The Greatest Lover of Last Tuesday

by Neil McKinnon

  Once each party, either verbally or internally, has propelled his or her imagination off the runway, the middle of the episode has truly been achieved. Just as a well-constructed tale should contain nothing that does not relate directly to the story, a well-constructed sexual act should contain little that detracts from the performance. An extraneous character should never enter a story simply for the purpose of telling the author’s favourite joke. Just so, as the sexual act is progressing, it is not correct for a man to bring up the fact that a previous lover wore transparent underwear, or for a woman to reveal that she can become aroused only by witnessing potential lovers skydiving in the nude. Writer’s block may occasionally bring a promising novel to a premature end. So too with love — shovelling inappropriate verbal fuel may cause blockages that makes the sex train lose steam and chug to an early conclusion — a phenomenon known as evaporating mood which usually receives no higher than a D-minus when sexual acts are graded.

  In the realm of literary fiction, it is important that there not be separate climaxes for each character in a story. In the sexual narrative it is not only acceptable but de rigueur that each character reach his or her own specific climax although, as already mentioned, they should occur as near to one another as possible, both physically and chronologically. When that occurs, it may be said that the sex train has truly reached its terminal destination and preparations can then be undertaken for the return journey.

  When I informed Adriana of my prescriptions, she shook her head, cleared her throat and said, “Like every meal you prepare, the entree is missing from the menu. Do you not know that there are more facets to love than speed, time, and location?”

  “What facets?”

  “Group factors, for one.”

  “Group factors! I’m not talking about that type of sex.”

  “I know, but the world’s population has skyrocketed.”

  “So?”

  “The more people in the world, the more they tend to form groups and subgroups.”

  “You mean, cultures?”

  “Not quite. Think about it. It used to be that sex was problematic only when moving outside one’s culture or one’s age bracket or one’s geographic area. Now things are more complicated.”

  “Enlighten me, my gargantuan groupie.”

  “Think of all the different groups of people in the world that cut across cultural, age, and geographic boundaries.”

  “You mean groups like athletes or librarians?”

  “Now you’re getting it,” she said. “The list is unlimited. Apart from obvious categories like librarians, mechanics, or teachers, there are hundreds of lesser known subgroups.”

  “Such as?”

  For example, one group might be Men Who Hate Yogurt … and a subgroup is Men Who Hate Yogurt But Eat It to Please Their Wives.”

  “You’re rubbing my leg.”

  “No, there are thousands: Steer Wrestlers Who Mumble While Gardening; Women Who Laugh Heartily at Unfunny Jokes Told by Dwarfs; Men with Big Egos and Small Tattoos; Bus Drivers Who Pick Their Noses at Red Lights; People Who Surreptitiously Pass Wind while Coughing; Men Who Write Their Names when Urinating on Snow.”

  “What is your point, woman who drinks brandy and spouts gibberish.”

  “The point, my simple sex sage, is that problems may arise when members of one group attempt to have a relationship with members of another group.”

  “An example … I need an example.”

  “How about when someone from the group Men Who Love Mud Wrestling, meets a woman from the group Ladies Who Wear Gloves to Open Doors.”

  “I see what you mean. That would be a problem.”

  “ … and Men Who Spit While Talking do poorly courting Women Who Sidestep Slowly.”

  She was wound up and I decided to play along. “How about, Men Who Refuse to Clean Up After Dogs will get nowhere with Women Who Walk Barefoot in the Park.”

  “Now you understand,” she said. “Some of the problems are so pervasive that the acts that cause them have been given names.”

  ‘Go on.”

  “Take, for instance, the case of a lady from the group Woman Who Relish Unconventional Sex. When she engages with a man who stores his adventure gene under his mattress — say someone from the group Men Who Colour Inside The Lines, or perhaps from the group Men Who Stuff Their Own Shirts, the act has come to be known as, what in hell are you doing? The onset of this interaction and its cessation are almost simultaneous.”

  “You’re right. I haven’t dealt with group factors and you’ve raised other issues that I’ve neglected.”

  Now she was puzzled. “What issues?”

  “You mentioned that the world’s population has skyrocketed. That means there’s a mathematical issue.”

  “Explain yourself, my numerical nincompoop.”

  “It’s simple. The more people there are, the more sex occurs.”

  “How is that an issue — apart from more groups?”

  ‘Don’t you see? It’s like soccer … or anything else. The more there is, the more the overall quality improves … and the more the quality improves, the greater the chance that records will be set and broken.”

  “So what?” she asked.

  “Whenever there is a chance to break records, competition increases … and the more competition, the more rigorous the training. It brings up the whole issue of competitive sex.”

  “There’s no such thing.”

  “Yes, there is. It’s already started. The writing is on the wall.”

  “Now you’re rubbing my leg.”

  No, I’m not. New industries have developed to complement the onset of tournaments in the realm of physical love.”

  “Name one,” she demanded.

  “Okay. Do you honestly think that sports drinks were created to increase stamina at lawn bowling tournaments? No! Their real function is to replace electrolytes lost during intense sexual activity. Entire manufacturing enterprises have entered the field. Less than one year ago a team led by Professor Dimitri Flaboff at the University of Vladivostok invented a machine he called the SX-6-9-9, but it had to be scrapped after it was used by two researchers to smash the world record for number of orgasms per hour.”

  ‘Why? Why was it scrapped?”

  “The researchers never recovered. The woman, a Ph.D. candidate in microbiology, is now barely able to hold a job slinging hamburgers at McDonald’s. The man, a post-doctoral linguistics expert, now has difficulty putting three words together.”

  ‘That’s terrible,” she said.

  “Another factor is nutrition. Unfortunately, competitive sex has spurred the creation of special diets.”

  “Why do you say unfortunately?”

  “The diets pose a danger to the continuing existence of some species.”

  ‘What danger?”

  “There’s already a worldwide shortage of rhinoceros horn and, by next year, oysters will be on the endangered list.”

  “That’s also terrible.”

  “Yes it is, but the biggest problem has been totally hushed up and is almost unknown by the general public.”

  “What’s that?” she asked.

  “The entrance of steroids and other performance enhancing drugs into the field. No one knows how many of today’s star performers are actually doping, but close observers believe that it’s common.”

  “Can’t they test?”

  “Yes, but testing has proven to be useless. Participants have discovered that taking a legal impotence drug will mask the use of a banned substance. It’s like building a high-rise in front of a bookie joint. The huge erection obscures the illegal activity. Unfortunately, competition is so fierce that athletes will abuse anything that modern science puts in front of them, and there are always coaches who bend all rules in search of instant glory.”

  “Is it that pervasive?” she asked.

  “Not completely. There are still places where traditional sex is practiced and probably will continue to be. Bu
t as world population grows and as the number of matches increases, we can expect the worst out of human nature.”

  “What does the future hold?”

  “There is a movement to make sex an Olympic event.”

  “The Olympics. Now you are kidding.”

  “No, I’m not. And due to the nature of the sport it will probably be the first event to be held at both summer and winter Olympiads.”

  “I understand,” she said. “It’s a year-round activity in all countries. You’ve certainly provided an eye opener, my effete athlete.”

  “It is an eye opener. My only regret is that I was born late. Given my background and experience I would have stood on the podium numerous times.”

  Adriana stood to go to the bathroom. “Either that or you would have been disqualified for jumping off the starting block before the pistol was fired.”

  I was left in welcome silence. It occurred to me that she had again succeeded in derailing my communication with you, dear reader. I have not completed the task I had set for myself which was to inform you of the various permutations and combinations that men and women arrive at when cohabiting each with the other. I will not attempt completion of that portion of my project — those who so desire may anticipate the outcome by closely examining Dante’s description of the inferno. Instead I will perform a greater service by making the reader aware of the types of men and women one encounters in this world and to provide guidelines so that each type may be identified before one prematurely commits oneself. I will also detail the actions required to deal in an appropriate manner with each identified type.

  Deadbeats, Philanderers, and Lowlifes

  AS PROMISED, I WILL NOW DIVIDE the two genders into their various types and provide guidelines for strategies to be employed when courting a representative of any particular one. I do this because there are thousands of Adriana’s groups and no one person embodies the full repertoire of behaviours needed to make him or her attractive to another in any specific typology. I will, of necessity, paint with a wide brush when I sort men and women into their recognizable categories.

  To begin, women must understand that there are only two types of men: those who can be changed or made-over and those who, despite all efforts, defy any attempt at alteration. Let’s deal first with men who can be changed. There are two of them. They are named Lyle and they live near each other in a remote farming village southwest of Bucharest. Both are committed bachelors.

  The second category is, men who can’t be changed. This group is comprised of all males other than the two Lyles and is made up of three recognizable subcategories: deadbeats, philanderers, and lowlifes.

  1. The Deadbeat: This type of man comes in many guises. He may be a lunkhead, a charmer, a layabout, or a wheedler. To maintain his lifestyle, a deadbeat may employ some of the methods used by the philanderer such as flattery, charm, soft-soap, and apple-polishing although often his attempts to use these sophisticated methodologies are amateurish and ham-fisted. Women must exercise caution because, once the deadbeat is attached, cutting him loose can be as difficult as trying to disengage from one’s own shadow.

  The deadbeat frequently hitches himself to women who are unable to grasp life by the chest hair. One such woman was Adele M. She spent years fluttering in and out of her own emotional purgatory, never focusing on her true talent, which was her ability to clear a room by answering the question, how are you? Stumbling through life’s brambles, her eyes firmly fixed on her shoes, she had no idea that Leonard, the sprightly gentleman who, one day, appeared next to her claiming to be an unemployed orthodontist was, in reality, a well practiced deadbeat. He used all of the stock tricks and gradually, as slowly and unobtrusively as lint enters a belly button, he inserted himself into her life.

  Adele and Leonard were soon married and presented to the world a picture of bliss, a picture as contrived as any image created by a photographer’s trick lens. The maddening thing is that Adele is unaware of Leonard’s deadbeat status and, though he hasn’t peered inside a mouth for years, she frequently introduces him as “my husband, the doctor.” The sad thing is that as long as she continues to provide Leonard with shelter, food, drink, and money, he will be quite willing to play the role of the contented husband … but should Adele lose her job as an in-store counsellor to born-again sales clerks, or should she come on hard times for any other reason, Leonard will disappear from her life as quietly and quickly as flatulence vanishes on a windy day.

  What Adele does not know is that there is a foolproof method to identify a deadbeat. Early in the relationship she should simply have asked Leonard for a loan. A true deadbeat responds to a loan request in one of two ways. He either vanishes into thin air never to be seen again, or he asks the woman for her dead mother’s wedding ring in order that he might pawn it and lend her the money. In the first instance, the woman should hold on to her skirts as the whirlwind caused by the rapidity of the deadbeat’s departure is truly mind boggling. In the second, the woman should take her mother’s wedding ring, pawn it herself and go on an extended holiday to a remote beach. She should remain there until the deadbeat himself solves the problem by turning his attention to greener and more lucrative pastures.

  2. The Philanderer: This gentleman is immediately identified by his unique odour, an enticing mixture of after-shave and grease tainted by a faint whiff of the psychological glue that he uses to stick himself to unsuspecting women, much like summer bluebottles attach themselves to flypaper. He has been in and out of more relationships than Lothario, Casanova, and Don Juan combined.

  In the beginning the philanderer is considerate and accommodating. He basks in the lady’s beauty. He revels in her conversation. But all the time his eyes are peering in two directions: back at the procession of devastated women disappearing into the horizon, and forward to the future as he sniffs out his next dalliance.

  The reason he’s enthralled with anyone is that he’s enthralled with everybody. He’s a loving lunatic — a horndog. His stamina is amazing. He can’t stay away. He’s here. He’s there. No, he’s back here. He’s everywhere. He’s ready to go again … and again … and again. He is an addict of indiscriminate lubricity, routinely unfaithful to his wife, his girlfriends, his wife’s friends, and his friends’ wives. His horizons have expanded exponentially, from high school where he nursed an intense desire to nuzzle every girl in his graduating class, to university where his aspirations grew to encompass all of the women in the faculty where he studied physical education. Eventually, his ambition knew so few bounds that he secretly craved to bed the entire female population of a state or province. He is an expert at bedroom multitasking and is restricted by few technical limitations.

  The philanderer never takes time off and has never had a real holiday. His work, his recreation, his avocation and his hobby are the chase. The only time he has been known to relax is during career day at the local high school where he fondly recounts how he became successful in his chosen profession.

  For an example of the havoc wreaked by the philanderer we need look no further than the tragic story of Sarah B., a deeply religious girl who thought her chance meeting and subsequent affair with Desmond, a sometime ski instructor and sweet-talking alley cat, was her ticket away from her stuffy liberal parents who did not subscribe to her right-wing religious philosophy and who constantly encouraged her to lighten up.

  Sarah met Desmond at a fundamentalist revival meeting where she had gone to seek solace after her parents had presented her with a membership in a radical animal rights group as a gift for her twenty-first birthday. Desmond had attended the revival because long ago he had discovered that at this venue, dressed in a beard, sandals and flowing robe, seducing young women became as easy as ushering lambs to slaughter. Using equal amounts of sweet-talk, charm, flattery, and sympathy, as well as dashes of piety, sprinklings of biblical quotations and small chunks of prayer, Desmond penetrated Sarah’s awareness, entered her consciousness, broke through her perimeter, infilt
rated her defences, inserted himself into her heart and finally, in what was his best time yet, he squirrelled his way into her pants.

  At first Sarah felt guilty because she had broken a promise she had made to herself years before: to preserve all alterable pieces of her anatomy in a pristine state until her wedding night, or until judgement day, whichever came first. But glib, sweet-talking Desmond soon convinced her that what they were doing — by then almost on an hourly basis — was, in reality, responding to a higher power. Once he had explained this, Sarah recognized their indiscretions as simple peccadilloes and soon she was able to immerse herself in trying to satisfy the quirky shifts in Desmond’s bedroom behaviour, shifts she soon came to enjoy. After all, he looked exactly like a picture of Jesus and she knew that the whole sordid affair would drive her atheist parents crazy.

  All this might have worked out if Desmond had not been a philanderer. However, monogamy is as foreign to philanderers as pork is to rabbis so, of course, he could not stay. The philanderer is trapped by his libertine nature. He must change partners as often as Prometheus changed livers … and so it was that Sarah awoke one morning to find a note on the pillow where Desmond’s head should have been. The note explained that he had finally identified a place in the world, near barren of population but with just enough females of indiscriminate nature, that he felt there was a reasonable chance that he could fulfill his secret ambition. To that end, he was leaving immediately for Saskatchewan.

  Sarah was devastated but admitted to herself that it might be for the better. After all, the Lord does move in mysterious ways. The experience has made her more worldly. Nowadays, she quickly exits from the company of any man who gets a wistful look in his eye whenever someone mentions Regina.