Tuesday, March 29, 2011

LIFE FLASHING BEFORE MY EYES

I should have known it would all come to this.  While sitting on the worn out 7th Heaven futon recovering from a fight with Cosmic Charlie, I heard a car driving up the long and winding gravel driveway.  It was quite unusual for visitors to find their way to Cosmic Charlie's little cabin in the woods - even though it was smack dab in the middle of a major urban area.  In fact, the quaint little home was often times too tucked away for even the U.S Postal service to locate, which made it the perfect oasis for my boyfriend to live off the grid and tend to his flourishing grow house packed with pot plants.

Like all the other fights we had, I can not recall the topic that made Cosmic Charlie yell at me in his gravelish "Denis Leary" voice while I stared at him blankly as though I was watching someone having a seizure in a foreign language.  I didn't grow up around yelling, or around anyone who ever communicated their anger directly with words, so I always found Cosmic Charlie's passionate rants fascinating.  Even when his anger was directed towards me.  After he made is point, he took off on a run with his two dogs into the woods to "sweat it off."

All alone now, I sat back on the futon and stared at the three foot glass bong on the coffee table and began to appreciate what a permanent fixture it was.  Noticing how odd my coordinating Wedgwood china plates looked showcasing various strains of herb, I realized it was the perfect metaphor for my relationship with Charlie - Dead Head meets debutante.

One thing about being Cosmic Charlie's girlfriend was that one had to be ready for anything, at any time.  In one of my first phone conversations with Charlie, I kept hearing a very annoying clicking sound on the land line.  When I asked if he could hear it too, Charlie just said, "Oh, don't worry - it's just the Feds."  In person Charlie convinced me that as long as we didn't talk about his career in front of Ma Bell, that we would stay out of trouble.  We got to the point where the audio disturbance became something of a game for us.  After every click we would break from our conversation and say, "Hello" to whomever was listening, then have one-sided conversations (our side versus the Feds) about various topics relating to political current events.  I never once realized what a dangerous game we were playing.

As I sat alone in Cosmic Charlie's home enjoying the cool spring breeze through the open windows and screen door, the sound of tires slowly rolling over crushed rock approaching broke my meditation and pulled my attention outside.  Jesus, Mary, and Joseph! - I thought - A fucking police car!  This is it.  My life is over.  There is no possible way to hide the bong, the green, the cash, the embarrassing amount of porn, and the endless amounts of shit I was not even privy to because Charlie only told me what he thought I needed to know.  Now he was out running in the woods and as soon as he caught sight of the cop car and the inevitable helicopters flying overhead, he would continue running all the way to Mexico leaving me to rot in some women's prison like the one from "Angels In Chains" -  the most watched Charlie's Angels episode of all time.  A fucking chain-gang!  What a waste of time the years of college prep courses, piano lessons, voice instruction, French tutors, and volunteer humanitarianism had been.  It was all swirling down the drain with not so much as a martial-arts belt to aid me in my future daily priority of prison survival.

So I just froze and tried not to breath, hoping I could make myself invisible as I had unsuccessfully tried to do so many times as a child waiting for my inevitable humiliation and punishment from the surrounding self-appointed authority of the moment.  The approaching officer - all decked out in his crisp polyester paramilitary garb complete with hat, badge, and loaded holster, exuded the most threatening sense of power and authority I had ever encountered despite having been raised in the Catholic Church where nuns in full habit attire were about the scariest human forms ever known.

The tall, muscular officer calmly walked up the front porch stairs and stood staring at me through the screen door.  I figured the SWAT team surrounding the cabin, must have sent in the city cop first strictly for protocol purposes - something to do with due process of sorts.  My only other encounters with law enforcement had been for two speeding tickets and supplying the refreshment table during "Safety Day" in school.

"You must be Carrie," he said with a delightful smile on his face.  I was waiting for him to follow it up with my social security number which would shortly be replaced with my prison number like Jean Valjean from Les Miserables (known by his prison number, 24601).  Of course he knew my name, the piles of transcripts from my tapped phone conversations with Cosmic Charlie had my life story in print and I was a little creeped out thinking that he must also know I was having my period.

"I'm Bill...a friend of Cosmic Charlie," he continued as though we were old friends, "is he around?"

"Ummm...he just took the dogs for a run, do you want to come in?"  What the fuck was I saying?  Inviting the wolf into the hen house was so typical of me.

Just as I opened the door for Bill, Charlie came bolting up the driveway and onto the porch with an outstretched hand for the officer to shake while the other patted him on the back as if to say, "Hello old friend, what a delightful sight for sore eyes you are."  I was really confused.

I quickly found out that Officer Bill was a regular customer of Cosmic Charlie's and had just stopped by during his workday to score a bag.  The three of us sat down together and shared the peace pipe while I struggled to wrap my head around the events of the day.  So I guessed I wasn't going to prison after all - at least not yet. 

Two months later Cosmic Charlie and I attended Officer Bill's wedding where he vowed his love and fidelity to a born-again Christian beauty queen whose platform at the state pageant was entitled, "Meeting America's Challenge:  The War on Drugs."  I didn't even bother to ask my date what our gift to the happy couple was, as I knew it was something the bride would never see.  And like our gift to the couple, shortly thereafter my ties to Cosmic Charlie went up in smoke.

Partly due to the new understanding of possible consequences to my illegal lifestyle and partly due to a desire to live the life I always wanted, I decided to return to an albeit more dangerous emotional lifestyle two-thousand miles away at my parent's home.  At least I knew the long term results of living a life with my family only ended up with me checking myself into a psych ward instead of law enforcement checking me into a correctional facility.  Also all my years of schooling and lessons would be put to much better use during group music therapy than time spent in the yard.

Thursday, March 24, 2011

MY BODY: A LOVE STORY

My entire life I have been obsessed with two imaginary numbers - my weight and my credit score.  The former was a number which no matter how low I got it, it was never low enough for me to be satisfied.  Although the latter has always been an incredibly high number, I once lived in daily fear that if I made one false move it would plummet to a value closer to my goal weight.  I believed my financial status would never be recovered and in turn my life would come to an end living under a bridge somewhere.

For now, let me just tell you about how I finally came to love my body regardless of any numerical label assigned to identify it.  At one time, my entire day was pre-determined by the read-out on my bathroom scale in the morning.  When that number was lower than I expected, I spent my day as the most beautiful and intelligent woman in the room.  Conversely, when that number was higher than I expected, I would spend the day being the ugliest and most mentally deficient person on the planet.  I have long since given my scale to my two young children who use it to weigh produce when playing "grocery store."

During most of my adolescence I was obsessed with food and heavily immersed in a destructive cycle of binging and purging.  The more I worked to control my weight - the more out of control my weight became.  It was a baffling wild goose chase which finally came to an end in my mid-20s after much therapy and personal growth.  Although the food obsession was lifted, the body loathing continued until one remarkable day.

My most protected secret throughout my relationship with Ken had nothing to do with the details of my colorful past and everything to do with my real weight.  During my pre-natal visits to my OB/GYN I made it very clear to the nurse never to reveal the steadily rising number on the scale to my husband.  I was about one hour from delivering my first born at a scheduled Cesarean section when the hospital nurse walked into my maternity room to review my stats prior to surgery.  "So let's see here," she said, "you are five feet, eight inches tall and 213 pounds."  Fuck, I thought, the jig is up!!!

Ken just sat there staring at a tile on the floor, with a look on his face that I interpreted to be horror.  Later I learned he hadn't even heard a word the nurse said.  I had gained thirty-five pounds during my pregnancy and currently out-weighed my husband by a good twenty pounds.  The anesthesiologist could not get there soon enough to load me up on narcotics which I was counting on to take me away from my current state of humiliation.

Five days later, Ken and I were back at home with our four pound newborn premie Valerie, wondering - What the Hell we were doing? - and completely lost in new parent confusion.  I stepped on my bathroom scale for the first time in a week which miraculously revealed a readout stating, "187 pounds."  I was astounded.  How does a person lose 25 pounds in six days without having a body part amputated?

As I stood there looking in my full-length mirror at my naked post-partum body, an overwhelming feeling of gratitude and joy came over me.  I suddenly saw the body of a beautiful mother who had: a thick, sagging tummy where life had been created and released, strong arms to embrace and comfort her family with, and rock hard boobs engorged with all the nourishment needed to sustain new life.  Having been on strict bed rest for the eight weeks prior to Valerie's delivery, I had a new fascination and respect for the ability to move freely and without judgment over whether or not I should be making a particular move.

I began to see my freckle's, which I had always despised, with the same eyes my husband has always adored them with.  All of the imperfections of my skin, including my stretch marks, were suddenly badges of honor for a life lived.  A life filled with adventure out in the sun.  I could feel a solid, grounding, sense in my legs and feet which I now knew would provide me with the strength and balance to carry myself and my life forward.  No longer would the defeating judgment of my past body be my guide.

While I was half-dressed, Ken came in our bedroom in response to my summons.  As I stood there in baggy, high-waisted, maternity underwear and an open nursing bra with one Pamela Anderson boob sticking out, I joyfully exclaimed to my husband, "Honey!  Look at how FUCKING HOT I AM!!!  I just loss 25 pounds in six days, dammit!!!  Look at this body, Ken!  I am so fucking beautiful!  I finally understand why you have never been able to keep your hands off of me."

Ken just looked at me with a huge smile, shaking his head from side to side and trying to either hold back laughter or the urge to have me committed - I couldn't tell which.  "YES CARRIE!  You ARE HOT and I love you desperately - I've never understood why you couldn't see all of that for yourself before now."

I finally understood why my personal trainer of a husband never "drilled me" about exercise and weight control.  He really did love me just the way I was and still does today, just the way I am.  Which is why he continues to "drill me" in the bedroom on a daily basis no matter where my body is along the 70 pound spectrum of my weight history. 

Just yesterday, Ken put is arms around my waist in an embrace and said, "I think you are getting a little smaller here."  Knowing I was on the lower end of my approximate ten pound monthly weight fluctuation I replied, "Really Honey...?  Or are you just saying that to get laid?"  Ken just smiled and said, "I don't need to tell you THAT to get laid."  He was right, as he always is.

Monday, March 21, 2011

THE FEMALE "SEX HANGOVER"

After a night away from the kids with my husband Ken, I woke up the other morning far from home with a sex hangover.  For those of you not familiar with this term, let me explain:

Like in the same way one experiences the delayed aftereffects of drinking too much alcohol in a relatively short period of time; a woman can feel the delayed aftereffects of having too much sex in one night.  Most women experience this sex hangover in their early days of "doing it."  Like in college when our male partner's refractory period was more like 5 minutes instead of 5 hours, or even 5 days for some now after marriage.

Instead of feeling her headache and some nausea and dizziness like from alcohol, a woman's sex hangover is felt it in her vagina primarily, while it extends all throughout her body from there.  The feeling of minor swelling and achiness from vaginal excoriation is what can have us feel like we are walking funny the day after.  In layman's terms (no pun intended), too much friction.

There may also be some puffiness throughout the vulva from her and her partner banging into one another over and over and over.  Although this hurts, it hurts in a GOOD WAY compared to the traditional hangover from alcohol.  Every time she feels the soreness throughout her body, she remembers what she was doing then, to make it feel that way now.  GOOD TIMES.  Typically this only takes a day or two to heal, so if left alone (key here), your girl should be better than ever before you know it.

Often, the sex hangover extends to muscle soreness all throughout the body.  A female partner may have whiplash from bobbing her head up and down for extended periods of time, or over-use of upper body strength from hand-standing and back bending.  Bruising may appear on the forehead from too many accidental encounters with the headboard, and rug burns may show up with no memory of how they could have gotten there.  To top it all off, an intense headache can emerge due to dehydration from so much physical effort - and the dehydration is only exacerbated by the too many to count alcoholic beverages it took her to be going this far to begin with.

The cure for the female sex hangover is cranberry juice, rest, and lots of pampering by her partner.  The man must not only give his girl a break from sex - but also from anything else she doesn't want to do for the next day.

So Ken took me to breakfast, then brought me home, and put me to bed - alone.  The rest of the day he played with the kids, folded some laundry, and let me recover in peace.  For the most part anyway.  Of course my husband Ken is something of a freak of nature when it comes to his sexual appetite - so I would be a liar if I tried to completely sell him as the perfect partner.  Out of the three more times he approached me for sex that day, I successfully turned him down without having to unlock the gun-safe.  That was good, because the last thing I would ever want to experience is a sex hangover in prison.

Friday, March 18, 2011

OH JOAN!!!

The other morning I sat at my mother's kitchen table while she applied the same Loreal Performing Preference #5MB hair color to my roots, which she has been doing since I was thirteen years old.  Although my roots weren't gray until I was twenty-eight, I have generally spent my entire life, like most women, trying not to look anything like my real self.  My mother, Joan Crawford, was an early inspiration and avid cheerleader regarding my synthetic metamorphosis.  And the other morning the saga continued.

I have told my mother countless times NEVER to read anything by this alleged imposter "Carrie Valium"- and then when she reads it anyway, not to believe a word of it.  How is my mother even familiar with Carrie Valium to begin with, you say?  Well, once again, I come from a very dysfunctional family and in spite of my heroic efforts to release myself - sometimes I slip a little and find myself tap-dancing backwards in a penguin suit asking my parents, "Do you love me now?  Am I pretty enough?  Am I smart enough?  Am I thin enough?"  I really do know the answers to my questions, so don't even think about trying to fill me in (especially on the last question!).

First of all, I LOVE my mother very much, just like I LOVE my kids, and I LOVE my husband - but why are those closest to us always our biggest pains in our ass?  (And with my husband Ken, I mean that strictly in the good way.)

The moment I am all wrapped in a styling cape (completely at Joan's mercy) while she applies hazardous chemicals very close to my brain, she says, "So...I read some of your blog."

Now out of all of the nineteen blog posts I have written since the New Year, my mother chooses to read the one about basically getting my first rim-job from a bi-sexual co-worker during Girl's Night Out, right after leaving a lesbian bar.  The first thing she said was, "I just didn't think it was very funny!"  I also recall her using this line as we were walking out of the matinee of Schindler's List in 1993.  Apparently she was prepared for a "Speilberg movie" (like The Goonies or Gremlins) instead of the ever so obvious "Holocaust movie" that had been all the buzz for quite some time.

"Aren't you just doing all of this silly stuff to be funny?" she pushed.

"Mom, it wasn't really supposed to be funny - just fun."  I replied while giving up all hope of trying to change the subject. My greatest effort was to desperately stay rooted in my thirty-seven year old self, instead of crumbling into a messy little girl which, up until recently, was so typical for me during this sort of interaction with my parents.  I went on to tell her that my story was a mirrored reflection of what so many women of my generation experienced during our college years, but none of us really started admitting to until recently.

"WELL I NEVER DID ANYTHING LIKE THAT!" my mother exclaimed with so much defensiveness and judgement that I couldn't tell if she was more angry at me for doing it - or at herself for never giving herself the opportunity.

"MOM - YOU ARE NOT MY PEER!!!  YOU ARE MY MOTHER!" I shouted, "WHICH IS WHY YOU SHOULDN'T BE READING THIS SHIT TO BEGIN WITH!!!  GOD FORBID I EVER ATTEMPT TO ASK MY OWN DAUGHTER ABOUT HER SEX LIFE - I PRAY SHE WILL HAVE BEEN RAISED WITH ENOUGH GOOD SENSE NEVER TO ANSWER MY INQUIRY!!!"

"But that didn't really happen...did it?" she continued.  The surprising astonishment and judgement in her voice made me suddenly realize that although my mother has a handful of gay male friends - that she is actually something of a homophobe towards lesbians.  This probably now meant that Meredith Baxter Birney would not agree to play the Lifetime Movie version of my mother.  In the '80s everyone always told me my mom looked just like Elise Keaton, so I never questioned the obvious casting choice before.

"No Mom!  Nothing I ever write about ever really happened.  It is all completely made up and created out of thin air - which is exactly why you shouldn't waste your time reading one more word of it.  Now just let it go."  I calmly replied, with one foot prepared to leap on and carry me all the way out her front door - despite the time sensitive process occurring to my mane.  I figured the worst that could happen is I would have to grab the neighbor's hose and rinse out my hair before getting into my car.  And uneven plaid hair color would be perfect for the upcoming St. Patrick's Day.  My vanity just wasn't going to be worth my sanity for this one.

Luckily, for the first time in my memory of our interactions together she backed off.  Of course she took the conversation back to the same old, "Your life was so much easier than mine!" routine, but that one I am a pro at managing.  I employed the same technique which countless therapists of mine have used on me for twenty-five years:  tilted head, concerned and sympathetic brow, and A LOT of "That must have been very difficult for you..." jargon.

Ultimately, I believe, most people just want to be heard.  Which is why I write, and why my mother always makes everything about herself.  My friend, Lamont Cranston III, once told me that writing is "a way to lance our psychic boils."  We all have them and we all attempt to lance them in different ways.  Some of us choose ways which actually work, while others choose what is most comfortable.  Either way, at the very root of it - just like our hair - if we hang around long enough, we all end up the same.  Bald or gray.

For now, I choose to keep fighting the good fight and keep Loreal's stock price stable.  But one day I will finally quit fighting nature and introduce my authentic life to my authentic person.  Of course this will also be the day after my 100th birthday celebration when I FINALLY let go of it all and:  join the Cheesecake of the Week Club, cease all body hair removal endeavors, throw away all restricting body-garments (including bras...ESPECIALLY bras), and show my 2nd husband (who hasn't been born yet) how beautiful I really am!


The televison version of my mother, Joan.  Thank you Meredith Baxter Birney for finally living your authenitic life.

Wednesday, March 16, 2011

DUMB, DUMBER, & DUMBEST

I am, of course, the "Dumbest" in this story.  This is the story about how I once (almost/maybe/probably) became a sexual slave to the what-would-be future Al-Qaeda bottom feeders.

Years ago, I was out with my only two girlfriends taller than me, Bergen and Terri.  We were having drinks Downtown at a swanky bar where we always found fun professionals to flirt with after a long day.  After several rounds we were approached by three very well dressed foreign businessmen who looked like they had just parked their magic carpet right outside.  Now this was pre 9/11, so confident Arab businessmen in Armani was more like something out of Disney's Aladdin than Darfur's Al Queda.  But regardless of racial profiling, we were still pretty dumb.

Quickly into conversation the men somehow convinced us to walk around the corner to their import store to check out handmade rugs and priceless art.  Everything just flowed so easily and as soon as we entered the dark, locked place of business things began happening very quickly.  The three men quickly separated the three of us like professional predators taking Bergen over to the hanging rugs, Terri to the cased art sculptures and me, "upstairs to see some vases." 

The tallest and most in charge of the three men whisked me up a long stairway into a dimly lit conference room towards a table which would seat about twenty.  The next thing I knew I heard two more men climbing the stairs and enter the room whom I had never seen before.  One was a shorter, younger Arab man and the other was a scrawny blonde white guy who didn't fit in anywhere.  I very naively kept looking around for these "vases" and turned back toward the table to see scrawny white guy pull a gallon sized zip lock bag from his belt-line.  I blinked my eyes and couldn't understand why he was opening a huge bag of powdered sugar.

An instant later, I realized that wasn't powdered sugar.  "Oh NO!!!" I said loudly to the three men while waving my open hands in front of me for the universal, "you've got this all wrong" sign.  "We don't want drugs!  We really do want to see the vases!"  I actually believed I had somehow given them the wrong idea, as I do so often throughout my life.  Perhaps "vase" translates to "a fucking huge amount of cocaine" in their native tongue. 

As I was trying to figure out how I somehow led these nice men in the wrong direction, my escort from popping up the stairs put his hand on the back of my head and shoved my face towards the five lines of white powder on the table.  It was a very gentle forcefulness, but I quickly realized that in trying to resist - his grip and push became more intense.  Now, although I am a big fan of the cannabis plant - I don't typically care for most drugs.  Particularly the speedy kind.  I really had no interest or curiosity in shoving this white powder up my nose - especially in front of other people.  Just gross!

Realizing I could very well pull a scene from "Annie Hall" where Woody Allen sneezes into the $2000/ounce mound of cocaine, the big guy scoops up an ample dose and literally shoves it into my nose while holding the back of my head down.  Now I realized I was no longer in control of any part of this night.  I started to see myself tied up next to Bergen and Terri and shoved in the cargo compartment of a plane on its way to somewhere women weren't allowed to show their faces.  Would Hollywood even consider making another, "Not Without My Daughter" flick in order to tell the story of my parent's quest to bring me home again?  I didn't see it happening.

The instant all three men started to approach me at once, I heard Terri running up the stairs saying, "Carrie!  It is time to go!  We are leaving now!"  She was always the smartest and most sober of the three of us, and although not much had changed with the girls downstairs - Terri knew something wasn't right up in vase inspection.  My trio of hosts quickly backed off from me while scrawny white guy made all signs of the drugs vanish in an instant.  Terri simply dashed in the room, grabbed me by the hand, and pulled me quickly away and down the stairs.  The men must have thought that since she acted with such authority and confidence that Terri was either a part of serious law enforcement or the daughter of a VERY strong American Pro Wrestler/Senator/Mob Boss.  For whatever reason, they didn't mess with her.

As we ran towards the locked entrance, we pulled Bergen away from her new friend who quickly shut down the alarm and unlocked the front door for us to make our escape.  The three of us ran two blocks away and hailed a cab to help us end our night.  I was totally freaking out and going over the whole night with the girls quickly realizing Bergen had no idea that we were ever in any danger.  She was about five seconds away from cutting a deal on a really nice area rug.  Suddenly the cab driver turned all of the way around the block and drove back towards the import shop.  I kept thinking, "He's one of them!" but he just drove on past the five men standing casually on the corner in front of their portal for exporting stupid American women to the other side of the world.

Rudolph Valentino, The Sheik, 1921

Thursday, March 10, 2011

MISS VALIUM'S FIRST VALLEY ENCOUNTER

My first lesbian experience was about 15 years ago with a co-worker from my job as a hospital switchboard operator. Tiffany was a really smart and funny ex-stripper from Southern Calif who asked me to join her for a girl's night out. She showed up at my apartment early while I still had hot rollers in my hair and was running around in my bra and panties under an open short robe. She fixed us both a drink and patiently waited for me to finish dolling myself up for our night out.

As soon as I was dressed and finalizing the finishing touches of my make-up in my hallway mirror, Tiffany approached me from behind and ran her fingers through my hair. Like usual all throughout my life - I had no idea she was coming on to me. I turned to look at her and she said, "Carrie, you look really pretty." I just said, "Thanks!" then reached for more lip gloss. Tiffany grabbed my fore-arm and said, "NO, I mean you look REALLY PRETTY!" then she grabbed the back of my neck and planted a huge sensual kiss directly on my mouth, quickly shoving her tongue inside while pressing her really cute figure up against me.

I was shocked and pushed away quickly and strongly. She looked at me with embarrassment while I said - "Oh Tiffany, I am so sorry - did I give you the idea that this is what I wanted?...Because I AM STRAIGHT!" She apologized and told me how she was bi-sexual and although she couldn't help herself, it was worth the risk to kiss me. At first I was really let down because I had really been looking forward to becoming good friends with her, and now I wasn't sure how to go about it from there.

After I got over my initial disappointment and shock, my curiosity and desire for information flared up. While Tiffany and I sat on my couch I just blurted out all kinds of questions about her sexuality and experiences. I confided to her that being with a woman had always been a fantasy of mine.  I went on about how much I got turned on by "pretty girl on girl" porn - but that I also knew myself well enough to know that MEN were where it was really at for me.

Tiffany was really sweet and humored my curiosity with her honesty.  Next she invited me to, "Just sit back and let her lead our plans for the evening - without me feeling any kind of pressure or discomfort over being my perfectly straight self." Of course we had another drink and smoked a little pot which always abandons my inhibitions and keeps me living in the moment. Abby took us to a lesbian bar in mid-town called "Sweeties" where all the furnishings and lighting were pink. Even though I thought I knew about EVERY cool bar in the city (underground or otherwise) I had never heard of this place despite having several gay friends. Between the decor, lighting, and amount of estrogen in the place - I truly felt like I was inside of a vagina!

As soon as we sat at a table, two women approached us and asked us to play pool. Tiffany jumped up and introduced me as her girlfriend and I went on to play an extremely awkward game of pool with these two fairly butch gal pals. I was so paranoid that they would know I wasn't really "one of them" and so I became extremely uptight. Sensing my discomfort Tiffany kept putting her arm around me while gently caressing my arm or back to try to help me feel at ease.  Towards the end of our winning game she quite surprisingly propped me up on the end of the pool table, put her arms around me, and pulled my hips towards her.  As I wrapped my legs around her she planted a huge passionate kiss on my lips for the whole bar to see. For the first time, I became EXTREMELY turned on and I pulled her closer to me and kissed her back with the same passion. Quickly my thoughts opened up to the ultimate idea of just lying back on the pool table and having the entire bar watch us do each other.

As Tiffany and I lay on the pool table making-out for then entire bar to see, she whispered her desire to quickly go back to my place. We hurriedly paid our bill and jumped in her car, then made our way back towards my place. During the short ride home, Tiffany had her hand up my mini-skirt caressing the inside of my thigh and working her way up to where I wanted it the most. As we got back to my place we giggled about our night out and promptly made ourselves comfortable on the couch.

We continued touching and kissing.  I was surprisingly enjoying it so much that I made the decision to abandon all labels of "gay, bi, or straight" and surrender myself to the pleasure I was feeling and just live in the moment. Before I realized it, Tiffany had completely undressed me and lead me by the hand back to my bedroom. As we lay naked side by side in my bed, I began to feel somewhat uncomfortable about what the hell I was doing until Tiffany went from kissing my mouth, all the way down my body to consume my most turned on area.

Even though I had been with some world class male lovers in the arena of oral pleasure - Tiffany's soft lips and velvety tongue were uniquely sexy and effective in helping me lose myself once more. As she expertly worked throughout the entire valley separating my left leg from my right she began to move her tongue further south. While her fingers were busy entertaining my clit and pussy, I felt her tongue and finger gently tease my ass. I began to uncontrollably moan in a cadence unlike anything I was used to hearing out of myself. Tiffany responded to my outburst with further exploration and energetic enthusiasm.

My entire pussy became incredibly engorged and wet while my excitement brought me to the level of quivering legs, piercing hard nipples, and a silky wetness which just wouldn't stop. I felt my pleasure rise higher and higher as Tiffany's attention to every detail of my womanhood increased with speed and rhythm. I didn't think I could take the ecstasy a moment longer when I felt myself come SO HARD that my entire body shook and my moan of delight turned quickly to tears and sobbing. Now, don't get me wrong - rarely do my orgasms bring me to the point of tears, and it is NEVER out of sadness or anything negative. More like an extreme exercise of tears, joy, and elation - like winning big on a game show or something. A kind of reaction similar to a super-surprising windfall.

After I collapsed and gave myself a couple of minutes to recover, I began to show Tiffany the exact attention she had both given and taught me. While I found kissing her lips, touching her body, and sucking on her tits very fun and enjoyable - the rest of the experience felt extremely unnatural for me. As I began to go down on her, it felt very much like taking a deep breath before going under water. I was way too hyper-aware of everything I was doing and no matter how much I tried - I just couldn't lose myself in the act and feel like I was truly giving. Do you have any idea what I am talking about? Almost like trying to have sex with someone you are not that into - but I really was into Tiffany, only halfway...the top half.

We ended up sharing a couple of more sexual experiences together - one with some guy she was dating and then I brought her to bed with me and my boyfriend (strictly for his benefit). But very quickly, just like so many other friends in my life - once it became hard-core sexual, the friendship suffered and she started acting REALLY strange around me at work. I was really disappointed because she was such a funny and smart girl - and the sex part just wasn't that big of a deal to me. At least not a big enough deal to stop being friends over. Shortly there after I moved to another city and although she called a few times, I quickly lost touch.

Ever since, I have strictly been a passenger on the "Straight Train" and rarely have had any desire to jump the tracks.  The closer I get to being forty, the more and more I find friends from my generation revealing the same types of experience I shared with Tiffany.  It is funny to me now, because just like my five minutes spent in prostitution I truly thought I was the only one in the world who was crossing into (what I then thought to be) a very kinky and twisted area of sexuality.  I am happy now to have decided to "live in the moment" before I was self-actualized enough to know better.  And Ken is very happy as this is one of his most favorite bedtime stories ever!
 
Red Canna by Georgia O'Keefe
(You canna too, by Carrie Valium)
 

Friday, March 4, 2011

ENCOUNTER WITH DR. DANGEROUS

Back in my early twenties I spent a weekend in Tulsa with my best friend Eartha and her local girlfriends "Sex And The City" style all dressed up in our high priced (not yet paid for) slutty looking attire taking on the bars and nightlife like pros.  It's not that I was particularly hideous looking, but next to my starving to be skinny/super-model looking girlfriends I was definitely not the first pick for plucking by the playboys we all flirted with throughout the night.  I was typically the funny one that the guys talk to while either staring at my boobs or tyring to make eye contact with my girlfriends in order to score with them for the night.

After the bars closed we five girls headed back to Chrissy's apartment which was on the top floor of an old mansion by the medical center.  As we approached the house we noticed a large group of cute guys partying right next door.  Responding to their cat calls and without saying anything to one another, we walked right past Chrissy's place and directly up the porch stairs and through the open door of what we found out to be a bachelor party beginning to wind down.  I don't think anyone realized what a dangerous mix of scantily clad drunk girls and plastered party boys was truly about to take place.

I made my way with Heather and Jennifer back to the kitchen where the keg was and we struck up a conversation with three hunky party stragglers.  The cutest one, Sterling, laughed really hard at my tasteless joke telling and the next thing I knew we were standing face to face engaged in an extremely interesting discussion about his experiences as a gynecology resident.  All the guys were medical residents who were a week away from graduation and they were throwing a Congratulations/Bachelor party for one of guys in the mix.

As happens so often in my life, one minute I was innocently talking to this guy and the next thing I knew I could feel myself lying in the cool grass under the stars passionately making out with Sterling while we grinded up against one another.  I honestly have NO IDEA how I got from point A to point B. This very strange momentary "black-out" has always puzzled me and is one of the things on my list to tell my therapist about after we get through the more pressing issues of keeping me from abandoning my family in order to become a third live-in "Goddess" to an old friend in Southern California who works in the entertainment industry.

So back to my story.  Once I finally realized we were rolling around in the summer grass, I asked if there was anywhere more comfortable we could move to as I was too modest to get naked in the fenceless urban green space.  Sterling led me back into the house and upstairs to his bedroom.  I didn't realize he lived there and was actually quite impressed with his tastefully decorated bedroom which stood out from the rest of the "college-frat-house" look of the rest of the house.  He had his medical text books neatly piled around his antique roll-top desk, lighting provided by three Tiffany lamps, and very fresh top of the line bedding which coordinated with the wall paint.

Lying comfortably in his bed, we continued to mess around on something slightly above a PG-13 level.  Between touching and tasting one another, I became fascinated by his honesty and willingness to answer all the questions every girl my age was way too shy to ask her own gynecologist.  He even suggested a different birth control pill for me to switch to as the one I was currently taking was giving me headaches.  Sterling was a really sweet guy and I started to feel a very friendly and less romantic connection towards him.  Of course that didn't stop me from pushing the sexual envelope with him - I figured I would test this man to see how much he really knew about the needs of women since he was dedicating the rest of his life to caring for them.

While basking in the recovery phase of pleasure, I casually complimented Sterling's decorating touch and asked him if he was going to be a part of the wedding and when it was taking place.  His answer was shocking and yet typical at the same time.  "Next weekend, and I am the groom" he said without missing a beat.  "WHAT THE FUCK!!!"  I thought, but then I quickly calmed down as I remembered I did live 3000 miles away and wouldn't be talking to this guy ever again anyway - so what did it matter?  Gee - just when you think you really know someone...

Now this is the part where I should have just gotten up, found my girlfriends downstairs, and headed back to Chrissy's apartment to go to bed alone.  But of course, this is Me I am talking about.  

Sterling went on to tell me how he was feeling pretty ambivalent about getting married and how he wished his guy friends liked his fiance and would they please just stop referring to her as, "The Bitch" all the time.  The bedding and the lamps I liked so much were wedding gifts from their registry and now the inconsistent decor of the entire house made sense to me. In spite of this very important new found revelation of Sterling's, not much changed in our continued physical activity with one another until I heard what sounded like a pack of wild boars running up the stairs.

The door to Sterling's room flew open and one of the guys from earlier, who was with us at the keg in the kitchen, ran in and pulled me off the bed assertively whispering, "Fuck dude!  SHE'S HERE!!!"  Sterling quickly jumped back in his clothes and smoothed over the bed while "guy with no name" snatched up my clothes and pulled me into the hallway while I heard the clickity clack of high heels coming up the stairs.  Next I heard The Bitch start yelling, "WHERE IS SHE?!!!"  My new date threw me on the bed in a room down the hall from Sterling's and just kind of jumped on top of me and started to furiously grope and kiss me while telling me "To pretend like I was with him all along."

By this time I was half scared for my life, and half just really tired from a long night and decided that it was time to get out of there.  I could hear the soon to be newlyweds (and most likely soon after to be divorcees) arguing in Sterling's room with the door closed.  As I frantically put my dress and sandals back on I suddenly realized I had left my purse with Guy #1.  Everything I needed, including my plane ticket home, was in that Coach bag and I saw no way to leave it behind.  Calling on the courage of my ancestor's all the way back to Esther from the bible, I took a deep breath and barged right through Sterling's bedroom door. Without even looking at the two blurry figures to my right, I scooped up my purse and ran down the stairs towards the front door.

Guy with no name raced after me and shoved my forgotten bra in my purse as I exited the now practically empty house.  Apparently the party had long been over and none of my girlfriends felt like interrupting me long enough to tell me they were headed home.  The Bitch's bachelorette bride's maids were gathered in the front lawn smoking cigarettes and trying to decided who should drive home.  I held my breath as I sprinted past them hoping to God they had no idea what was really going on. 

Amazingly I made it up the back stairs to Chrissy's apartment. As soon as I slammed Chrissy's door behind me and dead-bolted the door, I turned around to find my four accessories to the night staring at me with the look of heavy judgement in their eyes.  "Carrie, Sterling is getting married next weekend - why did you hook up with him?!" Heather yelled at me as if I had any knowledge of this important fact before I slutted-out.

"NOTHING HAPPENED!  We were just talking..." I lamely responded with the level of logic I hadn't tapped since I was thirteen years old.

"Then why is your dress on backwards and inside out and your bra about to fall out of your purse?" Eartha said casually without judgement or criticism, "Sure looks to me like you had a really great time!"  This is why she is one of my oldest and dearest friends, Eartha has a magical way of always loving me just the way I am while refusing to put up with my bullshit and she never misses an opportunity to call attention to it.

I guess the best lesson I learned from that night is to always be exactly clear about who is in the bridal party (or who is currently any type of groom for that matter) before randomly hooking up with ANYONE at a bachelor party.  I now understand why strippers are usually the only type of women at these functions, and how important the employment of their body-guard is.  Oh, PLUS the part about never to trust a philandering man who tells you that the naked chick in the house is with his friend down the hall.