You’re eighteen. Go.
July 18th, 2007You don’t realize that you’re kinky. You just realize that your boyfriends think you’re weird.
You start to seek out other weird people. It seems too lonely an existence to be weird by yourself. After all, you’re 18 and angsty.
At some point people offer you a role in their fantasies, and you find most of them are pleasant, if not thrilling. You like being dressed up in pretty things, and being dressed down in grubby ones, and even being naked. You like getting spanked and you like biting people. You like the ridiculous erotica. It’s all interesting really.
Sometimes you can’t sleep at night from the nail-biting, trembling, nausea-inducing want. But you keep it in check. You don’t know what you want, so how can you ask for it? You’re young.
Sex is still primarily about being good at sex. You haven’t yet learned how to be good at getting off, although by luck of biology, you’ll probably never need to try. You can’t separate your desires and his desires. The only things you’re sure of are the ones you must dislike, and those will shortly get swept from under your feet. Because you cannot articulate what you want, your sexuality is passive, receptive. The mere suggestion that you’re submissive leads your boyfriend to start printing out slave protocols off the Internet.
You start doing nude modeling. When you make money on it, you feel like you’re pulling one over on the universe. How fucking crazy that people would pay you to be photographed? You can barely get a date. You suffer fits of terror about misrepresenting yourself as “beautiful” and “thin”. You learn to do makeup. You learn to listen to what people say about your appearance, and they have a lot to say.
Later, your terrors center around BDSM. An errant bruise could condemn you to cancel a whole week’s shoots. How can you have sex, this hedonistic, indulgent thing? How can you ever justify it — and why the fuck can’t you just be normal? Your avocation and your means of employment are diametrically opposed.
You discover polyamory. You date a variety of non-monogamous people out of sheer stubbornness. You realize, given choice for the first time, that sheer will to conform and succeed does not fulfill you.
Armed with your strange new beautiful body, you go forth, as you might collect on a winning lottery ticket. You try a smattering of sex work. To your consternation, you find that little of it is unpleasant, even the parts that are contrived. Aren’t hate and fear supposed to be part of sexuality, warming the truly intimate acts where you can find comfort from the storm? Isn’t this supposed to feel filthy, so that the legitimate things can be clean? Are you really that much of a traitor and a slut?
Your lovers tell you you’re a masochist. You look at the men and women who claim that title and say you’re not. On the sliding scale of “normal” to “masochist” you’re somewhere in the middle with your hand down your pants. Up a little! No, wait, down a little. And to the right, while you’re there.
Your lovers ask you to top them. You do — it’s a matter of pride, to be just as capable as at the rest of it — and for the first time, you resent this. To cater to their desires while you’re playing submissive is one thing; to let them beat it out of you is even easier. But to have to present their desires as your own? That’s bitter. You can barely articulate your own needs, but the wordless want, the pit of it is yawning. You build up anger, and with it the cruel certainty that your anger is unjustified.
You’re young, and they know better.
You stop playing submissive: you’re tired of manipulating people, tired of emasculating them and belittling them in order to be whole. You buy a vibrator, then two. You buy your first whip with no intention of it being used on you. You keep looking for people who will hurt you more than you are willing to be hurt. You find a few, and they make you so happy, you could cry. But they do not make you cry.
You have threesomes, you have orgies. You fuck girls and boys and girl-boys. You hurt people and you tie them up but mostly, you are interested in playing vicious games. You like to win those games.
You learn to turn the childhood ban on “no” around. You love your “no” utterly, foolishly, rather like your parents must have loved that child. And that gives you back your “yes,” the option of asking for things for yourself.
“If you’re _____ you’ll know.” Fill in the the blank: gay, straight, submissive, dominant, even in love. But it’s not a matter of always knowing your place, and selfishly wanting to annex someone else’s territory. You’ve never known your place, if you have even one.
Now that you can ask, what do you ask, anyway? At what point are you grown up enough to know?
On a lighter note, my 22nd birthday is rapidly approaching. Not being a particularly material person, I have no idea what to ask for. Okay, I lied: I asked for a threesome. More likely suggestions are welcome.
July 19th, 2007 at 9:07 am
I really loved this post. I’m a man so always curious how women think. Your post is so open and real. Thank you for sharing a little bit of your soul with us!
The name and email above are not real so you won’t hurt my feelings if you don’t post this to your blog. I just wanted to thank you.
July 19th, 2007 at 10:12 am
Now that is a good book, isn’t it?
And this was a good post. Suddenly more about you falls into place with much greater clarity for me. Thanks for that.
And, naturally, the only problem about your request for a threesome is going to be logisitcs. Minor details. Happy early birthday.
July 19th, 2007 at 11:21 am
BN - You’re welcome! I’m happy that you enjoy reading.
May - The logistics are proving troublesome. I have no leads, in New York at least.
Bisexual men are a damnably picky bunch, I’m thinking. My boyfriend not least among them.
July 20th, 2007 at 8:55 pm
loved this post, love your blog in general, you are so honest about this stuff not a lot of people wolud talk about, i´ll keep on reading it and learning more about the lifestyle
July 21st, 2007 at 5:52 pm
I identified a lot with this post.
My 22nd birthday is also rapidly approaching. I asked my partner for 6 straight hours of sex.
We’ll see if he can take it.
July 23rd, 2007 at 8:23 pm
Chesty, tell us if he lives. (If he does… he’s not a bisexual man looking for a threesome by any chance? Kidding, kidding.)
July 23rd, 2007 at 9:10 pm
*hands you a lead*
July 26th, 2007 at 8:39 am
You have such mainstream beauty, I was always intimidated by you. You were quiet (shy maybe?) and part of a circle that was not mine, and I always assumed that you would want nothing to do with me, given that I have never possessed that sort of socially smiled-upon beauty. Somehow a while back, I found myself in conversation with you. You were friendly and sweet, with no apparent trace of disdain. I’ve found you approaching me now and then, and I’ve tried to disguise my surprise. I find myself uncertain how to respond to you. You are reserved. I don’t want to trespass your boundaries. I read your blog and now I’m a little intimidated by your intelligence, but so moved by your emotional process. Sometimes I think that I’d like to offer you some of the things that you need. Someday, maybe. For now, I’ll continue to observe and admire and let you approach as you wish.
Thank you for sharing the things that move you. I hope your birthday is a smashing success, threesome or no.
July 26th, 2007 at 9:55 pm
You’ve succeeded in confusing me utterly. I’ve no idea who you are (as seems to be the point) but at least you don’t seem malicious, unless hurting my brain counts.
July 27th, 2007 at 8:34 am
I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to confuse you. I was thinking out loud, and maybe I should have refrained! I was essentially trying to say that I like you but I’m very shy around you, and I’m surprised when you come talk to me because I grew up being very much ignored by pretty girls, and possibly I should confront my assumptions more. Sorry I talked in circles. Maybe someday I’ll confess.
December 11th, 2007 at 12:19 am
I really liked this, both the writing and the honest struggle to figure it out. I don’t know if it gets easier or harder - a little of each probably - but there’s no “if you’re ___ you’ll know” as far as I can tell, there’s only what is right now, what was, and what might be.
Which sounds horrifyingly pedantic, but is also, fortunately or not, true.
i’ve read this twice now. I like it a lot.
December 12th, 2007 at 10:02 pm
Bad Man - Thanks. It sounds reassuring, not pedantic, which I am sure is the spirit in which it was meant.