Hmm... as sartorias said, much of what you wrote could apply to me as well. I have a recently divorced friend who has flung herself into the dating scene with what to me is a somewhat incomprehensible enthusiasm--but she is younger than me (in her midthirties) and of course has just come out of a very unsatisfactory marriage, while I am fourteen years into my second marriage and, like you, will be perfectly happy never to sleep with anyone but my husband again. I say, thank all the gods I don't ever have to do that dating thing again!
I don't know if it's my "settled" situation, my age, or a combination of other factors (probably all of the above), but I do think my ideas and feelings about attractiveness have changed. In terms of physical attractiveness, there is an aesthetic distance now--looking at a beautiful man or woman is very much like looking at a beautiful painting or statue. I find that characters in novels and movies attract me for a variety of reasons--I like complexity, intelligence, a sense of honor, humor, compassion, strength, spiritual awareness.... These are the same qualities (although of course in a fictional setting they're usually magnified) that I also admire in my husband and my friends.
The other thing that has become increasingly attractive to me in recent years is prowess, in the sense of consummate mastery of one's art ("art" being rather loosely defined perhaps)--Yo-yo Ma playing the cello, Judi Dench putting just the right nuances into a scene, Jet Li executing a perfect form, even a UN ambassador spontaneously turning perfect phrase after perfect phrase in an interview.... I see this most closeup in my involvement in the Middle Eastern dance scene--and actually, this leads me to conclude that the attractiveness lies not just in the prowess but also in another, less definable element. When I watch a truly great dancer perform, she (or sometimes he) is so totally alive, so completely at one with the music, so present in the moment, that I am carried along. My self is enlarged--and at the same time, I feel closer to my core.... Well, I've probably veered off the topic somewhat at this point, but still--a person with the power to do that cannot but be attractive to me....
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branchandroot
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Date: 2004-07-04 07:52 am (UTC)I don't know if it's my "settled" situation, my age, or a combination of other factors (probably all of the above), but I do think my ideas and feelings about attractiveness have changed. In terms of physical attractiveness, there is an aesthetic distance now--looking at a beautiful man or woman is very much like looking at a beautiful painting or statue. I find that characters in novels and movies attract me for a variety of reasons--I like complexity, intelligence, a sense of honor, humor, compassion, strength, spiritual awareness.... These are the same qualities (although of course in a fictional setting they're usually magnified) that I also admire in my husband and my friends.
The other thing that has become increasingly attractive to me in recent years is prowess, in the sense of consummate mastery of one's art ("art" being rather loosely defined perhaps)--Yo-yo Ma playing the cello, Judi Dench putting just the right nuances into a scene, Jet Li executing a perfect form, even a UN ambassador spontaneously turning perfect phrase after perfect phrase in an interview.... I see this most closeup in my involvement in the Middle Eastern dance scene--and actually, this leads me to conclude that the attractiveness lies not just in the prowess but also in another, less definable element. When I watch a truly great dancer perform, she (or sometimes he) is so totally alive, so completely at one with the music, so present in the moment, that I am carried along. My self is enlarged--and at the same time, I feel closer to my core.... Well, I've probably veered off the topic somewhat at this point, but still--a person with the power to do that cannot but be attractive to me....