Cav's Place

Some time ago I stumbled upon This I Believe and spent a few days racking my brains to figure out what I could submit but didn’t come up with anything. Needing to write about a single thing made the choice next to impossible and the ridiculously low word limit ensured there was no way I could get anything across that wouldn’t seem shallow even if I could choose. Plus that needing to write about one event that illustrates your belief, and in so few words too, is just silly. I read some of the featured essays and the best they got out of me was an amused grin. So I’ve been meaning for a while to write a post where I’m simply listing my beliefs, the way I think the world should be like, and now here it is. Or here is the first part of it, since there’s a lot to say even if I’ll only outline each.

I believe Earth is terribly overpopulated. The very fact that there are 6.7 billion people on this planet is frightening in itself, even without looking around and seeing what all those people are doing to themselves, to each other, to all the other creatures that they share this planet with and to the planet itself.
I trust the studies showing that this planet can hold at most three billion people in decent conditions and while also leaving enough room for other creatures and that we only need about two billion to efficiently exploit all of it. I also think we don’t need to exploit all of it, so being less than two billion would certainly be no problem. At times I even find the appeal of the idea described in “Adiamante“, less than ten million people split among several completely self-contained cities around the world, but I’ll usually agree that such a thing would be taking it too far. Let’s get under 2.5 billion first and then we’ll see.
To achieve that, I think draconian eugenics laws should be passed and enforced everywhere, initially forbidding at least 90% of people from ever having children, though that percentage will drop as the population drops. Also that not even most of those who would be allowed to have children should receive any aid in raising them, but should be held accountable for the slightest slip from their parental duties, so people will see having children as a chore as much as possible, not as a joy. None but those who have absolutely extraordinary qualities to pass on should be encouraged to have any children or helped in raising them.
I also think “right to die” laws should be passed, so anybody will be able to go to a clinic and ask to be put to sleep for any reason, or even no reason at all. In addition to that, medical research should focus on improving the existing life instead of extending it. Don’t know about you, but I for one would much rather live 50 or 60 good years and then just drop dead than 80 or even 100 but start struggling with health problems around 30 or 40. This would also take care of the aging population problem, as people who are alive, regardless of age, will generally be active.

I believe love should be allowed to conquer everything and that relationships must be the top priority for everyone. Doing anything that might jeopardize your relationship, like moving for a new job or school when your partner can’t come with you, shouldn’t even be considered. Of course, as long as everyone involved knows and fully accepts the situation, I can accept temporary relationships and relationships based solely on sex and can even sometimes tolerate the relationships that are basically described as an exchange of sexual favors for money (those where one is very rich and the other is very good looking, especially when there is a noticeable age difference between them), but those are not the ones I’m talking about.
I think that any relationship that is not clearly defined and fully agreed upon from the very start as being something else should be understood as being for life, though not necessarily monogamous, excepting extreme situations. And by “extreme situations” I understand repeated physical or severe emotional abuse, forcing the other into criminal activities that they don’t approve of, severe substance addiction without even the desire to quit and a couple of other such things, all of which are crimes in themselves, of course.
I also think that, while break-ups on common agreement should of course be permitted, there should be severe penalties for those breaking up with their partners over anything except the above-mentioned extreme situations while their partners still want to be in that relationship, and also for those who start purposefully treating their partners badly in order to make them want to break up as well. Granted, the punishment would serve little to no purpose after the harm has already been done and nobody wants to see the person they love hurt even after that person hurt them, but this might make people reconsider when they start thinking about breaking up. Starting a relationship should imply a full-time commitment to making it work, no matter what. “I make you happy and you make me happy. I don’t worry about myself as long as you do and you don’t worry about yourself as long as I do.”
To make this achievable, seeing as nobody is or could ever be perfect for another, I firmly support polyamory. Though the term can also be applied to open relationships, I’m talking about solid, trusting, committed relationships involving more than two people. I can’t understand jealousy or the need many people have to feel that they are all that their partner needs, when obviously their partner isn’t all that they need. If you can find a way for all to have all of their needs met, why not use it? And if somebody truly loves you and you can grow to at least somewhat care for, or at least about, them, why not have some sort of relationship with them alongside that with the partner(s) of your choice, making everyone happy?
And I should also note that, despite everything, the best way, and possibly the only way, of making a relationship stay happy over many years is not to expect it to be. If you expect only good times you’ll make the bad times even worse than they are and reduce the chances of solving the problems that caused them. After a while, a good relationship turns into a comfortable routine, emphasis on “comfortable”, with a balance of good and bad moments that break said routine, and that’s exactly what you should expect it to be. If the good moments noticeably outnumber the bad then it’s absolutely fabulous, but you should be careful not to get used to it and end up running away at the first sign of trouble afterwards.

I believe the environment should concern us all and that economic and even social interests should be swept away when they go against what’s best for Earth. We’d have nothing without Earth and we should act like we know that! Business should be tightly regulated not according to social concerns or economic principles, but in order to preserve the environment. If something can’t be done in a way that doesn’t harm the environment more than its normal rate of regeneration can heal, then it shouldn’t be done. If prices or taxes need to be raised in order to come up with less harmful products and practices, then they should be raised. If people will need to end up unemployed because a polluting factory will be shut down, then they should end up unemployed.
I think humans should never put themselves above the world. We’ve harmed it long enough, how about starting to fix it for a change? Personal interests and even whole settlements should be sacrificed if they stand in the way of real environmental preservation plans. Move those who accept to move, jail those who don’t, it’s that simple. You can even justify this from that same rotten perspective that puts humans above all things: We all benefit from the environment, so isn’t the good of all worth the sacrifice of a few?
Public transportation should be improved and encouraged on all levels. Once that is achieved, personal cars should be phased out and any measures are fair for that purpose. I’m thinking that having certain areas where the only motorized vehicles permitted are those that are part of the public transportation system and basically ensuring gridlocks and lack of parking spaces for those who insist on taking their cars on other routes would work, despite protests. I also think new roads or railways shouldn’t be built unless absolutely necessary, and even then they should be underground as much as possible.
Presently undeveloped areas should stay undeveloped, and as many presently developed areas as possible should return to Nature. I firmly believe that at the very least 25% of both the waters and the land surface of Earth, chosen from the best areas, most suited for all the plants and animals that live in them, should be off-limits for humans except for research purposes and perhaps a little tightly controlled tourism. Drastically reducing the human population would go a long way towards achieving that, since right now we’re overcrowding each other’s personal space as it is and many don’t even have access to the basic necessities.
I think taxes should be used to encourage environmentally-friendly products and discourage the environmentally-harmful ones. It’s easy, put taxes according to how much a product harms the environment and use those money to fund research for “greener” alternatives, or even as direct subsidies for cleaner products. Organic foods are a great example as to where that should happen. Sure, conventionally grown foods are affordable, genetically modified ones might be even more so, but what is their true cost? How much is the health of the planet worth? Actually, how much is your own health worth?

I think the top three are enough for now, I’ll continue at some other time… Maybe… If I’ll still be around…

Another flawed study, but food for thought. Since we know testosterone is mainly responsible for a person’s sex drive and also for the “hunter” instinct when it comes to sexual partners, wishing for others either instead of or on top of the existing one(s), a few interesting speculations can be made.

If married men have much lower testosterone levels than single men, it would seem to indicate that a low testosterone level makes a man want to settle down. However, since this study was performed on men who consider their spousal bonds as having little or no value, and it suggested including men who had affairs besides their marriage, it would seem that the low testosterone level is an effect instead of the cause.
Including aloof men in the study makes it seem that the lower testosterone levels are a result of simply having a stable partner, one that you are involved with for a large enough portion of the time spent being involved with anyone. Which brings me to the first flaw in the study: What about men who are in a committed relationship without marriage? If both options would be available to a man, would there be any noticeable difference in testosterone levels between those who chose to marry and those who chose not to, assuming an equal interest in the relationship as a whole? I for one highly doubt it, but it’d be interesting to see.

The higher levels in single men can be explained quite simply by not getting enough, or any, sex. The body probably wants to ensure that it won’t miss any opportunity and therefore maintains a heightened state of alert. Same explanation would work for those who are getting enough, but are getting it from varying partners that are changed frequently. The body is never certain the next opportunity will arise in a reasonable amount of time and therefore strives to always make the most of what it knows it has.
It would also be interesting to study the testosterone levels of single men who are single completely by choice, not being interested in sex. The attitude, whether natural or created by training, should normally imply significantly lower levels of testosterone, which if found in single men will once again dent the validity of the study.

As for their findings that men with multiple wives have even lower levels than those with a single wife, on one hand it has been contested even by the researchers themselves since those with multiple wives were significantly older and therefore the lower levels were completely normal, but on the other it makes sense.
If my hypotheses are correct, then the testosterone level is decreased by commitment and increased by not knowing that your sexual needs will be met in the future. And whether you make a commitment to one person or to two or three, it’s still commitment, your body is still able to recognize that you have a stable relationship. Adding that to the fact that having more than one partner increases the chances of your sexual needs being met and that some of those involved in monogamous relationships are still looking for other options while those with multiple stable partners already have variety available to them, it means that the factors that lower the testosterone level are present in a relationship with multiple partners while those that increase it are not.

In the end, what did this study tell us? Firstly, that men who aren’t getting enough sex want way more than they’re getting, which is a truism. Secondly, that men who have a stable relationship with a partner that satisfies at least a part of their sexual needs are significantly less interested in “hunting” for other partners than those who don’t have even that, which is also a logical assumption in most cases. And thirdly that men who are certain to have most, if not all, of their sexual needs, including the need for variety, met by their stable partners are generally content with their sex lives and have little or no interest in finding new partners, which is another generally logical assumption.
That leaves the question of how low does “low” mean, exactly, but assuming that the “low” values are still within acceptable limits for being able to successfully perform sexually and considering the anger and aggression that are induced by elevated testosterone levels and the potential health risks caused by such states of mind, all of that translates into the obvious fact that having one stable partner is generally better than having none, whether that “none” means none at all or none that are stable, and having more than one stable partner is generally better than having just one.
I’d like to see a similar study performed on women as well just to have a comparison since they bothered to make this one, but with such a truism as a conclusion can anybody please tell me what was the point of the study in the first place?

I might be wrong, but if I’m not and I’ve figured this out correctly, it means the entire chain of events that led here was triggered by me e-mailing somebody my results on a test that I took out of boredom. Depending on how this turns out, that one completely random and otherwise meaningless e-mail might just become either the best or the worst thing I’ve ever done… If this doesn’t make you think really hard about the possible consequences of your actions, I don’t know what else could…

Sooner or later we all need to make choices that run a huge risk of causing terrible pain to ourselves. They are always preceded by confusion and panic. Also by lots of anger, at the world for making us choose and at ourselves for not being able to figure out what the good choice is. But, while sometimes the confusion, panic and anger linger on long after the choice is made, at other times a strange calm settles over us, sweeping all the negative feelings away… And I have to wonder, is that calm caused by the feeling that the choice was right, the hope that things will turn out well after all, or by the knowledge that it was wrong, the acceptance of the terrible pain that is to come?

Have to start with a warning: If you’re uneasy about sexual content, skip right to the end of this. Or don’t read it at all, whatever… On the other hand, if you somehow ended up here looking just for such stories, please don’t tell me you got the keyboard, or anything else, sticky, not even if you’re a girl. I don’t care and that’s not the point of the post anyway. If you can’t look beneath the surface and see it for what it is, your problem.
This also feels extremely personal, far more than anything else posted on here. I actually found myself thinking that I couldn’t post something like this, which is just why I am posting it, proving to myself that I’m as open as I consider myself to be.

I woke up this morning with a certain train of thought already in my mind and then I developed it further. Or perhaps it was less of a train of thought than a feeling, or the ghost of a feeling… What you’ll see here is what it made me think about afterwards.
For your information: No, nothing got sticky as a result.

I was just waking up while she was still sleeping next to me. I felt really horny and thought I’ll just masturbate to take care of the issue. Tried to cause as little movement as possible, but she woke up anyway, noticed what I was doing, told me to continue but to tell her what I’m thinking about. I asked if she was sure she wants to know and she said yes. So I started.

“It’s morning, but still quiet. I’m back on my ‘vampire’ schedule so I’m only going to bed now, but you have been sleeping for a few hours already. You’re naked and, despite thinking that it could get a bit chilly, I can’t pass up on the feel of your skin against mine, so I also undress before getting under the covers. Then I do what I always do in such moments, I gently caress your hair, bury my face in it and whisper ‘I love you’.
But this time it’s different: You wake up. Maybe you didn’t hear me, but you felt me and that woke you up. You stir, then turn towards me and smile sleepily. I let one hand run down your back, barely touching you with the tips of my fingers, while with the other I caress your cheek, then slightly lift your chin.
You turn more towards me. I hug you, look into your eyes and smile for one moment. Then, breaking eye contact, I start by slowly kissing your forehead, then your eyelids, nose, cheeks and chin, ending with one very gentle kiss on your lips.”

At this moment I turn towards her and do just that, give her one brief, gentle kiss.

“I look into your eyes some more as, with the tips of my fingers, I very gently caress your hair, neck, shoulder and arm, ending by taking your hand in mine, raising it to my lips, and placing a very light kiss on it. Then I lift myself a little and you turn on your back.
Starting once again with the forehead, I kiss all over your face, this time avoiding your lips. Instead, while gently caressing your neck and shoulders, I take my kisses down the line of your jaw and then back up, nibbling a little on your earlobes when I get there.
The kisses then trail down on your neck, ever so slowly, while my hand is moving down your arm. When my kisses get to one of your shoulders, my hand reaches yours and our fingers intertwine. I then kiss my way accross from one shoulder to the other and, as soon as I get there, quickly get up and give you a passionate kiss, gently biting your lip as I move away again.”

When I mentioned our hands meeting and locking together, I searched for her hand with mine and did just that. Then I kissed her passionately just after I mentioned the kiss, delaying my story for one moment longer to drink in the smile from her eyes.

“Going back to your shoulders, I continue to kiss down one arm and then back up the other, gently caressing at the same time, stopping to plant one lingering kiss in the palm of each hand when I get there.
Moving on to your chest, I playfully kiss and caress above, in between and all around your breasts, apparently paying very little attention to them. You probably expect me to dive right into them once I finish kissing my way around, but I don’t. Instead, I take your hands in mine and pull you up for a moment, hugging tightly, pressing our bodies together and kissing one more time. Then, with a mischievous smile and one last gentle touch on the back of your neck, I let you lie back down.
You sigh softly as I get myself between your legs, but I’m only doing it to be better able to kiss and caress all over your belly and sides. I don’t focus too much on that area, however, spending more time to draw a curved line, at first with the tip of one finger and then with kisses, from one of your hips to the other, then continuing to kiss and caress ever so slowly down your inner thighs.
You stir a little, and I take that as my cue to stop and pull myself back up. I allow my cock to barely graze your pubes as I do so and your reaction to that gentle touch makes me smile to myself for a moment before my lips and fingers find your breasts and start covering them with kisses and light caresses, taking time to gently suckle and nibble on your nipples a few times.
Then I get back down very slowly, keeping my head close to you, letting my breath caress you instead of my hands. Once there, I start gently caressing between your legs with both fingers and breath, but still don’t touch any ‘key areas’.”

At this time I hear the rythm of her breath changing next to me and I turn to look, noticing that she started to play with herself as well. I smile, tell her not to stop, softly kiss her neck and then get back to my story.

“Soon, you stir again and seem to mean to take care of matters yourself if I won’t, moving one of your hands there for a moment. But then you change your mind and take it back. Still, I got you where I wanted you so I get out from between your legs and tell you that something like that can’t go unpunished and that you need to roll over. You make a slight sound that seems to express annoyance, but do what I ask.
I let you wait for a moment as I just look at you and play with your hair, then lie on top, pressing myself against you for a few seconds before pulling up and starting once again with the kisses and caresses, this time letting my breath work even more in the wake of the wet kisses.
I take it once again from the top, the back of your neck and your exposed earlobe, and work my way down your back painfully slowly. My cock stays on your butt until I absolutely need to move lower, letting you feel just how much I want you too. You stir, sigh and even moan a little as my lips and fingers find the places they are looking for on your back.
You think I might move to other things and squirm as I reach a hand under you and put it between your legs, but all I’m doing is covering the area so I won’t accidentally touch it, and so you won’t touch it yourself. When you realize this, you breathe heavily and try to move against my hand for a while but eventually give up, somewhat frustrated.
I wait for you to settle back down, then move on to your butt for a little while, on my way to your inner thighs. When I get there, I put the hand I have between your legs to another use, holding you spread open with my fingers. This makes you squirm again, but I take no heed of it, keeping my pace.
Eventually I tell you to pull up a little and keep your legs spread, which you quickly do, allowing me to start ever so gently licking the inside of your outer lips with the very tip of my tongue, letting only my breath caress your clit now and then. You moan ever so softly and I stop, telling you to roll over again.”

I stop for a moment and look at her. She opens her eyes too and we kiss one more time, at first gently but then more and more passionately. When we pause for breath she tells me not to stop. I ask if she means not to stop what I’m doing now or what I’ve been doing so far and she says what I’ve been doing so far. So I tell her not to stop either but also not to let herself finish before I’m done. She rolls her eyes but smiles, so I get back to the story.

“You get back on your back and I get in between your legs, looking determined. You stare into my eyes and push up to meet me, but I hold you down and then put one hand there again to cover everything. You look annoyed and try to push against my hand, which makes me do my best to look angry in return and you eventually give in.
Once you’ve settled back down I remove my hand, carefully placing my cock so it will touch as much as it can without risking to slip in and then wrap you in my arms and we lock in a breathtaking kiss.
After we manage to regain our senses I smile, spread your outer lips apart again, hold my cock down so the head will rub against your clit and start moving it as much as I dare, since all of this made me be very close myself. It’s obvious that you’re enjoying this, but it’s equally obvious that you need more and now I finally oblige.
After pressing my body on yours one more time and stealing one more quick kiss while you were still trying to figure out what I was about to do next, I start masturbating you rapidly, but not quite touching what I should touch. This frustrates you even more for a moment, but then realize it’s enough to bring you over the edge anyway, it will just take somewhat longer.
Still, that’s not my plan, so after a little while I get down between your legs and start practically kissing your outer lips, ever so gently grazing them with my teeth now and then as well. You squirm and press my head there with your hands, but I struggle to stick to my plan and so I do, moving on to do to your inner lips what I had just done to the outer ones.
Then, just as the frustration makes you whimper, I stick two fingers inside you and plant a passionate kiss right on your clit, using my tongue on it as if I’d be wrestling your tongue during a real kiss. You go completely quiet, probably trying not to cry out, arch your back and press my head even harder.
But I don’t want it over like this so after just a few seconds I remove your hand from my head and stop when you needed just one more touch.”

I hear her whimper next to me and remind her to wait until I’m done with the story, then continue.

“This time you do cry out, only in frustration instead of pleasure, and push up to press against me. But I’m done playing, so now I finally meet you, entering cleanly, and neither of us can stop a moan from escaping our lips. Then we lock in a tight embrace and try to kiss only to notice we simply can’t manage to anymore, not enough control left.
Still holding on to each other as tight as we can, we start moving fast and hard. Since what I did to you made me feel like I was just about to explode even before entering, the long, fast strokes bring me over the edge almost instantly, but the feel of me inside of you and the press of my pelvis against your clit get you right there with me at the same time. We dig our nails into each other’s backs and bite each other’s shoulders in the heat of the moment, ending with tears in our eyes that are not caused by the pain.”

I stop playing with myself and put my hand on hers to stop her too, then making my way past it. Her breath becomes heavier as we switch, each masturbating the other, grabbing our hands again and holding even tighter than before. But I tell her to take it slow, wait a bit more, both for me and for her, since I want to finish the story properly first.

“After a rather long time we manage to regain our senses and kiss passionately, then I say I want you on top for a moment and we roll over, still hugging tightly. We kiss again and lose ourselves in each other’s eyes for what seems like an eternity.
Eventually, with one more feather-light kiss, we snap out of it, sob, smile, kiss each other’s tears away and get up to take a shower. Your day is about to begin and mine is about to end… I love you…”

We kiss again and start playing with each other like we mean business. I warn her that I’ll make a mess but she just shrugs and smiles.
Soon, fingers and tongues intertwined and our love pouring bits of itself into our tears and leaking out since our bodies can no longer contain all of it, we both finish, the orgasms being the calm, quiet kind that envelops you in a healing warmth and leaves behind a feeling of perfect peace.
After a little while we stop kissing, wipe our tears away, smile about what we did, laugh at the mess, and look at our souls reflected endlessly into each other’s eyes.

Take this as whatever you wish, I just know that in between these lines I’ve poured more of my soul than I ever have to anyone except her… Writing this felt like ripping each word I was typing out of myself. Took me over four hours to type it, kept getting lost in memories or choking on tears that won’t come… But now it’s here, out in the open, and I can say, like Galadriel when Frodo offered her the ring, “I’ve passed the test”. Though I really don’t feel that my poor writing skills do much justice to what I was trying to express…
What did this start from in the first place? Exactly the same place the story I was supposedly telling her started from. I realized last night that what I miss the most aren’t all the hugs and talks, the kisses and caresses, the fears and tears, or even the sex, but just lying next to her in bed until she fell asleep, then caressing her hair one last time, burying my face in it and whispering “I love you” just before I either got back up or went to sleep myself…
How bad is it that what I miss the most is something I used to do and not something she used to do? Not even something she knew I was doing… Yeah, I told her a couple of times, told others before now as well and now I’m telling everyone, but she wasn’t actually aware of me doing it, nobody was… Those moments live in my memory alone… Who knows, maybe I was just imagining that I was doing it and I never really did, nobody could ever confirm that I did… Maybe everything was nothing more than an elaborate dream…

Oh yeah, just to answer the likely questions to arise from this: No, I’d actually rather be a little on the submissive side, but I have my moments… No, tears aren’t an usual occurrence in such a scenario, and their real meaning is perhaps what anyone reading this should understand the most… And no, this whole thing certainly never really happened, not by a long shot… As for the story I was supposedly telling her, that probably never happened either, at least not quite like this.