Movin' On

Sad news, kids.

I've picked up a new project -- one that I'm really excited about. But it precludes me blogging here at Sexual Evolution. I honestly feel a sense of loss akin to ...well, what I imagine leaving summer camp must be like.

But now, like Candy and Pre before me, I'm closing up shop. I'll still be reading others' blogs and commenting from time to time, and you can still reach me at sexualevolution at gmail dot com.

So long... and thanks for all the fish smart sex talk!

I will stand in the rain on the corner...

It’s pouring here, the kind of rain that’s perfect for a first date. Two people who’ve just met, or met last week, or who’ve known each other for years and were suddenly drawn to each other by the immense heat of the past week – they’re out on the town, glowing, giving each other those looks. I saw those looks over and over tonight, before the rain started. “I can’t believe you’re with me,” is what that look says, and to anyone who will pay attention, “look! she’s with me!”

And then the rain starts, and sheer summer shirts stick to wet skin, and suddenly everyone is laughing. Rain like this always feels a little absurd because it seems to come from nowhere, and when it comes it isn’t kidding. You’ve got no chance to prepare yourself for this. Couples on first dates stand together under awnings, laughing and wringing out their shirts, proffering jackets, offering to hold umbrellas, gauging the probability that the rain will let up and considering making a run for it, whatever ‘it’ happens to be. And they’re grinning. They look like drowned rats, and yet somehow they just can’t wipe the smiles off their faces. I hope they take advantage of the downpour – few things are more romantic than making out in that kind of driving rain, especially when it comes on the heels of this kind of heat and humidity. I hope they tell their kids one day about getting caught in a downpour on their first date.

I walked home alone, my umbrella stowed away in my bag, my flip-flops squeak-squeaking as I struggled to keep them from sliding off my feet. Rain like this is meant for running through grass and on blacktop in bare feet and rolled up jeans (or, y’know, underwear), seeing who can make the biggest splash. Poorly drained city streets with god knows what in the stormwater aren’t made for that kind of romping. But city streets in summer storms were made for first dates.

(photo: Amanda a la drowned rat, El Yunque PR. Somehow we managed to forget that it would probably rain in the rainforest. Man, that was an awesome day.)

How I spent my day off...

I just looked around and realized that I'm laying in bed with a vibrator, a bag of chocolates, and a notebook and pen. This is how days off are meant to be, I think. At least once in a while.

Theory Heads, Take Note

Heather Corinna has written a long and very interesting post about the problematic nature of "sex positive feminism" as a category. It's really worth a read if feminist theory interests you. This response post is a little less to-the-point, more rambly, and less cohesive than my usual post, but bear with me.

Clearly, sometime this fall, I decided that "sex positive feminist" was a label I could claim for myself. Before that I had claimed "sex positive", but as for feminist... I guess I thought it went without saying. Anyway, Corinna raises some very important points, most importantly (I think) that these kinds of divisions amongst feminists aren't beneficial. While it's true that my opinions on pornography and sex work and the "adult industry" might differ from another feminist's, we still have a common goal, and for most of the relevant issues our differing perspectives on sex won't be pertinent.

She points out the sex-negative "strawfeminist" -- that is, that no such feminist exists -- to which I initially reacted "well of course no one labels herself that way." She creates a women's sexual autonomy manifesto of sorts, which is worth quoting:

To whit: women DO need the agency to have sex (or physical and emotional intimacy combined, however you’d like to put it or whatever you’d like to have) on their terms, and by their definition, that is pleasurable, that is real communion, that honors our bodies and selves.

Women DO need real sexual autonomy and ownership of our bodies and our sexualities.

Women DO need a cultural sexuality that includes them, truly allows for them, and which holds them in equal regard.

Women DO need to be able to define sex on our own terms, whatever they may be, and have equal allowance made for us to even be able to discover what our authentic sexualities and terms even are — to truly author our own sexuality — free of pressures to make our sexuality fit, support or enable a cultural model of sexuality which men created, not women, and which men created without much, if any, accord for women. Hell, we didn’t even get to be the ones who named our own parts.

She follows it with an assertion that radical feminists recognize that masculine sexual culture is one source of women's oppression. That may be true, and I also think she's right that most feminists affirm the importance of women's sexual equality, but I certainly feel like issues of sexuality are often treated as frivolous and unimportant in radfem circles. The exception, of course, is when pornography and sex work are being burned at the stake as the primary means by which men are keeping women in their place (okay, I'm taking a deep breath, I'm moving past it).

Corinna also worries that adding "sex positive" to the label "feminist" weakens it by half:

To plenty of men, that sex-positive in front of feminist says that either I am the sort of feminist they just don’t have to worry about, because I pose no real threat to them — since I don’t appear to want to take away or limit access to sex — or worse still, in some cases, it says additionally that they will get the heart of what they really want from me — sex — regardless, so who freaking cares if I’m feminist, right? So, you nod and smile when I talk women’s equality and it’s all cool: you’re still getting laid, Joe.

This reminds me of my own rejection of the term "bisexual" based on the fear that people would hear it and assume I was 'easy' or 'greedy'. A housemate of mine put "bisexual -- and still not interested in you!" in her facebook profile to combat that perception; I chose queer as a label instead, for several reasons, but definitely to prevent people from thinking that I'm just a horny bitch who'll do anyone she can get her hands on.

But if we reject terms like bisexual and sex positive based on what other people think we mean by them, aren't we just perpetuating the stereotype? I am sex-positive; that doesn't mean I'm not critical of sexual culture (in fact it may well mean I'm more critical than most), and it sure as hell doesn't mean I'm going to sleep with you. Why should I allow anyone to think that my intellectual and political interest in sex means I'm indiscriminate when it comes to sexual partners? I want a bumper sticker: "sex positive -- and still not interested in you!"

So. Corinna makes a lot of good points, although I don't agree with all of it. Certainly lots to think about, in any case; I think one of the most basic, and most important, points she makes is that feminist "community" isn't sweet and gooey and always supportive. It's hard, and challenging, and critical, and in order to be a part of it you have to be willing examine what's really behind your position.

So, things have been a little crazy...

I worked a two-week stint of ten-hour days -- and as soon as that was over, I had a convenient couple of days of to move into (drumroll, please...) my new apartment! The last several days have been a flurry of moving and shopping for accouterments (like an absolutely beautiful set of dishes that I decided to splurge on a little, since hey, I'm going to be eating off of them for a while) and opening a bank account here (since at this point it's pretty clear I'll be here a while) and getting internet installed and having online Ikea dates with the Beau to pick out our furniture and... it's been a little overwhelming, but also very gratifying.

Meanwhile, I've missed out on commenting on all kinds of things -- especially the Supreme Court's unfortunate decision to uphold the Partial Birth Abortion Act as constitutional, and North Dakota's trigger law (which will make abortion illegal in the state immediately upon a reversal of Roe v. Wade, heaven forbid). At this point, pretty much anything I would have said has been said. It's all fucking terrifying.

In much better news: Massachusetts has joined the list of states which will decline federal money for abstinence-only programming! Way to go, Deval. We knew you could do it.

Over at Eden Fantasys, my review of the Swinging Pendulum has gone up, as well as an article I wrote for them about Phthalates and sex toys -- check it out!

So: my apologies for the dearth of posts, readers dear. Things ought to get back to normal around here now -- I hope -- for a few weeks at least!

(also: HAPPY BIRTHDAY to my favorite veggie connoisseur!)

Spanking Dilemma Solved!

Isn't it beautiful? Coco de Mer, the company that makes it, uses fair-trade and renewable resources, and they make truly beautiful, classy looking products. The product description:

A classic wooden paddle, handcrafted by a passionate English spanker. This paddle is ethically made by a fair trade project in India and the wood from a substainable source. So spank away for a better world!

Good stuff, right? Their leather cuffs are beautiful as well, and totally belong on my kinky wishlist.

Spankers and Slappers and Paddles, Oh My!

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Warning: This Post Is Not About Sex.

And it's kinda sad.

One of my dogs had to be put down this morning. Blazer was twelve and a half, which is old in Siberian Husky Years. I hadn't seen him since January, when I gave him a goodbye snuggle and admonished him not to die before I saw him again. A week or two ago my mother let me know that things weren't looking good -- his eyesight was going, he whined all the time and slept very little, and he'd gotten too weak to walk up the stairs to go to bed at night (which led me to imagine my father carrying a 60lb Sibe up the stairs, and it's a pretty funny image, especially because I'm sure Blaze would have fought it the whole time).

I found out when I called this morning to leave a message for my parents, both of whom I knew would be at work, and my 17 year old sister answered. I was, of course, walking down the street on my way to a coffee shop to write for a while when she told me. I stood still on the sidewalk, trying to keep it together, and managed until I tried to say goodbye. I hung up, cried, was embarrassed to be crying in public and over a dog (when so many people wouldn't understand), pulled it together, called Beau and started crying all over again when I heard his voice on his voicemail message.

Blazer was the Alpha Male, although he started to lose that position in the group towards the end. Koda will take over now, I'm sure -- he's one of the smartest dogs I've ever known. I asked my sister how Hoover was handling it -- Hoover is a little slow(to say the least), and he really loved and relied on Blazer. Ab said she was pretty sure Hoover didn't get it; he stood there wagging his tail at Blazer's body as if to say "come on, get up, come play!" Tucker, on the other hand, apparently got it right away -- the first thing he did was find and sniff the injection site. When they took the rest of the dogs back into the house, Hoover tried to slip his collar to go back out and be with Blazer.

Needless to say, I'm finding it a little hard to write about sex right now. This is the problem with being a Big Girl and moving away from home; animals, and eventually people, will die, and I won't be there when it happens.

Blaze is the one in the photo who's trying to jump out of my dad's Lemans. He's furious that my mother put a pink scarf on him for the christmas photo.

Tantus G-Spot Review and a Headache

My review of the Tantus G-spot is up at EdenFantasys!

Products from Tantus are hand-made with high-quality silicone. No phthalates there, folks! This wasn't the best toy I've ever used, but I think it would make a good g-spot toy for use with a harness, so if you use one of those you should check it out.

In other news: apparently my immune system survives full-on attacks better than guerrilla warfare. Ten days of throwing caution to the wind with my sick boyfriend got me approximately two days of mildly sore throat. Then my roommate got sick, and somehow -- even though I make out with her a lot less than I make out with my beau -- today I feel like hell. Go figure.

The Ultimate Green Sex Toy

We were talking about living green and reducing carbon footprints in the apartment tonight when my beau tapped me on the knee:

"Your job," he said, "is to make environmentally friendly sex toys."

From across the room, Roomie chimed in: "Isn't that what cucumbers are for?"

And this is why I love my friends.

What is this strange thing you call blog posting?

Once upon a time I thought that my life would no longer be dictated by the university schedule after I'd obtained my Bachelor's, but a year later... sorry for the dearth of posts, kids, but it's spring break and I've been too busy having sex to write about it!

Yesterday, March 20th, was Back Up Your Birth Control day. Emergency contraception is available without a prescription to women over 18 now, and should be available at your local pharmacy. If you're a woman having potentially reproductive sex it's a good idea to keep a dose on-hand -- that way this is less likely to happen to you.

If was 7am on July 5th, and I woke up still tipsy in the arms of the guy I'd been dating (Mr. Spring, that is) on my best friend's couch. He wanted to leave -- he was restless, and possibly embarassed by my antics (our antics, to be fair) from the night before. I crept into my friend's bedroom, found my pants, kissed her and her boyfriend on the forehead and told them to call later. We were literally 20 minutes into the hour drive back to our hometown before I realized I wasn't wearing my shoes --I'd left them behind in my friend's room.

Somehow, as we drove along, the subject of birth control came up. We hadn't used a condom the night before, and I wasn't on birth control, but since he hadn't ejaculated inside of me I wasn't that worried (though there's still plenty of reason to worry in that situation). Or at least, I wasn't until I realized he was.

"What do you mean you're not on birth control?" He asked. I shrugged. "Look," I said, "I know it's a risk, but it's a fairly small one and I'm comfortable with it."

"Small risk?" he said incredulously, "My dad got both of his wives pregnant the first time he had sex with them. I come from a fertile family. It's a pretty big risk." Normally too emotionally unavailable to lose his cool this much, he was in quite a tizzy over some pre-ejaculate fluid.

"Okay, look, it's not like you actually came, so we're probably--"

"Yes I did," he cut me off, shooting me a quizical look. "When?" I demanded, wondering how I could possibly have missed it.

I won't go into much more detail, but he explained when and I guess I must have had more to drink than I thought, because... well, I just had no idea. Anyway, we decided on EC. I called my clinic for a prescription, but they were closed. Panicking, I hung up and we headed to the ER attached to the clinic in hopes that someone there would write a prescription.

My honey pulled a u-turn as we passed his house on the way to the hospital. "What are you doing?" I asked. "My folks are away," he responded, "and there's no way I'm going into a hospital for emergency contraception with you barefoot. You're borrowing my step-mom's shoes."

I got my EC and I didn't get pregnant, thank goodness, nor did anyone get the opportunity to make "barefoot and pregnant" jokes (until now!). The moral of the story, though, is go get some EC! It's so much easier to have it on hand than to chase it all over town in borrowed sneakers.

Birthday Spankings!

Today is Sexual Evolution’s first birthday! Unfortunately, you can’t really spank a blog. I’d offer to let you spank me instead, but I’m not sure my beau would approve.

I wasn’t always a spanking kind of girl. There was a time, long after I’d begun to explore my kinky side, when I found spanking fantasies laugh-out-loud funny. Erotica with spanking in it was an immediate turn off. When Virginia, who was older than me and had already gotten in touch with her spanko-self, asked me to spank her one night, I tried, and wavered the entire time between laughing (because it felt so ridiculous) and crying (because I was utterly mortified by the whole thing). Needless to say, it was not a satisfying experience for either of us.

But then I found myself in a relationship that was outright kinky.

I knew he liked to top, he knew I liked to bottom, and even our most vanilla sex usually had some element of power-play. When we had our initial series of “what would you flag?” conversations, we agreed that neither of us was turned on by spanking play and it wouldn’t be a part of our bedroom repertoire.

Then something changed. I got into the habit of making a certain kind of silly joke which happened to drive him crazy. He warned me one day that if I kept making those jokes he was going to have to spank me – so of course I had to test my limits. He grabbed me and spanked me and I squealed and we both laughed. It was funny, not sexy, and it became a game for me – I’d see if I could slip in a joke without him noticing. Inevitably, he’d notice. He spanked me in front of friends once, and I was horrified (although probably not as horrified as them. Then one night, as we were leaving my house for his apartment, I made the forbidden joke as we walked past the living room full of people. I said goodbye for the evening to my friends, thinking nothing of it, and as we stepped onto the porch and the door closed behind he pushed me up against the rough brick wall.

“No!” I whispered, “someone might see!”

“Guess you shouldn’t have made that joke then,” he said, and brought his hand down hard against my backside. I stifled my yelp and swallowed the safeword that had been on the tip of my tongue. This felt different. He meant business, and it completely changed the way I felt about the spanking. We stepped off the porch, my backside stinging. I hoped that no one had seen, but the whole walk to his apartment I struggled to get a grip on the intense and new experience of being so incredibly turned on by my own sense of shame. By the time we made it to his bedroom I was pretty much ready to tear his clothes off.

But I digress. Happy Birthday, blog-o-mine! Here’s to another year of smart sex.

Love,
Amanda

Slut

I’m not really a slut in the classic sense. I’ve had my fair share of sexual partners, sure, but they’ve all been people I’ve known for some length of time and given some thought to. Even my one and only one night stand was with someone I’d known casually for years. Despite the fact that there are people in my life who have more or less called me a slut, and the fact that my mother still worries about my reputation, I’m not what most people would consider a slut.

But there’s a word – a bedroom word – that makes me weak in the knees. Rachel Kramer Bussel thinks everyone has one, and she may be right, but I know for certain that I have one.

It’s slut.


I get a little shivery just typing it, actually. I had fantasies about that word for a year or so before someone finally unleashed it on me. It was one of my most secret fantasies, because (as a 14 year old feminist) my rational brain thought it was horribly degrading. How could I be so turned on by something so against my politics? But one afternoon, after we’d been having sex for about a year and a half, my high school boyfriend pinned my arms above my head and whispered “You’re such a little slut” into my ear.

I went absolutely wild. I locked my eyes with his for a second, and then I was finally able to act out the fantasy I’d been having in my head for years. It’s not a very complex fantasy: the person I’m with calls me a slut, and I say I’m sorry for being such a slut, and then he (or she) has his (or her) way with me (this is one of my few equal-opportunity fantasies). Of course, he brought out the s-word because he’d seen it in porn and read it in erotica, but it didn’t matter to me where it came from. All that mattered was that my dirty little secret was out in the open.

For the rest of the time we dated, he expanded on the “slut” theme. Words like “cockslut” and “cumslut” became part of our bedroom vocabulary. I’ve said a lot of mean things about this particular ex and his sexual prowess in the past several years, but I’ve got to hand it to him: he knew how to talk dirty.

Why Slut? My theory is that it allows me to let my sexually ravenous side out. After all, if the person I’m with knows my dirty little secret – that deep inside of this innocent looking blonde girl is a debauched, wanton harlot just waiting to make her appearance – well then, why hide it?

Years later, I was up against the wall of my dorm room, pants around my ankles, being done with such force that I thought my knees would buckle. Call me slut, I pleaded in my head, tell me I’m your dirty little slut. I wasn’t quite ready to give voice to that taboo desire in the context of my new-ish relationship, though, and apparently my telepathic skills were a little out of practice that evening.

When it was over, we collapsed onto my bed and I curled up against his chest. After a few minutes of conversation about the power-structure of our sexual relationship, he tentatively asked if there was anything I was particularly opposed to. Was he asking what I hoped he was asking? I began a faltering answer, unsure if he really meant what I thought he did, but he cut me off.

“Any words, I mean,” he clarified.

He was asking! I told him in a rush that I wasn’t easily offended and in fact I love being called slut, and he let out a long breath and told me that was the exact word he’d wanted to use, but he hadn’t wanted to offend me. Apparently my slut nature is more obvious to the people I sleep with than I realized! We spent the rest of the evening proving to each other that the label was an appropriate one.

So there, now you all know my dirty little secret. Just for the record, it doesn’t work unless I’m already attracted to you – if someone walked up to me on the street and called me a slut, I’d punch him in the balls and be done with it. But in bed… mmmph. Hearing that word makes any sex better.

What's a Flower?

Dear February,

Thank you for being an unusually short month, because I'm pretty sure I couldn't take much more of you.

Love,
Amanda

Great Moments in Sex Education

I’m a sex educator, but that hasn’t always meant that I’m as careful as I should be. Just like pretty much every other young person I know, my high school self was convinced that she was invincible. As the following story demonstrates, though, by the time I was a sophomore in college the sex-ed message had taken hold.

“Your tits look amazing in that dress,” Virginia said breathlessly, leaning in to me. It sounded so vulgar; coming out of her mouth, that only made it hotter. She had shown up to the party in a black silk slip with a black ribbon around her neck, next to which her skin was that perfect shade of creamy white you always hear described in smutty stories. Her flask was tucked into the lace at the top of her thigh-high stockings. She looked amazing, and she was paying attention to me. My cheeks felt hot. “Your tits look amazing.” How was I supposed to respond to that? “Thanks! Want to go upstairs and do it?” No, no. I didn’t want to scare her away. Everyone said Virginia scared easily when it came to relationships.

I waited until she turned back to the entertainment – drunken college a Capella – before resting my hand on the base of her neck. I traced a pattern there with my fingernail. She shivered. I stopped, just in case I was annoying her, but she pulled my hand back to her neck without even looking at me.

By the time the party moved upstairs to my bedroom I was drunk and desperate to get her out of that little black slip. On my bed, in front of a room full of people, she was taking off my borrowed stilettos and kissing and biting her way up my leg. The rest of the room was oblivious until Virginia reached the back of my knee – and sucked on it. Hard. Let me tell you, if you’ve never had the back of your knee sucked on, you’re missing out. I gasped and cried out, and the entire room turned to look – and then left. Quickly.

I flipped Virginia onto her back, kissed her mouth – hard – and her neck, pulled the straps of her slip down over her shoulders and touched and kissed as much of that creamy white skin of hers as I could manage. She was breathing hard. I was in heaven. I couldn’t believe my luck in having this beautiful, brilliant creature underneath me. I kissed her thighs, slid my hand over her underwear, moved my mouth higher and started to pull the damp material away from her body. My heart was pounding. I’d been looking forward to this moment for months, ever since she’d pushed me up against a door and left me with a hickey that no amount of makeup would cover.

“Wait,” she said, reaching a hand down to stop me. “I have my period.”

I think I laughed. Of course she had her period. “Me too,” I said, letting out a deep breath. I felt like someone had popped my balloon. There’s always a risk of STI transmission during oral sex on a woman, but when there’s blood present that risk is much higher. And did I have any dental dams? Or even a non-lubricated condom for turning into a dental dam? Oh no, that would just have been too convenient. But I was well past feeling invincible at this point – an STI scare or two had ended my days of unnecessary risk, and apparently this thing with Virginia wasn’t supposed to happen after all.

In the long run, it’s okay with me that she and I didn’t end up having the kind of sex I’d imagined that night. It wasn’t okay with me at the time, of course, but I know I made the right decision, because finally – in college – I had gotten the kind of sex education that I should have gotten years before.

Scarleteen, a website devoted to promoting sexual health among young people, provides the exact kind of sex education that young people should be getting. The fact that it’s run independently means that it isn’t subject to the kinds of restrictions that many other youth sex ed sites are (although still subject federal “decency” regulations), but it also means that the entire site is completely donor-funded. So, if science-based, realistic, respectful and intelligent sex education is important to you, please consider making a donation!