are tentative about first hugs. But as his arms slide firmly around your back and you snuggle in close, cheek to cheek, you let out a small sigh of comfort. He is a hugger. You step out of your hug and he says, "You give really good hugs." "So do you," you reply. You take every opportunity throughout the rest of the night to repeat this full-bodied hug, and take to standing with your arms around one another's shoulders. It is a wonderful night.
In the video game version of my life, along with the normal health and energy bars that every character needs to sustain life, I would have a Snuggles Touch bar. This bar would make my energy last longer and the things that usually hurt me hurt less. Today, coming off of my weekend with BC, I feel like my Touch bar has been alternating between being completely drained and being so low that it's red and flashing for months now, and then over the 28-hour period I spent in Charlottesville, it's now filled back up to a vibrant green color and I feel AWESOME.
Evidence: *came home from 4 hours on public transit to rearrange her clothing and fold her laundry* It's Monday? *Is bright and chipper as ever* It was in the 40s as I walked to work? *sings along with her mp3 player* *Doesn't need tea to keep her going through the morning*
I was telling this to KS, and he said rather poignantly, "I didn't realized one needed snuggles." I've understood about myself for a long time now that I'm a person who craves physicality. I don't think I so clearly understood that I THRIVE on it until now, though. Touch doesn't always mean something. I don't get off on high five or fist bumps. I don't think that grinding with a guy and any hand-holding/touching that happens as part of that is some sort of spiritual connection. I don't think that having sex with someone fundamentally changes our relationship forever. I am not naive about touch--I just find that substantive episodes of touching people that matter to me enhance the quality of my life.
Touch is something that the overwhelming majority of people have some level of strict boundaries about. I'm writing yet another blog post about how I really like touching, but that doesn't mean that someone touching me when I do not want them to be touching me isn't violation. So it feels both emotionally and physically good to me when someone that is important to me a) doesn't mind, b) likes, or c) actively encourages my touching them (a < b < c). Those emotional good feelings increase exponentially when permission to touch can safely be assumed, when we fall into what I like to call a pattern of physicality. This is best exemplified by the fact that I would often say hi to my friend DS by walking up behind his chair in the Large Library at Quad, digging my hands into his hair to the scalp, and massaging/scratching his scalp while playing with his hair. I would to this for a few minutes and then realize I should actually say hi. He'd say hi back, not really looking up from what he was doing, but I knew I was appreciated by the way he'd angle his head to encourage me to move a little to the right or left and the little moans and sighs of satisfaction. He would take breaks from his work to return the favor--not right away like one demanded the other, but just because it was something we liked to do.
An altogether different kind of example is that of how I became known for the quality of my massages during the course of my time at Princeton. I have never turned down someone's request for a massage, because someone coming to me saying the equivalent of I-am-in-some-degree-of-pain-or-discomfort-and-I-trust-you-to-put-your-hands-on-me-and-take-it-away is beautiful to me. I am not particularly skilled at slow-dancing, but when RG or BC pulls me into a Pianoman circle, I feel..reminded of the strength of our friendship, maybe. When I play Santa Claus at Quad's Christmas party and EL is the unlikely first person to seem comfortable on my lap, it becomes my favorite memory of him. When I pick little pieces of lint off of people's clothing/hair and they do not mind, I feel...intimate. Touch and intimacy are one and the same to me, often, except that I don't bring sex into that equation. Hands that easily find one another when you're walking down the street say we fit together. Cuddling says you want me here. Your arms around me while we sleep is the sweetest I've missed you you can say.
I don't remember why this came up, but I clearly remember saying this during the wee-hours-of-the-morning drunken conversation KS, EY, and I had the night before last:
"You know who I kissed twice last night? CB. You know who I'm not attracted to at all? CB."
I also remember KS being confused by my shirtless snuggles with MT and my having kissed him the week before (#truthdarekissorcody #middleschooldrinkinggamenight #dranglerproblemsawesomesauce), so I decided not to mention having also held MT and JD's hands that night or been in a cuddle/feel-up puddle with DS, SW, and RW the night before. When you're with a group of people that will get up and run around the house naked on a moment's notice, touching each other isn't always the biggest deal. But even when I'm not talking about PQCSS members or that kind of touching, it's still really easy to be physically affectionate with a lot of the people I'm (sometimes not even particularly) close to on this campus: for example, there are at least two guys in my eating club who I usually initiate interaction with by running my fingers through their hair and massaging their scalps. We used to get a small Asian female member who has since graduated to walk on our backs, and massage circles are still quite prevalent. It's not uncommon for people to sit on other people's laps for no particular reason; we're quite cuddly.
And I thrive on that. Granted, I don't have that kind of easy physicality with KS or EY, and they are the people I'm "closest" to overall on this campus, but there are few other people I call close friends that I would hesitate to put my arm around in daily life. ChoosingPancakes was entertained by the fact that my strongest love language on this quiz we both took was physical touch, because that was one of her weakest. I don't just mean sex or sexual-ish touches when I say I value physical touch as one of the strongest ways to show me you care about me. It can be little things, like hugs that feel like you mean it, or not feeling the need to jerk your knee away if it meets mine under a table or on a couch, or an arm around a shoulder for no reason at all. It's rubbing my back when you're comforting me while I'm crying. It's me being in your space/you being in mine not being a big deal. That's how friends
should be, in my opinion, but I know that a lot of people have much
stricter restrictions on even light physicality than I do and try to
respect them (though that sort of goes out the window when I'm drunk,
oops). For me, it can certainly also mean being able to do things like hold hands and snuggle in various degrees of undress and kiss in front of a room of cheering friends on a dare without it being a big deal, but again, I recognize and respect that most people have lines they draw in this arena.
What worries me, though, is when I get to wondering if I'll ever have this kind of easy physicality with a group of people ever again. I had it for a while in high school--one of my fondest memories from sophomore year will always be laying on the floor in PD's living room watching Pirates of the Caribbean with my head in the small of TJ's back and him telling me he would be my pillow anytime--and I have it here in this amazing community of 'Dranglers (who mean more to me than I may ever be able to express), but conceptualizations I have of the "real world" suggest that maybe it's something about youth and chosen communities, that grown folks don't do that. I feel like in some respects, adults revert to like middle school rules about what touching someone means, and it makes me sad.
Side note: Did I ever tell you how when I was holding PD's hand at an Applebees once to comfort her while she was telling me about a breakup and some dude came up to our able to ask if we were lesbians? I both appreciate the acceptance of this as a possibility by our unknown audience and am mad that two people interacting with each other physically must be presumed to be romantically involved.
If being okay with you touching me and vice versa is a quality of youth, then I want to stay young for as long as I can while I grow up. How do I find other people who want to stay young in the same way? I don't necessarily need people who will laugh at bad porn together on a giant television in the middle of the night or play shirtless ruits (though that would be AWESOME), but I want people who understand that the unequivocal best way to watch a movie is while snuggling, people who won't read anything more into me laying my head on their shoulder than I find your presence enjoyable. But I feel like that kind of easy physicality only comes from like, spending all your time together in intensely social subcultural spaces, and that seems difficult to recreate in the 9-5, separate addresses, lack of communal spaces world. I feel like if I want someone to replace the guys whose hair I like to fluff, I should get a pet. Sigh.
Growing up stinks. I want to change it. But this revolution can't just be personal...
Older black women [or any other person of any other race and/or gender, for that matter] who think they can touch me without permission. This most often happens with regards to my hair, which often beckons the touch of complete strangers (I welcome touches from those I know and love, but randos are a whole different story...). Today's situation, however, went a little something like this:
Me: [approaches register with very full shopping cart at ShopRite. Doesn't notice tank top riding up to expose her lower back.]
Random older black woman: [Reaches over and pulls my shirt down while saying] You should pull your shirt down, okay?
Me: [stiffens noticeably at the feel of strange fingers on the small of my back, turns around to glare at her]
Her: Okay?
Me: [decides I don't have time to give this woman a propriety lesson. Storms off.]
What gave this woman the right to think she could just touch me like that? I have two words for her: PERSONAL FUCKING SPACE. If the fact that MY shirt is riding up to expose MY lower back is somehow offensive to YOU, the appropriate thing to do is to keep it to yourself. The also fairly appropriate thing to do is to discreetly mention to me that I might want to fix my shirt. The absolutely inappropriate under every possible circumstance thing to do is to fix it yourself.
If I hadn't been in a rush, you would have gotten smacked, fyi. Consider it my good deed of the day that you didn't.
