Classy

That's why The Puppy says he's so intimidated by me that we still haven't got to second base. Because I'm so classy. I objected immediately -- I'm basically a loud, opinionated, slutty, big-boned, ass-kicking radical femme who swears like a sailor. I've been called a lot of things in my day, but I'm pretty sure this was the first time for "classy." But the more I think about it, the more I think he didn't mean to say classy. I think he meant to say class.

Oh, class. I have such a fucked up class background it's hard to explain, but I'm not surprised my seriously working class punk musician puppy smells a class chasm between us. I got raised with and around a lot of old money and privilege, and while I live pretty hand-to-mouth now, I've had a lot of doors opened to me because of money and class, and I have a built-in safety net likely to last for the rest of my life.

Nor is this the first time I've fallen into a romantic class gap. Au contraire. (see! classy!) There was the anarchist girlfriend raised by a single mom (and abandoned by a deadbeat dad). Any time I tried to set any kind of boundary with her (like, for instance, don't wear my underwear), she accused me of wielding privilege, and I relented. There was also the girlfriend raised rural poor (also with a fuckhead father, but I'm here to attest that that cuts across class), who didn't wear my underwear (yay!) but did have an absolute meltdown anytime I wanted to see my family and not bring her, because of how pampered and privileged she got to feel around them.

Right now I probably sound exactly like the snotty, "classy" girl I so desperately don't want to be, and that's the problem. In both of these situations, I felt so responsible for closing the class gap between us (because I was the one with the relative power), I regularly ignored my own boundaries, which made both of us miserable. But what was I supposed to do? Say, oh, sorry our lives have had such different trajectories due solely to the accident of our birth situations under capitalism, but I have my needs so fuck off?

And now here I am in a situation which is not only unbalanced in my favor because of class, but also because of age. And already I find myself biting my tongue and constantly monitoring my behavior to prove how very fine and cool and chill I am with the whole situation, and how completely unclassy I am.

But I'm not. And I don't think either of us are fooled. And I'm going to try to just be my damn self from here on out, and if that means he thinks I'm too "classy" and the whole nascent thing falls apart and I never get to have sex with him, so be it. (Except I kinda like him. And I really want to sleep with him. So I hope that doesn't happen.)

[siiiiigh...]