What it feels Like to Rediscover Sex in Your Fifties

                                                  Sexy celebrities over 50

 Why should your sex life dry up when you reach middle age? I came of age sexually in the early 1970s. These were the sexual salad days of a generation, in that rose-coloured window between the appearance of the pill and the onslaught of HIV.  I started college along with an Indian bedspread, a plug-in teapot and a copy of On the Road, the trappings of my new life included the pill, dispensed like candy at the local clinic. Doctors and nurses treated nuisances such as crabs and genital warts without a trace of moral judgment. With libidos fuelled by recreational drugs, beer or just youthful hormones in overdrive, we suffered few regrets and little guilt. Our limbs were supple, our skin was unmottled, our bellies were flat.

Though my friends and I routinely poured our hearts out to each other  on a range of matters, a constant refrain was, "So, how was the sex?". How was the sex? Not so good. I know this now, in middle age, because I and many of my peers are having the best sex of our lives. Really.
In fact, people my age and older seem to fall into two distinct categories: those who crave sex, feel entitled to it and thrive on it, and those who couldn't care less if they never did it again.

Above all, good sex requires confidence. And confidence comes with age. When I was 18, 19, 20, I was too shy to discuss my desires with boyfriends, never mind one-night stands. None of us wanted it to be slam-bam, but slam-bam it mostly was. We pored over the book Our Bodies, Ourselves and concurred that we should contort ourselves in front of a mirror, speculum in hand, but we didn't truly inhabit our bodies. Mostly, we obsessed about being fat, which, ironically, few of us actually were. When it came to sex, I followed my partners' lead. My sexual behaviour reflected my general cluelessness. I couldn't count the times I would force a faux-satisfied murmur while some guy worked furiously on a spot miles away from any serious nerve endings. Now I have carnal GPS ­ turn there, stop here ­ and men are grateful and not at all shy about directing traffic themselves.

Good sex requires a well-honed sense of the ridiculous. This, too, comes from experiencing love, loss, parenthood and random infirmities since the summer of love. Though as youths we considered ourselves ground-breakingly ­hilarious, we steered clear of laughing at ourselves. Then again, when we were young and lacked a sense of power and self-awareness, unfunny stuff happened and we let it happen. Who hasn't been groped by some icky guy who made you want to puke. No 50-plus woman I know would put up with such nonsense. Among consenting, mature adults these antics are irrelevant.

The world is crowded with unattached, 50-plus men and women who aren't merely looking for sex, but for great sex. I know single women my age who simply won't abide bad sex. If their efforts to improve the situation aren't successful, they move on, telling anyone who asks that the sex was lousy and, as such, unacceptable. So much for the stereo­type of the postmenopausal sexual retiree.

Women's magazines are awash with prescriptions for reinvigorating, or reviving, marital sex in the waning years: light candles, wear seductive lingerie, unplug the phone, uncork the K-Y, pop the Viagra. That drug and its ilk may have fewer women tiptoeing around the delicate matter of erectile dysfunction. However, these recipes for romance don't address a big problem: many women over 50 are ashamed of their naked bodies. Yet it isn't a regimen of Pilates or eating like an air fern that makes you feel sexy. Sex makes you feel sexy. Fewer mirrors, more laughter, I say. Of women who are self-conscious about their flab, I ask, have you seen a guy over 50 without a spare tyre, or at least an undisguisable paunch? I know a man who looks like he's 12 months pregnant and he gets all the sex he wants. It's because he adores women, he's full of mischief and he has been around long enough to know that sex with a smart, confident, cellulite-covered woman in her sixties is much more fun than watching a bony Victoria's Secret model mesmerised by her own reflection.

 What a shame that marital sex can be so fraught, even burdensome, that many of us allow sex to recede until it withers and dies.  These days I sometimes view sex as akin to a spa treatment. It's invigorating, it gives me an all-over glow and it makes me feel attractive. It leaves me feeling peaceful and whole. At 50 and beyond, good sex reminds us how miraculous our flawed bodies can be. And it helps that you're not gnarling the bed sheets with an Olympian poster boy. I suppose we should also be grateful that our near vision is failing to the point where the unsightly is invisible.

There's another reason sex after 50 can and should be the best sex of our lives: our keen awareness of our mortality. Schopenhauer declared sex to be  the"greatest affirmation of life". Think of how sexually charged life ­becomes in a war zone. In advancing age, we are in a war zone of sorts. A voracious, unbridled bout of sex is the best hedge against death, and it's recession-proof. If we can still move, sex can make us feel better. Mysterious aches and pains evaporate. We sleep better. Postcoital food somehow tastes better, and we can eat it with the guiltlessness of an athlete. Not long ago, I read an ­article about sex in old-people's homes. The news was, not only does it exist, it is fairly common, and not only among committed couples. I find the notion ­inspiring. Nice to know that if we use it, we don't lose it. And it sure beats ­doing the hokey cokey in the day room.