My Truth ~ Part Two: My Sexual Awakening

Part One

I grew up in an Italian Catholic middle class house in the greater NYC area. My family was different than a lot of other Italian households, or so it seemed to me at the time. My father was the spitting image of the actor, Victor Mature, except dad was taller and broader and in the summer much darker. My mother, in her youth, looked very similar to Grace Kelly. My mother had done some runway modeling in NYC and my father had spent years playing minor league baseball, only to suffer a career-ending injury to his pitching arm during spring training after he had just been called up to the majors. I will always be a Yankee fan!

My father was somewhat of a hero to all who knew him. Aside from being tall, dark, and handsome, he was extremely talented. He was athletic and excelled at any sport he played, but baseball was obviously his passion. He could also sing opera and even performed while in college. He was extremely intelligent and was a product of a prestigious New York private school from Kindergarten through high school. He was funny and witty and made everyone around him laugh. He was well-mannered, gracious, and always a gentleman. He was larger than life. I could write volumes about my father and maybe one day I’ll write a book, but I’m here to write about my sexual awakening.

My father was what they used to refer to as a “ladies man.” Women really did throw themselves at him and I even witnessed it growing up. I have no idea if my father ever cheated on my mother. She adamantly denies that he ever faltered, but I have my suspicions. My mom seemed to go crazy right about when I was 10 or 11 and to my knowledge no cause was ever seriously given. At one point it was thrown around that she was hypoglycemic and that explained why she used to throw herself down the stairs in front of us young children and then supposedly pass out. It was during those episodes that my mother mysteriously spent two weeks in the hospital without visitors being allowed. Hypoglycemia my ass! My mother needed some psychiatric care. My father fell over backwards for my mother during that time. As an adult I recognize the actions of my father as someone filled with guilt and shame. Still, it’s just a theory. Some of the rumors about my dad before he was married to my mom were that he had an affair with the famous burlesque star, Blaze Starr, and that he even tried to pick up Jake LaMotta’s wife, Vikki, at a club. I know for a fact that my grandmother was arranging a marriage between my dad and the heiress to a well-known vineyard. It was right about that time my father met my mother. My mother tells me that my grandmother tried to buy her off so she wouldn’t marry my dad. Nice, grandma!

My great uncle owned a “candy store” just outside the Bronx. He sold candy, magazines, newspapers, and tobacco products. A lot of suspicious activity went on in that store (can you say running numbers or Italian lottery?), but one thing that came from that store directly into my house was a voluminous amount of porn magazines. I can’t tell you specifically which ones because the banners were always torn off. Nonetheless, there were stacks of them in the back of my father’s walk-in closet. I’m sure my brothers all found their way to those stacks, but I did as well. Later on we all generously helped ourselves to the cases of liquor my dad received as Christmas presents from law firms, but that was during the drug and alcohol years. I was a curious 8 year old who had recently heard as a 7 year old everything about reproductive systems and sex in front of many listening ears at the beach that summer from my overly zealous nurse mother. Nice, mom!

At 7/8 years old I could read and comprehend as well as an 8^th grader so not only did I look at all the dirty pictures, but I read the stories as well and filled my head with all kinds of imagery. Emotionally I was, of course, a 7/8 year old so the motivations behind those stories in those magazines were confusing. However, I was fascinated and couldn’t get enough. I became addicted to porn at 8 years old. Nice, Elle!

I had my first orgasm at about the age of 9 and I wanted to try to have one for close to a year. I had a routine late Saturday afternoons if there wasn’t a game to go to or a project or chore that needed to be taken care of. My grandmother (the same one I wrote about) had an apartment on the lower level of our house and was the built-in babysitter. Many times on a late Saturday afternoon it would be she and I that were home. Grandma stayed in her apartment to watch TV and all she knew was that I was up in my room reading or coloring. What grandma did not know, and neither did anyone else, was that when I had that private time I would go and get some magazines from my father’s closet (always hoping for new ones), lock my bedroom door, sit on the floor right next to the door so I could hear if anyone was approaching, and devour what was in front of me. I wanted to look like these women and I wanted to feel something wonderful. I remember an erotic story about a woman who was teased with a rabbit’s foot. Well wouldn’t you know it, I had a rabbit muff!

Remember these?

I ran to my closet and took out my muff. I imagined I was getting teased like the woman in the story. I ran the muff all over myself and then settled it between my legs, started rubbing, and had my first orgasm. I masturbated for the first time. I was even more hooked after that and spent as many waking hours as I could with my muff and porn.