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Although discussions flowering from ideas of 'nature or nurture or choice or something else' in the matter of sexual orientation are inevitable and necessary, they are also unlikely to ever be resolved to everyone's statisfaction.
Indeed, if a day arrives when such questions can be definitively answered, the biped providing the answer will be, essentially, inhuman or transhuman.
By which I mean to say that we are ultimately trapped within our heads when it comes to such matters and I cannot imagine any change in our cognitive equipment which would enable us to solve riddles of this sort.
At least, no change that would leave us, on the other end, still human in the present sense.
We are a mystery to ourselves. I say this as a person who firmly believes in the scientific method and the human need for problem solving. Still, it may be that some areas of inquiry will prove forever resistant to our intellects.
Here's an example of this mystery.
Years ago, a group of lesbians I used to hang out with got into a discussion of who was "the most Gay." It was funny but had an interesting subtext of seriousness.
After a lot of bandying about, it was decided that Lisa, a woman who had never been with a guy and made disapproving comments at the sight of penises in porno films, was surely "the most Gay" (insert joke about award show here).
Lisa was dating a lovely woman and all seemed quite cozy. They were a fun couple and I enjoyed spending time with them.
Then one day, a year or so after the "most Gay" discussion, Lisa broke up with her girlfriend and began dating a guy she'd met at work.
Of course, this caused a tsunami of speculation: 'who'd have thought she'd do this?' 'Maybe she was just too scared to face the life of a Gay woman.'
And so on.
Lisa was, to put it bluntly, ousted from this friendship circle.
I really didn't know what to think. Lisa had indeed seemed to be the most Gay among that group of women (a few of whom were a bit frisky with me when out of camera shot of the group indicating a less-than-total commitment to woman only romance).
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So, there I am, a few months later, in the midst of a crisp Autumn day, sitting in a little dog park reading a Simone Weil essay compilation on my lunch hour when I run into Lisa.
Awkardness at first and then I just get to it: "everyone's confused, so am I. Why'd you run off with a guy?"
"I just fell in love. That's all."
She really couldn't have said anything more profound I think.
Now, where'd this come from?
Was there a latent hetero-gene (God forgive me for typing such an absurd hyphentated word) that came to the fore when she met this certain guy?
Or was the official, 'state sanctioned' explantion of the erstwhile friendship group, that she'd punked out on the hardcore fact of being a member of a marginalized group and fled back into the waiting arms of hetero-normativity, the truth?
Or perhaps it was as simple as a woman falling in love with another woman at one time in her life and then falling in love with a man at a later time?
Or something else altogether.
I'll never know and neither will anyone else, despite all the clever theorizing and carefully formed arguments.
No one's comfortable with this void of unanswerables.
DRM
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