Sunday, March 6, 2011

Hey-Hey

Don't I have a sweet pussy?

Yes, welcome to Euphemism Week here at Word-Whores.

My hair-dresser when I was a child told me a story once. He was a Brit and decidedly hetero - with a wife and daughter and lots of flirt for my mom. His nickname back in London had been "Puss," because of this pair of tall leather boots he wore. Hey it was the 70s. So his buddies dubbed him Puss in Boots, then just Puss, and he went by the name until he moved to the US and discovered that no man here goes around voluntarily called Puss.

One man's friendly nickname is another's humiliating euphemism.

I'm not really much of one for euphemisms for the naughty bits. It always strikes me as kind of heh-heh-heh humor that accompanies embarrassed wriggling and red faces. Nor am I much into naming body parts like some are. A friend of mine referred to her breasts as "blossoms," and I could never quite stop myself from rolling my eyes at that one. Never mind my friend who named her vagina "Sheila."

No. I don't know why.

I suspect distaste comes from my two faces: both the scientist and the lover of words. I like knowing the right word and using it. I have never found that there's any reason to dance around the proper names. I would not have done well in a society where "legs" was shunned as too personal and replaced with "limbs."

In college, I spent several years as a peer counselor. We spent something like eight Saturdays in a row, training to handle various issues. On sex day, we devoted four blackboards to listing words for female parts, male parts, intercourse and masturbation. This exercise served as an ice-breaker for the day, because by the time we were done brainstorming, there were no taboo words left. Everyone got the squirming and giggling out of their systems and were ready to talk about real issues.

But the most instructive part was how many terms reflected the male point of view. Inevitably each year, some trainee would notice this and point it out. Even the names for female parts are ones the guys use more. It becomes dramatically apparent with female masturbation: the boys aren't all that interested in our she-bop and the girls, curiously enough, just don't talk about it that much.

Go ahead, take a minute to think of some.

See?

At any rate, this becomes an interesting task for the female writer of sex scenes. There are a lot of euphemisms that dramatically fail to be sensual or romantic at all. Playing with taboo words can be fun and release a charge, but if the reader isn't completely on board, that can create the opposite effect. So writers often come up with new analogies. Sometimes they work and sometimes they don't. I won't mention any now, because I'm sure my sister-whores have worked up a whole arsenal to share with you.

Once, listening to Loveline on a late-night drive through Wyoming, I heard a girl refer to her "hey-hey." That one cracked me up. She was young, too, right at that teen age where a boy touched her where no one had and she liked it, but had many questions.

I like that one because it can go either way - a caution or a pleased encouragement.

Just wait until I trim all the mats off my cat. I'll tell you about my shaved pussy.

14 comments:

  1. Oh, what a lovely pussy it is, too! This post totally cracked me up. As much as I would like to say I have "worked up a whole aresenal" that is just not the case. My sex scenes tend not to be explicit and I skate by without calling in too many creative euphemisms. This is, perhaps, a weakness that should be remedied. I await the wisdom of my word whore sisters.

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  2. Gods, I hate it when the pussy has mats! It's so very hard to run your fingers through it, and you never know what you'll find underneath.

    ~snicker~

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  3. KAK - not exactly the wisdom I was hoping for, but it did make me spew coffee.

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  4. hey-hey - you gotta take the wisdom where you can get it!

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  5. I accept your challenge!

    - Tiptoe through the TwoLips
    - Tossing the pink salad
    - Shebopping
    - The ole feel n' squeal
    - Stirring the honey pot
    - Shucking the fresh water clam
    - The two-fingered tango
    - Slapping slit
    - To tease the tuna taco
    - Spanking your puppy on the nose
    - tickling the kitty
    - Slapping Susie
    - Working out at the Y

    I could do this all day; then again, I work at a sex shop, it's my job to know such things :p

    Great post though! Love the blog.

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  6. Okay, Brad - I totally bow to your FAR superior knowledge!

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  7. Don't have much to add, except that I'm terribly impressed with Brad's knowledge. ;)

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  8. OMG. I wonder if I can sneak the phrase "tease the tuna taco" past an editor. Now, I want to try...

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  9. I think we should all pick a phrase to try to sneak past an editor. Word Whore Challenge!

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  10. It's odd, but I do that. Sort of my own private "Where's Waldo" amusement.

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  11. This was hilarious. Hey-hey! And I echo Linda G--I think "shucking the freshwater clam" might be my favorite.

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  12. *snerk*

    My fav line for a guy jerking off is "white water wristing" (which I know isn't what you asked for. LOL.

    Female? Playing the clitar, of course. ;-)

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  13. Love it, Allison! Laura - so what IS the magic phrase??

    Nice, AJ - we expect you to use that in a sentence at least once a day! ;-)

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