More Wild Dreams

This must be the week of wild dreams. Here are three more I had last night:

In the first one, I'm sitting here in front of the computer, when I heard the tornado sirens go off. A few seconds later, I hear the winds, and, suddenly, my chair was shoved across the room into the wall.

My son was in his bed asleep. I tried to call out to him to let him know there is a tornado, but I couldn't speak audibly. Eventually, I made my way across the house to his room, where I kneeled by the side of his bed. He woke up and we hung on to each other for dear life as the storm buffets our house. I looked up as I heard the roof creaking, but it held, and my fear dissipated. Then I looked out the window, where the tornado had moved to my neighbor's house.

In the second dream, I'm at some sort of outdoor picnic or barbecue. There are several long tables set up with long benches on either side. After I filled up my plate, I sat down to eat. As I was sitting down, a bit of cinnamon fell off my dessert and onto the ground on the opposite side from where I was sitting.

I didn't think much of it, but a man sitting catty corner on the other side of the table began glaring at me. It was the old SOB captain I couldn't stand from my police days. He didn't say anything, but I knew he wanted me to pick up the cinnamon grains.

I looked at him and told him it wasn't bothering anyone and that I'd clean it up once I finished eating. I was damned if I'd get up immediately for a few cinnamon grains and let my meal get cold.

In the third dream, I was a wizard and there a huge boiling cauldron in the room in front of me. It was a large room with lots of people coming and going.

I reached inside the cauldron and pulled out a long umbilical cord-like string. Eventually I got it all out and it turned into a woman my own age, a friend or relative of some sort that I'd thought had died. She was naked, but unaware of it, and went into the kitchen where a bunch of others were.

I reached in again, and pulled out another string and it turned into the woman's daughter, who I'd also thought was dead.

I had another relative, a brother or a cousin who I thought was dead, so I reached in again, hoping to find another string. I didn't, even after emptying the cauldron of all the liquid and this disturbed me.

Thoughts?

My Early Experiences With Porn

Ok, I admit it. Sometimes I look at internet porn. I'm not compulsive about it, nor do I look every day, but, trust me, I've seen my share of it. In the pre-internet days, I occasionally looked at it, but only the hardcore stuff -- Playboy is too tame and a waste of time in my opinion.

I first discovered porn when I was about nine or ten years old. On one of our overnight stays with my great aunt and uncle, I found a mildly racy magazine in their stack of magazines when I was looking for something to read. No one would bat an eye looking at this magazine now, as it only showed mainly dressed women in shorts and low cut tops, with the odd, blurry topless picture now and then, with nothing whatsoever below the belt. It was only slightly more titillating than looking at certain issues of National Geographic, which I also perused with fascinated interest.

Not too long after that, I discovered my brother's stash of Playboy and Penthouse magazines, which he usually kept between his mattress or buried under several other "innocent" magazines. Again, these magazines, though more explicit than my great uncle's magazines, wouldn't raise much of an eyebrow today. Though the women were usually completely nude, they'd frequently have a knee strategically raised to hide the crotch area, and even when that area showed, the pubic hair was airbrushed out. And one never saw a pose where the woman had spread her legs. But for a kid growing up during that time, this was hot stuff for me.

I would usually wait until no one was around, then sneak in there to have a good look. I was very careful not to get caught doing this -- I'd make sure to place the magazine back in the exact same spot in the stack or under the mattress, even to the point of noting how many inches from edge it was when I found it.

I thought I'd died and gone to heaven, when he finally brought home more explicit mags where the women posed with their legs spread open. I remember this one, Nexxus, that began to approach the modern presentation of porn. But even this one, the women were always by themselves, posing alone. Never did my brother bring home a magazine showing anyone actually engaging in sex.

Once I became sexually active, my interest in looking at porn tapered off. Why bother to look at it when I was doing it? I've sometimes used porn mags and videos with a partner to spice things up a bit, but for the most part, it's all old hat for me.

Tell me about your first exposure to porn.

Childhood Memories

When I was a kid, most kids spent more time playing outside than kids do nowadays. Though we had TV, there were no DVDs or VHS tapes, nor were there any video games, as the first video game, Pong, didn't come along until I was nearly out of high school. As for TV, all we had to watch were the 3 major networks, plus a couple of UHF channels, usually only one of which came in clearly. We also had no computers, ipods, etc......we had record players that would play either a large LP record on 33 rpm or a 45 rpm record. The 45s had a huge hole in the middle that required a special attachment to play on one's record player and had a single song on either side.

So, most kids spent a lot of time outdoors. As well as getting to exercise our imaginations and our bodies, being outside had the added bonus of taking us away from the ever watchful eyes of our parents.

When I was about five or six, I wanted to be the Sheriff like Andy Griffith, so my mother got me a Sheriff's badge and a hat like Andy's, which I had a lot of fun with. I also had a leather headband, a fringed vest, and moccasins for when I'd troop through the woods, pretending that I was an Indian back in the pioneer days. As I got a bit older, some of us kids played World War II, with toy helmets and guns. I sometimes even wore my father's old sailor shirt from the war during these games.

I remember being about seven or eight and we built our own treehouse, with the help of some kids a few years older than us. One kid's parents provided a bunch of old boards and a box of nails, so we went to town with it. The tree house was a completely enclosed room with a little door on hinges and a porch out front. It had a little window, covered with a mosquito netting screen. We had a ladder to get up to the tree house, but all of us could get up there without the ladder if necessary. I can remember scrambling up into the treehouse and pulling the ladder up behind me, so some younger kids couldn't follow us up there.

We also spent a good bit of time riding our bikes around the huge subdivision I lived in. Every summer, the "bug truck" used to ride through our neighborhood every couple of weeks or so, spraying pesticides to keep the mosquito population down. Whoever spotted the bug truck first would yell, "BUG TRUCK!!" and we'd all follow it down the street, riding in and out of the noxious plume of pesticides it spewed out the back. It's a wonder no kid ever passed out from it.

And there were the games we played, usually organized on the spur of the moment, depending on how many kids were available: baseball, basketball, football, kick the can, etc.

I could go on, but you get the picture. I'm happy to have grown up when I did, and I think we had a better time as kids than kids do nowadays, despite our lack of technological gadgets.

Thoughts?

Questions and Answers

Fairly often, I get emails from people asking me questions about my lifestyle. Here are some questions and answers from a recent query.

My first reaction to your adventures was (as a women), how could he
do this, but when you think about it , it really makes you think. With me being a married women with children and a career, I have always wanted a love-free sex life. I'd enjoy it, rather, love it!! Another question relates to being careful in today's world -- are you careful with all your partners or are your regulars different for you? Do you protect yourself with all your partners. and how do you become a regular?

By protect, I assume you mean condoms. Yes, with new partners and one night stands. That tends to go by the wayside with regular partners after a period of time.

A regular is one who is well suited to me sexually, and for those who get especially close, they should be intelligent and be able to carry on a conversation about other things of mutual interest. Of course, the cast of regulars fluctuates over time.....I don't have the time to maintain more than a few regulars and a bit more semi regulars.

I myself would love to know what it feels to be carefree and have sex without feelings.

I am capable of having sex with love, but I don't think they always need to go hand in hand. Both are nice separately as well. And if I love someone, it doesn't necessarily follow that I'd want to limit myself to that one person, any more that I'd spend the rest of my life eating my favorite meal 3 times a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year.

When you meet a new partner what do you say afterwards; say goodbye and thank you, or do you call afterwards?

With a one timer, I thank them and say goodbye. That's it. I don't shoot them a line of shit, telling them I'll call them when we both know full well that I won't.

If I see future possibilities in further meetings, I'll call them within a week or so, usually, depending on what I'm up to at that point in time and their schedules as well.

So why did it not work being married did you feel the urge to be with different women then as well?

I wasn't meant to be married....and I don't think the government has any business involving themselves in people's relationships. So, I am against legal marriage, and think it's up to people to decide what their relationships are for themselves.

I tried to be faithful to her, but I couldn't do it. I only lasted two weeks at that try before I had to go out and have someone else......big fucking joke, that was. So, I got out of it and decided never to live such a lie ever again.

A few days later, another email came from her...

Hello again I have a few more questions: #1 Do you date? #2 What turns you on the most. #3 What was your first desicion to decide on being a libertine. did something or someone decide for you. #4 Do you take care of the women sexually first or is it about getting yours.

1. Do I "date"?

If by that, you mean do I associate with women for purposes other than sex, of course I do. But there's nothing formal about it -- there's none of this formal calling and asking for a date, holding doors, etc.

Getting together with a woman for other activities is limited to 2 or 3 that I'm closest to, and who share common interests with me outside the bedroom.

2. What turns me on the most.

Hmm. I think it's a woman who truly enjoys sex, knows what she wants, and is totally inhibited and guilt free about it. I'm not interested in high maintenance, prissy ladies -- I want a woman who can fuck like an animal when the mood is right. It helps if she's an out of the box thinker in other areas as well and has something that she is passionate about

3. Becoming a libertine.

Unlike most people, I am rather introspective and I question everything. Fairly early on, I realized that I didn't want what most people are brought up to want. My one brief misadventure into marriage cofirmed that. And as I dislike hypocrisy and phoniness, I decided I wasn't going to give lip service to the societal sacred cow of monogamy if I couldn't and didn't want to live up to it. I decided just to live according to my basic nature.

4. Woman first, or me first.

It depends. With my regulars and when I have the time to take my time, I make sure they are satisfied, but with one night stands or when I'm pressed for time and can only have a quickie, I take care of myself first.

Quote Time

You're never too old to become younger.
-- Mae West

I remember my father always said that my brother was older than he was!

I used to be disgusted; now I try to be amused.
— Elvis Costello

The difference between being anal and being laid back.

When humor goes, there goes civilization.
— Erma Bombeck

Can you imagine Hitler or Osama bin Laden with a sense of humor?

The important thing in science is not so much to obtain new facts as to discover new ways of thinking about them.
— Sir William Bragg

Learn to think outside the box.

Those who don't build must burn. It's as old as history and juvenile delinquence.
— Ray Bradbury, FAHRENHEIT 451

There's a reason why religious fundamentalists and Hitler both believed in burning books with ideas they didn't like.

All progress has resulted from people who took unpopular positions.
— Adlai E. Stevenson

In other words, people who were not afraid to think outside the box.

I praise loudly. I blame softly.
— Catherine the Great

Good words to live by.

Take what you can use and let the rest go by.
— Ken Kesey

There's no need to accept a philosophy part and parcel in order to benefit from a kernel of truth in it.

To be yourself in a world that is doing its best, day and night to make you like everybody else --- is to fight the hardest battle any human being can fight; and never stop fighting.
— E.E. Cummings

Amen!

Disappointing Gifts

Like nearly all of my readers, I've gotten disappointing and inappropriate gifts over the years. What has changed since my childhood is how I react to getting such gifts.

I remember being about five years old and my mother's best friend gave me this garish pillow in the shape of a clown's head for my birthday. I hated it the minute I opened the box and my facial expression clearly showed my displeasure. I'd never liked clowns and this clown pillow made of several bright colors was especially repulsive to me.

I don't remember what I said, but I know I verbally expressed my disdain for my gift. I do remember my mother taking me aside and telling me it was rude to react this way; that I might hurt the giver's feelings. She said I should always thank the person nicely for whatever gift I got simply because they meant well, even if I would do no more with it than stuff it in the back of my closet.

A couple of years later, my birthday party was held at my aunt's house, and my aunt had made a chocolate cake with chocolate icing for me. Then, as now, I despise chocolate cake, as I've always preferred white cake with white icing.

My mother, knowing that I hated chocolate cake and knowing my propensity to being brutally frank, gave me a look warning me not to express my true opinion of the cake. So, I thanked my aunt for the cake, though I don't know how convincing I was.

I've gotten better at this over the years. My sister has absolutely no clue as to my taste, so her gifts to me are always, without exception, clunkers. She also apparently thinks I stopped getting older once I turned sixteen or so, as most of the gifts she gives me would be appropriate for a teenager.

I've tried to get her to stop giving me gifts at all, because she really can't afford it; I tell her that a card is more than sufficient, but, still, the turkey gifts come. Now, I simply pass the gifts on to more appropriate recipients or I end up giving them to the Goodwill. Because she doesn't live near me, I don't have to deal with questions as to why I haven't worn the clothing she's given me or otherwise used her gifts.

Let's hear some of your disappointing gift stories.

The Sunday Night Blues

As a kid, during the school year, I would always get this feeling of dread late on Sunday afternoons as the weekend was coming to a close, thinking of having to go to school the next day. I called it the "Sunday Night Blues", and it happened every Sunday night without fail, unless there was something to look forward to at school, which was a rarity.

Now, as an adult, I still get this same feeling when I know I've got to go back to work the next day, except the feeling of impending doom is worse now, as I hate my job much more than I ever hated school.

The main reason for this feeling as a kid was hating to get up early and giving up so many of my waking hours and privacy to doing things I didn't want to do. Now, as an adult, though I don't have to get up early for work, I still hate giving up so much of my time and my privacy. And I have the added reason of totally hating what I have to do for a living.

Do any of you get the "Sunday Night Blues"?

Memories of a Favorite Aunt

My favorite aunt was not either of my parents' sisters, but, rather, my mother's aunt. She was my maternal grandmother's baby sister, 11 years her junior, and only ten years older than my mother.Because of my aunt's "between generations" age, she was a lot closer to my mother than she might have been otherwise.

My aunt babysat my mother quite often, one time taking her to the movies when she was fifteen and my mother was five. Aunt Mary got so engrossed in this particular movie that she did not notice that my mother hadn't returned from a bathroom break. At the end of the movie, she finally noticed my mother was gone and ran out of the theater to frantically search for her. She found her within minutes, standing outside a candy store, looking in the window.

Aunt Mary had a rather tough life once she grew up. She married a Norwegian immigrant at age 19, who'd been one of her mother's boarders. He turned out to be a disappointing husband, an alcoholic and a hypochrondriac, and she ended up being their main support for most of their marriage.

They had five children, only one of whom lived, having lost two sets of twins. She ended up with six grandsons, whom she spoiled shamelessly, as her son and his wife were, at best, indifferent, if not neglectful parents.

She spent most of her working life as a chambermaid for the finest hotel in the state capital, eventually being promoted to head chambermaid. Though she'd only gone to the eighth grade in school, she was a whiz at crossword puzzles -- she always had several booklets of them to do whenever we visited her.

The most interesting thing that happened on her job was the time she went into one room to clean it one day in 1960, only to find then-candidate John F. Kennedy standing in front of the mirror combing his hair. Security back then was nothing like it is today, obviously! She said that he was quite gracious, spending a few moments chatting with her.

A close second to that had to be when the popular 1960s band, Herman and the Hermits, stayed at the hotel. They were equally as charming with her as JFK, and after they'd checked out, she brought home a pair of purple satin jeans that Herman had left behind, which ended up in my sister's closet.

She remained close to my mother for the rest of my mother's life. After we moved away in 1967, she and my uncle would periodically drive the 300 miles to come stay with us for a weekend. I remember she had a battered black 1960 Mercury Comet station wagon that she refused to drive more than 50 miles an hour on the interstate.

Whenever we went back home to visit for a weekend, we always chose to stay with Aunt Mary. Though her home was very small, we felt most comfortable and at home with her. Indeed, my mother's fatal stroke occurred on just one of those weekends.

She outlived my mother for six years, though not in good health. A year after my mother's death, she had a stroke of her own, but lingered for five more years in various living situations, as her no-good son sold her home and everything in it when she was laid up in the hospital.

I last saw her when I was nineteen, about six months before her death. Her speech was severely impaired from the stroke, but I listened carefully and was able to understand what she was saying, which pleased her to no end, as her caregivers evidently did not spend much time trying to listen.

I miss her still to this day.

This and That

My son recently came to me and asked me to read a position paper he'd written for a high school friend. I read it and found it to be informative, well organized, and presented in a logical fashion. It wasn't perfect, there were some rough edges with the language, but that was OK. If it were too perfectly written, his friend's teacher would more easily get suspicious.

He reminded me of myself doing that, as I once wrote a paper for a lover getting her Master's degree. Got her an A, too.

I hope my son's friend gets an equally good grade.
______________________

Recently, I heard a radio commercial for a local attorney. He mentioned that he specialized in "divorce and doptions".

WTF is a doption? I know that he meant adoption, but it boggled my mind that he would mispronounce such a common word in an advertisement.

I once knew a guy who said "abortion" as "dabortion", but he was 14 when he thought that. This attorney has no excuse.
______________________

I've heard of married couples "renewing their vows" and having another wedding ceremony in front of preacher, a reception; the whole nine yards.

I don't get this. To me, it's kind of like cleaning a bathroom that's already clean.
_______________________

I got a terrible paper cut last night, right under my right thumbnail. I bled like a stuck pig for awhile, bleeding through two bandaids. And the sucker throbbed for hours, keeping me from getting a good night's sleep. It's better now, though, but I think I'm going to go get a nap.

History Repeats Itself

Back when I was about two years old or so, my mother took me along with her to go visit my aunt. Once we got there, I got bored quickly, with the two women sitting at the kitchen table gossipping as they drank coffee.

I went out into the yard and eventually wandered away, walking down the sidewalk. I had it in my mind to try to find the school where my older cousin was.

I was halfway across town before they realized I was gone and they found me. Because I was so young at the time, I don't remember too many of the details, but I do remember that I wasn't the slightest bit afraid.

Fast forward 20+ years.

Shortly after my divorce, I moved in with my father for awhile until I got on my feet again. One day when my son was about two, I went to take a shower. My son and I were home alone, but I didn't think anything of it. I left the bathroom door open so he could come in the bathroom if he needed me.

When I got out of the shower, I found the front door standing wide open, my son gone. Because the front door had been locked, I didn't think he'd gotten out by himself. I first thought my father had gotten home and taken him out in the yard. He wasn't anywhere in the house or anywhere in the yard, and my father wasn't there.

I ran all over the neighborhood looking for him and about twenty minutes later, a woman from three streets over approached me, my son trustingly holding her hand.

That's the last time I underestimated him.

I'd be curious to hear any stories like this you might have from your family.

Hard of Hearing?

I've known a few people in my life who were born with moderate hearing impairments. Such people typically talk with oddly flat, sing songy voices, not dissimilar to that of mildly retarded people. But if one takes the time to actually listen to what these people are saying and to get beyond their odd intonations and speech rhythms, one will quickly and easily realize that they are not mentally challenged, but merely hard of hearing.

Unfortunately, many people don't do this and as soon as they hear the odd voice, they immediately decide the person is slow and treats them accordingly, either speaking to them verrrrrrrrrry slowwwwwwwly or in an affected high pitched voice than some people use with very small children. Conversely, I've heard people talk to retarded people very LOUDLY, as if they will understand better if the volume is increased.

Such people also typically speak English VERY LOUDLY to foreigners as if increased volume is a key to immediately learning an unfamiliar language...

There have been a few times over the years where I've had a head cold that settled in my ears and left me with temporarily reduced hearing, as if I'm going around with pillows attached to my ears. Each time, I was amazed and disgusted by how people treated me because I couldn't hear properly and had to ask them to repeat things, sometimes more than once.

Two common reactions were that people would act as if I were mentally deficient or with exasperation, as if I was pretending I couldn't hear just to be difficult and to give them a hard time. It made me sympathize with those people who have such hearing impairments permanently and have to deal with this rude treatment all the time.

Thoughts?