Lady business

So, having finished 50 Shades (it was pretty meh, at least with Twilight I had some mislead hope that it might get better - with this one it was just so one note from the start I can't even bring myself to care about the next two), I have officially started Sex at Dawn. It's a book I've had in my "to read" pile for awhile, and have finally decided to actually just hammer down and read.

So far, I'm not exactly sure how I feel about it. I'm about 200 pages in, and the whole, "guess what people, monogamy might not be the best option for everyone" argument is something I certainly agree with. In fact, I might have a few other books in my personal library that make similar arguments. It might be a big part of why I originally decided to read Sex at Dawn. On the other hand, the writing style is sort of random sometimes. And this coming from somebody who has difficulty putting together coherent blog entries, let alone an entire non-fiction novel. Even the 64 pages that wound up being my Master's capstone I'm sure was not stellar as far as literature is concerned. But there are several times that I find myself having to read and reread sentences to try and figure out the actual point.

Despite some personal clarity issues, the only other major issue I have right now is I'm in a chapter where they're talking about "wife sharing" in other cultures. Which is an interesting concept if you frame it the way they do, which is in the sort of way where it's fun and consensual. There's a little part of me that has an issue with the idea of tribesmen offering up their wives to visitors for sex, or women participating in sexualized rituals with multiple men at the same time. In instances such as these, I tend to wonder how much actual consent of the woman is a part of the process, and how much it's, "you're an available sex object, go make yourself worthwhile." I don't think it's helpful to frame wife sharing as an entirely positive, cooperative activity.

On sucking cock

It's come up at least twice today. Frisbee mentioned it, and my Mouseketeer (Hooray, another arbitrary nickname! waves if you're reading this.) brought it up as well. Completely different contexts to both conversations, but cock sucking was mentioned in both.

I warned you that I like to bring up the topic of my cock unbidden - sometimes I also bring up the actual cock, but there's usually a bit more warning in those type of scenarios. So this is the blog post where I'm going to do that. But we'll of course also deviate just a bit. Standard issue thought processes are difficult for me.

When I'm going down on somebody else, it's an incredibly powerful feeling for me. To have such a small percentage of somebody's body (let's not get all twisted about size, that's not what I'm talking about, more in the way that I'm interacting orally with just somebody's genitals, as opposed to say, unhooking my jaw and swallowing them whole from the feet up) in and around your mouth and yet have so much control over their pleasure is pretty cool. My hands can reach, grab, pull, stroke other parts, but ultimately it's tongue, lips, and teeth running the show. And that's neat.

I'm not a huge fan of people going down on me. It's a bit that stupid lady, "I'm not supposed to like it/guys aren't supposed to want to do it/it looks, smells funny/etc ad infinitum" thing. It's also that I've very rarely found somebody who was spectacular at it, and I'm a pretty exacting person when it comes to getting myself off. That I don't know if it boils down to me being a frequent masturbator, so I know what I like, or if it's because I'm a fan of the ladies, so I know how I would go down on a woman, and very few people do it the way I would.

Now. Getting my dick sucked is phenomenal. It can take a bit of courage for me to ask somebody to do (again, that little, "oh, this is weird and might freak you out and you might run away from me forever" voice works it's magic), but once it's happening it is awesome. I've heard some really bad horror stories from male friends about significant others who just didn't get blowjobs (too much teeth, no lip closure, I had a friend whose girlfriend actually blew on his dick like she was cooling soup). I've been lucky so far I guess.

Countdown

4 days left until Pride and counting. I've already picked my Pride anthem for this year (not necessarily an actual ritual, but it just happens to be on the radio recently, and the buildup and bass to the chorus is so deliciously mid-90s club that I can't help myself).

One of my favorite parts about the whole group alliance thing is being able to watch everyday occurrences and interpret them in very gay ways. In the previous sentence, I am of course using "gay" in the only way it was ever meant to be used, to mean ridiculously more awesome. Case in point, I have been on a classic movie kick recently. Guys and Dolls and It Happened One Night and such. I was talking to Frisbee (if you're reading this, hooray! Now you have a completely arbitrary and sort of boring nickname as well) about Aladdin being the second gayest Disney movie. The most gay? Little Mermaid. No contest. Now-hubby and I constantly debate whether or not Clark Gable was gay (I am for, he is against). I would say at least 75% of the dancers from Luck Be a Lady were friends of Dorothy.

That's another thing that's totally gay (again, read, "ridiculously more awesome"). Our vernacular and history is awesome. Things like the hanky code are this neat little peek at how a culture makes itself work when you can't just go, "well, I have a penis and you have a vagina. Let's insert the former into the latter and make a baby as the Lord intended." I am, of course, not trying to imply that all straight people have boring textbook sex. But as Blink-182 once said, "We believe in the love that exists between two vaginas." Yes, I realize that's not really a cohesive argument at all. All my brain cells are currently residing in what is the last bits of my Master's thesis (I tried for a Mistress degree, but they only had Master's. Hurr hurr.)

Gender fuckery

My internal, "Pride is coming up, time to get freaking excited" internal clock is beginning to tick. Chicago Pride is the 24th - a little more than 2 weeks away. I'm already craving club music, dykes on bikes, and drag queens sweating off their heavy eyeshadow. I know I've already mentioned Pride here before, and how freaking awesome it is, but it bears repeating.

In related news, I was talking to a straight (but kinky) friend last night about what I like about using a strap-on. (Totally unrequested conversation, by the way. I tend to just sort of meet up with my friends and say, "good evening, we're going to talk about strap-ons tonight." And then blather loudly over all their protestations.) <-- Entire parenthetical statement was a joke, for those of you having trouble keeping up.

The conversation eventually wound it's way to the idea of "forced bi," i.e. a submissive being put in a situation where they were made to somehow interact sexually with someone of the same gender. (I believe the same sort of scenario could apply to gay/lesbian submissives, as a sort of "forced straight" thing.) It was a very interesting idea for me, as a card carrying member of Ye Ol' Queer Brigade. I believe the first time I had a naked woman available to me in a bed the only thought running through my head looked a bit like this: (Where of course Neville is me being a spaz about it, and Seamus is my subconscious reaching levels of spaz heretofore unknown to man.)

Two points for honesty

A side-note to the entry on open relationship input. Honesty. Especially when we're talking about the communication aspect. Not only honesty about who you're with/what is going on, depending on how much your significant other wants to know (i.e. "I'm going out with so-and-so to whereabouts, we'll be back at this time, there will possibly be this sexual event occurring at some point in the evening.") Also honesty about feelings, which is the more difficult aspect. At least it was for me. Being able to say, "this makes me feel uncomfortable." Or, "I'd really like it if you'd kiss me right now." (Hopefully these sentences don't occur one after the other. :p) Asking for what I wanted is/was a huge hurdle. Who can say if it's partly upbringing, futilely trying to keep everything together even while those around me continuously tore it down. Or maybe just the old societal, "you're a lady, don't talk about things you want, because guys don't want to hear about that." Who knows. Now-hubby and I got in a discussion once over an event I was going to with one of the other guys I was dating. It was something now-hubby would also be interested in, but I had just recently met the other guy, and wanted to spend the time just with him. Instead of just saying, "I'd like this time to just be me and so-and-so," now-hubby and I wasted about 2 days going, "well, what do you feel?" before he finally got bored and asked, "What do you want to do? Just say it." Therapy woman tells me I need to start counting to 3 when somebody asks me a, "What do you want?" question and then just say honestly what I'm thinking. Perhaps we'll get there someday.

Comedic timing

The intrepid Girls With Slingshots recently had a sidebar link to this little gem: Go Get a Roomie

I've started at the beginning in the archives, and this one sort of popped out at me. It's very similar to discussions I get in with people sometimes. Both about the idea that I have a husband as well as also date/have sex with other people (and that he does as well), but use terminology that others also use. I think it's interesting that there's the idea out there that poly somehow has to necessitate an entire other language just in order to be possible. You can't call going out to dinner with somebody who is not your husband a "date," because "date" already has a gender and sexual-role specific definition that doesn't fit that.

Also the idea that since I'm open, I must want to sleep with everybody. This, for me, is a similar mindset to the one that existed for the other women on my dorm floor in college. You know, the ones who would pull their towels tighter around them if I happened to come into the floor bathroom to shower, or the ones who actually told me they couldn't be friends with me because, "they didn't want me to get the wrong idea." (I believe said idea had a lot to do with another great straight people/monogamy myth in that you can't possibly be friends with somebody of the opposite gender, because at some point you are almost always going to want to touch genitals with them.)

The second idea is more interesting for me. The language thing, that's just a matter of semantics. For an outside example, let's say I have a navy blue shirt. Somebody else has a periwinkle blue shirt. (Side note: I Googled "periwinkle" just for shits and the dictionary definition says, "another term for WINKLE." snrk) Both shirts are technically "blue," but just different versions of the same color. The second idea comes down to intentions and actions, which are more difficult to hold up to somebody's face and say, "see? These are both still blue." The issue comes about in that I am sort of a sexual person. I relate to others in a sexual manner, and it feels comfortable for me. Does that mean I touch genitals with everybody that I meet? Not necessarily. But it's a more difficult color blue to explain for those who don't know it.

They love to watch her strut.

I was talking to now-hubby recently about the definition of "vanilla." He does a podcast with a few other gentleman, and recently they got together to do a live recording. When he was telling me about it later, it came up that the other guys involved were fairly vanilla. The way now-hubby put it: "I don't even think any of them have ever done it in the butt." Me: "You mean, not even accidentally like, 'oops now it's in your butt?'"

The individual human experience being what it is, it's always fascinating to be among different groups when talking about sexual acts. For example, within the kink community there are experiences others have had that I haven't, nor am I interested at all in trying. But it's still out there as an option, and I'm familiar with the vocabulary. Sometimes I will forget myself outside of the kink community if I'm around people who I feel I otherwise have a lot in common with and say something like, "rope play" and then just get blank looks.