Sunday, April 16, 2006

Another easter at work: Uneccessary Post About Penis Size

I worked today. I've worked, now, since starting my current job-

Three easters.
Two christmases.
Two christmas eves.
Two thanksgivings.
Two halloweens.

And countless arbor days.

It was dead tonight. Mostly it's busy on holidays. Next to the pharmacy, we're the only thing in the neighborhood open on holidays. The first thanksgiving we were open, we sold more milk and cream than coffee.

My coworker told me a joke, because it was so dead. Normally, we can't say vulgar, obscene, funny, critical, controversial, etc- things in the cafe area, but tonight there were hours at a time where no one came in. We tried to stay away from the doors so people might drive by real quick and think we were closed.

Q. How do you tell when a woman's having an orgasm?
A. Who cares?

It could just as easily be, or more honestly be, "How can you tell if a woman is happy?".

Who cares, who knows, who can even judge the criteria these days. It's a dark, damp, and scary subject. Who knows if a woman is happy? Who knows what a woman is even getting out of a relationship? Who knows if she's enjoying herself in bed?

You can't know. You have to depend on her for all of it. Men are easier. Even if they hide their emotions and motivations, anyone can tell if a man is enjoying himself in bed. Anyone can tell if a man is grossly unmotivated to perform sexually. His body is a fairly reliable indicator (see how I resisted that pun there? See. I'm such a grownup. I'm an intellectual) of his level of arousal, and the effectiveness of any sexual technique used on him.

Women- there's no way to tell. They can lie. Their bodies can be out of sync with their emotional state. They can be mentally aroused and sahara down below. They can display all indicators of emotional and physical enjoyment of the sexual act, while trying to watch televison in the reflection in the bedroom mirror. How frustrating!

It is the male dedication to the sexual act, and only the male dedication to the sexual act, that makes it possible. A woman can be entirely passive and unaffected, while theoretically participating in the exact same experience.

The penis size debate, penis size anxiety, mostly grows from the paradox of uneven sexual requirements. As a measure of sexual success, it bypasses mutual enjoyment entirely. It reframes the debate- rather than a question of sexual ability and talent, it becomes about capacity and potential. Filling, rather than fulfilling.

By making length and girth the measure of himself, a man takes his sexuality back into his own hands (as it were). Female arousal and enjoyment is abstract, unreliable, easily misinterpreted or falsified. The size of the erect phallus is a constant. No woman can, during a break up, flippantly declare that she faked your penis size for the entire relationship. Your penis size is unchanged by the time she tried to change channels during sex. Your dick doesn't get smaller when she leaves you for a woman.

It's actually quite liberating, when you think of it. And, it explains why men are never comforted by such platitudes as "It's the motion of the ocean, not the size of the boat." Of course it's the motion of the ocean, not the size of the boat. But if you can't tell whether you've got a Tsunami or not, or if that's a good thing, or if lapping waves are really the way to go- maybe you'd be happier knowing it's a canoe.

1 comment:

Roger Williams said...

An excellent post. That joke is so old I'm amazed you'd never heard it before. Also:

Q: What do you call the extraneous flap of flesh near the vagina?

A: A woman.