Sexy Grandpa

Like most full-blooded straight males, I spent a fair amount of time in my youth hoping I would be attractive to women. In my fantasy, I could just enter a room and let the flirting begin! Every encounter offered the possibility of irresistible offers that, of course, never came. Sure, there were occasional alluring smiles and interesting body language and looking out for particular folks at the Orff folk dancing nights. But all pretty tame.

But now that I’m in my 60’s, I’ve suddenly taken on an electric attraction and find that hundreds of alluring young women want to sleep with me. Well, at least in my SPAM folder. Here are some of the unexpurgated (pardon my French) offers I’ve received in e-mail headings:

• I’ll be your slave for sex

• Pretty housewife is looking for a lover

• Private dating for sex

• Need a girl for sex?

• Lover that will pay you for sex.

• Are you ready to meet and fuck someone’s wife?

• Searching for a sex-slave.

• Dating love and sex of course.

• Housewife is looking for a wealthy lover.

• Girl looks for a man than can satisfy her

• Are you ready to interview for a new position? (could be about sex or a job.)

Isn’t the Internet wonderful? See how it has brought us together and elevated us to the height of human possibility? If the electronic circuits of the Internet function as our giant collective brain, reveal what’s mostly going on in our own brains, what does that say about us a culture? The early proponents of computers as an extraordinary breakthrough in education and human thought, where a mere click of a button could bring us to the theory of relativity, the precepts of Buddhism and the complete Shakespeare, argued that i-Pads in the hands of children would set fire to their sparks of curiosity as to how the world works, in the hands of adults, raise the level of our national discourse geometrically.

Ha ha! Dream on! The kids are sitting in the back rows of school surfing for violent video games or soft porn, the adults are learning how to make bombs with time out for hard porn. The Hindus knew this millennia ago when they revealed the chakra system, the energy points along the spine that focus our attention and intentions. Food, sex and power are at the bottom of the ladder, the three nature gives us for free. Real humanity begins at the 4^th heart chakra when an effort is made to move the energy up to a higher realm. It can never negate the first three, but it can transform them and keep them in check. TV advertising, Hollywood blockbusters, chat rooms and SPAM e-mails pretty much confirm that all the higher level thought that went into the Internet is mostly used for lower level purposes. It’s sex, money, violence, power all the way. Garbage in, garbage out.

The fact is that yes, you can read this blog because of the Internet and also look up the Indian chakra system. And you are and you might. But the mere existence of machines means nothing without the preparation of a real, analog education. As I wrote two blogs ago: “The Internet gives us instant access to the treasures of the world, but electronic signals alone are worthless without the human heart and mind prepared to seek them out and receive them.”

I don’t want to get too high and mighty here. Even Einstein and Gandhi and Mother Teresa still had these impulses at the base of their spine and in their brain stems. No question that these messages get my attention. But I talked to a computer guy and asked, “Just out of curiosity, what do you think would happen if I answered one of these sex offers? Is this my adolescent fantasy come true? Just click a button and get lucky that night?” He assured me that there’s probably a fat guy with a beer in one hand and his belly sticking out who just wants to get into my software. That disturbing image killed my notion that I was one sexy grandpa!

Now I’m not fond of seeing these blatant sex messages in my SPAM, proof that overthrowing the bonds of Victorian sexual repression did nothing really to free the human spirit. Some level of civility and decorum and restraint when it comes to our natural urges is a worthy goal of civilization. But hey, sexual energy is real and fun and playful and best when it comes with love and affection, but an intriguing little game that we play most of our lives. Until we don’t. Walking into a bar with hormones bouncing off the walls and all speeding right past me is—damn it!— part of nature’s way. But hey, young ladies, a harmless coy smile and lifted eyebrow is always appreciated by us guys, at any age. We know we’re in the left-field bleachers, but it’s nice to know we’re still at the game.