As a certified grumpy bastard, I can tell you that it’s always much easier to be negative than positive. As someone with access to web stats I can also tell you that if you want to get clicks, and you’re not writing porn, you’re always better to be critical than optimistic. I’m throwing all that out of the window today, though, because of a conversation I had the other day that went a little something like this:

“Know what’s brilliant?”

“What?”

“We could have sex now if we wanted to.”

“I’m not really in the mood, but…”

“Ah, but you don’t have to want to, you just have to appreciate how cool it is that we totally could if we wanted to.”

Sometimes I go through miserable phases when I look down at my body and think ‘huh, there are some things that have happened here that are basically irreversible.’ I worry about stretchmarks or consider the fact that I’m no longer able to do the things I did when I was eighteen. I may still be able to get my ankles behind my head to brace against the bedposts, but I’ll no longer do it without a groan of effort. I can bend over sexily, but I’ll say ‘oof’ when I get up. Cramp is not so much an occasional visitor as a permanent unwanted house guest.

But, while it’s easy (and certainly more clickbait-friendly) to snark about the negatives, it’s also worth remembering the benefits of having sex in your thirties. This post is about giving credit to all the things I often take for granted…

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Confession: I used to hate lube. Not all the time, I could see it had its merits. When you’re bumming, for instance, there is no natural lubricant up your arse, so a fuckload of the sticky stuff is as essential as a safety rope if you’re climbing a mountain.

For hand jobs, I could get on board with lube as a means of making the whole thing more special – just the right kind of tingling lube at the perfect moment, or a good dollop to enable better use of a masturbation sheath. Fine.

But for sex? I wasn’t sure. I feel like a total nob for admitting this but lube used to seem like a sign of personal failure.

I haven’t talked about this much before, and to wrench a nugget of total honesty out of my cringing heart, I hadn’t really discussed it with my partners either. Occasionally, if I was horny but a bit too drunk to slick my knickers, I’d pop to the bathroom on the way to the bedroom. Pull down my pants, spit on my hand, and rub it in the right places: fake what I couldn’t make.

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A long time ago someone published a book called ‘Porn for Women.’ Don’t get too excited, it isn’t actually porn. It was simply a collection of different images of guys doing the hoovering, washing, and other household tasks. In this ‘porn for women LOL’ hilarious trope, guys are occasionally tantalisingly half-dressed but never doing the kind of thing I’d consider genuinely horny: masturbating on the sofa, or poised halfway to sitting down on a butt plug – that kind of thing. I would be surprised if – barring a few people with very niche fetishes – anyone’s actually ever wanked to it.

I was reminded of it recently when someone (I don’t remember who and I don’t want to drop them in it even if I could) tweeted a list of ‘top female turn-ons’ which looked suspiciously like this book. The list included such gems as ‘listen attentively when she tells you about her day’ and ‘take the garbage out.’ I don’t know about you, but I’m more likely to have actual, satisfying sex with my own vacuum cleaner than to orgasm while thinking about a guy begrudgingly hauling bin bags to the front garden.

I do not sit at home frigging myself trembly over the idea of my partner picking up a hoover. I do not get wet just because someone is listening attentively while I speak, unless perhaps that person is Tyrion Lannister and what we’re discussing is just how hard he’d fuck me.

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