But maybe boredom is erotic, when women do it, for men.
Interpretation
The quote suggests that boredom may have an alluring quality when perceived from a woman's perspective for men.
Margaret Atwood's quote presents a thought-provoking notion that boredom, often seen as negative, can possess a kind of erotic appeal, particularly from the viewpoint of women and their interactions with men. It implies that the mundane aspects of life and relationships might carry hidden depths of attraction and intrigue, revealing an unexpected complexity in how we perceive desire and engagement in romantic contexts.
In practice
During a gender studies lecture discussing the complexities of attraction.
If I am good enough and quiet enough, perhaps after all they will let me go; but it’s not easy being quiet and good, it’s like hanging on to the edge of a bridge when you’ve already fallen over; you don’t seem to be moving, just dangling there, and yet it is taking all your strength.
I would like to believe this is a story I’m telling. I need to believe it. I must believe it. Those who can believe that such stories are only stories have a better chance. If it’s a story I’m telling, then I have control over the ending. Then there will be an ending, to the story, and real life will come after it. I can pick up where I left off.
What else can I do? Once you've gone this far you aren't fit for anything else. Something happens to your mind. You're overqualified, overspecialized, and everybody knows it. Nobody in any other game would be crazy enough to hire me. I wouldn't even make a good ditch-digger, I'd start tearing apart the sewer-system, trying to pick-axe and unearth all those chthonic symbols - pipes, valves, cloacal conduits... No, no. I'll have to be a slave in the paper-mines for all time.
We love each other, that’s true whatever it means, but we aren’t good at it; for some it’s a talent, for others only an addiction.
I've learned quite a lot, over the years, by avoiding what I was supposed to be learning.
Knowing too much about other people puts you in their power, they have a claim on you, you are forced to understand their reasons for doing things and then you are weakened.
Some people insist they've never met a gay person. But Three Degrees of Jason Collins dictates that no NBA player can claim that anymore. Pro basketball is a family. And pretty much every family I know has a brother, sister or cousin who's gay. In the brotherhood of the NBA, I just happen to be the one who's out.
Like every child, I adored her. Until I formed a brain and got to know her.
You don't need to be told some things. You can sometimes tell more by a man's silence and the set of his head than by what he says.
Cats and their owners are on a private, exclusive loop of affection. Thus cats have become symbolic of a community eschewed and a hyper-engagement with oneself. They represent the profound danger of growing so independent in New York that it's not merely that you don't need anyone - it's that you don't know how to need anyone.
Appreciation - Learn to give flowers while people are still living
Our goal is to create a quality of empathic connection that allows everyone's needs to be met.
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