Constructing Desire (plus lingerie recs!)

EFF Newsletter #5

Whatever your relationship status, Happy Valentine’s Day x

THE VALENTINE’S CURSE

Back when I lived in the UK, I had planned my first trip to Scotland with a budget coach tour company (with my partner). It was during Feb 2018, post-Brexit vote, my UK visa to expire that year. I knew I was going to leave the UK. Almost every weekend we were trying to fit in local trips because I didn’t know when I’d be back in that part of the world again.

So the weekend prior, we went to the Greenwich Market. We ate Cuban sandwiches and went to the Royal Observatory, drank hot chocolate and looked through the telescope (except it was cloudy so they put in photos for us to look at). But I was really, really excited about my trip to the Highlands.

We didn’t end up going. First my partner fell sick, struck with a violent case of food poisoning. I didn’t want to lose the money we had spent on the trip (it was too late to cancel) and thought about going alone. It’s not contagious, I thought naively as I went to work wondering why I was struggling to finish my cheese and pickle sandwich. Soon after, I was stuck with the same sickness. So there we were, in our crummy rented single bedroom and ensuite bathroom, both in pain and struggling. I called to cancel the trip, lost all our money. Icing on the cake, the morning after, I received a call from a grouchy coach driver telling me we were late. How romantic!

Last Thursday after meeting with a friend, I was looking at my schedule with unease at how overcommitted I was, worried I’d not be able to fit it in. And the Universe answered the call. You’re worried about fitting it all in? How about fitting NONE of it in! Shivering and wrapped in blankets with the heater on, I moved my laptop into my bedroom and finished last week’s newsletter.

I thought I had a stomach bug that would go away in a couple of days. But after taking meds from the pharmacy, calling a medical advice line, visiting a hospital and a specialist clinic (mind you, all in Japanese which was also very stressful), I realised this time it was going to take my body longer to recover. I cancelled all my commitments, trying to buy more time.

I am chronically ill, and I am still trying to reconcile with my changed body from both the passage of time and illness. In it’s daily capacity, in my immune system and delayed recovery times, and yes, in the way I look.

So maybe it wasn’t the best decision to binge One Day while sick and feeling disconnected and grieving my past 20ish-year-old body.

If you don’t know, One Day is a romantic comedy-drama series (it’s not uplifting though) that follows two people over two decades after an almost-one-night stand. I won’t go into a proper analysis because I’m still gathering my own thoughts. But what is unusual (and shouldn’t be) for this series is that one of the romantic leads is Ambika Mod, who is South Asian. Ambika and her counterpart, Leo Woodall have amazing chemistry on-screen. As I watched, I found disconnect from my experiences growing up, where I was often treated as ‘fuckable’ but rarely held enough desirability status to be seen as a romantic partner. And the ways that I also tried to reach and reinforced the desirability hierarchy

There is no right to sex. (To think otherwise is to think like a rapist). But is it "banal as it gets" to observe what is ugliest about our social realities - racism, classism, ableism, heteronormativity - shapes whom we do and do not desire and love, and who does and does not desire and love us. The Right to Sex: Feminism in the Twenty-First Century by Amia Srinivasan