Noah
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Joined: 7/5/2005
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quote:
ORIGINAL: mistoferin
Great topic. Thanks.
Sometimes the clearest thing that can truthfully be said is vague. The only alternative in some cases is to be arbitrary, that is, to try to impose clarity where none exists.
You can scan a photo and digitally manipulate it for increased clarity. But what if it is a picture of a wispy cloud originally, one that fades very gradually to blue on all sides, and more on one side than the other because the color of the sky varies behind it? Then you probably aren't serving truth or understanding by having Photoshop make this middle part white as snow and the sky around it as blue as blue can be. The imposed clarity isn't clarity at all, is it? It is an "either-or" mask on a thing which is itself not either or.
But arbitrarily imposing stuff isn't always bad. Not sure where the limits of your capacities, interests and desires lie? Maybe you should impose some conservative boundaries to start with, then honor them with a mutual understanding that they may turn out to be mutable. I'm not saying things you don't know. I'm just trying to tidy up this little pile of ideas.
You can ask me who I want in the next statewide election. I can make some vague noises about it but you might claim I was equivocating, refusing to be pinned down. You might even imagine that I was refusing to state my true opinion because I didn't want to disappoint you.
That would be pretty funny.
But the fact is: I don't know yet. Besides the fact that no candidates have declared, I'm thinking of moving and may be a citizen of another state by then, and maybe there's a GIANT ASTEROID HURTLING THROUGH SPACE ON A COLLISION COURSE WITH PLANET EARTH EVEN AS WE SPEAK, not to mention that, you know, the whole thing about convicted felons and voting rights and stuff.
Note: when your partner makes a habit of refusing to address your questions based on asteroid-induced uncertainty it might be time to declare her sub-orbital (or secretly married or something.)
Sometimes the clearest answer your partner, top or bottom, can give is a vague one, because the notions or opinions he or she holds don't have crisp edges themselves, or the facts themselves are vague. The true answer with the most genuine clarity is then a vague answer.
If the man described in the first post is being met with manipulative refusal to tell the truth, he has one kind of decision to make. If he is being met with lazy refusal to examine things then he has another kind of thing on his hands. If he has a partner who just doesn't "know what to think" he is in a great spot to help her. Not by telling her what to think, presumably (though I've seen a few profiles offering and asking for that,) but in other more compelling ways.
Sometimes no does mean maybe. It really, simply does. No number of posters and bumper stickers to the contrary will change that. Hell, sometimes "No" means "Pleeeease!". But sometimes it means no.
Anyone here unclear on what "Fine!" means in a vanilla relationship that's hit a bump? ... unless the couple have done some work in advance to avoid that kind of crap.
All language is ambiguous. All of it. Including the word "all" in the previous two sentences. Those are the cards we're dealt. Two people in a sort of communion can transcend that inherent ambiguity and actually communicate. Here is an analogy*:
The fact that you can sail across it rather than sink doesn't mean that water is solid. Similarly the fact the we manage sometimes to communicate doesn't belie the fact that every application of every word is liquid, so to speak. In a certain situation, the word "pretzel" might mean "THE INSTANT THIS SAFE CALL ENDS CALL THE COPS!" And if pretzel can mean that then anything can mean anything.
That is an extreme case but I think it is well to keep awareness of the underlying principle always in mind to some little degree.
Members of my ethnic group have been accused of being reluctant to provide straight answers. We are taught in childhood to respond to this criticism: "Well it's true and it isn't." Some truths are yes/no, black/white. Others, which are just as important to life, can only be told by the whole story. A yes or a no can be as lazy or disingenuous as a maybe.
Listen carefully to the words surrounding her yes, no, and maybe, and attend to all the other cues too. The immediate ones like tone and body language, probable fatigue and blood sugar levels ("Why do we always disagree when we're late for dinner?" he wondered.) Attend to the less proximate cues like how things have been going lately between us and how things have been going lately for her and for you, individually.
Attend also to the distal cues: potential hot-buttons arising from old relationships or upbringing; the culture or micro-culture in which your partner was raised; time of the month; phase of the moon, etc. I have had occasion to wonder about Planet of Origin as a factor, but then I'm sure some of my prospective partners have had the same doubt.
Too hard? Do something else then. Maybe I have it all wrong. I love those moments with that special person when it is all so blessedly easy. Sometimes those moments can last for months and I'm grateful for them but in my life they are punctuated by other kinds of moments when hard work must be done.
regarding another point from the OP:
For my part, I can't relate to the notion that a dominant is responsible for each party walking away from each transaction pleased. Sometimes my partners displease me or, being as fallible as anyone else I displease myself. You can bet your milk money that not everything I do leaves them all warm and fuzzy. I presume it is the same on their side. Life isn't a series of separate events which each resolve internally. Hopefully, if the relationship is good it will in the end be seen as fulfilling, or at least meaningful. I value these more than pleasure.
And yes someone may respond that "what I mean by pleasure is fulfillment based on finding deep meaning," or something like that. That's cool. I get it. I only wanted to point to a distinction I think is worth noting. Because, let's face it, a lot of the time people mean something far less cerebral when they say "I'm pleased" and those simpler pleasures rock, are also crucial to a good relationship.
Finally ...
And if the topic is crucial and if the conversation seems to be degrading rapidly, and if you're in a chat window: agree to disconnect and either give it a rest or pick up the phone, as you in your domly domliness see fit. And unless your subbie is a total lunkhead you might consider taking her preference into account.
* if "sociology" is the study of society, what is "analogy" the study of?
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