Orgasms for Two

by Betty Dodson

  One friend combined commercial porn with photos of her boyfriend and her having sex. Keeping a sex journal or writing down your fantasies is also informative as well as stimulating. If you are paranoid that someone might read your journal, write everything in files requiring a password. For me, drawing sex art has always been a source of arousal. Although I would never have admitted it at the time, drawing and painting the nude when I was sexually repressed secretly turned me on.

  The first time I went to the Metropolitan Museum of Art fresh out of Kansas, I nearly swooned when I saw the old masters’ paintings of nudes with religious or mythological themes barely disguising the erotic elements. Society’s insistence on keeping the subject of sex separate and hidden keeps us from accessing fine-art images of human sexuality. We don’t have museums of sex art where folks can go to get inspired, but we do have books with high-class sexual images created by great artists. Nearly every artist has at one time or other done erotic drawings and paintings.

  Despite the efforts of the religious right to censor explicit sexual images, porn has become so much a part of American culture that it is being taught at the college level as a legitimate course. My friend Susie Bright actually put together and taught the first course at Santa Cruz, titled “How to Look at a Dirty Picture.” Susie once said it’s easy to criticize what you don’t like about pornography, but it’s far more informative to discover what you do like. I totally agree, but as a double Virgo I’m born to criticize.

  When I watched my first X-rated video, everything turned me on because sexual images were new. After a few years of seeing live sex at parties and watching women having authentic orgasms with vibrators during workshops, I became bored with the obligatory blowjob to get the man hard, a fast friction fuck with no clit stimulation, and the phony screams of a woman faking orgasm. In the meantime, the men remained focused on breathing and getting what they wanted in order to have their orgasm. My constant criticism of the heterosexual formula in most pornography interfered with my sexual arousal.

  Next I went through a period where the genre that turned me on most was gay male porn. Looking at men’s muscular bodies going at it equally and coming for real was more interesting than watching a woman being passive while a man fucked her. I have no objection to men having this kind of porn as a favorite fantasy, but I do have a problem when pornography stands in for sex education. Of course, there are those exceptions when porn is done well enough to actually demonstrate good sexual techniques.

  LOVERS SHARING MASTURBATION. A young couple watches a pornographic video they have chosen together while they play with themselves. She has cushioned the head of the electric vibrator with a washcloth over her clitoris in order to vibrate longer before coming. He has the remote control nearby to fast forward.

  During the eighties, when I was still running my weekend workshops, Saturday night the group would have dinner together. Those who were interested were invited to come back to my apartment to watch some porn. For the most part, these women had never seen hard-core sexual images. First, I’d put on the standard male-oriented porn, and it would have them glued to the screen until the first woman voiced a complaint. Then it set them all off. Next I put on one of the videos produced by my friend Candida Royalle. She acted in porn in her youth and decided to get behind the camera to make her own videos from a woman’s point of view. At first the group preferred her softer approach with a love story minus what’s called “the money shot,” when a man pulls out and ejaculates on a woman’s body. But after awhile they lost interest and started talking again. When I put on my favorite gay male porn, it held their attention the longest.

  Watching porn and masturbating together can be fun. The problem is finding something that you both like. There is a huge selection of X-rated videos available these days, along with all the soft-core movies on cable. My suggestion is not to watch porn like you would watch a movie—from beginning to end. I fast forward if the story line slows down the action, and when a scene is good, it’s worth playing more than once. Sometimes I turn off the sound track and listen to my favorite seventies rock ’n’ roll. With a vibrator on my clit, I am less critical of what’s happening in any X-rated video.

  Sexual fantasy is at the heart of the creative process that requires the freedom to imagine the unimaginable without a censor inside our heads. After years of a sugary diet of romantic fantasies, I worried whenever I found myself thinking about getting tied to a log in the woods by a kidnapper and having a Boy Scout troop find us. The kidnapper, the Scout Master, and the troop then take turns having their way with me. Once I understood that I was playing all the roles in my imagination, it freed me to stop passing judgment on my fantasies.

  Now when I fanaticize a rape scene, I know I am both the rapist and the woman getting violated. In a bondage fantasy, I use the idea of being tied down and helpless as a way to imagine sexual surrender or the opposite of being in complete control. Although I have put others into bondage, I have never been tied down and I have no desire to be raped in real life. I use these images to excite my mind and fuel my orgasms.

  In developing a more varied fantasy life, I also began probing the recesses of my unconscious mind to uncover childhood memories. Growing up with three brothers and a handsome daddy I adored, I found a wealth of sexual treasures buried in my nuclear family. These memories are labeled “incestuous” and are forbidden. Reclaiming them opened one of the major accesses to my erotic mind.

  Sweet memories of sitting in my daddy’s lap feeling protected and secure. Playing doctor with my little brothers and the kids down the block. Feeling my older brother’s erection under a blanket on the front porch when I was seven. Now I love it when Eric pretends to be my big brother. We are like kids again with the added naughty element of making sure we don’t get caught. Even hotter and more forbidden is when I call him daddy while we are having sex, which is actually a more common fantasy for women than society would care to admit.

  Women who have never thought about sex will have to start from scratch when it comes to developing a fantasy life. They can begin by discovering and collecting images from reading magazines and books with sexual material gradually building a repertoire of sexual imagery. Watching X-rated videos provides visual imagery. Visiting chat rooms or talking on the phone anonymously is another way to explore your sexual fantasies. One of the best companies for phone sex, Intimate Connections, is posted on my website with detailed instructions if you are new to phone sex.

  During the eighties, when casual sex shut down, anonymous phone sex allowed me to revisit my hedonistic days. In spite of all my experiences talking about sex, the first time I began describing myself on the phone, I drifted into being who I actually was and got bogged down in reality. A few fantasy versions of myself were a horny housewife, a famous porn star, or a bisexual nymphomaniac, to name a few. I’ve used phone sex to get turned on for a session of self-loving after I hung up. When I had a great voice on the other end and we were building a hot scene together, I had the phone in one hand and my vibrator in the other. It was the ideal low-maintenance anonymous sex date where I didn’t have to wear makeup or be the famous woman who teaches masturbation.

  Fantasy role-playing with your lover or spouse is an adventure into new realms of physical sensations with mental games that create heightened emotional states. This consensual game is based on playing a dominant or submissive role to make sex more varied, fun, and exciting. Couples can explore an erotic exchange of power without the psychological baggage of labels like “sadomasochism,” and cliché images of whips and chains. Playing a sex game by deciding who will be in control is simply an extension of what’s actually going on in our daily lives without agreements or awareness. Once the roles are spelled out there are more possibilities for new adventures with pleasure.

  We know there are many husbands who dominate their wives, or the reverse, wives who dominate their husbands. This exchange of power is unconscious and taken for granted. It’s quite diffe
rent when two adults decide who will be in charge of what takes place in the bedroom and then negotiates a game for sexual pleasure.

  Many women have told me they could never take control of sex because they have no idea how to be “dominant.” That’s when I ask them to recall a time when dinner was nearly ready and one of the kids ran in wanting attention. If she herself is not a mother, then she can easily “hear” her own mother’s voice sounding like a five-star general—“Get out of the kitchen this instant! Can’t you see I’m busy?” Women wield this kind of power in the home every day, all the time.

  Instead of being a silent partner or a drill sergeant in the bedroom, consider the idea of running a sexual encounter with your lover or husband. Some of the roles I have played that have been fun with both women and men are: I’m the teacher and he is my pupil. I’m the mistress and she is my sex slave. I’m the doctor and he is my patient with some genital disorder I must examine and cure. A girlfriend of mine loves to be the whore with a heart of gold who will do anything to please her client. Her husband gives her a hundred-dollar bill that she keeps when they play this game. When the kids were small, they’d get a baby-sitter and he would pick her up in a bar and rent a hotel room for privacy. She said bringing cash into their sex life inspired them both. She really put out and he appreciated her more.

  Dressing for sex is a major part of fantasy role-playing. Picking a role and then creating a costume to go with it is as much fun as actually doing the role-playing. Start off gradually. Later, you can buy elaborate costumes if this turns you both on. My first dominant outfit was going topless with tight gray sweatpants, my favorite cowboy boots, and a big leather belt. It was amazing how those few items combined changed my mental attitude. Instead of being a passive, pretty little sex object waiting to be made love to, I became a cowgirl who knew how to ride a bucking bronco.

  Your first experience might be having “regular sex” with one difference: You play the usual male role by making a dinner date, choosing a restaurant, making the reservation, ordering for him, selecting the wine, and paying the check while only the two of you know he’s wearing a pair of your silk panties underneath his dark blue suit. During dinner, remind him that he must surrender to your sexual wishes later. Most men love this kind of role reversal. He’ll find it nice to be taken care of sexually if he’s been responsible for initiating sex most of the time. If the opposite is true in your relationship, relinquish your control and promise to be his devoted sex slave for the evening.

  Setting the stage is about making your environment inviting with soft lighting, candles, incense, and mood music, and having everything you want to use close at hand. Some basic things to consider are standard sex toys like a battery-operated or electric vibrator, a dildo, and a good massage oil. Or, if you’re using condoms, have plenty along with your favorite water-based lube. If there are children at home it’s a good idea to have a lock on the bedroom door to ensure privacy.

  When you’re feeling adventurous, gradually add new items to surprise your lover: a cock ring, a small paddle, a buttplug, and some light restraints that fasten with Velcro. If either of you has any mixed feelings, start off with “pretend bondage” where your partner imagines he can’t move. A blindfold alters the experience of sex by eliminating sight; it emphasizes the other senses of touch, smell, and sound.

  Later, if either of you wants to be restrained with wrist and leg cuffs or tied up with rope, it’s important to read a book that goes into detail about how this is done safely. While some might like the idea of restraints, they can also bring on panic and the person will need to be released immediately. Even a silk scarf can tighten when stress is put on it, so you’d want to have a pair of scissors handy to cut him loose fast. Everyone who does fantasy role-playing with restraints agrees on a word that ends the game immediately. It’s like the button on a treadmill marked stop. If you press it, it will stop. Playing with more intense sensation needs to be learned with a professional in a workshop or by joining a club where scene players meet and share their expertise.

  Fantasy Role-Playing requires a more advanced form of sexual communication. Couples can explore each other’s fantasies, which will create more intimacy between them. When the game is over, take care of each other by doing a lot of hugging and talking about what you felt and thought while you’re still in bed. Most of us have been conditioned to surrender our bodies and souls to love, so consensual SM (slave and master) or BD (bondage and discipline) can become the ultimate romantic scenario.

  Couples who want to experiment with threesomes usually start off having it as a fantasy before they actually do it. If the idea turns them both on, then they can consider pursuing the possibility. It’s often easier for most women to be sexually intimate with another woman than it is for a man to feel comfortable about inviting another man unless he’s bisexual. Each couple will have to discuss this before they proceed. Personally, I needed to establish equal sharing before taking my first step toward a threesome, and Grant agreed. We also thought it was best for me to choose a woman I was interested in being sexual with for the first time. Not the other way around.

  FANTASY ROLE PLAYING. This couple is acting out a consensual fantasy with light bondage; she is the dominant partner and he is her sex slave. She rides him while using her vibrator for clitoral stimulation. His hands are tied to the bedpost with a silk scarf. He watches her enjoying herself while he helplessly awaits his turn.

  The first girlfriend I asked declined, but the next time I made the offer, to another friend, she was very turned on by the idea. We made a three-way date. Grant was sensitive about honoring our primary bond by not going nuts with a new piece of ass and ignoring me. When that happens, it creates a degree of jealousy and dampens the possibility of sharing this kind of pleasure in the future. The night Grant and I had sex with another man was interesting but weird. It was more like the two guys politely taking turns while I got all the sexual attention. They were not at all interested in each other.

  There are many variations on three-way sharing. A couple I know enjoys having both women doing oral sex to the man. One husband simply wants to watch his wife get fucked while he masturbates. Other couples enjoy having the women go down on each other followed by him pumping one or both of them. One of my three-way affairs consisted of the husband going down on me while she played with my tits, and then they would fuck each other while I masturbated alongside them. Their agreement was he couldn’t put his penis inside another woman’s vagina, but she could screw whomever she pleased.

  Today, my favorite three-way sharing is taking turns with two pleasuring one and then rotating. It’s the same as with a three-way massage, where the people involved decide who goes first, second, and third. During another affair with a married couple, all three of us wanted to go last so we ended up flipping a coin and leaving it up to chance. When we started spending weekends together, sometimes we would pick separate nights so one person could bask in the luxury of getting all the attention from the other two that evening.

  Group sex could easily take a whole chapter, but I’m saving all those delectable details for my memoir. There are basically five different sexual combinations; self-sexuality, partner sex, a threesome, and two couples, which is a foursome. It takes five or more people to qualify as group sex. Although group sex slowed down with the advent of AIDS, some married couples never stopped enjoying it. Sex parties made a comeback in San Francisco during the second half of the eighties with the Jack and Jill Off parties that featured heterosexual group masturbation. As people became more comfortable using latex gloves and condoms, the JO parties turned into the Queen of Heaven Parties hosted by Carol Queen and Robert Lawrence. The group dynamic will always have the warmest spot in my heart, since it was my real graduate work in human sexuality.

  After all my experimentation with recreational drugs, the only one that enhanced sex for me was marijuana. The fact that marijuana heightens all the senses of pleasure will ensure that the liquor and ph
armaceutical lobbyists in Washington will continue to keep it an illegal substance. While some people enjoy a glass of wine before sex because it reduces inhibitions, I find alcohol dulls my senses. None of the psychedelic drugs of the sixties and seventies rocked my boat sexually, and while cocaine and ecstasy were great for dancing, they never improved my partner sex.

  Today we have to beware of all the legal prescription drugs. Americans are taking antidepressants as casually as aspirin, and they are known to dampen or totally kill sexual desire. The best aphrodisiac is a healthy body and an open mind.

  Designing their own sex lives gives couples an opportunity to go beyond the limitations of each one’s personality, the polite and appropriate cover story we show the world. With a little creativity, couples can discover a new sexual persona just waiting to be brought out of the bedroom closet. Go ahead. Take a risk with a little sexual adventuring.

  14

  ROSEBUD

  Anal Eroticism for Heterosexuals

  In the movie Citizen Kane, the close-up of Orson Wells’s lips saying “Rosebud” was supposedly the last word uttered by William Randolph Hearst. Some claim it was the name of his sled. My fantasy is that rosebud was his mistress’s nickname because they were into anal eroticism—a redeeming quality for such a power-driven, greedy man. I can’t help but admire those folks who can turn the lowly asshole into a source of sexual desire.

  There are common words that are used to refer to the anus, like asshole, poop shoot, bunghole, and bum to name a few, but I have called mine rosebud ever since I’ve learned to love this powerfully erotic orifice. My other favorite name is buttyhole, because it’s the one my mother used when I was a child.