Showing posts with label coffee shop. Show all posts
Showing posts with label coffee shop. Show all posts

Wednesday, October 15, 2014

The Pussy Knows

He shows up to Urth Cafe an hour late wearing a shirt that says THE PUSSY KNOWS. I can smell his breath from across the table—hot and musty—and his shirt is damp when we hug.
“I’ve got so much energy flowing through me right now.”
He has just come from a seminar on the female orgasm. On his OKCupid profile, he is a self-proclaimed “female orgasm expert.” Obviously, this is why I’m here.

We talk about Law of Attraction (which he doesn’t believe in), and about how people are much more intuitive than they realize (which we agree on). To demonstrate this principle, when the food runner comes to our table carrying a slice of coconut custard pie and a turkey burger, my date insists he guess which belongs to whom.
“Come on, man, you know the answer.”
The food runner looks flustered and continues to repeat the names of the items, as if we haven’t heard.
Eventually, Orgasm Man gives up and sighs, “the pie is for her.”
I eat my pie with gusto, and he smiles at me, "You have a healthy sense of your own appetite."
"I love food!" I exclaim.
"Not just with eating," he says with a suggestive wink.

Later, he puts his hand on the table between us and I know I’m supposed to put my hand on his. I do, feeling the sweat gather in my palm. He stares into my eyes and we don’t say anything for awhile. Then, he smiles.
“I felt that. That wave you just sent through my body. I can feel it at the base of my cock.”
My mouth twitches into a snicker, but I choose to stay in the game. Also, I’m intrigued. In his very first message to me on OKCupid, he had said, “I find myself standing amongst a ton of people stroking pussy and for some reason in this moment I want to say hi.” I wondered if this was a metaphor—turns out it wasn’t, he actually teaches workshops in which men and women couple off and the man spends fifteen minutes stroking the woman's pussy. So, I knew what I was getting into with this guy, and it doesn’t particularly surprise me when he starts talking about the sensations he's feeling in his cock. However, I do get a hell of a kick out of the fact that this is happening over coffee at Urth CafĂ©.


I have to say, I don’t feel much sexual chemistry with this guy. It’s not that he’s not attractive, it’s just that by talking a lot about sex and what’s going on with his cock, the whole sexy game is demystified in an unsexy way. However, I am convinced that this Female Orgasm Expert has to be dynamite in bed. I don’t think that’s an unfair assumption.

At some point, after another long bout of staring into each other’s eyes, he asks, “Do you want to make out?”
I say, “Sure. In the Coffee Shop?”
“No,” he smiles.
And so we leave.
He walks me to my car and then we stand facing each other and, in slow motion, move closer and closer until our noses are touching. Then we slowly bring our mouths and tongues together, and he starts moaning, apparently very into it. I have to say, I am still more amused than turned on.
“Do you want to have sex?” he asks, matter-of-fact.
“Sure,” I say. Despite my incredible lack of horniness, I feel like turning down sex with the orgasm expert is not a smart move.
Then we start to work out logistics. I live East Side, he lives West Side, we met in the middle. I also have an important meeting the next day, and do not want to stay up all night fucking.
“Couple things. I have my period--“
“Don’t care.”
“And I have a big meeting tomorrow so I need to go to sleep soon.”
“I come custom,” he says. “Whatever you want, we’ll do it. I can come over, fuck you for 20 minutes and leave. You can come over and spend the night, or not. Whatever you want. What do you want?”
To be honest, if I listen to my instinct, I want to go home. Alone. I want to crawl into bed and get lots of sleep. But I feel like I have already agreed to the sex and I should probably follow through on that.
“Let’s fuck in the car,” I say.
“I knew you were going to say that,” says the Psychic Orgasm Expert.


We walk to his car, actually his roommate’s SUV he has borrowed for the night. He’s parked on a residential street that’s very well-lit and there are several people milling about. He clears out the trunk, puts down the back seats, makes a pretty functional bed. At this point, logistics are overwhelming passion and I try to think of how I’m going to get myself more in the mood. I pull out my tampon and, with no trash in sight, deposit it in a Recycling bin.
“Sorry, Recycling,” I say.
We then decide to move the car so we get back inside and drive around, looking for a darker, less inhabited spot. We park and crawl into the back.
He pulls off all his clothes, saying, “No time for the sexy undressing of each other.”
I’m wearing a dress so I leave it on. He doesn’t have a condom, but fortunately I do. He puts it on, gets on top of me, and pulls a boob out of my dress.
“You’ve got great tits.”
He plays with them a little, but then immediately starts to push his erection into me. I shift slightly, trying to accommodate him.
“Relax,” he says. So I just lay there while he sticks it in dry, feeling a little sore from the lack of a warm up act.
Then he fucks me for like fifteen minutes. At some point, he says, “This is the point where I would usually ask if you want to get on top.”
We just keep on doing what we’re doing. Every time I try to adjust myself to get into a position where I might possibly come, he tells me to “just relax.”
After a little while, he says, “I’m going to come inside you.” And then he does.
He lies on top of me for a bit, then rolls over, and starts getting dressed.
“That was awesome,” he exclaims.
I just lie there in the dark, thinking ‘that was it?’
He massages my legs for a couple minutes, and then it’s time to go.
For all those pussy-stroking workshops, he doesn’t stroke my pussy at all. Not even for a second.

He drives me back to my car and invites me to a workshop he’s teaching on Monday near where I live.
“I think I have something on my calendar for that day.”
I drive home, feeling a little grossed out. I don’t usually fuck strangers in cars, but the goddamn Female Orgasm Expert? I feel like I’ve been scammed. I look him up online and he is who he says he is—he’s a partner in an organization that specializes in female orgasm. He has youtube videos talking about it, he’s legit. People pay him to teach them how to give a woman pleasure—what? Then I get a little sad for the state of affairs between men and women—if this guy has no fucking idea about female orgasms, it doesn’t leave much hope for the rest of them.


That was Thursday. This is Friday.

I feel I can’t write too much about my second OKCupid date because, in my drunkenness, I accidentally told him about my blog, and I make it a rule not to write about anybody that might potentially read this. 

HOWEVER, there are some details that simply cannot be left unwritten.

My second OKCupid date is with a short Jewish man. I’ve been messaging with this person on and off for like six months. Early on, in reaction to something he said, I jokingly responded, “I don’t think this is going to work.” He countered with, “Well, it was worth a shot. I guess we should part with as much dignity as possible. So, uh… Nice rack.” Not gonna lie, his bluntness/ rudeness had kind of turned me on, and I decided to objectify him back: “And you look like the porn star James Deen, so I’ll enjoy that later…” Which was actually true, he did remind me of James Deen, which was 90% of the appeal. Then he said, “Yeah, I get that… a lot. Though more in person. Take that how you will. Or take that how you’d prefer. But, you know, take it.” This had my triangle throbbing a little, and again I was intrigued. Then I asked, “So you look like James Deen, but do you fuck like James Deen?” To which, he essentially said yes. As with Orgasm Man, this seemed an opportunity too good to pass up.

Turns out, he looks less like James Deen in person. We meet at what he calls a “dive bar” and to me looks like a nicely-lit Chinese restaurant. He’s nicer in person than his snarky online personality. And he’s clearly nervous, laughing a lot and too loudly. As the drinks flow, the snarkiness reemerges and he starts giving me sideways glances and kind of talking down to me. His condescension is annoying but also annoyingly sexy. We move closer and closer as the night progresses, and eventually we start making out in the bar.

His place is walking distance, so we head out at 2am, stopping at a 7 Eleven on the way so he can buy a cheap bottle of red wine. I comment that this particular 7 Eleven is the “crackiest” one I’ve ever been too. Which is true, and I’ve been to lots of 7 Elevens in my day. He then comments that I’m the “whitest” person he’s ever met. I notice that he has a bit of a thing about whiteness, because he was born in the Ukraine and grew up in a very white suburban town on the East Coast, where he was the “most ethnic” kid in school. He still looks pretty white to me.

He tells me that there are two Korean guys living in his apartment—his landlord apparently rented to them without asking him, and they don’t speak English or talk to him at all.
“I’m going to make friends with them,” I exclaim, drunkenly.
“You’re like the biggest seven year old in the world,” he tells me, not for the first or last time that night. I find it hilarious every time he says it.

We don’t see any Koreans when we arrive at his place, but there’s a curtain in the corner of the apartment, and I guess they’re living behind it. We beeline for his bedroom, where we make out on the couch and he pulls off my clothes.
“You look good naked,” he says.
He moves us to the bed, and we have sex. It’s actually pretty hot—he’s aggressive and passionate. At one point, he sucks too hard on my tongue and I groan and push him away. “Aw,” he teases, condescendingly.

After we have sex, I’m sprawled out naked on his bed. He points at my crotch.
“This is unusual,” he says. I look down. Everything looks in order to me.
“This landing strip. I haven’t seen a girl with pubic hair in years.”
Truth be told, I have very little pubic hair, and I’m surprised he’s pointing it out.
“I guess it depends on the kind of girls you’re fucking,” I say.
“Not necessarily. A girl could be a saint and she still would have shaved pubes.”
What?
“It has nothing to do with sainthood, it’s cultural,” I respond. “Does it bother you?”
“No, I don’t mind. I’m just not big on hair.”
I wish I could show you a photo of this guy naked and how completely COVERED IN HAIR he is. I’m surprised that someone this hairy has the audacity to point out the like square inch of hair on my entire body.


“I don’t usually date white girls,” he says. Here we go again with the ethnic profiling. “At least not ones as All-American looking as you.”
“Really? I don’t think of myself as All-American looking.”
There’s that sideways glance again. “You look like a cheerleader. Were you a cheerleader in high school?”
If I had liquid in my mouth, I would do a spit take.
“I was a theatre nerd!” But thanks for not listening to a goddamn word I've said all night. 
He suddenly seems annoyed with me, as if now that he’s come, he realizes he’s fucked an “All-American white cheerleader girl” and feels bad about it, or something. I don’t know. I get up to leave.
“Where are you going?”
“You seem annoyed or something. I think I’m gonna go home.”
“Come here,” he extends his arms. I pull on my pants.
He grabs me and pulls me down on the bed. Takes off my pants. And fucks me again.

I don’t come, he doesn’t seem to care. I head for the bathroom, naked, and I can hear someone in there running the faucet. I guess the Koreans are home.

At 4am, I walk the five blocks or so back to my car, and I wonder if I should have stood up for myself more. If I owe it to the next woman who sleeps with this guy to tell him he has no right to judge anything on my body—I have a banging body and he’s a short hairy little man. I wonder, like I always do after an orgasm-free One Night Stand, if I’m supposed to point out to these dudes that I didn’t come, and that they might try harder next time. Or at all. Or if I should wait to be asked. Orgasm Man didn’t ask me if the sex was great, he thought it was "awesome". I like to think if he had asked, I would have told him. I want to think I’m a good communicator in the bedroom, but I think I’m learning that guys really have no fucking idea and they need to be hit over the head with the cold hard facts. Even the ones who claim to be Orgasm Experts or say they fuck like James Deen. Perhaps they set the bar too high for themselves, and then pussy out and decide not to even try, because they know they can’t live up to the expectations they’ve built. Why would they do this? And why do I continue to fall for it?

The little Jewish Man’s follow up later that night: “You know, all in all, that wasn’t a bad date. Or maybe it’s just been a while for me.” I’m not sure how to respond to this.
“I’ll choose to take that as a compliment,” I say.


Tuesday, September 3, 2013

Afternoon Delight

So, I’m sitting in this coffee shop reading Bonobo Handshake by Vanessa Woods.  Along with the chimpanzee, the bonobo is our closest existing relative.  We apparently share 98% of our DNA with both species!  


As I’m reading, I notice this guy in the cafe pretty obviously checking me out and trying to make eye contact.  I smile and go back to my book.  My friend calls and I take the call outside.  While I’m out there, this guy comes out to smoke a cigarette and plops down right next to me.  It’s a little awkward trying to talk to my friend while he’s sitting there, and I wonder if he’s a psychopath or just has no social filters.  He’s holding out two tootsie roll lollipops.
“Want a lollipop?”
I’m not sure if he realizes this is the universal sign for I’m a Pedophile.  I politely decline and turn away.  He unwraps the orange one and pops it in his mouth.  He keeps watching me, but I purposefully ignore him and he eventually gives up and leaves me alone.

So, if we share 98% of our DNA with bonobos and chimps, why is it that when I mention bonobos, practically no one knows what I’m talking about?  And why are we taught in school that we’re descended from chimps, and bonobos are somehow left out of the picture?  I hypothesize there are two reasons: bonobos live in a matriarchal society in which a male’s rank is determined by his mother, and they have a lot of sex.  In other words, they are Slutty Feminists.


Back inside the coffee shop, the guy turns to me.  This time, he reaches out his hand and introduces himself.  He’s got an interesting name. 
“What ethnicity is that?”
“Israeli.”
I tell him I met a lot of Israelis backbacking in Guatemala and that I found them intense, smart, and attractive.  This makes him smile and blush.
“What are you reading?”
 “Have you heard of the bonobos?”
Of course he hasn’t.
I explain that I’m thinking of writing a play about them.  I tell him a little about their sluttiness.  He’s genuinely interested. 
I learn that he’s 32 years old and family-oriented.  I also learn that he’s a jack of all trades – he works in a law office, he’s a massage therapist, he went to medical school, and he wants to be an actor.  He stares deeply into my eyes, smiling unabashedly.
“Your eyes are so beautiful.  What color are they?  Honey?”
“Hazel, I guess.”
“I could stare into them forever.”
His honesty and directness are intriguing.  Is this guy for real?  He wants to hang out today.  I’m impressed with his bold proposal, but I’m not sure yet if I’m interested, so I give myself an out.
“I’m meeting friends later.”  Which is sort of true.

Until very recently, scientists further underestimated the significance of bonobos by referring to them as “pygmy chimpanzees” when not completely ignoring their existence altogether.  Woods admits that “even people like me who are familiar with chimps barely even know there are two ‘closest living relatives’ to humans.  Like an embarrassing relative, bonobos are frequently missing from the family tree.  According to Microsoft Word’s spell-checker, “bonobo” isn’t even a word.” (Vanessa Woods, Bonobo Handshake).  We like to think we’re not related to a bunch of slutty feminist primates, but we are.

The coffee shop is going to close soon.  The guy closes his computer and smiles wickedly.
“You’re distracting me.  Wanna get out of here?”
I have to admit I love this line.  We get outside and I suddenly realize I’m noticeably taller than him.  I hate that this makes me momentarily uncomfortable.  I'm a feminist, for fuck sake!  Besides, I should be used to it by now, tall woman that I am.
“Your place or mine?”
This sounds remarkably like an offer for sex but I’m so unused to men being this forthcoming that I assume this isn’t his intention. 
“Let’s go to your place, I want to meet your dog.”  I know this is a game I’m playing, I’m not really a dog person and I don’t really care if I ever meet his dog.  But I want to get off the street and I’m not bringing him back to my place.  Also, I still don’t know what I want from this guy.


In the 1980s, Frans de Waal studied bonobos in the San Diego Zoo.  “He saw tongue kissing, fellatio, and a kama sutra of sexual positions.  Before de Waal, people thought that nonconceptive sex, or ‘sex for fun,’ was unique to humans.  But bonobos were having sex in all sorts of crazy ways, including the missionary position, which no one had ever seen in an animal.  De Waal also concluded that bonobos were female-dominated and that compared to chimps, they committed very little violence.  He suggested that here was another model for human behavior, one that didn’t include war and bloodshed.” (Woods)  Of course de Waal’s findings inspired much backlash from the scientific community, who felt that his “image of the ‘make love not war’ hippie ape was an exaggeration.” (Woods)

I walk in the door of this guy’s studio apartment and I’m accosted by a sea of boy crap under an unfortunate case of overhead fluorescent lighting.  I feel like I’ve stumbled into a chimpanzee habitat.  I try not to look at the rumpled and dismal gray bedspread as I step over a pile of dirty boxers, heading straight for the only thing I feel comfortable focusing on in this room: a photo of two little boys on his refrigerator.
 “Who’s this?”
“My nephews.”
I stand awkwardly, feeling like I’m invading his space by staring at the mess, not sure where is safe to look.  He clears a big ol’ pile of clothes off the only chair in the room so I can sit down.  Then he starts packing a bong.  I try to make small talk as he takes a huge bong rip and starts hacking coughing.  I talk louder.  He puts down the bong and goes in for a kiss.  It’s wet and sloppy.  I pull away.  This room has really done a number on my libido.
“I don’t even know you.”  Honestly, I don’t care if I know him or not.  I just suddenly feel like I’m in over my head and I’m not sure what I signed up for.  Did I agree to this when I agreed to come over here?  Was I giving my unspoken assent?  He apparently enjoyed the kiss and goes in for another, crawling on top of me in the process.  I can see every pore.

He then makes the move that changes everything.  He turns off the fucking overhead light.  And leads me to the bed.  Is this really happening?  I met this guy in a coffee shop in the middle of a hot Monday afternoon and now we’re going to have sex in his messy apartment.  I have to say, the idea of this seduces me more than anything else.  I decide to go for it.  I kiss him back.  I like his directness, I like his passion, the way he touches me. 


A bonobo handshake refers to the array of sexual behaviors bonobos engage in as casually as humans do a handshake.  And coffee shop guy and I bonobo handshake the shit out of that afternoon.  We do it all.  Front to back, face to face, upside down and backwards.  And it’s really fun, casual, playful.  We roll around in bed like a couple of bonobos getting to know each other – occasionally stopping to talk and switch positions.  And neither of us orgasm, but it doesn’t matter.  It’s almost better that way because it’s never over – it’s this continuous game that has no finish line, no beginning or end.  It feels comfortable and mutual, and like a perfectly legitimate way of getting to know someone. 

I wish we could let go of our Puritan roots and get back to something older, more primal.  Accept the bonobo in us.  I’m not saying we should live totally in a free-loving, non-competitive society because, as my male friend put it “nothing would ever get done.”  But I love the idea of some balance.  Wouldn’t it be wonderful if both sides were considered?  If we knew we came from both a patriarchal/ competitive/ violent society and a matriarchal/ cooperative/ sexual society?  Maybe we would stop slut-shaming.  Maybe we would have more women in powerful positions.  Maybe we would have more fun.  And meet in coffee shops.  And have more sex.  Lots and lots of sex.

Want to know more about bonobos?  This book is awesome...