I’m a 24-year-old woman who just ended a five-year relationship. It sucked. I cried. It was my first breakup, so I’ve felt totally insane for the last three months. Now I’m in the dating world, and I go out with people only to find that we have no physical chemistry. My mother says, “You’re just picky.” How am I supposed to enter my slutty years if I rarely have a physical connection with someone? I’m starting to think I’m broken; the last few years, I’ve felt pretty cut off from my sexuality. I feel like I formed some sort of sexual block. Is there a pill for this? How do I break the dam?
Bring Lass Overtly Clearer Knowledge
Here’s how you break the dam: You get high, you consume porn (text or vid), and you read Daniel Bergner’s book What Do Women Want? Adventures in the Science of Female Desire. (“It should be read by every woman on earth,” Tracy Clark-Flory of Salon writes. “You want a female Viagra? This book is as close as we have to it.”) Don’t do all three at once, of course, lest you grind the gears off your sex gaskets. But do all three, over a long weekend, and try to relax and listen to your body and allow your erotic imagination to speak to you.
And give yourself a break, BLOCK. Some folks need more than three months to bounce back after ending a five-year relationship. Don’t force yourself to date right now if you’re not ready. Get high instead, read Bergner, and take in some erotica. And when you are ready to enter your slutty phase, BLOCK, hang on to your pickiness. In my experience — ahem — picky people are likelier to enjoy their slutty phases and likelier to survive them.
I have some friends in the Pacific Northwest. They told me that they sometimes go “clam digging” for their dinner. This phrase has to have a filthy double meaning. It HAS to! But Urban Dictionary had nothin’. Any ideas?
Curious Lad Asking Master Savage
A filthy double meaning did leap instantly to mind, CLAMS, but it involves so unspeakable a violation that squeamish and/or sensitive readers might wanna skip to the next letter (or read some other advice column). Here goes: “Clam digging” is something you can find necrophiliacs who are into chicks doing with shovels in graveyards in the middle of the night. Moving on …
I’m a gay man in my mid-20s with an etiquette question. I recently met a crazy-hot guy on an online dating site who seems like a great match: tons of common interests, similar sense of humor, shared life goals. The one thing that has kept me from meeting him: He does porn. He doesn’t acknowledge that he does porn on his profile, but I recognized him. I am “familiar” with his work. I don’t mind that he does porn, but I am at a loss for how to broach the subject. I’m worried that if I let on that I recognize him from his work, he might think I’m some crazy stalker. But I also worry that if I play dumb and we do hit it off, it could blow up in my face down the road. What’s the most graceful way to handle this?
Pondering Online Romance Netiquette
Here’s how you handle it: You assume he’s not an idiot. A porn star on a gay dating site figures that most of the other guys on the site will be “familiar” with his work. So there’s no need to broach the porn subject, as he most likely assumes you already knows. Don’t stress about it. If you want to ask him out, ask him out. When he mentions his work, tell him you know his work and you’ve enjoyed it, and let him steer the conversation from there. If he wants to hear about your favorite films, scenes, come shots, etc., he’ll ask.
I am a longtime reader of your column. Now that the United States Supreme Court has struck down the Defense of Marriage Act and California’s Proposition 8 — struck ’em both down good! — what do you say to people who still think gay marriage should be illegal?
Congrats To You
“You lost; love won. You can get over it and come to the wedding and have some cake or you can fuck the fuck off. Your choice.”
This article appears in Jul 4-10, 2013.