Tie Me Up, Dammit!

I wanna be tied up. And fucked. And you might say that’s just because Fifty Shades of Grey just came out, and yes I did think that movie was hot as hell, but that’s not the only reason. It just seems to be something that keeps coming up in my world. I just started listening to an amazing podcast called Risk! hosted by Kevin Allison because my roommate told me I would love the episode where he goes to Kink Camp. And on this journey, Kevin finds that all his preconceptions about kinksters—that they’re a certain type of person, namely not super attractive people who got into kink because they couldn’t get laid rather than just, well, because they’re kinky—that these preconceptions were false. I too had similar misconceptions—that kinksters are all nerds or punks or some other fringe counter-culture group I don’t necessarily identify with. But what Kevin Allison found at Kink Camp was a huge variety of people—young and old, conventionally hot, fringe, and everything in between. Listening to his experience, I thought, maybe this world is for me after all.

Then I listened to another Risk! installment entitled “Slave,” in which self-described “Perverted Negress” Mollena Williams describes her experience with kink. Even though she’s a strong empowered black feminist, she found herself wanting to be dominated in a violent, racially-charged scene that really turned her on until it suddenly went too far and ended rather traumatically.

Although my only beef with Fifty Shades was their need to justify Christian’s kinkiness with a tortured past (rather than just allowing him to be kinky), I find myself posing the same question to myself: why is it that I, a self-proclaimed “angry feminist,” finds the idea of being tied up, called whore, and fucked hard, so fucking hot??

I think back to my long ago experience with BDSM Guy—truly my very own Christian Grey, complete with all-American Jon Hamm good lucks, sparkling blue eyes, crisp grey suit, the whole fucking package. I remember when, within minutes of our very first text conversation, he started calling me “whore” and “slave” and my feminist brain was pissed while my confounded body was wet and excited. And I remember feeling really conflicted about my angry thoughts v. my aroused feelings. And what did this mean for my identity as a feminist? Was I betraying my strong beliefs and the community of women I respected and admired so much? But the more I learned about BDSM, the more I realized that some of the most passionate kinksters are the most progressive, socially-conscious, un-hetero-normative, non-racist, un-gender-conforming, uber-feminist people. In fact, from Kevin Allison’s description of Kink Camp, they seem primarily like a bunch of fun-loving hippies. Perhaps because they have this extreme outlet for their deepest, darkest inclinations, they are more evolved people in their regular lives. Perhaps kink is like a form of exposure therapy.

I wonder how my feminist anger translates into hot sex in the bedroom. And I’ve come to the conclusion that anger and frustration and other strong, heat-inducing emotions are intrinsically linked to arousal. There’s a reason why the people that hate each other most in rom-coms always end up getting together. And maybe the angrier something or someone makes you in life, the hotter things can get in bed. I think about how arguments between couples sometimes end in fucking. And about how the jealous feelings inspired by seeing your significant other flirting with another woman or checking out someone else’s ass on the street can feel both crushing and totally arousing.

Amanda Hess puts her finger on the connection between humor and the erotic in her brilliant review of Fifty Shades for Slate: “Pairing the humorous with the erotic produces a sensation of nervous, off-kilter euphoria; laughter and sex both leave you flushed, tingly, a little out of control. I left the movie feeling like I’d just been on a first date with someone I’d secretly crushed on for a long time.” She also talks about how the haters have contributed to the success of that book as much if not more than its fans. People love to hate-fuck Fifty Shades of Grey. No one is neutral on this subject. And people’s response to the material, be it anger or excitement or frustration—these are powerful emotions full of heat, and I would argue, sexual energy. One of my coworkers called it “the smuttiest piece of filth [she’d] ever seen.” Her face flushed. She looked offended and pious and, dare I say, turned on?

I have to say, I loved this movie. I went by myself on a Thursday night, bought myself a seat in the last row, and sat back with a large popcorn and soda to enjoy. I loved the sheer camp of amazing lines like "I'm fifty shades of fucked up." I found myself turned on to the point that I considered rubbing one out in the movie theater. I felt the thrill of girlish delight as Christian takes Ana up in his helicopter and Ellie Goulding's Love Me Like You Do swells as they soar over the city. In fact, I loved the whole damn soundtrack. If it hadn't been for the asthmatic mouth breather sitting next to me, it would have been a totally perfect date with myself. A girlfriend of mine described going to see Fifty Shades with her boyfriend, and while she wanted to enjoy the campy pleasure of it all, he just laughed through the whole thing. My advice, ladies: See This Movie Alone. With lots of salty sweet things to put in your mouth while you're watching it.

In my life, I’m always in control. I work hard. I’m responsible. I take care of my shit. And all I want in the bedroom is for someone to take control. To render me powerless and truly dominate, to have their way with me. But I honestly don’t meet many men that I think are capable of dominating me. Because a lot of the men I meet or at least the ones I usually end up in bed with, I think tend to be a bit intimidated by me, or at least I find myself calling the shots more often than not. It’s hard to imagine a man who could really gain status over me in the bedroom. Perhaps the last person who did was BDSM Guy, and it was fucking hot and I wanted more.

When BDSM Guy first started rolling out the “slave” narrative, I asked why he knew I would be down for something like this. He said he “[knew] the type who [needed] it.” When I probed further, he shut down the line of inquiry. His slave was asking too many questions. I had requested that he “ease me into this BDSM shit.” Then, when we were having sex that he would later describe as “vanilla” and I thought was amazing, I told him “you can call me whore if you want.” He slapped my face and said, “I’ll ease you into that.” That was it. No more BDSM shit for me. The red ropes he had sent me a photo of earlier never came out. There was no more talk of master and slave. Apparently I had blown it with all my questions, and he had already concluded I would not make a good slave after all. A couple days after we had sex, I texted him that I wanted to be “tied up, blindfolded and fucked hard.” I never heard back from him, and I haven’t seen him since.

But how did he know that I even had it in me to want to be part of his slave narrative? Was it because his introduction to me was seeing a play in which I had the role of a young actress who used sex to manipulate situations in her favor but underneath it all was oozing insecurity? Was it the catfight at the end of the play in which the other actress straddled my back and yanked on my hair? Did he see something deep inside me that I didn’t even know was there? Or is it just that every woman secretly wants to be dominated? That might be true. Why else would Fifty Shades be so fucking popular? Maybe my coworker and all the other haters are really lying to themselves. That wouldn’t surprise me, considering how little we still know about female desire, and how much shame is still associated with what really turns us on.

Having blown the opportunity to have my very own Christian Grey, now here I find myself, dying to have all four limbs tied to the bedposts, rendered a helpless starfish, and where is he now?

I was listening to my other favorite podcast Guys We Fucked last week and, whaddaya know, Krystyna shared that for V-Day her boyfriend tied her to all four bedposts and she came harder than she ever has in her life. Meanwhile, my Best Guy Friend recently attached a permanent restraint system to his bed. Even my ex-boyfriend told me just the other day he was practicing Shibari—a Japanese form of bondage—on himself, getting ready for the scene he was planning to play out with his girlfriend that very night. So, literally everyone’s getting tied up but me.

The last time I wrote about BDSM Guy in my blog, a friend from college reached out with the name of a mutual friend of ours who has apparently mastered the intersection between BDSM and feminism. I didn’t reach out to her at the time. Probably because I wasn’t ready. My interest was purely intellectual. But now, it’s personal and I think it might be time to make that long-awaited phone call. What will be my first voluntary step into the BDSM world? We’ll have to just wait and see.

12 Minutes A Slave

**I am very sorry if this title offends you.  It, like so many other things, was something I was advised strongly against.  And, like so much advice given to me before by very smart people, I didn’t take it.  Because, if I did take smart people’s advice, I wouldn’t have any material.**

I’m not sure how I got here.  Last blog post, I was patting myself on the back for recognizing assholes before I sleep with them – the assumption being that I therefore wouldn’t sleep with them, and that would be progress.  I had put this latest car salesman guy out to pasture for being too sexually aggressive via text message.  I sort of assumed that because I had given up on him, I wouldn’t hear from him ever again.  But of course, the moment you give up on a guy, he’s beating down your door.

He leaves our soured text conversation to stew and starts a fresh one on Facebook.  Somehow, he gets me back on the hook.  Staring into the beautiful blue eyes of his Facebook profile pic, it probably isn’t that hard.

He’s sick in bed apparently and keeps sending me photos of the dirty tissues accumulating on his carpeted bedroom floor.  This is weird, so I jokingly ask if he’s into fluids.  He tells me he’d “be down for pretty much anything.”  I ask if he’s kinky.  “Very,” he says.

I probe a little further and before I know it, he’s texting me a photo of two red ropes tied off at the end in the shape of a heart on his bedroom floor (by this point, I’d recognize that brown carpet anywhere).  I know he didn’t lay these ropes out for me in the minute since his last text – this is a stock photo he uses on all the girls.  It’s alright, I’m gathering evidence and it’s all coming together now – the rude sexual text directives, the multiple personality disorder – this guy is into BDSM.  So he really is having a Christian Grey fantasy after all.  Called it!  The All-American good looks, the expensive suits, the ropes in a heart on the floor…

Him: “Would u make a good little slave?”

This question makes me laugh out loud because, truth be told, I would make the worst fucking slave in the world.  He'd be like 'do this' and I'd be like 'fuck off'.'  But I decide that my curiosity/amusement outweigh my repulsion at this point, so I reply: “That’s a really good question… I don’t know.”  To this he responds: “Ur curious.  That’s a good start.”

Then I show off just how curious I am by writing him a flurry of probing questions: “Why me? How did you know I might be down for this? Or do you just lay it out to every girl you meet?”

Him: “I know the type that need it.”

Me: “What does that mean?”

Him: “It means don’t overthink just obey.”

This is where the conversation stops for the moment.  I wonder if I’m being a bad feminist by going along with this slave narrative.  But I know that you can be into BDSM and also be a feminist, you just have to negotiate the terms to make yourself comfortable right?  If I feel okay about it, it should be okay.  For the moment, I choose to ignore it.

The following night, the sexting commences.  I send him a tasteful nude portrait of me in black and white.  He sends me a selfie of him in bed – in the foreground: hard cock, knees splayed, pants at his ankles; in the background, a very faint reflection of his face reflected in the giant mirror across from his bed.  He doesn’t ask me for a vagina-pic, which I’m grateful for, because in the state I’m in, I would probably send it to him.

I tell him “I can’t wait” to see him.  He responds, “when whore.”  I cringe at this, and decide I can’t ignore it. 

Me: “I have to be honest, I don’t love these names.”

Him: “Poor girl.” I ignore this too… I know, bad, bad, very bad.

Me: “Is that a deal breaker for you?”

Him: “Maybe.”

Me: “Really?”

Him: “How am I not supposed to call my slave by her name?”

Me: “I haven’t agreed to be your slave…”

Him: “Guess I’ll have to find another willing participant.”

Me: “If you won’t ease into this with me, I guess so.”

Radio silence.  I sit there and stare at my phone.  Seriously?  I know I should put it down and go to sleep, but how the hell am I honestly supposed to do that?

Me: “That’s it?”

Him: “U tell me.”

Me: “This bdsm shit is all new to me… I feel it’s only fair you ease me in.”
Him: “Ok baby.”

Then we make plans to maybe grab a drink tomorrow night.  To “meet up as human beings first.”  Which he says is “pushing it.”

I plan so much dialogue for when I go over there.  I plan on asking him if he’s seen that Louis CK bit about texting and the lack of empathy it creates in kids - how kids learn to be sociopaths from a young age with their cell phones because they don't see how their hurtful words land on the other kids they’re targeting.  I know he’ll say he loves this bit, because truth be told I saw a link to it on his Facebook page when I was internet stalking him.  I want to draw attention to the fact that this is how I felt on the other end of his early texts - that he wouldn't have kept going if he could have seen how they were landing on my face.  How I felt dehumanized by some of our exchanges.  

I plan on telling him that I identify as a feminist, and haven’t quite figured out how this jives with my desire to be tied up.  That this whole BDSM thing is complicated for me, and I’d like some more information.  

He texts me the next night: “Where u at?”

I’m in his neighborhood.  “Wanna grab a drink?”

He says: “I’m relaxed. Come over. I won’t make any moves on u.”

Obviously, I know this is a lie and my heart is pounding.  Go over there?  I’ve already consulted several friends about this whole being-tied-up-by-a-stranger thing and pretty unanimously people are advising Don’t Do It.

I call my best guy friend, who I know will give me permission to go over there. “What does your gut tell you?” “To go.” “Then do it.  Have fun and text me the address.”  I do.  In case I disappear, last seen here.

He greets me outside in a baby blue robe with a big grin on his face.  I tell him I don’t know how to greet him.  He takes the initiative by tongue-kissing me.  Which feels weird considering the last time I saw this guy we were having a polite introductory conversation post-show at my theatre.  It’s also weird because he’s chewing gum, which I can taste in his mouth.  And this is an odd detail, but he doesn’t smell freshly showered, which I assumed is just something you do when you have a girl coming over you intend to bang.

We go inside and I perch on the couch as he proceeds to sit spread-eagle (not joking) with one foot on the top of the couch and one foot on a cushion below.  I can now see he’s wearing very tight black briefs under the robe.  I can also see that the muscled torso body shot selfie he sent me last night, is perhaps a couple years old.  Which, frankly, is a relief, because this guy is already quite a bit hotter than anyone I should reasonably be having sex with.  

I must be making a face at his couch-sitting position, because he shifts to something a little less awkward as we engage in some friendly small talk.  I’m aware of the sexual tension building in the room.  It’s also weird because, due to last night’s sexting, I kinda feel like we’ve already had sex.

At some point, he says “I’m listening to you, but you just licked your lips.”  He then comes in for a kiss, and as he does, he hocks his gum out of his mouth and onto the coffee table without missing a beat, like this is some super hero gum-ejection move he’s been practicing.  I find this hilarious but am unable to laugh as fully as I would otherwise if his tongue weren’t down my throat.

I’m frankly not used to moving this fast and for once I feel like the less eager party.  “So I guess that concludes the talking portion of the evening,” I say, as he drags me into his bedroom which is lit, I must say, very well for sex – with warm side lamps, no overheads, and, of course, candles everywhere.  Also, the walls are covered in floor to ceiling mirrors.  So, yeah, he’s that guy.

Then we have sex.  Lots of it.  In lots of different positions.  And I enjoy admiring myself in the mirror as we’re doing it.  He has a kind of intense, angry-looking sex face, but I find that guys in general have not-so-great sex faces, so I’m not going to judge him too harshly for that.  He does have some sort of dorky dirty talk call-and-response lines like “Yeah you like that” and “you want this cock?” which force me occasionally out of the moment in order to respond to him.  He’s also a bit of a porn-y fucker, meaning he favors the jack rabbit pounding style that will never in a million years of pounding get me anywhere close to an orgasm.  BUT, I do manage to slow him down and pull him in for long enough to actually have an orgasm on the first go round, so that’s really something.  It’s not the most amazing orgasm in the world, but it exists and I feel good about it.

After a long time fucking, I ask if he’s close.  He says he can “come anytime you want baby.”  Within minutes, he’s coming.  Which I find miraculous.  When he’s done and we’re relaxing in bed, sweaty and spent, I tell him he should be a porn star – stay hard for hours, come on command (I learned from Jenna Jameson, this is what it takes).  He tells me he would “LOVE THAT.”  I tell him to do it, he could be like James Deen but even hotter with a whole Christian Grey thing going for him.  He tells me that he totally would, except that it would kill his parents.  I tell him to do it anyway – it looks like from the enthusiastic expression on his face that being a porn star would make him really happy.

Then he gets us popsicles and, when we’re done eating them, we read each other the stupid jokes on the popsicle sticks.  He actually guesses the answer to mine, which I find quite impressive.  Then we talk – we talk about kids and Facebook and our depressing digital age culture.  We laugh a lot.  He finds me very smart and funny.  Sometimes, in the middle of talking, I go in for a kiss or to playfully nibble his shoulder.  It feels nice and intimate and just totally not what I was expecting.  I share with him that his text personality is very different from his real personality.  He shares that the reason he didn’t want to go out to dinner was financial – that dating is expensive for men and especially if you don’t know if someone’s going to be cool or not.  Having him explain himself in person rather than the flippant one-liners on text makes me understand where he’s coming from and I start to see him as a human being.  I admit to him that I was nervous coming over here.  That I texted his address to my big, muscular male friend should I disappear the next day. 

Me: “So, story of your life: 50 Shades of Grey or American Psycho?”

Him: “A bit of both.”

We joke about his “slave” script.  I tease him and ask how many slaves he currently has.  He laughs at all my jokes, apparently very amused and not into taking himself too seriously.  Which I find very attractive.

He doesn’t bring out the ropes.  We have sex again and, in the moment, I tell him “You can call me whore if you want.”  He slaps my face gently and says “I’ll ease you into that.”  And that’s that.  He’s very respectful.  Even to a fault.  When he smacks my ass, I feel he thinks he’s going to break me.  I assure him this is not the case. 

Afterwards, I say “Well, that was very…”  He finishes my thought: “Vanilla.  “But it was fun, right?”  “Yeah, it was alright.”  I sense he’s teasing me, but I’m also wondering why he didn’t try to roll out any of his tricks with me.  Maybe I put him off – he doesn’t want a slave he has to “ease in”, he wants one practiced and ready to go.  I wonder if I killed the fun by asking too many questions, being too in my head.  Or maybe he just senses the truth – that I would make a shitty slave, and it’s not even worth trying. 

Or perhaps this is simply how it goes now.  The new mating ritual of the digital age: flirting on Facebook, sexting on text message, sending dirty pictures, the promise of “the crazy shit I'm gonna do to you,” all culminating in an inevitably “vanilla” sexual encounter. 

He’s very sweet as he walks me to my car and kisses me good night.  I turn to say something else, to give some button to the evening, but he’s already walking back down the street.  I watch him strut away in his robe, proud to have made another conquest, on to the next.  I wonder in that moment if I'll ever see him again.

For several weeks, I stalk him on Facebook.  His occasional messages dwindle to zero.  He’s apparently bored of the small talk.  When I tipsily send him what I think is a very sexy cleavage selfie, he responds with little feeling: “Boobs.”

My same male friend points out, quite accurately I think, that men are desensitized to these suggestive body shots.  The internet is full of images of naked breasts, with nipples and everything.  So a PG-13 cleavage pic just isn't cutting the mustard anymore.  He encourages me to "cut the small talk," to be "bold and direct."  

He helps me construct the following sentence on text message: “I really need to be tied up, blindfolded, and fucked hard… Can you help me out with that?”  I giggle nervously, expectantly at my phone.  We both wait with bated breath, knowing he will respond to this one.  He has to, right?  What guy in his right mind could refuse an offer such as this?   

I never hear back from him.  My friend's conclusion: "He's weird."

I over-share with my gynecologist that I recently messed around with a guy who’s into BDSM.  I’m not sure what reaction I’m expecting but her face looks slightly disturbed as she feels me up, looking for lumps.  She tells me to “be careful.”  I’m not sure if it’s my heart or my vagina she’s most worried about, but people tell me this a lot.  To “be careful.”  I wonder if I’ll ever listen.