Alcohol and sex. They’re probably the two biggest conversation topics at Sunday brunch in Proctor, and the most interesting stories involve both of them. The Health Center, and the administration in general, are obligated to stress that sex and alcohol don’t mix — for good reason, considering sexual assault statistics on college campuses — but despite the warnings and Jyoti Daniere’s attempts to start a student dating movement, the sexually active Middlebury student’s night life seems to involve drunk sex with mere acquaintances.
I don’t have any research or data to back up the claim I just made, and I am quite aware that plenty of Midd-kids get it on sober or with long-term partners, but the stories I hear in the dining hall and from friends paint a picture of lots of drunken doing-the-deed between people who hardly know each other.
Personally, I have never had drunk sex with someone I’ve just met — I’ve definitely had awkward sexual encounters with friends while drunk and interesting drunken interludes with romantic partners, but the idea of going to a party or a bar, drinking and then picking up a stranger just never really sat well with me.
After making my life sufficiently uncomfortable because of sober sexcapades, I think I also realized that loosing my drunk self on a room full of similarly sloshed and attractive people would end very…embarrassingly. I don’t want to be that girl getting her face sucked off with her hands down someone else’s pants in the middle of the dance floor, and that idea would seem way too okay if I were drunk.
The other thing about hooking up with a stranger while drunk is you’re not on your A-game, and I’m rather proud of the skills I’ve developed over the years — I don’t want anyone’s first (and probably last) impression of sex with me to be characterized by sloppy making out or me vomiting on their junk. After a certain level of intoxication, drunken sex is just not good sex in general — it’s like eating junk food. It satisfies an immediate and superficial hunger, but it leaves many other needs unmet, and if you have too much of it, it’s detrimental to your health (holistically and physically, if you consider the heightened risk for STIs).
I turned 21 last week, and my first bar-hopping experience this past weekend has changed my opinion on sex and alcohol. I didn’t go out and pick up a stranger at a bar (my boyfriend might have had something to say about that), but I got my first taste of intoxication in public surrounded by attractive 20-somethings, and it wasn’t the debacle I’ve imagined. Granted, I wasn’t on the prowl, and I didn’t drink to excess, but I was sufficiently silly and uninhibited, and I was amazed at the potentiala I felt the whole night.
Strangers chatted me up and I felt confident, even hot — I chatted them up right back like a pro. Or at least my tipsy conception of how a pro makes fine new friends.
Locking eyes with someone from across the room and absconding to the bathroom for a quickie felt possible — not necessarily like a good idea, but it felt possible — and I guess I finally understood the appeal of Middlebury’s sex scene. It’s easy if you know how to play the game. Not so easy that you don’t have to show up to the table with some natural (not just liquid) confidence and charm at the ready, but a lot easier than approaching someone after class and asking them on a date.
Alcohol, used moderately, is an effective way to keep silly things like inhibitions from cockblocking us (so to speak). Problems arise when alcohol isn’t used in moderation, and I still think a diet of drunk sex isn’t enough to fulfill a person, but what’s a little (consenting) tipsy tryst every once in a while?
The L-Word - 04/22/10
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