This. Is Shaun with flowers.
To listen to this episode, click here. . .
Shaun: I mean, I have intimate relationships with a lot, a lot of men in my life. But they’re not physical. There’s no cuddling. […] And I think I heard you say something about being touch-starved. (Lila mmhms) Which I love, that, being able to put a name to what I’ve been feeling. […] I’m touch-starved. I’m, I’m, not right now in this very moment, because, I have you laying half on me (Lila mmhms) and it feels really nice. But, generally, yeah. You know I’ve only, gotten naked with very few people this year. Usually I, I, I save all that for Burning Man. […] So my goal is to figure out, how can I get more touch in my life, and, and is that lined up with my ultimate goal of finding a partner.
Lila: I’ve never been touched as much as I want to be touched… I want so much more. And I think it makes me far happier when I don’t have that skin hunger. I also think it’s an epidemic.
Shaun: Yeah, we’re not the only ones.
Lila: Certainly not.
Shaun: But look at the line of work that we’re in. We should be getting more touch.
Lila: Yeah, I think, I think, part of it is about, arranging it— i— is about the setting the parameters, right, so maybe, you and I would’ve spent a night together if we had been like, “Hey. Not feeling a sexual charge here, don’t think we’re compatible. I feel the impulse to hold you; can we like— can we cuddle for two hours and then I’m gonna go back so that I can get sleep and you can get sleep. […] If we had, created a container with the parameters that we desire, instead of feeling like: I think, a lot of people feel like, well if I have sex, I have to spend the night, and I read your thing, y— then you’re not gonna get much sleep, and then, you know, brunch, etcetera etcetera. But why— why can’t it be, like, Hey, can we set a timer for an hour and just like, touch each other’s bodies all over? And then, you go home.
Shaun: (beat) Yeah. It can be like that.
Lila: But—
Shaun: But it’s not.
Lila: To do that we have to— ask, and we have to set the example, that it’s okay to do it.
Shaun: Yeah. And you have to identify what it is that you want, first of all.
Lila: Sure! So, so the self-inquiry is required and maybe sometimes, you have to sit quietly with yourself, and feel into your body to see what it is you actually desire— do I smell, like, off, to you?
Shaun: (takes a whiff) No.
My dear patrons! Welcome back to your horizontal, the podcast of intimacies recorded while reclining. This is the first episode that you all have exclusive access to, as patrons of $5 a month and up. Yay!
Your patronage heartens me, moves me, emboldens me, inspires me, and spurs me onward. Thank you thank you thank you. You are part of making the world a more intimate place.
This is part two of my episode with Shaun Galanos, of The Love Drive.
In the first part of our conversation, released as episode 57. fear of intimacy: horizontal with the love (drive) podcaster, we talked about cruising chat rooms and cybering, wizard sleeves and uncircumcised cocks, the pics of naked men that turn Shaun on, the pics of naked women that turn me on, self-voyeurism, check-ins, and how Shaun and I turned out to not be sexually-attracted to one another — which kind of surprised both of us.
In this part, we discuss my softness in romance with Peter, the hierarchy of relationships, touch-starvation, our pheremones, Old Spice, how I track sex with hearts in my planner, my 70s breasts, and Shaun tells me a story about a risky wedding liaison.
We recorded naked, in my bed in Brooklyn, so we are backed by the Symphony Orchestra of Bushwick.
For more photographic proof, check Instagram, and make sure you’ve signed up for the missives on horizontalwithlila.com and added lila@horizontalwithlila.com to your address book.
If you can’t get enough of Shaun and I, we got vertical together! This summer, in addition to getting naked and horizontal, we recorded episode 28 of Shaun’s podcast, The Love Drive. The episode is titled how to get invited to a play party. (I make no promises, but I will say this: listening to that episode will probably increase your chances.) I also share the single most important exercise I’ve ever encountered for preparing yourself and your date for a sex party.
For our episode, plus all things Shaun and The Love Drive, including his free love advice, follow him on the Instagram (I aspire to the adorability of his Instagram stories) and point yourself to thelovedrive.com
P.S. I’m still debating which episode to release next week, but it will either be with a polyamorous podcaster of political proportions, an actor-romantic that I went to college with, or a queer, body-positive fat aerobics instructor. This to say: we’ve got a lot to look forward to!
And now, my dear, darling patrons, come lie down with us in Bushwick, Brooklyn. And thank you for being the lifeblood of horizontal.
horizontal with Shaun Galanos in bed at Hacienda Villa. Bushwick, Brooklyn, NY. August 2018
Links to Things:
Become a patron of the horizontal arts to listen to this episode and all the part twos ever!
All things Shaun can be found at thelovedrive.com
Don’t miss his consistently adorable Instagram stories
Hacienda Villa, where I live in Bushwick, and where this episode was recorded
Free Love Advice, Shaun’s street theatre / performance art
Marianne Williamson’s book A Return to Love, Shaun’s recommendation, in which Williamson questions the pair-bond’s status as the “sacred relationship”
Show Notes (feel free to share quotes/resources on social media, and please link to this website or my Patreon!):
website link: https://horizontalwithlila.com/
Patreon link: https://www.patreon.com/horizontalwithlila
[3:21]
Shuan: S— I think that’s because, I have a, deep-down fear of intimacy. I am scared of starting something with somebody that I think isn’t going to work out.
Lila: Yeah, yeah that makes perfect sense.
Shaun: And so, instead of even starting something, where I will have to, maybe let you down—
Lila: Ohf.
Shaun: I don’t let anybody get close to me. And I’ve been like this for a long time and I’m working on it in therapy, because I ultimately want partnership. And in order for me to have partnership, I need to back up, and let people get close to me. And I think I have a great idea of, what that ideal partner looks like, and I mean looks like in the broad sense of, values and personality and all that. And so when I meet someone that’s not that, I’m very hesitant to let them get too close, so that I don’t have to let them down.
Lila: That makes a lot of sense to me. I also have that kind of barrier, where if I, if I don’t think, if I think that— this isn’t compatible, this is like, not gonna be good at some point, I’m gonna break— break their heart, if I do let them in, or, I can see an expiration date, like, I also don’t, don’t usually enter, and, it’s.. Interesting, because if I— I mean, we don’t know what’s gonna happen in the future. We can have a very good idea, however, whether or not we’re compatible with somebody, and with, Peter, who I’m, seeing now, I— I’m not sure what it could be, you know, I’m— and I feel— I feel really really wide open to it, and it’s exciting and… and I feel like, soft, and every time I share my softness with him it’s received with softness, so I’m encouraged, to offer more … you know? Because I think when my softness is not received, or received with a prickle, then I, I don’t, I don’t want to, you know, so then I start to, to put up some, barriers but, also there’s no reason why we can’t be sweet to each other as loving friends, or, as collaborators or, you know? […]
[6:11] Lila on sourcing intimacy outside of romantic relationships.
Lila: It’s really sad to me how many of us relegate intimacy only to the realm of the romantic and the sexual. You and I could be very intimate. And choose to not have a romantic or sexual relationship. Because we don’t think that we’re very compatible. (Shaun hm’s) But we could still decide what that looks like for us, we could still cuddle, we could still support each other, we could be, you know, I video your thing / you video my thing, we could, you know, still have something that we create together, and so… I know you recognize how limiting it is to, to not take a step towards openness or intimacy with someone because you see, you know, the potential of letting them down or something.
Shaun: Yeah I think all that requires, is, communication. Is for me to say… exactly what I’m feeling. Like oh I, I, I don’t feel like this is the type of relationship where it’ll be romantic or sexual, but I would be available for these other—
Lila: Right!
Shaun: Stages of intimacy with you.
Lila: And, in this case, what causes so much pain is when people are not in the same, on the same page, and that happens, fairly often, right, but in this case we are. I know we’re not compatible.
This is little Shaun.
Shaun: What the hell!
Lila: (giggles) I can feel it too! But, also there’s clearly something compelling enough that we’ve been conversing for two months pretty much every day, you know, so what—
Shaun: And I’m naked in your bed.
Lila: What’s that?
Shaun: Yeah.
Lila: What’s that? And… and doesn’t that warrant some curiosity? Or some investigation? My, my hope is that, we expand intimacy and, and source it from all these different avenues. From our friends, and from the people we collaborate with, and from, you know if you’re on a team, your teammates, and from, your family, and, and all these different relationships that, we tend to as, as Americans, as as, U.S. people, to like put, all those below our romantic relationship and by, almost de facto by default, the romantic relationship is at the top of this pyramid. And, I’m not sure— I don’t really understand why— I know it has an evolutionary benefit, but I don’t really intellectually get why, because, my friendships have been longer-lasting, more reliable sources of joy, more— fun, uh, more— uh, sustainable… very few fights, very few disagreements, and then, the longevity of them is so glorious! Why would somebody I don’t know— who comes into my life, and has sex with me… and then suddenly they’re above all these people that have been around in my life for so long, showering me with love and joy… it’s perplexing. It’s perplexing.
Shaun: It’s the sacred relationship.
Lila: (beat) Is it, though?
Shaun: No, it’s not, but that’s what we make them out to be.
[10:40] Shaun paraphrases Marianne Williamson in A Return to Love about the “sacred relationship” and putting it on a pedestal.
Shaun: She talks about the sacred relationship and how, as soon as you make it sacred, it takes on a life of it’s own, and it’s not a good thing. Because you’re putting a person or a relationship on a pedestal. […] In, in a position that it doesn’t need to be in, this is—
Lila: And that it’s only gonna fall from.
[11:03] Shaun on his intimate, non-physical relationships.
Adorable little Shaun & friend.
[13:53] Lila & Shaun on pheremones and Old Spice.
Lila: ‘Cause sometimes when I’m, like drawn— like I’m drawn to you visually, and then pheremonally I’m like, “Mm, there’s something that’s not quite… not quite it.” It’s not that you smell bad. It’s just that, it’s like, it’s not quite… like sexually right, or something.
Shaun: Mmhm. That’s quite possible. But I’m not getting— I mean, you’re very clean. You said that, earlier.
Lila: I did just take a very—
Shaun: Thorough—
Lila: — thorough shower.
Shaun: Yeah and I have not, and I’m a fairly, like… odorous man. (Lila giggles) Although I do think that my smell is incredible. Does everybody think that?
Lila: That their own smell is incredible? So it’s very interesting because, sometimes, I smell my armpits and I smell great. And sometimes I smell my armpits and I’m like, “Oh my God! I need to take a shower.” I mean, now I have Old Spice on, so you’re gonna smell—
Shaun: What the fuck is it with—
Lila: —mostly Old Spice. Shaun: — women and Old Spice?
Lila: Old Spice smells delicious, and—
Shaun: I know!
Lila: — lady deodorant smells like— like cruddy flowers!
Shaun: So I used to like Degree Shower Fresh (Lila uhhuhs) which is ladies deodorant. I never thought that women liked Old Spice.
Lila: (breathily) I love Old Spice!
Shaun: All my friends wear Old Spice, and I’m like, “Yo, girls don’t like Old Spice!” and then I—
Lila: So much.
Shaun: Did a poll— (Lila cackles) Turns out I was wrong.
Lila: (overlapping) We like it so much!
Shaun: I was wrong! Women like Old Spice: they like wearing it, they like smelling it, I mean—
Lila: Yup!
Shaun: Some women do not like it because it reminds them of their father or their grandfather.
Lila: Oh, okay. I don’t have that association. Shaun: There’s probably about f—
Shaun: Forty percent of women do not like Old Spice in this, uh, very non-scientific Facebook poll that I did (Lila giggles) right before writing the article. But sixty percent of women did like it, and I just stopped wearing deodorant and wearing underwear 15 years ago, and, that’s what’s going on.
Lila: I see. Okay.
Shaun: Is that why my penis is so dark?
Lila: So you might actually be a little stinky.
Shaun: Whaddyou mean? I’m always—
Lila: You don’t wear deodorant.
Shaun: I’m always a little stinky. That’s why I said I was odorous. (both laugh)
horizontal with Shaun in Bushwick. August 2018
Lila: Okay okay okay okay! I know some people really like that. Like the people who do contact improv. That’s why I stopped doing contact improv, because a lot of people who do it don’t wear deodorant and like, if you are going to roll around, over other people, then you should wear deodorant. […]
Shaun: So I’m not getting, like, a repellent pheremonal reaction from you… if that’s what you were asking.
Lila: That was what I was asking.
Shaun: Are you getting one from me?
Lila: As I said, it’s not repellant, it’s not like, but it’s like, “Nnnnn!” There’s nothing— there’s something that’s not quite right.
Shaun: Also, let’s be clear. We’re in the top third of your bedroom.
Lila: It is very hot up here, because I had to turn off the fan and the AC in order for us to record.
Shaun: So there’s that greenhouse effect happening, I think. (Lila giggles) And the door is closed— there’s no circulation happening here. Although in— if I was in this space with someone that I was pheremonally attracted to, it would be— it would be a huge turn-on. […] I mean it would be, […] boner city.
Lila: And you’re not.
Shaun: Zero boner.
Lila: I know.
Shaun: There was a little bit, starting to as soon as I shed my clothing but I always feel that that— getting naked with a woman is always exciting.
Lila: Right. And as you were talking about some of your childhood turn-ons, I got turned-on, but I’m not turned-on anymore.
Shaun: Right.
Lila: I just have to pee now.
Shaun: I have to pee so bad.
[18:35] Lila bemoans their lack of attraction.
Exhibit G.
Lila: It’s kind of a bummer, because you’re so handsome.
Shaun: I know, and you’re beautiful. (Lila laughs) You’re totally beautiful, you’ve got that silky skin, you’ve got those luscious breasts— and we were talking about your breasts, I mean they’re, they’re luscious, there, that’s— the only way I can describe them. I would go, go ahead and say— I’d go as far as saying you have the most perfect breasts I’ve ever seen.
Lila: Wow.
Shaun: They’re like model-esque, there’s a 70s aesthetic to it, they’re, they’re incredible.
Lila: (laughing lightly) 70s!
Shaun: 70s in the best way possible. I feel like, breasts were a little more teardrop-y in the 70s.
Lila: Hmm. I don’t know if that’s true but maybe.
Shaun: Well, that’s why I said I feel like. I don’t actually know if it’s true.
Lila: Maybe the imagery is—
Shaun: Maybe that’s—
Lila: They were the ones chosen at that time; their, their breast shape was in fashion.
Shaun: Right, r-right, the teardrop was in fashion in the 70s. Anyways so yeah, you’re right. It is a bit of a bummer.
Lila: Your silver fox thing is so hot! I love your— hair and your gorgeous— smile, and, you’re just hot!
Shaun: What are we gonna do?
Lila: Uh, nothing I guess.
Shaun: We’ll just be friends.
Lila: (giggling) Just be friends!
Shaun: We can be intimate friends and colleagues.
Lila: Yes.
Shaun: And we can talk to each other about the fact that we have some blocks— some intimacy blocks that we’re working on. And how that shows up in our lives. And what we’re doing to work on it.
[20:25]
Shaun: I don’t have a lot of sex. I feel like we have about the same amount of sex, although I think you maybe have been having more sex lately.
Lila: I’ve been having a little bit more sex lately. For a while, I was only have sex about twice a month, and now I’m having sex about, mm— I actually put a little heart in my, in my planner every time I have sex, so I I track it so. I’ve been having sex about, like six times a month.
Shaun: Okay that is—
Lila: That’s a little bit more.
Shaun: — far and away, way more sex than (laughing) I’ve been having! This year I had sex, probably I can count it on my, on my two hands. So less than 10 times.
[20:50] Shaun tells Lila a story about a risky wedding liaison.
To listen to this episode, click the sensuous horizontal lady below. . .
