More Porn

Reading Girlvert: A Porno Memoir by Oriana Small AKA Ashley Blue. One of the women who read/performed at the Femina Potens event.

It's a compelling read mostly because she just keeps taking it in the ass and taking more in the ass, and letting herself get pissed on and choked to death on camera, and yet she maintains a scrappy and uncanny sense of humor about it. She knows she is more than all of that, and we know she survives because look, she's written a book about it.

I'm half way through but I haven't read anything so far that reveals whether she gets real pleasure out of sex herself. Her mission thus far is all about getting more cocaine and pleasing her boyfriend and appearing to be a badass. I'm half-way through and have not heard about one single orgasm that belonged to her. She let's the most disgusting pervs cum on her face. She reluctantly agrees to give an extremely overweight, gross and stinky "director" a blow job after she's had a night of ass fucking by two large cocks and is completely exhausted. Why? Because her boyfriend wants some money to pay back the coke dealer.

I understand. I've done things not quite that gross but things I'm not proud of, for money or acceptance from a man. But I keep wondering, when is SHE going to get some pleasure? Or does she just not talk about it in the book? I guess I have to finish it just to find out. It won't take long.

The book has unsettled me.

The real discovery this last week of reading was Lidia Yuknovitch, and her book The Chronology of Water. Wo. This is the shit. Thank you Becca for leaving it on the night stand for me. I read it in two sittings...

Don't take my word for it. Maybe I'm a little late to this party, but why did I not know about her sooner?

P.S. It's not porn. But maybe the best writing I have read in years. Which is incredibly sexy.

Porn

I went to see Intersections: LOVE:SEX:PORN:ART: Our Intimate Identity last week at Yerba Buena. It was curated by Madison Young of FeminaPotens. I am still digesting the experience.

I grew up in a different era. As a kid, I would sneak into the hiding place between the sliding glass window and my parents kingsize bed (with Don Draper's gold bedspread), and read Playboy. I read every cartoon, every letter to the editor, and gazed at every centerfold. That was porn for me. And it was a special, private experience (that I am now sharing on the internet). It helped me understand that sex wasn't actually dirty. It could tell it was good.

There was porn porn then, of course. But I didn't know about it. 

Now it's different. 

I've queried people from Bolinas to Zurich, and most young men by age 12 are looking at hardcore porn on the internet. 

I am not against sex-positivity. I'm for it. 

I am not against sex work. It's been a fact of life for thousands of years.

Yet I have misgivings about the reality that young boys (and girls I'm sure) are imprinting their lifelong sexuality with porn. I worry that bondage and submission games that I am only beginning to understand cannot possibly be understood by preteen boys.

I worry that the women in front of the camera, even if they soberly and confidently choose to be there, which was the case for all the women who performed at the Yerba Buena Femina Potens event, will not always want their vulnerability out there for literally anyone in the world to view. Forever.

At the event, after watching some seriously disturbing scenes onscreen and moving live performances, and listening to these beautiful women speak so confidently, I was very challenged by my own background and feelings. These women, all 31 or younger, have chosen to own their decisions to enter the world of porn. Three out of five are no longer doing sex work or sex performance, but they are all talking about it in other ways. Publicly and intelligently. Which is refreshing.

Maybe my misgivings are no longer relevant.

Maybe my old-school fear that there is still abuse and coercion behind the scenes is just not true anymore. I heard from these women, some of whom are now directors and authors of books and screenplays, that they had much more control over the content of the porn scenes than I had ever imagined.

Maybe these women, and women I know that have gone on to be serious professionals in other arenas, are on the front lines of third wave feminism, truly making strides in the sex-positivity arena, countering the forces of female objectification. I believe this to be true.

Yet I struggle with it. I hate the idea of men never growing up, hiding behind their computer screens, jerking off to fantasies of women who never tell them to curtail their video games. I worry about a generation of people losing the ability to talk about their feelings face-to-face and to engage in "real sex."
 
I know just saying that is really controversial. The young women I meet are so together on this subject. Does this post reveal more about my prejudice that men are often beasts? Or the fear that our culture in San Francisco and all the healthy sex-positivity is simply not the reality everywhere else?

Am I just paranoid? Maybe people everywhere, including young boys, are more sophisticated than I give them credit for.

How do you feel about it?

Mother to "grown-ups"

Mothering large people through their transitions. Standing by.

Available to feed, or demonstrate some basic skill I somehow neglected to teach before. Such as how to remove toenail polish. Or to find the right mouth medicine. I brush my fingers through his or her hair as he or she lay curled up on my bed feeling small.

Available to listen on the phone to gut wrenching tears as I walk through the farmer's market looking for eggs and tomatoes. I listen to the sounds of my grown baby and tell her I'm glad she is smart enough to let it all out. I tell her that I'm willing to step into first string for as long as she needs.

Telling her this helps her feel strong enough to go to a picnic in Dolores Park.

I make an omlette for my big son and my bigger baby brother. Who is 42. In doing so I realize that I almost never cook anymore. It's such a nice way to express love.

I am alone now. Standing by for whomever needs me next.

There is no limit to my love.

There is no limit to my capacity to receive love.

Burning Man 2012 - Take 1

Beautiful, fantastical. Inspiring.

Singing Black Dog and Fever with Zoe on ukelele.

Family dinner before the Temple Burn.

Sitting in the Temple during a white-out dust storm watching/hearing the most beautiful wedding.

This is what it looked like when the dust cleared for a moment.

While we were there, three more weddings took place, all so different.

In a total white-out moment, I felt Zoe's presence, called out her name just once, and she emerged from the dust to come sit on my lap. Then she and T performed acro-balance as the sun was setting.


Ian DJing at Desert Morning for five hours, gathering a huge crowd at 11:00am.

Lounging with Mike and Jane while Mike read the most astonishing Australian poetry that we'd never before heard.

Joseph's face as we rode around the City for the first time together, five Benders deep. All smiles.

The Unicorn Stampede that we missed, but instead found Robot Heart at dawn...

Dancing with Joe at Robot Heart as the sun came up, fresh from 10 hours of sleep. Three days in a row.

Temple Burn.