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Back on December 10, 2018, I posted a blog with the title “Sex in writing.” No other blog has produced so many private email messages to me as that one did. In that blog, I discussed why I did not feel detailed descriptions of sex in my writing was important unless I was writing erotica. However, I discussed why it is important to include intimacy and gave several reasons I feel it’s important. The people who are emailing me, on the whole, were not interested in those topics. They are asking very interesting questions such as “Do you think people look silly making love?” It is the 50th anniversary of the Monty Python Flying Circus and I could imagine them making a whole series of vignettes of people making love meant to make you laugh. However, I don’t think the participants in an intimate relationship necessarily think their lovemaking is funny looking. I actually got a couple of questions asking me for sexual advice. There are many things I maybe, but a qualified sexual advisor I am not. The sheer volume of questions sent via email and not posted has me thinking about people’s interest in sex.

It started me wondering if a new term is not needed for sex to be used in our discussions and my writing. I recently listened to an NPR show called Fresh Air hosted by Terry Gross. She was interviewing Claire Tomalin who is best known for her biographies of writers such as Mary Wollstonecraft and Charles Dickens. Tomalin is in her 80s and she recently wrote an autobiography titled A Life of My Own. Her husband who was a war correspondent and killed while on assignment repeatedly cheated on her. She found herself on the other side when she had an affair with a married man which finally led to him divorcing his wife. Tomalin indicated she felt that sexual intimacy was still very important even at her age. She used a term for sexual intimacy that I really like – physical love. I wonder if you haven’t experienced this – you touch the person you love and you are filled with a warm gentle feeling? Isn’t it even richer when you touch them in an intimate way? Isn’t it amazing how a physical act brings so much internal pleasure?

What your opinion? Should we use the term “physical love?”