(From a partner).
You may not initially see where I am going with this piece. It's a bit messy. And in that way it's kind of like your first orgasm. You don't really know what the fuck is going on, or what exactly will happen, and then all of a sudden, voila! a beautiful release.
I recently read Sula, by the incredible Toni Morrison, and three specific quotes really fuckin stuck with me; And for now, I am going to share the first one with you.
"She lived out her days exploring her own thoughts and emotions, giving them full reign, feeling no obligation to please anybody unless their pleasure pleased her"(118).
This brought to my mind two thoughts.
1. Who, in this social-media filled world, are we living for?
2. Who, in this hetero-normative, porn-centric, sex world, are we faking it for?
Our lives have become personas, both the social and sexual. To get to know someone, we scroll their instagram feed. To fuck someone "well" we do what we think they'll like, what we think will look good, perhaps what we've seen on TV, or worse, in porn. Everything, in a way, has become an act. One grand performance. And for who? For your high school friends? Your ex? The person you met on tinder and want to impress?
They are always telling us ways to improve.
They do this by making us presently feel like shit.
Our skin could glow more.
Our lips could plump more.
We could have a tinier waist and bigger ass.
We could wear even more make up, but have it look like even less.
One second it's hot to be skinny.
The next, it's hot to be curvy.
Somewhere amongst the insta feed, the tinder profile, the Facebook statuses, it stopped being okay to just fucking "be." And this is a problem in general, but it's also a HUGE problem in the bedroom. And I will get to that.
I ask, are you living life for yourself? Personally, I think I am, but I am also simultaneously not.
I moved to Paris because I wanted to travel, avoid the American school system, and escape the shit storm I was in in San Francisco. I also, deep down, probably wanted to insta about it.
fffffuuuucccckkkk.
Sula, the woman from the book lives for herself, and in doing so, has sex for herself.
There are times, I have had sex not for myself.
Because he was hard.
Because I knew he wanted it.
Because I felt I owed him it, because I have a body, and that body made him horny.
Because society told me it was time.
Because I was kinda asleep, and he put it in anyway.
Because I was mad at you, in love with you, and you didn't want me, so I fucked someone else, and cried the whole way through it.
Sula, "felt no obligation to please anybody unless their pleasure pleased her."
Can we be like that, in this current state of affairs, are women allowed to be like that? Fuck, is anyone allowed to be like that?
It's a competition. It's a race. It's a number. How many likes? How many people have you fucked? Do you feel good after fucking them?
You deserve to feel good fucking them.
I had my Sula moment, the first time I came from a man. The first time it was not a performance. I've been an actor my whole life, and in a way we all are now, and in this moment I was stripped of my whole fucking costume.
He was going down, and all I could really think was maybe he's not enjoying it, he's doing it because he thinks he has to, oh! time to moan... oh! grab the headboard, oh! arch your back... and oh! fake an orgasm. So I did. Curtain falls. Round of applause.
But then, he looks up, "Did you come?
"Yes." Liar.
And he looks back at my pussy, like it's a fucking piece of cake covered with that incredible two dollar frosting, and he keeps eating.
And it hit me, he wasn't waiting for me to fake an orgasm, he was just giving me pleasure for the sake of giving me pleasure. C'est tout.
And all of a sudden, it was about me. No performance, no perfect lighting, no arched back here, no sexy little moan there.
Just this undeniable sucking motion. Just my legs spread wide to this beautiful 19-year-old Salvadorian boy with perfect pink lips. And then this strong licking motion. Fuck, my back is arching. But fuck, I'm so still. Actually quiet. Fuck, he found my magic little spot, just to the left. Fuck, I'm coming on his
perfect
pink
lips.
There was no faking, there was no persona, only me, "feeling no obligation to please anybody unless [my] pleasure pleased [me]"
Thanks, Sula.
The performance is the problem. We fake it in life, we fake it in the bedroom. We are cutting ourselves short. And what happens if we stop?
If we live our lives, have sex, don't have sex... but we do it for us, and not for what people will say, think, or like about it.
It will be scary as shit, but you might just end up coming; Try it.