Internet Inspiration – June 13, 2014

I was going to open with, “Have you missed me while I’ve been away?” But the truth is I miss myself. You don’t even have to participate in missing me 🙂 I am overwhelmed friends, and trying to get organized. And not just organized, but back to having everything on a simmer and not just fighting fires and always feeling inadequate. In the meantime, I’m committed to posting some daily lines on Facebook. It’s my hope (and now, reading over everything, I’m relatively confident) that some of these thought threads will come together for a longer blog post later, but I have fewer hangups about what I post on my Facebook page, so pop on over and have a look.

I’m not a big drinker, but I found this article on why you should drink beer from a glass interesting.

Why we sleep together.

“Often a bedmate became your best friend. Not just married couples, but sons sleeping with servants, sisters with one another, and aristocratic wives with mistresses. Darkness, within the intimate confines of a bed, leveled social distinctions despite differences in gender and status,” Ekirch says. “Most individuals did not readily fall sleep but conversed freely. In the absence of light, bedmates coveted that hour when, frequently, formality and etiquette perished by the bedside.”

We sleep together not because it’s fiscally responsible, but because we are affectionate beings. Our minds need rest, but our minds also need camaraderie and intimacy and whispering. Anxiety and stress seem less intimidating when discussed with a partner while wearing pajamas. It’s important to talk about our days lying side by side, discuss children and household situations, gossip about neighbors and colleagues, plan for tomorrow in the confines of private chambers. We cuddle. We laugh. At the end of each day we remove the onerous cloaks we’ve donned to face the world, and we want to do this lying next to our best friends, to know we’re not in it alone.

I’ll see your article on why running makes your breasts sag and raise you an article that says the jiggling and bouncing that comes from being bra-free keeps you cancer-free. Run if you want to. Don’t run if you don’t. But I am firmly of the belief that what makes your breasts sag is your belief that they are an inconvenience, not enough, unwanted. Love your breasts. If you don’t have breasts but your partner does: love her breasts. If you have breasts and your partner also has breasts: love ALL the breasts.

You know I’m not advocating drug use, but I really appreciated this primer on crack cocaine and your brain. I actually think I knew most of it, except I didn’t know the difference between cocaine you snort and crack cocaine.

I really wanted to like this article on Fixed vs Growth Mindsets, but I didn’t. It is a little too black & white for me, and there’s clearly a “right” way to be. When it comes to the human mind and the emotional spectrum, I don’t play games with black & white or right & wrong. Maybe I’ll try to read it again when I can take the time to keep an open mind.

But I did love this article on how different cultures view time. My younger brother Danny, in his best man’s speech at our older brother, Mark’s, wedding, made a big deal out of how he thought Mark’s habit of being late everywhere would be a dealbreaker for Mark’s new wife. But then we learned that there’s such a thing as Nigerian Time, which means that, at their wedding in Nigeria, the wedding planner/decorator had not even shown up to the venue by the time the ceremony was supposed to start!

Spaniards, Italians and Arabs will ignore the passing of time if it means that conversations will be left unfinished. For them, completing a human transaction is the best way they can invest their time. For an Italian, time considerations will usually be subjected to human feelings. “Why are you so angry because I came at 9:30?” he asks his German colleague. “Because it says 9:00 in my diary,” says the German. “Then why don’t you write 9:30 and then we’ll both be happy?” is a logical Italian response. The business we have to do and our close relations are so important that it is irrelevant at what time we meet. The meeting is what counts. Germans and Swiss cannot swallow this, as it offends their sense of order, of tidiness, of planning.

So sweet. While Big Sister was at preschool, her baby brother had the time of his life.

The world’s largest sperm bank closed its doors to redheaded donors in 2011, which inspired a photographer to take photographs of the variety of traits in redheads. I can’t get enough, and, for the record, I would always choose a redheaded donor.

Do you guys follow @GSElevator on Twitter? I think it’s awesome, a (very sarcastic) snapshot of typical conversations in the elevators of Wall Street banks. And I appreciated this internship guide. My favorite is, “People love to talk about themselves, so ask questions that get them in their comfort zone. A big part of your first impression is how you make people feel about themselves.”

Beautiful advice on feeling beautiful.

Today I will FILL UP WITH THIS BEAUTY. I will SEE this beauty and really NOTICE IT and smell it and hear it and roll around in it and soak it all up. I will allow all of this beauty to become a part of me — to BECOME ME — and by the end of the day I will be so freaking beautiful from the inside out that folks will stop and stare, probably.

If you do not feel beautiful then FILL UP, Precious Sister.

Evidently June is #AdultSexEdMonth, so let’s talk about Sex at 60.

I got where I am by hard work – and I didn’t do all of it on my back either. As my interest in sex as an educator and writer grew, I began reading, writing and thinking about sex. If I felt aroused, I would take time for self-pleasuring … it’s all about increasing one’s expertise, right? Desire led to increased desire, which expanded and permeated all of my life. I pay more attention to the sensual things in life. I want to have sex. I enjoy sharing my latest readings and experimenting with what I’ve learned. I might try out a new sex toy and then tell my lover all about it, showing him what I like about it and how it works on my body. I have a whole new appreciation of sex – and we both benefit.

But … I would be remiss if I didn’t acknowledge that my process involved letting go of old stories, of developing the confidence to move forward in my path, and choosing to not be hampered by public opinion.