Do Every Sin That You Can, You Know?

Lately I’ve been thinking about sinning. I think about how everything we do means there’s always a price to pay, a consequence to every action. But what if we paid for our sins before we even added them to our carts? What if the sins are our reward for being in hell for so long? We’ve already been to the ninth circle, a frozen lake reserved for those who have betrayed the trust of someone close to them. To betray: violation of a moral standard. Moral standard: those concerned with or relating to human behavior. I betray others by only letting them see my behavior on a surface level, I betray myself by doing the same. I’ve lived a life of reducing myself down into smaller and smaller portions of myself, portions that I believe are palatable to others but leave everyone desiring more. To quote Rax King, I am a dessert. A taste of pleasure, something you desire with no substance of value. I believe I deserve to offer pleasure, both to myself and others. I believe I belong in this ninth circle, only able to ascend to the weak version of heaven that’s available to those familiar with the dark side: Pure pleasure.

If I knew anything about directing movies I would make one that begins with a girl walking through the red light district in Amsterdam, a bottle of Russian Standard in one hand and a half smoked Lucky Strike in the other. She would stop in one of the windows and wonder about the pleasure of those who are tempted by lust, one of the emptiest sins, to keep walking. She would wonder about the performance of pleasure versus the act of experiencing it, and the realization that some of those girls in the window may never know the difference makes her so sad she spends the rest of her night at a coffee shop alone, smoking cheap joints and pouring vodka into the juice she ordered.

My existence in the ninth circle allows me to be both the main character in this movie as well as one of the girls in the window. I have sent nude photos to men who couldn’t make me cum, my way of beckoning them in with a crooked finger and a wink. Come inside and you’ll get the gratification that you need. Neither one of us needs to mention the cost. I don’t charge by the hour but I do demand some sort of compensation. Concert tickets, endless Red Bull, an Uber home at peak pricing. I’ve had my fun but very rarely has it come with a happy ending. We all pay for our pleasure, I guess.

 

If the hell I’m in is the place where I am left alone with my thoughts, forced to contend with my demons, forced to contemplate the ways I have betrayed myself and others, then heaven is where I get to experience the pleasure that comes from the company of the right kind of people. Heaven is where I get to experience the pleasure of being more than a dessert. I am still struggling with this concept, so I grasp at the straws of the only form of pleasure I’ve ever known by texting men I’ve met at festivals come get in my bed. I’m old enough to have been through hell but not old enough to understand I still have a ways to go before I reach the heaven of my dreams. I slept with a guy in Vegas who knew a lot about pleasure, and that sin made me foolish enough to believe I’ve learned enough to be able to reach heaven. He still texts me asking when I’m going to come back to Vegas, we have some sort of relationship, I send him nude photos on Snapchat and he sends back fire emojis, I am being seen by others. I am showing my naked body, my most vulnerable form, to another human being. Is this heaven? Is this drawn out version of a one night stand my reward for making it out of the ninth circle? No, I’m still in it. I’m still nothing but pleasure. Still a dessert. When it comes to paying for my sins, I’m a day late and a dollar short.

The good thing about being 26 is that I have youth on my side, which means I have time. I’m spending that time with a guy who, like the guy in Vegas, knows about pleasure. He also, like me, knows about pain. He knows what it’s like to sit in the ninth circle of hell, selling yourself short and settling for committing empty sins you deluded yourself into thinking were the only reward you would ever get out of life. I send this guy nude snapchats, and he replies with Holy fuck. Can I just pledge my undying loyalty and soul to you? After we get our fill of the pleasure, we talk about what we went through to get to where we are now. We talk about depression, about suicidal ideation, about our relationships with our parents and the ones we had before we met each other that were painful and embarrassing. We talk about the experiences we have at concerts, and we never mention the people we went home with afterwards. I only see him once or twice a week, which gives me time to think about how little I know about the pleasure I now associate with heaven. I have time to reflect on the choices I’ve made that have kept me stuck in the ninth circle, and I think about the opportunities I have now to get out of it. I am in therapy, unpacking my trauma. I am working the steps in AA, unpacking old narratives and behaviors. I am gaining friends and mentors. I am slowly peeling away the layers of myself. In some ways I’m still a dessert, wanting to offer pleasure, but now I wish to receive it in return. I’m entering purgatory, or what I like to call liminal space. This is an uncomfortable period, one that makes me understand that in my pursuit of sins, of pleasure that has nothing to do with the heaven I envision for myself, I have been obsessed with finding answers when I’m not even sure of the question. This quest for answers has led me to engaging in lust, the most empty sin. I want to be sure that I can offer something to myself, and I want to be sure of what I offer to other people. I want my answers, so I made myself believe my questions about rewards and consequences could be fulfilled with lust. Really, I want the certainty that comes with knowing you’re in heaven. I want my sins to mean something, to teach me about what it means to live in a state of knowing oneself well enough to be known by others as well.

Just for today, I will allow myself to exist in this liminal space, to seek out pleasures both physical and spiritual and mental with this guy I’m seeing without a need for answers. I will seek out the pleasure of my own company by taking care of myself. I will engage in things that allow me to know myself, and I will share this knowledge of myself with others when I can, a noble attempt to try to get to heaven before they close the door.