Nonsexual Intimacies (Part 3 of 5)
Oct. 26th, 2011 05:09 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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asexualityThis series on asexual forms of intimacy is part of my activity for Asexual Awareness Week.
Everyone has a bubble of space around them, its size varying by culture, but usually about arm-length. Strangers and casual acquaintances customarily stay outside that area. Friends and coworkers will touch or slightly overlap edges. Only close friends, lovers, and family members tend to come into very close physical proximity. This is especially true in terms of sleeping, sitting, or traveling in the same space. In fact "sleeping together" is a euphemism for sexual intercourse, precisely because of its intimacy. However, that intimacy can be just as deep -- or deeper -- without involving anything sexual at all.
Putting someone to bed. Interestingly, this activity can happen among people who are just getting to know each other -- most often if someone passes out drunk, but exhaustion can have a similar effect. It's a gesture of caring to put someone to bed rather than leave them where they drop. A milder version involves draping a blanket or coat over a person asleep on a couch or the like.
Sleeping in the same bed. This is an act of shared vulnerability and intimacy. Lovers customarily do this; so do some siblings or friends, especially as children. People may also be driven to share a bed, sleeping bag, etc. for warmth or lack of other accommodations in challenging circumstances.
Watching someone sleep. There is more vulnerability on the part of the sleeper, and more intimacy from the watcher, when only one person is asleep. Parents often watch their children sleep. Lovers sometimes do this with each other, which can be cute or creepy. It's also a guard position, useful for showing that one character seeks to protect another.
Waking someone up from a nightmare. A subtler form of rescue than more physical actions, this is still a gesture of protection and caring. It often leads to comfort afterwards. A typical courtesy between parent and child, or lovers, this can also be an early threshold for characters thrust together unexpectedly if one of them has sturdy daytime walls and a lot of issues. It is common, but often unspoken, among war buddies or veterans, many of whom have nightmares.
Camping or hiking overnight. You wind up sharing a tent, if you're lucky enough to have one, perhaps a blanket or a pile of leaves if you're unlucky. Long-distance wilderneering pushes people to rely on each other as well as share space and more intimate awareness.
Sharing a saddle. Riding a horse or other animal requires a careful coordination of two bodies; adding a third makes it even more complex. The motion usually causes two people to rub against each other constantly, and fighting it throws everyone off-balance. Either you learn to cooperate very closely, or you wind up very uncomfortable. Friends often ride together; lovers and family members sometimes do; but this can also happen with strangers meeting during a rescue. It's a good way to push standoffish characters together.
Sharing car/berth space on a long trip. This is less intimate than riding, but still involves relatively close contact over an extended time. That usually gets people talking, a terrific icebreaker early in a relationship. In established relationships it offers a chance to spend time together and catch up on news.
Sleeping & Other Spacial Closeness
Everyone has a bubble of space around them, its size varying by culture, but usually about arm-length. Strangers and casual acquaintances customarily stay outside that area. Friends and coworkers will touch or slightly overlap edges. Only close friends, lovers, and family members tend to come into very close physical proximity. This is especially true in terms of sleeping, sitting, or traveling in the same space. In fact "sleeping together" is a euphemism for sexual intercourse, precisely because of its intimacy. However, that intimacy can be just as deep -- or deeper -- without involving anything sexual at all.
Putting someone to bed. Interestingly, this activity can happen among people who are just getting to know each other -- most often if someone passes out drunk, but exhaustion can have a similar effect. It's a gesture of caring to put someone to bed rather than leave them where they drop. A milder version involves draping a blanket or coat over a person asleep on a couch or the like.
Sleeping in the same bed. This is an act of shared vulnerability and intimacy. Lovers customarily do this; so do some siblings or friends, especially as children. People may also be driven to share a bed, sleeping bag, etc. for warmth or lack of other accommodations in challenging circumstances.
Watching someone sleep. There is more vulnerability on the part of the sleeper, and more intimacy from the watcher, when only one person is asleep. Parents often watch their children sleep. Lovers sometimes do this with each other, which can be cute or creepy. It's also a guard position, useful for showing that one character seeks to protect another.
Waking someone up from a nightmare. A subtler form of rescue than more physical actions, this is still a gesture of protection and caring. It often leads to comfort afterwards. A typical courtesy between parent and child, or lovers, this can also be an early threshold for characters thrust together unexpectedly if one of them has sturdy daytime walls and a lot of issues. It is common, but often unspoken, among war buddies or veterans, many of whom have nightmares.
Camping or hiking overnight. You wind up sharing a tent, if you're lucky enough to have one, perhaps a blanket or a pile of leaves if you're unlucky. Long-distance wilderneering pushes people to rely on each other as well as share space and more intimate awareness.
Sharing a saddle. Riding a horse or other animal requires a careful coordination of two bodies; adding a third makes it even more complex. The motion usually causes two people to rub against each other constantly, and fighting it throws everyone off-balance. Either you learn to cooperate very closely, or you wind up very uncomfortable. Friends often ride together; lovers and family members sometimes do; but this can also happen with strangers meeting during a rescue. It's a good way to push standoffish characters together.
Sharing car/berth space on a long trip. This is less intimate than riding, but still involves relatively close contact over an extended time. That usually gets people talking, a terrific icebreaker early in a relationship. In established relationships it offers a chance to spend time together and catch up on news.
no subject
Date: 2011-10-26 11:41 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-10-27 12:28 am (UTC)You're welcome!
Date: 2011-10-27 01:50 am (UTC)Thank you!
Date: 2011-10-27 01:49 am (UTC)The whole point of this exercise is to make people think. It's working -- I'm getting a lot of good feedback. I've even helped one writer identify a couple of asexual characters. ("She's 300 years old and still a virgin...")
no subject
Date: 2011-10-27 07:20 am (UTC)Thanking you again. I'm loving this series. :)
You're welcome!
Date: 2011-10-27 07:28 am (UTC)Yay!
>> It's also made me realise how many of these I use in my writing; since I tend to gravitate towards asexual characters in my fiction (which I didn't realise with quite so much clarity until recently - but I've been writing them, on and off, for about 9 years), or romantic Gray A characters - <<
That's an interesting pattern. My writing spans many orientations/sexes/genders/etc. I've had other writers say that this series is helping them spot asexual characters in their own fiction too!
>>so intimacy comes from things like proximity, or hurt/comfort, or other gestures of care. I think they are immensely powerful acts in general, and seeing them all laid out like this is so helpful.<<
That's good. I want there to be more kinds of fiction than just romance, and for romance to be expressible with more than just sex, angst, and making calf eyes at each other. It should have bedrock underneath: the things people do to make a difference in each other's lives. (More on that, specifically, in later sections.)
>>Thanking you again. I'm loving this series.<<
That makes me happy. Thanks for letting me know.
Re: You're welcome!
Date: 2011-10-27 07:34 am (UTC)There's a scene in a chapter of a fanfiction I put on ff.net recently, where one of the ways a character showed his care to another was in ways like - unscrewing the cap off a water bottle and leaving the water bottle by the bed, because he knew his friend/partner would have problems with the cap - and his partner didn't even realise until a few hours later. It's little things like that, that for me at least, really build a solid and meaningful connection between people.
Re: You're welcome!
Date: 2011-10-27 07:44 am (UTC)That's cool.
One of the most diverse casts in terms of sexuality and ethnicity is for Schrodinger's Heroes. I started with the character thumbnails that
>> I just find it personally enjoyable not to write the same 'type' of character over and over again, I guess?<<
Same here. I'd get bored. I'm always looking for something different.
It makes me laugh when someone says that writers always write characters who are like themselves. I mean, WHAT? Mine aren't even like each other let alone me. There are some cultural or practical groupings, but that's about it.
I have fun with pairs of opposites. One of my current poetic series, Path of the Paladins, has one paladin who stayed loyal and one who deserted. (Also relevant to this discussion, the paladins all seem to be indifferent to sex and romance. I'm not sure if they're ace or just celibate, but they've certainly made other things a priority.)
>>It's little things like that, that for me at least, really build a solid and meaningful connection between people.<<
Yes, exactly! Like I'm the designated vermin-slayer, because I enjoy playing Mighty Hunter of things that some other people find alarming. I won't hesitate to take a flyswatter to a wasp or a boot to a mouse. So that's a way that I can take care of people in my circle of family and friends.
no subject
Date: 2011-10-27 07:19 pm (UTC)I'm really enjoying these posts :D
Thank you!
Date: 2011-10-27 10:16 pm (UTC)