Somewhere among the awe-inspiring tales of those who have fully overcome sexually repressed (or even abusive) upbringings to enjoy adulthoods of totally unrestrained sexual pleasure and variety, there ought to be some room for the testimony of "the rest of us" who have slowly, and with advancing age, won partial, but meaningful victories over less extreme, but still powerful assaults on sexual expression. While my experiences may not be typical, or my choices conventional, they still represent one more proof of the inherent and universal power of human sexuality to eventually overcome any obstacles that may temporarily block its path.

Since human beings are by nature among the most sexual and social species in the history of the planet, thwarting those drives is a task equal to making a fish phobic about the water, or an eagle terrified of heights. But the job is still being attempted today in too many homes all around the nation. Not just by "the usual suspects" (erotophobic Fundamentalists, or insane, neglectful, or abusive parents, which mine were not), but by parents who care about their children, and who don't realize the inevitable and lifelong consequences of certain "lovingly protective" actions. So, as the recipient of a quite unintentional, but well-executed and ALMOST effective program for producing sexual and social dysfunction, I'd like to alert parents who wish to avoid causing their children ANY degree of dysfunction as adults to do so by stopping anything that sounds even vaguely familiar to what's being described, and reassure those who may still be exorcising their early indoctrinations that some real progress is eventually possible.

SEXUAL & SOCIAL
"BACKUP SYSTEMS"

The reason it's so hard to make a human being sexually or socially dysfunctional is because nature has put such a high priority on these two functions that we have two separate vehicles for achieving healthy expression : Genes and environment. Either can compensate for any failing in the other. Most people are born with the ability and need to seek and give affection in many forms, and by the time they're mature enough to engage in sex, it need not be a huge, frightening leap, but just a new "variation on a familiar theme" IF their environment has been supportive of emotional and affectional expression.

One essential precursor to successful adult social and sexual functioning is peer bonding from an early age. Being able to feel comfortable around others, trust them, and "read" them (pick up on nonverbal signals, and simply "know" how they see things, and how they are likely to react to those things) is an essential skill. Some people are born with the social equivalent of "perfect pitch" and as such have a rare ability to achieve "instant bonding" by instinctively knowing exactly the right thing to say or do. They tend to become extremely successful politicians, con artists, and seducers (or all three since the skills are identical...). But for every Yin there's a Yang, so there are an equal number of those whose "social software" is either "nonstandard" or "non- existent," and therefore tend to be socially "tone deaf." We just see and react to things in an alternate manner, and therefore, though this

has its advantages in terms of creativity and making nontraditional choices in life, it definitely does not lead to the kind of early peer bonding required for the process of socialization. Fortunately, there is that "backup system" of environment, and if a parent uses it properly, the ability to see how others might feel about something or react to it can be learned, and environment can trump genes, just as genes can trump atrocious environments. The problem occurs when neither system impels toward healthy functioning.

"SPECIALIZATION"

Every parent since the beginning of time has known that their child is "special," and so long as that belief is manifested by making a child feel wanted, valued, and safe at home, that's a good thing that will enhance their self-image and make them bolder in regard to social interaction. But if it's expressed as "You have more potential than your peers, and should have higher ambitions, so don't dress like them, talk like them, act like them or spend any more time around them than you must," it can be devastating to the socialization process. (Thank goodness "home schooling" was unheard of in the early 50's, so at least I got to have a reasonable amount of interaction in the public schools, though my "different drummer" genes never allowed me to "read" my classmates well enough to say or do the "right thing" on any regular basis.)

"VULCANIZATION"

Another "good-idea-gone-bad" was the concept of "unbugability." Though it was unleashed long before sexuality would become an issue, it was a torpedo aimed directly at it, and by far the most difficult part of my past I still need to overcome.

The basic idea was excellent. Mature people should be able to weather life's inevitable crises, small and large, with a kind of calm control, make the best of their choices, and then just move on. That's a lesson any parent should teach. But whether due to misapplication or misinterpretation, it somehow took on a "Vulcanesque" quality - a full decade before Gene Roddenberry would introduce us to the those emotionally stifled Vulcans of "Star Trek." At exactly the same time as the teachers at school were cracking down on "classroom exuberance" (admittedly, only to keep their own sanity...) at home I began to feel embarrassed about any failure to keep my feelings firmly in check. Since I identified only with adults, maturity and the respect that went with it was what I craved most, and any overt expression of emotion or affection was something I began to see as a "failure" signifying the stigma of childishness and immaturity due to a lack of self-control. By 7th grade, the process of "Vulcanization" was pretty well complete, and a lifelong aversion to precisely the kind of uninhibited behaviors and emotions that are essential to good sex was firmly entrenched, years before there would have been any opportunity to establish a different pattern.

LULL BETWEEN THE STORMS

By 8th grade, the train was sufficiently off the tracks in terms of anxiety and depression that some modification of the "program" was in order, and I was actually encouraged to do a fair amount of socializing. Had things gone on in the right direction, life might have been a lot different, even with things like school dances and unrequited crushes making life more complicated, but also a lot more fulfilling.

ATTITUDINAL PIROUETTE

In 9th grade we moved from a medium sized city to a rural area several miles from a small town. This obviously made socializing a lot harder, but the school lunchroom gave me a reasonable amount of exposure to friends, so though still fairly "tone deaf" socially, I was doing relatively well in regard to same-sex friendships. The possibility of romantic relationships with someone of the other sex was occasionally mentioned by my mother, though generally in a low-key, off-in-the-future context with no real relevance to someone my age, despite the fact that the desire to have a romantic relationship had been delightfully dominating my thoughts since the evening of March 8, 1959, when I got my first major crush on a seventh grade classmate.

The problem was that even in small towns in the early 60s, teen pregnancy was a real problem, conservative myths to the contrary. When the first one hit my class, my mother's reaction to it was extreme and intense, but surprisingly even-handed gender-wise. She saw BOTH sexes as calculating predators : In addition to the universally held view that all boys were obsessed with only one thing (having as much sex with as many girls as possible while avoiding all responsibility for their actions, and would do or say anything to bring this about), she also believed that as graduation approached, all girls also became obsessed with only one thing (trapping a man into marriage by becoming pregnant, and would do or say anything to bring this about). So, interestingly, the message that was pounded into me day after day would have been identical regardless of my gender : "Be smart, avoid entanglements with those scheming sharks - and I'll 'help' you do that - and have a successful life. Then if one day as an adult you WANT to have a family, great." Since I knew from childhood on that I did not want to become a parent, the melding of sex with unplanned parenthood was an extremely traumatizing thought, and this alone would have probably been enough to keep me from doing anything too risky or really, really dumb - even though I was still ignorant of exactly what "sex" was. In that primitive, repressed time there was no sex education in the schools, and for me - and I'm sure many others - no explicit discussion of it at home, since the issue was already far too embarrassing to ever bring up.

THE FLAW IN "THE PLAN"

But luck was (finally !) on my side, and the blackout on any explicit discussion of sex had one fantastic advantage. Since I lived in a world of total sexual ignorance, any oblique references to masturbation went completely over my head, so on September 29, 1964, when I spontaneously discovered it (and gave myself the best 18th birthday present of the day) I never then, nor in any of the 15,504 days I've enjoyed it since, ever had anything but the happiest of feelings in regard to this much-maligned, but still totally valid form of sexual expression. (I do, of course, wonder if I would have had an equally free and healthy attitude toward partnered sex had I not been so relentlessly propagandized against it beginning right around the middle of my high school years, and thoroughly "Vulcanized" even earlier in grade school.)

COLLEGE : A SLIGHT LOOSENING OF THE LEASH

Since I went to a local college and still lived at home, little changed after high school. Socializing was still limited to the campus lunch room, until one day I was finally given one small (though it didn't seem small to me) taste of freedom : A couple of hours on Saturday afternoons when I could drive into my small town on my own. Like any other teenager, I wanted to make the most of my freedom by seeking out a clandestine relationship, and though it never went anywhere affectionally due to us having nothing in common but our ages, and an equally (but not identically) antisexual upbringing, just the fact that I would have liked for it to have been more affectional shows that I hadn't been totally suppressed, and this was at least a chance to advance my social skills with the other gender slightly beyond where they'd been frozen since 1960 at the end of that last 8th grade dance. But EVERYTHING would change soon when I took advantage of an "escape clause."

ON THE CUSP OF LIBERATION

"Military life" and "liberation" may not seem like interchangeable terms, but for me they were. After the Draconian restrictions I'd grown up with, military service was a welcome adventure in newfound freedoms once I got sent to my first permanent duty station. And since my February 21, 1966 enlistment coincided almost exactly with the beginning of the American Sexual Revolution, this "harmonic convergence" of escaping from my antisexual environment at the same time that my generation was just beginning to challenge every rule and assumption we'd grown up with had incredible possibilities. Fortunately, I got some good advice before going off like a loose cannon into the delightfully anarchistic world of the late 60s.

GOOD THING THE PHASER WAS SET ON "STUN"

Just as I was thrashing around, trying to figure out a sexual value system to give me some idea of how to navigate this new world, I was blindsided and stunned by the most powerful and concentrated blast of pure Vulcan logic I've ever encountered in my life. Since it was from another member of the military, and not my mother, it wasn't part of her philosophy, and certainly didn't sound anything like it, so I was quite willing to listen. Forty-one years later, I still think it was the most profound observation ever made about the nature of sex, and I'm probably - though it's debatable - better off for having heard it.

Though I don't remember exactly what was said, nor the name of the speaker, in less than one minute, my entire attitude toward sexuality was set for life by the simple observation that people have a choice about what they want sexuality to be. It can be something very special and meaningful, or something very trivial. Since our attitudes toward ANYTHING are determined by our experiences, one way to make partnered sex as special and meaningful as possible is to associate it only with a very special person in a well-established, genuinely loving relationship, even if all that doesn't always come along conveniently early in life. (Yes, it's true that some people have the ability to shift from meaningless to meaningful sex whenever they change partners, but I'm highly doubtful that I ever would have had that kind of mental flexibility).

(continued...)

Now You can get all the girl on girl porn star action you have dreamt about ...

Video Secrets VIP membership - broadcasts exclusive and uncensored 3-hour events with the biggest names in adult entertainment. When the show is finished they add it to their archives where you can watch or download it anytime you want!!!!