Dry Spell
Right middle finger. Over the panties. Left and right. Quick. Left and right. Quicker. You know the rest.
Over the last decade and a half of rubbing one out, not much has changed. I still use the same hand, same finger, same cadence, and I come without fail after about a minute — sometimes less. If it ain’t broke, right? Though I’ve dabbled in the dildo arts just a few times, it always felt distant and awkward and — fuck, maybe I just didn’t have the right kind of vibrating silicone that was necessary. I mean, I once took (and disinfected, of course) a large sparkly, purple cock that was hanging from the ceiling of a warehouse party in New Orleans a few years back, but every time I tried to put it near my vag — that shit just didn’t turn me on. Call me old fashioned (lolol), but I prefer to go about personal pleasure via digital stimulation and not much else.
My right middle finger has been a constant in my life more than some friends, definitely more than some boyfriends, it’s outlived jobs, pets, and hobbies — though jacking off is a favorite hobby to some (sup). And while my favorite finger can’t stay up late talking about our collective and uncertain future or Drake’s new album or sad shit my mom did when I was a teenager, it always knows just the right way to turn that clit frown upside down. In some regards, the relationship I have with my right middle finger is the most important non-platonic relationship of all — surpassing lovers, friends with benefits, friends that I fucked once, friends that I accidentally fucked twice, and all sexual experiences in between.
My right middle finger nurses me when I’m hungover, it helps me fall asleep, it eases stress and anxiety and depression, and it takes care of me when I’m not having as much sex as I would like to be having. Sure, dry spells when single and mingling suck, but dry spells when you’ve rounded the year and a half mark in your relationship? Fuck. After two months and only two humps, you start to wonder — what’s happening? Relationships, and your emotional connection with your partner, ebb and flow. Sex can fade when people get complacent, when people get busy, when people get frustrated. Sex rebounds just as quickly as it lapsed, but how do you navigate the interim? How do you bounce back when fucking feels like something that needs to happen, but you just can’t move past the emotional disconnect in order for it to occur?
If my right middle finger could talk, she’d say — get a grip, bitch. And cut your fingernails. If you’re a sensitive motherfucker like me, it’s easy to over analyze every little thing that goes on in your relationship. One stress becomes a wall becomes a breakdown becomes a conversation that you’ve had every four months like clockwork. You want to feel close and orgasm the pain away, but unfortunately — sex and intimacy haven’t worked for you that way in the past. If my mind isn’t properly lubricated with comfort and vulnerability and security (and a whole lot of lust), my vagina will literally become a desert of missed opportunities and resentment. Water-based lube helps, but it can’t always be the solution.
In periods like these, my right middle finger steps it into overdrive — masturbating my way to a better understanding of myself and how I deal. It’s like a self-help book if self-help books had no words and made your clit get really sore and swollen. Masturbating clears my head and gives me just the right amount of dopamine to process and work through all of the shit that I keep bundled up inside. With one physiological toe-curling release, I’m able to exhale a lot of the pressure that clouds my judgment when it comes to my relationship woes, faults, and insecurities. It’s kind of like accessing the deep web of my brain, but with less drugs, right winged political affiliations, and Bitcoins — and more ideas about communication tactics, gut-desires, and emotional labor. My deep web is in touch AF, y’all.
Sex will come and go just as relationships will fall and rise, but keeping up with the one relationship that matters most is no easy feat. Call it what you want — flicking the bean, choking the chicken, diddling your skittle — it doesn’t really matter. But cultivating that relationship with your hand, vibrator, dildo, cock ring, anal beads, or Fleshlight means accessing and opening a part of your sexual and emotional storybook on your own terms. Being able to lubricate the mind and body during a dry spell won’t always happen with a lover or large, sparkly purple cock — but I’ll always have my favorite fuck buddy in my right middle finger.
