Three Zero Six: Requests

Once upon a time, I recalled something my friend Liberty said about the older men in her life and past:

Liberty told me that what she liked about affairs with Older Men was that they all had kinks and obsessions that they'd rarely (if ever) been able to talk about with anyone. She was always willing to listen and learn...and not mock them. 

That meant a lot to me once upon a time, hearing a lovely strawberry-blonde girl say that she wouldn't mock the things I like. That's something I've been agonizing over.

Back in another age, I had no problem asking girls for the things I liked in bed. I had no problem telling someone what gave me pleasure...and asking what they liked. Even ten years ago--- maybe even five ---I had no problem with just asking for things. I took it as a given that that was what an affair was about. You told a lover or potential lover about the things that gave you pleasure, and the two of you shared that knowledge. In all the years since I was fifteen or sixteen I'd felt perfectly safe doing that. An affair, a relationship, was about learning what obsessions and kinks a lover had...and learning something from trying them out. Back a dozen years, and I had no problem just saying, This is something I like. Have you ever tried it? I'd had girls laugh with me about those things--- the bright laughter of someone thrilled or intrigued or amused ---but no one had ever laughed at me about the things I liked. No one had ever recoiled in horror or disgust. But here in the third decade of the not-quite-so-new century, I don't feel safe any more. Not at all. 

Last evening I watched a brief video clip of a rather lovely porn actress who calls herself Ashley Lane. She's apparently a fairly well-known bondage and fetish model, and she does more standard porn as well. Lovely girl, by the way. Long light brown hair, high cheekbones, that lithe and slender look I like. Anyway...the clip was simple enough. She was sitting naked on a countertop, giving a foot job to some random male scene partner. She was smirking a bit, and obviously confident in her skills. I watched the clip and sighed. Ms. Lane herself was very attractive, and what she was doing looked fun and just wicked enough to seem worth trying in some risky place. And...it's not something I would ever ask a girl to do. I'd be far too afraid to ask.

If the girl offered, of course I'd accept. But I could never ask. Asking for that would be too close to the foot fetish world, and that world is always considered pathetic and risible these days. As a male of a certain age, I certainly couldn't ask for anything either specific or non-vanilla. To be a male of a certain age here in the brave new world is to be regarded as inherently creepy and disgusting. You're not allowed by the Arbitrary Social Rules to admit to anything non-vanilla...or to admit to any sexual preferences at all. 

There was a time when I had no problem looking at a girl across a table and telling her that I'd love to do the blindfold and candle wax thing with her, or to introduce her to a riding crop. Nowadays I won't even hold someone's hand.I'd never spend an evening talking about films or books while running a finger along a long, slender bare leg. If a girl asked me what I like, or what turns me on, I'll never tell her. I"ll respond to a direct offer, but I will never admit to having any preferences. I will never ask if someone might be interested in something. That's not mine to do. 

Nothing I might like, nothing that gives me pleasure, is anything I can admit to, no matter what it is. And I'm equally forbidden to offer some way to give a lovely partner pleasure.  In any case, it would be taken as a given that I'm incapable of giving pleasure--- or at least I'd take it as a given. Anything I might want to do or try is inherently pathetic or creepy. Any skill I might offer up is insufficient, and my thought that I might have a skill is a sign of toxic narcissism. 

We've reached a place where lust, adventure, and exploration are all regarded as sad and pathetic, if not abusive. The Age of the Windowless Monads, I suppose we can call it. Communication used to be the panacea for all things--- communicate with your partner! Not these days, mind you, Opening up to a partner is as unwelcome as an actual phone call. 

Three Zero Five: Sheets

 I was looking at a video clip with Kenna James and Skye Blue, two of the girls I do crush on at PornHiub. The clip opens with Kenna waking up naked in a strange bed. That's an opening image that I did like. 

Oh, there's more to it, of course. Skye Blue comes upstairs with carry-out cups of coffee (one cream, one sugar) and a bag of fresh croissants. It seems that she's stolen Kenna away from her own bachelorette party. Their interaction there on the bed is languid and gentle and very, very romantic. And what makes it work for me is the coffee and the croissants, the two girls talking before they begin to kiss and make love.

I've always said that beautiful girls should sleep naked. I've been saying that since I was a boy, since I was barely old enough to grasp sex as a concept. It was James Bond who gave me the idea, of course. When I was very young, there were magazines whose Entertainment sections had lots of pictures of Bond Girls. The classic image was a Bond Girl stretched across a bed naked, with crisp new sheets draped strategically over herself. I suppose I took it for granted that in some later, better world, beautiful girls would sleep like that in hotel rooms or penthouse apartments with me. I still cling to that hope.

The French fashion blogger Garance Doré noted in passing once that "all top models sleep naked, of course", a sentence that instantly caught my eye. I wanted that to be true, especially for Ms. Kloss and Ms. Rubik and Mlle. Valade. I wanted it to be true for the lovely long-legged undergraduate girls who ripple through the downtown in my city in black leggings and zippered hoodies. 

Liberty had slept naked since her early teens. Levin, too. For Liberty it was I think something she barely thought about, some mixture of comfort and presenting herself as a hippie girl in the Rockies. For Levin it was a fashion choice. Sleeping naked was something an art-world girl might do as a marker for being "European" and "decadent".  They both knew instinctively how to strike poses naked in late-afternoon sunlight or on late night balconies. Levin stretched out naked in the sun always looked like she should have a copy of something by Lawrence Durrell to read...which she often did. 

I'm male and older. Sleeping naked on my own is not something I'd do. With a lover, certainly. But not on my own. My body is not something I'm comfortable with.  Males sleeping naked on their own always call up thoughts of...well...skidmarked sheets. In the Ian Fleming novels, Bond slept naked as a young man, but then discovered the short Japanese sleep robes I can recall seeing sold in "novelty" menswear catalogs (yes, the kind that also sold cocktail sets and golf-themed joke ashtrays) when I was young. Is it a happi coat that Bond slept in? I will admit that I've had Young Companions sit up naked in bed and ask with some concern if I was okay, since they were sleeping naked and I was in a t-shrt and gym shorts. Well, being male and of a certain age comes with its own set of rules. 

If James Bond--- or at least the early Bond films ---taught me that all beautiful girls should sleep naked, it was Pauline Reage's "Story of O" that taught me that beautiful girls should avoid underwear whenever possible. I do remember reading "Story of O" at maybe fifteen and instantly accepting what the rules at Roissy tell O.--- no underwear. That's something I've tried to edge lovely young companions toward since high school. It's my particular obsession and something I always tell girls is a dress code thing if they're involved with me. 

I'm thinking of the gallery owner who had the major foot fetish thing with Liberty. My whole thing for having my lovely young companions panty-free under short skirts or skinny jeans or faded denim shorts is probably no less an obsession. It's certainly been with me lifelong. Not that I'd give it up, mind you. I love having a girl aware of her own body, aware of a certain kind of vulnerability to strangers' eyes. And it's certainly a signature thing for me, something that was always part of my reputation once upon a clubland time.

I do encourage lovely girls to sleep naked, to experience crisp fresh linen sheets again bare skin, to stretch out atop a duvet and do long phone calls not so much about phone sex as about books and politics and film...all while having a secret at their end of the phone. And...there is always something very, very kissable about bare shoulders (or hipbones, or ankles) just above the sheets. Always that.