TABLE OF CONTENTS

But First This Word from Our Author

Evelyn

Christie and Vernon

Frank

Marv

Kate

Letters, Letters, Letters

Erica

Paul

Alvin

“Dear Mr. Wells . . .”

About the Author

Excerpt: Versatile Ladies

SEX WITHOUT STRINGS

JOHN WARREN WELLS

LAWRENCE BLOCK

copyright © 1974, 2012, Lawrence Block

All Rights Reserved

BUT FIRST THIS WORD FROM OUR AUTHOR

In the following pages you will make the acquaintance of the following people:

Evelyn, a divorcée, whose husband introduced her to swinging, and who is still swinging although she’s shed her husband . . .

Christie and Vernon, who like to bring home an extra man now and then . . .

Frank, a retired doctor who has made a permanent house call upon a young married couple . . .

Marv, a man who has managed to swing even though his wife isn’t interested . . .

Kate and Bob, who arrange threesomes with other couples in a most unorthodox way . . .

Jean-Paul, a model husband at home, but a practicing sadist away from it . . .

Lew, a uniquely gifted sexual con man . . .

Erica, a bisexual who swings on a never-ending pendulum from man to woman and back again . . .

Paul, who has found paradise by encouraging women to divulge their favorite fantasies . . .

And a couple more.

•  •  •

What do all these people have in common? (Aside from the fact that they’re all in the same book, that is.)

All of them touch in one way or another upon a subject I had the devil’s own time finding a title for. They are swingers, involved in casual sexual relationships for recreational purposes, and yet they are not in the traditional mold of couples meeting with other couples. They are people without mates, or people swinging without mates, or are sexually involved with such people, or—

It’s somehow more complicated to write this silly introduction than it was to write the book. Anyway, you get the idea. It’s not a book about single swingers, because that term usually means nothing more than unmarried individuals who have a rather relaxed attitude toward sex. And, title notwithstanding, these folk are not solitary swingers in the sense of swinging by themselves, all alone in a room somewhere.

Enough!

Enough, in fact, of this introduction. I’d far rather let the subjects of these chapters have a word with you than stand around in the way.

EVELYN

Evelyn is a petite woman, her small, heart-shaped face framed by a mane of straight red-brown hair. Her waist is small, her hips trim, and her breasts quite large in relation to the rest of her. At first glance she looks no more than half her age, which is thirty-five. She dresses young, and although lines at the corners of her eyes and around her mouth spoil the illusion at close inspection, the result is not garish or unbecoming; her facial features and body type are definitely of the Pepsi generation.

She was divorced about three years ago. She lives now in a small, modern house in a suburb of Pittsburgh with her two children, boys eight and ten years old. Shortly after her divorce she resumed working, and is presently employed as Gal Friday at a one-man travel agency. While her duties are largely clerical, she is learning the business and anticipates becoming a full-fledged travel agent before long, either as an associate of her present employer or by switching jobs.

Evelyn is that much-sought commodity in the swinging world, the single female swinger. Single women, whether heterosexual or bisexual, are far more in demand than in supply. While single men have a difficult time of things, single women suffer from an embarrassment of riches. Evelyn can have as much sex as she wants, and could do so even if her appetite were on a par with that of Catherine the Great.

Which is by no means the case. Although Evelyn’s past experiences have ranged reasonably far and wide, her sexual preferences have narrowed of late. She no longer cares for parties or crowd scenes, and is at the point where she can envision herself marrying again.

But let’s let her tell it.

•  •  •

My husband and I got into swinging a little over two years before we were divorced. I suppose that without stretching a point you could say that we went into it in an attempt to save our marriage. We never said it aloud in those terms, but I guess that was at the root of what we were thinking. I know it was in my thoughts, certainly. That may have been an attempt on my part to rationalize what I was doing. I had a lot of inhibitions to overcome, and when we first got into it I had to give myself a noble reason for my acts. I couldn’t face up to myself and say I was balling these strangers for the hell of it.

The whole thing was basically Stan’s idea. He talked me into it. He gave me the usual arguments that this was a way to eliminate sexual jealousy, that it satisfied a natural need for variety without disturbing the foundations of a marriage, the usual line of talk. I know that our own sexual relationship was getting stale. We very infrequently made love, and it was just not all that exciting for us when we did.

I can more easily recognize now that the monotony of our sexual relationship was just an echo of the general feeling we had for each other. Stan and I were bored with each other after the first few years of marriage. We were a mismatch from the beginning. I had more education than he did and was interested in more intellectual things. I don’t mean I spent every night at libraries and concerts and museums. But I like to read, and Stan would say that he hadn’t read a book since school, and he’d say it proudly. We bored each other, and I think it was inevitable that this boredom would carry over into the bedroom. No matter what sort of physical innovations you try, you can’t find people sexually exciting night after night unless you continue to find them emotionally and intellectually exciting as well.

I let myself be talked into it without too much trouble. I think that once it was clear to me that Stan didn’t secretly want me to refuse him, that he would respect me just as much or more if I went along with it, my objections melted away about then.

Not that I stopped being nervous about it!

Our first time was a good example of the wrong way to go about it. Stan had picked up copies of various swinger magazines and we had read through them together, but at the time I was really apprehensive about contacting anyone through the mail. It seemed like a terrible way to go about things, and I suppose in many respects it is, if you don’t know what you’re doing, but our way was worse.

There was this fellow Stan knew at the plant, a guy named Roy. We had seen him and his wife, Judy, a couple of times, one couple going to the other’s house for drinks, and I think we were at a party with them once. So I knew them, but not well by any means. Anyway, Stan and Roy had a few beers after work one night and got to talking, and it turned out that Roy and Judy were also interested in swinging, and were also unsure about how to make contacts, and had had no experience with it either.

So we all got together.

I would say that it would have been better if they had been either very close friends or complete strangers, and it certainly would have helped if one couple had been experienced. As it was, the anxiety in that room was so thick you could have cut it with a knife and spread it on toast. You know how there are times when people are nervous and they try to cover it by making stupid little jokes? The four of us were so nervous that we didn’t make those stupid little jokes.

We spent the first half hour or so pretending we were having a pleasant social evening, and then we spent the next two hours talking very earnestly about the merits of what we were about to do, as if it was all going to be some deep religious experience instead of the simple business of fucking each other’s mates. We all drank more than was a particularly good idea. The vibrations in the room were not the best. Roy had a very obvious letch for me, which would have been more exciting if I’d had the slightest interest in him. But if I wanted to go to bed with a big Polack steelworker, I could go to bed with my own husband. Stan seemed to be attracted to Judy, though I can’t say why. I thought she was fat and sloppy, and she didn’t know how to dress or what to do with her hair, but she did have big tits. That’s Stan’s definition of female beauty, incidentally. He as much as told me that he married me for my tits. I’m pleased with them myself, as far as that goes, but I hate being regarded as a dumb Polish broad with her brains in her bra.

Ultimately Stan and Judy went upstairs and fucked, and Roy and I stayed in the living room and didn’t. We tried, but the poor guy couldn’t get it up. It may have been my own lack of passion that turned him off. I don’t really know. He was really terribly hung up about the whole thing, and he kept saying this had never happened before, which probably meant that it happened a lot of the time and he had a real hang-up about it. I eventually felt sufficiently sorry for him to go down on him, to his everlasting surprise, and in less than a minute he came without even getting erect.

He did a funny thing. He asked me if I would let Stan and Judy have the impression that we had made it in the usual way, and that it had gone fine. Which was all right with me, because I wasn’t too sure that I wanted Stan to know I had gone down on another man.

I think both Stan and Roy were very ambivalent about oral sex. They found it very exciting but felt it was not respectable the way coitus was, that it was demeaning for both the man and the woman when an act of fellatio took place. I did it with Stan some of the time because he wanted it, but he was always reluctant to come right out and ask for it. He would make little Body Language hints in that direction. I gather Judy never did it to Roy from some things he said and from a couple of phone calls I got from him during the week following that experience. And of course Stan never performed cunnilingus upon me. Not before we began swinging, that is. Afterward we all learned to do everything. That is one very beneficial aspect of swinging, by the way; it does get rid of inhibitions for those couples who have let inhibitions keep them from a decent sex life.

My own feelings about oral sex probably derived from Stan’s. I think I picked up his vibes on the subject. My feelings then were that I didn’t mind doing it because it gave him pleasure, and I didn’t find it distasteful, although I preferred just using the act as a prelude to regular fucking, and in any case I was revolted at the idea of swallowing the semen. I’m sure all of this was because I was predisposed to think of the act as dirty and of semen as a disgusting fluid.

How a girl can change her mind! It took quite a bit of swinging before I turned full circle on the subject, and I had a great many cocks in my pretty little mouth before I learned that I absolutely loved to do it. Not just for the man’s benefit, although that of course plays a role, but because I simply enjoy it. A large portion of the time I would rather suck than fuck, to put it in plain language. I can come that way, although whether or not I reach orgasm in fellatio is not terribly important to me. I just dig doing it. I’m no Linda Lovelace with a clitoris in my throat, just a girl who likes it.

Speaking of that, the whole Deep Throat business. Did you see it? I thought it was a pretty bad picture, but then I don’t usually get anything much out of pornography. I can occasionally get turned on by something I read, but movies don’t do much for me. Especially seeing a film in a theater where the bulk of the audience is middle-aged men with their raincoats covering their laps.

The point is, Deep Throat worked commercially because it was every man’s fantasy come to life, a girl who really prefers fellatio and gets her kicks that way. Yet men prefer to believe that women like that don’t exist in real life. I was thinking about this the other day and came up with the idea that men prefer to believe that their fantasies are unattainable. Otherwise they might be faced with the possibility of attaining them someday and the poor little boys would have nothing left to fantasize about. I don’t know if my theory is valid, but I sort of like it.

•  •  •

After the icebreaking experience with Roy and Judy, Evelyn and Stan had no further contact with the couple. After a week or two of further discussion, Stan replied to several advertisements in a swinger magazine. Two of the advertisers replied, and after an exchange of letters and photos they spoke with each couple over the telephone and set up dates. With both couples things worked out quite well, and as these couples were veteran swingers in the Pittsburgh metropolitan area, they in turn introduced Stan and Evelyn to a number of other couples in the Pittsburgh area. The two did not answer any further ads, but were able to function satisfactorily by means of this introductory grapevine.

After a couple of years of this, their marriage ended in divorce.

•  •  •

There was a time when I could make myself believe that swinging ended our marriage, or hastened its ending. It certainly did not cause our divorce, though. My personal opinion is that swinging neither ruins nor saves marriages. A good marriage can possibly be improved by swinging—it can bring partners closer together—and in a bad marriage it can make a husband and wife more dramatically aware of the differences between them. But I think that those swingers who stay together would have stayed together anyway, and those who wound up getting divorces would have done so in any case.

I know swinging intensified my awareness of the differences between Stan and myself. I think, though, that I would have grown more and more aware of those differences during the same period of time whether or not we were swinging. It did drive certain things home to me, though. I would meet men who were so much more interesting than my husband, both in and out of bed. There were times, many of them, when at the end of the evening I wanted to go home not with Stan but with the other guy, and not for sexual purposes but for conversational purposes. I felt guilty at such times, but I also felt I was being cheated out of the best part of my life.

Another way we became more aware of our differences was the type of people each of us liked to be with and the type of swinging situation each of us preferred. As far as people were concerned, Stan obviously liked guys like himself and their dumb big-tit wives, while I liked and was most comfortable with college-educated, professional people. As for preferred situations, Stan really liked parties. “The more the merrier” was the way he felt about it. His idea of heaven was a party of about twenty couples, and a few hours spent bouncing from bed to bed without even taking the trouble to learn the name of the woman he was bouncing.

That kind of sex bores the piss out of me, to put it as plainly as I know how. I’ll have to admit that there are rare moments when it’s fun, but I would hate to do it more than, say, once a year. I have to be interested in the person I’m in bed with. Not emotionally interested, not involved, but interested to the extent of having some sort of feeling for him, some kind of rapport. Also, one man a night is generally enough for me. I may want to make love more than once, and I can get into a certain amount of group stuff, but if a man is worth fucking at all, I feel, he’s worth spending a few hours with.

Stan was exactly the reverse. He really never got over being a notch-cutter, and according to his lights the evening was or was not a success depending on the number of different women he had stuck his cock into. He has always considered himself a fantastic lover because he can almost always manage to do it half a dozen times a night. From my viewpoint, he’s got quantity and quality mixed up. He’s not interested in foreplay, he’s not much interested in variations, and his main object is to get on, pump away for a couple of minutes, and get off in time to find somebody else. To me, that is the antithesis of sexuality.

Toward the end, we didn’t have sex with each other at all. We would swing with other couples once or occasionally twice a week, and that was all the sex either of us ever got. Stan stopped approaching me for sex, which was fine with me, as far as that goes. I sensed that he didn’t want to waste his potency on me. After all, if he threw it to me on Wednesday, he might only be able to bang six girls on Saturday instead of the eight he aspired to. I really feel that was in his mind.

The sexual aspect of our swinging experiences was gratifying for me for the most part. I didn’t like mob scenes and hated to feel like a piece of meat at big parties. When it was just us and another one or two couples, and especially if I liked the people and felt warmly towards them, I enjoyed myself very much. I felt that it was very valuable to work my way out of a lot of inhibitions I hadn’t even realized I had—like making love in the presence of others, which I was always sure at the beginning I could not possibly do, and which I found I got a special kick out of. The kick of forbidden fruit, of overriding a taboo, I guess, because now I would just as soon be alone with whoever I’m having sex with, not because I’m inhibited but because the presence of others can be distracting.

Another taboo was the enjoyment of oral sex, which I told you about, but another part of it was that I was introduced to cunnilingus, and it was the most worthwhile introduction since Laurel met Hardy. I absolutely love it. I don’t suppose that’s unique, is it?

I think what I like most about oral sex is that there’s so much more subtlety to it. No two people really do it exactly the same way. I’m talking about people who like to do it and know how to do it—otherwise it’s just boring. Stan, for example, learned to give head while we were swinging, I think largely because he realized it was expected of him, but he was never good at it. I used to fake orgasms just so he would stop, because he would get the rhythm wrong and eventually it just got to be monotonous and irritating.

With people who dig it, though, it’s really subtle and loaded with nuance. Whereas ordinary fucking is pretty much the same. Even with positional variations, it’s about the same.

I used to have fantasies about getting fucked and eaten at the same time. Then, when it finally happened, it wasn’t as great as I had imagined it would be.

I’m getting ahead of myself, because this happened after the divorce. Oh, it only takes a minute to tell. It was a threesome, I was with a married couple, and she and I did a 69 while he took me doggie-style from the rear.

Actually, this does tie in with what I was saying, with taboos, in connection with bisexuality. At first I didn’t even think much about this, because at our early swinging experiences it didn’t come up at all. Then we were at a party and there were a couple of women having sex, and I was so shook at the entire idea that I couldn’t even stay in the room. From then on I became more perceptive and realized that some subtle passes were being thrown at me, but I’ve always been fairly good at pretending to be dense when it suits me. That was one thing marriage to Stan had taught me very well.

When I finally did go through with it, finally got into bisexual activity, it was for several reasons. The most obvious one was that Stan wanted me to do it and really pressured me into it. This surprised me, although I’ve since learned that this is a standard male fetish and seems to work just as strongly if not more strongly upon men with a very strong bias against male homosexuality. They want to watch girls pleasure each other. I don’t know why. I’m familiar with all the psychological arguments but I don’t know which ones are correct and which aren’t.

Another reason was that I was afraid I would like it. That was a reason for my reluctance, and it was also a reason for my desire to try it and find out. It had occurred to me long ago that I might be a lesbian without knowing it. I’m sure most women have elements of this fear at one time or another. I felt that my repugnance might be related to a secret desire, and I finally decided it was better to find out once and for all than go on worrying about it.

One night we were at this one couple’s house. We had swung with them a few times before this, and they were one of the rare couples that we both liked. Stan got on fine with the guy and loved balling his wife, and I liked the wife very much and could tolerate her husband, although he was nothing sensational and was not a particularly wonderful lover. This woman had made teasing passes at me previously, which I had laughed off as if I didn’t know she really meant it, and she said something similar, and Stan put in a few words of encouragement, and I decided, what the hell, why not, and I said I was game if she was. The facade we both kept up was that we were putting on a show for the boys to get them excited. This woman always operated under that pretense, but when I got to know her better she confided that she preferred women to men. She said something like “I’d leave my husband and live full-time with another woman if I just had the guts.” I guess she never developed the guts, because I understand she’s still married to him.

Possibly because of her own inclinations, she said she would do me and I didn’t have to feel obliged to do anything in return. Naturally, she was superb at cunnilingus. The myth that all women are better than all men at this is just that, a complete myth, and I’ve known several men who were better at it than any woman who ever did it to me, but it is true that virtually all women are reasonably proficient at it, while a percentage of men really have no idea what to do.

As good as she was, I didn’t get much of anything out of it. Part of this was uptightness. This was my first time and I was very unsure how I felt about it, and I’m sure that kept me from responding fully. I was very conscious of her being a woman and of there being something unnatural about this. I was also thinking about doing it to her. Although it was understood I didn’t have to, I knew I wanted to satisfy my own curiosity about how I would feel about it.

When it was my turn, I found out that it was neither as good as I had feared nor as bad as I had feared. I was neither turned on nor sickened. This is probably a funny way to put it, but it was interesting. I had had it done to me so many times and it was extremely interesting to remember what I had liked and hadn’t liked and to act accordingly. I guess I did a good job, because her response was sensational and her excitement did make me feel sexy. It was much the same sense of accomplishment I get performing fellatio, but less gratifying physically and in other ways. I didn’t come when she ate me, although I had the brains to pretend to, and of course I didn’t come from doing her, but when her husband grabbed me immediately afterward and started fucking me it was wildly exciting, far more so than it had ever been with him before, and I’m sure the lesbian prelude had a lot to do with this.

Later on I got into bisexuality mostly in the context of group sex. I still do it now and then, and I am now very much capable of having an orgasm with another woman from being eaten, but I cannot honestly characterize myself as bisexual. This may seem contradictory in that I’ve admitted I can enjoy relations with women, but say it because I can never really think of another woman as a sex object. I can’t look at a girl and get turned on by the thought of balling her. I can’t respond to her physical appearance, the way I can with a man. Also, I find it a lot harder to take intimate kissing with a girl than with a man. The unequivocal sex acts don’t bother me, but the thought of kissing and petting as an expression of sexual love for another female is something I find personally distasteful. I would be more apt to label myself as fundamentally heterosexual with a capacity to appreciate occasional lesbian relations, especially in the context of group sex.

•  •  •

After her divorce, Evelyn had a great deal of trouble evolving a sexual lifestyle for herself. As an unattached female working in a job situation where she had considerable contact with the public, she received a great deal of attention from men. However, most of it was not what she was looking for, and at the same time she was not too clear in her mind as to just what she was looking for.

•  •  •

I was very much at loose ends. The kids and I were new in this neighborhood—Stan had sold our other house, and I wanted a smaller place that would be more convenient to my office. And I was very new at being single. I could have called some of our swinging friends, but I really didn’t want to see anybody who knew Stan. Also, the circle we were in at the time was very much into confining itself to married couples only. Not only were singles unwelcome, but unmarried pairs were unwelcome; these people by and large were very middle-class and very much afraid of anything that might disturb the sanctity of their marriages. I was in no position to threaten anybody’s marriage, as the last thing on earth I wanted was another husband. But for this reason and others, I did not get in touch with them.

The men I met through my job didn’t work out very well. First of all, the great majority of them were married. This was all right with me, and in fact I much prefer to date married men, but they were uptight about it, and that was something I didn’t want. They were almost all nervous that I was going to make a big romantic thing out of it, which was nonsense, and again it was sort of a case of a man fulfilling his fantasy and being unwilling to believe it, because all of these cheating husbands were looking for an absolute no-strings unemotional physical relationship, and that was just what I wanted myself, and they couldn’t believe it. At the same time, if they did believe it, they seemed taken aback. They didn’t want to get involved, but if a woman slept with them as casually as they slept with her, then she was a nut or a tramp or something.

For a while I more or less abandoned sex. I turned down dates and saw nobody after work. Now and then I would get out my handy-dandy vibrator and masturbate, but I did that more out of a feeling that it was unhealthy to go without sex than because masturbation gave me any real pleasure. It doesn’t. It can give me an orgasm, it can even give me a terribly powerful orgasm, but that’s not as satisfying to me as having sex with a man I like even if I don’t have an orgasm with him.

Then I thought about swinging. Of course, I was not naïve; I knew it was the easiest thing in the world for an unattached woman to function as a swinger. I’d read the magazines and I’d heard people talking, so I knew it was a cinch to do it. The reason I didn’t think of it sooner, I suppose, is that I had come to think of swinging as a function of my marital relationship with Stan, and the only thing from that marriage that I wanted to retain were the children, and sometimes I wasn’t too sure about them.

I’m joking—I love them very much, but there’s no denying that immediately after the divorce I resented them. They tied me down, they kept me in one place, they limited me financially, and I think it was only human to go through a period of resenting them. I just made damn sure they never knew I resented them.

The point is that, because of all this and also on the basis of my personal experience, I thought of swinging as something for married couples—and, based on most of the people we knew, something for fairly dull married couples. Of course, there are also bars in downtown Pittsburgh and out by the airport for what they call “swinging singles,” pickup joints for unattached young people. That just was not my scene. I can’t really stomach the calculating eye contact and the mindless small talk and the semi-subtle “let’s-go-to-my-place” horseshit. I’m also a little old for that. The girls are for the most part in their early and middle twenties, and I was a couple years north of thirty by this time.

And one night, after I did accept a date for the first time in a while, and got a decent dinner out of it but decided not to go to bed with the guy, and then changed my mind over drinks and then he didn’t make a pass anyway, and I got home and thought, why in hell can’t I meet someone to have sex with on equal terms, with no crap involved and everything understood in advance, and so on—that was when I thought about swinging, and the more I thought about it, the more sense it made.

I wasn’t sure how to go about it at first. Stan and I had never placed an ad, and I did not like the idea of putting my picture in a magazine. It wasn’t just that I was afraid of being recognized, because a lot of women guard against that possibility by covering their faces, just showing their tits to the world. But even so, I consider that degrading. I didn’t even like it when Stan used to send pictures of me to people we were corresponding with. It was distasteful to me. A couple of times I came very close to answering ads. I would read through the magazines until I found someone suitable in the Pittsburgh area and would write out a letter, but I never mailed any of these letters.

Then I realized that I could easily run an ad without a picture. There are so few ads by single women. The magazines charge you if you don’t include a picture—they’re aware that those pictures help sell the magazines to a lot of non-swingers who just like to look at tits. But I didn’t mind paying a couple of dollars to keep my picture out of print, and I figured I would still draw a decent response.

The ad I wrote read something like: “Single gal, divorced, thirty-two, weight and measurements blah blah blah, desires to meet men living in or passing through Pittsburgh for casual good times. Married men welcome. Include photo and phone.” Later on I added the line “No generosity on either side,” because some of the men who answered said they supposed I was a hooker and if so they weren’t interested, and another wrote to offer his stud services for pay. Since “generous” is a code word for financial reimbursement for sexual favors, this cleared things up. I got a good response, good enough so that I was able to throw nine out of ten letters in the garbage. I didn’t get any really sick pervert letters. I guess those generally go to women who show the world their bodies. But I did get a lot of letters from people there was no point in answering. A man who invited me to look him up if I was ever in Alaska, for instance. Another batch who were functional illiterates, and several who were so unappealing physically that there was no point in seeing them. But I was left with several letters from men in Pittsburgh and several more who said they visited the city regularly on business, and I made contact with several of them and it worked just fine.

Things gradually evolved to the point where I have about half a dozen semi-regular boy friends, all of them living in or around Pittsburgh. All but one of them are married. They know they can call me at certain hours and make arrangements to see me. Sometimes we’ll go out to dinner. Sometimes they’ll have dinner at my place. Sometimes we go to a motel if it’s an early-evening thing and the boys are home and awake.

With these fellows it’s not exclusively sexual. I like their company and they enjoy mine, and there are occasional times when we don’t even feel much like having sex and sit around like an old married couple in front of the television set. I don’t think there’s much deception involved. I know I’m primarily a convenience for them, and they know they’re primarily a convenience for me. They like to fuck and so do I.

Now these are the men I see frequently. I also see a great many men once or twice and that’s it, either because they don’t call me again or I don’t take another date with them. There was a time when this bothered me. It bothered me when someone balled me and never called me again, and it bothered me to have to tell a man I didn’t think we should see each other anymore. But then I came to see that there is nothing wrong with fucking a man once and not fucking him again. Unless something about the person turns you off in a big way, the first time with almost anyone is exciting. The novelty, the challenge of pleasing the person, everything. I’m sure it’s a form of the same kind of notch-cutting I condemned Stan for. But on a higher plane, I think.

Men operate this way all the time, and I’ve learned not to take offense if they don’t call me again. I recognize that it doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with whether or not I pleased them, and that in any case there’s no law that says I have to thrill the eyes out of every man I go to bed with.

But men don’t seem to like it when a woman takes that stance. I’ve had some awkward telephone calls and I’ve been called some nasty names.

•  •  •

I pointed out that a man prefers to believe that he can have sex at the snap of his fingers with any woman he has had sex with in the past. I don’t know why this is so, although I recognize that the rule seems to hold as true for me as anyone else.

•  •  •

Maybe it’s a compulsion to build a harem. Once a man sleeps with a girl, she’s his concubine, she belongs to him. Even if he’s not possessive about her, he likes the idea that she’s there when he wants her.

The best people for purely casual sex are businessmen from out of town. They’re really great. They have money to spend, and that doesn’t hurt, but it not the important thing. Better than that is that they’re not so uptight about being seen with you in public. They’re out on the town and they want to have a good time. They don’t worry that you’ll make trouble for them with their wives, because you’re not going to be able to get in touch with their wives. I can really understand why airline hostesses have such a good time.

•  •  •

At the present, Evelyn’s swinging consists largely of one-to-one relationships of the sort she has described. However, she also has continued to involve herself on an occasional basis with group sex.

•  •  •

I’ve said I don’t like big parties. That’s still true, although once in a great while I’ll go to one. Some of the guys I know might get invited to a sex party, and of course they have to bring a girl to get in, so I get invited pretty frequently. I generally turn down these invitations, but every now and then the idea sounds good to me and I go. Sometimes a party can be a fairly good experience. Let’s face it, there are times when the idea of being fucked by a great number of guys is exciting. It’s rarely as nice in practice as it is in the imagination, but once in a while I give it a try.

What I do like on a more frequent basis are small groups, three or four or five people. I frequently will get responses to my ad from a couple. In most cases the wife is bisexual, but not always. One girl, for example, went to some length in her initial letter to explain that she was not bi, that she had no interest in having sex with another woman, that the whole thought turned her off, but that her husband wanted other women and she didn’t want to swing with another couple because she didn’t want to have relations with another man. She didn’t want to deprive him of his right to other women but didn’t want him sneaking around behind her back, and so she’d like it if I came over and balled him, in private if I insisted, or with her watching if that was all right with me.

I wrote back a sort of tentative letter to see what I would get next, and what I got was a letter, again from the wife, coaxing me to ball her husband and going on at great length and in oppressive detail about what a great fuck he was, the size of his cock, blah blah blah. That usually turns me off, and letters like that go straight into the garbage, but something intrigued me about this gal, so I met with them and we sat around and talked for a while and then he and I fucked while she watched. She fingered herself furiously while we watched, and as soon as we were done she rushed over and went down on him and brought him to another climax.

Well, I’ll tell you. This girl was about twenty-three or twenty-four and really beautiful, genuinely blonde and slim and sweet, and I did something I never did before or since. I decided to make her. She had all this oh I’m a hundred percent straight crap, and here she got off fantastically from eating him after he’d been in me, and I decided to do a job on her. I didn’t try anything that night but I saw them again a week later and I nailed her, and she loved it every bit as much as I knew she would. And I loved it. I suppose it was the role I was playing or something, but that was the only time I really got into it. Correction—I saw them a few other times and we did some nice threesies, and I enjoyed her on those occasions as well. With other women, though, I’ve never felt anything like that. I got such an enormous thrill out of tonguing her.

I guess you may be having trouble believing I’m as heterosexual as I say I am, and maybe it’s silly to split hairs anyway, but I really and truly think this was a special case. I think what I got off on was the novelty, and also the challenge of the whole thing.

In other instances when the wife is bi I usually don’t get much at all out of what I do with the wife. The thing is, it’s usually three people just playing all at the same time, and the presence of another woman certainly doesn’t interfere too much, although I’m old-fashioned enough to believe that two people who really enjoy each other is the best combination of all. A lot of the time, incidentally, when a couple answers and the wife is described as bi, she isn’t really bisexual at all; she can tolerate it, and she’s going along with the whole threesome notion either to make her husband happy or because the addition of an extra person into her bed appeals to her for voyeuristic or exhibitionistic reasons or whatever it is in her particular case.

Lately I haven’t been doing much of this, anyway. I think it’s all something I wanted to run through for the sake of the experience, but down deep I don’t think it’s me. I get much more satisfaction out of my relationships with men.

Obviously, by any standard I ever heard of, I’m promiscuous. I don’t find it difficult to maintain my self-respect. I can imagine several forms promiscuity might take that would interfere with my self-respect, but the way I live does not. I’m not a whore. I don’t take money, and while someone occasionally gives me a present, I’d just as soon they didn’t. I’m a good mother. I keep a good home for the children, and I do it on my salary and what I get from Stan. I don’t have sex with whoever asks me. I’m very choosy, and especially choosy about the men I see more than once. What I do is completely opposed to the beliefs of the church I grew up in, but that church still thinks masturbation is a sin and the Vietnam war is moral, so I don’t really give a shit about the beliefs of the church. I’m only concerned with my own beliefs, and I don’t think I’m doing anything wrong.

Lately I’ve found myself thinking about the possibility of remarrying. There was a man who was seeing me fairly frequently, and he fell in love with me and wanted to leave his wife and marry me, and instead I insisted we break things off. He was difficult for a day or two but then called to say he knew I was right and it was best all around if we stopped seeing each other. I wouldn’t have wanted to marry him, not under any circumstances, but it’s not impossible that I’ll want to get married again. The way I live is all right at my age, but in ten years I’ll be forty-five and I won’t want the life any more than the life will want me. The thought of growing old alone does not terrify me, but it doesn’t appeal tremendously either.

I feel I would have to marry a man who has had a lot of the experiences I have had. I certainly would not marry anyone who had not been married before. And I doubt that I would want to marry someone who hadn’t been involved at least to some extent with swinging. As to whether or not I would want us to swing after marriage, that’s not really something I could decide at this point.

Concerning the life I live now, it suits me for the time being, but I’m not sure I would recommend it to the average woman. I’ve always been very fortunate in that things don’t bother me an awful lot. I’m not moody the way so many people are. I don’t get depressed. I’ve never been to a psychiatrist, and have never felt the slightest urge to go to one. Even in the worst parts of my marriage, I always had the feeling that I could handle anything that came along. For someone who gets into bad depressions, or who isn’t generally stable, I could imagine this life being very hectic.

CHRISTIE AND VERNON

She is a tall blonde with a bountiful figure, full breasts, round hips and belly and buttocks. She is attractive, her attraction vested less in beauty than in her abundant sensuality. Our few meetings were exclusively conversational, but every now and then she would indicate with a glance that she would not mind sharing a bed with me. I don’t think she did this because she found me irresistible; women often find me eminently resistible, and Christie’s own tastes seem to favor younger and frailer types over bearded alcoholic writers. I think her performance was more of a reflex. She’s used to coming on strong.

Vern is about the same height as his wife, fairly slender, his face unremarkable except for his guileless pale blue eyes. He’s about thirty-five, and I gather Christie’s a couple of years older than he is. She was reticent about discussing her age.

They live in a small industrial city in Ohio. They own a two-family duplex a couple of blocks from the gas station Vernon owns and operates. They live in the bottom flat and rent out the top one. Their home is modestly furnished, they dress becomingly enough but at no evident great expense, they drive a five-year-old car, and they have no children; unless Vern’s a secret horseplayer, I’d guess they’re banking a lot of money each year.

When I saw them, Christie did most of the talking. The obvious conclusion is that she dominates him, taking care of all the small decisions and leaving him the big ones. I’m not sure just how valid this impression is. The particular pattern which their sex life takes suggests it, but it is fairly clear that this is the pattern Vern wants and that he in fact initiated it—although with no resistance and considerable encouragement from his wife.

But, as I said, she definitely did the bulk of the talking, so let’s let her explain it.

•  •  •

We’ve been married altogether twelve years now. From early on Vern was always interested in what I did before I was married and who with and like that. I didn’t have too much what you’d call experience, but I got around a little, I’ll say that much, and he wanted to know about it. Well, I never pretended to be a virgin, but first off I’m a little shy about laying all my cards on the table.

Actually, there were four guys I went all the way with before I met up with Vern, and one of these was a guy I was engaged to for four months, so I wasn’t running around all that much. Plus, I had a lot of experience without going all the way, which I guess is par for the course. There were a lot of guys who put a finger up me and lots of guys I gave hand jobs to and one guy who taught me to blow him, which I did twice with him but never with anybody else until Vern and I were married. I was never thought of as a fast girl. I was a virgin until a couple of years after graduating high school, which nowadays is probably something that not many girls can say.

Anyway, bit by bit he gets me to tell him all of this, first because he lets me know that’s in the past and nothing I say is going to shock him, and second because I can see that it gets him worked up and we always have better sex after I’ve told him something. Eventually it gets to the point where it’s a kind of a game with us at bedtime. He might say, “Tell me about the time you jerked off that guy in the drive-in while So-and-so was in the front seat,” and I would tell him the whole thing in great detail, even making up things a little, because who remembers everything? I’d tell him the whole bit all jazzed up, talking about the guy’s penis and how I rubbed it and everything and how much come he shot, all the gory details, and he would get very excited and I’d say, “Look, I’ll show you what I did to him,” and do what I’d just told him about, and we would have a really thrilling session.

At first I thought this was maybe a little weird, but then I figured what the hell, it’s not hurting anything, and if it makes sex better for us, why not? Also, to tell you the truth, it was exciting for me too. Not just the sex with Vern, but telling the stories and sharing those old experiences with him.

The next thing that began to develop was that Vern was sort of pushing me in the direction of having sex with other men. He would ask me if I didn’t have the desire to experience other men, and I would always say I didn’t. And at the time this was the absolute truth. I had no regrets about having slept with other men before Vern, but now we were married and he was plenty for me, or so I thought at the time. His mentioning it so many times did begin to put the idea in my head, though. I can’t say I never would have thought of it anyhow, but his saying so kept it on my mind a lot.

He would say I should feel free to have somebody on the side if the right guy came along. I asked if this meant he was trying to tell me he was having other women, and he said he had enough to do trying to keep me happy and he had no interest in other women, but that didn’t mean I should go without other men. And there was a time—we were married four or five years at the time—when he had to make a little trip on family business. A cousin of his mother’s in Missouri died and there were some things that had to be straightened out, which would mean he’d be away for a week. I was staying here and he kept telling me I ought to find somebody to go to bed with while he was gone. He said a week is a long time for me to go without sex, and there was no way to make his thing stretch from Missouri to Ohio, so I should go ahead and enjoy myself.

When he came back he asks me, did I go to bed with anybody, and I say no, and he’s disappointed. I can tell he’s disappointed, and we talk about it, and it comes out that he wants me to have sex with other men. Not that he’s willing, but that he actually wants it.

Well, at first this was very tough for me to figure out. To be honest, I’d never heard of any such thing. Lately I’ve seen some books on the subject, including something in one of yours, which is why I happened to write to you. So now I know it’s not all that unheard of for a man to want his wife to have sex with another man. But at the time it was completely new to me and I thought it was a little crazy. As a matter of fact, it occurred to me that it might be a test, a way Vern had to find out if I would be unfaithful, and then if I was he would leave me.

Then, thinking about it some more, I saw how it ties up with him always wanting to hear about what I did before we were married. So I could see then how it would get him excited in about the same way. We had some frank talks on the subject, like we would be out walking or out for a drive and he would point out various men and ask, was I attracted to this one or that one or what. His doing this made me more aware of other men, made me take more notice of them. I would find myself glancing at men’s crotches, for example, which is something I had never done before. And by answering his questions as to which men did or didn’t turn me on, I was taking notice myself of which men did, and being turned on by the thought of making it with them.

I guess this must have changed me, because all of a sudden I was noticing that men were giving me the eye, or making passes at me. Part of this was me noticing what I never noticed before, but also there were men who would say things, and this had not happened before. I think what it was, was that they sensed I was aware of them sexually and that I was more open to the idea of doing something sexual, and that’s what made them take an interest.

One time, for example, I had this man over to the house to look at the furnace, and when he was done I asked him if he’d like a cup of coffee. “Okay,” he says, “but why don’t we go and drink it in the bedroom?” I got rid of him, but fast, all full of righteous indignation and giving him no encouragement at all, but I have to tell you that him saying those words got me so hot you wouldn’t believe it. My panties were soaking.

When I told Vern about it that night he got real excited. He told me I should have gone to bed with the guy, and he made us pretend that he was the guy, and we went through the whole thing, him saying, “Okay, but why don’t we drink it in the bedroom?” and me saying that sounded like a good idea, and making a little playlet out of it, and then we went into the bedroom and had a fantastic session. I never saw him so excited before.

He began talking more and more about this idea of me making it with another man, and also the idea of him watching. At first he said he would like to be there in case some guy got violent or something, or I needed to be protected in one way or the other, but then he admitted that what it was was that he would get a tremendous thrill out of watching. He said that he had always had the urge to have me experience sex with another man with him watching and then joining in. I don’t know why this is, and Vern says he doesn’t know either.

•  •  •

The standard explanation for this not uncommon desire to share one’s wife with another male, or observe her having sex with another male, has been one of latent homosexuality; one is supposedly gratifying unconscious homosexual desires by sharing one’s wife and thus possessing the other male through the medium of the wife. I suspect there’s occasionally some validity in this, but it simply does not adequately explain any number of cases with which I have had some familiarity.

I can advance several alternate proposals. For example, this sexual sharing very often provides a husband with reassurance that his wife is sexually desirable; that he himself finds her desirable is not enough proof for him, and he is reassured when another man displays similar enthusiasm for her charms.

Then, too, one could argue that observing one’s wife having sex with another man echoes the primal taboo of watching one’s parents copulate, with the wife cast as the mother and an outsider as the father. (This theory might be particularly apt in explaining Mike’s acquiescence in the next chapter.)

•  •  •

It got to the point where he was saying, “Look, suppose I brought a guy home with me. Would you go for it?”

Well, I wanted to and I didn’t want to if you know what I mean. By this time, I have to admit, I was very hot for the idea myself. Of course, I came up with a lot of conditions. It would have to be with a clean-cut young guy, the kind of person who’s going to be clean and healthy and all. And it would have to be someone from out of town, because I wouldn’t want anybody we know to find out about this or anything.

So I agreed with those conditions, and two nights later, lo and behold but he comes home with this guy, nice-looking guy about twenty-eight years old. They both had a couple of drinks but they’re not drunk or anything, and Vern says he brought this guy Ed along for a drink, and then he checks the fridge and says we’re almost out of beer and he goes out for beer, leaving me alone with this Ed.

Now this was all set up beforehand with Ed. What he told Ed was that his wife needed more sex than he could give her, and he’d introduce us and get out of the house and then Ed could have a good time with me. We had already discussed that he would give the guy this story. After he left, though, you could see that Ed still didn’t believe the whole thing was on the up and up. I think he thought it was some kind of a joke or something, or maybe a badger game thing, I don’t know, with Vern coming in with a gun and trying to get money out of him. I don’t know.

Anyway, I was real nervous at first, but when Vern left something came over me and I felt real sexy. I put on a record and asked Ed, would he like to dance, and all I had to do was rub against him for a minute or two and he was hard as a rock. Normally I’d be shy, but that night I was really something, and I put my hand right on his cock and started giving him a nice rub, and we were kissing and rocking back and forth and he had his hands all over me, and I was really hot.

I’ll tell you something. I’m getting hot just thinking about it and telling you about it. I don’t know if you can tell with this dress, but my nipples are hard.

I took him into the bedroom and we kissed a lot and got our clothes off and got in bed. He had a nice slim body with very little body hair, and he had a very nice cock. I took his cock in one hand and started rubbing my breasts against it, which is something Vern always likes, and I thought he was going to go off just from that, so I stopped and he got on top of me and we started going at it. The first time he came like a jackrabbit, but that was all right because I came the minute he got inside of me. We lay there and necked a little and I sucked him and he got hard right away again, and we screwed a second time. This time he was able to last for a very long time and I had a whole chain of orgasms, which I do when I’m very excited.

Afterwards I felt funny, and I guess he felt funny too. It wasn’t a question of being unfaithful to Vern, because I didn’t really think of it as being unfaithful on account of it was his idea in the first place and he arranged the whole thing. But I felt strange because this whole setup was unusual and I never before thought of myself as a person who goes in for unusual things, like having her husband bring strange men over and getting into bed with them.

What the guy wanted to do was get out of here, but he left his car over at the service station. Which is where Vern found him, and knowing he was from out of state by the license plates and all.

So he had to wait for Vern. Well, Vern came in as soon as we were dressed and back in the living room. What he did was, he sat out front in the car, and when he saw the bedroom lights go off when we came back into the living room, he knew it was all right to come in. What he really wanted to do was go around the house and watch through the bedroom window, but he said all he could think of was a cop coming and figuring him for a Peeping Tom, and then go try to explain to a cop that you own the house and you’re just peeping on your own wife, so he decided the hell with that and he stayed in the car.

Not a word was said until he drops this guy at his car and comes back, and then we went to bed and he asked me to tell him everything, and I did, and the time we had together was beyond belief.

I had to admit to him that I enjoyed it. I’d rather make love with Vern than any other man in the world, but being with another man and having that excitement, and then having Vern, that’s just the best possible thing. And as far as guilt is concerned, well, that was never something I really worried about. The way I looked at it, there was me and there was Vern, and if it was something we both wanted to do, that was all that was important. I can’t have children, so there’s no question of the kids finding out. My parents are dead and Vern’s mother lives in Missouri, where most of his family is, so it wouldn’t be the end of the world if somebody in this town did find out about it, although we try to keep that from happening by staying with out-of-towners. And Vern doesn’t have a job to get fired from. He owns the station. A lot of them, the company owns the station and you manage it for them, but Vern owns the station outright. Not that your average oil company cares if the manager’s wife goes to bed with another man, but the point is, it’s not like being a schoolteacher or something where you have to worry so much about exposure.

So we decided that this would be something we would do.

•  •  •

They did decide, too, to limit themselves to strangers, an easy task because cars with out of-state plates frequently turned up at Vern’s gas station. And they refined the way Vern would approach these men, to ease some nervousness they both felt and to facilitate Vern’s remaining present for the sexual relations.

Here’s Vern’s explanation:

•  •  •

The whole idea of saying to a guy, “This is my wife, you can fuck her if you want to,” it didn’t sit well with me. Then it comes to me that nobody’s going to know we’re married unless I tell him. That makes it more comfortable for Christie, too. And it makes it easier for me to hang around, because a lot of guys, they’ll get uptight at the idea of screwing a woman with her husband in the room, but just two guys in a room with a woman and both of them on an equal footing, more or less, that’s another thing entirely.

So what I would do is this, I always take the last shift, and I close the station up at ten. Now, say sometime after the dinner hour, a car comes in, and I can tell right away it’s the type of guy Christie could go for. I got a fair idea by now what’s her type and what’s not. And I’ll see he’s from out of state, so while I’m wiping his windshield I’ll talk to him. If I see a wedding ring, for instance, I might say something like “I’ll tell you, if you weren’t a married man I could tell you something you’d go for.” Or I might just start in by saying there’s this really great-looking woman I know who goes in for threesomes. Whether I lead in slow or not, the guy gets the message.

Most of the time the guy will go for it. Sometimes I get an immediate yes, no questions asked. Other times they’re more cautious about it. They want to know, is it going to cost them anything, for instance. They want to know, how old is she, what does she look like, that kind of thing. Then I whip out a picture of her, and that always clinches it, Here, I’ll show you the picture.

•  •  •

He showed me the picture. It was a Polaroid shot of Christie, and all she was wearing in it was a ring. Christie seemed very interested in my reaction to the picture, and in my reaction to her after having seen the picture. That I maintained my cool in the face of all this may be attributed to the integrity of my professionalism. Then again, it may be attributed to the fact that I had a girlfriend waiting for me back at the Holiday Inn, and she made Christie look like a tragic accident.

Ah, well. Back to Christie.

•  •  •

The first time we did this was perfect. It took a while before it happened, Vern is very careful who he comes up with. Not just that it’s a guy I’ll like, but that it’s a guy who’s not going to make any trouble.

Well, about ten days after that first time, he gives me a call about nine o’clock that he’s got a guy. He describes him, and he starts getting me hot over the phone by telling me he’s sure the guy has a nice big cock and that he’ll fuck me like crazy. I can get excited just hearing language like that. I’ve always been that way.

The business of pretending that we weren’t married made everything much better. One of the best things about it was that it made it a kind of playacting. We could both pretend to be something other than the people we really are, and that’s always fun. Also, I didn’t feel funny about things the way I did before.

Another thing, I really liked it much better with Vern staying around. Let me just come right out and say that I like sex with three. I really enjoy it. It’s very exciting being the center of attraction and having two men make love to you at the same time. I had expected it would be great, but I didn’t know it would be as good as it actually was.

We all got into the mood together. We had a couple of beers, and then I went over to Vern and gave him a kiss, and then I gave this other guy a kiss, and I wound up sitting on the couch between the two of them, kissing one and then the other and having them feel me. The two of them worked on me, undressing me, and each of them began kissing one of my breasts, both at the same time, and it was really great. There’s no real limit to things you can do when you have two men and a woman. I read one of your books, Three Is Not A Crowd, and I was disappointed that it was just about threesomes involving two women and one man. You said that was more common than the other way around.

•  •  •

I pointed out that what I had written was that a two-women-one-man arrangement seemed to be far more common in permanent ménages à trois than the reverse. Since writing Three Is Not A Crowd I have become familiar with several permanent threesomes involving two men and a woman, but I would still suspect that the other form predominates, much as I feel it predominates in casual threesomes. The greater incidence and acceptance of female bisexuality is almost certainly a factor.

•  •  •

Well, I can see that. A permanent relationship would be something else. A woman wouldn’t want two husbands, whereas I guess a lot of men would want two wives.

But for just getting together, I can’t see it that way. Oh, if the women are lesbians it would make a difference, and in most of the cases in your book I think they were. That’s something else again. But otherwise—well, a woman can easily go on having sex as long as she wants, and she can handle two men easily. But for a man to handle two women, I don’t know; I think a lot of men would like to think they could manage it, but I don’t guess most of them can. Not and really satisfy both women the way I’m satisfied when I go to bed with Vern and another man.

I was saying how much more you can do when it’s three of you instead of two of you. The possibilities are just endless. Like, oh, sucking one man while getting fucked by the other one. That’s just really great, I always enjoy it. Or the best of all, which is sort of tricky to do, is to do a sandwich.

We had talked about that several times before we actually went ahead and did it. The thing was that Vern and I had never done anal intercourse before. I thought it was dirty at first, but the idea of having a sandwich was just great, and it made me want to try it. Vern had never done anal intercourse with anybody either. Once when he was a boy he and another boy tried to do it to each other but couldn’t manage to make it work. He was only eight years old at the time, so it’s not what you would call a real homosexual experience, more on the order of kids fooling around. Vern has never had anything sexual with another man, nor have I had anything of that sort with a woman. We just don’t have the desire for that kind of thing. I don’t hold anything against people who are homosexual or bisexual; in fact, I believe in full sexual freedom as long as it’s just adults concerned, consenting adults that is. I mean, I don’t believe anybody has the right to rape anybody else, obviously.

Where was I? Oh. Well, Vern and I tried a few times to have anal intercourse, and it just didn’t work. I mean, it hurt! He did get it in one time, but I hollered so much he pulled out before anything happened, and even so I ached for the next day or two. Then Vern got a wild idea. There’s this book we read, I think it was called something like The Jewel in the Lotus, all about sex practices in the Orient, and it said something about young boys being trained for anal intercourse by being given opium, which would relax the muscles in the anal sphincter so that the opening was larger and there was less pain involved.

He told me about this and my reaction was, where in hell are you going to get opium in Sandusky, Ohio? I think there are two Chinamen in the whole town, and one runs a restaurant and the other runs a laundry, and I just can’t believe there’s an opium den anywhere in Ohio, and if there was we wouldn’t know how to find it.

Vern laughed when I said this and got out this bottle of cough syrup. It’s terpin hydrate and codeine, and he takes it when he has a cough and sometimes when he doesn’t have a cough but he wants to loosen up. It’s the codeine that does it, and it’s supposed to be an opium derivative or synthetic or something, but basically the effect is the same, except, of course, that you don’t smoke it, you drink it.

The taste of that stuff almost killed the whole experiment then and there. But I said, well, anything for science, and I drank three quarters of a bottle of it. It made me feel very weird, and I did get slightly nauseated, but then that feeling passed and I’ll tell you, I felt pretty good. I don’t normally like to get high drinking. I like to have a few beers but I don’t like to get high. But this stuff, it was more of a glow than drinking, and it didn’t make me feel out of control. I have to admit I got a kick out of it.

Well, I felt sexy enough with all of that codeine in me so that I probably would have let him screw me in the belly button if he wanted to. I don’t honestly know if it helped or not as far as relaxing the anus was concerned. It seemed to. He had an easier time getting it in, but it was painful still. I think the codeine cut my feeling the pain so much, and I let him go on. It was too uncomfortable for me to get really excited but it was very thrilling for Vern, and I did enjoy it to a degree.

We tried it a few more times, and each time, even without any more codeine, it became easier. I guess you get used to it and your muscles stretch, because I honestly can’t imagine anybody enjoying it the first time, as painful as it is, and yet I understand a lot of homosexual men love nothing better than to be fucked in the ass, so they must all have gotten used to it through practice, because if it hurt that much every time, nobody could enjoy it.

Eventually I reached the point where I actually enjoyed it and could have a wonderful orgasm in that position. Not just by anal intercourse. That could be exciting alone, but I also would have to touch myself in front or be touched by Vern if I wanted to come off. According to Vern, that was the most exciting sensation in the world, because my anus would contract and expand over and over again when I had a strong climax, and he said it was just wonderful and it almost always brought him off immediately, which was really great.

When we became good enough at anal intercourse so there was no way at all it could hurt me, we decided to try a sandwich. Vern brought this young fellow home and we all fooled around a little, and then I got in position curled up on my side and he got behind me and got into my ass. Then I straightened out my body and moved so that the other fellow could get into me from the front.

I don’t know how many times we’ve done it since then, and each time is fantastic. I can’t begin to tell you what it feels like. It’s like nothing else in the world. And it’s evidently a marvelous sensation for the men, too. But for a woman—I mean, the whole idea of being double fucked is just more exciting to think about than most things are to do, and actually doing it is even better than you would think it could possibly be.

•  •  •

Christie told me in considerable detail about some of the other combinations and permutations of organs that she and her husband have worked out over the years with the help of various obliging strangers. I will neither bore nor titillate you with them; suffice it to say that you will not likely imagine anything yourselves that Christie did not do . . . and recount to me in what I felt was more than adequate detail. The more she talked, the more I really did want to get back to the Holiday Inn.

A couple of questions occurred to me, as they may have occurred to you. I wondered if Vernon had never had any desire for other women, and if they had taken any steps in that direction. I wondered, too, if they had ever tried any other form of making contacts than the rather haphazard one of waiting for the right sort of chap to drive an out-of-state car into the gas station. There is a certain charm in the idea of going in for a couple of gallons of gas and getting your oil changed free, so to speak. (Or your radiator flushed, or whatever strikes you as the happiest metaphor.) But it did seem sort of catch-as-catch-can, and I knew that Vern and Christie were acquainted—intellectually, at least, through their reading—with the wider world of swinging and the contact medium of correspondence bulletins. Had they ever considered contacting people through the mails?

Here’s Vern’s answer:

•  •  •

As far as other women are concerned, I really don’t have the desire. I suppose that makes me some kind of an oddball, judging from the number of married men who will go to bed with any woman they can get to hold still long enough, but it’s the way I am.

I’ve felt this way ever since I met Christie. I had quite a bit of experience with girls before I met her. Quite a bit, I would say, and I always enjoyed it—I mean, what the hell is there not to enjoy?—but when I met her I looked at her and never wanted another woman. I know it sounds like a load of warm shit to hear a man say that, but in my case it’s true, and after the first time I went to bed with her, I knew I would never want another woman.

Now it’s going to sound funny after I said that, but as a matter of fact we did meet with other couples. To swing, that is. I think we did it three times. No, wait a minute, it was four times.

I’ll tell you why.

What it was, was this: We both wondered why it was that I didn’t want to have sex with another woman. And I got to wondering whether it might be some kind of fear on my part about not being able to perform. I knew I could perform with Christie, I had never in my life had the slightest trouble, and maybe I was worried about what I could do with someone else. And Christie thought it was unfair in the sense of her having all the fun, and also thought it might be pleasure for her to see me with somebody else.

What it comes down to is that we were thinking about it, and we figured, why not try it because what would it hurt?

Well, I don’t guess it hurt anything, but I don’t guess it accomplished anything either. We were twice with one couple and once each with two others. They were not men I would have picked out for Christie myself, but she was able to enjoy herself with them to a degree. Same as I was able to enjoy myself with the women, but just to a degree, because I would have had more pleasure watching her with the other man than I got screwing with the other woman. Those women were not as beautiful as Christie, they were not as sexy, they were not built so well, they just didn’t turn me on so much. What I mean to say is, when you own the best restaurant in the city, you don’t run over to MacDonald’s for a hamburger. Not when you’ve got a freezer full of prime filet mignon.

Now as far as getting in touch with people through the mails, well, we did that with the other couples. We picked people who lived out of state and we visited them, drove over to see them, and I guess that’s all right, being the only way we could think of to arrange that sort of thing. If we were going to do it again, I guess we would make contacts the same way.

But for getting an individual guy, it’s easier to use the station, because even if you’ve got a photograph of the guy, you don’t know whether he looks very much like that photo. More important than that, we would have to say we were a couple rather than play that “I’m just a friend of Christie’s and she likes having two men at once.” With swingers I don’t know as that would be a problem, as there are all these men advertising to meet couples but we like to pretend the way we do.

Also, we really get enough men from the way I pick them up at the station. Now sometimes that’s only once in a month, and we’d probably like it more often than that, but one thing you have to realize is that we do all right by ourselves. We have sex pretty nearly every night and it’s always been good for us, so we don’t just sit around and cry if nobody turns up for a while. It doesn’t make that much never mind to us, and in a way it’s better, because the threesomes are a special occasion and we don’t lose our taste for them. If we had another man around every night it would be fun for a while, but then it would lose what it is that makes it special.

•  •  •

I asked if they had ever tried sex with more than just one additional partner. Christie answered.

•  •  •

Just once. Vern gave me a call and said he had something really special. I thought he meant a colored fellow, because he had been saying about that time that he was going to bring one home one of these days. Like he says he’ll wait until Brotherhood Week, just joking. I don’t think I’m prejudiced, but I never yet have had sex with a colored man and I’m not sure whether I want to or not. I don’t see anything wrong with it, just the question of whether or not it’s something I would want to do, but he called that night, and from the way he was talking I thought that was what he had in mind and I was in a state, figuring I would have to go through with it but not knowing whether I would be able to, or whether it would be too much for me. I guess it’s something that’ll happen sooner or later, but first I want to make up my mind myself as to how I feel about it, and I guess Vern understands as much, but that’s still what I thought he was bringing home.

So what happened is, the bell rang and I went to it expecting a colored man, and instead there’s Vern and not one but two boys. And I mean boys, because I’m sure they wasn’t more than nineteen at the most, and nice, attractive, clean-cut young boys, not dirty or long-haired or anything, but as nice-looking as you could want.

I don’t guess they had a whole great deal of experience, as young as they were, and they were very nervous about the whole thing, but whatever they lost in experience they made up in how excited they were. I swear, they must have stayed for half the night. I guess we were all in bed for close to six hours, and I didn’t get ten minutes rest in any one of those hours. Now, it was nice. We did a sandwich and I sucked Vern at the same time as they were having me from the back and the front, and that was nice because I had had the thought in mind that I would like to be had in all three openings at the same time, and I liked it. But I’ll tell you something, as great as the difference is between having one man or two, it’s not that great a difference between two men and three. I was glad we did it but I told Vern, and he agreed, that just him and one other man was as much as I really wanted.

Oh, I’ll tell you something funny, in line with what Vern was saying about the service station being the best for contacts. There was this one fellow we had a little trouble with, on account of he turned out to live right here in Sandusky. He had these Georgia plates on his car but that was because he hadn’t got around to changing over his registration to Ohio. He had just moved up here, and it turns out he lives only two blocks from us! So when he’s ready to leave he tells me he’d sure like to see me again, and that’s when we find out he lives close by, and we didn’t know what to do.

Now, one thing we agreed was we didn’t ever want to see anybody more than once. Occasionally a man would pass through that we had seen once and stop at the station, and Vern would say like I had moved away or something to get rid of him. But we couldn’t do that with this fellow, and sure enough, a couple of days later he came over to the house while Vern was at the station.

Not knowing what to do, I went to bed with him. I didn’t really want to, but I didn’t know how to get out of it without being nasty or acting dumb. Later I told Vern, and he agreed we had a problem. What we did, the next time the fellow came over I called Vern and he came back to the house, and we both explained the situation to the fellow, about being married and all. I have to say he was stunned, but then he said of course he understood why I wouldn’t want to see him alone under the circumstances, but why couldn’t the three of us get together for a threesome now and then.

We tried that, and we were seeing him once a week for about a month, but then we called and told him we wanted to stop it, and fortunately he was good about it. I think by then the novelty was wearing off for him too. I was just uncomfortable and so was Vern, and that was the end of that, and ever since then Vern makes a little small talk first to make sure the man is really from out of the state before he brings up the entire subject.

Just seeing a man one time only is more exciting, and there’s no hassle or anything that way.

•  •  •

A rather unusual couple. You can draw your own conclusions about Vernon’s motivations for desiring this sort of troilistic arrangement. I won’t bother foisting my own ideas upon you, but I will say that the two of them happen to have what looks to be a good thing going. The frequency of their own sexual relations, related so casually by Vernon, is such that their occasional trios are not really much more than icing on the cake. While what works for them would probably work for relatively few other couples, there’s no denying that it does indeed work for them.

FRANK

A writer friend of mine, who has been into swinging for several years, a while ago began telling me about Frank and Mike and Dena. “I could introduce you to them,” he offered. “They’d be good material.”

I agreed that they would be good material, and felt they could fit well enough into this particular volume. “But I’ve got a better idea,” I said. “You’ve known them for a long time, and certainly know them better than I ever would. And you’re a writer yourself. So write.” I thought for a moment. “I’ll even pay you,” I said, and no words ever came harder to me. “I get a pittance myself, so I’ll give you a fraction of a pittance.”

Here’s what he wrote:

Dear Jack,

Swinging makes strange bedfellows. I think your readers would be intrigued by the story of the oddest situation my wife and I have encountered in our six years of sexual exploration. The reader must be warned that this story (as of Spring ’73) is unfinished, and the possible endings more complex than those of “The Lady or the Tiger?”

The strangest side of this unequilateral triangle is a drop-out doctor, who I’ll call “Frank.” There are no statistics available on drop-outs in the vocations, but I’d assume that the percentage in the medical profession is near to the lower end of the scale.

Questioning Frank about his motives for quitting is a frustrating experience. His reasons sound plausible, but they don’t mount high enough, and they don’t satisfy. He doesn’t like his fellow doctors and he doesn’t care for the majority of patients it was his DUTY to treat. He hates regular hours. Getting out of bed is traumatic (particularly if the company is good). All these things are true for many doctors, but they don’t drop their bankbooks and run.

You know SOMETHING has been omitted. He didn’t tell you THE reason. Frank’s personality compounds the feeling of something missing. There’s a curious sense of hollowness. He’s there, but not quite. And it’s caused by more than the realization that he’s not listening to what you’re saying, and perhaps not even listening to what HE’s saying.

Through experimentation, you learn that there are a few magnetic words that cause a few moments of attention: Baroque music, chess, bridge. You can guarantee his wholehearted attention if the subject is sex.

Frank is approaching sixty, but he has the constitution (in this case, euphemism for COCK) of a far younger man. That is to say, he has the CONCENTRATION of a younger man. He LOOKS his age, even unto a slight paunch and gray hair. But, to the everlasting gratitude of uncounted women, his lower half belies his upper half.

However, there’s an element more important than ability to keep man’s core perfectly parallel to the ground women worship. Frank is a wizard at the psychic turn-on. In spite of his appalling lack of insight in the social sphere, in the sexual sphere his mental flashlight pierces tangled Freudian undergrowths as if they were mere will-’o-the-wisps.

Frank fucks not just the body, but the psyche. His body fucks the body while his mind fucks the mind. Although socially and diplomatically inept (if he were in our State Department we’d be at war with Luxembourg and New Zealand within hours), on the way to and in bed he is superb, playing almost errorless ball. His words, his attitudes, are tailored to the specific fantasies of the to-be-bedded.

It took my wife several years before she landed in bed with Frank. But that was because Glynn had seen Frank only in a social setting, and had been put off by his eagerness to impress, sweating to appear knowledgeable in areas of dim or nonexistent knowledge. It took two years’ worth of Frank’s phone calls before her curiosity reached the level of her antipathy.

You’re thinking that WE were the trio I was leading to? No. We three were A trio, but not THE trio. I’m only explaining the relationship of my wife and myself to the leading angle of THAT triangle. Glynn and I are unconventional swingers. We don’t follow the standard rules (which are so rigid that the dullest cocktail parties, by comparison, are examples of spontaneity). For one thing, I don’t MUST have HIS wife, too. We don’t MUST have separate rooms (Closet Swinger Rule 1). We don’t MUST be together (Non-closet Swinger Rule 1). They don’t MUST be married. If we swing with just a single man (frowned upon, though swinging with a single woman is permissible), I don’t MUST NOT come into contact with him in any manner, means, way, shape, or form.

Swingers who scream SEXUAL FREEDOM the loudest are the uptightest, most narrow-minded hypocrites you’d ever not want to meet.

But we were talking about Frank. He fucked my wife and I watched. Which makes it appear that I’m a voyeur. Appearances are more often accurate than deceiving, and this is an example. When I wasn’t watching, I was participating, and not just with my wife. So it would also appear that I’m bisexual. Again, appearances are accurate.

Which makes it appear that Frank also is bisexual. Score one more for the accuracy of appearances. His homosexuality, though, is two one-way streets with NO U-TURNS. That is, he’s always the male, even with a fellow male. I think of Frank as primarily a heterosexual to whom an orifice is an orifice is an orifice. Logically, then, two orifices would be better than one, three better than two, etc. The mathematically perceptive have by now determined that to Frank, my wife and I were preferable to one woman alone, but that the two of us were not as desirable as two women. The best of all possible worlds for Frank, it therefore follows, is the orgy, specifically the bisexual orgy.

All the intelligence and energy Frank had once put into the practice of medicine (friends most critical of his dropping out vouch for his skill and reputation as a doctor) was invested into some of New York’s grandest orgies. He couldn’t throw the parties in his own nest (which was rumored to be uninhabitable, except by Frank). He arranged and hosted the parties at the apartments of cooperative friends (or lustful enemies).

The parties varied in both quality and quantity. What Frank described as “an intimate little party” meant about twelve. A big party meant there’d be no room on the floor. In his wisdom, Frank broke the rule of even distribution. “Men wear out faster than women,” he said, in a patronizing tone that excluded himself from the generalization. Thus, each woman would average approximately one and a half men, which kept both the women and the bisexual men happy, and the straights on their toes, waiting their turns.

My wife and I eventually had our fill of Frank’s parties because we discovered an almost infallible rule. Place more than a half-dozen people in a room, and either Glynn, me, or both of us will find at least one of them intolerable. Although this isn’t disastrous at an old-fashioned party, it’s calamitous at a sex party. If you have to keep heading off the giggling thing with the vibrator that’s after your wife, or having to be polite to a fat lady who’s devouring everything in sight, it can be a total turn-off.

Some time after our departure from party life, Frank called to tell us he had met a couple “you and Glynn would be crazy about.” I shrugged, because shrugs don’t show over the phone. In the past Frank had often spoken in glowing terms of people we were to meet at his parties, and seldom was the glow for us better than a dying ten-watt bulb.

For months we put off Frank’s application for a sexual pentagon, before finally giving in to his persistence.

One evening he brought his couple to meet us. Glynn and I were startled. It wasn’t that we were expecting the worst, but that we expected the mediocre. And what we got was the best, or certainly the best we had ever seen within a hundred yards of Frank.

Dena was the youngest-looking thirty I had ever seen. Delicate skin, wide-eyed, long, lovely dark hair. Adding to the illusion, she was dressed in an old-fashioned skirt which looked as if it had been borrowed from her mother. She could have passed for sixteen.

Her husband, Mike, was one of those rare presences that is comfortable to have around from the moment of meeting. An intelligent, quiet, gentle man. Hippie-like without self-consciousness.

Frank basked in our reactions to them. Among his less pleasant habits is his manner of running I-told-you-so’s into the ground and under. He is a gloater without peer.

The vibrations were so positive that it would have been unnatural if the five of us had not linked sexually.

I have heard it complained that the finite possibilities of variety in sex make it, inevitably, a bore. I can agree, but only if it’s the possible variations between TWO people that are under discussion. Granted, there are more possible arrangements between two people than between two books on a shelf. But compare possible two-book arrangements with five-book arrangements. Then compare the comparatively limited arrangements of five books with the possibilities of five PEOPLE! The potential for variation increases more than arithmetically with each person added to the original two. Listing all the possibilities in a group of five would be a task taking days. LIVING them might take years. And by the time you’ve gone through all of them, the ones tried years ago would again seem fresh and novel.

That night each of us experienced things we had never experienced before. Whoever says there’s nothing new under the sun forgets to add a footnote that makes the statement ridiculous. There are constant new COMBINATIONS OF EVENTS under the sun.

Has a person of YOUR exact temperament ever read these words, placed in THIS order before? Has anyone ever led YOUR EXACT LIFE before? Met exactly the same people? Said the same things in the same order in the same tone of voice in the same places? If you really think so, it’s grounds for suicide. Anyway, the five of us shared an experience that no one else has ever had. Of course, there have been other fivesomes, and they have done the same exact things. But it would be miraculous if any member of those fivesomes responded emotionally in exactly the way any of the five of us did. They weren’t US. Whatever they felt, it meant something ELSE to THEM.

Although the possibilities of variation in an orgy is infinitely greater than in our small group, to me that advantage is not worth the accompanying loss of the PERSONAL (a quality that some orgiasts secretly find terrifying). We weren’t bodies to use and be used, we were still OURSELVES. This takes some courage. There is a feeling hanging over orgies of people fleeing from themselves.

The most vividly recalled moments of that evening were those of total connection. At one point we WERE a pentagon, connected by mouths. I suspect none of us will ever forget it.

Our groupings were fluid, changing constantly. Dena and I took turns withdrawing from connection to concentrate on watching. In Dena I had met my match in voyeurism. In both of us the desire to experience warred with the desire to watch. This was conveniently balanced by the exhibitionistic tendencies in Frank and Glynn. Mike didn’t upset the balance. He sat in the middle.

Except for those unhappy people so repressed that they must constantly stand guard even over their thoughts, everyone has sexual fantasies. Many go through life without an opportunity to convert fantasy into reality. That may be what is regretted most at the moment of death.

Glynn, Frank, Dena, Mike, and myself will not die as regretfully as others. The memory of that evening and subsequent evenings we spent together will subtract from regrets. Perhaps what we’ll experience at our final moments will be nostalgia.

“The Unholy Five” (an uncopyrighted title in case you wish to form your own) continue to meet about once a month. Why so seldom if it is that good? First, the psychic energy expended in that intense an experience leaves myself and my wife content for weeks. There isn’t any temptation to glut ourselves. Secondly, there are logistical problems. The visiting team must travel a distance to see us, and Mike and Dena must find a baby-sitter for their young boy and girl. Thirdly, all of us have other interests and must leave space to pursue them. Glynn has boyfriends, I have girlfriends, WE have trios. (All requiring less “psychic expenditure” than our intense fivesome.) In addition, we’re fond of theater, ballet, and concerts. And somewhere, amidst all this, we must even find time for our work.

Compared to us, Mike, Dena, and Frank are one-tracked. They DO enjoy monumental parties, and haven’t much time or energy left for anything else. In spite of pleasant distractions our Unholy Five continues to thrive. Why five? Must Frank always be there? Yes. He is the soul, the prime mover, the motor, the devil of our parties. We other four enjoy having a generator. We can function without Frank, but on a more sedate level. There are few things more depressing than sedate sex.

Frank is a sexual glutton, the Sexual Appetite incarnate. He starts us, heats us, fascinates us. In return for this (as men forgive sensual women ANYTHING), we forgive his pretentiousness and his unwitty witticisms. He sets us off and indulges our sexual fantasies, playing Dominant Man, playing Stud, playing Daddy.

Glynn and I can break the spell when we choose. But Dena (and perhaps Mike in his own way) cannot. To Dena this unextraordinary-looking, post-middle-aged man is Svengali, Rasputin. (Freud and I prefer the term “Daddy.”)

He turns her on as no man (except, in the subway of her mind, the original Daddy) ever has. At the time Dena and Mike met Frank, they had had a sexually bland, emotionally passable, occasionally shaky marriage. They went to a swinging party in an attempt to climb out, and there was Frank, who had always been looking for a daughter.

But his new-found daughter is a difficult woman to live with. “Girl” describes her better than “woman,” and THAT’s the difficulty. She behaves as young as she looks. She’s self-absorbed. Like Frank, she is only half aware of the people about her, and over-aware of herself. Without warning she turns cranky. The slightest frustration can cause hysteria. I have seen her do everything but lie on the floor kicking and screaming because Frank criticized her for mispronouncing a word. It took him one hour and two sedatives to calm her.

She can’t bear criticism from Frank. But not being fucked by Frank is a deeper hell. Sex was of no great significance to her during her first ten years of marriage. It lay dormant. She laid dormantly. As for oral sex, it was something to be tolerated. Anal sex? What’s that?

Frank opened all the portals. With a relish. They will never close now. At least, not if Frank’s knocking.

Frank has also opened a fourth portal. The one of their house. He has moved in with them. While Mike works, Frank and Dena fuck . . . among other things.

The two children? UNCLE Frank!

And what of the un-outraged husband? The nagging wife, whose prime target was once Mike, now has another target (armed with tranquilizers to fire back). More important, the sleeping sexual volcano has erupted, with enough extra lava for Mike to wade in. Frank and Mike often go wading together. I’ve seen erotic waves break upon the floor of my living room as they enter Dena from opposite directions.

Once, in an experiment more sociological than sexual, I introduced two close friends to the Unholy Five. I wasn’t concerned with body-adding. I was curious about their response to the Frank-Dena-Mike trio. Their reactions were startlingly similar, considering the disparity in their personalities. Linda and Charles are as unlike in temperament and philosophy as they are in sex.

Both were chilled. Both were repelled. Both thought the three were dangerously unaware of the game they played. Both disliked Frank totally. (They never used the word “vampire” but I felt it in their voices.) Both thought Dena a lovely but irritating child. Both liked Mike, but found his part in the drama difficult to understand. Both felt there was a frightening storm brewing.

I agree, but I wouldn’t want to predict the course the storm will take, or the extent of its violence. I think Mike must eventually explode. He hasn’t yet, because he has been compensated by a smoother marriage, a hotter wife, and a deep dip into his own fantasies.

Some day the balance will tip. Frank’s vanity, and gluttony will outweigh the rest. (They may already, but Mike, knowing he has a rhino by the tail, is stalling for time.) Even HE can’t know what will happen when his temper finally gives way. (And he HAS one. Beware the gentle man!)

If Frank is forced to leave, which way will Dena jump?

Into Mike’s arms?

Into Frank’s arms?

Into hysteria?

Into madness?

Dena once told me, “I had a father problem.”

Yes, Dena. And the world is round.

•  •  •

I’m generally inclined to let my friend’s letter stand on its own. However, I’ll have to take exception to his last statement. As a member of the Flat Earth Society of Canada, I must point out that the world is flat, as anyone willing to trust the evidence of his senses can readily see.

MARV

The solitary swinger with the most difficult time of it is the man who wants to swing who is married to a woman who does not. I could not begin to estimate how many men find themselves in this position at one time or another, but their number is certainly substantial. I am constantly receiving letters from such men. They want advice on how to get their wives to swing, or ask for suggestions as to how they can operate on their own. I’m afraid I’m rarely of much help to them.

In some cases, I’m unconvinced of the sincerity of their desires. However large the number of swingers in contemporary America, there is surely a much larger number of persons of whom the whole notion of swinging is a very alluring fantasy. I would go so far as to say that group sex and consensual mutual adultery is the predominant fantasy of the American middle class.

And it is eminently possible to delight in a fantasy without truly wishing to bring it to fulfillment. Sadomasochistic pornography, for example, has a very large and very enthusiastic audience composed primarily of persons to whom the thought of actually acting out these cruel fantasies is utterly revolting. (That an occasional maniac who does act out such fantasies is also an admirer of such pornography is an argument invariably advanced on behalf of censorship, and, I think, a wholly specious one.)

As far as swinging is concerned, I don’t doubt that most of the men (and, to a lesser extent, women) who relish it in fantasy are consciously convinced they would really like to practice it in actuality; fantasies are most effective when one is able to believe in the possibility of their sometime fulfillment. But I am sure some of these people are deluding themselves. Any number of men are certain they would be delighted if their wives would agree to swing—yet they go to great lengths to avoid bringing up the subject at all. They argue that their wives are emphatically not the type, that even the suggestion would have a detrimental effect on their relationships, that they know their partners well enough to avoid broaching the topic, and so on. There is probably a degree of truth in these arguments, but I cannot avoid feeling that the wish is often father to the thought.

Perhaps they themselves are not all that open-minded about swinging, and use their arguments as rationalization for their own unconscious doubts. Perhaps their double-standard morality is such that they could not conceive of being married to a woman who would wholeheartedly embrace what they are reluctant to suggest. Perhaps—well, you get the idea.

Certainly, a great many men do have wives who are reluctant to swing. And certainly a great many of them try to talk their wives into swinging, and many of them succeed—most couples who do get into swinging do so because it was the man’s idea, and in most cases the wife has needed substantial convincing over a period of time before giving her agreement. And, just as certainly, many men make a real attempt to get their wives to swing and are not successful. For some of them the matter ends there. For others, as well as for men who have not attempted to introduce their wives to swinging, there is another route. They attempt to swing on their own, generally behind the wife’s back but occasionally with her implied or stated acquiescence.

How well do they do?

Not terribly well, most of the time. The problem of the single male swinger is great enough when he is genuinely single, as we have seen, and it is greatly compounded when he is married. He has less mobility, less time available, and often less discretionary income. He has to worry about exposure, often on two fronts—not only does he have to worry that his wife will find out what he is doing, but if he has mismanaged things sufficiently, he has to guard against his playmates’ finding out that he is indeed married. Many swingers who will accept a single man as a partner are considerably less sanguine about swinging with a married man. The cheater is an object of scorn for not a few of them, which is not hard to understand; concealing one’s activities from one’s spouse does not set well with those who make a virtue of keeping one’s indiscretions out in the open.

Yet a great many married men do swing on their own.

In Southern California (where everything is easier anyway) I met a young law student who had been married for about three years. We met at a swinging party in the Valley with about fifty people in attendance. He had brought a date, a girl he had not seen before and most likely would not see again, and with whom he had not and would probably not have sexual relations. This date was arranged for him by the Sexual Freedom Alliance, an out-in-the-open organization based in Hollywood which brings people together for this sort of thing, and charges a membership fee of around fifty dollars a year for their unlimited services. (As I said, everything’s easier in Southern California.)

He had needed the girl to come to the party, as single men were not otherwise admitted. In return for her company he had provided transportation there and back and had paid the party’s ten-dollar admission fee. Since their arrival they had gone their separate ways, and by the time I got to talking to him he had done the dirty deed with two young ladies and expected to manage one more performance before returning home to his wife.

“My marriage is sexually boring,” he said. “I married too young and knew it was a mistake right away, but it’s good in certain other respects. It’s possible we may get divorced eventually, but for the time being I want to keep my marriage intact.

“But that doesn’t mean I don’t need a sexual outlet. I do. About a year ago I got involved with a girl. It was a very heavy relationship and it almost wrecked my marriage. Toward the end this girl started calling me at home—that sort of thing. I would some of the time think I was in love with her and wanted to marry her and other times I would realize that it was just sex and in every other respect she bored me and I found my wife a more genuinely interesting person.

“So I broke off with the girl, which was also difficult, and then I was talking with someone and heard about these parties and how you could arrange for a date to go with you. So I’ll go to a party once or twice a week. It’s not hard to get away. As far as my wife is concerned, I’m spending a lot of extra time at the law library. Law school is a cinch, I’ve got the right kind of mind for it, I can breeze through all my courses, but she doesn’t know that. There’s no way she can reach me at the law library to check up on me. I call Sexual Freedom Alliance, I get a date arranged, bring her here—unless we just hit it off perfectly, which has happened a couple of times, in which case we never do get to the party.

“But we usually end up at the party, because, frankly, most of the girls you get as dates this way are dogs, and I just think of them as tickets of admission. I have some good casual sex and I go home feeling fulfilled. It’s not always impersonal. When you go to the same parties more or less regularly, you keep running into a lot of the same people. There’s a turnover, but there’s also a basic core group of people you see again and again.

“And there’s a certain amount of socializing that goes on. You’re welcome to spend all your time in the bedrooms if you want, but unless you’re Superman you don’t want to ball nonstop for four hours, so you spend a certain amount of time in the living room talking to people. There are girls here who I consider friends. We go to bed some of the time, and we just talk some of the time, and it’s good sex, and it’s good conversation, and it’s completely casual with no chains attached and no threat to my marriage. Or to my peace of mind.”

For this man, swinging as a married cheater is no great problem. But for a man who lives in a town of five thousand people in the middle of Arkansas, things just are not that easy.

Yet men in very forbidding circumstances do manage to get their acts together. In another book, Beyond Group Sex, I wrote about Grant Burdon. I won’t go into his story here, having covered so much of it before, but will point out that one could hardly envision a less favorable environment for this sort of swinging than his situation—he is a Protestant minister in a small town in Western Pennsylvania. His income is limited and his professional position obviously precarious; yet, with his wife’s acquiescence, he manages to conduct a very fulfilling private life of sexual freedom, swinging with singles and couples all over the country.

Marv’s experiences seem to me to be quite interesting in this context. Perhaps I should stress that my sole contact with Marv has been through the mails, and I am thus presenting his revelations in letter form as received. This has advantages and disadvantages for the reader. On the plus side, Marv’s story is presented directly, without having to be filtered through the perceptions and occasional misperceptions of an interviewer. On the minus side, there are elements of Marv we are less likely to find out about, not the least of which is whether he is writing the truth.

There is, needless to say, a very powerful advantage for the writer: It’s a sight easier to sit here and retype some letters virtually verbatim than to spend hours interviewing and additional hours turning those interviews into coherent narrative. Ah, well. Show me a man who doesn’t take the easy way out and I’ll show you a man who goes through life pushing doors plainly marked PULL.

Dear Mr. Wells:

I am writing to you after reading several of your books . . .

My problem is, I guess, run-of-the-mill. For months now I have been wanting to be a swinger, swapper, whatever you want to call it. I am a very loving person and need a rich and rewarding sex life. Meaning, having sex for the rest of my life with only one woman is not enough for me.

The problem is my wife. She will have nothing to do with this. In fact, she will not hear of it. She is a woman with strong religious convictions and has little interest in sex in or out of marriage. She enjoys it when we have sex but would not miss it if we didn’t. She never refuses me but if I do not suggest it for weeks at a time, there is no difference for her. To this woman sex means in a dark room with lights out after children are in bed, and in one position only, and with no eagerness for foreplay first. She just wants to do it and be done with it and does not want to talk about it or about sex in general.

Lately I have tried to bring up the subject. I could not do this by saying I was interested in it but told her some of the things I had read in your books and by other writers on this subject. Her reaction was, she did not even want to hear about it. That I should not be reading books like this. That books like this should not be written, that it was sinful even to write about the sins of others in a way such as would make them attractive to others.

This is the shituation I am in:

(That’s his spelling, and I wouldn’t change it for the world—JWW)

This is the woman I am supposed to spend the rest of my life with having sex only with her.

You might say, leave this woman. I would but for the children. They are my children and I would not leave their upbringing to her alone. Also, she is a good wife in many ways and I would not want to hurt her . . .

So what it comes to is this: How can a man swing if his wife is against it? Do not tell me to talk her into it, as it is no use. Believe me, it is no use.

I have a magazine called Select with thousands of ads of swingers. I have read this magazine so many times I almost know it by heart. In ad after ad it says “No single men.” But what is a single man to do? Also, how can I make contact in a way that will keep all of this from my wife?

I guess you will just throw this letter in the wastebasket, but will hope for an answer from you. I like your books very much and find them interesting and exciting, although I must say they are no substitute for the real thing.

Sincerely,

Marv

I didn’t throw his letter into the wastebasket, although there’s no denying I was tempted; I get an awful lot of letters very much like this one. But I replied, albeit briefly, telling Marv his first step ought to be to rent a Post Office Box, and adding that he would probably have to write a great many letters in order to get a handful of replies, but that if he was persistent, and if he avoided answering ads that did specify “No single men” and made a special point of answering those with the phrase “Three is not a crowd,” he would probably do well sooner or later. I added that I hoped he would keep me posted on how he made out, and I mailed the letter without expecting ever to hear from him again.

About five months later I received the following letter from Marv, with a P.O. box as the return address:

Dear Jack,

Don’t know if you remember me but I wrote you some time ago about my problem . . .

Well, I took your advice. I want to thank you for taking the time to answer my letter. It was what you wrote that made me “take the plunge.” You also said to let you know how I made out so I will take you at your word.

Once I make up my mind to do something, I go ahead and do it. I do not know if I gave you any personal details in my last letter, so here goes, so that you can get the full picture of me. I am forty-two years old, married since I was twenty-seven. I own a dry cleaning business here in ——— and have lived here all my life. I have three children, two girls and a boy, their ages are thirteen, ten, and eight . . .

After receiving your letter I sat down and took my time getting things thought out in my mind. Then I decided there was no use kidding myself. I could go on having daydreams and reading books and thinking or I could take action. I have always been a believer in action or would still be working for somebody else instead of in business for myself.

The first thing I did was to rent a Post Office Box, as you said. Then I bought a new copy of Select as the one I had was out of date and I did not know if the same people would still be advertising for friends. Then I went through the ads for an area within a two-hundred-mile radius of where I live. I checked off every ad that was promising in any way. Then I went through those ads I checked and picked the most promising of the bunch and wound up with forty-seven ads. I found three more to make it an even fifty and I went to work.

I had a photograph taken of myself and had fifty copies made. Not a nude or seminude but a full length photo, which is enough to give anyone a fairly good idea of what I look like. Then I wrote the same letter fifty times with only slight variations. I typed up fifty envelopes and sent off the fifty letters. I put the letters in a large envelope addressed to the magazine along with my check for fifty dollars. I mailed it right away before I lost my nerve.

Let me tell you this, Jack. Once that envelope was in the mail I felt like fifty different kinds of damned fool. Between the photographs and the fifty dollars for a forwarding fee of a dollar a letter—believe me, Select must be making a fortune if there are many guys like me around—I had close to a hundred dollars invested in this business. Also, it came to me that out of fifty couples and girls chosen at random, there was a good chance of hitting a blackmailer or troublemaker somewhere in the bunch. But that was why I mailed the package right away, on account of knowing I would have second thoughts on the matter and wanting to get it over and done with before my second thoughts could intrude.

One of my motives for writing you is this: Because I did write so many letters, fifty in all, maybe I can give you a picture which is of some value from a statistical point of view. My other motive is that you asked me to write!

Of the fifty letters I sent out, I received exactly seventeen replies. As you probably know, the magazine makes a big deal about advertisers guaranteeing to reply to all the letters they receive. They also print a lot of bullshit about revoking advertising privileges for advertisers not following this policy. Jack—don’t you believe it!! Of the fifty people I wrote to, exactly 66% did not reply! Remember that I did not send obscene material through the mails and did not write obscene or overly suggestive letters, and yet two-thirds did not reply, not even with a postcard saying thanks but no thanks! I was going to report this to Select but decided, why bother? Let’s face it, Jack. They know which side of the bread holds the butter. They are not going to cost themselves advertising on this account, whatever they say in print!

Now, of my seventeen replies, ten wrote to say thanks but no thanks, in about so many words, either to say that they did not swing with single men or that they had more single men than they knew what to do with. I can understand their position and respect them for having the decency to make a reply. Of the other seven, three indicated that the husband was bisexual. This was a mistake on my part, in that I failed to spell out in my own letters that I am not bisexual. (At least, I don’t think I am, and that is not what I am looking for, at least not for the present time being.)

That left four letters. Puts me in mind of a story you probably know, Jack, about the fellow who every day would stop the first one hundred pretty women he met and ask them each if they wanted to fuck. He would get his face slapped ninety-nine times a day, but he would also get laid once a day! In other words, four out of fifty ain’t bad!

Two of these favorable replies were from couples and two from single girls. The couples enjoyed swinging with single men. One lived only twenty miles from here, the other a hundred and forty miles, both of them certainly within easy driving distance for me. They included photos, and both of the wives were very attractive and shapely. I was, to put it mildly, very interested indeed.

Of the two single girls, I should add to that by saying one was single and the other married but with her husband’s permission to swing. The single one was quite plump, in fact I would have to say she is fat. I am not the sort to be turned on by fat women, but even so her letter was sexy and I thought I ought to see her, fat or not. I certainly made the right decision in that case.

Incidentally, of those three couples where the husband was bisexual, I would like to say that I wrote back to them and explained my own position as to why I did not think it would be a good idea to get together with them. Unlike those thirty-three advertisers, I believe anyone who writes to me is entitled to the courtesy of a reply.

Well, I visited the two couples and the two single girls. First the one who had her husband’s permission, then the fat girl, and then the two couples. In every single case I had a very good time!

I can’t say I didn’t know what I was missing before, because I did know. But in all four cases I got more than I expected. Now I know how much I am missing in this loveless, sexless marriage. No, not loveless, because I love my wife in many ways and know she loves me in her own way. But since the first time I met with one of those girls and went to bed with her, I have not had relations with my wife. Why should I force myself upon a woman who does not want or need sex when the world is full of women who desire it and appreciate it? There is no point. It may interest you to know that my wife has not even mentioned the fact that I have had nothing to do with her in a sexual way for some months. I doubt she even notices the difference. She can enjoy sex when I bring it up but it does not look as though it bothers her at all to go without it. Well, as far as I am concerned she can go without it for the rest of her natural life and I don’t guess she will ever notice the difference anyway.

My own life is changed now. I am doing things I had dreamed before. I am having a good time and living from one day to the next with interest and excitement. I have seen one of the couples two times and the other couple three times. I have seen the fat girl five times, as she lives nearby and it is easy for us to get together. She seems to like me very much. Not to be bragging, but it is the truth, and I must say I like her. There is one particular advantage to fat girls which I could tell you if you are interested. Also, I have seen the married girl with her husband’s permission two times and will be seeing her again soon. There is a difficulty there because of her living quite a distance away, and also because her husband’s permission is not all it should be. He is willing but she still has to sneak around anyhow.

Jack, the point of this is first of all to say thanks for helping me get up the nerve to do this, and also to give you some statistical information which you might want to use in your future writings; but also there is the point of giving you some information you may feel free to pass on to other fellows in my position by way of advising them.

Most important is this: If I hadn’t answered a great many letters, I might not have gotten any replies at all! My first plan was to send out five letters and see what would happen. Well, if I had done that, and then no replies, I am sure that would have been the end of it as far as I am concerned. By sending out fifty letters I got the seventeen replies, and four of them panned out really fine. I am sure couples or single girls have a better batting average than that. But single men are not in that good a position. Just too many of us guys and not enough people looking for us! So the thing to do is write as many letters as you can afford and send them all out at the same time.

I’m not saying every man who sends out fifty letters is going to get seventeen replies, or that four of them will be favorable ones. It’s possible a man could get zero replies. It’s possible he could get twenty or thirty. But I would say that by sending out fifty or a hundred letters you’ll get an idea where you stand, but if you sent out just a few, you might strike out completely and that’s the end of it.

You might say, why not save all the expense and run an ad yourself for a couple of dollars? Take it from me, Jack, there is no point to it. For a couple, yes. For a single girl, also yes. But not for a single guy!!!

The reason is not hard to see if you think about it. Again, it’s like a business, supply and demand. Why should a couple or a girl spend money enclosing dollars to answer ads from single men? There is no percentage in it for them to spend a dollar for each letter when they can receive a flood of letters just by running their ad.

Well, I guess I’ve wasted enough of your time, Jack. Maybe too much!!! You don’t have to answer this letter, as you have done enough for me already, but I did want to keep you posted on my experiences. If any more details would be of interest you just have to say the word.

Your friend,

Marv

I did reply to Marv, advising him that I would be glad to hear a more detailed account of his experiences should he care to write. I also told him I rather agreed that few ads placed by single males were likely to be productive, and largely for the reason he specified. I know of one man in Missouri, for example, who ran an ad for several months and received only one reply, and that from a prostitute. But I wondered if his reasoning on the matter was purely a matter of conjecture or if he had had any direct experience of his own.

Shortly thereafter I received this letter:

Dear Jack,

I was surprised and pleased hearing from you so soon. I know you are busy and am glad you found the time to write.

Yes, things are going very well for me. I am still seeing the two couples and two girls I told you about, as well as a third couple I met through one of the couples I have been seeing all along. I have been giving thought to sending out another mailing but for the time being will wait and see, as I think it likely I will continue to meet new people through my present friends.

For another thing, the fat girl and I have been considering the idea of placing an ad as a couple to meet other couples. I know this would greatly increase the number of people we would hear from. Just now Shirley (that is her name) is a little concerned about publishing her photograph. Not that she is afraid someone will recognize her but because of her weight problem. She feels she is fat and this will turn men off. I have to agree in part, as it turned me off at first, but I care for her a good deal and consider her a super sex partner. One thing about fat girls is that they are really crazy about putting things in their mouths, if you understand my meaning. At the present time Shirley is on a diet. She has attempted diets many times in the past, losing the weight and gaining it back again. This time I am giving her encouragement and she says it makes a difference. Well, time will tell. Even if she does not lose weight I can tell you that I think the world of her and enjoy spending time with her.

I have also written to you about Pat, the married girl who has her husband’s permission to swing. Hers is a sad story. You could say that it is a tragic story. What it amounts to is that her husband is a homo. Not the kind of homo who can adjust, because his “thing” is young boys and he has twice been arrested for making advances to boys ten or eleven years old. His family has plenty of money or else he would have been sent to prison by now. He has had medical help but it does not change the desire, just helps him keep it under control. He married Pat some years ago hoping her love would make a normal man of him but no such luck. He does not make love to her more than two-three times a year if that much. He has to have a lot to drink first and then has to have her suck him for a long time, and then he enters her and comes right away. She has had two children by him and then had a sterilization operation.

She is not really a swinger, having no interest in more than one person at a time. All she wants is regular sex. I don’t mean she doesn’t want to do the full variety of things but that she wants to be able to have sex regularly. She loves to fuck and the harder the better. The problem is this. Her husband knows he cannot satisfy her needs and knows she must look elsewhere but is still wildly jealous. He has told her to get what she can and still she must sneak around, as he opens her mail, races her to the phone, etc. This is a complication, but as she is very attractive and only 29 yrs. old and wonderful in bed it is worth it to me even though it is a two-hour drive to where she lives.

Of the two couples that I have been swinging with from the beginning, one is a pharmacist and his wife who live nearby, the other an industrial chemist and his wife, who is a schoolteacher. The chemist and schoolteacher like to swing mostly with couples, in fact I am the only single male they swing with at present, and in fact they were the ones to introduce me to the third couple. They are very warm and open people, and as a matter of fact with them it is not the idea of having a wild sex scene as much as the idea of having a close friendship which is made even closer and more intimate by sharing sex openly together. I have twice brought Shirley along to meet the chemist and his wife for foursome activity, and the four of us get along in every possible way. Rita, the schoolteacher, is bisexual as well, and is attracted to Shirley, but only time will tell as to whether or not Shirley will want to participate in this sort of thing. It is my opinion that she will sooner or later, Jack, but this is just an opinion and nothing more.

The pharmacist and his wife are less interesting as people, that is, as far as I am concerned. But they are very interesting sexually. The pharmacist is a voyeur and likes to watch the sex acts of others. I guess this is nothing new to you, Jack. He can function normally and sometimes has sex with his wife while I am there, but mostly prefers to spend such times watching me have sex with her in every imaginable way. Especially he likes to tell us what positions to do and gives us directions as if he were a movie director. This is enjoyable for me because she is such an attractive woman, beautiful body, and very good in bed, but I do not think I will be seeing too much of them in the future. I think this feeling is mutual. I think they like to have a lot of different people, single men or couples as the case may be, because this variety is the spice of life to them and they are not so much interested in forming close relationships with their swinging friends, as is the case with Jerry and Rita, the chemist and his schoolteacher wife.

As for the third couple, I have so far only seen them once, and that was with Jerry and Rita present, so will not write about them now. She is certainly pretty and I enjoyed making love to her, also enjoyed the fivesome we got into. It is my guess that the husband is homo to a degree. This is just a guess and it is probably not fair for me to leap to that conclusion . . .

Now about placing an ad as a single man. Yes, I am basing my opinion on experience. I did not mention this before because of the lack of results, but at the same time that I answered those fifty ads I placed an ad of my own. It was published the following month and to this day I have not received a single response! Perhaps it proves nothing, but for my money if an ad goes out to all those subscribers and does not draw a single response, I would not place an ad again. Also, I mentioned this to the various people I have met through answering ads, and they have all said that they would not answer an ad placed by a single man because they would not find it necessary to do so.

You also ask how my relationship with my wife has been affected lately. I could say, What relationship? We still have not had sexual relations and it does not seem to bother her at all, and she has still not said anything about it. However, I have a hunch she suspects I am getting sex somewhere else. This is just a hunch and I could not say for sure what prompts it, just her attitude in ways I cannot describe.

Jack, sometimes I wonder why I stay married to this woman. She is a good housekeeper and in many ways a good mother to the children, but that is all there is. She is loyal to me, but what is the good of this type of loyalty? Why do I stay with her when all the pleasure of my life is found outside of our marriage and nothing but boredom is in the marriage itself?

If I were not married, I suppose I would marry Shirley. At least, that is my feeling at the present time being. We have not talked about this at all. Or if not marry her, then live with her. It amounts to much the same, as we are not people for whom marriage is important, just feeling.

Oh well, time will tell. I will keep in touch if there is anything to report and will answer any additional questions you may have, Jack.

Your friend,

Marv

I replied briefly to this letter, perhaps more briefly than I would ordinarily have done, because of the pressure of other work. Some time passed, and I did not much expect to hear from Marv again. Just recently, after this volume was already in preparation, I received the following letters.

Dear Jack,

Haven’t written to you in some months, but maybe you remember me . . . Had the urge to write you because things have changed around much for me and wanted to keep you informed about my life and how things are going. I see you have been busy since I was last in touch with you. I have been keeping up with your books and especially liked your latest one and so did Shirley.

I don’t remember just how much I wrote about Shirley in my last letter. The fact of the matter is that the two of us became very important to each other as time went by. Two weeks ago Friday I could not take it anymore and “took the plunge.” Meaning that I moved out on my wife and am now living with Shirley.

I will tell you something, Jack. It is hell to live two lives at the same time and try to be two different men at the same time. The man I pretended to be, husband and father, was a mask. It was not the real me. I found I could only be the real me when I was with Shirley and the rest of the time was just a shambles. It was a terrible situation and I stuck it out as long as I could, thinking it my duty to my wife and my children. More and more I came to the light that I had other duties too. Namely, my duty to Shirley and, most important of all, my duty to myself. I don’t like putting myself first but in the world we live in that is what you have to do and Jack, believe me, that’s the only world we’ve got for all of its faults and we only have one life to live.

How about that, old Marvin the Philosopher, but it is the truth as I see it just the same.

What I told my wife was that I had fallen in love with another woman and could not live with her anymore. I did not say anything about the swinging, seeing no need to bring it up. I kept putting off doing this for fear of hurting her, my wife that is, and lo and behold there was nothing to fear but fear itself, as she did not take it as hard as I thought she would. No, to tell the truth, I don’t think it bothered her much at all. She said, did I want a divorce, and I said, no, not for the present time being, but I would not be living with her anymore. Well, she said, I will expect you to be sending money just the same as I need thus and so many dollars a week to run this house and care for your children, and I said, of course I will send the money, and outside of that it is just a matter of packing my clothes, which I did, and moving out, which I did, and that was all there was to it.

Shirley says she doesn’t care about being married and I believe her but only time will tell if she continues to think that way, as women have a great desire to be married for the sake of security and I can understand it if that turns out to be what she wants. By then my wife will be used to me not being around at all, and who knows, she might find somebody herself. It is possible, and then she won’t stand in the way of a divorce, and everything will be however it turns out to be, but for the time being I am very happy about how things are turning out.

One of the things that brought this on was Shirley and I started swinging as a couple. I don’t know if I wrote you about this or not. I think I did. We put an ad in Select and got several replies and began meeting some of the people who answered. Shirley when I first met her she was on the heavy side, and while she is still plump has slimmed down quite a bit so that I would not want her to lose more weight than she already has. She is the perfect woman for me and says I am just right for her. I don’t know what she sees in me but whatever it is, I’m glad I got it, Jack! Shirley is the woman I have wanted all my life.

She is almost eight years younger than myself but is quite mature so it is like there was no age difference at all. She has never been married and in fact had little sexual experience before she met me. In spite of having put an ad in Select, which she did. She had sex with quite a few men before meeting me but never a long relationship. She did not get too many answers to her ad in Select on account of not having her picture printed. You see, Jack, she had this complex about being heavy which made her nervous about putting her picture in the paper.

But she is the sensuous woman all by herself. She loves sex as much as I do and she loves it in all its forms. Her skin is as soft and as smooth as a child and there is nothing she does not like for me to do with her. Also, she is bisexual, as we have found out. I should say that she is bisexual under certain conditions, being that she has to feel a closeness to the other woman or else is not interested. And she is not at all jealous but loves to see me make love to other women, as I am not jealous and enjoy watching her with other men or with other women as the case may be.

Well, Jack, that’s about it for now. Just wanted to keep you up on what was happening with me and to tell you that Shirley and I think the world of you and hope we will get a chance to meet you some day. Shirley says she would like to go to bed with you! But of course, Jack, the main thing is, we would both like to see you in person some day if your travels ever take you to this neck of the woods. Just drop a line and let us know if you are coming and you will get a warm welcome. It’s the boondocks out here but there is plenty going on in the boondocks, Jack, as I am sure you well know.

Your good friend,

Marv

KATE

In the preceding chapter, Marv writes of Pat, a woman who more or less has her husband’s permission to swing. This is by no means uncommon, nor is it rare for the permission to have an element of more-or-less about it. Often the permission is given because a couple has tried swinging and one party has found it unsatisfactory in one way or another while the other party has enjoyed the experience. The attitude of do what you want but leave me the hell out of it amounts to a compromise, and sometimes a viable one.

In other instances, essentially orthodox couple-with-couple swinging has led to a less structured open-marriage arrangement. One young woman, who swings quite frequently with her husband, suddenly decided that there was no reason why she should be sexually deprived during her husband’s frequent extended business trips. She discussed this with him and was told, a bit reluctantly, to go ahead and enjoy herself, and has certainly done so; she does not limit herself to times when he is absent but also slips out for an occasional afternoon at a motel when her husband is at the office. I have not met the husband and cannot say with assurance how he feels about this; my impression is that he’s not crazy about it.

Kate’s an example of another sort of arrangement. She has not only her husband’s permission to swing as a single but his active encouragement. Because she and her husband share a particular enthusiasm for troilism, specifically for threesomes composed of two women and a man, Bob happily sends his wife off to swing with another couple—and can look forward to having his wife and the other wife in his bed on a future occasion.

Kate is twenty-eight or twenty-nine, with high cheekbones and almond-shaped eyes that give a vaguely Oriental cast to her face. Her hair is dark and cut short. She is a tall girl with a fine figure, although she talks frequently about wanting to lose ten or fifteen pounds. I cannot imagine why, or from where. She’s a former nurse. Her husband sells medical supplies to hospitals and clinics. They’ve been married six years and have two small children.

•  •  •

Bob became interested in swinging very early in our marriage. At the same time he was a little unsure about it, and, for that matter, so was I. Actually, we had both had quite a bit of experience before we were married. I guess I had slept with about a dozen men before I met Bob, and he had had a great deal of experience. He’s eight years older than I am, so you can figure it out, he was over thirty when we got married, and he led a life right out of Playboy magazine.

So the idea of having sex with another man didn’t shock me the way it shocks so many wives when they first consider it. Or when their husbands first suggest it. As a matter of fact, I had wondered before we were married whether it could possibly be enough to sleep with just one man for the rest of my life. We were open about this; we both talked about our concerns on that score.

The idea of swinging fascinated me from the beginning, but I was still very nervous about it. One thing, it all seems so stylized, so mechanical—you sleep with my wife and I sleep with yours, that whole bit—and also the idea of going to bed with strangers, people you may not have anything in common with outside the bedroom . . . well, it all seemed a little off-putting to me.

Those elements still seem off-putting, actually, but in anything you have to take the bad with the good and weigh them together and make your decision, and for all the contrived aspect of swinging, for us the good very much outweighs the bad.

Our early swinging experiences were both good and bad. It was an education. I guess it is for everybody. The educational aspect, it was not just finding out what goes on but finding out what we liked and didn’t like. For instance, we found out immediately that we did not like large gatherings. We made our first contacts at a swingers’ bar in Manhattan and one of our first times we were invited to a party out on Long Island. We went, and there were about a dozen couples there, which isn’t even considered a large party by people who go in for mob scenes, but as far as we were concerned it was ridiculous. There were men I had sex with that night whose names I did not even know. I had been introduced, I guess, but how can you meet twenty strangers all at once and remember all their names? The whole thing made me feel like a whore. It was very impersonal and I didn’t like it, and Bob felt the same way.

There was one thing, though, one thing that happened at the party, and it made a tremendous difference in our lives. There were two women having sex together. They were bisexual, obviously, and they were making it with each other right in the living room so anybody who wanted to watch could. I didn’t really see much because it frankly made me uncomfortable just standing there and staring at them, and I wasn’t cool enough to not stare at them, so I went to another room. But Bob watched the whole thing and got terribly excited and screwed one of them as soon as they had finished their performance. I don’t know if it was what she had in mind, but I think Bob would have raped her if he had to, he was that turned on by the whole thing. He got excited by remembering it later that night when we were home, and he got me excited, and we had a very nice time, screwing like minks.

It was afterward that Bob told me his ultimate fantasy was to have two women at once. Now, that’s not the most unusual fantasy in the world. I think it’s harder to find a man who doesn’t have that fantasy. And as he fantasized it, both the girls would be completely bisexual. And I would be one of them, of course.

I’m trying to remember just how I felt about this when he told me. I know I was shocked, but I don’t think I was all that terribly shocked. What went through my mind really was that I just didn’t think I would enjoy it.

I had never had what you could honestly call a homosexual experience. There was one time before I met Bob when I was nursing at St. Vincent’s and I was sharing an apartment with a girl on Jane Street. I had not known her before. She had an apartment to share and I answered her ad and that’s how I came to know her.

There was one night when the two of us went to bed together. But it wasn’t actually sexual because nothing really happened. The problem was that she was terribly depressed, she had just broken up with her boyfriend, she was being hassled by her parents—anyway, to make a long story short, she was very down in the dumps and we both drank a lot of Chianti and went to bed separately, and then she came into my room and said she couldn’t sleep, she was too uptight, and could she get in bed with me.

It didn’t occur to me to think of this as sexual at the time because I knew this girl, I knew she had just finished having an affair with a guy, so I knew she couldn’t be a lesbian. The possibility that she was bisexual did not occur to me because I didn’t understand the whole concept of bisexuality. I thought everybody was all one way or all the other. Now I’ve come to the conclusion that everybody is basically bisexual and it’s just a question of whether or not your hang-ups keep you from expressing the full spectrum of your sexuality.

Anyway, on that occasion, as I said, nothing really happened. She cuddled up next to me, and I put my arms around her and comforted her a little when she started crying. And then for a while she put one hand on my breast. I was wearing a nightgown. I think at that stage I was beginning to get the slightest bit uneasy about the whole thing, but I had also had quite a bit to drink and wasn’t at my very all-time sharpest, myself. She didn’t do anything more and after a while I guess she got up and went to her own room, because she wasn’t there when I woke up the next morning.

I don’t know if you would call that a bisexual experience or not. I hadn’t thought about it in years, but it came to my mind when Bob brought up the subject. He insisted I tell him about it, and he said the fact that I wasn’t turned off by her touching me, that I didn’t have an unpleasant reaction, probably indicated that I had the potential to be bi.

For a while it was just something to think about, because nothing happened. We would always state that we were both strictly heterosexual, so even if a woman we met was bi she would know not to bring the matter up. Then eventually we were with a couple we had swung with on a few previous occasions, and I think Bob said something about female bisexuality, I guess to the effect that he found it exciting. The other couple exchanged glances, and the woman admitted that she was bisexual on occasion, with a woman that was her type.

I watched her face as she told me this, and I remember being both embarrassed and excited, because from the eye-contact she was giving me I knew she was indicating that I was her type, and that she would like to ball me.

I had a lot of hesitancy on the subject. First of all, there was the hang-up of doing something abnormal. Not that I mean I think bisexuality is abnormal, because I don’t, and not even that I thought so at the time, but when you’re brought up to regard anything other than heterosexuality as perverted, it’s hard to overcome those inhibitions. Of course, it seems to be much harder for men. When we first started swinging Bob got uncomfortable in the presence of other naked men. He didn’t want to look at their genitals and he didn’t want not to look, and all in all he found their presence inhibiting. In fact, he preferred closed swinging at first for primarily that reason. He decided he would rather be in another room with the wife of the other guy than be in a room where there was another male. He’s very able to intellectualize on the subject and understand his hang-ups, but the thought of any sexual contact with another man puts him off completely. I’m sure that’s a major factor in his preferring threesomes to foursomes, although there’s surely more to it than just that.

I’m getting ahead of myself. To get back to the evening I was telling you about, I had that hang-up to overcome, and I also was not sure I could go through with the physical act of going down on another woman. I knew what it tasted like because naturally I had now and then touched myself and licked my fingers, and I never thought of it as a displeasing taste, and more or less figured that somebody else’s wouldn’t taste all that different from my own. But I just wasn’t sure I could do it. I figured I could let another woman do me, but it seemed tacky to not want to do it to her in return.

You could say my feelings were very mixed. Through all the thinking about it, and Bob with his fantasy and everything, I had a really strong urge to do it, if only to find out what it was all about. Also, although I was a little reluctant about eating pussy, I had had it done to me so many times by guys, and I was curious as to what it would be like to do it. The act itself held this fascination for me, in addition to the more special idea of crossing the line and actually having physical intimacy with a woman. In other words, I was interested by both the concept of sex with a woman and the concept of getting physical with a cunt.

Well, as it happens, I did go through with it that night. I wanted to put it off and take time to think about it, and I suggested that, but Bob asked me what the hell I wanted to wait for, and his encouragement made the difference. I also would have preferred to go off in private with her. I knew Bob wanted to watch, and I knew it would excite me to have him observe me, as I have a certain amount of exhibitionism in my make-up, but I wanted the first time to be by myself, or rather just me and the woman, I guess because of embarrassment or something at the prospect of actually doing it.

It was really terrific. Much much better than I expected. All I really expected was that it would be interesting, and that the men would be so excited that the fucking afterward would be wonderful. I got a surprise. First of all, whatever my mental reservations, I had no physical reservations at all. My body liked what was happening to it. The first thing she did was kiss me, a regular open-mouth tongue kiss, and I think if I had known she was going to do that I would have been uptight about it. But she did it before I had time to think of it, and it seemed perfectly natural to me to kiss her that way, and it was really very nice. Woman are always kissing each other on the cheek and all, but this was a frankly sexual kiss and it worked.

Everything she did worked. We didn’t have any clothes on to take off, and she began touching my body and stroking me, handling my breasts, and I responded fully. And I discovered that instead of being reluctant to take an active role I particularly wanted to take an active role. It was very nice to have her touch my breasts, certainly, but it was far more interesting to touch her breasts. I had never touched a woman’s breasts before. I think it’s very natural for the breast to be regarded as beautiful and fascinating by both men and women. I wanted to touch her tits, then I wanted to kiss and suck them, and then I knew I wanted to do everything there was to do.

Basically, in a bi scene I am more interested in doing than being done. Of course, I enjoy both parts of it, but the major excitement for me consists of playing with a girl and eating her up and make her come. This is less true in heterosexual scenes, but with another woman I get more pleasure out of her orgasm than I do out of my own. And that’s saying a great deal. I’m a very sexual person and I have orgasms readily and I enjoy the hell out of them. This woman made love to me, which is to say she ate me, and it was wonderful, but I held back a little because what I really wanted was to be eating her and finding out what it was like. As soon as I had come I told her it was my turn now and we changed positions on the bed. She lay on her back and I crouched down between her legs and had her.

I really liked it. She had a very nice taste to her. In fact, I always like the way women taste. In my experience, swingers are invariably clean and hygienic. They always bathe before going out for the evening, and in fact some of them at the larger parties dash into the shower every time they have sex.

So I went down on her, and apart from being exciting, it was very interesting to do it. Because this was something I had had done, by her and by any number of men, and I knew what I liked, and it was interesting to do to her what I liked to have done to me.

That’s another thing about bisexuality. In certain ways it’s a lot like making love to yourself. This is something I’ve found especially in sixty-nine. I’ll be eating another woman while she’s eating me, and it’s like the whole thing is a perfect closed circle, as though my cunt is feeling what my own mouth is doing. I don’t know if I’ve explained that too perfectly, but I think you must know what I mean. While I was doing her, her husband came around behind me and began to fuck me. At the time I really wished he would cool it, although I usually like that combination. But this was my first time and I didn’t want any distractions in the shape of a rigid penis. I think a rigid penis is one of the nicest possible distractions, ordinarily, but at the time I wished he had kept it to himself.

As far as I was concerned, that was it, I was converted. Now a lot of girls have had a similar experience and enjoyed it in the same way and afterward in the next couple of weeks they have a lot of second thoughts. Quite a few women have told me this. It didn’t happen this way with me. I honestly never had second thoughts.

I think the husband’s attitude has a lot to do with it. I think that even when a husband finds bisexuality exciting in a woman, and even if he’s the one who talks her into it, he still may find himself wondering if he hasn’t made a mistake and worrying that his wife enjoys girls more than she enjoys him. Bob did not have this worry, or if he ever did he kept it to himself. And it’s odd, because in a way he is jealous when I’m with another man. Not exactly jealous, and not worried that I’ll meet somebody who’ll turn out to be a better lover, but he certainly prefers threesomes to foursomes, because he would just as soon be the only man in the room.

But when I’m with a woman there’s no jealousy at all. As far as he’s concerned, bisexuality is the sign of a more highly sexed woman. It’s not just that it turns him on. He approves of it. And I would tend to think that had a lot to do with my not having any second thoughts.

•  •  •

After Kate embraced bisexuality wholeheartedly, the pattern of her swinging remained more or less the same, with the added bisexual element. She and her husband would see other couples, contacting them either through the mail or, increasingly, through referral by mutual friends. Gradually both of them decided that what they really wanted was a threesome with another woman.

•  •  •

We decided on this quite a while before we managed to arrange anything. You know how it is—there are so many ads placed by couples looking to swing with single girls and so few by single girls looking for couples. Probably two out of three ads nowadays are couples advertising to swing with “couples or single girls.” We did answer a couple of ads placed by single girls but none of them panned out. I suppose they already had more action than they could handle.

One evening we were seeing a couple we were friendly with, and the subject came up, and it turned out that they were in the same position more or less. They also would have preferred a trio with an extra girl but had trouble arranging them, although they had done it several times. Half jokingly I said we could make a pact—the other wife could swing with me and Bob one night while her husband stayed home and worked on his stamp collection, and I would visit them sometime while Bob stayed home and built a model airplane.

I really didn’t expect anybody to take it seriously, I don’t think, but to my surprise all three of them thought it was a great idea.

So we decided to do it.

We made a date for a week later, and I have to tell you that it was comical to me the way Bob and I were so excited about it in anticipation. I say it’s funny because we had swung with this couple several times, Bob had fucked her and I had had sex with her and we had all done just about everything but swing from the chandelier. The only element of novelty was a negative one in that her husband was not coming along. I realized at the time that this was funny but it didn’t change the fact that our anticipation was really at a high pitch.

The evening lived up to expectations. You know, I would have trouble explaining why it is, but a threesome is just more exciting than a foursome. To me and to Bob, that is. I can understand why it might be so for Bob, the thrill of being the only man with two women, and also any hang-ups that the presence of a second man might cause are not present. And I suppose my reaction could possibly be explained by my picking up his vibrations. But I think there’s more to it than that, and I don’t pretend to understand all of it.

That first evening she came to our house. And it was great, really great.

Then the week after, or maybe it was two weeks, I went over to their house. I forget what Bob did, I think he went bowling or something, I don’t remember. Anyway, I went over there myself, drove over to their place, and it was really exciting. It was such a different thing for me, going out for a sexual evening without him along. It felt very naughty, but in a good way because he approved completely; in fact, when I was leaving he told me to save some of it for when I got home, because he was going to be in a mood to screw my eyes out.

It came off very well. I enjoyed the feeling of being out by myself, that was a kick, and I enjoyed the sex with both of them working on me at once, pleasing me at the same time, and I liked, oh, I liked everything about it, actually. They were warm and loving people and there was a closeness about the evening that was very nice.

The kind of threesome we have is very different depending on whether it’s just me with another couple or another girl with Bob and me. I wonder if I can explain the difference. Let me try.

First of all, when another woman comes to our house, it’s as though Bob and I are sharing her. It’s very much of a togetherness experience for both of us. For both of us, the object of the evening is to please this girl together and to enjoy her together. That’s what it amounts to, basically. Oh, some of the time she and I will both work together to please Bob, and there’s a lot of mutual voyeurism and exhibitionism, but the general tone of the evening is as I described it.

Now, when I go and visit another couple, I’m basically playing the role the extra girl would be playing with Bob and me. I’m the extra girl and thus the center of attraction, and this makes me feel very sexy.

We’ve had quite a few of these arrangements, where the husbands take turns staying home. A lot of our friends say they never heard of anything like it and that it strikes them as ridiculous, but a lot of others say that it makes very good sense and they want to try it that way themselves. As far as we are concerned, what makes sense to us is whatever gives us the most enjoyment and satisfaction. The idea of a swinger putting down somebody else for a particular sexual preference strikes me as utterly insane.

I don’t know which type of threesome I like better, being the odd girl myself or being with Bob. I should answer automatically that I prefer being with my husband, but I enjoy the other very much too.

Of course, Bob prefers it when he’s there. That’s obvious, but he really doesn’t feel left out when I visit people myself. Well, I phrased that badly; of course he feels left out, because he is left out, but what I mean is that he doesn’t resent it.

Of course, we’ve reached the point where we do know some single girls, so our trios are not completely limited to the arrangements I’ve been telling you about. As a matter of fact, our closest relationship at the moment is with a former airline stewardess. She’s two years younger than me and divorced, just recently divorced, and Bob and I are both crazy about her. We see her very frequently, like we’ve been seeing her several times a month, and usually we have avoided getting involved with anyone, but so far we like the whole feel of the relationship very much. She hasn’t done much swinging, and basically we’re the only people she swings with, the only couple, although, being single, she does date guys in a general social sense and has sex with them if she wants.

We talk and joke, all three of us, about how great it would be if she moved in with us. But I don’t know if that’s really something I’d like to get into. I like her very much, you could almost say that I love her, but if she actually lived here I think there would have to be a certain amount of competition between us and I don’t know if I’m anxious to get into all that. Not just competing for Bob, although that would be a factor, I think. But, oh, the day-to-day problems you would have to have if you had two women in a house with only one kitchen! I just don’t think it would work out. I’m sure it would be absolutely impossible if we were both straight, but even though we’re bi and very into sex with each other, I still think living together would be a hassle and I don’t like to feel hassled.

Sometimes, to tell you the truth, sometimes I think that we ought to see a little less of her than we do. And that’ll very likely happen as time goes by, because in any relationship like this the novelty wears off sooner or later. One of the points of swinging is that you keep getting into sexual scenes with different people and there’s an element of novelty that keeps it exciting. I don’t like to fuck strangers in the sense of parties where you don’t even know their names, but it seems to me that developing a closed circle of friends and never seeing anyone else would more or less defeat the whole purpose of swinging.

I told you before that I never had any second thoughts about being bi, and that was the truth, but I have to admit I’ve had some thoughts on it lately. Sometimes it seems to me that maybe I’m more of a lesbian than I really want to be. I still always enjoy making love with Bob, but I’ve noticed that sometimes when I’m with another woman and her husband, I sort of wish he would go for a long walk and just leave me alone with his wife. I don’t always have this feeling. It depends on the guy, and also it depends on the woman. But if I dig her a lot, and if it’s the first time I’ve been with them, well, I’m far more interested in having her, and his presence is a drag.

I don’t know exactly what this means. I have a hunch it might be related to the sense of conquest, that I get a kick out of being the seducer, which I certainly do, and that it’s more of a job seducing a woman than a man. Maybe in bisexuality I express the masculine side of my personality, and thus I show male sex attitudes in the way I relate to a woman. I know I read in that book by Xaviera Hollander that the reason she’s butch in her bi relationships is that the whole excitement of balling another girl is the thrill of turning her out and getting her off, and I agree with that one hundred percent. I’m exactly that way myself.

Anyway, I don’t suppose it’s really anything to worry about.

LETTERS, LETTERS, LETTERS

The category of swinging is a broad one, It’s an arbitrary line that separates a married man cheating on his wife from a married man “swinging as a single.” It’s an equally arbitrary line that distinguishes between a single person participating in the swinging subculture and one who is simply leading an active social life. And I would submit that it is rather unimportant to make these distinctions; I’m far more interested in individual people and what they make of their individual lives than how best to label them and pin them to a board.

Thus, the following selection of letters, which you may or may not regard as typical of swingers, according to your own lights. You may, further, find them and the lives they lead either commendable or contemptible or somewhere in between. But I’d be more than a little surprised if you didn’t find them at all interesting.

First, a pair of letters from Jean-Paul:

Dear Jack,

I just finished Doing It! and was very favorably impressed with the concept of a column devoted to open discussion of all types of sexual activity and feelings; it seems just the item to air a truly representative range of ideas concerning sex. Although I haven’t read that magazine in a number of years, I’ll have to now start again if for nothing else than to read your column.

(All for nothing, I fear; the bloody magazine dropped the column—JWW)

I’d like to tell you about my sexual predilection and, possibly, solicit your suggestions and opinions regarding it. For many years I have been a bondage lover. My preference when having sex is to tightly bind and gag the girl and subject her to minor indignities and discomforts such as stroking her flanks with a horsehair pad or spanking or flogging her. For the past ten years I have been in the Navy and my travels over the world have given me ample opportunity to indulge my desires with prostitutes. Sometimes I do love to reverse the role and be bound and gagged myself when having sex. I suppose this may indicate a desire to be chastened for my “misdeeds” in preferring this type of activity, or it may simply mean that I am a sadomasochist rather than simply an occasional sadist.

One of my favorite incidents occurred when I was in the Philippines. I had negotiated for the evening with a lovely little high-breasted hooker. After taking her to a hotel, I managed to make her understand that I wanted to tie her up before we got down to cases. She demurred until an extra bill made its way into her hands, then she somewhat grudgingly agreed.

After I had her naked, I tied her hands behind her, lashed together her ankles and legs just over her knees, and then got my clothes off. By that time I had a huge erection; it was larger than any I could remember having previously. I took a cloth out of my pocket—I am always prepared for this sort of thing—folded it, and stepped behind her to gag her. She didn’t want that, however, and really fought like mad to jerk her head away—she had a huge scream just in the offing when the cloth jammed itself between her teeth and I tied the knot.

Suddenly she was twisting and squirming like mad trying to get free, evidently convinced that I was some madman about to do away with her. Enjoying the scene, I slowly donned my protection—Filipino whores are generally lousy with VD—and walked over to the bed. Freeing her legs, I pried them apart and set myself to the task ahead. After several minutes of screwing, she finally decided I wouldn’t hurt her and relaxed somewhat.

After I finished, a devilish plan began to form in my mind. I dressed somewhat hurriedly and tied her legs again, turned her face down on the bed, and tied her ankles and shoulders to the bed. Then I went out, hanging the “Do Not Disturb” sign on the doorknob.

For a long time afterward, I would get a thrill imagining her embarrassment when the cleaning girl finally would come in and find her tied up there. I had no fear about her getting me in trouble, since there were several ships in at that time, and I didn’t think a known prostitute would go to the authorities and admit she’d been taken advantage of or used as a genuine, rather than a surrogate, sexual object.

That was only one of my experiences abroad. I also have an extensive collection of color bondage photos and the illustrated pamphlets of the sort to be obtained in adult bookstores. I would estimate that in the past ten years I have put about eight hundred dollars into this collection. When it’s not possible for me to obtain sex in the usual way, I use various types of the books or photos as masturbatory stimuli. It’s very exciting even in this way; since I have so many photos and don’t masturbate to excess, each time I can have a different fantasy and never really run out of ideas.

I would say that my sex life is satisfactory except for the fact that I have never had any true bondage situations with my wife; she knows a little about my idiosyncrasy, but not all. At times when we indulge in horseplay we’ve tied each other, but neither of us has been tied while indulging in sex.

I would like very much to screw her while she’s helplessly bound, but am not sure exactly how to go about doing it without scaring her off the idea, or, for that matter, how to get her to do the same to me. She doesn’t know about my dealings with the prostitutes overseas, and each time I go out to sea I’m confident in the knowledge that I will be able to permit myself all the desires of my libido without danger.

When I’m home, I have and enjoy regular sex without any feeling of guilt over my actions; however, the fact that I crave passive algolagnic acts may, as I said before, indicate that subconsciously I might have guilt. At any rate, consciously it doesn’t adversely affect me. And it is exciting to know that there is a facet to my life that no one but me knows about. It reminds me greatly of what you mentioned about others getting a thrill out of keeping sexual secrets; I suppose it’s the same thing.

Well, Jack, there you have basically my sex “thing.” I was glad to be able to get it down for you and I would value your letting me know what you think about it. I know a lot of people are just like myself in their desires and so this letter won’t seem too unusual. Nonetheless, I would like to hear from you, especially in regard to what you think I could do about my wife. Also, if you’d like to hear about some of my other overseas “adventures” it’d be my pleasure to tell you about them as candidly and openly as I can.

Very truly yours,

Jean-Paul

My reply was rather perfunctory—thanking Jean-Paul for his letter, expressing interest in hearing more from him, and suggesting ways in which he might hint at his interests to his wife without exposing himself unduly. I added that he might find out she shared his fantasies and they had each been keeping it a secret from the other—this does seem to happen a great deal of the time. I also added that his enjoyment of passive S-and-M didn’t need any profound psychological interpretation, that sadism and masochism were largely two sides of the same coin, and that it was normal for him to enjoy both sides—insofar as S-and-M was to be considered normal in itself.

I received this letter a couple of weeks later:

Dear Jack,

It was good to get your recent note in reply to my letter. I took particular interest in your view that S-M devotees usually go both routes; I’d not particularly like to think of myself as having a guilt complex—after all, S-M is fun!

As far as getting my wife into the swim, I’d really like that but so far haven’t had too much luck. We have fooled around a little bit along the lines of discipline but she seems pretty hesitant to get right down to cases, and I must say I really wouldn’t want to force her into it against her desires. Time alone will tell what will become of this dilemma. We’ll just have to cross our fingers or, as the Germans say, “Drücke die Daumen!”

. . . I believe I mentioned in my last letter my rather extensive collection of photos and booklets; these can be obtained by mail with far less trouble than frequenting bookstores. You know, Jack, in these days of sexual emancipation it’s nothing at all to go into one of those stores and pick out a good collection of fuck books, but for those who like the offbeat it’s more difficult because, after all, who wants to take a chance on an acquaintance seeing one browsing through that sort of thing? This in itself might be a good topic for an article or short book—The Psychology of Adult Bookstores might be a real hot item. What do you think? The ideas just keep rollin’ along!

. . . Well, I guess that’s about all I have for the time being. I’ll keep looking for more information for you, and next time I write I’ll be sure to tell you about one of my other experiences. (It’s good to be able to share the goings-on with someone who’s genuinely interested!)

Best regards,

Jean-Paul

A fellow in the Midwest, whom I’ll call Lew, sent me a brace of rather bracing letters, which I somehow feel compelled to share with you good people. (He also sent me, as you’ll see, what he called a homemade French tickler, consisting essentially of a rubber band with some knotted yarn fitted around it, and that I won’t share with you, or indeed with anyone.)

I have no idea how much of Lew’s story is to be believed. He is, by his own admission, something of a con man, but even a con man spends a certain amount of the time telling the truth, On the other hand, as you’ll see, he had an ulterior motive in writing to me.

But enough commentary, Lew’s letters are rather a delight in their own very special way, and I’ll get out of the way and let you read them yourself.

Dear Jack,

You don’t know how nice it is to read something worthwhile for a change. I have just read your book Doing It! and it is one of the best books I have ever had the pleasure of reading,

(It’s a little embarrassing to reproduce this patent bullshit, but Lew is very big at laying it on with a shovel, as you’ll see—JWW)

Just for the heck of it I will mention a few of my experiences that certain parts of your book brought to my mind.

Did you know that a convict at the Ohio pen got electrocuted when he connected a 110-volt wire to a copper tube and inserted it into his anus? I was told this story by another ex-con about eleven years ago.

I guess he had been enjoying the sensations that the flow of current caused for quite a few weeks before he had a rather unfortunate accident. In the greenhouse he would stand on a dry board and would plug only one wire, the positive one, into an electrical outlet. Without any ground no electricity would flow, so he felt nothing. To get his gun, he would carefully touch a green plant, and this would complete the circuit and allow a small amount of current to flow into his anus. To increase the amount of flow he would touch the plant closer to the soil. All went well until he accidentally let his bare buttocks lean back against an out-of-service steam radiator. He let out a scream, crumpled to the floor, and was dead.

A week or so before his death, I experimented by placing a short copper tube in my own anus, but I employed a train transformer like the other nut in your book. I used two wires from the secondary 0-22 V. a.c. of the transformer. One wire went to the tube. The other was a thin enameled wire with a few inches cleaned at its end. This free end I wrapped around the head of my penis. Then I would very slowly regulate the rheostat on the transformer until I had enough current to produce a mild and pleasant sensation in my penis and anus.

I quit this when I got married.

Once while in grade school I got the idea of letting a nightcrawler go inside of my penis. Well, actually I never did this, but I suggested it to a classmate . . . He loved to do this.

As mentioned in your book, intercourse is great in the water. I have discovered a way that I think is wonderful. First find a pool, pond, or lake whose bottom gradually gets deeper. Then have a gal step inside an auto inner tube and pull it up under her armpits. Then both of you walk out into the water until she can wrap her legs around the back of your waist. Then, while standing you push her swimsuit to the side, and shove your hard thing in her. In the same position out of the water it is a very hard way to do it, but while the tube holds her weight up, it is wonderful. And she can even bounce up and down on it, or you can take turns doing it to each other.

Another thing that is great is the fact that, if a guy has a problem of going off too soon, he will be delighted to find that he can screw for hours in warm water, but don’t do like I did. I decided to end it up on the ground, I got sand on it, and it tore the hell out of both of us.

This brings another little story to mind, when a guy is in an outboard motor boat, and decided to take a split tail to the river bank to do it to her. Well, if you have a finger in her, watch when you reach back to shut the motor off. I touched the damn spark plug and she jumped out of the boat, calling me a no good smart alec son of a bitch, and that was the last I ever seen of her.

Well, I could go on telling stories all night, true ones, but I doubt if you are interested, so I will close. However, if you should be interested, feel free to ask me to tell you more—I need the typing practice.

Best wishes,

Lew

I wrote Lew a couple of lines saying to feel free to write more. And he took me at my word.

Dear Jack,

From a man of your importance, I considered your letter of eight or nine lines most sufficient. Please do not ever apologize because I realize that you are a very busy man and that your time is valuable.

I thank you for your letter, but please never acknowledge my letters or encourage me to continue writing just to be polite. In other words, my time is not too important, but I do not want to waste it by merely being a nuisance or a bore.

Just for the heck of it, I will briefly write about certain things. If you should ever be interested in more details relative to any of these miscellaneous inserts, feel free to request more details.

I do not mean to insult your intelligence by telling you things that might be old hat to you.

I enjoy sucking on a woman’s big toe or thumb while she is going down on me. I also enjoy having my big toe or thumb sucked on.

Recently I met a split tail who introduced me to heel nibbling. It’s a nice little extra delight. A few years ago I met a girl who called herself the human vibrator. She would tighten her lips around her tongue after taking a deep breath. When she exhaled, the air blowing out around her tongue caused her tongue to vibrate on the head of my penis. This produced a lot of noise but was very stimulating, especially when she would force the pointed end of her vibrating tongue to enter the opening at the end of my penis, which she would spread open with her fingers.

(Here follows a careful description of the enclosed homemade French tickler, with a near-endless elaboration on its special advantages—JWW)

I have experimented with the art of tongue facial massage. If interested, mention and I will describe.

I invented a device for female masturbation. It consists of merely inserting about ten steel ball bearings of about three-quarters of an inch in diameter into a children’s penny rubber balloon, the long type. It can be used as a dildo, but the most pleasure is obtained by pulling on the last ball, then allowing it to snap free. This causes a chain reaction of jolts that will really ring most women’s bells!

A few months ago I invented a phony club to aid me in the seduction of women for sex. I had some forms printed up that were supposed to be ran through a damn computer. (At least that’s what I told the gals I invited to join for free.) I also made it a point to forget to mention that I was the only male member, or that I was married.

I then sent for several female mailing lists from some real clubs. Then I sent my forms to about sixty females whose addresses I obtained from the mailing lists. These gals must have been pretty excited by the idea of meeting their ideal man, one who had been selected by a computer, because I received about 60% response from select women in this area.

I always wrote back and told all of them that the club’s brilliant sixty-thousand-dollar computer had selected a certain man named Lew as their ideal mate. And I had all the data on each of them, so I had little trouble in being most compatible with each of them.

They never did find out I was running the club, let alone guess that I was its sole male member. M-m-m-m-m, it was a lot of fun, and I got to make it with some delicious split tails, but I made a graceful exit as soon as I had sampled each of them. However, I do still keep a couple of the best ones on the string. That’s enough besides my wife, I’m getting too old to take care of more.

Enclosed is one of the club business cards. Altogether I had about thirty dollars invested in that little scheme. It don’t take very long to waste that much in bar-hopping, or going to cat houses.

. . . By the way, I have a girl friend who I have taught to strengthen her puckering muscles by certain exercises. She can put a grape in her pussy and squeeze the juice out of it. We are going to try to make a little wine—would you care for a sip of it?

. . . By the way, in case you wonder why I go out of my way to try to be of help to you, well, Jack, I do have a small motive. You see it’s like this. I have what I call my bag of tricks. In this bag I have a photo of me sitting in someone’s fancy two-engine flying machine like I own it. (I almost went to jail when this grouchy old bastard thought I was trying to steal that damn old airplane and called the police. I had a hell of a time convincing them that I just wanted to have my picture taken.)

And I had to do some fancy talking to keep from getting the dog poop kicked out of me when another sourpuss caught me on his yacht posing for a few photos, especially when he saw I was wearing his fancy cap and brass-buttoned coat.

I also have a few phony medals and trophies for doing things that I only read about and know how to bullshit about. I have a few phony letters that are supposed to be from certain women thanking me for helping them when they were down and out. I wrote most of them myself. And I have a few phony diplomas, degrees, etc.

Well, if you ever get the time, and think that I deserve it, I wish and hope that you might type me a letter to add to my bag of wonderful tricks.

Below I will give you an example of the sort of letter that I would love to receive. But it would not have to be exactly as I have written it. Just so it’ll look impressive to some of the gals that I happen to meet.

Dear Lewis,

I made a special trip to your town to see you when I was in the area last week, and I felt bad because I did not get to meet you.

I am thinking about writing another book, and wanted to discuss it with you, as I consider your suggestions and comments very important.

I also thought that I would try once more to encourage you to write a book. It’s a shame that all of your talent is being wasted. And you should want to share your great knowledge and wisdom with the world. Besides I feel almost certain that your books would be big sellers. The next time I am near your home I will try to visit you again. I feel that I must talk to you before I go any farther with my new ideas relative to the book that I am considering writing. I will even make a special trip if necessary.

Best wishes.

Of course, Jack, you would know how to really make such a letter sound even better, and less phony. Especially if you typed it on your stationery with your letterhead.

Best wishes,

Lew

You may be surprised to learn that I did send Lew a somewhat restrained version of the letter he requested. Audacity of such dimension should not go wholly unrewarded, certainly. Then too, there is something appealing in the thought of someone getting laid on the strength of a letter from me. To round out this little collection of correspondence, here is a pair of letters from Richard. His swinging, as we’ll see, is very much a function of his preference for oral sex.

Dear Jack:

I just finished two of your books. I like your style. To me the material is very interesting.

It strikes me that I read something in the last book that gave me the impression that you and I are about the same age. I’m a Scorpio, if it makes any difference. They say it does. Anyway, I’m not mean, vindictive, or a jealous person as we Scorpians are supposed to be. Just horny. Always have been. Whenever work isn’t on my mind, sex is. I think it, breathe it, dream it, and eat it.

Now that last is one of the reasons I decided to write to you . . .

Basically, I guess you would say I’m a cunnilinguist. When I read that Havelock Ellis preferred cunnilingus, it made me feel better. He wrote, “It was only by intimate contact that one might know or divine the scent and the taste of the mysterious salts and essences that distilled from the guarded places of her form.”

I agree with him 100%. I found out when I was a kid that I could get more response out of the girls this way. Better than jumping on and banging hell out of them. Things were over too fast that way and I liked (and still do) to draw out my lovemaking. Of course, I would end up in the usual fashion a good many times. Maybe one-third of the time I wouldn’t. It suited me okay because I’ve always been one to enjoy pleasing my female friends. Not to brag, but I’ve had many.

I’ve never yet known a girl or woman that didn’t enjoy it. If it was new to them, after they found out about it they wanted more. Straight intercourse has never been a problem to me. I’ve got the equipment. I suppose there are people who would say I should see a shrink. I say, “What for?” I like the way I am and so do a lot of my friends . . . If you think I’m nuts, tell me. Maybe I am . . .

Sincerely,

Richard

In my reply, I assured Richard that he didn’t sound sick to me, that not a few men have worked out a code of ethics to the effect that, if they didn’t like a woman enough to eat her, they did not want to ball her at all. And I quoted the words of the immortal Vince Planko: “Show me a guy who won’t eat his girl and I’ll show you a broad I can steal.”

That elicited this reply:

Dear Jack:

The Code of Ethics you mentioned really hit me. It sounds so much like the statement I have made many times which has shocked a number of people. I’ve always said, “If a girl don’t look good enough to eat, I’m not interested.” Fact is, I think there is no stronger way to show a woman that you really like her. No more intimate way to show her that you care.

On my first date with my present wife, I took her home with me, and as soon as I could I went down on her, and that was all I did on that first date. She didn’t tell me then, but later she let me know that she was pissed off. She later told me that when I took her back to where she left her car she didn’t care if she ever saw me again. She felt I didn’t think she was nice enough to lay. Well, since then I’ve got her thinking straightened out and we’ve got an excellent relationship.

We are not swingers in the true sense of the word but we each have friends of the opposite sex. She let me know that she didn’t care who I balled, but she didn’t ever want to hear of me eating any box but hers. I guess you know that I’ve got to be careful because I’d rather eat it than ball it.

I should apologize for not writing sooner but I have been busy as hell. My boss took his vacation and I had to take his place for two weeks. With my other activities, I’ve been as busy as the famous one-armed paper hanger.

I have a second job where I do maintenance work in one of our local figure salons. I’ve had this job for a little over two years. The women that go there are not all pigs trying to get skinny. Some are trying to develop certain areas of their bodies and some are just trying to keep in shape. One thing is for sure they are all there because they want to look sexy and to be wanted as women.

I guess it’s a good thing I am what I am—a Cunt Eater. If I had to ball all these women, all of them eager to prove they are desirable to the opposite sex, I’d be a living dishrag—if I was living at all. Instead I’ve made a lot of women happy and enjoyed myself in the process.

It’s funny how many married women feel it’s okay for some guy to go down on them, but that they are only to be fucked by their husbands. Some feel that sixty-nine is the only way to go but they don’t do it at home. Of course, this makes me happy, so I’m not complaining too much. Usually, when I’m eating pussy, I don’t want anyone eating me—it distracts me.

About a year ago, the girl that runs the salon, who is living with a local advertising man, came to me when I was making my usual check of the torture machines—my name for the equipment. She said, “Richard, will you do me?” I asked her what she meant and she didn’t hesitate a second. She said, “I’ve heard about you, and the guy I’m living with won’t eat me, and I’m so hot to be eaten, I’m about crazy.”

I tipped my head toward her office and we went in. I asked her if she was sure she wanted me to do it and not the guy she’s living with. She assured me that she wanted to try. She told me her guy would only fuck her and she had learned that there was more to sex than screwing.

We went over to their apartment. He was at work. Up to two weeks ago we’ve made it twice a week ever since. She’s absolutely delicious. She’s not one of those sixty-nine girls but who cares. I know she is using me to fill in what she can’t get from the other guy. He’s missing the best part of the woman he’s living with. He’s getting old fucking her while I’m getting young sucking up those delicious juices.

I might be fifty-five, but I’ll go up against any thirty-five-year-old and I attribute it all to the juices of my women. John D. Rockefeller drank mother’s milk. I drink cunt milk. It’s the fountain of youth.

I guess I sound like I’ll eat anything, but I won’t. The woman has to be clean and attractive and send out good vibes to me or it’s no go. I also might say that it’s the better-educated and higher-class women who are interested in cunnilingus. Some I’m sure have lesbian tendencies, but when they can have a man do to them what another woman would, they feel better about it. Suits me fine. I get a real kick out of being able to bring them to repeated orgasm. I’m sure you know what I mean, Jack. Of course, the books all say if you suck ’em you should fuck ’em, but I don’t feel that way any more than you do. Or do you?

Of course, some women just have to feel the meat inside them, and I’m always happy to oblige, but most of them have had it when I’ve brought them off several times. Some are apologetic about being exhausted and not taking care of me. Some say next time they will fix me. Some say thanks and put on their clothes and go home.

I just wait until I get home and fuck hell out of my wife. Or she goes down on me—she is quite expert at it. With my wife we can go sixty-nine perfectly.

Well, Jack, I guess this is enough for now, if I’m ever going to get it in the mail and go to work. The salon manager and I had our little party this morning and I am running a little short of time.

Hope I haven’t bored you with all of this, but I’ve enjoyed writing and will do more if you want. I’d sure like to hear more from you.

Until next time,

Sincerely,

Richard

ERICA

Erica is an attractive woman of twenty-nine, slender, with bleached blond hair. The original color, she has explained, is that of a field mouse. She has light brown eyes, which she frequently conceals behind dark wrap-around sunglasses. At the present time she lives alone on the West Side of Manhattan. At the time of writing, that is; it’s not unlikely that she’ll be living with someone by the time you read this.

I saw Erica around the neighborhood any number of times before we met. We would nod to each other when our paths crossed. Often I saw her sitting alone, reading a book or newspaper at a local coffeehouse. Several times I’d see her having a drink or a bite to eat with a man about her age, and then for a period of time I saw her walking hand in hand with a woman a few years older than herself. Once I saw the two of them emerging from a bar which has a clientele that is almost exclusively lesbian. I assumed that Erica was a lesbian, and found nothing particularly astonishing in the idea, lesbians are by no means uncommon around these parts.

Eventually we got past the nodding stage to the chatting stage. I was strongly attracted to Erica, but did not even consider acting upon this attraction, both because of my assumption of her homosexuality and because I was involved at the time at what looked to be a potentially meaningful relationship. The relationship turned out to be not so meaningful after all, and Erica turned out to be not homosexual but bisexual. Even so, Erica and I have never managed to get it together, as the kiddies say. We have, however; become rather good friends over the past several months, and she has told me quite a bit about her life.

The material which follows represents a distillation of any number of conversations over an extended period of time. Because of the nature of our relationship, I never interviewed Erica per se. But the following is essentially in her own voice, arranged rather more chronologically than I originally learned it.

•  •  •

I think that the best result of the sexual revolution might be the recognition of bisexuality. Of course, people already recognize that some people are bisexual, that it’s possible to love persons of either sex, but there’s knowing this and really knowing it. I have the feeling that kids are growing up nowadays with a deeper awareness of this, certainly a deeper awareness than I grew up with, and maybe a deeper understanding of it than I have even now.

What I mean is this—I know that I’m bisexual, I’ve had a lot of relationships with men and a lot of relationships with women, and I live alone now and pick my lovers for themselves and not for their sexual identity, but even so I’m not that secure in my identity as a bisexual woman. It’s difficult to put this insecurity into words. As an example, say I’ve been having a relationship with a woman, and it ends, and then I get involved in a relationship with a man. Well, at the onset of that relationship, there’s a voice inside me which says: Well, Erica baby, you’re over that unnatural phase now and you’re fulfilling your normal, healthy, heterosexual self. And then later on, when that relationship ends, and I’m getting it on with a woman, the same voice pipes up and says: Well, Erica baby, you made another of your desperate guilt-ridden stabs at being like everybody else, and as usual it didn’t work, and now you’re being true to your basic nature as a lesbian.

On an intellectual level, I know that neither homosexuality nor heterosexuality is “normal” for me, or rather, that one is as normal as the other. Neither is the exclusive representation of my true nature, whatever that is. I’m fundamentally bisexual, attracted to either men or women more for themselves than for abstract reasons. I know this, Jack, but on some gut level I don’t entirely believe it.

One indication of my uncertainty is that, in one way at least, I do choose sexual partners on the basis of their sex. What I’m getting at is that I almost always switch from one sex to the other. lf I’ve broken off with a man, my next lover will be a woman. If my last lover was a woman, my next will be a man. This doesn’t count casual contacts, there’s no pattern in them, but as far as serious relationships are concerned, there’s this pendulum effect; I go from one sex to the other and back again.

I don’t know whether or not this is typical in bisexuality. I can see how it might be, because I don’t plan it this way, I don’t literally say to myself, “Well, I’ve just broken off with a woman, so the next person I’ll be strongly drawn to in terms of an intense relationship will have to be a man.” It just works out that way.

•  •  •

Erica’s background is upper-middle class. She is an only child. Her parents were divorced when she was four or five years old. She does not remember the divorce, and says she has little recollection of her early childhood. Her father was a chemical engineer; he was frequently abroad, and spent the greater portion of his time in Latin America. Before the divorce her parents had traveled together from job to job. After the marriage terminated, Erica and her mother moved back to the mother’s original home town, an industrial city in eastern Pennsylvania.

When Erica was ten years old, her mother was found to have a virulent form of cancer, which killed her in less than a year. Erica lived with her grandmother for a year and a half. The grandmother seems to have been either eccentric or dotty, depending on one’s point of view. Erica thought at the time that the woman was as nutty as a pecan orchard, but is now inclined to accept her as highly individualistic. (She ate only cashew nuts on Mondays and Thursdays but dined more or less normally on other days, for example.) After a year and a half of this, during which time Erica developed a loathing for cashew nuts that has endured to the present day, her father returned to take custody of her.

The rest of her childhood and adolescence was spent largely at boarding schools. She attended six or seven schools and did poorly at all of them in spite of a high IQ. She talked her father into withdrawing her from some of the schools. She left a couple of the others at the schools’ suggestion; not only was her scholarship weak, but she was something of a discipline problem.

It was at one of these schools that she had her first significant sexual experience.

•  •  •

I don’t know if there’s more sex at boarding schools than there is anywhere else. I think it does become a great deal more obvious there, because it’s a completely closed environment and everybody knows a lot about what everybody else is doing. Also, the sex is a lot more likely to be homosexual in nature, not because boarding school girls are fundamentally lesbian but because they’re fundamentally sexual, and there’s very little opportunity for sexual outlets with boys.

There’s a lot of talk about boarding schools turning you into a homosexual. From what I understand, most of the schools nowadays have either turned coeducational or are in the process of turning, so maybe there’s little point in speculating about the whole thing.

I suppose the obvious analogy would be to prisons. From what I’ve read, there’s a tremendous amount of homosexuality in prisons, and to a large extent it’s because it’s the only game in town—men are deprived of women so they turn to one another for sex. Of course, there are prisoners who are gay or bi on the outside, but there are also men who engage in homosexual relations without a qualm while in prison and revert to absolutely straight behavior on the outside.

Of course, there’s a difference between adult prisoners who have already pretty well defined their approach to sex and young kids who have had little or no prior experience. I would think it would be easier to shrug off a homosexual relationship as “just something I did while I was in jail” than it would be to have your whole sexual awakening take place with a roommate or a girlfriend and then try to tell yourself later that it was because there were no boys around.

Although now that I think of it, there were a lot of girls who did more or less that, but in slightly different terms. The sexual relations they had with one another they later passed off as “just kid stuff,” or they explained to themselves that they had been “going through a normal developmental phase.” Depending on the intellectual level of their rationalizations, you might say.

The first school I went to, I was there less than a year, and while I assume there was sex happening, I was not aware of it at the time. I’m sure it was going on around me, if not with girls as young as I was, because I’ve never heard of a boarding school that didn’t have a certain percentage of the girls fooling around with each other. Nor have I ever heard of one where all the girls, or even most of the girls, were into lesbianism. You read about schools like that in cheap fiction, but I’ve never heard of one yet.

The second school I went to wasn’t a bad place generally. Its academic rating was high, and there was a certain social cachet to having gone there. I was there for two years, and it was there that I first had a sexual experience. As a matter of fact, you could say that it was there that I first really became aware of the existence of sex. My mother hadn’t told me anything before she died, and of course my father was never around long enough to tell me anything, not that he’d have been inclined, and my grandmother—well, it’s hard for me to believe she even knew anything. And at that first school I was very withdrawn and everything and never reached the stage of sharing secret information with my classmates.

At the second school, though, I learned rather quickly about the mechanics of sex, what it did and what it was for, and that it was supposed to feel heavenly. (I had known some of the biological information previously, but, honestly, very little.) I also learned that there were certain kinds of girls who liked each other and didn’t like men, and there were rumors about certain of the instructors, implying that they were of this sort. I suppose some of them were.

While we recognized this specific category of girl as a lesbian we were still capable of getting involved in lesbian behavior without recognizing it as such, both in terms of acts and emotions. On the emotional angle, it was possible to have a crush on a teacher or older girl where you revered her and saw her as the ultimate in female sophistication and beauty, without thinking of the girl in specifically sexual terms, without wanting to have sex with her, and without having your friends necessarily regard the crush as homosexual in nature. As a matter of fact, I think a lot of those crushes are not sexual at root. When you have no parent around, and no older sister, and you’re looking for someone to model yourself on, you can have a crush on someone and it can really consist of a desire to be like that person, to emulate that person, rather than a desire to have sex with her.

In physical terms, it was very easy to find yourself experimenting with another girl sexually in much the same way that you might dance with another girl. We had dances frequently—you were supposed to develop social graces that way—and we would pair off and one girl would take the boy’s part and lead and the other girl would take the girl’s part and follow. And in plays certain girls would have to play male roles because there were no boys around to play them. This was not thought of as a sexual thing, and it really wasn’t; there was simply no other way to learn to dance, or to present any play other than one set in a convent, or something like that.

In the same way, girls might find themselves taking turns “playing the male role” in sexual experimentation. Like, two girls might be talking about kissing, and what it might be like, and whether it was enjoyable, and if it was disgusting or exciting to have someone else’s tongue in your mouth, or whatever; and one would suggest that one or the other pretend to be a boy in order to find out what the whole thing was like. In another environment, with boys available for this sort of experimentation, I suppose less of this would have gone on. But even in a coeducational school the same thing happens for certain girls, not necessarily because they have a predisposition to homosexuality or anything like that, but because they aren’t popular and aren’t sought out by boys and yet have the same interest in learning about these things that everyone else has.

I remember one night I was sitting around talking with a girl named Winifred. She was called Neigh, as in Whinny, as in a nickname for Winifred. Well, Neigh and I were talking about kissing and boys and sex and so on, and it was exciting, not because either of us was turned on by the other, but because the conversational topics were stimulating in and of themselves. And the idea came up—I don’t honestly know who suggested it—that we could take turns being the boy and see what it was like. Kissing each other and that sort of thing.

I guess I was thirteen years old at the time. Twelve and a half or thirteen.

So we did, and it was very interesting and very exciting. We first danced, with her leading, and then she gazed solemnly into my eyes and kissed me. It was very moving, a very moving experience. She kissed me quite a few times, and it was certainly a sexual turn-on for me, and I believe it had the same effect on her.

We did this over a period of several hours, taking turns playing the male role both in dancing and kissing, although I don’t know just what we thought constituted the male role in kissing. Probably being the first one to initiate the activity or something like that. We were French-kissing, putting our tongues into each other’s mouths and hugging each other close. One thing I remember quite vividly is that Neigh was very well developed compared to most of us at that age. This is a fancy way of saying that her tits were a lot larger than mine, when you come right down to it.

I didn’t come right down to it. Meaning, I didn’t go down on her or get into anything sexually heavy with her. It’s so hard to explain this. It was sexual and yet it wasn’t sexual. Maybe what it amounts to is that it was sexual for me but not for Neigh. Or that it was sexual for both of us, but that I could recognize this in certain ways, while she was not prepared to. I remember, for instance, that I had private fantasies of carrying things much further. The two of us never got past a little minor breast-stroking, and that with our clothes on, but when I was lying awake at night and trying to sleep, I would imagine us going much much further than that. I had a devilish little imagination. I fantasied us lying nude in each other’s arms in the standard coital position—which at the time I thought was the only coital position—and rubbing our yummy little pussies together as if we were a man and a woman fucking.

Incidentally, I thought for the longest time that I had invented this idea. I was rather stunned to know that girls had been doing this with other girls ever since Sappho held court on that island.

It was around this time that I found out about masturbation. I had already discovered that it was pleasant to touch myself. I was especially interested in touching my breasts, which were beginning to develop about then, although they weren’t setting any records. I think this touching was more a matter of luxuriating in myself as a developing woman than masturbation as such, but it did provide a physical pleasure. And I also touched my genitals and found that enjoyable, but I didn’t know it could lead to anything.

Then one girl was talking about it, about masturbation, I think she was saying something to the effect that her roommate was at it all the time, that she used to do it when she thought the other girls were sleeping, and she talked about how she would get all hot and make these wild sounds and then moan into her pillow when she got off. I didn’t know much about this whole concept of getting off but I was interested in finding out, and I began handling myself rather more forcefully and I found out what an orgasm was.

It wasn’t long before I was a really fantastic little masturbator. I’ve read a lot on the subject of masturbation guilt and have always wondered why I never seemed to have any. It seems that this applies more to boys than to girls. Maybe it’s that the male orgasm is a more concrete thing, it leaves evidence in the form of a puddle of sperm on the sheets, while a female orgasm is just something you feel. Or maybe society is more uptight about inhibiting male masturbation. In any case, I was completely cool on the subject. I did it in private, generally while I was waiting to fall asleep, and fantasizing about all the things Neigh and I would never get around to doing. I was quiet about it, too. But not out of what I would call guilt. It was more the feeling that this was something it would be somewhat embarrassing to be caught doing.

Gradually Neigh and I stopped our experimentation. As I said, it never went beyond a little breast fondling and some deep kissing, and instead of getting passionate in the course of it, we usually wound up giggling, so the relationship had to either get more intense or stop. And it stopped.

The next girl I got involved with was something very different. She was almost two years older than me, a tall brunette with a willowy body and very strong facial features—a hawk nose, a sharp chin, and really deep-set eyes. You know the women they have in sadomasochistic pornography, with the ten-inch high-heeled boots and the whips? Barbara would have been a perfect model for that sort of thing.

Barbara picked me out. Just as some younger girls have crushes on older ones, some of the older ones with butch temperaments will develop passions for younger girls, or less-experienced girls. I sort of noticed Barbara taking notice of me but didn’t pay much attention to it, probably because of my naïveté on the subject. She would linger around so that our paths crossed, and she would look me up and down, and otherwise give off signals that I might have picked up on.

Then she used an intermediary. She had a girl in my class come up to me and tell me that Barbara thought a great deal of me. This puzzled me, because I couldn’t imagine why anyone would think much of me at all, as I didn’t think all that much of myself at the time.

“Barbara likes you, Erica,” I was told. “She was wondering if you liked her.”

“Well, sure,” I said. “I think she’s neat.” Or something dumb like that.

I guess my words were duly reported back to Barbara, and a day or two later she invited me to have a Coke. She paid for the Cokes and we talked about all sorts of things, none of which I can presently remember. She said she wanted us to be special friends. Now about this point I knew exactly what she meant. I had sort of half suspected it earlier, and now there was no question in my mind. So in no sense did she seduce me. When I agreed that I wanted to be her special friend, I was agreeing to have sex with her. No question.

Even so, we didn’t do anything for the first couple of days. We would arrange to meet each other and we would walk around holding hands. We spent quite a bit of time together.

In the meantime, I had of course completely incorporated Barbara into my masturbation fantasies. I was very highly sexed right then, very stimulated at the thought of having sex with Barbara, and none too clear as to who would do what and with which and to whom, but I figured she was the leader and, same as in dancing, all I had to do was follow her lead.

As it turned out, the physical seduction, if you want to call it that, did follow some dancing. She invited me up to her dormitory room to hear some records, and we danced to them, and of course she took the male part and did the leading, and she held me very close to her so that our bodies pressed and rubbed together, and after we had danced to a couple of records she put her hands on my shoulders and held me at arm’s length, and we looked into each other’s eyes, and then we were kissing.

It was nothing like kissing Neigh. It was extremely passionate, and a few moments later Barbara was wedging a chair against the doorknob so that nobody could open the door, and very soon afterward we were in bed together. She did things I hadn’t even thought about and most of the things I had thought about as well. She was completely the initiator, which was quite as it should have been, because she was the one who knew what we were doing.

She made a tremendous fuss over my breasts, which really made me feel wonderful, because I felt hers were so much larger and nicer and I had been worried that mine would turn her off. When she went down on me I was completely astonished. I had thought she was just getting ready to look at me down there, and then I felt something wonderful without knowing what it was, and then I realized she was licking me and I almost fainted, but it felt so good that I stopped even thinking about whether it was decent or not and just swooned off into a dazzling come that was a hundred times as strong as anything I’d managed with my grubby little fingers.

She was not only my first sexual partner—unless you count Neigh, who doesn’t really count. She was also my first real relationship, because we were together for a couple of months, and I didn’t have anyone else during that time, and I don’t think she did either.

I don’t think I was in love with her. We would talk about how we loved each other and how it wasn’t just sex. I don’t think I really meant it, although I probably believed it at the time. I think Barbara may well have been in love with me, but maybe that’s just ego on my part, that I wanted to believe it, even that I still want to believe it.

There was a very definite butch-femme distinction in our relationship, with Barbara the butch and me the femme. By this I don’t mean she was mannish in manner. She wasn’t. But she was dominant, and also she was the aggressor sexually. Her main interest was in bringing me to orgasm. That was the most important thing for her.

God, she was certainly good at it! She knew a tremendous amount about sex, and she had what I guess you could legitimately call a natural talent. Her eyes were a tremendously seductive instrument. She could get me wet just by giving me a long look. I could melt just meeting her eyes. And she had slender hands with very long fingers, and she let her fingernails grow, and she would play her nails along the tops of my thighs and sometimes I could come just from that. And she loved to eat me, and I adored being eaten, and sometimes we would be together like that for hours and I came more times than I could possibly keep track of.

Of course, I wanted to do the same for her, and although at the beginning of our relationship she made it clear that she didn’t want to switch roles, we did so occasionally. I was very anxious to find out what it was like, how it felt to do it to someone, and it wasn’t as though she disliked it, just that she preferred the butch role. I was able to make her have an orgasm, but she evidently got more pleasure out of making me come than of coming herself. I didn’t understand this at the time. In later relationships with other girls I found the same thing happening myself. It would depend on my partner, on the type of person she was and how I felt about her. I do know, though, that the relationships with other women that have had the most devastating effect on me, the ones that have injured me most when they turned sour, were ones in which I preferred a butch role and got my greatest pleasure from the pleasure I was able to give the other person.

Of course, not all relationships have a butch-femme division, and for me personally, I think I’m most genuinely comfortable when there’s no such distinction, or a vaguely defined one. I have a theory that the butch in a relationship plays a dominant role on the surface but is actually very subtly dominated by the femme, and is the one who does most of the giving and sustains most of the pain.

I still think of Barbara from time to time. I can remember just what her body was like and just how she made me feel. I’m not usually like that; I have a tendency to lose interest in partners once they move out of my life, and I cease to think often of them or to care a great deal about them. But Barbara was special, if only because she was the first. A couple of years ago I learned that she had killed herself. I don’t remember the details. I hadn’t seen her or heard from her in I don’t know how many years, and I had ceased to believe that she was still important to me in any way, but when I heard she was dead it went through me like a dose of salts. I was shaky and weepy for days.

•  •  •

Despite its impact, Erica’s relationship with Barbara lasted only a matter of months. It ended with the close of the school term, and after summer vacation, spent partly with her father and partly with an aunt and uncle, she was entered at yet another school.

For the next several years her contacts were exclusively homosexual. Although she knew rather little about homosexuality at the time she began with Barbara, she was to learn a great deal about it during the following years, through both firsthand experience and considerable reading. She had several intensive affairs and a great many casual conquests.

•  •  •

Lesbians don’t usually go in for hit-and-run sex the way so many faggots do. Not all faggots, of course, but for a great many of the ones I’ve known there’s a great kick in having sex with total strangers in the park or a public toilet, and another kick in keeping score and seeing how many numbers you can run. I don’t think there’s any equivalent of this among gay girls. I’ve known guys who would talk dreamily about some time when they were on their knees in a lavatory taking on all comers, maybe going down on two or three dozen men in the course of a day. I’ve never known a lesbian who wouldn’t find that concept distasteful in the extreme. Possibly it’s because the idea of compulsive loveless promiscuity is compatible with male sexuality but not with female sexuality.

This doesn’t mean I can’t enjoy a one-night thing. I can, with either a man or a woman. But only if I have some sort of feeling for the person, not necessarily an emotional feeling, but something that makes the person special to me, if only for one night. There was a time when I was a lot more aggressive sexually than I’ve ever been since. My last year at school and my first two years in college—my only two years in college, actually. I took a special pleasure then in spotting a girl who had never had homosexual relations and bringing her out. I behaved more or less like a female Don Juan in such occasions. I wasn’t like that constantly, but if I saw a girl, preferably a younger or less experienced girl, and if she turned me on, I would launch a long campaign to get her.

You would be surprised how often I was successful. In this respect I would say that it’s easier for a female homosexual than a male. There’s not as much inhibition about lesbianism, and girls who are fairly sure of themselves as heterosexuals may be willing to give it a try just to see what it’s all about.

As for my own motivations, I’m not too sure what they were at the time. A large part of it, I’m sure, was a desire to reassure myself of my sexual expertise and my attractiveness. I had grown up thinking of myself as unattractive, and it’s taken a lot of sexual success to show me otherwise. I was never fond of my body or of my facial appearance, I didn’t think I was pretty, and being accepted on a sexual basis does a lot to improve anyone’s self-image.

For another thing, I was having a lot of trouble defining and accepting my sexual identity. I had no understanding of the concept of bisexuality at the time, and was ambivalent in my feelings about being a lesbian. I didn’t doubt that I was a lesbian, but wasn’t sure how I felt about it. Sometimes I tried to assert myself as homosexual, to behave in an unmistakably homosexual fashion, as if to prove that I accepted my place in life—which is one reason I went to quite so many schools. It was all right to be gay, they didn’t dare expel everybody who was like that, but it was emphatically not all right to be so patently obvious about it.

Still, this was obviously a method of proving something to myself, and something I didn’t entirely believe. If I was so sure I was gay, and so content to be gay, I wouldn’t have been going to bed with boys.

•  •  •

Erica had sex with several boys before she entered college. One was a boy she met on a dance weekend. The others, including an older man, were liaisons arranged during summer vacation and semester break.

•  •  •

The first time was terrible. I didn’t know the boy, he wasn’t attractive or personable, and I was just using him in the same way that he was using me. He wanted to get laid and I wanted to find out whether or not I was Dumb Dora Dyke. It was a fiasco, of course. He didn’t know anything at all about exciting me. A little kissing—I remember his breath was awful—and a little cumbersome breast-squeezing, and then zoom for the main target. I don’t suppose he knew what a clitoris was, or where it was located. He just jabbed his finger in and out in an annoying way. Then he got his cock in me, and it hurt, and he gave a couple of thrusts and considerately took his cock out in time to squirt all over my skirt, which was bunched up over my belly.

The whole thing was more distasteful and unpleasant than it was painful, and there was absolutely no pleasure in it. I think it would have been an awful enough introduction to screwing for a totally inexperienced girl, but it was considerably worse in my case, because instead of having to worry that I was frigid, well, I knew I wasn’t frigid. I had been with girls who really knew how to excite me, and I had had very enjoyable sexual relations with them, and on the other hand I had had this terrible experience with this clod. I came to the obvious conclusion that I was a lesbian, as I’d always thought I was, and I came to the further conclusion that no woman really enjoyed having a man fuck her, because, after all, what was there to enjoy?

I thought the sperm was awful, too. Coming all over my skirt like that, the whole idea made me want to gag, and I developed a distaste for sperm that lasted for a long time.

Even now, when I’m going down on a man, I have to love him quite a bit in order to want him to come in my mouth. And even then I have to almost consciously suppress the gagging reflex.

The fact that I kept trying with other boys certainly indicates I wasn’t that secure about being a lesbian. And I had better luck with other lovers. It wasn’t until I picked up an older man, though, that I really had any reason to expect that I was bisexual. I did get a certain amount of pleasure with some of the boys I balled, but it was nothing spectacular, nothing to compare to the pleasure I received from female lovers.

The man—I’m sure it’s a weird mental block that keeps me from remembering his name—was someone I met on summer vacation before I started college. I had a job at a children’s camp in New England, not as a counselor, but as a sort of Gal Friday to the Camp Director, typing, and answering phones and running errands. I took the job because a girl I was close to was also going to be working there, and then she came down with mononucleosis, and I took the job anyway because I didn’t know what else to do with the summer. But I didn’t have anything going for me in the way of sex and I wasn’t interested in anyone on the staff, and also was afraid to come on to anybody because I didn’t want to lose the job.

I used to get one day a week off, a day and a night, and the usual policy was to hitch into the nearby town and catch a movie or something, and usually hitch back the same evening, rather than pay for a room anywhere. This one afternoon I went to a movie and then went somewhere for a cup of coffee, and this man and I got to talking. I don’t really think his main objective was to pick me up. I think it just started as an ordinary conversation.

He probably reminded me of my father. I wasn’t conscious of this at the time, but I can’t think of any other explanation for the fact that at one moment we were having a perfectly innocuous conversation about nothing important and the next minute I was baring my soul to him, telling him everything about my sex life and how I was a stone lesbian and like that.

He wasn’t really that old. I suppose he was in his mid-thirties. Which gives you an idea how young I was, thinking of him as an Older Man.

He was marvelous at drawing me out. I told him absolutely everything, and he said it sounded to him as though I was more likely to be bisexual than exclusively homosexual, both because of my personality and the fact that I had not always been a hundred percent turned-off with boys. We talked about this, and eventually he said he’d like very much to make love to me, if only for the sake of experimentation.

I wasn’t surprised when he said this. I was already thinking of him in sexual terms. Possibly this was an oedipal thing, or it may have been more a case of his being the first man I’d ever had an intimate conversation with. He was the first man I’d ever had sexual feelings about, certainly. I’d responded after a fashion to other boys in the course of sex, but I’d never had a specific urge for any of them before getting down to business.

We went to a hotel, and I discovered the difference between making it with a sensitive and experienced man and making it with a crude and inexperienced boy, and I found out it was all the difference in the world. He took a great deal of time to excite me, and actually brought me to orgasm several times before we got down to the serious business of fucking. When he was inside me I experienced real pleasure. It was the first time I’d ever experienced true pleasure in feeling a penis inside me. It was a wonderful feeling. Most important, it was a completely new kind of pleasure, and one that was categorically different from any sort of pleasure attainable with another woman. It was different. Not better, necessarily, but different.

He was able to sustain intercourse for a long time, an amazingly long time, and I had a very strong orgasm before he was finished. I don’t know if there’s any such thing as a vaginal orgasm, or if it’s better or worse than a clitoral orgasm, or any of that bullshit. I do know that I’ll go along with Germaine Greer to a degree when she says that a clitoral orgasm feels even better if you happen to have a cock inside you at the time. I think that’s more or less the way she put it. I never saw him after that night. I stayed all night with him in the hotel room, and he gave me a lift back to camp the next day, but he never suggested getting together again and I didn’t want to bring it up. Actually, I wasn’t entirely sure whether I wanted to see him again or not. I’d had a wonderful time and learned some important things about myself, but I think at the same time I was afraid of getting deeply involved with him. I’m almost certain he was married, although he never said so and I never asked. I’m sure he was, though, and I was generally nervous about getting hung up on him. I did go back to the place we met a couple of times, and of course I was hoping to run into him again, but as it turned out, either he was avoiding me or we just never happened to be at the same place at the same time.

He did give me one thing that was more important to me than a night of pleasure. He made me aware that there honestly was such a thing as bisexuality, and that I was bisexual myself. The discovery was both good and bad.

I wonder if I can explain that intelligently.

Well, it was good to know that I could respond to a person independent of their sex. It was good to know that I had the option of sex with a man or a woman, that I wasn’t cut off from the “normal” life of marriage and children. It was good to know that I could pick my own life-style without being automatically limited to life as a homosexual.

But it was also very difficult when you realize that I was having a lot of trouble establishing an identity in the first place. At least before this I had a certain tenuous hold on my identity as a lesbian. Now I wasn’t absolutely gay and I wasn’t absolutely straight, and that made it harder than ever for me to know just who in hell I was.

•  •  •

Her experience with the older man ultimately launched Erica into a sexual life-style which she has essentially pursued to the present. She alternated between male and female lovers, turning almost automatically from man to woman and back again. Neither relationship alone seemed to fulfill her sufficiently. An affair would be fully exciting at its onset, but before very long she would feel a strong urge for sex with a partner of the opposite sex from her lover.

Sometimes these pendulum swings from homosexuality to heterosexuality and back again involved nothing more than a change of partners. At other times they were accompanied by dramatic behavioral changes; once, upon taking a shy younger girl as a lover, Erica begun dressing in extremely masculine garb, all the way to jockey shorts. And on another swing of the pendulum she got married.

•  •  •

Getting married was absolutely the worst thing I could do, and at the time it seemed absolutely essential. I’d just had a very rotten time of it with a girl who was something of an emotional sadist, and I was rocky and suicidal, and I interpreted all of this emotional pain as being inherent in homosexuality. I decided that bisexuality was simply not a viable option, that you had to be all one thing or all the other. That a person might legitimately have bisexual impulses, that it was highly probable that everybody had bisexual impulses, but that somewhere along the way, consciously or unconsciously, you had to decide which side you were on and spend the rest of your life being one thing or the other.

And I decided that I couldn’t be happy as a lesbian, and thus that I had to put homosexuality out of my life once and forever. I knew I enjoyed sex with men, and it didn’t seem impossible for me to find a man and marry him and have his babies and be a good wife and find satisfaction in that sort of life.

I was twenty-two at the time, and I suppose that’s not necessarily too young to get married, but it was certainly too young for me to get married. I think before you get married you ought to have a very clear idea of who you are. I had a very clear idea of who I intended to become, but it didn’t jibe with the facts that well.

He was a nice-enough guy, I guess. I don’t really feel like talking about him.

It’s a funny thing. While we were going together—and we lived together for a couple of months before we got married—well, all during that time, the idea of sex with a woman was absolutely unthinkable. I was perfectly sure that it had all been a phase I had gone through. I even worked up a theory to support it, that adolescence was a time for bisexuality, but that when you grew up you either blossomed into adult heterosexuality or got sidetracked into a permanent unhealthy pattern of homosexuality. And I was convinced I’d blossomed as no one had ever blossomed before, and all those girls I’d gone down on were already receding in memory, slipping like shadows into the dim depths of the past.

Then we got married and signed a lease on an apartment, and in very little time I began to get weak in the knees every time I saw a reasonably attractive woman on the street. Well, I told myself it was a perfectly understandable case of being slow to adjust to the idea of marriage, that I was a little nervous at having committed myself to live with this one man for the rest of my life, and of course I was not morally prepared to entertain desires for other men, so I was sublimating by having these unreal desires for women, since I knew I didn’t really want them and thus wouldn’t really attempt to do anything about them. In other words, it was a safe way for me to dream of cheating on my husband, and I would never actually do anything about it, and as I became more adjusted to the idea of marriage these desires would go away and everything would be fine.

It was a sensational theory. It sounds sensible doesn’t it? The only problem is that it bore no relationship to the actual circumstances.

It took a year and a half for the marriage to break up. In the course of it I had three very casual affairs. One with a man, a good friend of my husband’s. That was the first, and it was very purposeful on my part. I was still in love with my theory, you see. And I managed to sell myself on the idea that if I went ahead and violated this big taboo against adultery with a man, I would eliminate the reasons for this false desire for women. Obviously, the reason I tried this was that I was willing to accept myself as an adulteress but not as bisexual.

It didn’t work. Oh, it wasn’t unpleasant. In a purely physical way it was enjoyable. For that matter, my sexual relations with my husband were still enjoyable at this stage. Later in the marriage that relationship deteriorated as well, but at the time it wasn’t that I failed to enjoy what my husband and I did in bed. It was just that somehow it wasn’t enough to satisfy me.

Neither was the roll in the hay with his friend. Good, but not what I’d wanted. And then I said, fuck it, and made up an excuse and went down to the Village one night, a bar I’d hung out at years ago, and I ran into a couple of girls I had known before but had never had a thing with, and one of them cruised me gently and my knees buckled, and I knew I’d come home. I went to her apartment and it was fantastic. At this point, though, I wasn’t prepared to break up my marriage. It still seemed possible for me to preserve the marriage, and to have lesbian affairs on the side. I thought it was possible that I would be able to get this urge out of my system by giving into it from time to time, which is a little like breaking the tobacco habit by smoking a cigarette whenever you feel the urge for one. The more sex I had with women, the more impossible it became for me to be passionate with my husband.

Anyway, we were going through a lot of changes in our marital relationship that didn’t have anything directly to do with sex. I think that even if I hadn’t had this special situation with bisexuality, we would have broken up before long.

I drifted through a couple of affairs while the marriage went progressively to hell. Then I met a girl and the affair wasn’t so casual, and I saw her as often as I could and hated my husband for every minute I was forced to spend in his company instead of hers. And at that point it became inevitable. I moved away from him and moved in with her and a divorce was arranged.

Shortly after that—oh, a couple of months, I guess it was—I began being attracted to men again.

•  •  •

If group sex is a sine qua non of swinging, then Erica cannot be properly termed a swinger. She has had a handful of experiences with group sex and has concluded that the scene is not for her.

•  •  •

It would seem like a logical answer, wouldn’t it? But—I don’t know whether it’s a matter of inhibition or what, but I can’t really get it on with more than one person at a time. Ideally, I like to be in love. Even when it’s not love, I want to be completely wrapped up in one other person and have that other person completely wrapped up in me.

I was at what you’d probably call an orgy on one occasion, about twenty or twenty-five people all naked and rolling around on the floor. Guys with guys, guys with girls, girls with girls, all sorts of combinations. The public nature of all this was a turn-off. I don’t like to watch other people fuck, frankly. It turns me off. And if I want a man, oh, I don’t want any other women to be around. And if I’m drawn to a woman, the last thing I want near me is a cock.

I guess I’ll just go on like this, at least as far as I can predict. It’s not as horrible now as it used to be, because I’m sufficiently aware of the pattern not to be thrown by it anymore. And I enjoy sex very much, and I enjoy most of the relationships I get involved in very much. They don’t last, but some of them have a good long present even if they don’t have a future, and in a sense nothing lasts, anyway. At least I enjoy myself most of the time.

As far as how I feel about being bisexual, I don’t really know. I think there’s a great advantage for a person in being all one way or all the other. It makes your life simpler in certain important ways to have your options limited to that extent. It’s easier to determine who you are and to organize your life accordingly.

This doesn’t mean that a person couldn’t be bisexual and have a successful marriage. I’m a special case in that respect, I’m riding this eternal pendulum, but for other people I know that it can work. And it’s possible I’ll get somewhat less compulsive in my own behavior as I get a little older, and I might be able to have some sort of permanent relationship with someone, male or female, however it turns out. I’m not sure it could happen, and I’m not sure it’s what I want, but I’m no longer absolutely convinced it’s unattainable.

PAUL

The double life of the married solitary swinger comes easiest to the person who spends a large portion of his time away from home. The American businessman, a paragon of fidelity at home and an unabashed philanderer on the road, seems to be less the exception than the rule. Technology has changed the central figures of our sexual myths from traveling salesman and farmer’s daughter to traveling executive and stewardess, but the basic scenario runs about the same.

It’s not terribly difficult to understand this. It’s far easier to remain faithful where infidelity carries heavy risks of exposure, much easier to commit adultery where no one knows your wife, or even that you have one.

It would be stretching our definition of swinging, such as it is, to label every adulterous traveler as a swinger. But some closet swingers who lead their double lives on the road do fit the scope of this book, participating in group sex scenes away from home while maintaining monogamous lives otherwise.

I know Paul only through correspondence. He is, as you will see, a man who enjoys going into detail in his letters, and at one point I became somewhat suspicious that he was inventing details of his sex life as a form of some sort of literary exhibitionism. (In a section of a letter not quoted here, he admitted that on paper; elsewhere, as you shall see, he mentions the satisfaction of being able to tell everything, if only through the impersonal medium of a letter.) But for a variety of reasons which I won’t bother to go into, I’m completely convinced that what he has written is the truth.

Dear Mr. Wells:

I have read several of your books, including your latest, Beyond Group Sex. I found this latest particularly impressive. You have handled some complex subjects with sensitivity, and in such a way as to suggest you have a sympathy for all people, whatever their sexual peculiarities.

I have been interested in the practice of swinging and group sex for some time. As for myself, I am not sure as to whether or not I would properly be considered a swinger.

I am thirty-eight years old, married, two children. I have a job with a plastics firm—you would no doubt recognize the name—which keeps me on the road a large portion of the time. It is during my road trips that I do my swinging, if indeed you would be inclined to call it such. By this I mean that I have had some involvement in group sex but that my wife is not at all involved.

Frequently in your books you write about men who have tried to talk their wives into swinging with other couples, either with or without success. You have also made mention of men who state that they know their wives would not be interested in swinging. In my own case, to be honest, I do not really know whether or not my wife would swing, as we have never discussed it. My marriage relationship is fine just the way it is, as far as I am concerned. When I am at home I am a hundred percent faithful, and it could be said of me that I never look at another woman.

Perhaps this makes me a hypocrite. I don’t know, and do not see it that way myself. It is my feeling that, when I am at home, my wife has a complete claim on my affection, and that she should be my whole sexual outlet. When I am a few hundred miles away, however, I am depriving my wife of nothing by having sex with another woman, as I could not have sex with my wife at that time and I see no way in which her ends would be served by my being deprived of sex entirely.

Of course, I keep this a secret from her because I am sure she is better off that way. “What you don’t know won’t hurt you” is an old saying, but that makes it no less true . . .

Do you suppose my experiences would be of any interest to you or your readers? I realize there are probably thousands of men living the life I live, so I will not take offense if you are not interested. But if you think what I have to say would be of any value, I will gladly write and supply full details on any points you might wish clarified. Please write to me at my Post Office Box; for obvious reasons I can’t have personal correspondence directed to either my home or office! And do not be put off if I am some time in replying, as I am often out of town—and having a ball!

Sincerely,

Paul

I replied affirmatively, suggesting that a great many men in Paul’s position have wanted to lead the sort of double life he described, but have had great difficulty in gaining entree to group sex activities. I wondered, too, whether his rationalization of committing adultery while away from home encompassed a willingness for his wife to do likewise.

Dear Jack:

I was glad to hear from you. To tell you the truth, I didn’t expect you to write . . .

Sorry not to have replied sooner, but I have just returned from two weeks’ worth of travel throughout the Rocky Mountain states. I managed to attend two parties in that time, as well as to enjoy a couple of single girls, including one I met on my last trip to Denver. A little honey blonde with melon-like breasts and an insatiable appetite for cock—in this instance, my cock! While there is literally nothing this creature does not enjoy, she is especially fond of eating it, and who am I to deprive her of such pleasure? Especially when she does such a wonderful job at it. I have been sounding her out on the idea of attending a party with me, and I think she is going to go for it before too long. It is funny, Jack. This girl has the morals of a mink in heat, and knows it, but she is very nervous at the thought of being with more than one other person at a time. She says it seems decadent to her. To be honest, I didn’t think she knew the word. Here she is, with my cock halfway down her gullet, talking about decadence, and of course you know the old line—I wanted to tell her it wasn’t good manners to talk with her mouth full!

But to get back to the points raised in your letter. Yes, I am well aware that there are a lot of men who want to get into group sex on their own and who are unable to do so. You bet I am aware of this, as for several years I was one of them! So that gives me an extra motive for this correspondence. Perhaps other fellows in the same boat will read of my experiences and learn how to make it all work for themselves.

You also raise the point of my wife having sex while I am on the road, and how I might feel about this. Naturally, this is something I have considered myself. As a matter of fact, I have no way of knowing that she does not have a lover when I am on a road trip. As for my feelings, let me say this. If she is doing this, I would not want to know about it. I am sure that sounds hypocritical but that’s the way it is. I know I am not consistent on the subject. I do not say it would be a big deal for me to find out, I do not think I would be upset to any great extent, but I would prefer not to know about it, much as I am sure she would prefer not to know of my own swinging activities.

Also, and perhaps I am just rationalizing, I think it would be more difficult for her to carry on and be discreet about it, as we live in a closely knit suburban community where everyone is an authority on everyone else’s business. I don’t know if you’ve ever lived in the suburbs, but if you have you know what I am talking about. I don’t say that she couldn’t cheat on me without the neighbors knowing, but that she would have to be pretty shrewd and pretty lucky to get away with it. On the other hand, I do my dirty deeds far afield, so it is not just that she does not know about them, but that no one knows. As a matter of fact, the name I signed to my last letter—and that I’ll sign to this one as well—is not my own. It is the pseudonym I used to rent my Post Office Box and one by which I am known to the bulk of my swinging contacts. I even have a wallet full of false identification in that name . . .

To get back to the subject of swinging, it is true as I said that I was interested in this long before I managed to get involved in it. This is not to suggest I was true to my wife all this time. Jack, I am sure there are men who are able to be faithful to one woman all their lives. I am simply not like this and could never be like this.

I married at twenty-six and am thirty-eight now. I led the life of a carefree bachelor before marriage and had a great deal of sexual experience before marriage. My wife had very little previous experience; in fact, her only sex partner before me was her previous husband. She was married at twenty and divorced at twenty-two. I married her three years later. Our marriage was excellent from the start and has never been less than excellent, but after less than a year of marriage I realized I had made a mistake in thinking I could be faithful to her forever. At the start I had really believed this. I suspect most men believe this at the beginning, but sooner or later most of them learn different.

Well, the only thing that kept me on the straight and narrow at the beginning was lack of opportunity. I was very concerned about doing anything and having my wife find out. I was also concerned about catching a disease from a prostitute, although even without this possibility I would not go to a prostitute, as I do not find the idea of sex with paid prostitutes exciting or attractive . . . Though I did engage in a flirtation with a girl at the office, and could have had her if I had decided to go ahead with it, I wisely decided to drop it before anything got started. (As far as I am concerned, any man who has an office affair is an idiot.)

For all these reasons, nothing happened for another two years, when my job changed to put me on the road a great deal of the time. Before, I had not done any business travel. On my first business trip, all I could think of was that I had a perfect opportunity to get laid. It was just an overnight trip to a nearby city, and as luck would have it, I was unable to find anyone. But not long thereafter I was on another jaunt and dated a stewardess right off the plane. We went out to dinner, had a couple of drinks, and went straight back to my room, and she was a crazy little brunette, one-quarter Osage Indian, who liked nothing better than to fuck. I was more than happy to oblige her.

I thought I might feel guilty about this but felt nothing of the kind. I felt wonderful about it with no guilt at all. It seemed to me that I had found the answer to my situation. No worries about discovery, because I was in a town where no one knew me. No worry about the girl making trouble, because she did not know my right name or my address. No worry about getting involved in an affair, because I would not be around long enough for that kind of involvement. Also, when the girl knows you are from out of town she does not expect more than a pleasant evening.

I operated in this fashion for several years, Jack. A large number of the girls I met were stewardesses, and in many respects I grew to prefer them, as they generally know the score. Not that all of them are game for what I was looking for, but they know the score, as I said, and either will play or won’t and usually let you know early on. Sometimes, of course, I would have no luck with the girls on the plane, or none of them would appeal to me. In that case I would generally try a couple of logical places. First of all, the Holiday Inn, which is where I almost always stay. In the largest cities this may not be a good bet, but in the great majority of cities and towns it is the place to meet people, the place where all the local action is. This is for a very good reason. It’s where most businessmen on expense accounts stay, so it draws the girls who want to meet men of that sort. If the Holiday Inn was a washout, I might try the airport motel, which catered to flight crews, always a good place to meet stews looking for a good time. And, as time went by, I had established quite a few contacts, and I could call a girl up and tell her I was going to be in her town that evening, and what about getting together?

At the risk of boasting, I’ll have to say that I have always been good at picking girls up, and at getting something started once I’ve picked one up. My business depends entirely on getting along with people, sizing them up quickly, and making a good impression upon them. As you can see, that’s much the same talent required in getting places with women. I don’t mean that I’m a Casanova. I take a sincere interest in any woman I’m making a play for and believe women sense this sincerity.

I believe this is important not only for getting a woman into bed, but for getting her to express herself fully once you are in bed. The same woman will be a lousy lay for one man and a great lay for another, and it doesn’t depend so much on being a great lover as it does on encouraging the girl to do everything she’s capable of. I could give you some suggestions on the subject if you think your readers would be interested . . .

Well, that’s enough for one letter, I guess. Thanks again for your courteous reply, and let me know if this is the sort of information you want. If so, I’ll keep those cards and letters coming.

Sincerely,

Paul

Dear Jack,

Good to hear from you and glad you found my letter of value . . .

Once again I’m back from a trip. And once again it was a ball, with plenty of balling! The highlight was the last night, and it’s a shame I didn’t have more time there, as I would have loved a repeat of it. Yours truly and two beautiful girls, a tall blonde and a short redhead. I believe the redhead’s hair coloring comes out of a bottle, but the blonde is the same sweet color everywhere . . . What made it all especially exciting was that the redhead had never been involved in a group scene before—in fact, she had never had anything to do with another woman. You wouldn’t have believed it, though, to see her slurping away at the blonde’s pussy as if she had been eating hair pie since the day she was born!

Jack, that leads me right into the real point of my letter. I wrote you last time about bringing out a girl’s true personality in bed, and you were kind enough to ask my further views on the subject. Well, I’ll be glad to oblige.

It’s my discovery that women are just like men in that they have fantasies of things they would like to do in bed. But getting them to own up to their fantasies is the problem. I discovered over the years, especially in my relationship with my wife, that encouraging a woman to tell you her fantasies and then helping her act them out not only gives her the best time she’s ever had in bed, but it also gives the man involved a hell of a ride.

In the case of the blonde and the redhead, the easiest thing is to tell you just what happened. The redhead is a stenographer at a company in, well, it doesn’t matter what city, does it? But she’s in her early twenties, beautiful body and nice face, and still lives at home with her parents, but she’s independent enough to go out when she wants to and stay out overnight if she feels like it. She was engaged for about a year but did not get married. She likes sex and manages to get a lot of it.

I met her a couple of months ago, took her out drinking, then back to my room, where we got along fine. I looked her up again the next time I was in her town and the sex was even better, as she was more at ease with me. This most recent time we began talking about fantasies. I told her some of the group things I’d been in, and encouraged her to talk about her own fantasies. My intuition is fairly good, and although she didn’t say it directly, I had the feeling she had the fantasy of having sex with another woman. Well, one thing I’ve developed in the course of my experiences with group sex is a lot of enthusiasm for being around while a couple of good-looking women are getting it together. It’s a turn-on for me, as it seems to be for the majority of men. And there was a girl in this town whom I had taken to swinging parties on a couple of occasions, and whom I knew to be completely bisexual.

So while we were cuddling there and talking about fantasies, I told her there was something about her that reminded me very much of another girl I knew, and that this girl had an interesting fantasy. Of course she wanted to know what it was. (There was no specific other girl that she reminded me of, naturally, but it was a great way to bring the subject up without scaring her.)

I said this other girl had always wanted to know what it was like to make it with another girl, and when I saw her reaction I knew my intuition had been right on the mark. Then I told her I had managed to arrange things for the mythical girl in question and how great it had been for all of us, and she couldn’t hide the interest she felt.

From that point it was just a matter of calling the blonde. She was busy that particular night but said she would be glad to get together with the two of us the following night. I told my little redhead everything was set, and we spent the rest of the night speculating on what would happen the following night, and it turned her on more than anyone would believe. Then the next night we met the blonde and had a perfectly delightful threesome. If there’s anything more enjoyable than fucking one beautiful girl while she in turn is going down on another beautiful girl, I don’t know what it is . . .

In this particular case, Jack, it was especially great because her fantasy happened to be one I like very much myself. Even if this is not the case, I’ve found nothing more rewarding than encouraging a woman to act out her own fantasy, whatever it might be. The special excitement it brings her, and the feeling of being involved in a broadening of her sexual horizons, is very much a turn-on for me all by itself.

Let me give you an example or two. There was a girl I met, a little on the heavy side but still quite attractive, and I gave her the usual approach after we had already made love once. After much hesitation she admitted that what she had always wanted was to pretend to be asleep while a man pretended to sneak into her room and make love to her. I suppose there are all sorts of psychological explanations for a fantasy of this sort, but I am no expert on that subject.

Now, on the surface it doesn’t sound like the kind of fantasy that would be brimful of excitement for the man who helped her act it out. Making love to a woman who just lies there and pretends to be asleep is a great deal like marriage! (Just kidding, as my own wife is a most enthusiastic sexual partner, as I’m sure I’ve told you before. In fact, she is my favorite sexual partner, and the fact that I seek variety is no reflection on her performance; I would chase around no matter who I might be married to.)

I determined to act out this fantasy, however, if only for the girl’s enjoyment. Accordingly, we turned off the lights and I sat in the chair across the room from her while she pretended to fall asleep. After about five minutes or so I quietly moved over to the side of the bed and drew the sheet down from her body. She did not react. I studied her nude form for a while, then got in bed with her and began to pet her. I sucked her breasts for a long time, then brought her to orgasm with my finger. She lay quite still during all this, although I could watch her become more and more passionate until she finally climaxed with an almost inaudible moan.

Then I spread her legs wide and gave her a really intense fucking. By this time I was very much excited myself. Her complete passivity was very stimulating to myself. It was like rape in some ways, like necrophilia in some ways, and it’s interesting to note that neither rape nor necrophilia could possibly appeal to me in actuality, but became appealing in the context of acting out this girl’s personal fantasy. I fucked her hard and strong, and on an impulse withdrew at the last moment and scurried forward so that I could shoot all over her “sleeping” face. This came as quite a surprise to her, and she found it very exciting. Again, I’m sure a psychiatrist could explain why I did this and why she enjoyed it, but the point is that it made for a great experience for both of us. She tried something she had always wanted to try but had never had the courage to ask for, and I got sexual enjoyment out of something it would never have occurred to me to try in the first place.

I’ll save some other thoughts for my next letter—assuming, that is, that you’re interested in hearing more from me.

Sincerely,

Paul

I replied that I was indeed interested in hearing further from him, and was especially interested in knowing more about haw he managed to participate in swinging as a single male. I conjectured that perhaps, in discussing fantasies with women, he suggested swinging to them and took them along to parties if they expressed interest.

I was delayed somewhat in replying, and my letter reached Paul when he was on another road trip. Thus, it was a while before I heard from him. He began by apologizing for his delay, then recounted at considerable length an experience from his most recent road trip. It consisted largely of a description of a sex party he attended, and he described in overwhelming detail everything he did and most of what he witnessed. There’s no need to reproduce it here.

He continued:

Yes, you are right in guessing that the easiest way to find a swinging partner is to find a girl, take her to bed, and then encourage her to give group sex a try. It won’t be news to you that this doesn’t always work out. Girls who will do absolutely everything in bed with a man will draw the line at attending parties. However, you might be surprised how many of them will give it a try, especially if you have taken trouble to know their sexual interests and have made them feel encouraged to express their fantasies. By inducing a mood of experimentation and showing yourself to be open-minded and permissive, a great deal can be accomplished.

It also should be pointed out, Jack, that it’s a different matter getting a girl to try swinging when you’re having a casual sexual affair with her, and when she’s basically a sexual liberal in her own life, accustomed to pickups and hit-and-run sex, compared to inducing a standard suburban housewife to take the plunge . . .

As a matter of fact, though, this is not how I had my own first group sex experience. I had already contemplated doing this and had gotten one girl to the point where she thought she might be willing to swing with another couple if I set it all up, but that was as far as I had proceeded. Frankly, I didn’t know just how to go about it, whether to answer correspondence ads or what. I am sure I would have put the ball in motion sooner or later, but in the meantime I met a girl in another town, and in the course of becoming fully acquainted with each other on a sexual basis, she felt comfortable enough with me to confide that she had attended a couple of group sex parties. This excited me very much, as you can surely guess. I told her of my interest in attending such a party and she was able to arrange that I go to one with her in the near future. I went, and it is fair to say that my life has not been the same since.

Personally, I have never had to resort to correspondence ads. I am sure, from what I have heard from other people, as well as from what I have read in your books, that they are very useful for a great many of the people who do make use of them, and that they can be handled in such a way as to be completely safe, or as safe as anything else. However, I have been lucky in being able to build up contacts, so that I have an address book full of the names of people in the cities I most frequently visit. If I have a partner for the evening, all I have to do is make a phone call or two and be virtually certain of finding some swinging action. And, needless to say, in most of these cities I can be fairly certain of finding a partner on reasonably short notice. This at least is how things have developed over the past few years. It was not always this easy, but I have never had to place or answer an advertisement.

If you asked the average girl to attend a group sex party, you would surely get no for an answer. But if you set the stage right, your odds improve tremendously. This is especially so in the last few years as group sex has gotten more and more publicity. Girls who had barely heard of such things, or else assumed they only took place in New York and Hollywood, are now at least familiar with the idea of group sex. And, when you’ve let them come to see that you respect a woman more if she is sexually adventurous, and that you have done just about everything yourself at one time or another, the climate for her getting into group sex is more and more favorable.

Jack, almost all of the girls I get together with want to try it. That’s not saying that they all will, but that they all have some curiosity on the subject. Even those who go to great lengths to insist that it is not for them will ask a lot of questions about just what it’s like, what sort of people go there, what goes on, etc. Occasionally I have told a girl that one of her girlfriends was at a sex party I recently attended. Of course she had to know which one, and of course I never tell—sometimes because the original statement is a lie, other times because that sort of thing is something you keep confidential.

As I see it, virtually everybody is interested because of awareness of group sex and natural curiosity. Swinging serves a lot of functions besides giving you a wide range of sexual partners. It satisfies the desire to watch other people fucking, and even if you are not in the least bit a voyeur, people still wonder what it’s like to watch other people fucking. It satisfies the urge to have other people watching you, an urge that women seem to feel more intensely than men. So all this interest exists and it’s just a matter of exploiting it. Maybe exploiting is the wrong word, since all I try to do is encourage people to do what they wanted to do in the first place but shied away from for fear of what other people might think of them.

Well, friend Jack, that’s about it, I guess. I could tell you more about specific experiences, people I have met, etc., if you want, but what I’ve written should tell you something about my own sexual lifestyle, as you put it. I get a kick out of writing these letters, as I guess I mentioned. I can’t say it’s my favorite pastime—you know what my favorite pastime is, don’t you? But it’s enjoyable or I wouldn’t waste my time (and your time) on it.

Also, it is a pleasure to be able to tell someone all of this. Most of the girls I see know I am married, that’s no hang-up, but there’s no one on the outside I can really confide in at great length. To tell you the truth, the one drawback to my “double life” is that keeping a secret from my wife gives us that much less in the way of common experience. It would be better if I did not have to keep things a secret from her for this reason. Often, in a particularly exotic situation, I imagine how enjoyable it would be to be able to discuss it all with her afterwards.

But of course that is out of the question. Unless, of course, I should introduce her to swinging. I have been thinking of this more and more lately and cannot say for certain whether I will attempt to do so or not. It is possible that I will and possible that I will not. On the plus side, there is the fact that I think swinging is a good experience, and since I love her I would want her to have this good experience for herself. On the other hand, there is a special feeling which I have for her, and I am not sure I would continue to have it if she was to be with other men in my presence. I feel foolish admitting this, with all the swinging I have done, but I am not sure I could accept it from her. This is the old double standard again, sure as hell but realizing it’s the double standard doesn’t make it go out of your mind!

Also, the nature of my job is such that I am on the road a great deal. Now she could not possibly come with me on those trips. So I would continue to swing alone on those trips, and if we were both swinging at home, she would be aware of this and would probably disapprove. Which would be a great source of friction in our relationship.

Also, my travel is sexually important to me not just for the thrill of group sex—I don’t devote that much of my time to sex parties—but for the opportunity to meet new girls and become sexually intimate with them. I don’t mean I’m the textbook example of the satyr or male nymphomaniac whose sole interest is in screwing as many girls as possible, and once he’s had them he doesn’t want to see them again. On the contrary, I want to know a girl as deeply as possible in a sexual way, want to go to bed with her several times, and occasionally want to maintain a casual relationship with her for a long period of time. Yet there’s no denying that, to a great extent, variety is the spice of life for me and sexual variety is the spice of my sex life.

And this whole side of my life is not something I can share with my wife, Jack. No way!

So I am not sure what I will do, but I’ll certainly keep you posted. If there’s anything you’d like to know more about, just drop me a line and I’ll do the best I can to fill you in.

Sincerely,

Paul

I answered this letter rather briefly and did not have any questions, just advised Paul to let me hear from him from time to time. A long time passed before I received the following letter:

Dear Jack:

Well, it’s been awhile, but something came up that prompts me to write to you . . .

You may recall I wrote you that I was thinking of introducing my wife to swinging. Well, after writing to you and thinking about it for a while, I decided against it. Things were going well and I saw no need to rock the boat.

Then, not too long ago, I happened to be leafing through one of the swingers’ correspondence magazines. I have never used these magazines but swingers have them around all the time and I often look at the ads and pictures. I was astonished to find a photograph of a woman I recognized—not a woman I knew through swinging, but a neighbor of ours back home. I thought I was mistaken but the city was right and the likeness was unmistakable, and from the ad the woman and her husband looked to be hard-core swingers.

My wife and I did not know this couple well, but we did know them through PTA, the neighborhood, etc. This gave me the idea of introducing my wife to swinging with this couple. I realized it could be done in such a way that she would not know anything specific about my activities out of town. There were still other arguments against it, but the more I thought about it the more I realized that it was something I wanted to do, whether it made perfect sense or not . . .

It was not difficult at all for me to get her to go for it. After all, look at all the experience I’ve had talking other girls into it! Also, my wife is a very open person sexually, always anxious to try anything either she or I might think of, and is highly sexed.

I asked her if she didn’t ever get a yen for other men. She replied quite frankly that when I was away from home for long periods of time she frequently got horny, and that on more than a few occasions she had a yen to take a lover. But she had never done so (she said, and I believe her) because she was afraid of ruining our relationship and afraid that, in a town like ours, she could easily be found out.

I asked her next if, even when I was around, she didn’t wonder what it would be like to experience sex with someone else. She admitted she’d had such thoughts but had never entertained them seriously. Then I began to discuss swinging and group sex and she admitted it had a certain appeal for her but said she had strong reservations about it. She was concerned that I would cease to love her if she went with another man. I reassured her on this point. Then she said she knew a little about the subject from television programs and magazine articles and it seemed awfully shoddy to her to meet strangers at bars or through ads. I agreed with her completely.

Then I told her I had found this swinger magazine in a hotel room. (The only things I’ve found in hotel rooms are Gideon Bibles and telephone directories, Jack.) I opened it to the ad, and she was really stunned to recognize our little pixie of a neighbor, smiling like mad and showing her tits to the world. She couldn’t believe it.

Well, that certainly simplified things. It wasn’t a case of having sex with strangers because these were people like us, people she knew. We could just invite them over to the house for drinks and see what developed. (In the ad, the gal was described as versatile, meaning bisexual, but I saw no point in translating that little terminology for my wife, thinking, Why throw too much at her all at once?)

To make a long story short, we got together with them and everything went off perfectly. It turns out that there is a large group of swingers in the area—I had always figured as much, but this came as a surprise to my wife. So we now swing about once a week when I’m home, and things are going very well. One of my concerns did come to pass, namely that she now takes it for granted that I screw around when I am on the road. We have talked very briefly about the subject. She says she always took it for granted more or less that I was untrue to her when away from home and that she didn’t mind, but would rather not know about it specifically. Then, on another occasion she mentioned after I returned home from a road trip that some of our swinging friends called her to invite us to a party, and that when she said I was out of town they asked her if she’d like to come on her own. I asked her if she did. “What do you think?” she said. I said she didn’t want to know what I did on the road, and I didn’t want to know what she did in my absence, and we decided that was a good enough policy. I think we will probably outgrow this mutual secrecy in a short time when we are more completely adjusted to the whole idea of each other playing around, but for the time being I think it serves a purpose.

Well, Jack, that’s about it. In retrospect, I guess I did have some guilt feelings toward my wife in the sense of her sitting home alone while I was out having a good time, Now I don’t have to worry about that. Everything’s well with me, and I hope all is well with you. Keep on writing those good books and helping to open up people’s heads.

Sincerely,

Paul

ALVIN

The sort of double life we observed in the last chapter is very much a way of life for the whole world of “closet” homosexuals. These, of course, are men who are to all appearances exclusively heterosexual in their orientation. Often they are married and have fathered children. Yet a desire for relations with other males leads them to seek this forbidden sex—sometimes through clandestine meetings with friends in similar circumstances, more often through furtive anonymous couplings with strangers in Turkish baths or other public places.

It is perhaps questionable whether the closet homosexual qualifies as a swinger. Although he may enjoy group sex with other similarly inclined men, his major concern is not the number of partners he has but that they be male. To be sure, he “swings” in that his homosexual relationships are engaged in purely for recreation; his emotional involvement is likely to center on his wife and family. But this is not swinging in the context of this book.

Nevertheless, closet homosexuality is occasionally a component of swinging. In one case with which I am familiar, a bisexual male had for some years frequented gay bars once or twice a week to seek sexual companionship. One night he made the unfortunate mistake of responding to the overtures of a slender young man who turned out to be a member of the Vice Squad. He was arrested, evidently because he did not have enough cash on his person to bribe his way clear, and in the course of things his wife found out about his activities.

After a considerable amount of discussion and soul-searching, the man and his wife decided to find in group sex a means of gratifying his homosexual desires without his being forced to lead a separate life—and, incidentally, without risking police harassment. They began swinging, either with bisexual single men or with couples of which the male member was bisexual. In this instance the wife discovered that she too appeared to be bisexual, although she had had no prior experience in that area and had been aware of no conscious desires for sexual relations with other women.

And, as far as I know, they’ve all lived happily ever after.

In Alvin’s case, swinging provides a means of enjoying homosexual relations in a manner which he finds especially satisfying, for reasons which we shall see. His wife is unaware of his activities and will likely be kept unaware of them if Alvin has his way. He swings as a single male with other couples. This is somewhat easier for him to arrange than is the case for most single males seeking such situations; as a bisexual, he seeks couples including a bisexual male, and such couples are more likely amenable to trios with single males.

Alvin is forty two, dark-haired, of medium build, and balding. His penis, he confided to me, is considerably larger than average. I have only his word for this. He is a media buyer with a New York advertising agency and lives on Long Island with his wife, his two sons, and his daughter.

•  •  •

What’s funny is I never thought of myself as gay. Your typical closet queen is a guy who gets married because he’s fighting homosexuality, or because he makes the cold-blooded decision that he wants the gay sex but not the gay life. In either case, he’s a guy who ultimately goes back to what he was doing all along.

My case is a little different. I’ve been married sixteen years. I got married right after I got out of the Service, and at the time it never occurred to me that I would ever have the desire to have relations with another man. I knew I was a “normal” guy and I loved to ball girls and I met what looked to be the perfect girl, so I was getting married to her and that was that.

Now I don’t mean I never had any homosexual experience before marriage. That’s not quite true. I’d better explain that. First of all, when I was about eleven or twelve years old there were a group of us who used to get together and jerk off. We would have contests to see who could come first, or who could shoot the farthest, or sometimes we would jerk each other off. I don’t think this whole business went on for more than a couple of months and I’ve never thought of it as homosexual in nature. It was sex with other boys, but they weren’t sex objects in any sense so it was more a matter of all of us being together to share the experience of discovering about our sexuality; I know a tremendous proportion of kids go through a brief stage of something along those lines and in the greatest number of cases that’s the end of it and they never have any sort of homosexual relationship again.

That wasn’t the extent of my experience before marriage. In fact, if my previous experience had amounted to nothing more than a few circle jerks I don’t suppose I’d even bother to mention it. There was also the habit I got into in the Service.

See, we were stationed at this toilet of an Army base in Texas. This was back in the days of the peacetime Army, before Vietnam, and the thing was, there you were for two years, and they really didn’t need you for anything, so after training they stuck you somewhere in some godforsaken part of the country and gave you whatever boring things they could think of. I knew how to type, so I was a clerk typist and spent two years filling out forms.

Being in that remote a place, it was almost impossible to get any sex when you had a pass to town. The towns near bases are supposed to be wall-to-wall cunt. Well, maybe that’s true of some bases, but not this one. There were a couple of grungy whores around if you could find them—and if you could afford them. As far as the local freebie stuff was concerned, all I can say is, I never ran across any of it.

So what you very often did was hang around the Y and one of the local fairies would take you on. There were two classes of them in that town. There were the ones who wanted company, wanted you to spend a couple of hours or a whole evening with them, and if you did you got your drinks paid for and your meals and possibly a few bucks extra.

I never went for that. The whole idea of being close to another man sexually for any length of time, I didn’t like the idea. But there were other guys who would take on one soldier after another. You know, giving blow jobs. There was a guy who had a room at the Y and you’d line up in the alleyway around the corner and he’d take on all comers. And there were two others who worked the men’s room at the movie theater. They’d take turns, one of them watching while the other’s working away on his knees, then the first one would get a little of the action while the other kept an eye out for cops and MPs. The MPs knew about it, of course. Everybody knew about it, but nobody was getting hurt so they let it alone.

The thing was, there was this distinction. To our way of looking at it, the guys who gave the blow jobs were homosexual, but the guys who received them were not. It was a way of getting your rocks off that was better than jerking off. And it took what—two minutes?

It wasn’t something you were necessarily proud of, and as I remember, the guys generally didn’t talk about it afterward, but a lot of us went that route. You would go into town and make the usual ritualistic search for girls, and not find any, and then before you went back to base you’d let one of the tube-cleaners do the job on you.

One topic that came up once in conversation, I remember, is, would you want your wife to blow you after you were married. There was divided opinion about this question. Some guys said, hell yes, why not. Others said it was a sort of a disgusting thing for you to want from a woman you loved and respected. I wonder if kids nowadays think that way. Remember, this was something like twenty years ago. Attitudes have changed, kids aren’t uptight about as many things as we were.

For myself, I’m not positive how I felt. I think I had certain reservations about asking a woman to go down on me—I mean about the concept of it, since I had never asked a girl to do it, or had it from anyone but the queers in that little Texas town. On the other hand, I really didn’t like the idea of going without oral sex for the rest of my life, because the sensation was indescribably pleasant. I didn’t have any feeling for those guys except contempt, and complete bafflement that they wanted to do such a thing, but I certainly got a lot of intense physical pleasure out of it.

When they did it, I would always imagine it was a woman doing it to me.

For the first, oh, six or eight years of my marriage, I don’t think I ever had a homosexual thought. But then I began to get a sort of nostalgic feeling about a really first-rate blow job. The question we had asked each other back in the Service had resolved itself. My wife and I did practice oral sex together, but it wasn’t really terrific. First of all, when she performed fellatio it was never an end in itself, always a prelude. We invariably finished things off having intercourse. She had an absolute fear of having me come in her mouth, as if semen was composed of sulfuric acid or something. Also, she had read in some cockamamie marriage manual that oral sex was all right as preparation for the real thing, but that it was abnormal if it became an end in itself. I don’t know where she got that marriage manual. I think the Pope wrote it.

I had occasional desires for really satisfying fellatio, but it was nothing that you could call an obsession. Then one evening, before I caught the train home from work I was in a men’s room and a guy made overtures to me. I brushed him off and got out of there, but that put an idea in my head. I had always thought of that kind of sex as something tied into the whole business of Army life. I certainly knew it was available everywhere, but I hadn’t thought of it that way.

The next thing that happened, I can’t remember exactly when it was, is that I was involved in an evening on the town with a prospective client. One of our pitches was that we would do a much better job of media selection than his present agency, which was very traditional and unimaginative mediawise, at least the way they were treating this particular account. The evening wound up in a high-class East Side whorehouse, an apartment with half a dozen chicks, and I wound up with one of them, and she went down on me. Up to this point, based on my experiences with my wife, I had sort of thought that only homosexuals enjoyed giving head, and that women were never good at it. Well, I don’t know that this chick enjoyed it. I suspect she found it simpler and more comfortable than intercourse. But I do know she was damned good at it.

Over the next couple of years I saw prostitutes on several occasions. What put me off was the expense, plus the fact that I was troubled by the knowledge that it was just a business for them, that they got no pleasure out of it. I don’t want my sexual partner to fall in love with me, for Christ’s sake, but I don’t like the feeling that she’s just there for the dollars either. After that first experience with the hooker, I began to think more and more in terms of finding a free source of that perfect oral sex. And it became a simple matter to find out where you could pick up a guy for a quick impersonal blow job. Certain subway rest rooms, for example. And then I discovered the baths, and that was perfect.

There was a whole code there. You rented a private room—at least I always did. I didn’t like being in the open or cruising around. And then, if you happened to want to be blown, you lay on your back and played with yourself so that you would be sporting a nice hard-on if anyone came in. Your position indicated what you wanted, namely to be blown.

I got in the habit of going to the baths once or twice a week. The expense was next to nothing and the anonymity perfect. I felt, too, that I was not risking disease. This is nonsense, as I discovered once when I picked up a mild dose of clap, which I fortunately got rid of before passing it on to my wife. But the baths seem clean, you know, in the same way that a public toilet seems dirty, so you have the feeling you’re less likely to catch anything there. I had no trouble keeping my activities from my wife. As a matter of fact, I told her I had joined a health club.

•  •  •

At this point Alvin was functioning as a closet homosexual. He still did not fully recognize his behavior as homosexual, but did not take him long to realize that his enjoyment of relations with other men earned him that label. Also, it was not very long before his preference for passive fellatio led him to desire to find out what the active role was like.

•  •  •

I understand this happens to almost everybody. It was a great surprise to me. I tried to push the thought out of my head at first. In fact it was this troublesome thought that several times led me to skip the baths and try having sex with female prostitutes. But it didn’t work. It got to the point where I would make love to my wife and have fantasies that I was sucking a penis, and that really gave me the willies.

Well, to make a long story short, I tried it and I liked it, like the Alka-Seltzer commercial. Liked it? I loved it. I developed a real taste for it. And before long I was digging everything. I liked to be blown and I liked to blow other guys. I liked to bugger and be buggered. I liked the whole thing. I still cringed at the idea of kissing another man on the mouth, and as a matter of fact I still do. I could never have anything like a love relationship with another man. In fact, I would not like to have sex with any male with whom I have any other sort of relationship. I don’t know why this is, but for me homosexual relations are nothing but a sexual matter and I have always wanted to keep it that way.

The unsatisfying aspect of my “closet” existence was the guilt that always went through me. There seemed to me to be something very grubby about the whole business. Whether it went on in a filthy toilet or an immaculate steam room, it was still somehow distasteful to me. I would go through periods of giving it up, I would have occasional affairs with women, I would try everything, but there was something that compelled me to keep returning to the baths.

As I see it, the picture of the closet queen, sneaking gaily off to the baths while his wife has her hair done, is a little simplistic. I’d be surprised if most of the guys in that position don’t go through much the same thing I did, being filled with remorse from time to time, swearing off homosexuality from time to time, the whole bit.

I went to a shrink for a few months. It didn’t do any good as far as I could see. It was just a matter of lying there and talking. He was pretty much of an orthodox Freudian, from what I understand of the whole business, and he hardly ever said a word to me. I figured I could talk to myself a lot cheaper and I broke it off.

•  •  •

One possible way to “normalize” his circumstances, Alvin thought, was if he could have not homosexual but bisexual experiences. He knew he was not exclusively homosexual; he was always able to perform with his wife, and invariably derived considerable satisfaction from sexual relations with other women. It was more that he seemed to need both male and female sex partners. The possibility of having partners of both sexes—and at the same time—subsequently occurred to him. It was a pornographic novel which suggested the idea.

•  •  •

It was a piece of homosexual pornography. I had read a few books of that sort, although I never dared to buy them, as if what some pimply bookstore clerk thought of me should make any difference. Periodically, though, you would find them at the baths. Guys would bring them along, read them to get excited before they started cruising, and then toss them in a corner rather than tote them home to Scarsdale. They usually didn’t do much for me, but this particular one put a bug in my brain.

I still remember the basic plot. This older man gets a crush on a young kid in his twenties. The kid is married. He befriends them both and seduces the wife as a way of getting close to the husband. Then he seduces the husband. Then each finds out what’s been going on, and the three of them wind up having orgies for the last seventy or eighty pages, with everybody doing everything to everybody else, and at the end they talk about how much fun it will be in a few years, because the wife’s pregnant and they’ll have someone else to play with soon.

It was revoltingly written, of course, and the dialogue was incredibly bad, but it was fantastically exciting to me because of the possibilities it opened up. The idea of having sex with a man and woman at the same time—it was what I had actually been wanting for years, only I hadn’t realized it.

My first idea was to have my wife get involved with another man, a bisexual like myself, but, as taken as I was with the idea, I knew how utterly impossible it was. She was just not the right person to put in that kind of role, and thank God I never took steps to bring anything like that about, because she would have either dropped dead of shock at the thought or run off screaming, never to be seen again. And I don’t want that to happen. I love her and we have a very good marriage, and I want to keep it that way.

In certain ways I might be better off if she did divorce me, and I might eventually find a woman to marry who is on a keel with me sexually—for example, a bisexual girl who enjoys the swinging life. That might be ideal, but at the same time I know what it’s like financially for guys I know who’ve been through the divorce mill. They make big salaries and it all goes for alimony and child support. Also, I don’t want somebody else raising my kids. I enjoy spending time with them, and I’m not a bad father, either. As a matter of fact, I think I’m a pretty good father.

To get back to what I was saying, I realized in plenty of time that this was something my wife would never be the slightest bit enthusiastic about. She enjoys sex—provided it’s fairly conventional, and at night, and preferably with the lights out—but I don’t think it’s terribly important to her. I’m always the one to initiate lovemaking. She always welcomes it, but if I don’t make the first move, nobody does.

Now, all along I had been aware of the existence of swinging. Except I wasn’t aware of it by that name. I thought of it as wife-swapping, and that term gives you an idea of the mental fix I had on it. I’d read what I suppose is the usual number of magazine articles on the subject, and felt it was limited to married couples having sexual relations with other married couples. You know, trading wives for an evening. I thought it was a great idea, but I also knew it was not something my own wife would ever go for. In fact, I had mentioned it from time to time—just testing the water, so to speak, not even hinting that I thought it was a great idea—and she made it quite obvious that, as far as she was concerned, people who would do that sort of thing were sick and disgusting.

But when I began fantasizing having sex with a couple, I dreamed up a lot of impossible plans to pass myself off as a couple, then turn up at the house explaining that my wife couldn’t make it, on the off-chance that something would turn up. I also thought of hiring a prostitute to pretend to be my wife. I gather a lot of men go through this sort of scheming, and I understand some of them even try both of those things, though I suspect the guys who say their wives got sick—well, I don’t suppose they get the warm welcome they’re hoping for, do they?

In line with these fantasies I bought some of the correspondence magazines, and I was amazed to discover a couple of ads from couples where both parties were bisexual and were looking for single males to join in the fun. I really was terribly naïve and had missed the whole point of swinging, which is for people to do whatever they want if they can find people who want to do the same things . . .

Naturally, in that first magazine the only ads I could find like that were on the other side of the country. But when a man is determined nothing can stop him, and of course I bought every swingers’ magazine on the market, and answered every ad in the New York area that was of that type, and before long I was making contacts.

•  •  •

The couples he met through the correspondence clubs turned out to be the answer to Alvin’s prayers. The presence of sex partners of either sex seemed to have a synergistic effect upon him. He got keener enjoyment out of relations with the man because of the presence of the woman, and vice versa. This seems to have been more than the thrill of being able to do several things at once; he had experienced group sex with other males and had not felt anything similar.

I suspect this synergy is not uncommon among bisexuals. In a book unfortunately titled Women Who Swing Both Ways, I included an interview with a male bisexual who stated repeatedly that he always enjoyed sex with males more when a female was present. Perhaps the females presence does little more than mitigate the guilt of engaging in an exclusively homosexual performance. I’m not certain.

•  •  •

I can’t say I’ve never had a bad experience in swinging. I doubt that there’s a person around who could make that statement. Invariably you meet people who simply don’t appeal to you, in which case you have the choice of hurting them by saying so or going through with it even though you’d rather not. And invariably you meet people whom you enjoy well enough in a sexual way but with whom you have nothing else in common. I don’t mind that myself, as I try to keep all these relationships exclusively sexual. For friendship, well, I have my business friends, and I have several couples my wife and I are very close to on the Island. I would no more want to have close personal relationships with my swinging acquaintances than I would want to have sex with my personal friends.

And I say that knowing that a lot of the more utopian swingers consider it the worst kind of hypocrisy. In fact, they would label me a closet swinger, as far as that goes, because they feel swinging shouldn’t be something you do just for sexual kicks but that it should be part of a total way of life, that you should fuck your friends, you might say. I personally think this looks very good on paper. Maybe it even works for some of the people who practice it. But I know myself well enough to know that it’s not for me. That may be a fault of mine, but that’s the way it goes. And I think they’re idiots for condemning the people they call closet swingers. That’s the greatest thing about swinging, the freedom in it; you can be any kind of swinger you want as long as you don’t screw up anybody else.

As I was saying, I’ve had a share of experiences that weren’t perfect. But they were just a tiny minority of the swinging I’ve done, and the results have been . . . well, “beyond my wildest dreams” is the phrase that leaps to mind.

It’s better than having affairs because even when the affair is obviously not going to lead anywhere, even when the girl knows the score completely, there’s always a certain amount of involvement on one or both sides, and there’s always the threat of starting an affair that isn’t going to lead somewhere. You can be very sure of yourself, very sure you’re not going to make the mistake of confusing an erection with true love, and before you know it you’ve fallen into the shit. I know so many guys who’ve had that happen. Very cynical bastards, guys who like to have something going on the side but positive they won’t make fools out of themselves, and the first thing you know, they’re convinced they’re in love. They may not break up their families over it, although that does happen some of the time, but in any case they put themselves through a lot of pain and aggravation.

It’s also better than that round of the baths, all that guilt, all that hit-and-run sex under what are, now that I think about it, the worst possible conditions. Sweaty rooms with sex going on all around you, and even if you’re in a private room you know what’s going on next door, and the next door after that, and so on, a whole building full of men fucking and sucking one another.

No, this means going to a private home or an apartment and having some drinks and hearing some music, possibly smoking a little marijuana, and then some perfectly natural sex. Balling the guy, balling the gal, watching them together—it’s nice. It’s right for me.

I frankly can’t imagine myself living any other way.

“DEAR MR. WELLS . . .”

This book was supposed to end with the last chapter, which I finished very late last night. Then I checked the morning mail and found the following letter. It seemed a nice way to round things off.

Dear Mr. Wells,

I decided to take you up on your offer in Beyond Group Sex, which I am currently enjoying, to write—although I feel sure you are swamped with other “helpful” people!

I’m 20 years old, a psychology major, and obsessed with sex, although Masters and Johnson say there are no biological differences predisposing certain people to greater sexual needs. Whatever my motivation, which personally I feel is my motivation and high drive level—I love sex, period.

It is so upsetting to see people strung out against anything even remotely sexual that I am seriously considering devoting my life to the eradication of ignorance and whatever else makes people so inhibited. As is oft quoted, they just don’t know what they’re missing! Plus, I’m tired of people ostracizing me and calling me perverted, a nympho, you know the scene.

I personally think I entered the field of psychology to see if I was indeed sick, amoral, etc., and in my younger years went so far as to become a Catholic convert to help alleviate my guilt feelings, which were enormous!! Anyway, I just finished a Human Sexuality course—I just wish that more people could have that opportunity!

About myself, I’m currently experimenting with different sexual experiences. Now that I have accepted myself as completely normal and healthy, I am enjoying myself much much more. At 13, I lost my highly-valued virginity to a boy I was in love with and a terrific instructor, as I will always remember him. Since then I have had sex with fifty-four men (I’m obsessive-compulsive to keep a list, huh?), one chick, a group of men, and two guys who had previously slept with each other—and I hope to further extend my list!

I have had all the advantages I could have wanted—upper class, great parents, a college I enjoy . . . but I do have a lot of trouble now in that others are generally put off by how open and sexual my talk always is. I love it, I love it, and I just wish there were more uninhibited warm people on my list of acquaintances, as I am sure it would be all I would need to further enjoy life, as an ultimate of sorts.

Anyway, I am sure you are overwhelmed by many many letters from others who are interested for whatever reasons—but if you ever do find the time, I would certainly enjoy a letter, conversation, whatever. As do many, I consider myself quite full of all the joys, the sorrows, that I’ve known subjectively from being sexually liberal, but I also have a good store of the psychology, the statistics, etc.—the intellectual side. I merely study my favorite subject! If you can’t find time to answer, then just take this as another letter from someone pleased at what you’re doing.

Sincerely,

Annette

Ah, yes. I suspect I can find time to answer, Annette. And you don’t live terribly far from here, do you?

There are far worse ways, dear Reader, to earn one’s bread . . .

The End

ABOUT THE AUTHORS

Lawrence Block has been writing best-selling mystery and suspense fiction for half a century. A multiple recipient of the Edgar and Shamus awards, he has been designated a Grand Master by the Mystery Writers of America, and received the Diamond Dagger for Life Achievement from the UK’s Crime Writers Association. His most recent novels are A Drop Of The Hard Stuff, featuring Matthew Scudder, and Getting Off, starring a very naughty young woman. Several of his books have been filmed, although not terribly well. He's well known for his books for writers, including the classic Telling Lies For Fun & Profit, and The Liar's Bible. In addition to prose works, he has written episodic television: Tilt! and the Wong Kar-wai film, My Blueberry Nights. He is a modest and humble fellow, although you would never guess as much from this biographical note.

John Warren Wells emerged in the mid-1960s as a writer of sexological nonfiction, and produced twenty books in the ensuing decade. His works, in the main, consist of compilations of case histories selected to illuminate a particular theme, and topics range from female bisexuality (Women Who Swing Both Ways) and troilism (Three is Not a Crowd) to the evolving lifestyles of a decade of sexual liberation (The New Sexual Underground and Wide Open: The New Marriage). His groundbreaking work, Tricks of the Trade: A Hooker’s Handbook of Sexual Technique, was especially successful, and may have inspired Xaviera Hollander to write The Happy Hooker.

One particularly noteworthy book, Different Strokes, consists of his screenplay and production diary for the pornographic feature film of that name, which he seems to have written and directed, in addition to playing a key role. His column, “Letters to John Warren Wells,” was a popular feature in Swank Magazine. The dedications of several books would seem to indicate that Wells carried on an extensive on-again, off-again relationship with Jill Emerson, herself the author of Threesome, A Week as Andrea Benstock, and, more recently, Getting Off. All of JWW’s books have been out of print for thirty-five years; that they are now available to a new generation of readers may be attributed to the technological miracle of eBooks and the apparently limitless ego and avarice of their author.

Contact Lawrence Block:

Email: lawbloc@gmail.com

Blog: LB’s Blog

Facebook: LB's Facebook Fan Page

Website: www.lawrenceblock.com

Twitter: @LawrenceBlock

John Warren Wells on Sexual Behavior Ebooks

3 Is Not A Crowd

Beyond Group Sex: The New Sexual Life Styles

Come Fly With Us

Different Strokes: Or, How I (Gulp) Wrote, Directed & Starred in an X-Rated Movie

Doing It!

Eros and Capricorn

The Male Hustler

Older Women and Younger Men: The Mrs. Robinson Syndrome

Sex and the Stewardess

The Sex Therapists

Sex Without Strings

The New Sexual Underground

The Taboo Breakers

Tricks of the Trade: A Hooker’s Handbook of Sexual Technique

Versatile Ladies: Women Who Swing Both Ways

Wide Open: The New Marriage

The Wife-Swap Report

VERSATILE LADIES:

WOMEN WHO SWING BOTH WAYS

John Warren Wells

Lawrence Block

copyright © 1971, 2012, Lawrence Block

All Rights Reserved

ONE:

DIMENSION OF FEMALE BI-SEXUALITY

“When we first began to get into swinging, our whole orientation was rather innocent. By this I mean that our concept of swinging was limited to the one fundamental idea of mate-swapping. That was what we thought swinging was about—you met with another couple or with a group of couples, you paired off and went to separate houses or rooms, and you had sex.

“Variety was a big appeal, but it was all the idea of a variety of partners. You could enjoy sex with different partners without sneaking around or cheating. In fact the whole thing became a part of the marriage instead of an extramarital thing, in that you went into it together and discussed it and all . . .

“But neither of us ever thought in terms of a variety of acts. Of course we expected to learn new things with different partners, that was only to be expected, but that was as far as our minds went. Essentially we expected to do basically the same things with these other partners that we did with each other. Group sex was something we had not really contemplated. Our image of group sex was simply that a group got together and paired off. The first time we switched partners and made it all in the same room together, I remember it was something of a shock. It was tremendously exciting, naturally. It added a whole new dimension to the experience. Nevertheless, it was a shock.

“More than that, neither of us ever considered the possibility that there would be any homosexual relations involved. This may be hard to believe when you realize that we had read quite a few books on swapping. And in these books absolutely everything happened—group sex, homosexual relations, intercourse with animals, absolutely everything anyone could imagine. But the thing was that these books were obviously nothing but fantasy. They were novels, and there would be long drawn-out descriptions of sexual relations that couldn’t have been more detailed, and absolutely mindless character motivation and unbelievable dialogue, and we just thought of these books as the pornography they obviously were and didn’t take them seriously as a description of the swinging scene. They occasionally turned us on and I suppose in certain ways they made us more amenable to swinging, but neither my husband nor I thought that, just because these cardboard characters in these tacky books did thus and so with each other, that actual people in real life would behave that way.

“Well, you live and you learn. Just because the books rendered the whole thing so implausibly didn’t mean that people didn’t perform all of the acts that the books so elaborately described. And just because the people in the books were nothing like us didn’t mean that we didn’t find ourselves duplicating their behavior to a surprising degree. To make a long story short, we found out we liked group sex, and I found out I liked making love to another woman. In fact I can hardly envision swinging nowadays without lesbian relationships. The one is part and parcel of the other.

“I suppose it’s possible to be a swinger, to be really into it, and to avoid this. But it’s damned rare. It really is. I don’t know what the statistics would be. There’s a new book out that I haven’t read yet, a hardcover book on swinging by some professor, and in the advertisements there’s something to the effect that ninety-two percent of the wives who get into swinging also get into homosexuality. Or bisexuality, whatever you want to call it.

“Ninety-two percent is as reasonable a figure as any other, I guess. As far as I’m concerned, what it means is this—ninety-two percent of the wives are into swinging with other women, and the other eight percent haven’t gotten around to it yet. That’s what it really means, because when we meet a girl who isn’t ready for it it’s almost invariably a case of her and her husband being new to swinging. In fact what a girl will say in those circumstances isn’t that she doesn’t dig making love with other women but that she’s not ready for it yet. As if she already accepts the fact that sooner or later it’s going to be an okay scene for her.

“The way I’ve come to see it, and a couple of years ago I never would have believed I’d be saying anything like this, is that all women are bisexual. All of them. One hundred percent of women are bisexual, in swinging or out of it. The only thing is that not all of them realize it . . .”

•  •  •

All women are bisexual.

If this is so, they are rather like Orwell’s creatures in Animal Farm, where all animals were equal but some were more equal than others. All women are bisexual, but some are more bisexual than others. Some are aware of it and acting on it; others are not.

Every day, more women are finding out.

For the past decade, I have spent a major portion of my time as a close observer of the American sexual underground. Occasionally I have suspected that a close long-term association with mate-swappers, swingers, or what have you, gives one a somewhat unrealistic perspective of contemporary sexual behavior. In a sense, generalizations on this theme based on observations of the sexual underground are like generalizations about the American social structure based on observations of life in Southern California. But a continuation of the analogy is instructive. Southern California, however one feels about it (and one can hardly avoid having ambivalent feelings about the place), does show us in a great many ways what the rest of America is going to look like in ten or twenty or thirty years time. And the sexual underground, the swingers, very definitely represent a direction which is being and will be taken by an ever increasing number of Americans . . . however one feels about it, and however ambivalent one’s feelings are likely to be.

This last is an important point. A decade ago, even five years ago, I was considerably less inclined to take this position. At that time one could as easily argue that swinging in its sundry forms was a passing fad, important to study and understand for various reasons but unlikely to have any lasting impact on the American socio-sexual scene. One could regard the wife-swappers (a term now lamented as an example of the worst sort of male chauvinism, but unequivocally accepted then) as on a par with the hula hoop and the Twist. In a larger sense, one could explain the sexual underground as an understandable reaction to earlier extremes of native American puritanism facilitated by various liberating social forces unleashed after the Second World War. The whole phenomenon could be viewed as cyclical, with a swing toward conventional morality ultimately likely to counterbalance all of it.

Well, swinging is now ten years older—as are we all—and what seemed logical then seems less logical now. Not only has there been no countertrend but there has not been even the beginning of a countertrend, nor has swinging ceased its constant pattern of acceleration. The sexual underground grows ever larger and ever more vocal.

I would hesitate to predict that, in a greater or lesser period of time, what is now the sexual underground will become the sexual overground—i.e., that there will be more people engaged in swinging than not. Yet I would be equally hesitant to predict that this will not ultimately be the case. One cannot fail to acknowledge the possibility.

Some months ago, I appeared on a Dayton radio program to discuss another book, The Wife-Swap Report. This particular book dealt with one couple whom I was privileged to interview in great depth over a period of several months. It had seemed worthwhile to me to abandon in that instance the usual pattern of dealing with eight or ten cases in a single book so that I could instead examine one couple’s experiences at length and show the full role swinging had played in their lives and its effects upon them.

One result of this approach was that the ordinary lay reader, well-insulated from the sexual underground, was able to see a pair of swingers very much as people, with full human dimensions and rather typical human problems. The radio program’s host, Ted Ryan, commented on this in a pre-program interview, and asked at the time if this whole phenomenon of swinging, with which he was manifestly unfamiliar, could possibly exist in a town like Dayton.

I told him it could and did. I told him further that I would be enormously surprised if the program did not draw at least one telephone call from a self-acknowledged swinger in his audience.

The program consisted of perhaps ten minutes of straight interview and an hour during which listeners could call in with questions or comments. A large number of callers merely wanted certain information or desired to speak out strongly against swinging, usually accompanying their views with biblical references. But among the callers were two women who stated that their husbands were interested in swinging and had attempted to persuade them to give it a try. Both seemed about ready to take a tentative step in that direction. Then a third woman called to reply to the anti-swinging forces, announcing that she and her husband had had two years of a bad marriage, had joined a mate-swapping group, had been members of the group for the past seven years, and credited it with saving their marriage and enriching their lives. “Don’t knock it if you haven’t tried it,” she advised.

Almost immediately, after her call, a fourth woman called in to ask if there were any memberships open in the third women’s group, and how she might get in touch with her!

While one can draw several conclusions from all of this, the one I find most significant is perhaps the least obvious. And that is the fact that it would have been wholly inconceivable for that same radio program to have been aired five or ten years ago. I would never have been invited to discuss such a topic over a Midwestern radio station in the early afternoon had not our overall sexual attitudes undergone considerable change in the interim.

•  •  •

The foregoing may seem a digression from the theme of the present volume, which is of course a discussion and survey of female bisexualism in swinging. But the point is that the trend toward female bisexual relations is very much a part of the overall trend of swinging itself. And its rate of acceleration has been extraordinary.

When swinging first began to manifest itself to any appreciable extent, typical swinger behavior was very much that anticipated by the young wife quoted at the beginning of this chapter. For most couples, swinging consisted of nothing more than exchanging partners and retiring to private quarters for what was essentially a duplication of activities carried on in the nuptial bed. One did with this new partner what one did with one’s own husband or wife.

Gradually, swinging in general went through the same evolutionary process as this couple did in microcosm—proceeding a step at a time to sex in one room, to heterosexual group sex, and ultimately to group sex in which bisexual relations play a part.

An analysis of advertisements in a typical swingers’ magazine quickly shows just how much things have changed. An overwhelming majority of these ads specifically imply a distinct interest in female bisexuality. Ads in which a desire is expressed solely to swing with other couples will often stress that the wife is “bi-minded” or “versatile”—these being the two most popular euphemisms for bisexual at the moment. Even more ads aim at a meeting with couples or bi-minded single girls. Other ads, placed by a wife, aim at a meeting with other bi-minded women; a common phrase in such advertisements is “Husband participates if desired.” And other couples desire only to swing with single bi-minded women.

(This last preference, for a threesome or ménage à trois involving a man and two women, is so significant a behavioral trend that I devoted a book, Three Is Not A Crowd, specifically to it.)

Why female bisexualism? Why, in the permissive world of the swingers, is there such a predominance of lesbian relations as compared to male homosexual relations? And is this trend toward female bisexualism being echoed to any extent by a trend toward male bisexualism?

To answer the last question first, there is a definite trend toward male homosexual relations in the context of swinging. It has emerged more slowly and has reached dimensions nowhere near those of the parallel trend toward lesbianism, but its very real existence is undeniable. Male bisexual swingers are inclined to see themselves as the vanguard of the future. In a few years time, they say, male bisexualism will be every bit as common and unremarkable among swingers as female bisexualism is now. Barring any reversal of present trends, I suspect they are right.

At the present time, however, they are very much in the minority, and it is important to understand the very real reasons for this “sex gap.” One aid to understanding is the realization of the very great difference in society’s attitudes toward male and female homosexuals. Straight society has always had an infinitely greater fear of and contempt for the male homosexual. He has been subjected to police harassment and social ostracism to an extent far greater than that applied to the lesbian.

In a similar vein, our social norms are such that the non-sexual behavior of males is circumscribed in certain ways which do not affect women. It is considered perfectly acceptable, for example, for two unequivocally heterosexual women to walk down the street holding hands, to kiss upon meeting and parting, to hug each other, and so on. Men simply are not encouraged to behave in this fashion.

A young girl with an enthusiasm for sports or other typically male activities may be labeled a tomboy, but not in a distinctly pejorative sense. A young boy with a comparable inclination for dolls and cooking and sewing is labeled a sissy and scorned for his preferences. A girl in a shirt and pants is perfectly fashionable; a man in a dress is in drag, and is damned likely to be arrested.

Finally, our attitudes are such that male homosexuality is widely considered to be specifically unmanly, a negation of virility. A man is considered less of a man for making love to another man. This is very much less the case with women. While the deep-voiced, broad-shouldered butch lesbian is defeminized in our eyes by her manner, the ordinary lesbian is not; her enjoyment of sexual relations with members of her own sex does not in and of itself detract from her essential femininity.

This helps to explain why, outside of the sexual underground, females are more likely than males to be bisexual. Traditionally, males have been far more likely to be “either one thing or another”—either homosexual or heterosexual, as if the enjoyment of relations with one sex precludes the enjoyment of relations with the other sex. This has been noticeably less true with women.

An inquiry into this particular gulf between the sexes could go on at greater length than present space limitations permit. But we will return to this theme periodically in the pages which follow.

•  •  •

The interviews which follow have been selected not because they are typical, whatever precisely that may be construed to mean, but because I feel they are instructive. They show a variety of ways in which female bisexualism has manifested itself in the world of swingers, and show too a variety of effects which such behavior has had upon the persons involved.

The reader will note that I have kept my own remarks and observations to a minimum and have let the subjects of these interviews speak in their own voices. My own work has consisted in large measure merely of cutting extraneous material and streamlining the presentation in the interests of clarity and brevity. An interview frequently runs quite a few hours, and a verbatim rendering of such material would fill several volumes in and of itself.

With this stipulation, and with the obvious admonition that all names, places, and comparable details have been deliberately altered, the interviews are presented in the subjects’ own words, and the author, like the reader, is essentially no more than an interested listener.

•  •  •

In the pages to follow you will make the acquaintance of several very interesting women. All of them have recognized within themselves a capacity for the enjoyment of sexual relations with both men and women, and have accommodated themselves and their sexual life styles to their desires, in the face of society’s implicit insistence that such life styles are immoral, unnatural, and perverse. But for their willingness to share their ideas and experiences first with me and finally with you, the reader, this book could never have come into being.

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Table of Contents

Table of Contents

Title Page

But First This Word from Our Author

Evelyn

Christie and Vernon

Frank

Marv

Kate

Letters, Letters, Letters

Erica

Paul

Alvin

"Dear Mr. Wells..."

About the Author

Excerpt: Versatile Ladies