Joe in his natural state: Dadding.
horizontal with lila
horizontal is the podcast about intimacy (sex, love, and relationships of all kinds) that’s entirely recorded while lying down. Many episodes are recorded at Hacienda Villa, a sex-positive intentional community in Bushwick, Brooklyn. The rest are recorded while horizontal … elsewhere.
Joe: I was, I was casually dating, a couple of different people, at the time. It was a week later— we’d been kissing for a week. Just, here and there. And I told her that, I said, you know— you know I, I wanna be open about this, ‘cause everybody, everybody, all the— ladies involved knew. That I was not monogamous, with them. And I said, “You know, I’m, I’m kind of, seeing, you know, a few other girls as well” … and she said, “Okay. It’s fine.” And I said, “You know, I just wanted to make sure that you’re— that I’m open about that.” She said, “Yeah, I don’t have a problem with that. But… you won’t be seeing me then.” An’ I went, “What?” (Lila giggles) And then she said, “You won’t be dating me, then.” I said, “What do you mean?” And she go— said, “Well… I mean, I don’t mind if you date other girls, that’s, you know, you’re … I wouldn’t stop you from doing that, but … I don’t even see anything wrong with that, but ….. I don’t want to be dating somebody, who’s dating somebody else other than me. That’s just. That’s my preference, so… That’s fine.” And we talked about it a little more and … you know, in, years and years of polyamory, an’, and also, you know, relationships— unless I was in a committed relationship with somebody… (Joe laughs throughout the next part of the sentence) nobody had ever said that to me. (Lila laughs) Especially not a week in. And I went, “Uhhhh… okay!” And I broke it off with the two other girls.
Lila: You just felt… a surety about Emma?
Joe: The first time I ever — walked into her apartment, I knew I was in trouble. First time I ever saw her I knew I was in trouble.
Lila: That’s not really trouble, is it?
Joe: Isn’t it? (laughs)
Lila: It’s more like … mmmmm, exactly what you want in your life? I don’t know! (chuckles)
Joe: Well, y’kno— I knew that I— didn’t feel like I w— I didn’t feel like I was in a place to be meeting somebody who I— felt— for … no logical reason, that strongly about that quickly and that— you know. I wasn’t in a good headspace for it; I wasn’t in a good, you know, I just wasn’t, wasn’t prepared for that. And when I look back on it … I realize that, I started falling in love with her the first time I ever saw her. And, I d— was not prepared for that. I was not emotionally ready; I was not— mentally ready.
*
Lila: So many people that I know … believe, that it’s simply not possible … for one person to be everything….. that another person needs in a relationship.
Joe: I think, that if you’re idea of, someone being everything that you need in a relationship is that that person is everything you need … in life, in terms of human interaction, then those people are correct.
Joe: But I don’t think that that’s— Lila: That’s not what they mean.
Lila: That’s not what they mean, they’re all people who have friends and close ties with their — colleagues and … families—
Joe: Then maybe they— Lila: Chosen families.
Joe: Maybe they can’t.
Lila: (little pause) Maybe they can’t.
Joe: But I don’t think any human get to speak for all of humanity.
Lila: No, of course not, and they’re not purporting to. It’s just … it’s very refreshing s— for me to hear your perspective … particularly— you’re not in NRE. You’re not experiencing New Relationship Energy.
Joe: No!
Lila: This is, what, nine years in, to your relationship?
Joe: Yeh.
Lila: Yeah, this is—
Joe: Nine years in, we met in 2008, it’s 2017 now. We… moved to Chicago together. We moved to Georgia together. We moved to Maine together. We got married…
Lila: Bought a house, had a child.
Joe: Yeah, married in 2014, had a kid in 2016— no, we got married in 2015… so I mean, we were together, and we— we started living together. I mean, hell, we met, summer of 2008… late summer of 2008, and … she spent the first semester of 2009 in Italy, came back in May, and by, no later than August, we were living together. And we’ve been living together since, either July or August, I think August of 2009.
Lila: So did she feel the same way when she saw you, initially? You said she ignored you for a long time.
Joe: She ignored me ‘cause she had a crush on me. She’s shy. I later found out.
Lila: Hm!
Joe: But I don’t— I don’t know if she felt quite the same way that I did…
Lila: Until later.
Joe: I knew that something was different. I knew that there— like there was was a passion for this person who I didn’t even know, that, was not, reasonable or rational… but I didn’t identify it for what it was until later on— I didn’t realize that I had fallen in love with her, until she was already in Florence.
Dr. Joe.
Welcome back to horizontal, the podcast about intimacy that’s recorded while “the opposite of vertical.” I believe: when we make private conversations public, intimacy becomes contagious.
In this episode, I lie down with my closest friend from high school, Joe McCue. Beloveds from that era of my life are few and far between, and I’m only in touch with a handful of them today, which makes my friendship with Joe all the more precious to me. Joe and I went to an arts magnet program at Gibbs High School, called Pinellas County Center for the Arts, or PCCA for short. His major was Visual Art; mine was Performance Theatre.
Joe is now an osteopath in Bangor, Maine, where we recorded this episode. Bangor was the second stop on my 10,000 mile cross-country road trip. This conversation marks the first episode release from the road trip and tour, which I dubbed horizontal does america.
In October and November of 2017, I, a couple of suitcases, and my recording equipment circumnavigated the United States in a Honda Civic — in order to lie down with people in their homes, in their cities.
I first went to Burlington, Vermont, where I failed to record an incredible conversation with the relationship coach Lola D. Houston – SIGH. You can read that behind-the-scenes story in this missive.
Stories from the road (like the mishap with Lola’s episode), behind-the-scenes photos (like my horizontal portraits across America with pumpkins and monuments), and discounts on live events shall be yours when you sign up for the mailing list! You can do that right now! Below! Or, to the side!
In the first part of our episode together, titled “why we never had sex: horizontal with my dearest high school friend,” Joe and I talked about our high school lives, Joe’s bad first time, the title of this episode — why we never had sex, teaching his sister to read, and the stay-at-home Dad dream. He also points out the fact that he’s been getting horizontal with lila since the 90s.
In this second half of our episode, I tell Joe a minor secret, we debate whether missionary can be a kink (who do you think took which side?), how joe met his wife, the paper anniversary, and how such a radical person ended up monogamous and happy about it.
For my sweetest, most vanilla episode yet, I invite you: to come lie down with us.
Joe said, “Be a pumpkin.” Do you think I took direction well? I consider this outfit to be Hipster Snow White, but every time I wear it, Kenneth says, “Sexy Minion.” You must decide for yourself.
If you enjoy lying down with Joe and I, become a patron of the horizontal arts! Patreon is an innovation in the life of the artist. It’s a website that crowdsources income on a monthly basis. It can make it possible for me to continue creating independent, uncensored, ad-free homemade radio.
There are lovely perks when you become my patron. For instance, for $25 a month you’ll receive recorded love poems. You’ll also get two tickets to a live recording of horizontal, quarterly lullabies, an invitation to my secret FB group, and a post of what I call GPG: Genuine Public Gratitude (or not! If you want to remain a private patron, I shall honor you privately!) There’s loads of other rewarding rewards as well!
Links to Things:
Patron of the horizontal arts!
My horizontal does america tour, on which I recorded this episode!
The Center for Erotic Intelligence (website of the sex therapist Mal Harrison)
Show Notes (feel free to share quotes/resources on social media, and please link to iTunes, this website, or my Patreon!):
iTunes link: https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/horizontal-with-lila/id1238031115&ls=1
website link: https://horizontalwithlila.com/
Patreon link: https://www.patreon.com/horizontalwithlila
horizontal with joe mccue in Bangor, Maine
[5:46]
Lila: And what I’m remembering now is going down … to the causeway maybe? Not all the way to the beach? And just parking, and, and I think cuddling, and and—
Joe: In the truck bed.
Lila: Yeah.
Joe: Yeah. (beat) And nothing happening. Just cuddling and talking.
Lila: Just cuddling and talking.
Joe: I told you— I’ve been getting horizontal with Lila since the 90s.
Lila: (laughing) That’s right!
Joe: In the truck bed—
Joe: On the second floor of— Lila: Outside of—
Joe: — building 4 outside of LaMore’s class. Lila: LaMore’s classroom.
Lila: Must have been other places, too.
[7:18] Lila makes a minor confession to Joe.
Lila: Can I confess something to you which I don’t think I’ve ever told you, about that? (pause) So… I think the reason, the— there were multiple reasons, it was multifaceted, why I didn’t … step into romantic space with you… or … see if it could go that way, and, one of them was that I … until … college, really, I felt pretty ashamed of my nose—
Joe: (quietly) I knew that.
Lila: And I had been … really … battling … very difficult self-esteem—
Joe: (softly) Yeah.
Lila: — in middle school and high school. And I thought, “oh God, if we get together, we’ll be the nose couple…”
Joe: Yeah, ‘cause my nose isn’t small.
Lila: “That’s what people will say about us!” (Lila laughs, Joe cackles)
Joe: That’s so vain!
Lila: (cracking up) Isn’t that so awful?!
Joe: It was better if it worked out that way. I didn’t push it either.
Lila: Oh my God.
Joe: I don’t know why I didn’t. Um. I remember talking with you; I remember you confiding in me about your feelings about your nose and I remember telling you that … I thought that was silly. (laughs, then Lila laughs) That I, that I recognized your feelings being real but that I didn’t think anybody else saw it the same way that you did.
Lila: And I’m sure I appreciated you saying so… (chuckles)
Joe: Maybe, I dunno.
Lila: But, yeah. The nose couple.
Joe: (under his breath) The nose couple. (at regular volume) Yeah, ‘cause I have nostrils that can f— each of one, each one of which can fit a fist. Aquiline, we’ll call it— it’s an aquiline nose.
Lila: (decisively) Yes. (beat) I’ve been seeing my nose in places lately … like Sofia Coppola. (pause, then giggles lightly)
Joe: I can see that. Yeah, I mean there are, there are lots of— lots of pretty people who have noses that are similar to your nose.
Lila: And it’s really not that bad. It’s, it’s—
Joe: (emphatically) No, it’s not.
Lila: It’s it’s—
Joe: Your nose fits your face—
Lila: — not —
Joe: — and you have a pretty face.
Lila: — very… yeah, I mean, the … I— I think it was to the point where it was really— it was really body dysmorphia.
Joe: Oh, absolutely was. I mean, you thought you had a Jimmy Swaggart nose… or something. Or like—
Lila: The i— like, I thought I had a Wicked Witch of the West nose…
Joe: No, you thought you had— you remember, um, did you ever watch the muppets? The original muppets?
Lila: (beat) Ye-eah.
Joe: You know the blue eagle? (Lila giggles) It was like that level of body dysmorphia.
Lila: Yes, yes.
Joe: You thought that’s how you were walking around; you thought that’s how everybody saw you.
Lila: Yeah, absolutely. Like they couldn’t see my face, for my nose.
body dysmorphia (noun) = when one person’s visual perception of some aspect of their body or visage is outlandishly out of proportion with what other people see, engenders obsession, and requires exceptional measures to hide or correct.
[10:48] After Joe’s bad first time, when did sex become good?
[12:57] Is Joe kinky at all?
[13:12]
Joe: I don’t like any kind of violence. Or anything that resembles it. (Lila hm’s softly) Like, if the other person in, involved, is into it then I can, I can get into some light hair pulling or some light spanking, but, it’s not really my thing. And I don’t like violence directed toward me.
Lila: Mmhm.
Joe: Which also probably goes back to Jodie….. She used to, um… you know, she used to get upset at me … for … I dunno— m— st— no reason that I could ever really understand, and, sometimes it would be like, in in the ons and offs of making out, sometimes it was just— talking. And would just like — ball up her fists and pound on me. Not like in my face but … You know, it was— I would describe it as physically abusive.
Lila: Definitely. (pause) Acting out rage that—
Joe: Mmhm.
Lila: She didn’t know how to channel or process.
[14:30] How Lila is becoming more and more kinky.
Lila: I’m becoming more and more kinky, as you might imagine or really, it’s not that I’m becoming more kinky but that I’m having the freedom to express it and experiment and see … what I really like.
Joe: Yeah.
Lila: And having that in a really open, welcoming, nonjudgmental atmosphere, so it’s just kind of— unfolding. Continuously unfolding. But my very first lover, was kinky.
Joe: Hm.
Lila: And really, I feel like, molded … All the things that he did to me are still things that I want today.
Joe: Well, that makes psychologic sense.
Lila: And, look for in a partner as— acts that they enjoy. And want to do to me. And I, enjoy doing them back, as well. I don’t know how much I did with him… Which is, switch behavior… being able to, to enjoy switching from a dominant to a submissive— role, or from a top to a bottom position…
Joe: Yeah, I do like, I do, like, that. I like being able to … being able to switch.
Lila: (pause) Kink is really broad.
Joe: Yeah.
Lila: There’s so much that it encompasses and I’ve asked, you know, several horizontal guests to try and— have a crack at a definition of kink ….. But kink changes as the, as the times change, because it’s (Joe mmhm’s) related to norms.
Joe: Yeah….. I mean … why can’t it just be: kink is what gets you off?
Lila: (medium-length pause) I suppose because if what gets you off is mm-missionary style —
Joe: If that’s what gets you off —
Lila: — vanilla sex —
Joe: — that’s your kink.
Lila: Well it’s not a kink.
Joe: Sure it is.
Lila: A kink would be a non-normative way. That’s the normative way. It’s not bad; I love missionary sex, I love it. (giggles)
Joe: But if you really need — missionary sex, right, if you need to have it through a hole in the sh— in the sheet, that’s kink. Even if it’s normative. Right, norms can— norms don’t have to be— just because they’re the— they’re commonplace that doesn’t mean that they’re, in any way actually ….. (sighs) That doesn’t mean that they’re not artificial.
Lila: From —
Joe: You know what I mean?
Lila: — my understanding at the moment, which is evolving, and of course, incomplete: that would be a fetish. The fetish is the thing that you need in order to get off.
Joe: Yeah.
Lila: A kink is just something you enjoy. That is probably in— of the non-normative variety.
Joe: But again: probably. I would hook on that word. I would argue that kink is just what gets you off. Your kink is what gets you off. And, you know, I’m not a very kinky person. Like I’m not a very— most of the things that, that I like are— you know, given … given my openness to stuff, really pretty … pretty vanilla.
Lila: I think kinky people like being kinky because there is a taboo in it.
Joe: I agree.
Lila: So if you made it, non-taboo, if you say, “Ah, it’s anything. It’s anything that you like.” (giggles) That takes that away from them.
Joe: But I think—
Lila: From us.
Joe: I think that opens it up— even more than it takes away. Because it allows more people to— be okay with exp— you know, if your expression of your sexuality is ….. you know, whatever it is, anything, any way that you express yours— if any way that you express your sexuality is okay, that, and if, and if the idea—
Lila: Any way is not ok.
Joe: If— well, no. You know what I mean. Um. There are, there are personal harms and safety things that are unacceptable. But… um, except in cases of consenting adults. But, if— your expression of your sexuality, and another adult’s expression of their sexuality …. are, you know, extremely vanilla or, extremely rocky road. (Lila giggles) You know, why can’t that be your kink, why doesn’t that actually u— I mean, if kink is about embracing the different ways that we can be sexual, and be okay being sexual and not be shamed for the things that we like about being sexual, and the ways that we like to be sexual, then, defining it against the norm … vilifies the norm and that’s not— that to me isn’t in the spirit of it. You’re creating an other, you’re other-izing.
Lila: Mmhm.
Joe: You’re just counter-otherizing. Which is my argument for why kink is what gets you off.
Lila: I hear you.
[20:15] Joe on judgment and his position as a doctor.
Joe in his doctor getup, with Finn.
[21:29] The story of how Joe met his wife.
[24:07]
Joe: You know, when you’re behind a bar, of any variety, you’re job is to flirt with everyone.
Lila: (decisively) Yes.
Joe: That’s your job.
Lila: Definitely.
Joe: Right? And I’m good. At flirting. (Lila giggles) It is one of my only true, like, native talents. (Lila laughs) It’s one that I have genetically passed on to my son—
Lila: Yes indeed.
Joe: He. Is. A flirt.
Lila: Iii noticed.
Joe: Yeah. And it’s native. It’s in his blood.
[24:36] How Joe met his wife, continued.
[27:24] What happened when she insisted on monogamy?
[30:49] How does Joe manage a strictly monogamous marriage, being such a radical sort of person?
[31:15]
Joe: I do think most humans base-line is probably polyamory, and that—
Lila: Multiple loves, or nonmonogamy … some form?
Joe: Some form. I don’t know. Multiple loves. Probably, I think is what is probably the baseline. Maybe mo— maybe nonmonogamy as well, I don’t know… That’s a little more complicated.
Lila: I, I see it as the umbrella.
Joe: Yeah, I mean tha— and it is, it’s a, it’s a spectrum of stuff but… when you know that the person you’re with … can be everything that you … need in a partner— even when they’re failing … and when you know that you can be everything that your partner needs in a partner, even when you’re failing … and when you know that you can talk with each other, and, when you know that, even when things are feeling really shitty … that— person— can just light you up….. In a way that other people— can’t quite. And even when … you’re the sort of person who can get— you know, who can get brightened up very quickly and very easily and by lots of people, you know, you’re a people person … I don’t know, she— there’s something about her that noone else has. Annnd… you know, I wake up, every morning, and I— choose to love her as though I didn’t— as though I had another choice. But I do, I consciously choose it, and I also don’t think I have a choice!
Lila: (pause) Hm!
Joe: (pause) But I keep myself in the illusion that, my choosing … is my choice… because it is, even though I don’t have— I don’t really have another choice. I would, I would … (big inhale) If she left me, I would never stop loving her. (big exhale)
Lila: Mal Harrison, who, is a, sex therapist … she has the Center for Erotic Intelligence — says that erotic intelligence is the ability to hold simultaneous truths… and that’s what that just reminded me of.
Joe: I think you can, you know, like I’ve— I have, been deeply in love with two people before.
Lila: At the same time?
Joe: At the same time.
Lila: I haven’t.
Joe: I have. And I absolutely think that’s possible.
Lila: I believe it’s possible for me too.
Joe: I don’t think, that I, could ever love someone as deeply as I love Emma. (Lila hm’s) There’s somet— there’s just something different. Something’s different. I don’t know if it’s chemical, I don’t know if there’s a soul thing or an— magnetic thing, I don’t know, what it is. (beat) And really I don’t care.
[34:39] Grand gestures Joe made for his first anniversary. Below: the paper anniversary drawings (excerpts from the full album).
[36:54] Lila marvels at the idea that one person fulfills everything that Joe needs in a partner. (She’d like to find that person, herself.)
[41:37]
Joe: So, things haven’t always been easy. And in relationships, they’re not… but… if you don’t expect them to be easy all the time… and you’re willing to talk through things, and you’re willing to be wrong… and you’re willing to stand up when you believe you’re right. And you’re willing to stand up when you believe you’re right and still … be wrong … you know? (beat) You got all that and you love somebody, what can’t you fix?
Lila: (long pause) Well. (chuckles) We’ll not try to answer that question, but—
Joe: Yeah, there are answers to that question I guess. (Lila laughs lightly) I mean that— you get what I mean.
[42:29] How did Joe develop his communication skills to be able to talk about difficult or uncomfortable things?
[44:35]
Joe: I do my best to listen, and I do my best to listen openly … and I do my best to communicate … precisely ….. and to communicate honestly … and I do my best to communicate complicated things. And I do my best to, listen, to complicated things and to see the complication. You know, and I. I just don’t have the ability to see things in black and white, I don’t have it. I can’t— I can’t do dichotomies. My Gifted teacher in second grade told my mom … you know, she, she said, you know, Joseph doesn’t, doesn’t see things in black and white. He sees things in grey. And… I’m going to push that in him hard, I’m gonna push that quality in him … and my mom said, “Oh. Ok good.” And she said, “No, I don’t think you understand. I’m going to make him a huge problem for you. And I’m just being honest about that with you. So that you know. And I will help you to deal with that. But I’m going to make him a big problem for you.”
Lila: (pause) You remember her name?
Joe: Marilyn Jacobs. I’ve tried to find her; I haven’t been successful.
[46:12] Are there any unexpected challenges for Joe about being a father?
[47:10]
Joe: He’s 18 months old, I don’t know if he has slept longer than, 5 or maybe 6 hours at a stretch without waking up, at least a little bit, in his entire life… but I fall in love with him every day. Even when he’s being a total shit.
Lila: Hm.
Joe: (beat) He is the most beautiful thing in the world.
Lila: I think that’s a … a particular kind of heartbreak when you pass something you really don’t want onto your children— like my tendency, you know, towards melancholy… My mom’s not happy I got that. (giggles lightly) You know?
Joe: But you’re gonna pass stuff on and some of it’s genetic and some of it’s not, and, you know, and this is something I’ve picked up from my Dad: If your kids are better than you are … then you’ve done your job. And if they’re better off than you are … then you’ve done your job … and sometimes, they’re not going to be, annd, that’s not your fault.
Lila: Well, I don’t like that, because … that means if they’re not then you haven’t done your job, and that puts a… kind of an unfair onus on people who do their best, and wind up with a, mm— (big sigh) an aberration or some, someone who … harms—
Joe: But you missed, you missed the last part of what I said. Which is that sometimes they’re not going to be. And it’s not your fault. Because you’ve done everything you can…. You can do your job and do it well, and still fail. Whether that’s in parenting or anything. You can’t foresee everything. We’re not omniscient; we’re not omnipotent.
[49:37] Joe tells Lila a story about a cute girl, a car accident, some pain meds, and his parents.
http://directory.libsyn.com/episode/index/id/6555354
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