Are there any lessons to be learned from the L Word, Sex in the City, television?
Last night we watched that incredibly exciting Superbowl and cheered to have our native boy Manning win the game! Then we came back to my house and watched the L Word. I was speaking to someone on Saturday night about how the L Word kind of depresses me in the same way that Sex in the City used to – it’s all about girls wanting so desperately to find intimacy and yet striking out in so many ways. Sex with strangers becomes the substitute for intimacy in so many encounters. Looking good doesn’t really matter because the person you might be trying to look good for is so hung up on other things they couldn’t see you if you were wearing a paper bag with balloons attached. A longing never seems to be satisfied.
In the world of it’s all about me:
Last night, four issues were brought up that gave me pause. Bette is being portrayed as a sexual predator in a movie that Jenny has written. The actress who plays her comes up to Bette last night and asks: I have a lot of whys I’m trying to figure out to play this character. You were in this great relationship and yet you had sex with the plumber. Why?. And you see Bette get all flustered and later she says, she doesn’t know the whys herself. AGHHHHHH. Hindsight: I can look back now and connect the dots and formulate a backstory that works and justifies the actions, but honest to God, I don’t know the whys – really. So you have to accept that you did what you did with the best you knew then, and now that you know better, you do better. It’s the only way to step forward.
In a parallel story, we have Alice who takes a pic of a famous athlete at a private party and then outs him on her blog because he said horrible things about gays. I flinched when she took the pic – thinking it a real invasion of privacy considering she said at the beginning that this party was a place where everyone could come and feel safe to be who they are. And in the meantime, she is protecting Tasha’s gay identity because the military is trying to kick her out. And YET, she outs this guy. She feels justified. It didn’t feel right to me, it didn’t seem like Alice would do something so stupid, so unthinking. And yet the more she is pressed, the more she justifies herself. I turned inward and thought of those people who have not appreciated being on my blog – who have not wanted to have any of their life exposed here and feel my own skin crawl at my own insensitivity. I justify my blog that I am not a private person – but overlook that others are.
Time passes, love grows, time passes love waits, time passes, love stays. Bette and Tina again danced around the probability of them getting back together. Can Tina forgive Bette’s affair? I think she wants to. I think she is still in love with Bette. As much as Tina kind of grates on me and I used to like Bette more – I see that Tina softens Bette, while Bette strengthens Tina. Together they actually were a good couple and you can see real love between them. Not superficial but real love. They have a daughter between them now. They understand each other’s weaknesses. I’ve felt incredibly numb the past couple of weeks – numb to a vision of being with someone again – of loving, being loved, of having sex, of having intimacy, shared intelligence, laughter – my faith in this possibility has been shrinking and shrinking into a tight narrow ball of numbness that seemed daunting. But then I woke up from that little nightmare and said fuck it – I fall back on my knowledge that I am the one capable of profound love – that I have loved, and therefore will love and so I bounce up and down knowing it’s all gonna be good, if not great.
And last, but not least, at the end of the day, when everyone starts dancing and then jumps in the pool. It really is true that girls just want to have fun.