My Secret Garden (Women Sexual Fantasies) (30 page)

Much of the material in this book came through this kind of setting up of associations, giving a woman not a direct request for a fantasy, but giving her an idea to get her started. For example, if I simply said to a woman, "Do you have sexual fantasies?" she would usually reply "I don’t know," or "What is a sexual fantasy?" or "No." But if I said, "I’ve found that most women’s sexual fantasies have this element of anonymity, that when she’s thinking about being fucked by another man, or men, that they’re faceless, or strangers …" then the dialogue is on between me and the woman, between her and her own imagery. She has a recognizable starting point from which to take off. I don’t know 226

whether this freedom of the imagination takes place because mentioning other women’s fantasies has set up a kind of competition, or because that mention freed my interviewee from isolation and guilt, or whether it was only because her up to now dormant sexual imagination simply needed that association as a springboard. I think all three contribute.

But I bring it up now, this power that association has in getting women to reveal their fantasies, because in using it as a method of collecting material, I gathered more information than I expected, in particular on the subject of where women get the ideas for their fantasies. And what especially interested me was how often these ideas had a visual basis.

I had sent a letter to several magazines describing my research and inviting contributions. Knowing how much more responsive women were if the subject was discussed as normal rather than extraordinary, and given a little personal background, I described sexual fantasies as images that could occur anywhere – during sex, while driving to work, or just walking down the street, parenthetically adding that in my own strolls, I was an inveterate crotch watcher. Not only did I look at men’s provocative fronts –as automatically as men look at mine – but I also imagined, en passant, the arrangement, the shape of what lay beneath. All very natural, I made it sound…as I think it is. No matter what else the women who replied to that article said about themselves and their fantasies, they almost all remarked on the crotch-watching: They all look. Maybe not at men’s flies (though most do), maybe not even at men, but they admitted with conspiratorial glee –whatever it was they looked at, it didn’t stop there. The looking was only the beginning of the wondering, the imagining and, yes

“now that you mention it” – the fantasy.

My own feelings about women’s sexuality have changed since I began researching this book. I always expected that women were far more adventurous in sex than men gave them credit for; that with the right man a woman would be game for anything.

227

Now I’ve come to believe that women aren’t just willing followers in sex, but given just a word, the right "starting off"

association, women can be sexually original, can be an as-yet-untapped source of new sexual ideas and fun. I think women are sexually stimulated by many things; they simply aren’t used to responding outwardly. But give them a clue they can relate to without guilt, get them started with an encouraging word and, as I said earlier, I think women are ready and willing to write a whole new chapter in a book that’s been accepted as closed. Think about it: it usually takes two sexes for sex, but after all these years of going at it we’ve still only beard from one. Ever since Adam, men have rolled over onto their side of the bed, lit a cigarette, and asked, "What were you thinking about?" And the woman has answered, "Nothing." Or the more outspoken, "You."

How can men have really believed them all this time?

For instance, men (and their tailors) may think women look at them admiringly because of the cut of their suits, much as they would look at a fashion photo on the men’s page, or that sane suit on a coat hanger. And if a girl is asked directly, she will often reply something like, "I was just thinking how nice you look in gray." But in actuality, the stories women have told me indicate that when a woman looks at a man, she’s seeing and wondering many things.

Fay

When I walk down the street I constantly watch crotches. I try to imagine what the penises are like. I am especially turned on when a man’s balls bulge through hiss pants. Often I am tempted to walk up to him, right there on the street, unzip his fly and feel his balls. [Letter]

228

Sukie

Looking at men, front and back, is a favorite pastime. I like to study the shapes of their asses and wonder how they use them when thrusting into a woman, or I wonder what it would be like to penetrate their anuses with a dildo. [Letter]

Constance

My husband has sort of turned me into a fly-watcher, too. He has been insisting for so long that his penis is too small (he is always measuring it when it is erect) that he has made me curious about other men’s dimensions. He has even made me a little curious about his suggestion that I might be able to have more orgasms if I had sex with a man who had a larger penis than he does. So I find myself watching for crotches that indicate there might be something fairly large hidden within. [Letter]

Deana

My mind doesn’t even rest when I’m outside the bedroom, as I am continually stealing looks at men, at their private areas. With trousers as tight as they are nowadays, it’s not difficult to determine just what lies under those promising bulges. At least one can dream about it and try to imagine what sort of lover a man would make, what size he really is, etc. What I mean is, I think so many men arrange themselves down there in such a way that it’s hard to tell whether everything’s been sort of piled on top of itself, giving a vast pyramid effect, or whether he’s for real. I think it’s nice that men have entered the "Hey, look at me" arena where women have been parading for years. Now, while men continue to look at braless breasts under sweaters, or big bottoms under tight skirts, we women have something to look at as well. I often wonder why men stayed in those big, old-fashioned, 229

shapeless trousers for so long. Don’t they want us to look?

[Letter]

Anna

I’m amused to see that your habit of being an "incurable fly-watcher" applies to me, also. Sometimes it can even be a little fun when you suddenly realize that the guy is watching youl Of course this all depends on who it is. I think it excites a man for him to think that you’re interested in what he looks like under his clothes. [Letter]

Vera

I, too, am a "crotch-watcher." I can’t help imagining the exact shape and size of a man "there" when I look at him, and I invariably compare him to my fiance. [Letter]

Una

I myself am so unconscious of looking at men, of glancing at their crotches as they approach me on the street, that I can be thinking of what to buy for dinner while my mind is speculating on just what a guy has done to himself to achieve a particularly interesting arrangement of his genitalia. They can get the most remarkable effects! In fact, my husband says that I notice on which side a man dresses before I’ve even shaken hands.

A funny thing happened to me one day as I was hurrying home from work, thinking about God knows what, but also checking out the oncoming stream of men hurrying home. I suppose I wasn’t even aware of how intently I stared at one particular man’s well-fitting trousers until just as we passed – tweak! – he reached out and tweaked my nipple! Just like that, on Fifth Avenue! I was stunned. I stopped, turned around with my mouth 230

gaping open, watching him disappear…and then I laughed. What else could I do? [Letter]

Lois

I love seeing the bulge beneath a boy’s tight jeans and imagining what is underneath. I long to know whether he might or might not be circumcised. I have always preferred uncircumcised boys. [Letter]

Liz

I am also an incurable fly-watcher, and also a bottomwatcher, imagining the reality beneath the clothing. I also have an almost irresistible urge to run my fingers through a man’s hair when it is well cut, reasonably long, and looks clean and soft.

I find men’s naked bodies very exciting (and often wish there was the equivalent of "girlie" magazines for us women). [Letter]

Winona

Sometimes when I have been on a train or a bus I have found myself looking at men’s trousers to see if I can trace the shape and size of the penis. Sometimes I have noticed a penis stiffen when the man has looked at my breasts or when he tries to get a glimpse of my thighs and then it excites me to think that I am the cause of his erection. [Letter]

Rudy

I do daydream a bit; if I have heard that a boy is particularly large, or good in bed, or something, then when I see him I 231

undress him mentally, wondering what he locks like naked.

[Letter]

Gale

I really do enjoy just looking at men. Any time I can catch a glimpse of a man’s crotch I do; why shouldn’t a girl like to see a crotch that’s filled well and shows its shape through the trousers?

It turns me on, just as watching my husband turns me on. [Letter]

Imogene

Although my husband knows I’ve always been faithful to him, I don’t think he realizes how much I enjoy looking at other men. I do it all the time; most of the time I am almost unaware that I am looking at a man’s crotch. If I see a man with a large bulge in his crotch, I just tend to stare. It is an eye-catcher. [Letter]

Francine

Of course I Look at men. We’re supposed to, aren’t we? Why else would they squeeze themselves into tight trousers that stretch so smoothly across the front…except where they don’t? But it’s certainly a young man’s game. I mean, what girl looks at an old guy in a pair of baggy trousers full of pleats and folds, just a lot of gathers hanging from the waist? It’s as though they were ashamed, like women who wear dresses one size too large.

You’d think they’d catch on, wouldn’t you? After all, we all want to be noticed, right? [Letter]

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April

I wasn’t aware I looked until you asked. Sure I do, but as I’ve never talked to anyone about it, I guess I just wasn’t aware, consciously, of how I checked a man out…down below. I sort of do it like a CIA agent: The eye goes blink, the man’s vital statistics are recorded on my inner brain, and then the information is just stashed away. What a waste! I’ll have to stop being so secretive with myself about all this now that we no longer live in the Dark Ages. [Letter]

Myrna

Naturally I look. Doesn’t everyone? But I’m very canny about it. You see, I have this wandering eye – an eye that
really
wanders due to poor muscular control. What I do is focus my good eye on something or someone legit, then I half-mast my eyes in this seductive, lowered-lidded manner I’ve developed, and then my wandering eye "looks." I really dig looking at men.

Even when I was in school I was very aware of how a guy’s pants fitted him, the way they’d hang low on his hips, the tight fit across the ass. I’ve always felt very sorry for guys who don’t have an ass, just the way I guess guys feel sorry about poor flat-chested girls. [Letter]

Laurie

When I see an attractive guy, I find myself imagining what his penis is like. I see it in my mind as I’m sitting there talking to him, or when I think about him I see his penis erect. I imagine my hand on it, I imagine it touching me, I see every little groove and detail of it enlarged in great erection. I can even feel the heat of it in my hand or in me. [Letter]

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Jeanie

I have developed an unusual fascination about men’s buttocks.

When I see an attractive man from the back, and he is wearing close-fitting pants, I often try to imagine what his buttocks would look like with his pants off. Sometimes, I even try to imagine what it would be like if he were bent over my lap and I were spanking his bare buttocks. To a much
lesser
degree, if I see an attractive man from the front, and he is wearing closefitting pants, I try to guess whether his penis is larger, smaller, or the same size as my husband’s. [Letter]

SEEING AND READING

I know popular theory has it that women are not as sexually aroused by what they see and read as men. Men are supposed to have this trigger response to the sight of a . breast or a bottom; whole segments of our economy depend on it. Whereas women, they say, feel nothing at the sight of a cock, except perhaps a sense of embarrassed amusement, or even distaste. Several years ago, the essential humor of a successful Broadway play (
You
Know I Can’t Hear You When the Water’s Running
) depended on this idea. On the other hand, some people will concede that the
erect
cock does
arouse some women…but even there the debate goes on.

Certainly if it were reduced to a contest of
who
responds quickest to what, men would have the edge on women. Their minds have been freer since childhood to respond to just the outline of a breast, the mention of a word, the scent of a woman; they were even encouraged, in this way, to be "little men." But women…In the girl’s school where I went, there was a pale gay fig leaf even on the dark bronze reproduction of Michelangelo’s David (thought to have been added by the spinster librarian). It 234

was years before I got my first really good look at a really good picture of a cock. And let no male expert tell me I wasn’t stimulated. Even if I’d still not seen an erect one, my child’s imagination graphically made up for what was missing, raising that cock to uneasily exciting (if anatomically incorrect) erect proportions. By the time I’d grown up, there still wasn’t (and isn’t) a garden of sexual stimuli for women in the world around us; but to go so far as to say that a grown woman – a woman who’s not only seen but caused a few erections – requires the already erect cock, the male sex symbol in full totality before she can feel anything…it’s ludicrous. Who more than a woman should feel aroused at the sight of a limp cock, at the provocative thought of what she might do to it?

It’s exactly because a woman has been taught not to look, and has been deprived of real outlets for what real visual and verbal stimuli there are, that she’s more talented than anyone at` making pictures do for the real thing in short, it’s why she’s so good at fantasizing.