By Paige Montes
As a kid, I was a different kind of triple threat: imaginative, inquisitive, and incessant. At eight years old, I successfully badgered my way into receiving a full-fledged sex talk. Fortunately, my mother worked at Planned Parenthood. She passed on her knowledge with detailed diagrams, anatomically correct language, and an open mind. But notions of pleasure were still largely lacking from the conversation. And at this point, I was already three years into my eight-year stint at Catholic school. Shame and curiosity pulled me in opposite directions for most of my adolescence.
On the recess yard—AKA the church parking lot—boys would recount the lewd antics they witnessed in porn. Cheerleaders gone wild. Slutty step-moms. A girl pulling a fruit rollup out of her WHAT?! I was simultaneously intrigued and disgusted. Porn was perverted. Masturbation was for boys. But that didn’t mean I wasn’t a hormone-gushing horndog, too.
Under the cover of night and, quite literally, my sheets, pre-teen me would circle my thumb over my clit through my pajamas. Eyes shut. Ears open. Legs zipped tight. Pleasure steeped in paranoia. I was certain my parents could sense I was up to something through our shared wall. But fantasy took me where I secretly longed to go. And, oh, how innocent my imagination once was.
I dreamt of crooners in suits sweeping me off my feet. The musical Newsies starring young Christian Bale left me lusting after young lads in suspenders. The very horny Phantom of the Opera, which I vaguely remember seeing in movie theatres, gave me plenty of fodder, too. So straight yet so very queer. Even if I wanted to slink around the sleazier side of the aughts Internet, I wouldn’t dare.
In fact, Googling “do girls masturbate?” alone seemed a huge risk. Clearing my history won’t cut it, I thought. Cookies, caches, and Incognito mode meant nothing to me then either. All I knew was my parents swore up and down that any funny business online could be seen by my father’s employers. Salacious searches would surely cause a virus to infiltrate his company’s intranet. My dirty mind could cost my father his job!
I wouldn’t discover my female friends were also doing the deed until at least my sophomore year of public high school. (Thank ripped Jesus my family couldn’t afford further parochial education.) At age 16 or so, I lost my virginity to my steady boyfriend. Did the idea of pregnancy and STIs frighten me? Big time. But the Catholic guilt just wasn’t present like it was with touching myself. Sex with a partner proved somehow…less embarrassing. Maybe because we’re also taught masturbation is for lonely losers. Later at Temple University, I went through my queer awakening. Suddenly, the trepidations that come with being a baby gay trumped all else. That was seven years ago now.
These days, I enjoy sex with the partner I plan to marry. However, I still turn to my imagination—or should I say turn on. Not because of limited smut access or ignorance, but because it’s fun. It’s free. It’s ethical. Not to mention relaxing—especially before falling asleep if you want to avoid screens. I can get down solo to any steamy scenario my heart and nether bits desire (more often than not, these stories involve fictional crushes). And I love it. My imagination is unlimited, and so is my wank bank.