Because I am trying to chronicle our experiences as we define a new stage of life, I feel free to ask impertinent questions, and I am always rewarded by honest and thoughtful answers. No surprise, really, from women who are discovering the joys of not caring “what other people think anymore.” Much of what they tell me begins with an astonished “I can’t believe that I am telling your this…” or “I can’t believe I am doing this…” but we are surprising ourselves at every turn.
My latest line of inquiry has to do with how we are experiencing love, sex, and intimacy these days. That is the subject of my next book, which I am working on now. I am intrigued by answers like: “I would never have chosen a guy like him twenty years ago!” “I was very happily married, but I would never marry again. I like being on my own.” “Sex used to be irrelevant, now it most certainly isn’t.” And I am touched by others who admit, “I am more content in my thirty-year marriage now than ever before.”
I am asking you to take a look at the questions below and answer any of them that interest you with a few sentences about your life.
If you would consider being interviewed in greater length (by me) please write to me directly at: info@suzannebraunlevine.com.
Thank you for joining this ground-breaking conversation.
Are you in love now?
If so, does it feel different from other times in your life? How?
Is your partner someone you would have picked (or did pick) back then?
Or someone totally different?
If not, would you say you were “in sex”? Meaning enjoying sex even though the relationship couldn’t be called love? If so, is there anything new about the sex?
Have you found out anything new about the way you love now? Are you less/more interested in companionship and doing things together? Are you less/more interested in monogamy? (or are you a “serial monogamist?”)
If you are aware of power differentials or abuses of power in previous relationships, can you describe them and whether things are different in current ones? If you are in a long-standing relationship, has the balance of power shifted over time?
If you are not in love now and wish you were, what is it you miss?
If you are not in love now and like that just fine, what do you like about your situation?
Do you feel what you used to think of as “being in love” for people who aren’t romantic or sexual partners, (friends or grandchildren, for example)?
Your age _____
Your marital status _____
Write to me at info@suzannebraunlevine.com (if you would consider being interviewed).
Find out what your friends and other women are thinking as we continue the dialogue in new posts, comments, information and themes at “The New Intimacy,” www.suzannebraunlevine.com
©Suzanne Braun Levine, 2009.