Lovecraft

There's an undercurrent throughout my life that sex is somehow wrong. That it will harm you. This comes , quite possibly from a Catholic school upgringing. I acquiesce that sex can add to a relationship dimension, both positive and negative. It can hold relationships together, build trust, and it's a universally accepted apres ski. And it's fun. But...

I have been thinking today about a man who thought very little of Tiger Woods, and seemingly - sex in general. Someone who shot himself in the head a day or so ago. He seemed to think that because Tiger got involved with a girl... ok... 12 girls... on the side, while he was married to a beautiful blonde swedish woman... that somehow Tiger should be stripped of his green jacket. For those that know, a green jacket is won by winning the greatest golf tournament of all time - the Masters. And it is not lost, ever. On this point, a friend of mine was confused.

When we found that Woods had cheated on his wife, some said that his personal life was none of our business. Others said he should have his jacket stripped from him and be barred from playing the Masters. Once you win the tournament, you have a lifetime standing invitation to return. Although the Augusta National Golf Club is a powerful organization, they do not exercise moral authority over their competitors. The men who win this tournament are usually men of focus, drive and talent. This is what the Masters tournament measures: not whether or not one can become addicted to sex.

Woods still bears the honor of having received a green jacket. And whether or not his sexuality has contributed to whether or not he will receive another - the honor that he won for himself cannot be stolen away.

I have wondered why the statement was made that his jacket should taken from him. Sexuality has biological, emotional, and physical dimension. We sometimes wonder , when we are young - if our sexuality has a darker aspect.

I have often wondered about the relationship between sexuality and death. Setting the death of Tiger Wood's golf swing aside for the moment, it's pretty clear that if we were designed not to die - we probably wouldn't need sexual reproduction. Sex seems to be designed into our species to allow us to trade genetic information between man and woman, edge dna and core backup sequence - to allow us to adapt and grow against the ever present danger of viral destruction. We are, after all - not the dominant species on planet earth. Viruses outnumber us nearly 45,000 to one. And they can execute generational mutations once a week. Sexuality gives us the chance to respond on a more or less 20 year generational cycle. It helps us to survive by allowing us to seek out healthy mates, procreate, pass our DNA onto our offspring. Men and women trade entire libraries of attack, counterattack, mutation and tactical patterns. We are driven almost to taste each other - we want to hold, kiss, and pull the very being of the other person into our arms. Our children (and other hazards of sex) help us to discover abilities we do not have, pass them forward in a bid to adapt to a new world. Because we realize, instinctively - that the world did change last week. And it will change again this week. And we will change with it, or die.

Seeing sexuality in the emotional aspect - we find safe haven in others. In the physical, we have strong biochemical markers that drive us forward. One day Tiger will be Tiger again. He did, what he did. And he has lost focus. But he will return to his point of equillibrium.

There are a whole number of people who are so constrained about sex, that they will never risk that uncertainty. The Shakers - a sect of religious men and women - oppose all sexual activity. The Gnostics were also encouraged to be celibate.

HP Lovecraft wrote, in "Call of Cthulhu" ... a particularly strange and dangerous form of destruction awaits any man who dares to look beyond. The complete irrelevance of mankind in the face of the cosmic horrors that apparently exist in the universe: the human characters all deteriorating when afforded a glimpse of what exists outside their perceived reality. Lovecraft states, in his opening sentence that "The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of the human mind to correlate all its contents".

He writes further..:

"We live on a placid island in the midst of black seas of infinity and it was not meant that we should voyage far. Some day the piecing together of dissociated knowledge will open up such terrifying vistas of reality that we shall either go mad from the relevation or flee from the deadly light into the peace and safety of a new dark age. Theosophists have guessed at the awesome grandeur of the cosmic cycle wherein our world and human race form transient incidents"

I would guess that we do not make this journey alone, but rather in pair. In complement.

Sexuality seems to be woven into us, and into the world we live in. Everything is sexual. Birds. Bees. Minx. Cats. Dogs. Everything seems to have a male, and a female. I am sure there are some who wonder about this seemingly non geometric relationship - the asymmetric wants and needs of men and women, their physical differences - the strange emotional undercurrent that seems to charge our existence. This shapes and guides so much of our life. Perhaps it is not noble - in the sense that we are shining white knights defeating evil. Perhaps dragons do eat virgins and there is a class of men dedicated to saving them.

Sexuality, like chivalry - seems to be related to how far and how carefully we can travel out of ourselves. And how intensely we seek to accomplish our goals. How much we can desire one another - seemingly oblivious to space and time. Perhaps that desire, in and of itself - is not as dark as it seems. A star ignites, seemingly for no reason whatsoever. It lights against the darkness. Some say it simply burns bright to light the way of the traveller.

But if we see that star pouring forth every shimmering wave of light as an eternal love poem to dark winged night - are we making a mistake?

A mistake that many will make - even men such as Lovecraft - is to assume that the darkness will not respond.



Got two reasons why I stay awake each lonely night..:)