Despite the onslaught of winter here in Vancouver, I took a nice long bike ride by the river yesterday, capitalizing on the selfdom-seen sunshine while I could. On my way back through the industrial lands along the river, a large delivery truck passed me by. Its paintjob dominated by dirt, I saw a message scrawled into the caked-on dirt on the back door:
“Wish my girl was this dirty.”
I had a great laugh as I continued peddling my way home, but it left me thinking about the dualities that every lover should have, but that many don’t. In writing about something similar not too long ago, I said, “When it comes to the bedroom, I’m able to balance being sensual, doting, and romantic with being pretty wicked and dominant when I feel like it. Sex is supposed to embrace all aspects of our personalities, and it’s the one time in our lives when we really have the chance be the person from our fantasies.”
If I can get personal for a moment, I suspect I can break down the evolution of a lover as it should happen for most people, and did happen for me.
As a kid, I was raised Catholic. My parents felt the religion was important, but as with anything in my life, when I believe something, I believe it with a zealous passion. By the time I was seven or eight, I was taking the priest’s sermon and teaching it to the athiest kids in the neighbourhood. At about nine years old, I was seriously thinking I should be a nun when I grew up. Seriously.
Like I said, passionate. In my mid-teens, a few things happened that made me realize that I might believe in the principles of the church, but that the folks who ran it were pissing me off. It didn’t take me long to walk away from it, and within a couple years I began learning about other faiths and realized we’re all in this together. I lost my dogma, and just kept the ethics.
As a result, though, I grew up with a lot of really religious takes on sex. For me, it was a sin. I never had sex until I was 18, and I felt wrong about it for the first two years. It wasn’t fulfilling, not really, despite my enjoying it, because I felt like I was going to be judged by a higher power or something. Around 20, I met a guy who introduced me to bondage, and I lost a few hang-ups then, but I really never got past myself until my mid-20s.
In my late 20s, I took an extended break from sex while I Dealt With Shit, but slowly began to realize I’d been cheating myself and depriving myself. I realized that I’m by nature a very mischevious person, and a person who needs that intimacy in order to feel whole. Why did that never translate to the bedroom, I wondered? Why was I so repressed and such a good-girl lover when I knew I could sometimes be oh-so-very-bad? I decided to force myself to try out the role of the “bad girl” and see what it did for me.
What it did, was get me off. What it also did, was get my lover sizzling hot. That look in his eyes told me he wanted to devour me whole, then and there. I’d never seen such unbridled passion, though I’d always had a fulfilling sex life. What next, though, I wondered? Would he treat me different? Were we going to have a weird situation after this? I realized that depended on me. Would I act normal when it was all said and done, return to the fun, irreverent Steff I knew myself to be? I had to, I decided. I had to see if I could be both.
I did, and I was. I realized then that the lover I was behind closed doors wasn’t the only person I was at heart. I was both. I was, as they say, every woman. Every woman I wanted to be, I could be. I could be bad in order to be good to my lover, and not have that impact who I was on an ethical level.
This is a dilemma I think a lot of people need to come to terms with — that playing games and being bad in the bedroom doesn’t necessarily reflect who you really are. Living out your fantasy version of you is something that can co-exist with your reality. The trouble is simply getting past whatever moral code it is that we’ve had imprinted on us by a society that doesn’t really get the fact that duplicity isn’t always a bad thing.
Have you managed to get past your hang-ups? How did you do it? If you haven’t, are you trying to? Let’s hear it, folks.
Category Archives: Best of Steff
The Waiting Game: The Better Way to Play
If you’ve never seen it, there’s a brilliantly inventive, noire-ish hospital dramedy found on Sunday nights on ABC. Grey’s Anatomyinspired me to order cable again, and last night I saw it for the first time this season.
Coincidentally, earlier in the day, I had been writing about the difference between suspense and anticipation when it comes to romance relationships. When I watched the show, guess what the sub-plot was? Hmm?
One of the last lines of Sunday’s episode came after the protagonist, Meredith Grey, finally finds out where she stands in the battlefield of love with Dr. McDreamy, as he’s known, who’s portrayed by Patrick Dempsey. In a voiceover, she comments, “Whoever said “What you don’t know can’t hurt you” was a complete and utter moron, because for many of us, not knowing is the worst feeling in the world.”
Recent events have reminded me that I’m one of those people. Oh, I try to play it cool, but not knowing where I stand, whether it’s movie plans with a friend or my place in the Cosmos, fills me with dread and apprehension. It’s unavoidable. Give me “suspense” and you’ll make a mess of me.
I said in my last posting that things were “confusing.” That’s just because I didn’t know when I was next hooking up with the nifty new guy I know. Face it. We’re all adults, and our lives get complicated. Some of our lives are more complicated than others can understand. Sometimes that’s by choice, sometimes destiny just takes a hand. It is what it is.
However, yesterday we cemented some plans for next week. This was what got me thinking about suspense versus anticipation. You see, I hung the phone up, furrowed my brow and thought, “Another week?” And then I realized, “Pfft, it’s only a week.” I grinned and went off and made my breakfast and had a terrific day.
I had been thinking that my uncertainty had been because I was insecure or uneasy with myself, and this was why I was so damned frustrated at all the unknowingness. Then I realized that it really was something altogether different.
I was in the room, too. I know we had some pretty wicked good times. I know what I offer. I know the expressions I saw on his face, and vice versa. I know it was pretty damned awesome. That logic, though, goes right the fuck out the window when I’ve got nothing empirical to back it up.
Figures, baby. Numbers, dates, times, whatever. Lay it on me. If I know we’ve got plans, I’m cool. Seems to me that guys are often hesitant to make plans because they want to have control of some kind. Now, I don’t get that sense from this guy, so that’s groovy, but it’s often been the case in the past. “If I can hold that card, I hold ’em all,” seems to be the line of thought sometimes. (This goes for members of both sexes, unfortunately.)
With an intelligent, strong, independent chick like me, that’s not going to be the case, though. You want to hold that card, then I hope you’re playing Solitaire, because that game just ain’t one I aim to play. I don’t have the patience or the strength. I really just don’t. Headgames are for people who don’t have control over their lives and who want to exert it over others to compensate. That ain’t me, man.
Fortunately, I don’t think I have to worry about that in my present scenario. And now I get to have those little fun thoughts in the back of my mind as to all the things I want to do with my playmate in a few days. Which brings us to another fabulous point in regards to the anticipation versus suspense argument.
If you’re sitting around in suspense, you just never know when, where,or if the games are gonna get back on track. In that case, it can be pretty hard to fill in the possible blanks, so to speak. When you do know that the games are on schedule for the future, then you get to turn your imagination on. You can scheme, you can plot, you can devise.
If you have a creative lover, one that likes to keep things interesting, then the best gift you can give yourself is to give them the gift of anticipation.
But we’re all so self-involved these days that it’s easy to forget what anticipation can do for us.
Really, it’s incredible how much damage we do to our relationships by not doing the simple things. Just committing to a date later in the week or making a quick email or a call to say “hey, you were in my thoughts. I can’t talk, but wanted to hear your voice,” can make all the different in cutting the tensions that eat away at our passion.
We all know modern life’s demands. We know we’re all spread pretty thin. Too often, we overfocus on ourselves. We frequently fail to think about lives from our partners’ point of views. We fail to understand the true stresses and challenges they face, despite the fact that we’ve got front-row seats. We’d like to think it’s all sunshine and roses because we’re in their lives now, but that’s pretty egomaniacal.
Like Grandma Death says in Donnie Darko, “In the end, every living creature dies alone.” We all have our lives, with their myriad complexities, to get through on our own. Most of us choose to share parts of those lives with our loved ones, but when the lights go out at night, we’re right back inside our self-contained universes.
Every now and then, we have to remember that our lives are filled with enough suspense. From the day we’re born to that day we die alone, suspense is all we get. What does your future hold? Do you really know?
When it comes to love and sex, isn’t it time we got a little something we don’t get enough of? The thrill of anticipation and eagerness?
For me, it makes me hotter. It makes me confident, secure, and inspires me to want to make the wait all that much more worthwhile. One of my readers said that a secure man is a horny man. This is true. But a secure lover is a better lover, regardless of gender.
And it’s so easy to build that added security in. Anticipation is more than just looking forwards to future events. It’s the knowing that there’s something to look forwards to. Think about it.
Penis Enhancement: A Chick’s POV
One of my regulars sent me an email a dog’s age ago, asking for me to take on the subject of penis enhancement. He didn’t ask for information about the procedures, but commented that:
The more I talk with guys either from my gym or circle of friends the more I have found out that some really would seriously consider undergoing surgery if it meant a larger penis. Perhaps you can provide a female-centric view on these procedures as well as any experiences you have had with men who have underwent procedures.
Well. There’s a can of worms, isn’t it? First of all, I know no men who’ve experienced such a procedure. If you have, and you want to go on the record, feel free to email me. (See sidebar for the address.)
There’s a couple cliches we’ve all heard:
“Size does matter.”
“It’s not how big it is, but how he uses it.”
I wouldn’t want any larger than 8 inches, and that’s a personal preference. Some chicks want guys who are as big as they can get, and other chicks want small men. Enter another cliche: It takes all kinds.
The last guy I was with before this one was guilty of false advertising. This is where it’s probably good to point out that *I* check out a man’s package as soon as the opportunity presents itself. I doubt I’m a minority, as I think that most women have done this.
There’s nothing like a good pair of jeans to give you an idea of what the future holds. That said, I’m also aware that a number of guys are “growers” not “show-ers,” so I don’t let my first impression colour my opinion… just my anticipation.
This dude, the false-advertising guy, seemed to have a nice package. A really nice package, which was somewhat surprising considering the well-known rumour about Asian men and their offerings. I saw him wander off to the washroom after we had begun to fool around, and when he returned, he had something in his back jeans pocket and his “package” seemed considerably less… um, inspiring.
In the end, “hard” (a misnomer in itself), the guy was four-inches long. In his back pocket? Socks.
If you’re the kind of guy who will stuff socks down his cock to “impress” a date, let me save you the hassle. You’re so gonna get busted. If she doesn’t laugh you out of the bedroom, you can expect to never hear from her again. Fact is, if you have a small cock, that’s just how it goes. Don’t build shit up or pretend to be more man than you are, because it always gets outted. (For this same reason, I think chicks are fools to wear padded bras.) And if you thought your situation was embarrassing before such antics, think again.
But it’s still not something guys should be sweating as much as they do.
There are chicks called “teeny queens” who are looking for small men. They just prefer that. There are “size queens” who think anything less than 6” is unthinkable. Then there are the rest of us. The ones who love what you do with your cock, no matter what size it is, so long as it’s eager to play with us, and you’re talented at what you do.
There are chicks who will walk from a guy because of his dick — too much, too little, too unenthused, whatever. Hell, I’ve known chicks who’ve left men because they were too endowed. I knew one chick who was almost in love with a guy when she discovered how large he was erect. She never let him enter her, and she walked from the relationship because she was too scared to allow him to penetrate. It broke her heart to do it, but there’s some things some chicks won’t allow.
There are men who have actually chosen to reduce their cock size because they’ve experienced that one time too many. (I don’t endorse that site, but am simply providing anecdotal evidence.)
Average size, I’m told, is five to seven inches. Most men I’ve been with have been in that range, and this man (and the last one) are the first who have been outside that range. Have I ever wanted a larger guy before now? No, actually.
What’s another reason a lot of chicks like average-sized guys? Well, if giving head’s something you want us doing, it’s more likely to happen more often when you’re average-sized — or at least happen for longer. Getting a large cock in a mouth can be a pretty challenging thing, and for any chicks with jaw disorders or neck problems, it can be daunting and painful.
Finally, another plus to not getting an overly enhanced penis? Anal. If you want your lover to try anal for the first time, she’ll be less likely to do it if you have a large cock. Face it, that’s just a little freaky for some of us chicks.
This fear, this paranoia men have about their cock sizes is really just the Cosmos’ way of getting even with them for all the fucked-up shit women think about themselves: Is my ass too big? Is my hair too flat? Are my breasts weird? Does my vagina taste funny?
Personally, I’m sick and fucking tired of this new trend we’re seeing in our society, inspired by Brazil, and perfected by Barbie of Beverly Hills, in which everyone is trying to surgically correct their “flaws.” So, the best “you” that you can muster is a certain “someone” you’ve paid thousands of dollars to create under a scalpel and too-bright lighting? Whatever gets you to sleep at night, baby.
If you can’t handle who you are, and you can’t get past what you are, then maybe, yeah, you need to do something about it. But before you let a perceived problem become a real problem, maybe you’d better check the facts. The facts tell you that the majority of women are satisfied by their man’s cock size, that the majority of them don’t want anything that can’t be solved by a cock ring or some Kegel exercises. (For more on those topics, you can read a posting I did not so long ago on NYHotties and another I did here.)
Said simply, knowing what to do with your tongue, what to say, how to touch her, how to finger her, how to do all those things that add up to a wonderful night in will almost always put her in her happy place, whether you’re “average” or not, and will save you lots of bucks, grief, and maybe even a little pain.
In short? Get over yourself, boys. It’s not all about your cock.
Photographic How-Tos on Sexual Positioning
If you don’t try new positions in sex and you wonder why other people are fussing about sex and orgasms so much, you’ve probably answered your own question.
Positioning is about the most important thing to consider if you’re wanting more variety in sex — bondage and all that should come after you’ve given and taken it in every position you can think of.
Why’s it matter so much? Well, sex is all about nerve-endings, basically, and position of entry and thrusting can affect which nerves are hit and when — if they’re firing in new sequences, it can result in a completely different climax.
This is true for men and women. So, really, know your positions. Here’s where this awesome site comes in handy —
This is one of the best sites of sexual positioning I’ve found on the web — thanks, SexyFX.com! — just because they offer a few varieties and because everything’s photographed.
This is their selection of 20 beautifully erotic positions — not safe for work. Just so damned pretty, too.
These are way unsafe for work, too, but with more than 80 positions photographed, grouped according to style (ie: Women on Top, Anal Sex, etc) and come with the explanations in detail.
The site has lots of other useful stuff, but they’ve not made it very pretty or easy to navigate, but it’s worth surfing if you’re interested.
The photo pictured here is from their “erotic” collection and is called “Crisscross coupling.”
(And I’m not paid to endorse this site in any way.)
One pill makes you smaller: Birth Control
A couple weeks ago, I started back on the birth control pill after five or six years off of it. There’ve been times when I’ve been on the pill, but I’ve never taken it for extended periods. That’s just because I’m the kind of person who’s hesitant to get into chemicals of any kind. (Herbs, though, I’m down with.)
It’s been about two weeks since I started, and it went all over the place at the beginning, since I’m shitty at following a regimen. But in the last week I began to notice some mood swings happening. Stress hitting me harder than it should, and things bothering me more than they should.
I think I should be over the moon. I had an incredible let’s-stay-in-and-fuck-all-day kind of weekend last week, and at the end, felt pretty damned smug about it. Then he walked out the door, I received a depressing email, and for the rest of this week, I’ve been riddled with fears and paranoia. For several days now, I’ve been mired in a depression I can’t shake, that’s causing me to move towards some pretty intense agoraphobia.
There was a time in my past when I dealt with depression… for a long fucking time. With it comes that total lack of desire to live, the lack of energy, the lack of passion. Depression is lack. That’s all it is. Overwhelming lack. It’s when nothing brings a sense of value to you, and it is one fucking horrible thing to dwell under.
And it’s coming back. The only thing I can point my finger at are those pills. I have lost weight in the last month, since my jeans fit me snugger in all the right places, so that’s something to be pleased about. My dire financial cloud is lifting, again, a thing to be pleased about. And I’ve been laid time and time again in the most divinely delicious ways in a long time, so, yeah, that’s a good thing, too. But here I am, short of breath, panicking, and freaking right out. Over what? A phone call? A missed client appointment? A little rain? What the fuck’s under my skin? Some questions don’t have answers. Others have pills. But my pills are bringing the questions on, and that just ain’t so cool.
I had an email, coincidentally, from a male reader concerned about whether his girlfriend should go on the pill since they have a history of condoms coming off. Honestly? That’s not something I’m qualified to answer. So, I won’t.
I will, however, say that educating yourself by reading up on the internet is a must-do before you make such a change in your lifestyle. Know all the negatives, all the potential mishaps that may arise, before you move in that direction.
Personally, these kinds of things have never really affected me a lot — pills, drugs, et al — so I’m somewhat surprised to have fallen prey to this so damned thoroughly and quickly.The pill can come with any number of side effects, from serious health issues like blood clots all the way through depression and lack of sexual appetite and headaches. This is a great thread on a discussion forum about women’s health, and it really illustrates one pill-user’s experiences on the birth control pill.
Me, I think it increased an already-active sex drive, but has caused very serious depression. Fortunately, I know the signs of depression and it’s only taken a few days to realize that Something Isn’t Right. I have booked an appointment with my MD for Monday, and intend to discuss the issue in detail. I’m confident that getting off the pill will lead this Steff back to the land of sunshine and bliss. Or I’m as confident as feeling depressed will allow me to be, at least.
If you already suffer from depression, you may want to rethink the pill. If you’re susceptible to chemicals of any kind, you also may want to rethink the pill.
HOWEVER, if you’re aware of what might happen, you know the signs to look for, and you monitor any changes that arise, and you discuss all those changes with your lover, so they’re watching out for you as well, then why not try it? If it doesn’t affect you, being on the pill can really contribute added security and enjoyment to your life. Just don’t go into it blindfolded, is all I ask.
Allegedly, the side effects tend to quiet down in two to three months. The question is, can you live with them that long? Depending on the severity, it’s entirely possible it’ll be but a blip on your life. Not so for me. Personally, I spent too much of my life in the dark to go back in it again. I’ll be looking at other options or trying other brands.
The struggle to love one's self
I am imperfect. Maybe it’s a newsflash to you, but it’s something I’ve been far too aware of for my entire life.
As a kid, I was plagued with health problems. It wasn’t until my early teens that my epilepsy went away and we discovered that the causes of my endless troubles ultimately stemmed from a rare kidney disorder.
Nearly two decades later, my health issues are things of my distant past, but I’m still a member of the bonus lover plan. I’m not some svelte sexy thing who’s able to squeeze into a size six, and some part of me doubts I ever will be. No, like my personality, my body’s larger than life, and it suits me fine.
I’d rather not ever be thin, despite struggling to lose nearly 20% of my body weight these past two years. During that journey to toneness, I’ve gained a better sense of self than I’ve ever known. Who I am, though, is larger than life, and that’ll never change. Presumably, my body will remain the first clue of my nature for others.
On that same journey, I’ve discovered something else. The “ideal” beauty is seldom our “real” beauty in the eyes of the everylover. While we all lust after our glossy magazine celebs, when it comes to having them as lovers, day in day out, we wouldn’t be interested. Why is that?
I’ve been trying to understand the seemingly incongruous nature between lust and desire. I’m more than able to lust after nearly any man I see, since sexuality for me isn’t a formula, but rather something almost impalpable. You have it or you don’t. When it comes to desire and attraction for the longterm, though, I find myself zeroing in on men who carry a little extra weight on their large frames, provided they dress well and groom well. What is it that makes me want them? I’ll never know, but I know they’re what’s in my mind when I touch myself in the dark.
The point is, we all have a certain make and model that drives our desire, and it may not be worthy of a glossy magazine spread, but they’ll spread just fine for us, thank you very much.
Until this past year, I was always aggressive in my interpersonal dealings, in an attempt to mask my everpresent insecurities. Somewhere along the way, probably when I escaped death last August in a scooter (think Vespa-ish) accident, I realized the insanity of not loving myself for who and what I was, since I had almost ceased to be and had another chance at this merry-go-round called Life. Loving myself then became my number one goal.
After all this time, all this work, I can say it’s true now. I’m a vixen in my own right, in my own way. I’ve also discovered something I’d forgotten: No man has ever complained about my body size to me. The contrary. Back in the day, though, I thought they were trying to make me feel better. I didn’t want to believe they could want me or love me for who I was… because what would that say about them, then?
Now, what it says about a man is evident to me: They understand passion, desire, and they know it when they see it. They see me for all of what I offer — intelligence, wit, charm, stylings, deviousness, sensitivity, romance, dominance, submissiveness, all wrapped into one package that’s just the right size to hold the dynamism of what I bring to the bed and to life as a whole.
A few years ago, I read a study that revealed those who were carrying a little extra weight generally had better sex lives. The scientists were at first stymied by this discovery, until they realized a very simple truth: Food, when done the way food ought to be, is as erotic and sensual as anything we can experience. Those who were overweight were in touch with their sensual selves and sought to enjoy all the delectable goodness offered by life, in whatever form they came, be it bed-bound, baked, or otherwise.
I have found myself besieged by young women of late, all of them emailing me about their inabilities to orgasm. I find myself having to keep explain to them that they got to love themselves — physically and emotionally — before they can handle the Big O. The odds are against them, though, and it’s largely why we sexually peak in our 30s. As young women, we suffer through the most inexplicable expectations from society and the hang-ups we develop are legion. There was a good mainstream example last year in the form of a short-lived TV show called Life as We Know It, with Kelly Osborne in it. A guy fell for her, but admitted he couldn’t handle having her as a girlfriend, because what would his buddies think if he was slapping thighs with a tubby girl?
We live in a society that’s so hung up on appearances that we’ve forgotten the beauty that comes from within. We’ve forgotten how incredibly hot and sexy it can be when someone simply digs themselves for who they are, regardless of their appearance, and can bring that passion and goodness into play in every thing they do every day.
I recall once being asked why I wanted to lose weight. I bit my lip, looked at the ground, thought about it, and responded “Because I want my inside beauty to match my outsides.”
These days, on a good day, I know I already match. In the last decade of my life, I have overcome enormous obstacles — the death of a parent, massive debt, illnesses, a couple near-death experiences, and writer’s block that hounded me for half a decade. But my greatest accomplishment is this: Loving myself.
One of my all-time favourite quotes is Oscar Wilde’s. “To love one’s self is the beginning of a life-long romance.” What can I say? I’m a romantic at heart, and now it shows.