Regardless, I’ve actually been thinking this one over for a while now:  how to phrase it so as to be fun and a bit cheeky, but not exploitative or alienating or pervy or gross for our awesome array of readers.

Curious yet?Well, there’s a tell there in the title. (Duh.)  We’re going to talk about things that you find attractive in people you find attractive.  This is pushing the bubble of objectification here, but I trust our regulars to set the appropriate tone (so chill with the “I <3  BIG TITTAYZ” comments, mkay?).  I’ll mod if I have to, but I don’t think I’ll have to.

So, if you want, you can tell us about your “type,” or you can mention how you find a particular human characteristic, like gap teeth or hairy toes, sexy.  Even if you’re asexual, you can recognize and appreciate beauty:  tell us about it.   Who/what turns your head?  When you sneak admiring glances at someone (because you don’t want to skeeve anyone out or make them feel threatened or uncomfortable), what exactly are you admiring?  And, after all that, have you ever been surprised by what you suddenly found attractive?

And I’m not talking “a silly sense of humor” or “a kind person.”  We’re talking physical stuff here, peeps. For example, I have always liked/dated lanky, dark-haired dudes.   And I lurrrrrrv bones:  not bone-iness, or skinniness, but parts of the body where bone structure is visible on just about everybody:  cheekbones, chins, strong noses (Aquiline, all the way!), that little knobby wristbone, hands and fingers.  It’s not that bigger or bonier is better, but when I ogle people, after I look at their faces, I look at hands and arms.  Ohhhhhhhhhh, forearms.  Proportions, shapeliness, the “right” amount of hair.  A dude with rolled-up shirtsleeves will have me checking him out, post-haste.  I have also been known to gaze at the nape of a stranger’s neck for longer than the average person.  Why?  Because they are pretty.

Now, the Dude is more or less my “type,” especially after he’s had a haircut and I can see all that neck.   But in my life, I’ve dated/been involved with short dudes, heavy dudes, blondes, gingers, non-white dudes, the button-nosed, and even a few diminutive ladies.  My preferences are not exclusive.  And I didn’t used to like facial hair, but the Dude grew a beard late last fall and now I loff it.  Desire  is a funny thing.

How about you?  What rings your bell?  What makes you look just a leeeetle bit longer than usual? But be specific, okay?  No “I like  a nice smile,” because everyone likes that.  (What is a “nice smile,” anyway?)

So bring it on:  in italics, all caps,  or with creative spellings, but please, no “TITTAYZ.”

*No worries!  This is not unexpected, and although I feel a little mentally carbonated right now, I’ll level out soon.  Right now, I’ma just enjoy all this horny gigglyness.

KARR: When I started Cherry [her memoir of her adolescence and sexual awakening], I realized there were no words to describe an awakening female libido. Boys have these childlike words like chubby and woody, but the parlance for female genitalia and female desires is too porno.

Looking at an early draft of Cherry, I said to myself, Oh my God, you’re superimposing a forty-year-old woman’s libido on a twelve-year-old girl. It seemed perverse. Like it’d inspire pedophiles to think that every young girl was Lolita. Eventually I realized I’d misrepresented the experience. A twelve-year-old writing a boy’s name on her notebook over and over doesn’t want to get boffed into guacamole. She wants the boy to bring her a valentine and put it in her lunchbox.

INTERVIEWER: It’s a different kind of longing.

KARR: It’s as powerful as a sexual urge but it’s not so genital. It’s somewhat about being seen – what feminist critics might call a longing for the male gaze. Being looked at in this culture invents you as a woman long before you’re getting laid. It was about love more than sex – about beauty, desire.

This last bit of hers was an epiphany for me, though I wonder if it won’t be controversial, considering how many feminist women I know will disclaim ever having Cared About Men, even as teenagers.

Que pensez-vous, commentariat?