Huggles

In card shops these days, there are plenty of others things to buy than a mere card. Actually the cards themselves seem to cover all eventualities these days. The other day, I saw a card in a shop that said “Thank you to my Classroom Assistant”. I wonder what will happen to that stock when the government cuts mean that there are no longer any of these vital workers left in our schools.

Anyhow, what else do they stock in these card shops? Well, any little non-essential you can think of. Yes, there is wrapping paper and sellotape but there are also trinket-like presents that on the surface seem to be little extras of presents right up until you go to check the price and realise that they cost more than or the same as a newly released CD. Most of them are really tacky. There’s the fridge magnets and the coffee cups or the useless book of quotes or a glass vase with some factory processed message surrounding it.

And there are the teddies. Teddy bears seem to have made a come-back, not that they were ever lost but there does seem an abundance of them, and one of the ones that I see most frequently in shops is a little good-looking bear wearing a red t-shirt with the following words emblazoned across its chest – “Need a hug?”

Need a hug? Who doesn’t?

But what does a hug actually entail? Are all hugs the same?

Now I admit that I am an extremely needy human being. Bodily contact of any sort is wonderful for me. I like to reach out and hug people that I care about, including friends and family but the hugs that I give them are different to the hugs that I give and receive from the special people in my life, and particularly from the lover in my life.

The hug and embrace from a lover fills the soul and rejuvenates in a way that no other hug can. Standing or sitting or lying within a hug just hits a button in me, not necessarily a sexual one though that also happens. It is more about an unspoken connection, a quiet moment of solitude and togetherness that just feels right. In that moment, there is no other world. It is all there in the human touch, the human warmth and the shared desire to be held and cared for.

But there are different hugs. There’s a greeting hug, which is always lovely but I sometimes prefer the second hug of the day more. The first one is like an acknowledgement of a relationship, a friendship but the second hug is more of a “You’re here, I’m here, we are together in our separate and conjoined worlds”.
There’s the goodbye hug too; sometimes clingy, sometimes needy because however small the time gap, you know that you are not going to get that hug, that human beings contact in the immediate future. There is no opportunity for hugs once that goodbye hug has been given; not until the next time. The goodbye hug is as important as the greeting hug in the manner in which it is given and received. I wouldn’t necessarily say I like the goodbye hug because I don’t like saying goodbye but it is an essential part of the separation and fills me with enough warmth to keep me going as I slip back into another world where hugs have never been part of the equation.

But the most special hugs are the spontaneous ones; the ones where you are occupied in doing other things and a passing hug is instantly given without behest, without demand, merely with thoughtfulness. They are simply given because in that single moment, it is the instinctive thing to do. I adore these hugs.

Sometimes these hugs are less than instinctive. Sometimes they are thought-out and a decision is made to hug – to reiterate an attitude or thought or positive emotion or feeling. Sometimes hugs are given and received because it just seems the right thing to do.

And there are the hugs in bed, lying together, moulding bodies together before and after making love. These hugs are in a league of their own. They require no words and are difficult to describe. These hugs are heartfelt and passionate, with or without the accompanying fingering or breast-clutching. They are the essence of oneness, and create an atmosphere of lovingness that even glorious fucking cannot do. I love those hugs.

Recently, my lover sent me a note explaining the importance for him about friendship, and how he needs friends, and how he needs friends to hug when I am not there, and even if I was there all or most of the time, he would still need these friends to hug and kiss and have sex with.

“Several of my friends seem to be in need of a male body to sleep with from time to time – who need hugs and kisses and the occasional fuck”.

And my lover is the man to give, and receive because the one thing about hugs is that if they are done properly, there is a seamless connection between the giving and the receiving.

I empathise. I understand completely their need and their desire to receive and give these hugs. They are important. Hugs are vital. In some ways, they are more vital than the act of penetrative sex, and perhaps that is why I have taken so long to come to terms with them. Sex is sex. It is an animalistic act in its rawest sense, and far too often we are hung up on what penetration actually means. Of course it is a bonding of bodily parts and of course it is a type of giving oneself to another but even when it is done with added feelings of attraction and affection, it does not necessarily give another person rights and it should not enable people to make assumptions about the nature of a relationship. Hugs shouldn’t either but in some ways there is something more intimate about a spontaneous hug, especially when it is given in the warmth and comfort of a bed at the end and the beginning of the day.

As I said, I empathise because I don’t actually get enough hugs, and I bloody well need them, now more than ever.

I would love to say that I miss that; the goodnight and the good morning hug but you cannot really miss something that you have never really had. And I have never really had that at all, apart from the utterly sporadic times I have managed to spend the night with my lover (without calling him a fucking bastard!).

Of course I am slightly envious of these hugs because they are the type of hugs that I have always wanted with a partner; to feel loved and to love as a lovely day draws to a close and the new one is released with the hopefulness of a hug. And that is before you even get onto the instinctual hugs that happen through the night, when bodily contact is almost desperately desired.

Sometimes, my lover cannot understand my hang-up about the sharing of night-time sleep. He says it is just sleeping, often without sexual intercourse, and often I have asked myself why I am so bothered by it. Not that I am quite so bothered these days. As it is – that is my new mantra. And despite outward appearance, I do want him to have the sort of warmth that I cannot get as I sleep night after night after night without that bodily contact.
No wonder I am a little insane.

But I think, in one of my moments of clarity, that perhaps it is this. Perhaps it is about the hugs or the potential for hugs much more than cock and cunt combination. And perhaps it is because I have never been held throughout the night, nobody has ever reached out to touch me or to hold me during the night, and I have never woken to the total embrace of the person that I am sleeping with – obviously apart from the times when I have slept with my lover.

Of course it is not only hugs. Recently I have had a period of not having penetrative sex. Over the next couple of weeks I am not going to have penetrative sex either, and I am not very good at not having sex now that I have discovered the need and desire that lay so horribly dormant for so many years.

My poor play toy is going through batteries at a rate of knots at the moment. Instead of a hug, the last thing I do at night is wank myself off with my dildo. The first thing I do in the morning is give myself another orgasm and sometimes, if I am awoken full of solitude in the middle of the night, unable to get back to sleep, I have another go with my pal to relax me into a state of oblivion.

But Satori it is not. Even yesterday, as I plunged my Roger Rabbit into the depths of my pussy, I realised that it was all very exciting, and yes, I really want to see some photos of me doing that to myself, and yes, my cunt reacted to this hard piece of equipment wriggling around inside me, but it is plastic! It is not human, and even the most expensive vibrator in the world cannot compensate for either its human equivalent or more importantly the feelings and connection that come with it.......... and the hugs. No dildo is going to give me a hug after I have had an orgasm. No amount of wanking is going to give a wanker a needed embrace to perpetuate and continue the pleasantries of climax into something more life-giving, and I am talking generally here, not just about me.

As readers will know, I am a strong advocate of masturbation both on your own and with other people. The other day, for instance, I thoroughly enjoyed the double wank that I gave myself and my lover. And I like nothing more than watching him jerking himself off as he gives my fanny a fisting.
I adore to look at porn, alone or with another – neither of which I/we have done enough of recently, and manipulate the already aroused parts of the body with a gentle or indeed vigorous plunge and tug. And there is a time and a place for erotic activity but nothing is the same as a hug, and nothing on earth can replace the essence and the essentiality of human contact.

So yes, I miss what I have never or too sparingly have had and to some extent, however “as-it-is” it is, I am a little envious of other peoples’ ability to hug my lover in the middle or the beginning of the night. However, the difference between now and a few weeks ago is that I am not riddled with envy. I am not perplexed or overwhelmed by it. I just acknowledge and appreciate its presence.

But just returning to hugs for a while. I have recently been reading a book called “Sex, Sin and Zen” by a Zen Master from the United States called Brad Warner. Over the coming weeks, I shall return to this book, quoting generously and suggesting to all that they should get a copy and have a good read through. It says an awful lot about sex but it says a whole lot more about Zen and how we should be living our lives, collectively and individually. I cannot begin to say how important this book has been to reiterate my views on life and to assist me to come to terms with some dark and destructive emotions.

In one of the chapters, called “Hug is the Drug”, he explains how he went along to see some Indian Saint who was supposedly the master or mistress of hugging. This woman, Amma, now tours the world giving the powerful healing natural high of hugging. Warner describes this weird gathering and how people with pink tickets are allowed to line up and receive a hug from this saintly woman as though her embrace will fix every misdemeanour in their lives. Warner argues, quite rightly that this may not be the case and in actual fact, real compassion, spontaneous action is far more important than any amount of hugs (more on compassion in later blogs).

“Warm smiles and hugs don’t fix everything and they never will”, he clearly states.

And he is right. As much as I yearn for spontaneous hugs, as much as I adore giving and receiving the very best of embraces, they are never going to take away all my darkness, and neither should they. There is more to life than hugs, and like any other wonderful thing, if they become too frequent and too contrived, then they lose all sense of worth and value. Spontaneity is vital too!

But one should also be extremely mindful of the need and the desire for hugs, what they give, how they are received and just how important human touch is, how very, very important.

Need a hug? Yes, I do, and I am fortunate enough to receive plenty of hugs, even if they are not in the middle of the night. But beggars etcetera, and I will happily settle for all the impromptu hugs that I both give and receive and be eternally grateful that I can get them as and when, as it is.