It was late Sunday afternoon. We had so much to do around the house that we'd given in and let the kids park themselves in front of a DVD. As soon as the movie title was up on the TV screen, Amy grabbed my hand, led me back to the bedroom.
This is too good to be true, I thought.
In the bedroom, door closed, she snaked her hands around the back of my head, pulled me into her mouth.
Waaaaaaaay too good to be true.
I wavered between going with the moment and questioning. When she finally broke the kiss, I asked point-blank: "Okay. What gives? Are you really starting something?"
She sounded deliciously sinister when she giggled. "No, I just wanted you to help me sort the dirty clothes in here."
Told you so.
"You know, I would have been happy to do that without the seduction. But now that I know how badly you want my help...." I started to unbutton my jeans.
"Ha ha," she said.
I was working on a pile of dress pants that showed my neglect via their desperate need for an iron, if not an all-out trip to the dry cleaners. Amy was sorting through lingerie and talking about how good she felt about the recent underwear purchases she (well, sometimes we) have made.
"It's my dream," she said from the closet, "to have matching bra-and-panty sets. Seven of them. One for each day of the week. Wouldn't that be awesome?"
I dropped my pants — oh, the ones I was sorting, sorry about that — and stepped to the closet. I locked my eyes on hers and searched for the perfect tone of voice that would deliver the high level of import I wanted my words to carry. I said:
"You. Must. Do this."
She started to smile, but my look confused her, and she wasn't sure what to do. "Huh?"
"Amy...." I put my hands on her shoulders. "Of all the dreams you have expressed, this is one of your most worthy goals ever."
She guffawed. But I continued.
"This is an exceptionally, egregiously, supreme goal. You must have seven matching bra-and-panty sets."
She rolled her eyes as she squeezed past me and headed back to the bed, where a pile of socks awaited. "I still can't tell if you're being facetious."
"I'm serious. You totally have to do this."
Okay, so I was being a little silly about it. But my reaction was only a slight exaggeration.
So what's the big deal? It's the fact that Amy might be looking at herself through a prism of sex appeal again. I mean, thinking this way outside of when I've gotten her all heated and horny. This may be the first time in ... what, years? Maybe.
Perhaps all my sorties of carnal reverence, my "shock and awe" blitzkrieg of ardor, have finally begun to chip away at the battlements that prevent her from realizing that this woman is smokin' hot. Amy carries herself with such confidence in her work environment; if her sexual self can find the strength to do the same ... well, there's no telling what might happen. Despotic empires could be destroyed. Literacy rates across our country could skyrocket. Reality television could fade from view. Gas prices could fall!
Of course, the concerns of global warming would increase greatly with the temperature emanating from her heaving, barely encased chest ... with the heat rising with the scent of appetite and ambrosia from the coordinated bottoms. But it's a small price to pay for my wife's new sexual esteem.
Not to mention, it'd be fun to get that panicked cell phone call from Al Gore.
"I'm sorry, sir, but if you saw Amy's ass in this sheer black number she slipped on this morning, you'd just ... What's that? You'd like a picture for future Powerpoint presentations? Well, I'll ask her...."
Showing posts with label body image. Show all posts
Showing posts with label body image. Show all posts
21 March 2007
20 March 2007
Swinging from My Trial Balloon
Despite how late Saturday night had gotten to be, the energetic sex we'd had a few minutes earlier had keyed us up enough that Amy and I weren't falling asleep right away. It provided an opportunity to ask her a question I'd been thinking a lot about lately.
"I don't want you to think that I'm killing to do this ..."
An odd way to start this question. It puts me sort of at a weak place. But I was uneasy about pushing the topic of swinging out there. I mean, in a non-fantasy, serious context. I'm sure my discomfort was showing. Even after all these years, the fear of rejection persists!
"... but would you ever consider checking out a swingers' club? You know, we could go to those places and not do anything ... just check it out."
There was a long pause. Somehow the pause actually assured me that she was okay with the conversation. It wasn't that she was so aghast as to be speechless; she was seriously considering my question and her answer. Why do I find myself amazed at her open-mindedness ... over and over again?
She finally said: "I think the hardest thing for me, still, is the idea that someone who didn't love me as much as you do would find me attractive enough to want to fool around."
"Again," I reiterated, "it's not like that would even be up for discussion the first time. I would want to go with the agreement that we'd keep our clothes on. That said, I think you'd be surprised how attractive you are, how much attention you'd get."
"Well, I'm sure that once I was there and I saw what the other people there looked like, I would see that this wasn't as much of a concern," she said. "But I can't help it."
"I totally understand."
We kissed a bit, and then I said: "I have my own misgivings too. I wonder what it's like to be in a world where these people have made it so much a part of their life ... where the lifestyle has become so prevalent to them. I think it would feel strange to be around people who had made sex such the major driving force in their lives."1
And there's another misgiving I have too, and it's probably an unfair judgment against these kinds of establishments: From the pictures I've seen of the public areas in many of these clubs, they just seem so ... tacky. I've seen rooms that look like they jumped right out of The Ice Storm, circa 1973, and I imagine a lot of somewhat impersonal surroundings. I worry that we (well, Amy, mainly) are viewed as "fresh meat" from the moment we walk in. I worry that there's not going to be anyone at these places to talk to ... who I would be the least bit interested in spending time with outside of the confines of the club. None of which is to say that I'm fascinated to cross the threshold and see what it might be like inside. Maybe it'll help me get over some of these prejudices.
"I think the other big thing for me," Amy said, "is that I'm at a point my life where I'm feeling pretty risk-averse. I think when the kids are a little bit older, I'd be more willing to consider things like that."
The truth is — and I told her — I can't really imagine something like this happening in the near future either. For all my fantasizing about "expanding the marriage bed," when I look at the reality of the situation, I come to this conclusion: Hell, we can't even sleep through a whole night right now! We're a long way from having the "freedom" to head out for a long evening away from home.
I'm sorry, in retrospect, that I didn't plumb Amy's mind some more about what "risks" she was specifically thinking about when she said that. But I will come back to her later on that.
This was maybe a very gentle sort of ice-breaker. But I feel like there's no need to bring it up again soon, after we both acknowledged we're several clicks away from the fantasies involving other people becoming a reality. Thankfully, there are a number of other fantasies still in play! If nothing else, I know that I can continue to explore these threesome/foursome/moresome ideas with Amy in the privacy of our own bed and discover interests and predilections related to these scenarios in the future.
--
1 Oh, shut up. I know what you're thinking. Your "bullshit meter" just went off, didn't it? But honestly, you'd be surprised how much more to my life there is besides sex. Really. This blog is only about sex. If you read my other blogs, you'd see there are actually other things I think about! But you're not here to read about that stuff, are you? [Return]
"I don't want you to think that I'm killing to do this ..."
An odd way to start this question. It puts me sort of at a weak place. But I was uneasy about pushing the topic of swinging out there. I mean, in a non-fantasy, serious context. I'm sure my discomfort was showing. Even after all these years, the fear of rejection persists!
"... but would you ever consider checking out a swingers' club? You know, we could go to those places and not do anything ... just check it out."
There was a long pause. Somehow the pause actually assured me that she was okay with the conversation. It wasn't that she was so aghast as to be speechless; she was seriously considering my question and her answer. Why do I find myself amazed at her open-mindedness ... over and over again?
She finally said: "I think the hardest thing for me, still, is the idea that someone who didn't love me as much as you do would find me attractive enough to want to fool around."
"Again," I reiterated, "it's not like that would even be up for discussion the first time. I would want to go with the agreement that we'd keep our clothes on. That said, I think you'd be surprised how attractive you are, how much attention you'd get."
"Well, I'm sure that once I was there and I saw what the other people there looked like, I would see that this wasn't as much of a concern," she said. "But I can't help it."
"I totally understand."
We kissed a bit, and then I said: "I have my own misgivings too. I wonder what it's like to be in a world where these people have made it so much a part of their life ... where the lifestyle has become so prevalent to them. I think it would feel strange to be around people who had made sex such the major driving force in their lives."1
And there's another misgiving I have too, and it's probably an unfair judgment against these kinds of establishments: From the pictures I've seen of the public areas in many of these clubs, they just seem so ... tacky. I've seen rooms that look like they jumped right out of The Ice Storm, circa 1973, and I imagine a lot of somewhat impersonal surroundings. I worry that we (well, Amy, mainly) are viewed as "fresh meat" from the moment we walk in. I worry that there's not going to be anyone at these places to talk to ... who I would be the least bit interested in spending time with outside of the confines of the club. None of which is to say that I'm fascinated to cross the threshold and see what it might be like inside. Maybe it'll help me get over some of these prejudices."I think the other big thing for me," Amy said, "is that I'm at a point my life where I'm feeling pretty risk-averse. I think when the kids are a little bit older, I'd be more willing to consider things like that."
The truth is — and I told her — I can't really imagine something like this happening in the near future either. For all my fantasizing about "expanding the marriage bed," when I look at the reality of the situation, I come to this conclusion: Hell, we can't even sleep through a whole night right now! We're a long way from having the "freedom" to head out for a long evening away from home.
I'm sorry, in retrospect, that I didn't plumb Amy's mind some more about what "risks" she was specifically thinking about when she said that. But I will come back to her later on that.
This was maybe a very gentle sort of ice-breaker. But I feel like there's no need to bring it up again soon, after we both acknowledged we're several clicks away from the fantasies involving other people becoming a reality. Thankfully, there are a number of other fantasies still in play! If nothing else, I know that I can continue to explore these threesome/foursome/moresome ideas with Amy in the privacy of our own bed and discover interests and predilections related to these scenarios in the future.
--
1 Oh, shut up. I know what you're thinking. Your "bullshit meter" just went off, didn't it? But honestly, you'd be surprised how much more to my life there is besides sex. Really. This blog is only about sex. If you read my other blogs, you'd see there are actually other things I think about! But you're not here to read about that stuff, are you? [Return]
22 February 2007
V-Day, Night Two: Movie, Dinner, Dessert.
A date.
A date!
Unbelievable. Date clothes! A gift from Amy last Christmas, but not worn until I had good reason. That reason came last Saturday night.
A babysitter! We sprung for one! An extravagance, when you figure in the cost of movie and dinner. Reserved for truly special times ... like, say, Valentine's Day.
A movie! One that isn't animated!
Dinner! In a restaurant with nary a pizza or grilled cheese sandwich on the menu! A wine list! Valet parking! Waiters who don't write down your order! Lookatme, Mom — I'm a grown-up!
I had hoped that Amy would be wearing her new Valentine's Day present tonight, but as it turned out, the bra was running a little small. So she'll return it for something that we both like, and in the meantime, she put on an incredibly hot sheer black bra front-closure bra she picked up yesterday ... So delicious that there oughta be a law. I'm talking, of course, about the law that would state she's not allowed to put anything over it when she wears it. Amy wasn't particularly dolled up, going casual (at my recommendation), but she still looked ravishing. Which worked out well, seeing as a ravishing was on tap for that night.
***
The movie was Pedro Almodovar's Volver. It was a little piece of joy. (Thank God! When you rarely go out to movies, seeing a film worth the money feels like a matter of life and death.) Like most of Almodovar's films, it had a strong erotic undercurrent -- though this time there isn't a hint of sex, or even a romance. Almodovar accomplishes the sexual charge through his camera lens' infatuation with Penélope Cruz. Or at least her body. He costumes and films her as if she's a modern-day Sophia Loren, complete with the most delectable cleavage I've seen on screen in ages. (At one point, a character asks Cruz, "Where did you get that chest?... Are they real?" Indeed, it was a question I asked myself throughout, distracting myself into trying to remember what she'd looked like in the other films I'd seen her in.)
On a couple of occasions, Almodovar indulges the audience in extended aerial shots, angles that shoot straight down into a most inspiring open blouse as Cruz does seemingly mundane things like washing dishes or walking up a stairway. And there is a moment in this film when she walks up a cobble street pulling a small shopping cart, her hair perfectly up-yet-tousled, that feels like something straight out of the 1940s. Cruz is so glorious, so delicious that I told Amy afterwards I just might have to drop someone off my laminated list to make room for her.
***
I had kept the dinner location a secret, but Amy asked for one hint and easily figured it out. It's an old, romantic haunt of ours from our pre-children days. A storefront type that opens into a lush, cozy space that looks bigger than you'd think from the outside. The decor is eclectic but tasteful. They've added live music since we were last there too, adding a new element to the ambiance. I dropped Amy off and drove away to find a restaurant with valet parking (It's the only way to park in this neighborhood), and by the time I got back, Amy was already seated, raving about the singer/pianist, who had just laid down a pretty damn good version of Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah." Throughout the night, he brought out renditions of Billy Joel and Elton John songs, sung in a lower register than usual, which brought a new facet to songs that otherwise would have been pretty tired.
Fingers were crossed that the food was as good as we remembered. We weren't disappointed. I enjoyed a salmon filet with a light saffron wine sauce on a bed of spinach and some terrific gourmet mashed potatoes. Amy's dish blew us away: a sauteed tilapia with a sauce that included raisins, tomato marinara, and white wine. The waiter gave us a tremendous recommendation on a red wine; if I hadn't been driving, we would have easily finished off two bottles.
We talked a lot about Volver during the dinner, remembering the moments that resonated. We also did a good amount of people-watching (though we didn't scan the room for a fantasy fuck-buddy). Eventually, I couldn't resist bringing the conversation around to ... well, you know.
"I'm trying to decide if I'm going to cash in one of my coupons tonight," I started.
Amy laughed. "You know," she said, "I can't really remember what I wrote. Well, I can remember one of them."
"Would you like me to recite them, verbatim?" I asked.
We ran through them. (It was the anal sex coupon she remembered.) I reiterated the effect that they had had on me. She asked my thoughts on the "wildcard" coupon, and I just said that my I was too overwhelmed by the options to think clearly about it right now.
Amy changed the subject: "I completely forgot to tell you something about your Valentine's Day present: I didn't tell you how amazingly fun it was to try those on."
This was a nice surprise. When I imagined what that shopping experience must have been like for Amy, "fun" was not the word that sprung to mind. Based on my previous shopping excursions with her, the harsh lighting and mirrors in most dressing rooms only seemed to dampen her spirits. Not this time, apparently.
"I was actually getting turned on while I tried them," she admitted.
"That's so cool," I said. "You were there for over an hour, it seems like you tried on a ton of stuff."
"Oh yeah," she said. "The lady helping me really got into it, too, helping me find stuff. I tried on a lot, but the cool thing was that even the items I didn't take, it wasn't because they looked bad on me; they just didn't look as good as the outfits I came home with."
This is an amazing development, on two fronts: First, that she was so comfortable with her body that she had no problem trying on sexy clothes; secondly, that she was actually turned on while doing it.
"In fact," she revealed, "on Valentine's Day, at work, I got to thinking about what we were going to do that night, and I actually got really aroused. For the first time ever at this job, I was trying to figure out where I could go to ... take care of things."
"Did you?" I had to ask.
She laughed. "No, no. But it felt really good to feel ... eroticized again. Like, I'm coming back in touch with that part of me again."
Um ... I'm sorry, give me a moment. I need to wipe a tear from my eye.
Okay. I'm back.
Maybe a corner has been turned. Maybe things are shaping up. But what changed? Was it just her? Or was it something that I did, something I'm projecting, that's changing the equation? There's a part of me that says, Don't overanalyze it. But it'd be nice to know what slight tweak turned up the volume on the sexual dynamic ... if only to understand how to sustain that change well off into the future.
***
On the drive home, out of the blue, Amy brought up a porn movie we'd watched together some time ago. She described a scene she had been thinking about a lot, where porn starlet Chloe gets fucked in her office by her boss, right in front of a vindictive (female) co-worker doing her best to ignore the action going on only a few feet from her. (The movie was Antonio Passolini's Unreal.)
"So, what is it about the scene that turns you on?" I asked. "Is it the office setting?"
"Maybe," she said. "I don't know, really. It just works." Getting Amy to pin down why something turns her on is always a challenge, just like it's difficult to get her to clearly identify any kinks.
At home, when I returned from walking the babysitter to her car, Amy stood in the kitchen. We embraced, kissing passionately.
"You want me to find that movie?" I asked, and she nodded a mm-hmm. We got more comfortable — there would be no tearing off clothes tonight, probably because mine were new! I donned a robe, while Amy put on the second of the two Valentine's Day outfits she'd decided to keep. I was not able to find the video anywhere (which worried me greatly: Had I left it out somewhere where my kids or babysitter might have found it?), so we oped for a movie I had on my computer. Down to the basement we went, with Amy settling in between my legs, her back against me, the laptop on her lap.
It turned out that the movie wasn't our cup of tea. It's what the industry commonly calls a "couples film," which means that it's shot with all beautiful models. It would have been considered "hard-core" (penetration, money shots, etc.), but instead of really getting to hear people in true throes of ecstasy, you get lots of Enigma-like music playing over their slow-motion machinations. It's staged, dressed up, and extremely slow-moving. It's the kind of movie that men just introducing their wives to watching porn together would try ... but we're way past that. We found ourselves fast-forwarding through all the seductive posing and lip-licking to get to some action.
Finally, there was one scene that started to work for Amy — a beautiful woman being lavished with attention by two men. I finally saw a hand disappear into her thong when that scene got going.
"Who would you be doing that with if that were you?" I asked. "Who is joining us?"
She moaned. "Graham, a new guy in our office," she whispered. How very interesting!
"Oh yeah? Is that Graham's cock you're sucking while I get ready to fuck you from behind?" I was playing with her tits through the camisole, and she was starting to writhe. "Or maybe," I continued, "Graham is here, between your legs. He's licking that wet, hot cunt of yours while you and I both watch. He can look up and watch me squeezing your tits while he eats you. Would you like that?"
She groaned. We murmured for awhile about her new young workplace stud. I wondered if she'd ever really fantasized about him. I'll have to ask her another time.
The movie, which was already pretty much a dud, was becoming less and less interesting to us.
"Once you fuck Graham and me, are you going to return the favor?" I asked into her ear. "Will you share my cock with another woman?"
"Yes," she breathed.
"Who gets to suck my cock with you?" I asked.
"Who would you like?" she asked.
I have to admit: I was stymied. I spend all this energy fantasizing about Amy that when she asks me what other woman I'd like to do, I'm at a loss. "You can say it," she urged, as if I had someone in my head but was withholding. But there was no one!
Finally, I came up with a couple. "I'd love to watch you and Cynthia go at it," I suggested, indicating a high-ranking co-worker in my department. "Or maybe you and Shelley," the woman who, along with her husband, Amy had suggested (though not seriously) as foursome partners in a sex coupon. "Between her tits and yours, I could be a very happy boy."
The laptop suffered no damage, but it was pretty much kicked away. Amy threw open my robe and got to enthusiastically sucking my cock. Later, I requested a 69: Few things excite me more than her trying to suffocate me with her pussy while she blows me. I was so worked up with all the talk that it didn't take long, once we were in that position, to spray a helping of cum all over her tits and my stomach.
Amy gave a victory giggle as I came, enjoying the fruits of her labors. She crawled into a position where my head was in her lap, as I slowly came down. She hadn't come on this night, but she was fine with that. I vowed to even that score as soon as I could.
We talked for quite awhile, about the night, about the rest of our weekend, about previous Valentine's Days. This one — or perhaps should I say, the two-part celebration — was definitely the most fun in recent memory. It wasn't anything extravagant or original, but when so rarely and get to be a couple out in public, extremes of romantic ingenuity aren't necessary to re-capture that lightning.
A date!
Unbelievable. Date clothes! A gift from Amy last Christmas, but not worn until I had good reason. That reason came last Saturday night.
A babysitter! We sprung for one! An extravagance, when you figure in the cost of movie and dinner. Reserved for truly special times ... like, say, Valentine's Day.
A movie! One that isn't animated!
Dinner! In a restaurant with nary a pizza or grilled cheese sandwich on the menu! A wine list! Valet parking! Waiters who don't write down your order! Lookatme, Mom — I'm a grown-up!
I had hoped that Amy would be wearing her new Valentine's Day present tonight, but as it turned out, the bra was running a little small. So she'll return it for something that we both like, and in the meantime, she put on an incredibly hot sheer black bra front-closure bra she picked up yesterday ... So delicious that there oughta be a law. I'm talking, of course, about the law that would state she's not allowed to put anything over it when she wears it. Amy wasn't particularly dolled up, going casual (at my recommendation), but she still looked ravishing. Which worked out well, seeing as a ravishing was on tap for that night.
The movie was Pedro Almodovar's Volver. It was a little piece of joy. (Thank God! When you rarely go out to movies, seeing a film worth the money feels like a matter of life and death.) Like most of Almodovar's films, it had a strong erotic undercurrent -- though this time there isn't a hint of sex, or even a romance. Almodovar accomplishes the sexual charge through his camera lens' infatuation with Penélope Cruz. Or at least her body. He costumes and films her as if she's a modern-day Sophia Loren, complete with the most delectable cleavage I've seen on screen in ages. (At one point, a character asks Cruz, "Where did you get that chest?... Are they real?" Indeed, it was a question I asked myself throughout, distracting myself into trying to remember what she'd looked like in the other films I'd seen her in.)On a couple of occasions, Almodovar indulges the audience in extended aerial shots, angles that shoot straight down into a most inspiring open blouse as Cruz does seemingly mundane things like washing dishes or walking up a stairway. And there is a moment in this film when she walks up a cobble street pulling a small shopping cart, her hair perfectly up-yet-tousled, that feels like something straight out of the 1940s. Cruz is so glorious, so delicious that I told Amy afterwards I just might have to drop someone off my laminated list to make room for her.
I had kept the dinner location a secret, but Amy asked for one hint and easily figured it out. It's an old, romantic haunt of ours from our pre-children days. A storefront type that opens into a lush, cozy space that looks bigger than you'd think from the outside. The decor is eclectic but tasteful. They've added live music since we were last there too, adding a new element to the ambiance. I dropped Amy off and drove away to find a restaurant with valet parking (It's the only way to park in this neighborhood), and by the time I got back, Amy was already seated, raving about the singer/pianist, who had just laid down a pretty damn good version of Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah." Throughout the night, he brought out renditions of Billy Joel and Elton John songs, sung in a lower register than usual, which brought a new facet to songs that otherwise would have been pretty tired.
Fingers were crossed that the food was as good as we remembered. We weren't disappointed. I enjoyed a salmon filet with a light saffron wine sauce on a bed of spinach and some terrific gourmet mashed potatoes. Amy's dish blew us away: a sauteed tilapia with a sauce that included raisins, tomato marinara, and white wine. The waiter gave us a tremendous recommendation on a red wine; if I hadn't been driving, we would have easily finished off two bottles.
We talked a lot about Volver during the dinner, remembering the moments that resonated. We also did a good amount of people-watching (though we didn't scan the room for a fantasy fuck-buddy). Eventually, I couldn't resist bringing the conversation around to ... well, you know.
"I'm trying to decide if I'm going to cash in one of my coupons tonight," I started.
Amy laughed. "You know," she said, "I can't really remember what I wrote. Well, I can remember one of them."
"Would you like me to recite them, verbatim?" I asked.
We ran through them. (It was the anal sex coupon she remembered.) I reiterated the effect that they had had on me. She asked my thoughts on the "wildcard" coupon, and I just said that my I was too overwhelmed by the options to think clearly about it right now.
Amy changed the subject: "I completely forgot to tell you something about your Valentine's Day present: I didn't tell you how amazingly fun it was to try those on."
This was a nice surprise. When I imagined what that shopping experience must have been like for Amy, "fun" was not the word that sprung to mind. Based on my previous shopping excursions with her, the harsh lighting and mirrors in most dressing rooms only seemed to dampen her spirits. Not this time, apparently.
"I was actually getting turned on while I tried them," she admitted.
"That's so cool," I said. "You were there for over an hour, it seems like you tried on a ton of stuff."
"Oh yeah," she said. "The lady helping me really got into it, too, helping me find stuff. I tried on a lot, but the cool thing was that even the items I didn't take, it wasn't because they looked bad on me; they just didn't look as good as the outfits I came home with."
This is an amazing development, on two fronts: First, that she was so comfortable with her body that she had no problem trying on sexy clothes; secondly, that she was actually turned on while doing it.
"In fact," she revealed, "on Valentine's Day, at work, I got to thinking about what we were going to do that night, and I actually got really aroused. For the first time ever at this job, I was trying to figure out where I could go to ... take care of things."
"Did you?" I had to ask.
She laughed. "No, no. But it felt really good to feel ... eroticized again. Like, I'm coming back in touch with that part of me again."
Um ... I'm sorry, give me a moment. I need to wipe a tear from my eye.
Okay. I'm back.
Maybe a corner has been turned. Maybe things are shaping up. But what changed? Was it just her? Or was it something that I did, something I'm projecting, that's changing the equation? There's a part of me that says, Don't overanalyze it. But it'd be nice to know what slight tweak turned up the volume on the sexual dynamic ... if only to understand how to sustain that change well off into the future.
On the drive home, out of the blue, Amy brought up a porn movie we'd watched together some time ago. She described a scene she had been thinking about a lot, where porn starlet Chloe gets fucked in her office by her boss, right in front of a vindictive (female) co-worker doing her best to ignore the action going on only a few feet from her. (The movie was Antonio Passolini's Unreal.)
"So, what is it about the scene that turns you on?" I asked. "Is it the office setting?"
"Maybe," she said. "I don't know, really. It just works." Getting Amy to pin down why something turns her on is always a challenge, just like it's difficult to get her to clearly identify any kinks.
At home, when I returned from walking the babysitter to her car, Amy stood in the kitchen. We embraced, kissing passionately.
"You want me to find that movie?" I asked, and she nodded a mm-hmm. We got more comfortable — there would be no tearing off clothes tonight, probably because mine were new! I donned a robe, while Amy put on the second of the two Valentine's Day outfits she'd decided to keep. I was not able to find the video anywhere (which worried me greatly: Had I left it out somewhere where my kids or babysitter might have found it?), so we oped for a movie I had on my computer. Down to the basement we went, with Amy settling in between my legs, her back against me, the laptop on her lap.
It turned out that the movie wasn't our cup of tea. It's what the industry commonly calls a "couples film," which means that it's shot with all beautiful models. It would have been considered "hard-core" (penetration, money shots, etc.), but instead of really getting to hear people in true throes of ecstasy, you get lots of Enigma-like music playing over their slow-motion machinations. It's staged, dressed up, and extremely slow-moving. It's the kind of movie that men just introducing their wives to watching porn together would try ... but we're way past that. We found ourselves fast-forwarding through all the seductive posing and lip-licking to get to some action.
Finally, there was one scene that started to work for Amy — a beautiful woman being lavished with attention by two men. I finally saw a hand disappear into her thong when that scene got going.
"Who would you be doing that with if that were you?" I asked. "Who is joining us?"
She moaned. "Graham, a new guy in our office," she whispered. How very interesting!
"Oh yeah? Is that Graham's cock you're sucking while I get ready to fuck you from behind?" I was playing with her tits through the camisole, and she was starting to writhe. "Or maybe," I continued, "Graham is here, between your legs. He's licking that wet, hot cunt of yours while you and I both watch. He can look up and watch me squeezing your tits while he eats you. Would you like that?"
She groaned. We murmured for awhile about her new young workplace stud. I wondered if she'd ever really fantasized about him. I'll have to ask her another time.
The movie, which was already pretty much a dud, was becoming less and less interesting to us.
"Once you fuck Graham and me, are you going to return the favor?" I asked into her ear. "Will you share my cock with another woman?"
"Yes," she breathed.
"Who gets to suck my cock with you?" I asked.
"Who would you like?" she asked.
I have to admit: I was stymied. I spend all this energy fantasizing about Amy that when she asks me what other woman I'd like to do, I'm at a loss. "You can say it," she urged, as if I had someone in my head but was withholding. But there was no one!
Finally, I came up with a couple. "I'd love to watch you and Cynthia go at it," I suggested, indicating a high-ranking co-worker in my department. "Or maybe you and Shelley," the woman who, along with her husband, Amy had suggested (though not seriously) as foursome partners in a sex coupon. "Between her tits and yours, I could be a very happy boy."
The laptop suffered no damage, but it was pretty much kicked away. Amy threw open my robe and got to enthusiastically sucking my cock. Later, I requested a 69: Few things excite me more than her trying to suffocate me with her pussy while she blows me. I was so worked up with all the talk that it didn't take long, once we were in that position, to spray a helping of cum all over her tits and my stomach.
Amy gave a victory giggle as I came, enjoying the fruits of her labors. She crawled into a position where my head was in her lap, as I slowly came down. She hadn't come on this night, but she was fine with that. I vowed to even that score as soon as I could.
We talked for quite awhile, about the night, about the rest of our weekend, about previous Valentine's Days. This one — or perhaps should I say, the two-part celebration — was definitely the most fun in recent memory. It wasn't anything extravagant or original, but when so rarely and get to be a couple out in public, extremes of romantic ingenuity aren't necessary to re-capture that lightning.
22 January 2007
The Mirror, Crack'd
I don't even remember now what precipitated the discussion. All I know is that I felt like we'd been here before. More than once.
The word "discussion" doesn't quite capture its ... essence. It was 1:30 in the morning on a weeknight, in our dark bedroom. Amy was in bed, I standing next to her. Both of us were on the verge of tears. The tone was sharp, but the words were hushed. Our children were asleep, and we were already exhausted. The last thing we needed was to wake them up.
The next-to-last thing we needed was to have this chat again, the one about our sex life. But here we were, so it was happening. As I said, I can't remember how we got there. All I know is that Amy was annoyed with me for doing this now ... annoyed, until I peeled back another layer of my frustration and gave a short monologue:
"I'm not talking about sex at this point, Amy. I'm talking about intimacy. I want to kiss you. I want to touch you. The sex doesn't even matter at this point, I just want to feel intimate, feel close to you!"
Suddenly she didn't seem "annoyed." She sensed the seriousness.
"Do you know what I mean?" I said, mostly to fill the silence, not really expecting her to respond. She did, though, in the affirmative.
"I mean ..." I struggled for a clearer example of my frustration. "... I can't remember the last time we went to bed at night and you were naked, so I could just press against you, skin-to-skin."
"I'm not comfortable being naked," she said quietly.
"Since when?" I fired back.
"Denis," she said, and she spoke more slowly to get it across, "I've never been comfortable being naked."
Struck dumb. Mind whirring.
Is she serious? Wait a minute, is she right? Is that true? Think, think, think ... when was the last time she was ... Holy shit.
"But that wasn't always true!" I insisted. "I remember ..." Yes, I remembered, but I remembered a long, long time ago. "... we used to be naked all the time." I finished the thought, but my stand was losing its footing underneath.
I was realizing she was right. Pieces fell into place. I had often walked naked around our homes and apartments all these years, but she almost always had something on. On nights when we had sex before going to sleep -- with a few exceptions -- she would rightside-in all the inside-out clothes that had been hastily tossed off, re-dressing before going to bed. If we had fucked in a different room, she always put something on for the walk from that location back to our bedroom, lest she be seen through a side window by a neighbor.
I was blessed with good genes in the body shape department. I was the kid who got the jokes about the hollow leg or the tapeworm at family holiday dinners. I swallowed everything and went back for seconds, as my metabolism burned off the calories faster than I could consume them. Now in my forties, I'm still within ten pounds of my weight in college. That mercury-like metabolism has only slightly slowed. A little paunch around the middle, but overall, when I'm toweling off after a shower and catch my image in the mirror, I don't think I look too bad. I'm know that keeping in shape gets harder as I get older, but I'm never going to have the battles that other people wage for their lifetimes. I can sympathize with Amy, but empathy, in the sense of "I've been there," will always be hard for me when it comes to body image issues.
I knew that Amy wasn't quite as comfortable showing her body. But somehow I had completely ignored how deep this issue went. I had missed that she wasn't even completely comfortable naked in front of her own husband.
Initially, the deepest blow from this revelation was to my own ego. Had I really been this clueless? How the hell do I spend almost every day of the last decade-and-a-half with a woman and manage to miss this intensely intimate fact? I create this notion that I'm a sensitive lover, in tune with my partner's body and mind ... and I miss the fact that she doesn't like to be naked? So much for Mr. Metrosexual.
Eh. Metrosexuals are suffering from culture backlash anyway.
As I sit here writing about this, I think back to 1991 ... to my first 24 hours with Amy. It was a whirlwind day, involving much mashing of lips, sharing of thoughts, and soulful looks. Actually, it was the "soulful looks" part where I perhaps first noticed an issue.
We were on her black leather couch, fully clothed but engaged in a sensual bit of frottage. Her legs wrapped around me. My fingers working through her hair. And when I locked my gaze on her, she nervously laughed and turned away. This happened two or three more times, until finally I had to ask her:
"What's wrong?"
She kept her eyes closed and almost bashfully said, "I'm just not comfortable when you look at me."
"Oh my God, why? You are ... so beautiful."
Spoken like a true, head-over-heels boy. You have my permission to roll eyes and/or feel nauseous.
She really was uncomfortable with anyone studying her from such close proximity. And that fact long baffled me. Amy is so stunning to me -- and other men have certainly found her so as well -- but that's a long way from saying that Amy felt that way. And you know, it doesn't matter how many other people tell you what you're worth if you have little self-worth.
If you met Amy in the workplace, you wouldn't suspect these insecurities. She is a presence in every room she walks into. She is a fighter. She's the kind of person that, with her quick thinking and steel-trap memory, makes herself quickly indispensable to an organization. She exudes confidence, and bosses recognize this. They give her the inside info and the power to affect their own careers. When she dons the power suit, she owns your ass.
I know this because I'm her husband; I see both sides of this woman. I call her at work, catching her in mid-project, and she says "Hang on," and I listen in as she gives explicit instructions to a co-worker or puts the finishing touches on a new strategy. And then later, in bed, I sense the vulnerability and near-embarrassment of a teenage girl when I pull back a bed sheet to admire her body. Like most of us (those that are human anyway), she's a dichotomy.
But this doesn't stop me, I suppose, from idealizing her in some way. Perhaps I lock in my head those moments when she strips away all caution and becomes unbridled, wanton, hungry for my body, and hungry to be consumed. I start to (want to?) believe she possesses those qualities 24/7/365. Maybe this is an easy trap to fall into when one focuses too much on the fantasies without checking in with the reality.
So nights like that recent chat are necessary to bring me back to Earth. Yes, sometimes as we're fucking, she whispers in my ear how good it would feel to be fucking another man, or how hot it would be to have another woman in bed with us. But the reality is, there is much to overcome psychologically before such fantasies can happen.
One might think that there's enough baggage here for me to break under its weight, to deduce that the taboos that so arouse me will never be broken. But I'm an optimistic guy, and I'm a patient guy. I still see a slow march of progress. After all, Amy is interested in knowing my predilections, and we discuss them. (I ask her often what her predilections are, and she doesn't cop to them. If she does have sexual needs not yet expressed, she may not realize what they are yet.) She knows what gets me off, and she loves me enough to want to do what she can to make them happen.
Likewise, I know what makes her happy, and I do everything in my power to help her experience that happiness. It's just that her happiness isn't necessarily about sex. She loves it, no question, but it's not a driving force as it seems to be with me. We respect the fact that we're in different places, and we know that being in different places doesn't mean we can't help each other in a mutual pursuit of happiness.
Amy got more comfortable with my looking at her as she learned to trust me, and there was an extended early part of the relationship when she was very comfortable being naked around me. You know the time I'm talking about: It's usually called the "honeymoon," when not a moment passes that isn't consumed with thoughts of your new love. At some point -- I can't really tell you when -- she reverted to her more modest self. I'm not sure if it was something I did. Maybe it was her weight gain that came on as we got older.
The issue of weight is such a loaded gun for people's esteem, and for the relationships they're in. At her heaviest, Amy was close to 40 pounds more than she was when I met her. (Not counting periods when she was pregnant. Thank God she cut herself slack then, enjoying her body and everything going on inside of it.) So much of Amy's character is attractive to me that it colors the lens through which I see her. Yes, I knew she had gained weight -- I'm not blind, fer chrissakes. But my desire for her never waned, and that desire would often cloud the awareness that she was struggling ... until her frustration would come pouring out of her in an emotional breakdown.
But that didn't mean that I didn't still get diamond-cutting hard-ons when I walked in on her disrobing.
(I have a favorite thing to do: When I'm lying in bed an Amy comes in and changes into her pajamas, I sit up and watch, remarking: "This is always my favorite part of the day." I love having those tits revealed to me. I feel like a 12-year-old seeing his first pair, every time.)
Through Weight Watchers and a lot of work (on both our parts), Amy is back to only ten pounds above her 1991 weight. She's more confident, more sure of herself. But that doesn't mean that she has difficulty finding dozens of things wrong with her. For example: I remember a morning early on when I was thoroughly engrossed in her boobs, my face buried between them, licking, nipping, chewing. She remarked: "I think my nipples are too small for my breasts." Now, years later, she said not too long ago that nursing children has resulted in nipples that "may be too big."
Is there any winning?
Well, yes. There might be some winning. But it takes devotion to the task. This is a lifelong problem for her, so it's a lifelong problem for us. As often as we talk about fulfilling fantasies, we talk about helping her feel better about herself. The two, after all, are closely connected. I continue to throw every bit of support to her that I can. And she continues to look for the thoughts and actions that will steel her confidence and help her see the woman that I see.
Or at least perhaps accept the fact that I'm not bat-shit insane for feeling that way.
The word "discussion" doesn't quite capture its ... essence. It was 1:30 in the morning on a weeknight, in our dark bedroom. Amy was in bed, I standing next to her. Both of us were on the verge of tears. The tone was sharp, but the words were hushed. Our children were asleep, and we were already exhausted. The last thing we needed was to wake them up.
The next-to-last thing we needed was to have this chat again, the one about our sex life. But here we were, so it was happening. As I said, I can't remember how we got there. All I know is that Amy was annoyed with me for doing this now ... annoyed, until I peeled back another layer of my frustration and gave a short monologue:
"I'm not talking about sex at this point, Amy. I'm talking about intimacy. I want to kiss you. I want to touch you. The sex doesn't even matter at this point, I just want to feel intimate, feel close to you!"
Suddenly she didn't seem "annoyed." She sensed the seriousness.
"Do you know what I mean?" I said, mostly to fill the silence, not really expecting her to respond. She did, though, in the affirmative.
"I mean ..." I struggled for a clearer example of my frustration. "... I can't remember the last time we went to bed at night and you were naked, so I could just press against you, skin-to-skin."
"I'm not comfortable being naked," she said quietly.
"Since when?" I fired back.
"Denis," she said, and she spoke more slowly to get it across, "I've never been comfortable being naked."
Struck dumb. Mind whirring.
Is she serious? Wait a minute, is she right? Is that true? Think, think, think ... when was the last time she was ... Holy shit.
"But that wasn't always true!" I insisted. "I remember ..." Yes, I remembered, but I remembered a long, long time ago. "... we used to be naked all the time." I finished the thought, but my stand was losing its footing underneath.
+ + +
I was realizing she was right. Pieces fell into place. I had often walked naked around our homes and apartments all these years, but she almost always had something on. On nights when we had sex before going to sleep -- with a few exceptions -- she would rightside-in all the inside-out clothes that had been hastily tossed off, re-dressing before going to bed. If we had fucked in a different room, she always put something on for the walk from that location back to our bedroom, lest she be seen through a side window by a neighbor.
I was blessed with good genes in the body shape department. I was the kid who got the jokes about the hollow leg or the tapeworm at family holiday dinners. I swallowed everything and went back for seconds, as my metabolism burned off the calories faster than I could consume them. Now in my forties, I'm still within ten pounds of my weight in college. That mercury-like metabolism has only slightly slowed. A little paunch around the middle, but overall, when I'm toweling off after a shower and catch my image in the mirror, I don't think I look too bad. I'm know that keeping in shape gets harder as I get older, but I'm never going to have the battles that other people wage for their lifetimes. I can sympathize with Amy, but empathy, in the sense of "I've been there," will always be hard for me when it comes to body image issues.
I knew that Amy wasn't quite as comfortable showing her body. But somehow I had completely ignored how deep this issue went. I had missed that she wasn't even completely comfortable naked in front of her own husband.
Initially, the deepest blow from this revelation was to my own ego. Had I really been this clueless? How the hell do I spend almost every day of the last decade-and-a-half with a woman and manage to miss this intensely intimate fact? I create this notion that I'm a sensitive lover, in tune with my partner's body and mind ... and I miss the fact that she doesn't like to be naked? So much for Mr. Metrosexual.
Eh. Metrosexuals are suffering from culture backlash anyway.
As I sit here writing about this, I think back to 1991 ... to my first 24 hours with Amy. It was a whirlwind day, involving much mashing of lips, sharing of thoughts, and soulful looks. Actually, it was the "soulful looks" part where I perhaps first noticed an issue.
We were on her black leather couch, fully clothed but engaged in a sensual bit of frottage. Her legs wrapped around me. My fingers working through her hair. And when I locked my gaze on her, she nervously laughed and turned away. This happened two or three more times, until finally I had to ask her:
"What's wrong?"
She kept her eyes closed and almost bashfully said, "I'm just not comfortable when you look at me."
"Oh my God, why? You are ... so beautiful."
Spoken like a true, head-over-heels boy. You have my permission to roll eyes and/or feel nauseous.
She really was uncomfortable with anyone studying her from such close proximity. And that fact long baffled me. Amy is so stunning to me -- and other men have certainly found her so as well -- but that's a long way from saying that Amy felt that way. And you know, it doesn't matter how many other people tell you what you're worth if you have little self-worth.
If you met Amy in the workplace, you wouldn't suspect these insecurities. She is a presence in every room she walks into. She is a fighter. She's the kind of person that, with her quick thinking and steel-trap memory, makes herself quickly indispensable to an organization. She exudes confidence, and bosses recognize this. They give her the inside info and the power to affect their own careers. When she dons the power suit, she owns your ass.
I know this because I'm her husband; I see both sides of this woman. I call her at work, catching her in mid-project, and she says "Hang on," and I listen in as she gives explicit instructions to a co-worker or puts the finishing touches on a new strategy. And then later, in bed, I sense the vulnerability and near-embarrassment of a teenage girl when I pull back a bed sheet to admire her body. Like most of us (those that are human anyway), she's a dichotomy.
But this doesn't stop me, I suppose, from idealizing her in some way. Perhaps I lock in my head those moments when she strips away all caution and becomes unbridled, wanton, hungry for my body, and hungry to be consumed. I start to (want to?) believe she possesses those qualities 24/7/365. Maybe this is an easy trap to fall into when one focuses too much on the fantasies without checking in with the reality.
So nights like that recent chat are necessary to bring me back to Earth. Yes, sometimes as we're fucking, she whispers in my ear how good it would feel to be fucking another man, or how hot it would be to have another woman in bed with us. But the reality is, there is much to overcome psychologically before such fantasies can happen.
One might think that there's enough baggage here for me to break under its weight, to deduce that the taboos that so arouse me will never be broken. But I'm an optimistic guy, and I'm a patient guy. I still see a slow march of progress. After all, Amy is interested in knowing my predilections, and we discuss them. (I ask her often what her predilections are, and she doesn't cop to them. If she does have sexual needs not yet expressed, she may not realize what they are yet.) She knows what gets me off, and she loves me enough to want to do what she can to make them happen.
Likewise, I know what makes her happy, and I do everything in my power to help her experience that happiness. It's just that her happiness isn't necessarily about sex. She loves it, no question, but it's not a driving force as it seems to be with me. We respect the fact that we're in different places, and we know that being in different places doesn't mean we can't help each other in a mutual pursuit of happiness.
+ + +
Amy got more comfortable with my looking at her as she learned to trust me, and there was an extended early part of the relationship when she was very comfortable being naked around me. You know the time I'm talking about: It's usually called the "honeymoon," when not a moment passes that isn't consumed with thoughts of your new love. At some point -- I can't really tell you when -- she reverted to her more modest self. I'm not sure if it was something I did. Maybe it was her weight gain that came on as we got older.
The issue of weight is such a loaded gun for people's esteem, and for the relationships they're in. At her heaviest, Amy was close to 40 pounds more than she was when I met her. (Not counting periods when she was pregnant. Thank God she cut herself slack then, enjoying her body and everything going on inside of it.) So much of Amy's character is attractive to me that it colors the lens through which I see her. Yes, I knew she had gained weight -- I'm not blind, fer chrissakes. But my desire for her never waned, and that desire would often cloud the awareness that she was struggling ... until her frustration would come pouring out of her in an emotional breakdown.
But that didn't mean that I didn't still get diamond-cutting hard-ons when I walked in on her disrobing.
(I have a favorite thing to do: When I'm lying in bed an Amy comes in and changes into her pajamas, I sit up and watch, remarking: "This is always my favorite part of the day." I love having those tits revealed to me. I feel like a 12-year-old seeing his first pair, every time.)
Through Weight Watchers and a lot of work (on both our parts), Amy is back to only ten pounds above her 1991 weight. She's more confident, more sure of herself. But that doesn't mean that she has difficulty finding dozens of things wrong with her. For example: I remember a morning early on when I was thoroughly engrossed in her boobs, my face buried between them, licking, nipping, chewing. She remarked: "I think my nipples are too small for my breasts." Now, years later, she said not too long ago that nursing children has resulted in nipples that "may be too big."
Is there any winning?
Well, yes. There might be some winning. But it takes devotion to the task. This is a lifelong problem for her, so it's a lifelong problem for us. As often as we talk about fulfilling fantasies, we talk about helping her feel better about herself. The two, after all, are closely connected. I continue to throw every bit of support to her that I can. And she continues to look for the thoughts and actions that will steel her confidence and help her see the woman that I see.
Or at least perhaps accept the fact that I'm not bat-shit insane for feeling that way.
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