11-10-2003, 07:12 PM
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#1 (permalink)
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The Northern Ward
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Funny article on adolescense.
I wasn't quite sure where to put this, I didn't think it went in either sexuality or nonsense, but I felt like sharing it so I'll post it here.
http://www.styn.net/brothers/000504.html
Quote:
November 10, 2003
I'm Okay, You're Okay...to Masturbate
by Kaya
My parents always stressed the value of communication with their children. They went to great lengths to make it okay to discuss topics with their children such as drinking, drugs and sex. And really, what child doesn’t crave to talk about smoking a bowl, shot gunning a Keystone Light and trying to figure out which way a condom unrolls on your stoned, drunk wang.
I truly respect the open communication my folks established with my brother and me. While it was “my folks” that believed in being so open, it was clearly my Mother that was the spokesperson. I suppose the term “spokesperson” makes it sound too commercial – but had masturbation been a product, my Mom would’ve definitely had an endorsement deal.
I love that as a child of the 70’s, and of a family that didn’t want to feel the shame associated with sex that their families had placed upon them, I was not only given permission to masturbate, I was encouraged. There weren’t bedside bleachers and concessions stands, but there certainly wasn’t anyone telling me not to squeeze the Charmin. I don’t recall what religion I grew up with, but it must’ve been the opposite of Catholicism. Pro-choice, Pro-shame-free sex, Pro-masturbation and my only childhood “confession” was that I occasionally squirted Magic Shell dessert topping directly into my mouth after being told not to.
Ever since I was little I remember the collection of self-examination/puberty books around. We had ones with cartoon images of naked bodies (the cartoon image of a circumcised and uncircumcised penis jarringly sticks out in my mind – like a four-square ball wearing a pink turtleneck sweater) as well as actual photographs of naked adults. However, this was real nudity. Raw nakedness in all of it’s un-airbrushed and hairy glory. The awkward men and women of these books were not models nor particularly into grooming or fitness. It was the 70’s and appreciating the body and its naturally existing hair (facial, pubic or otherwise) was valued.
The books were available but not forced upon us. Each one offering gentle nuggets of life lessons on why our bodies change and why we were all beautiful in our own way. There was “Our Bodies, Ourselves,” “What’s Happening to Me?”, and “A Stroll in the Cavernous World of the Vagina.” These books dispelled playground puberty myths and taught that even if we had bad hair and awkward posture, someday someone may still want to take a picture of us naked.
Perhaps the most memorable incident of “open communication” (or the memory I’m least able to numb in my brain despite a steady stream of Keystone light and bong loads) involves an intimate discussion between my Mother and me when I was 13. We were discussing school and girls or whether the Russians loved their children, too or something, when my Mom steered the conversation to romance.
I suppose since she thought I was a handsome and well-mannered guy there must be hundreds of adoring women forcing themselves upon me. While the idea is flattering, the closest I had been to a sexually intimate moment was when my older brother gave me his Heather Thomas bikini poster. (Why Heather – you’ve signed the poster for me? “Love and Laughs, Heather”. Oh Heather, they’ll be lots more love and laughs when I join you in that Jacuzzi and show off my emerging pubic hair.) The point being I was not the stud my Mother so generously supposed I was.
Then she offered some words of wisdom. Perhaps they had been passed down from wussy tribal leader to wussy tribal leader for generations. A comment, despite good intentions that would stick in my mind like gummy bears in your molars.
“You know Jim, if a girl wants to be intimate with you and you’re not ready…it’s okay to go into the bathroom and masturbate.”
Oh. My.
I opened my mouth to respond, but no words came out.
So let me get this straight. There’s this woman and she actually wants to have sex with me…but I choose to leave, go into the bathroom alone and masturbate?
If there was a woman, anywhere in the world, who out of the grace of god was interested in being physical with me, I can guarantee I wouldn’t be in the bathroom masturbating. I’m thirteen years old – all I think about this the slight chance that there may be a woman somewhere, perhaps a blind, amputee leper, willing to be intimate with me. I had been watching the scrambled signal of the Playboy channel as a training in case this situation was ever realized. Now there’s the option to leave and masturbate? Oh joy.
I imagined Ms. Thomas twirling her tan fingers in the curls of her glowing blonde hair and giggling as she asked me to tell her again about how many stolen bases I had last year in Little League. She bites her lip suggestively as she asks me if I want to join her in the Jacuzzi. Of course the material in her soft pink bikini might get ruined by the chlorine so she implores me to help untie her top. Being the helpful young man I am, of course I comply. I feel her smooth, warm skin as my hand accidentally grazes her back while I undo the bikini. She turns to me and pulls me near, pressing her globe-like breasts against my baseball uniform. “I. Want. You, “ she whispers in my ear as her lips delicately taunt my ear with every word.
I look deep into her eyes, run my hands down to her feminine hips and excuse myself. I politely scurry away to the bathroom where I feverishly masturbate.
So much for my fantasy world.
While the lesson of my Mom’s statement was valuable (masturbation is okay, don’t let anyone pressure you into anything, Mothers are shockingly out of touch with a 13 year-old’s sexual temptations) the words were a bit jarring to hear. I told her I’d remember her comment and secretly hoped I’d soon be in the position of turning away throngs of women so I could pleasure myself in the bathroom.
Another classic example of this glorious open communication concerning sexuality was when my mother decided it was time we learned about condoms. I was in the 9th grade and knew about rubbers, heard rap songs mentioning “jimmy-hats” and generally understood the principle behind putting a thin layer of plastic over the wiener to prevent the escape of millions of miniature baby-makers swimming towards their destiny. However, I’d never actually used one (I was 15 years old and unconcerned with any STD or pregnancy issues – of course, I was my only partner).
My mom had made some chocolate chip cookies to lure my brother and me into the kitchen for a fresh baked dessert. When she also pulled out a bunch of bananas I thought it odd, but no reason to be alarmed. Then she pulled out a box of condoms. Suddenly, I wasn’t so sure I wanted to be at this party. Hey, I love my family, not to mention chocolate chip cookies and bananas, but this wasn’t really “my scene.”
She explained to us that many men don’t know how to properly use a condom (a tidbit I hoped was learned from a magazine article and not field research). She had bought a box to show us how to use them correctly and to make sure whenever we did have sex, we were safe. So very cool…and, perhaps, so very odd.
Despite our crossed fingers under the table, my folks had not decided to get us each a hooker.
So we each grabbed a banana and opened our foil square. This would prove to be the least erotic moment I had ever opened a condom wrapper.
I carefully unraveled the latex-sheath onto my tauntingly large banana. I really didn’t need my training banana to make me feel inferior. I was also a tad nervous that this banana would be wearing a condom before I had and was therefore closer to having sex than I had been. I uncomfortably unrolled the condom onto my banana and proudly pulled the reservoir tip tightly over the top.
“No, no, no,” my dad chimed in. He reached over and grabbed my dick, I mean banana, out of my hands and told me that, “you’ve got to leave some space at the end. The semen comes shooting out of the tip and this allows a space to catch it and make sure it doesn’t enter the woman.” Awesome. I was learning so much. I was mostly learning that I may never get an erection again due to the numerous haunting events of the evening.
And surely, after all this, we wouldn’t be eating these tasty penis substitutes? Eating a banana is already tough to do without questioning my sexuality, now I have to conjure up images of placing a rubber on them? I could now scratch off eating bananas, looking at my parents in the eyes again and having sex with another person from the list of things I’ll ever do in my life.
At the end of the practice session (fortunately, there was no further instruction on what to do after the organ in question was properly sheathed), my mom gave us both a box of condoms to keep. She didn’t want to encourage us to have sex anytime soon, but she was a realist. She never bought the idea that giving a kid a condom was giving them a loaded weapon. She felt we already had the loaded weapon (thank you very much biology), and a condom was like showing you how to switch on the safety.
I felt slightly excited about the idea of having a box of condoms at my disposal. Perhaps that’s why I hadn’t been getting laid? Maybe it was that I didn’t have rubbers around? Once the ladies knew that I was a virile young man with a box of twelve, count ‘em, twelve condoms, the serious humping could begin. My only worry now would be if twelve was enough? How many Dallas Cowboy cheerleaders are there?
A nearly forgotten part of the Cookies & Condoms night (sounds like an ice cream flavor gone terribly wrong) was to make sure to read the expiration date on the box of rubbers. What became a confidence booster (my parents thinking they’d better get me condoms and teach me how to use them properly before the Cowboys came to town) turned into a sad “after-school special” moment. While checking on my secret condom stash, I realized that the box of condoms my parents had lovingly (and disturbingly) given me had expired. In the time since the infamous night, I had not had the opportunity to have sex. And, as much as I wish I could, I can’t even say I had the opportunity to have sex with a girl but declined due to my solitary focus on self-pleasure.
Perhaps that was for the best. It was also about that time that I learned that the condom actually went on my penis. I could now stop bringing a handful of bananas to parties in case I hooked up. Some lucky lady would’ve been in for an interesting evening.
I truly appreciate the lengths my parents went to in making our household one where we could freely talk about sex. I’ve been able to get most of our discussions out of my head during acts of intimacy and I stopped having recurring nightmares of my father discussing reservoir tips. And someday I imagine I’ll be able to buy a banana at the store and not assume that everyone thinks I’m going to slap a condom on it and “show it a good time.”
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"I went shopping last night at like 1am. The place was empty and this old woman just making polite conversation said to me, 'where is everyone??' I replied, 'In bed, same place you and I should be!' Took me ten minutes to figure out why she gave me a dirty look." --Some guy
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