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MIAs | Jan 29 2002

My memory is bad and getting worse.

This morning I tried to count how many women I’ve slept with. The number I arrived at was three less than the last time I did this, which was several years ago, I think.

Instead of going down by three, the number should have gone up by one, so that’s actually four missing women.

It’s disturbing.

I should say that the total number is not so high as to excuse oversights.

Also, I’ve never been one for casual sex—casual kissing, perhaps, but not casual sex. So again it would seem that the MIAs are probably all women who at one time I really liked and may have even gone out for a few weeks before realizing it wouldn’t work, or vice versa.

It bothers me to have forgotten them. And what it makes me think is that I should write down the names of the ones I do remember, in case I forget them as well.

This seem tacky, doesn’t it, to make such a list?

I think it seems tacky.

But then I picture myself at ninety and I can’t remember a single woman I’ve ever slept with, not even what’s-her-name, the contortionist.

I’m ninety and I think I’m a virgin.

Fuck it, I’m making that list.