During a summer family trip we stayed with a friend of mine and his family for a few days in a rural area an hour south of Grenoble, France. The landscape features rough, mystical mountains in all directions — I loved it.
We knew each other through some online work (but hadn’t previously met in person), and so next to spending time with our families, we also engaged with some of the topics we usually engage with online: nonviolence, feminism, patriarchy, and in this time specifically bell hooks’ book “The will to change” [1].
And before we each went to bed we hugged in a way I’ve only hugged very few men so far in my life. It was a long hug, a strong hug, and yet still tender, enjoying each others’ physical closeness, sensing our breathings, how they would go in and out of sync, and holding each other in a way that I believe is unknown to most men (at least in my culture), and, sadly, not part of my daily life.
And just in case someone wonders: No, that hug was not sexual in any way. It was not a hug that got me activated or aroused in any way, it settled my nervous systems, it brought softness and deep joy to my entire being without attachment or longing for more physical touch in that moment.
[1] Also see Enjoying violence