This is a response to Grace O’Neill’s blog “The ‘O’ Factor”

Dear Reader,

This is your orgasm speaking. You’re making things difficult for me. If you are worried about qualifying/clarifying/calling your erotic experiences by some name, you are MISSING THE POINT. What then, you may ask, is the point? ME! It’s all about ME! I am the motherfucking point of gay sex! Sheesh! Listen up lesbos. You are in the best possible position to pull me out of my hiding place. You needn’t worry about patriarchal oppression, nay! You needn’t worry about impending pregnancy, nein! And ninety-seven percent of you needn’t worry about HIV, non! Worry, should not even be in your lascivious vocabularies! Worry is my arch nemesis! Please, abort your anxieties, discontinue your discomforts, and quiet your concerns. Stop classifying the acts aimed at attaining me in some overzealous effort to exert control over the powers far greater than your brains, the powers only I contain! Please, dear readers, heed the words of Frankie Goes to Hollywood: Relax, don’t do it, when you wanna CUM!!!!

All the best,
“O”

I can’t help but wonder if our persistent, insistent desire to delineate/define/describe the Deed comes from some deep-seeded insecurity about the sex we have and how it compares to the more easily defined straight experience, or other seemingly certain lesbians’ experiences in the sack. Allow me to offer absolution. It’s okay to be unsure of these things. If a straight girl had a man inside of her, she’s going to have a hard time denying that she had “sex.” And there are (unfortunately) some very literal lesbians out there who feel the need to mimic that act with a plastic (or silicon, rubber, glass, titanium…etc.) appendage in order to declare their intimate act by that same name. But even within these parameters, there lies a grey area…or could I say “gay” area? I know straight girls who played “just the tip” long before they really considered themselves non-virgins. And I know plenty of people who would consider sex with a synthetic phallus akin to an “Italian” meal of Chef Boyardee. The point is, there is no point in labeling your grown-up fun time. It tends to take some of the fun out of it.

I think perhaps people of all shapes and sizes, sexualities and circumstances are insecure about the sex they’re having—probably because we don’t possess the proper composition to accurately account for the anatomical/emotional experience itself. After all, some of us are ladies (and a lady doesn’t speak of such things); some of us are gentlemen (and a gentleman certainly doesn’t shag and tell); and some of us are just plain inarticulate. Unless you’ve written for Michael Patrick King (Sex & the City), you’re probably not used to spelling out sexual encounters in terms that are suitable for drinks at Sushi Samba. And, if you haven’t had the good fortune of spending a lot of time with drunken gay men, perhaps you’re still a bit bashful when it comes to giving the blow-by-blow (forgive the pun…on second thought, celebrate it—it’s a good one). The point is, because of the secrecy—and perhaps (more accurately) the privacy—with which this topic is regarded, there is a great deal of mystery surrounding sex. As a result, we’re left questioning ourselves and tirelessly discussing the definition with each other.

This three-letter word has inspired volumes of verbiage to no conclusive end. Truthfully (and especially for the gays—mostly because there isn’t much in the way of documented precedent), there is no reasonable meaning of the word “sex.” The solution: Make it up. If you want to call it sex, do so; you have Grace Lightning’s blessing. If you don’t want it to count, don’t count it. It’s your life, your body, your choice. And (contrary to common belief), you’re allowed to say, “I had sex with her,” even if she didn’t have sex with you—and vice versa. The same way the you could go on a date with someone who didn’t consider it a date, you could have sex with someone who didn’t consider it sex. Sex does not have a one-size-fits-all definition. It does not have a mathematical answer. No one is going to audit your evening (or afternoon…or morning for that matter) with a calculator and tell you the correct answer…unless of course those numbers are 60+9…sorry, couldn’t resist the math-joke. So have fun, have sex, and for goodness sake, have a sense of humor. Orgasms for everyone!