For ninety-three days I've gone through a
period of sexual abstinence. I'd sworn off all sexual activity, convinced it would clear my mind and help me focus on personal growth. What it actually did was make me intensely aware of every phallic-shaped vegetable in the grocery store and give me a Pavlovian response to the vibration mode on my phone.By day ninety-four, my personal growth had stagnated into a state of perpetual, low-grade horniness. I was done. Enlightenment could wait.
That night, I downloaded a dating app. I swiped through it like a man possessed, a digital whirlwind of rejection and possibility. My standards, once lofty, had eroded to a single, simple criterion: Willing and Able. I matched with a woman whose profile picture was kind of blurry. It was a selfie of her in a car and her bio was just the chili pepper emoji? Perfect.
We exchanged a total of six messages. The last one was her address and a time. Tonight!