“Thus the climax of sexual union is also a climax of creativity and sinfulness…. [T]he instincts of sex are particularly effective tools for both the assertion of the self and the flight from the self. This is what gives man’s sex life the quality of uneasiness.”
Reinhold Niebuhr, The Nature and Destiny of Man
Over spring break, I took a brief road trip to another city. Staying overnight, I decided to sample some of the local “talent.” I made an appointment with “McKenzie” a few days in advance.
She arrived at my hotel room wearing a sweater and a miniskirt. Her black heels elevated her a few inches. Her long brown hair was accentuated by a few blonde highlights. She was quite cute and looked very much like the girl next door. I offered her a glass of Zinfandel, which she accepted. She sat right next to me on the short couch. In a heavy New England accent, she talked about a hockey game she had attended the night before. I peeked at her shapely legs. She must have sensed my interest, because she put her hand on my leg and sweetly suggested we head to the bed.
“The ego…may use the passion of sex, without reference to the self and the other, as a form of escape from the tension of life. The most corrupt forms of sensuality, as for instance in commercialized vice, have exactly this characteristic, that personal considerations are excluded from the satisfaction of the sexual impulse. It is a flight not to a false god but to nothingness.”
Reinhold Niebuhr
What followed was a blur of flesh and sweat, of thrusting and bouncing, of physical passion unadulterated by emotional entanglement. I ended up behind her, standing at the edge of the bed, my hands on her buttocks, our bodies jerking back and forth. Groans I couldn’t suppress escaped my mouth. I felt my face contort in tension as I pounded her. My fucking took on a desperate quality. Oblivious to everything but the slender female body bent in front of me and the surging pleasure in my loins, I strained toward that apogee when, if only for the briefest of moments, I would annihilate myself and plunge into unconsciousness.
“We fuck in order to escape and stifle the excess of the dream that would otherwise overwhelm us.”
Slavoj Zizek
Lutheran Guilt 