Day 148 - The Tension of the Sexual

January 3rd, 2010

Last night I went out for an evening on the town in Austin, Texas with my dearest friend, Erin Scott Kessler. As I’ve mentioned in my blogs over the last few days, I was brought from New York to Austin to teach comedy improv workshops at a high end destination spa called Lake Austin Spa and Resort. Erin is one of my favorite people ever and we performed comedy improv and sketch in Manhattan from 1997-2001. She’s lived in Austin for several years and took me to The Continental Club last night. This venue is considered the “granddaddy” of all local music and we were fortunate enough to see singer-songwriter Chuck Prophet headline. His genius lies in creating a paella of a wide variety of genres that has resulted with him being described as an “early Americana rocker, mid-period electronic folk singer, latter-day style chunky rocker and sensitive pop balladeer.” It sounded like alternative country to me. But what do I know? I’m a comedian. Not a musician. But I do have exceptional singer-songwriter hair.

At one point in the show, the cute bad ass keyboardist chick joined him at the mic for a perfectly harmonized love song of sorts. He introduced her as a friend…but seriously. I mean, seriously. Anyone with vision and the ability to hear could decipher that there was hot hot hot sexual tension between these two. I know the nature of “making the art” together often leads to some primal cravings because sexuality and creativity come from the same source. These two performers were giving each other soulful glances and sharing the same microphone as their lips were ½ an inch away from each other’s. The sexual force field encompassing these two was so over the top palpable that Erin leaned over to me and said, “Get these two off the stage. They MUST have sex. Stat!”

Let’s talk sexual tension. Shall we? Wikipedia defines it as an “occurrence between two people in which two or more of the individuals sexually long for one another, but the consummation is postponed or never occurs." I looked to Urban Dictionary for this term in a sentence. I didn’t feel their examples of the tension of the sex were stellar or particularly helpful...but I have included them just because I’m humored by what names they go with.

- “I so felt the sexual tension between you and Rufio yesterday.”
- “Char and Dom have major sexual tension.”

Poor Rufio, Char and Dom. I have a friend who is a chronic masturbator and would tell them to hit the sex toy store on the Lower East Side called “Toys in Babeland” where you can purchase some inanimate objects(that could double as mantle pieces) that can assist with release. She swears that “you’ll go through double-A batteries like you never have before.”

Looking back, primal sexual longings begin pretty early. One of my first introductions to the pheromone exchange between the two sexes was when I was five years old in a Jacuzzi in a hotel in Washington DC. My parents initially failed to notice that I was alone with 2 people who broke through their tension and began the act of getting to know each. Quite well. In front of my innocent eyes. Mom and dad eventually noticed what had transpired and I was removed from the hot tub. And my new friends.

A few years later, I developed some crushes that I would write about in my Hello Kitty journal…equipped with lock and key. I was in love with Scott Baio, John Ritter and my swim coach at Starmount Country Club, Quint Barefoot. All the mothers swooned over this guy too and would show up at swim practice in heavily applied early 80’s blue eye shadow and sexy form fitting mom jeans. You know, to “support their children, the budding swim stars.” This was also around the time my friend and I had a joint crush on a guy in our fifth grade class. We wrote him a love letter that included our favorite stickers (even the satin ones) and the sentence, “We know you have feelings for us too because you kick us.” We called them love kicks.

I guess I just revisited Jax’s intro to sexuality because I want Chuck Prophet, his singer-songwriter “friend”, Rufio, Char and Dom to know that it might be time to explore the tension. It’s how we’re wired. It’s our birthright. The fact that you're even in the presence of someone feeling a mutual heightened otherworldly energy…is a gift. You’re blessed. Besides, if you continue to hold back, I’m afraid you might end up like my sexually pent up friend who has developed some odd infatuation with Micky Rourke in “The Wrestler” and watches the film 5 times a day to quench her desires. The double-A battery industry sent her a 1-800-FLOWERS bouquet thanking her for singlehandedly being responsible for their best quarter. Ever.