I Never Touch You

I never touch you. But from afar, across time and space, I touch your imagination.

In Second Life, we sit at a computer and run a piece of software. While we communicate with people and interact with them, we never physically touch. Any use of the word touch is figurative, not literal.

And yet...

Dr. Marty Klein (b 1950) is an American sex therapist, educator and public policy analyst. He publishes a monthly magazine called Sexual Intelligence and in issue #137, July 2011 he tells the story of Sam who starts dating a year after his wife left him. (Sexual Intelligence - Issue #137 -- July, 2011)

Sam's having difficulty in bed with a new partner. The real problem? He doesn't know how to talk to his partner. Dr. Klein makes this startling statement: "Talking about sex is much more intimate than doing it."

It’s an interesting perspective on this most personal of acts between human beings. In SL, because we never touch, we are forced to communicate. Should we do this more often in RL? Could more communication in RL enhance our relationships? Naughty emails, suggestive phone calls, sexting. What would Esther Perel say about keeping things hot? (see my blog: Mindf*cking)

Talking about sex is much more intimate than doing it. Wow. Powerful stuff. I've always heard that the body's biggest sex organ is our brain. Are we all missing out on something? Is there more to this thing called sex than just an erection? Is there more to this thing called sex than just sex? This reminds me of an odd question about the brain and sexual arousal. This is applicable to all readers in whatever your partnered circumstances may be, but the wording, if you'll excuse me, is as if I'm asking this of a woman:

Can you give a man a hard-on without touching him?

Obviously, we're back talking not about a man's genitals but about his biggest sexual organ his brain. If that's stimulated, will everything fall into place? And if you think you could successfully answer the above question, I would add a second question:

Could you make a man cum without touching him?

I’ve sometimes wondered about this scenario in RL:

I set up two chairs, back to back. The two of us sit down. We can’t see one another. We can’t touch. We can talk and listen, but there is no physical connection. Question: Can we make love? Can we run gamut: tempt, tease, arouse, excite, and climax? Can we not just communicate but connect? Connect on a most intimate level? We never touch each other, but can we touch each other's imagination?

Now, you may be reading this thinking of Monty Python wink, wink, nudge, nudge. However, this is precisely what therapists have sometimes recommended to couples who are forced to be separated by lengths of time, a worker or a soldier stationed overseas, for instance. Letters, emails, pictures, phone sex, Skype, etc., communication with a naughty slant to keep the love alive, so to speak. The goal is to keep the sense of intimacy between two people.

I want to clarify something, since the questions I wrote above were as a man addressing a woman. It's a two-way street. It's very much a man's responsibility to connect with the woman. It's the responsibility of all of us in any circumstances to connect with our partner. Coming back to SL, can I connect with my partner? Can I make them cum without touching them?

2019-10-21