Can we go back to the recycling,
for a minute? Because I think I need to understand it a little better. It was a
round trip of only forty feet. It took probably less than thirty seconds. Why
was it so terrifying? Why such a rush? And further, why should the rush come
from the potential for something I was so clearly afraid would actually happen?
I don’t get that kind of exhilaration from other kinds of risk. I’ve always
wanted to bungee jump and hang gliding or sky diving or other such dare devil
type activities sound like they’d probably be fun to me, but those ideas don’t
cause me any fear at all. I have no fear of my own death. Rationally, there’s
nothing about death to be afraid of because either there will be something else
I’ll be really surprised and curious to find out about, or there will simply be
no me to even know I’m dead, much less to feel scared. But take thirteen steps
outside my door naked (which I love to be), and I’m terrified. And I love it.
Those are two distinct facets of this little experiment. I think I have to
dissect them one at a time.
Start with the fear. It’s the same
fear from the steam room and the security guard at Target. It’s the same fear
as confessing to my husband that I somehow cheated at a sex game or that I
failed to complete an assignment. It’s not being able to see the riding crop
that I know is raised behind me. It’s the time he took the switch to me with no
warning or sexual advance. Understand that from time to time I desperately need
him to welt me into stripes that are visible for days afterwards, but I am not
a masochist. It’s not about the pain – I don’t even like pain that’s going to
leave more than a (gorgeous, delicious, unabashed) handprint. It’s about
letting go. It’s about giving over everything. It’s about reaching a point that
does not contain any will of my own. It is the emptying of myself. The release
of everything I’ve ever pretended to control. The thing I crave is the very undoing
of me. It is the profound act of submission. And when it comes, it comes with
fear and relief in equal parts. It brings me to tears, and it is my very
favorite emotion. Maybe that’s where the fear comes from: The lack of control.
Maybe that’s why I love it so much. Maybe that’s why I am incapable of not
confessing, when I’ve missed an assignment or reached an orgasm I wasn’t
supposed to. Maybe that’s why I want those marks that last for days and that I
cannot hide.
Not hiding. Maybe that’s what it is
about exhibitionism that leaves me helpless to stop doing it. Maybe, when you
strip it all down, that’s why I’m going to take the recycling out naked again,
tomorrow. That desire is the other point I’m examining here… I have a friend
who hasn’t worn underwear for years. (Stay with me, I’ll bring it back around.)
When I first moved somewhere hot, she guaranteed me that I would be the same
way in under a year. I tried it. Then I remembered why I can’t do that: It’s
messy for me. I always wondered how she could constantly go around without
panties to catch all the wetness she must be producing, assuming that she
worked the way I did. Then I didn’t think about it again for years. Then, after Naked Day, I realized the obvious: When I was wearing panties, it didn’t
happen. It was the lack of panties that was making me wet. It was like I was
secretly naked. After that I frequently went without. I can stare you in the
face and listen with seemingly flawless attention to whatever story you’re
telling me, while I’m actually shifting about ever so slightly, playing with
the slippery pussy that you cannot see. Still, it’s a hidden pleasure, and
therefore not at all frightening, and therefore not as effective as the ones
that you can see. It’s not an
exhibition. There are a lot of things I have to do in my day that I cannot do
naked. Losing the underwear helps, but for that reason, it’s not the same. So I
took off my bra. I lived for many, many years without even owning a bra, so
it’s not really a challenge in that way, but as I am discovering, even the
minor incarnations of exhibitionism (like taking out the recycling), are more
effective than none at all. I don’t want to make people uncomfortable, though.
I am myself made uncomfortable by any level of anxiety in others. The trick to
navigating that is to feign ignorance. The same way I give a thank you wave in
the rear view mirror to make people believe that I believe that they
intentionally let me merge in front of them, I put a second see-through shirt
on top of my first, so that I can pretend that I don’t know you can see my
nipples and every detail of my tattoo.
What does this say about me? I look
at the near-teenagers who go out in public with fluorescent, leopard print,
push-up bras showing through shirts that barely exist, and I cringe. Then I
have to try to curb my judgment; maybe they are just like me. Somehow though, I
don’t think it’s the same. I think they want men to see them and want them. (Is
it only straight girls who do this? I don’t know…) Regardless of sexual
orientation, their exhibitionism is (I think), exacted for the response they
get from the people who look. I’m not in it for any response I might get from
the people who look; I’m in it for my own response to them seeing. That is
different, but it might not be any less fucked up. Maybe it’s just as bad. Or
maybe it’s not. Maybe we are all
fucked up, and maybe, just maybe, that’s totally okay.
(Naked is a state of mind...)
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