I had vanilla sex last night. By vanilla, I mean that (although my lover and I are both whole-hearted perverts) we had sex that had in it no particular element of power exchange, overwhelming sensation, role-play, physical constraint, leather, or costuming. We rolled around laughing. We were naked. We got our fingers wet all the way up to the wrists. We kissed madly, looked tenderly into each other’s eyes and fucked like bunnies. Like vanilla bunnies. Although I may have scratched her back some. And, okay, maybe she asked me if she could cum-the exact details become fuzzy after a certain point. But that’s it for perverted activities, I swear it.
Afterwards, in afterglow, we were almost apologetic.
“Uh, hey, that was great, even though…”
“I liked it! Um. We sure don’t do that often…”
It made me think, some. Am I seriously afraid the imaginary Kink Police will leap out from under the bed?
“Ah-ha!” they’ll shout, “Why didn’t you spank her first? You call yourself a leather dyke? You gotta follow the rules, girlie.”
If not that, then what? Perhaps I’m not secure in my perversion. Or maybe I’ve had too many strange reactions from some of the exceedingly kinky folks I know, when I speak of having occasional good vanilla sex. It’s as if I’m backsliding from my chosen orientation, and next thing they’ll see me featured in one of those odd Ex-Gay ads.
“Yeah, God made it possible to put all this dark perversion and sin behind me. I’m moving toward the light. I am now vanilla,” I’ll say.
Uh huh. Right.
Upon further introspection, I have to confess that I’m not much for following convention, and if I had wanted to have rules of sexual conduct dictated to me, I would have bloody well grown up to be the nice li’l straight woman my parents tried to raise me to be.
I’ve spent a lot of time arguing my right to have sex as queerly, as kinkily as I want it. I want to be free to tie her to the wall and flog her until she’s limp and smiling. I want to be free to dress as a pirate and fuck her at cutlass-point if she agrees that might be fun.
But I see now that it’s more than that. What I really want is to play in the full range of our sexual expertise and desires-that it’s about doing as I wish with other like-minded grown-up women, not picking yet another (albeit wildly exciting) metaphorical box to jam myself into.
Vanilla, after all, is just one of the 356 flavours.
* Elaine Miller is offering kink workshops, demos and seminars with Silva Tenenbein. Details at tenenbein.com or 604.253.2850.
Why you can trust Xtra
