Last week, The Today Show featured a new book called Forty Beads: The Simple, Sexy Secret for Transforming Your Marriage.  It’s the sex book of the moment.

The backstory is that this couple had gotten to a terrible place in their marriage, and the woman’s SIL gave her the advice that they should have sex daily. (I’m really hoping that the SIL is her brother’s wife and not her husband’s sister.  Because nothing says creepy like a woman who eagerly tells her SIL, “please screw my brother nightly!”)

She tried it and it worked.  Time passed again and their marriage unraveled again.  Now it was a few days before her husband’s 40th birthday.  She remembered — according to The Today Show — that her parents also enjoyed a nightly porking session:

Every year, at least for as long as I’ve been aware of it, my mom has given my dad an entire month of sex for his birthday. I hadn’t really given their steamy Septembers much thought until then.

Do you know this much about your parent’s sex life?  No?  Me neither.

So for her husband’s 40th birthday, she promised him 40 nights of sex.  At first, the nights were supposed to be consecutive, but in the end, the idea Carolyn Evans proposes (and what you need to do to become a Beader) is to give her husband a jar of 40 beads.  When he wants sex, he drops one in her bead catcher, a bowl she keeps by the side of the bed.

The reason I find this book so incredibly disturbing is not because it takes the act of sex — which can range from a spontaneous satiation of the intense feelings you have for another person to the obligatory romp that occurs around ovulation — and reduces it to a chore to be demanded by one person in the partnership.

I find this book disturbing because the point of the book is to use sex to fix a marriage.

That’s not only a lot of pressure to put on an act, but it takes the focus away from the actual problem and places it on this physical act that should be one of the tangential arms to a marriage, not the sole body of a marriage.

It’s like saying that my weight problem has nothing to do with the fact that I eat out of anxiety or sadness and instead I should focus on sitting down while eating my meals and that would solve! my! problem!

I obviously think I should focus on why the fuck I turn to food when I’m anxious or sad rather than something else.  I think I should focus on why I’m anxious or sad.

By making sex the “body” of the marriage, by giving it that amount of power, you relegate other parts of marriage that need to be in balance to the outer limbs.

Whereas all of those items on the limbs should actually be in the body and sex should become an extension of having a strong core.  Just one of the fun things a couple does together along with whatever else floats your boat.  If not, sex becomes the end-all-and-be-all, the judge of the strength of the marriage, and when that happens — and if your sex life isn’t perfect — it throws all those other, more important things out of whack when they may have been fine if you had a different way of viewing your partnership.  In other words, making sex the focus has more potential to break things than fix things.

Which isn’t to say that I don’t think a sex life is important.  I’m a big fan of sex — perhaps Josh should be giving me the jar if we did this instead of keeping to Evan’s heterosexual caricature of sexual desires.  I enjoy sex frequently.

But I think anyone infertile knows that sex takes on a very different meaning if you entered into your relationship believing you’d be able to use sex to procreate (and I’m sure that someone will inform me that it’s also true for those who go into family building with known problems, but I only know based on my experience).

Sex becomes this physical act that stands as the gatekeeper for what you can’t do — make a child.  It becomes this act that you need to do regardless of how you’re feeling in the moment when you’re ovulating, which makes sex as appealing as Brussels sprouts.  It can be a huge relief not to need to have sex anymore if you’re doing treatments.  It can be a reminder of loss — it’s the act that brought you to your  emotional pain.  It’s frustrating.  It’s painful.  It’s saddening.  I have yet to meet an infertile couple who said, “I am so thrilled we’re infertile because it means we get to have lots of sex” despite what dumb-asses think is one of the benefits of being unable to procreate.

Unlike other marital problems, sex is at the core of infertility.  And I don’t think bringing back a desire to have sex is as simple as placing a bead in a bowl.

I think you do need to at some point come back to a place of wanting to be physical, though that physicality shouldn’t be this one-sided, small-minded idea that a physical relationship = missionary-position, woman-submitting sex (you have hands, you have a mouth, you have an imagination — use them!).  But it takes time to get there and there aren’t shortcuts.  Rebuilding a sex life that has taken a hit due to infertility is more of a math equation than a self-help book:

time + commitment on both people’s parts to address the issue + leniency and understanding when the other person isn’t working on your time line = better sex life.

I think you need to come at it with the understanding that it takes time — and some “times” are more right than others.  I think it takes a commitment and flexibility on the part of both people to say they are willing to do what the other person needs them to do within reason.  And when that doesn’t mesh because the needs are in direct opposition, to take that third part of the equation.  Leniency.  Not taking your frustrations out on the person.  That leniency has to flow in two directions; and both people need to feel safe that they can express themselves.  They can push themselves without having the other person push them.

The way I mentally approach the idea of sex in a marriage is that the action is not a given.  There are plenty of life situations (including old age) where sex might not be possible.  Not where it’s being withheld as a weapon, but where it is simply impossible for physical or emotional reasons.  And is it possible to still have a happy, healthy marriage sans sex — yes, I believe it is.  Therefore, it’s a limb; it’s not the body of the marriage.  Is it possible to have a happy, healthy marriage sans understanding or support — no, I don’t believe you can have that.  Do you see the skewed focus of the 40 beads?

For a book to place it in that position of importance is to create more pressure, creating more problems.

So that’s how I feel about the concept of the 40 beads.  If you’re using the book as a sex game because sex games rocks your boat, let it rock your boat.  But to use it to fix a marriage is no better than having a child or buying a house or starting a new business venture to fix what is broken in the marriage.  Those things are all gimmicks.  To fix a marriage, you need to get to the heart.  Which is located in the body.

As I was writing this, I went outside to see two squirrels fucking under my car only to chase them away and have them return for a three-way.  Sex seems to be on everyone’s mind.  So if you’ll excuse me… cough.

Thank you for all of the birthday wishes.  My Chekhovian mood stretched through the whole week.  Josh asked if I wanted to go see a production of Uncle Vanya and I just stared at him for a long time until I finally said, “do you think that’s a good idea?”  And he had to admit that it probably wasn’t.

I am still feeling Prufrock-y, still wearing my trousers rolled, but I did spend an hour trying out electric guitars.  And then, in true form, walked out of the store without my birthday present and told the man that I needed to sleep on it.  I will most likely go back and buy it tonight — a simple, blue Fender Squier.  Nothing fancy, but a first electric guitar probably shouldn’t have too many bells and whistles.

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But the best birthday gift came from Amazon.  On Thursday I learned that Life from Scratch had been chosen for their sunshine deals program.  They picked 600 books that were already bestsellers or had won awards, temporarily dropped the price, and are featuring them for two weeks to kick off summer reading.

It’s a fairly eclectic list: Sophie’s Choice, Slaughterhouse Five, and… Life from Scratch.  There’s Chelsea Handler and short stories by Andre Dubus and the writings of Martin Luther King Jr.  See — eclectic.

By Thursday night, it was down to #316 on the Paid Kindle list.  Which is awesome.  I mean, it’s very cool to think of new people reading my book, but it also was an injection of energy into writing the sequel.  Stuff was just quietly going on with the first book and I was just quietly writing the second book, and this was like a huge yelp in the middle of a sea of words that woke me up, made me sit up straighter, and actually smile through my Chekhovian mood as I typed.

So.

Life from Scratch is down to $2.99 on Kindle for the next two weeks for this promotion.  It’s the perfect time (hint, hint) to get a copy if you don’t already have one (I don’t personally have a Kindle, but you can read Kindle books on the computer, the iPad, and the blackberry, etc).

And I’m telling you this because I’m going to beg you — as a birthday present to me? — to spread word.  Tell friends and family that this would be a great beach read, some good summer fun.  That it’s the perfect time to get it — it will never be this low in price.  It’s less than a frappuccino!  Tweet it, Facebook it, blog about it.  Pretty please?

My goal, since everyone should have a goal, is to get to #1 on the Kindle List.  Will you help me do that?

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And speaking of birthday fun… the winners of the giveaway (and seriously, I can’t believe 257 entries for a box of baked goods and only 28 for the best games I’ve ever played?):

1. Rush Hour (winner: JustHeather)
2. What’s Gnu (winner: Kristin)
3. Rush Hour iPhone/iPad app (winner: Magpie)
4. Solitaire Chess iPhone/iPad app (winner: Baby Smiling in Back Seat)

Congratulations!

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And now the blogs…

But first, second helpings of the posts that appeared in the open comment thread last week.  In order to read the description before clicking over, please return to the open thread:

• “What the Heck is Wrong with Me…” [Part One] and “What the Heck is Wrong with Me…” [Part Two] (Too Many Fish to Fry)
• “Little Warrior” (Three Times the Fun)
• “To Taryn, at Graduation” (Mrs. Spit… Still Spouting Off)
• “Mice and Cheese” (Mrs. Spit… Still Spouting Off)
• “Right Where I Am Project” (Still Life with Circles)
• “Rape is Not an Appliance” (Oh, Noa)
• “Forgiveness” (Expired Eggs… ?)

Okay, now my choices this week.

Kate, Uncensored has a wistful little post about wishing for a wedding.  On one hand, she doesn’t need the ceremony, the paper or the ring.  But on the other, it’s this little thing that is missing.  It made me think about all the things we can talk ourselves into living without, but how they always are like a little sigh in the back of our heart.

The Port of Indecision has a post about perspective.  She juxtaposes her experience with recurrent loss with her friend’s reaction to her own miscarriage.  At first the comparison makes her feel badly, but she comes to realize how her perspective has changed with each loss.  She explains: “And how by the fifth time I was simply resigned to the reality that this was the only thing that could possibly happen. And how it’s gone from, ‘Why not me?’ to, ‘Why me, again?’ It’s all a matter of perspective.”

Grit and Patience has a post about donor eggs and the cuckoo bird.  I love this passage: “I’d love whatever kid I had, of course.  I guess it’s just a visceral illustration of that baby or child being foreign, different, not OF ME, us not “fitting”. My reaction to the cuckoo image isn’t as strong now as it used to be.  Maybe it’s the passage of time, maybe it’s the Zoloft.  Who knows?”  But you’re going to want to read the whole post for this line: “It’s the love that makes you ‘fit,’ not the genes.”

Lastly, Write Mind Open Heart has a post about summer, specifically, summer vacations as a kid.  You will mentally go back in time.  Our neighbourhood wasn’t big on fort building, but we played all house hide-and-go-seek (meaning, you could be outside or in any of the houses on our street with only one tree designated as the “safe” zone).  We biked and explored.  We went to day camp for six weeks.  Go tell her what you did.

The roundup to the Roundup: I survived my birthday.  Please help me make Life from Scratch #1 on the Kindle list.  Winners from the giveaway.  And lots of great blog posts to read.  So what did you find this week?  Please use a permalink to the blog post (written between May 27 and June 3) and not the blog’s main url. Not understanding why I’m asking you what you found this week?  Read the original open thread post here.

We interrupt my existential crisis to reflect on the actual birthday celebrating festivities and eat figurative cake and put up streamers and all of those sorts of things tomorrow.

Happy Birthday to Meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!

Since my birthday falls between two weekends this year, I decided to claim both for my own.  This past weekend, we went to the aquarium sans kids and contemplated the jellyfish.  They just float through the water trailing gossamer tentacles, not concerned about paying the mortgage or procreating or growing old.  As far as I understand, based on information from the elderly aquarium volunteer, jellyfish do not have midlife crises.

They don’t check themselves in the mirror, fretting about grey tentacles.

Josh gave me the best birthday gift of all.  I’ve had a burning question that I’ve always wanted to ask, but didn’t want to be the one doing the asking.  On this visit, Josh allowed me to save face and took one for the team in honour of my birthday.  He marched up to the information desk and inquired if anyone had ever fallen or jumped into the stingray pool.

“No,” the aquarium volunteer informed him.  “I mean, there have been other things that have fallen in — cameras, cell phones.  But never a person.”

I’ve got to say that not only was the answer anti-climatic (I was assuming that the aquarium averages 2 or 3 stingray- or shark-inflicted deaths per year), but I didn’t really believe him.  People die every so often at the zoo when they climb into the lion enclosure and that takes actual skill to scale the wall.  Falling into the stingray pool is so simple that I contemplated showing him just how simple it would be by taking a running leap over the low railing (until I remembered that the pool is filled with stingrays and sharks).

Please don’t get me wrong — I’m thrilled that everyone is exiting the aquarium alive.  The answer just seemed suspect.

On that dark note, let’s go back to celebrating my birthday!  With cake!  And streamers!  And fish!

And more fish!

And turtles!

Josh took a picture of me by the bubble chambers.  He told me that I didn’t look happy.

Perhaps I looked a bit wan.

This was the picture that he told me was perfect; squinty eyes and all.

That is perhaps closer to how I feel despite my existential crisis.  That underneath all those layers of angst, there is a girl with an enormous fork, about to dive into a chocolate cake with birthday candles on it.

I am trying to come up with something fabulous for this upcoming weekend since I get a second birthday weekend.  Ice cream — definitely.  And force the family to listen to Green Day on continual play.  And perhaps purchase my first electric guitar.  And a splash park if it’s hot enough.  I’m open to any other ideas as well.

Perhaps we’ll just take a long drive, make a wrong turn, and see where it takes us.

My birthday always comes after Memorial Day, which is a time dip sort of weekend.  I don’t do well with quiet seas of time.  By which I mean that I am okay checking out myself — of going on holiday and stepping back from life — but I’m not okay when everyone else is doing it too.  When it gets too quiet.

And the fact that it gets too quiet coupled with the fact that birthdays always remind me of my own mortality means that I usually enter into a strong case of the pre-birthday blues.

*******

Early in the weekend, we finally got around to watching The Kids are All Right.  We have been on the waiting list at the library forever for this one.  I know I should have been focusing on what everyone else in our community focused on — which was either the donor sperm storyline or the how-lesbians-are-portrayed-in-a-mainstream-film idea — but all I could do was work myself into this anxious state where it felt like someone was stabbing at my insides with a fork as I fast forwarded to imagining what the twins would be like as teenagers.

One day, I’m going to have to drop them off at college.  And I’m going to have to get into a car and leave said college.  I will not be able to comport myself like Julianne Moore and Annette Benning.  I will be screaming like an animal, mortifying my children as I am dragged across their campus, shrieking and crying with a river of snot running between my face and shirt.

Because I’m like that at home and they’re only six.  So I can only imagine the place I’ll get myself to when it’s actually happening.

I was at an event last week, sitting in front of a psychologist who wrote a book about letting go of your children.  He had no idea what sort of freak was sitting just inches away from his chair.

*******

It feels like there is not enough time to do anything.  That note I taped above my desk, the one that’s supposed to remind me that it’s not a race?  It’s not really working.  Because it is a race.  We are constantly racing a clock.  To use our bodies before they cease to work; to use our brains before they start forgetting more than they remember.  We need to race to beat others to good ideas.  We need to race to hit deadlines — the ones imposed on us by others and the ones we impose on ourselves.

And there never feels like there is enough time in a day.  I don’t feel like I get enough done.

*******

These are the last few days when I can tell people that I’m 36.  In my mid-30s.  On Thursday, I’ll need to say that I’m in my late-3os (which I’ve written about before — my neat jumps of three).  Late-30s!  That’s a small step to 40.  And 40 is the waiting room to 50.  And my G-d, you know that 50 is simply the doorway to 60 and beyond.

Every birthday, I wait up until midnight and I say over and over again before the clock turns, “I’m 36, I’m 36, I’m 36.”  And once the clock hits midnight, I sadly add in, “I’m 37.”

And yes, I’d obviously rather age than the alternative.  But just because a hideous option exists doesn’t mean you need to be thrilled with receiving the goody bag of growing up.

*******

I ended the weekend by reading the entire limited series of Daytripper in one sitting.  It is incredible.  And gut-wrenching.  And emotional — exactly the sort of book one should AVOID when they are in the throes of the pre-birthday blues, but I ran to it like moth to freakin’ flame, sizzling as I hit the fire.

It takes you through all these possible days when the main character’s life could have ended.  How the obituary would read.  What meaning we’d derive from his death in that moment.  It’s tragic if it took place at 11.  It’s heartbreaking if he left behind a wife and child.  It’s terrifying if he was murdered.

It made me think of the important moments in my life and what would have been taken away by others if I had died on any of those days.  I’m not talking about obviously meaningful days such as my wedding day.  This book explores the small days — the personal days — which are meaningful only to the person experiencing it.  What had I accomplished in my life by that point?  What were the goals that were left undone?  Who was meaningful enough in my life in that time period to be mentioned within the obituary?

We keep our resume up to date, but why don’t we have a similar document held on our computer — an obituary that we update every so often to be utilized upon our demise?

Because it’s horrifying to consider a world where we no longer exist.

*******

I think my normal state is a bluish hue.  But near my birthday, it feels like the tape loop of life speeds up, darkens, distorts.  And after the clock turns and there is no going back, when I’m jolted into my late-30s whether I’m ready or not, the sky brightens again.

You only need to endure me like this for a few more days.

Though now that I have gotten all of that out of my system, I am feeling considerably lighter.  Apologies for placing it on you.

How are you right before your birthday?

And please, for the love, take my birthday gift to you before Thursday night.

I had a teacher in high school who gave a present to his mother every time it was his birthday instead of the other way around.  He told us that he wouldn’t be here if not for her; she did the hard work on that day and she should be celebrated for bringing life into this world and raising him all these years.  That the gifts should flow towards the people who helped you reach the birthday instead of towards you.  And even though giving a gift to his mother is the most family-building-normative way of thinking that negates whole ways of constructing family and raising children (gee, thanks Mr. S), I do like the sentiment behind it.  The idea that we wouldn’t get through another year without the people who hold us up, and on the turning point of each year, recognizing them with a gift.

I could restrict the gift giving to my mother, but that excludes my father, who might not have squeezed me out, but certainly had a hand in raising me.  And I could give something to both my parents, but that leaves out my siblings who certainly influenced the person I’ve become.  And I could give something to my parents and siblings (and their partners) but that leaves out my nieces.  And we haven’t even gotten to Josh.  And the twins.  And all my friends growing up and now.

Quite the conundrum.

Instead, the kind people at ThinkFun, amused by my gushing post about their games, have agreed to give away copies of the physical games and iPhone/iPad apps to you.  I know that I normally don’t do giveaways, but I honestly believe that my ThinkFun games have made me smarter (at least, that is what I tell my friend, C, when I am slightly buzzed off of hard cider and we’re trying to play Chocolate Fix).  And they are so damn portable.  And beyond Apple products and L.L.Bean clothing, ThinkFun is one of the only companies that consistently impress me.  That I can put my stamp of approval on it and say, “this company has never let me down.” (L.L.Bean, if you’re reading this and want to give away a pair of curvy-line jeans to a reader, I’m down with that too).

So, in honour of my birthday this week, I am hosting a giveaway of four ThinkFun games:

1. Rush Hour
2. What’s Gnu (and you can read here how we play the game)
3. Rush Hour iPhone/iPad app
4. Solitaire Chess iPhone/iPad app

These toys are all good for kids and adults; meaning, I play them without the kids around.  And I don’t mean I play them because they left them out.  I mean that I packed Solitaire Chess and had it with me when I went to BlogHer last year.

And this is how it works — you need to give a word gift for someone else.  Yes, that’s right, as we do for the Purim giveaway, you need to go leave a comment somewhere.

• Leave a comment below (yes, a rockin’ toy that is good for kids and adults alike for the low low price of one comment!) telling me where you left a comment already today–and feel free to leave, write a comment somewhere, and come back.  Please put the name of that blog and a link to the post in the comment.  And say something nice about that person’s post.
• You can enter as many times as you like.  Which means the more you comment around the blogosphere, the more chances you have to win.  Only comments that talk about a post you read elsewhere in the blogosphere have a chance at winning (in other words, if you write below, “ThinkFun games are so much fun!” I’ll nod my head with you, but you won’t be eligible to win.  You need to list a place where you commented today, give the url for the post, and say something about the post).
• Each comment counts as one entry, so if you’ve commented in three places, you’re allowed to leave that in three separate entries here.  Leaving it in separate comments is actually sort of an important fact because too many links in a comment will make it caught by the spam filter.  I will release comments caught by the spam filter, but it will take me a moment.
• In addition to everything else in your comment, please list which of the games you want to win.  You can write “all” if you’d be happy to get any of them or you can write “1 and 2” if you don’t have an iPad.  Or you can write “2 and 4” if you don’t like Rush Hour, etc.  Please write this information in each comment you leave.
• The giveaway ends at 9 pm EST on Thursday the 2nd, therefore, you can return all week and list new, great blog posts you found.  If you’re still confused, think of this as creating a Friday Blog Roundup-type list in the comment section, one comment at a time.  The winners will be contacted by email, but I’ll also list them in the next Friday Blog Roundup.

Sample Comment (just so you get the idea):

I commented on Life from Here’s post about her daughter’s birthday (http://lifefromhere.wordpress.com/2011/05/28/two-years-old-almost/).  It blew my mind that she’s already two!  And I’d like to win 1, 3, or 4.

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I will also love you forever if you read down the list and click over to read the other posts listed in the comment section.  And don’t just hit the first ones at the top of the comment list. Make sure you hit some of the people in the middle or bottom of the list and leave them a comment telling them that you agree with the original commenter — their writing does rock.

If someone writes something nice about a post you wrote this week, bask in the love and then pay it forward by going to someone else’s post and commenting on it.  You know how good it feels when someone leaves you a comment, so go do the same.

My usual blog rules apply: any spam is deleted — the point is to honour another person, not drum up business for a Viagra website — as well as anything rude.

So, that’s it.  In order to win, you have to join in my kumbaya-comment love fest.  But it’s really worth it.  These games rock.  And ThinkFun, I’m having a blogoversary coming up in a few weeks if you want to do this again… (and L.L.Bean and Apple, feel free to join in too).