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January 14, 2002
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January 14, 2002
There is a lot of literature about inappropriate fluids-sharing and the passion therein aroused; George Bataille made a whole career out of it. Another old Frenchman wrote a "novel" about he and his lover throwing up into each others mouths — how incredibly
intimate it was and how no one would understand their unique love. Then he found a whole group of people all throwing up into each other, but I think he made that part up.
These extra-juicy phenomena are served well in books and dreams — where no one gets pneumonia from being naked and wet all night and you don't need a cleaning service after each encounter. But I think the feeling they're trying to capture — the pouring forth, the waterfall bringing all the taboos down — that, I believe, is the essence of good sex.
Not all youngsters' romantic imaginings revolve around things that belong in the toilet. My friend Eliesha was horrified to discover, as a teen, that the penis actually has to be inserted into the vagina. She had assumed that it magically got in there by itself. Eliesha was crushed to learn the more prosaic truth — that the world can be so clumsy and forceful. And yet, when the light and the electrical currents are just so, the penis does magically get in there by itself, doesn't it? I asked other people what they thought sex was like when they were kids — and whether their adulthood reality has ever drifted close to that dream. Personally, I still believe my childhood pee-sex myth . . . but as with all great myths, it's best kept symbolic.
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Commentarium (22 Comments)
Funny, touching, sad... these vignettes are wonderfully presented.
I find this format hard to read. I don't like scrolling up and down to read what's in the little boxes.
i thought a man and a women stood up strait and tall with legs together. I thought they just stood there with thier "private parts" (as i called then then) touching and after 5+ minutes they would have sex.
As a young boy, I attended a Catholic school in Argentina. In the Religion class we were told about the Commandments and sins, and one of them in particular -adultery- puzzled me. What was it? I asked the priest who gave the course, and he was very much embarrased, and gave some vague answer that left me completely in the dark.
Back home I asked my father, who looked equally embarrased, and told me that "adultery is a repugnant thing that contemptible men do with loose women", without elaborating on what is a loose woman.
With this information I started trying to make sense of it. THe most repugnant thing I could think of was shit, and the worst thing you could do with it was to eat it, so I imagined that adultery consistied of a man and a woman sitting at a restaurant table and eating shit.
That was something very unappealing to me, I could not understand why God should bother to prohibit it in such a forceful way, as even with great encouragements people would be reluctant to do it.
Needless to say, I have neve committed adultery. It sounds most unappetizing.
G. A.
That's funny, GA!
We had Bible-reading (each kid read a verse) in 4th grade. It was terrifically boring: kids who could read got short snappy verses like "Jesus wept", while kids who had a hard time had an agonizing and humiliating stumble through miles of "thees" and "thous". Anyway, we came to Sodom and Gommorrah, which seemed understandable enough until we got to the part where Lot and his daughters leave mom/salt behind and escape into this cave in the mountains. One of the daughters says, "let us lie with our father to preserve his seed", or something King Jamesian. I couldn't figure out what this meant, but I figured that they had carried big burlap bags of wheat or barley with them to eat and plant. The cave was damp, so they had to lie on it--or under it--to keep it from getting mouldy. Still sounds more logical than incest.
I think I learned too much too soon (age 5). I hadn't ever considered where babies come from, but when I came across a children's book on the topic in the library, I thought it sounded like important stuff to know, and insisted on borrowing the volume. My mother looked in the dust jacket and calmly noted that the book was recommended for children six and up. I grabbed it, checked, protested, "It doesn't say that!", and off we went with the book. In which the parents lie beside each other a foot apart as an illustration on the intercourse description page. At some point before this, the reader is asked what the differences between mom and dad would be if you got them naked in the tub together (the father has a sailboat). My mother kept asking me and asking me. I had NO IDEA! "I don't know! Turn the page!" None of this had ever, ever, ever crossed my mind. But an ex, who grew up in the 50's, wondered and wondered. Some kid in his circle claimed to have the answer, and all the neighborhood boys gathered in the alley to hear it. They were afraid of the adults hearing what they were talking about and getting angry, so one boy whispered to another as the rest encircled them yelling and screaming, and thus the information, that the man peed on the woman's stomnach, was dispensed. And the yelling and screaming got them all in trouble anyway.
I think I learned too much too soon (age 5). I hadn't ever considered where babies come from, but when I came across a children's book on the topic in the library, I thought it sounded like important stuff to know, and insisted on borrowing the volume. My mother looked in the dust jacket and calmly noted that the book was recommended for children six and up. I grabbed it, checked, protested, "It doesn't say that!", and off we went with the book. In which the parents lie beside each other a foot apart as an illustration on the intercourse description page. At some point before this, the reader is asked what the differences between mom and dad would be if you got them naked in the tub together (the father has a sailboat). My mother kept asking me and asking me. I had NO IDEA! "I don't know! Turn the page!" None of this had ever, ever, ever crossed my mind. But an ex, who grew up in the 50's, wondered and wondered. Some kid in his circle claimed to have the answer, and all the neighborhood boys gathered in the alley to hear it. They were afraid of the adults hearing what they were talking about and getting angry, so one boy whispered to another as the rest encircled them yelling and screaming, and thus the information, that the man peed on the woman's stomnach, was dispensed. And the yelling and screaming got them all in trouble anyway.
I don't know how to explain this but I always knew? I didn't know the particulars but I knew sex, as I know it, was involved. I thought of a girls pussy as though it was a Pirates treasure of riches beyond imagination. The most fabulous thing. What confused me was this; Why did girls show such sexual restraint when they wanted the same thing I wanted?
This has remained confusing to me but I've found ways to work around it.
Well I've found out I wasn't alone. Your description of peeing is exactly what I thought. I remember being shown playboy magazines and being told that a man stick his penis inside the vagina (the furry things, I wasn't sure how it was supposed to go in) and then the man pee'd this white stuff that got the girl pregnant. I used to think that if you were trying to get someone pregnant but couldn't get the "white" pee caused people to have problems getting pregnant. Whenever I would pee white (clear) I would be glad that it wasn't insdie a girl. I remember breast's being these fantastic things that were unatainable and I wanted to touch them but didn't know why, curiosity I guess. I don't know, I've always been very horny though.
When I was a child, my father had a collection of beer steins, one in particular was a huge thing with the words "CAUTION: DRINKING MAY LEAD TO INTERCOURSE" emblazoned on it. I remember reading this when I was about six and asking my dad what "intercourse" was.
"Well, honey, you know if two cars driving on the road run into each other and crash? Well, that's intercourse."
So for years, I had no idea intercourse had anything to do with sex, I thought it had to do with automobile wrecks.
Many years later, I learned about beer goggles (hence the bold proclaimation of the stein) and I also found that sex could be linked with car crashes, especially if you were J.G. Ballard.
When I was about 6 or 7, my friend J. and I spent a lot of time speculating about sex. We played "you be the boy, I'll be the girl" games, and our pretend sex involved pressing our parts together with our legs scissored and our feet in each other's faces. We couldn't think of any other possible position that would get "tab a" into "slot b," although it seemed somewhat awkard and not at all intimate. ("Ow, you kicked me in the nose.") Precocious readers, we snuck Judy Blume's "Forever" out of her mom's bedside bookshelves and read the sex scenes with astonishment. Following the descriptions giving, we figured out that you could be face to face, with either person on top. Our games were much more fun after that.
I was chosen as an "experimental" kid to participate in a Catholic sex education program called "Becoming a Person". They started in about second grade, building up to telling us about the big event. Finally, in 6th grade, we got the famous sentence: "The man places his penis into his wife's Vagina and, in a special embrace from God, sends millions of sperm cells into her body." I especially remember the words "places" [vs. rams, moves, thrusts, etc.]. They were also clear to stress the "HIS WIFE" portion, plus, it couldn't be too nasty because God was watching.
JR
SF, CA
as for the liturature sharing innaproriate fluids (as well as in real life): my take on it is more along the lines of people wanting to share more of themselves and have their partner share more emotionally and being afraid to so share in a less threatening way. It may seem threatening to pee on and be peed on but hey, all that stuff washes off. But to expose oneself emotionally leaves one open and vulnerable to pain, rejection, and all those other risk taking activities that can actually make for very strong relationships.
Interesting, MBH. Or maybe all that activity takes the place of/obscures emotional exchange.
As a kid, I thought "humping" was just simply banging bodies together, even with clothes on. I can remember being in my room with an older girl friend (I was about seven and she about 11). As we were playing house, she asked if we could "hump" cause that's what married couples do. She was the husband in this situation. So, while standing up, she grabbed me and started banging her body into mine, thrusting hip first. I was sort of confused, but went along with it. Another time, along with a few friends, we built a "fort of fun" and we "humped" with our clothes off. My girl friend's little brother was younger than us (we were nine and ten and he four -- poor thing) and proceeded to bump bodies again. I asked my friend, "Oh my God! What if I get pregant?!" She just chuckled and said you have to have your period first, duh! I was 15 when I learned that the penis actually had to enter the vagina in order to get pregnant, as I frantically told my mom I thought I was pregant becuase I missed a period and had "messed around" with a guy. I was still a virgin.
Katia Rose
I suppose i've always had a warped view of sex. I started watching classic '70's porn flicks like "debbie does dallas", "the devil in miss jones", and "deep throat" along w/ others such as "teenage cowgirls" and "yank my doodle, it's a dandy" when i was quite young, perhaps 4 or 5. When the men would "pee" in the women's mouths, my brother and I would react w/ a loud "EWWWWWWWWWWWWW" as if we were revolted, when in reality we were intrigued. Maybe viewing these disgusting portayals of heterosexual encounters in my formative years is what turned me off to the whole idea of having sex w/ women in the first place.. hmmmmmmmm...
Well, this isn't about Lisa's column, it's about her appearance on HBO's Nerve.com: Downloading Sex... That scene of her in a bathroom with the video specs on was quite telling. She never washed her hands. I suggest the nerve.com staff think twice the next time she extends her palm in offer of a friendly greeting...
Patrick W.
Manhattan
Patrick, I brought that up in the HBO feedback. Perhaps I DID wash my hands and it was edited out (very little is continuous footage). Anyway, I grab a big bunch of TP and merely PAT the offending area. I don't stick my finger up there or anything when I wipe, do you? I mean, you have to grab your penis when you pee, right? But I don't have to grab mine. One really SHOULD wash, but if one gets drunk after a 14-hour day and is overwhelmed by the waiter's revelations, one might forget. I'd like to see footage of YOUR every moment. Fiend!
When I was a young kid, we lived near a marsh and frogs were everywhere. In the springtime, my siblings and I would see frogs stuck together, mating. For the longest time, I thought that sex was the man going into the girl and remaining motionless, maybe kissing, but never moving. I didn't actually realize that there was movement necessary until I was about fifteen and saw my first porn. I remembered being scared it would chafe. Yep.
The furthest the medias would go was to say that the man 'mounted' the woman. I had no idea at all that there's another hole below there, I thought he was just gonna pin her down and that's sex. Strangely the thought of being pinned down excited me even when I was a child. Then some other newspapers mentioned that a woman was raped three times. Three times??? What did he do, climbed on her, got off, climbed again, got off and last set? How long would that take, five minutes?
I have a diper on and i'm 10
Now you say something