He and I split for four days in September. It was an odd break-up; neither of us really wanted it but I was at a loss for how else to get unstuck and move forward. When it happens that way, I have to physically go off into the world by myself for awhile.

But after intense days of talking by phone and stating our cases, he knocked on the door again on a Monday afternoon, I opened it, and the rest is a much more satisfying story. It needed to happen; the bumps we’ve lived with for years are gone because of it. I’d do it again if I needed to.

That night we had some of the best sex of our seven-year relationship, and in the nights following we enjoyed (understatement) an unbroken string of 23 straight days of either fucking or getting each other off - sometimes more than once a day - before unintentionally skipping a night last week when we crawled into our tent at 1am and, mid-thought, fell asleep on each other.

Ah, well. The next day we picked up where we left off.

The need is unrelenting, and we had to get a little creative on the trip. On the 31-hour train ride, sitting next to a couple in their 50s, I waited until they dimmed the lights for sleeping then reached under the fleece jacket he was using as a blanket and jerked him off. Then we switched.

Monday night we had the hotel suite in Denver and made good use of it.

Tuesday night we arrived at the campground after dark and, assuming we had it mostly to ourselves, had some pretty loud moments only to wake up the next morning and discover there were other tents dotted around, one within about 100 feet. Oops.

Wednesday night was the night we passed out before we could get our hands on each other, but we made up for it on Thursday at the hotel in Salt Lake City.

Friday we drove 10 hours straight to get home, and somewhere near Battle Mountain, Nevada, I pulled off a lonely exit, got out of the moving truck, went over to the passenger side, opened the door, and jerked him off in the middle of the desert as the highway traffic rushed past. I was tempted to set up the camera on the tripod 20 feet away and take a very candid photo of it as it happened. I chickened out.

Worse than honeymooners, we’re like teenagers. We cannot keep away. Our relationship has always been very sexual, but this constant, constant undercurrent of irresistible urge day in and day out is new.

I like it.