Playboys at the Corner Deli : a masturbation story
White Lines by Sonia
A Masturbation story
I don’t remember having much association with my genitalia when I was young. My most solid memory dates back to being ten years old when my grandparents owned a corner deli and lived out the back.
My grandparents and I formed a special connection from the moment I was born. I would spend a lot of time at the corner deli. I’d stay overnight, get up early and help them in the shop pack the lolly bags (you know when you could still buy 50c bags from your local deli filled with teeth, milk bottles and caramel buttons).
A bounty of chocolate, ice creams, crisp packets, cold drinks and magazines surrounded me. I knew where everything was in the shop, and I would sit up on a stool behind the counter, watching all the colourful characters waft in and out whilst restocking gum packets. Some paid for things; others didn’t.
I found it most interesting watching men awkwardly linger around the Playboy section; of course, I’d only ever glanced at the glossy covers, never having the nerve to reach across and grab one from its plastic sleeve.
One weekend on a hectic lunch rush in the shop, I’d been ushered out the back to amuse myself. Not knowing what to do, I began to snoop around. My grandparents would leave stacks of unsold magazines in piles near all the empty crates and boxes.
It was there that I noticed them – a stack of Playboys piled on top of each other with the plastic ripped open and the top of the front cover ripped off. It felt like they were calling me, “Come play!” So I took one, and plopped myself on the floor, feeling fairly confident my grandparents would be too busy buttering buns and taking cash to worry about me.
As I flicked through the glossy pages, I could feel the blood rushing through my body. Something was happening to me, and it felt good. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. These older, sexy women with beautiful curves contorting their bodies and doing things that were turning me on. I admired their full breasts, the way they were touching themselves and looking at me.
I got an incredible urge to explore my own naked body, so much so that I laid down on the dusty floor on my stomach with my chin resting on one of the pages and, putting my hands in my pants, started to rub myself. I was flushed and excited, and then suddenly, I was staring at a pair of scuffed shoes and hearing a thundering “What are you doing?!?!”
My grandmother was standing there, her voice and face flush with a cocktail of shock, anger and embarrassment. She grabbed the magazine off me, yelled at my grandfather about putting the “dirty” magazines away and walked off. Just like that, my excitement and curiosity turned into an overwhelming sense of guilt. I had been caught masturbating and masturbating to women (the jackpot for my conservative grandmother).
Not another word was spoken about it. My dear grandmother would not have known what to tell my mum, and she is of the generation where things are swept away quietly, not confronted. I remember that I couldn't remove my embarrassment and guilt. I would have cried quietly alone and probably dreaded going back to the shop.
I see this incident as a defining moment, for it made me feel incredibly ashamed of masturbation, as if I were doing something bad, but now I look back on that occasion and see that what I was doing, simply exploring my body, was very natural.
I don’t blame my grandmother for her reaction; I think even more liberal folk would react with the same knee-jerk explosion today, but these early experiences around sex frame what we believe to be right and wrong, moral and immoral.
They set the tone of expectation around what is deemed acceptable and unacceptable, about what makes us a “tart” and “a good girl”. We aren’t told that even though it might be uncomfortable for parents to witness us exploring our bodies, it is still a natural part of life. Instead, we’re told that our exploration and discovery of our sexual self is dirty, nasty, wrong, unacceptable, immoral, disgusting, and rude.
I didn’t stop masturbating of course, because it felt good. Still it was something I never felt comfortable discussing in my conservative family, nor was it something that seemed appropriate to talk about amongst friends at my private girls’ school.
Fast forward to now, most of my family and all my friends are aware of my willingness and passion for opening the discussion around sex, but having done a quick mental recollection of the many talks I’ve had with them all; I realise that masturbation is still something that many feel incredibly uncomfortable about.
With or without Playboys, I'm going to keep masturbating. It's completely healthy, normal and pretty goddam satisfying, don’t ya think? Happy Masturbation May to you all!
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