A bizarre realization

[garote]

I don't know why it took me almost 20 years to see the pattern.

Just about every woman I've seriously dated or fallen in love with or even had a short fling with, has had a strong bisexual side. I could go right down my dating history from beginning to end, and whenever there was mutual attraction, it was with a woman with some bisexual traits, whether it be a sexual history with women, or an assertive masculinity to her personality, or a tomboyish appearance, or et cetera.

Why??

Even the girl I had a crush on in the fifth grade had a tomboyish haircut and demeanor. Decades later I found her on Facebook and discovered that she had become a career navy officer.

What the heck is going on??

Comments

[bluebear2.livejournal.com]

Hmmm... These kinds of things are hard to figure out. Maybe it's your energy. Perhaps you treat women equally unlike many straight guys and that attracts the same type of woman.
Just a theory, I'm guessing and really have no idea.

I have a friend who's gay but has had the occasional fling with women and he says all of the woman he's been attracted to have turned out to be Wiccan. He doesn't know what that's all about.

[beatings.livejournal.com]

This is a good point: Attraction is a 2-way street. Perhaps these women sense something in you that they're drawn to, and y'all proceed from there.

[garote]

What, in your opinion (knowing me as you do), is it?!

[pseydtonne.livejournal.com]

I can only give you my experience on this: I like butchy women.

I grew up with a lot of inhibitions about coming onto women. Thus I was drawn to women that made the first move. I soon learned that women with more of a swagger did not make me chase them: if they want to get involved, they've already told me.

This was especially true of the couple women I dated that were most lesbian. If that person chose me over other women, that's a clear signal.

I have no idea whether that will help you.

[garote]

Well. Having someone declare unequivocally that they're interested in me is very compelling, yes.

Also, it's true that I have very little interest in "chasing" after significant others. I totally understand, and even relate to, the idea of getting to know a person emotionally or intellectually before getting physically intimate with them. That makes perfect sense. But the idea that they would want to see more of me, but would deliberately make it harder for that to happen, or deliberately avoid telling me, always felt kind of ... degrading.

Yeah, I've encountered women before who justified this behavior by saying, "I need to draw the courtship out over a long period just to make sure that his interest is enduring, and not temporary." But again, that attitude feels ... degrading. Either you feel comfortable progressing with someone, or you don't. Either way you're better off listening to your instincts, and proceeding at exactly the pace those demand, whether fast or slow. Like guys who avoid returning phone calls, in order to avoid appearing "too eager". ... The manipulation has started even before the relationship has. How lame.

You can tell I have some Opinions about this.

So yeah, that honesty in intent is important, but I don't think it's a major ingredient in my attraction, or the mutual attraction. I think it's an indicator of how well the relationship might go, though...

[(Anonymous)]

Maybe you are just attracted to ladies who are open to exploring relationship configurations and physical/visual presentaions that are outside of the hetero-normative models we see in more mainstream culture. in other words, perhaps you like free thinkers who don't allow themselves to be confined by social norms and perhaps these visual gender cues are giving you reason to believe the ladies might be similarly nonconformist and exploratory in other areas of their lives too. That's my two cents anyway. :)

[garote]

That strikes me as an excellent reinterpretation of the phenomenon from specific to general.
It's true, I am drawn to people who are curious, and questioning. And perhaps to people who are a bit contradictory.

I remember a conversation I had a year or so ago where me and my SO declared that we were attracted to "high dynamic range" people. People who could project feminine OR masculine energy, introvert OR extrovert, goofy OR serious, depending on what suited them, and had found their own synthesis of these energies and turned it into something unique...

But then, what about the converse: Who wouldn't be attracted to someone like this?

[(Anonymous)]

Oh, plenty of people! A wide range of possibilities is intimidating for some people. Maybe a fellow wants his work and sportsball games to be unpredictable but wants his woman wearing a cute dress and a pleasant, subserviant smile on her face, and dinner on the table when he gets home. Valium, anyone?

It's an outmoded model but folks are still pushing for it, no? Eg I was shocked when I went to burning man and the VAST majority of folks were still playing out hetero-normative roles. I thought if anywhere, BM--an SF festival would involve tons of gender play. Turns out not so much. Stable narrow roles are comfortable for a LOT of folks.

[garote]

Really? That kind of throws me for a loop. I figured BM would be one big giant gender pretzel...