our culture has changed faster than our brains. the social structures that are presently sanctioned and actively utilized no longer suffice to meet our basic needs. we turn to unhealthy substitutes in order to exist within the isolation that is too often a by-product of our social structure.

is cuddling the sole answer? of course not. but its my way of contributing to a solution. its meaningful to me and it has been meaningful to many others.

one of the largest criticisms has been that it may cause arousal. so, too, may massages, ads for diet coke, and barbie dolls.

the fact that within a few days of gaining any media exposure i had international coverage means something, not about me, but about you. whether you think i’m a creep or whether you’re one of the people who posted comments beneath an image of my face detailing how you want to strangle me and ejaculate all over me, you’re paying attention. the opposite of love isn’t hate, its indifference. my story hasn’t been received with indifference. this is a statement, a testimony to the fact that something i’ve said or done, on some level, makes sense.

Beautiful relationships are unfolding with the clients I’ve met and I’m feeling warmth purer and safer than before. I trust the world as never before. I have a right to live a life that displays and embraces my trust in the world. I have a right to trust men. The hostility I have received is a symptom of fear. I can’t take their fear personally, I can’t hold the weight of their fear and hostility inside my being because my being wants to do other things right now. My being wants to find joy in the physicality of our connections to one another. My being wants to celebrate our togetherness.

okay, some elaboration…

“i have a right to trust men”– not just me, we all do. we all have a right to trust one another and when we begin to believe in each others’ goodness instead of fearing each others’ “badness”, we will strive to live up to each others’ beliefs. trust is a good thing. it allows freedom. trust is present when fear is absent.

“the hostility i have received”– i’m not imagining it. i’ve been called a lying whore. i have hate voice mails. i get long emails about how i’m “worse than a prostitute”. there is an image of me posted on a website beneath which men have left dozens of comments detailing their desire to strangle me, ejaculate on my face, and perpetrate other acts of sexual violence. most recently, the chair people of the graduate program i am in at school have requested a meeting to address the idea that snuggling and social work are incompatible. i’m afraid that if i don’t stop snuggling, i won’t be permitted to get my degree. though i strive to remain unaffected, that is not entirely realistic.

“my being wants to find joy in the physicality of our connections to one another”– for a long time, i’ve been very quiet. i’ve been afraid to speak up. i’ve had a sense that i’m different and when people see who i am, they won’t understand, won’t like me. instead of continuing to allow that fear to dictate my behavior, i’m giving myself permission to be who i am and do what i love to do. i trust earth is good for me and i am good for earth.

i don’t want to write about snuggling. i feel like snuggling but i don’t feel like thinking.

tonight, i ate ice cream and played hide and seek in a dark house. i didn’t actually really eat that much ice cream… processed dairy mixed with processed sugar makes me sick.

close your eyes and drift away. incomplete thoughts. a river bed. he said she said. left over lettuce from dinosaur barbeque in the fridge getting limp. eggplants in the garden needing harvesting. my juicer is dirty. i need more celery and lemon and ginger and green apples to juice. taking all the solid out of a food prior to consumption may not make sense, but it sure does feel good.

i dreamed a dream that this girl (i kinda know of her in real life) had purple sparkly converse high top sneakers. she was sleeping under a tree. her shoes were next to her. i liked them so i very quietly tip toed towards her and put my feet inside them. my feet were so little in her big shoes– made me feel like a child. as soon as i finished tying the second shoe, she sat up quickly out of her sleep and tweeted “omg the WHORE is trying on my shoes. i’m calling the cops” she capitalized “whore”. then she took her cell phone out and started dialing 911. i ran.

when i woke up, i put on some pajamas and went to snuggle.

i danced a dance in my underpants to the sound of les miserables soundtrack. then i watched the video of me dancing the dance in my underpants. then i thought “maybe if i die, they will play this at my funeral and this is how people will remember me”. if only i could be so lucky as to have friends who would know to play that video at my funeral.

i used to love imagining my funeral. i haven’t done that in a while. when i was a little girl, i begged my mother for my very own casket but never received one. i wanted tufted pink satin on the inside. i think there was a movie about a guy who had his funeral while he was still alive so he could be there for it. if i could find it on netflix, i would watch it. maybe i would identify with him and then i would feel more connected to humanity.

my mother was lucky to have so many children, each so different from one another.

I snuggled with an 82 year old man yesterday. I was amazed and delighted; honored. I felt like I was snuggling with history—a part of all of us. I wanted to ask him 8,000 questions. I was so close to him. I could touch the folds of his face, feel the softness of his 82-year-old-man hair on my fingers.

I can’t ever properly articulate what an amazing opportunity this has been for me. I’ve touched people I never thought I would touch. I’ve gotten into bed with them, entwined my legs with theirs, and held them in my arms. I’ve smelled their breath and felt the beat of their hearts slow as we lay next to each other. I’ve gotten closer to what it means to be human than I ever thought I could.

The problem with me has always been that I don’t speak. I don’t like to speak. I sit back and listen– feel. But in bed, there is so much to captivate me, so much more to facilitate and support a connection, besides speaking. Skin. Everyone’s skin feels so different. I can distinguish a contractor from a software programmer by their fingertips. Some men smell gentle and sweet like the powder my grandmother used to dust over my after bath time. Some men smell harsh and distinct like my brother’s cologne. Some breathe slowly and deeply immediately, others take time to settle into their breath.

I’m not sure why everything worked out so well for me.

Interviewers keep pressing the weirdness factor of what I do. Weird. Hmmm. I keep telling them that in order for change to happen, there has to be weirdness. That’s the nature of change—it is different. I’m not trying to make any radical changes here. Baby steps. We each do what we love and that is how we leave our footprint on this planet. I’m one small woman who wants to make the world a gentler place, one snuggle at a time. but that’s oversimplified. i want to be close to other human beings and learn about what it means to be human. that’s how we grow– we feed that connection, cultivate the parts we have in common with each other.

sometimes, when i do radio interviews, i have to pee. then i don’t know whether or not to flush because what if they can hear my toilet flushing on the radio?

I sat, soaked

in luke warm water,

knees pulled to chin.

Spout dug in

to back. I gave

birth to limp

mass of blue gray

baby. For a

few years, I was

a zombie. I breast

fed i fought

with baby daddy.

I cried. I loaded

the dish washer.

For a few years

I was a zombie.

Then I woke up,

bought a fancy lawyer,

sold a car and made

some Life Choices.

Made some lasagna

too. The lasagna was

better than any

of the life choices

but luck let me

prevail.

I don’t have anything important to say… but someday, I will.

I could pretend this is my diary… like Diary of a Wimpy Kid. Or Anne Frank.Those are kind of extremely different.

Dear Diary,

Today I snuggled. It was great. Then I got some iced coffee and now I can’t sleep. I’m living my own version of the American Dream… and its okay that they don’t like me in Pakistan.