For ten years I chose a celibate life. If you would ask me why, I am not sure I could give you a cogent answer. When my last relationship ended more than ten years ago, I was astonished by having a sense of happiness instead of loss. The relationship I was in was not a bad or unhappy relationship, but walking away from it I felt such freedom at being alone again I thought I never wanted this feeling to stop. Years drifted by without a thought to how having a man in my life or being sexual would ever be advantageous to me. I took care of my own sexual needs adequately without any messy emotional complications or unwanted entanglements.
On my birthday last year something changed. An inner restlessness took over, making me want anything but what I was confronting on a daily basis. My self-imposed isolation and introversion started crumbling. I began to investigate my escapist fantasies by looking at a geographical cure, changing my appearance, and reading spiritual books. My search was a marathon run to nowhere. Nothing seemed to quell my unsettledness. As part of my quest, I began to think I needed more social contact, thus began my foray into online dating. Initially my intent was to connect with men only through correspondence. Surprisingly, I did not expect to engage with very intelligent, witty, and articulate men who weakened my abstention with poetry, haikus, and words so beautifully composed I became hypnotized by reveries of what these men might be like in person.
Overcoming my considerations to meeting one of them was an emotional obstacle course. The rational side of me was not sure this was a smart idea to acquiesce to a man and give up being a reclusive spinster. I was deeply rutted in my cynicism of what men had wrought on me. A strong part of me could not digest that spinsterhood was keeping me stuck in a isolative pattern which was neither healthy nor spiritual. The other part of this equation was harder for me to handle was the emotional component. Not being a feeling but a thinking woman, I was unprepared for the turbulent eruption which preceded my first encounter with a man in ten years. I was in my kitchen that day, happily getting ready to go on my first date, when I start regurgitating emotion. It came out of no where-suddenly I was swept away by weeping. I am not a crying let alone a weeping kind of woman. The lightning speed at which this overtook me jolted my equilibrium. As I examined the root of this, I flashed back to all the times I took chances and it backfired on me. A wall of betrayal, tragedy, disappointment, and feeling eviscerated flooded my sensorium. In this paralyzed state I couldn't help but feel I could not go forward yet I could not go backwards either. Fear gripped me thinking about embarking on a journey I wasn't sure I wanted to take. When I look back at this day, I see how silly I was but that day I felt my life and future were on the line.
The man I dated was made aware of my struggles but met with me anyway. Needless to say, it was awkward. About an hour into our tea, the man looked at his watch and abruptly said, "Times up, I gotta go." I was stunned. When he left I started laughing hysterically at how absurd my first date in over 20 years had ended. A date from Data from Star Trek would have concluded more politely. I did not take this man's lack of social grace personally since most likely I appeared timid and overwhelmed. It was then I realized the process of reemerging from a celibate coma would take more time, patience, and practice.
Eventually I did consummate my relationship with this suitor after a number of attempts. So what I have learned from being chaste for ten years? I realized how easy it was to allow myself to be a recluse, wall myself off from men, and justify this by nursed hurts and unrequited emotions. Would I do this again? No.
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