Where to begin?

Yesterday morning, Sandy felt like the personal storm story I’d be perfecting, one of those “where were you?” and “how’d you manage?”conversation starters New Yorkers were beginning to share as we navigated our ways back to routine: clearing tree limbs, bumping elbows at re-opened neighborhood eateries, and — finally! —  reconnecting with familiar voices via cellphone, so we could complain about erratic Verizon service.

My emerging story, shared way too far and wide on Facebook, featured Parkside Avenue‘s post-storm band of neighbors,  armed with saws and black garbage bags and lead by the self-proclaimed “Strong Jamaican Man”.

In 1990, our foursome of ACORN organizers briefly considered moving to an elegant two-family overlooking the B12 bus stop on this block of Parkside Ave. between Bedford and Flatbush. Bus fumes, yes, but also marble bathroom fixtures circa Amelia Earhart, an earlier resident.  More, though, than that stately mansion with a bargain basement pricetag, we were drawn by the four side-by-side families whose toddlers shared nearby Maple Street School with my daughter Anna Poe-Kest and my niece Jessie Streich-Kest, born three months apart.

For years, the adjoining back decks of the Miller-Conroy-Ehrlich-Coplon/Moreno clans enticed us to summer evening pot-luck dinners and, even better — to the best annual backyard dance party in Brooklyn.  Every September, four yards became one grand ballroom.  Everyone’s downstairs front doors wide opened wide to the world, an irresistible magnet to under-aged neighborhood kids; their persistent reconnaissance missions past distracted bartenders mostly thwarted, thanks to several hundred pairs of watchful in loco parental eyes.  By dark,  a crush of dancers captured the basketball court, salsa and motown blared through four-foot tall speakers, alternating with ever-shifting acoustic and electric sets by local musicians performing from a deck overhead.  Major talents in this neighborhood, even today; an extended musical community that reaches to Bob Telson in Argentina and Angelique Kidjo, now back in Brooklyn.  By midnight, the delighted crush of party-goers chanted and cheered Jeff Coplon’s annual appearance as Mick Jagger — spastic, uncanny.  The other equally reliable appearance: then State Senator and now Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz.  Even without the accompanying tubs of Ben and Jerry’s ice cream, we would’ve tolerated his cornball Brooklyn boosterism —  “We love you, Marty!”  No political speeches.

Those party nights, no one in those houses slept until the next morning.  Until a  bleary-eyed cleanup crew, many of whom had claimed couches rather than drive home,  shoveled the last of the Parkside Avenue party into black garbage bags and dragged them to the curb.

No wonder, I’ve long declared myself an honorary Parkside Avenue resident.  No wonder it became my safe haven when Sandy threatened and my own home was on loan to a family from Sweden.  And, no wonder it felt great to be part of  yesterday’s black garbage bag brigade.

Monday, we’d mostly obeyed official directives to stay indoors, six of us hunkering down with comfort food chili with apple pie and the endless loop of storm images from Long Beach, Battery Park, the West 57th Street crane, Long Beach, Battery Park….

At some point late afternoon, the message got through that that this storm was not just another weatherman’s wet dream.  Against our own inclinations, we calmed to images of Mike, Andrew and — I can’t believe I’m going to say this — Chris battling his head cold. Governor Cuomo favored the drama of pounding, floodlit surf;  the other two members of NY/NJ’s regional elected trifecta, a steady recitation of closings and cautions press conference style. All three reassured us. Glued to the TV, we gradually absorbed the enormity of a storm we’d all underestimated.

Around noon Tuesday, a diverse band of neighbors emerged from grand Lefferts Gardens houses and more down and out down the block apartments to do battle with a downed pear tree, one of two neighborhood giants felled by the storm.  The uprooted monster blocked pedestrians on the sidewalk;  more hazardously, it overwhelmed an ancient fire hydrant in branches and hard, BB-sized pears.  I’d thought that rusty hydrant dormant and inoperable, but was reassured that it had  miraculously gushed into action when “the big fire” threatened a corner building.

Our shared mission: insure safe passage for the sidewalkers (en route to PS 92 soon — we hoped), the MTA bus riders and, the fire trucks (we hoped NOT).

At 1:15 the bottom fell out of my storm story.  Online, I read a voicemail from my friend Laura Kenny in New Jersey, somewhat incomprehensibly transcribed, googletalk style:

Cate.  It’s Laura lease lot suggest emailed me about your needs.  Jet the And I’m so sorry to hear this.  When you get a chance.  I’m sure you’re quite busy.  Give me a call and of course,  if there’s anything I can do let me know and an accountant, but just wanna hear that you’re okay. Take care, Kay.  Bye Bye.

After several tries through busy circuits, I reached Laura. Then, the bottom fell out of my world.

They did what dog owners do. They walked the dog. They were friends living in Ditmas Park, Brooklyn. Jessie Streich-Kest was 24 and Jacob Vogelman was 23. Around 8 on Monday evening, during the howling viciousness of the storm, they ventured out with her dog, Max, a white pit bull mix.

Ms. Streich-Kest grew up with her family in Prospect Park South and was a teaching fellow. She had just started teaching at the Bushwick School for Social Justice, a high school. She had gone through her first parent-teacher conference last week, and was laughing about it afterward with her parents and their friends.

Her father, Jon Kest, is executive director of New York Communities for Change and a longtime activist who has led the battle to unionize carwashes and supermarkets across the city, as well as being a leader in the battle for paid sick days. His daughter was herself a bit of an activist, and helped organize Stop Horse Abuse, which was aimed at the carriage horses in Central Park.

In the wind and the rain, the two strode along Ditmas Avenue, a block of old Victorians and similar sprawling homes beneath a canopy of vast maples, oaks and lindens.

In rapid succession, perhaps within a space of no more than a half-hour, the brutal winds knocked down three trees. There was a booming sound as one fell. Their roots tore up massive chunks of sidewalk.

One of the trees on the south side of the block crushed them. They lay there until Tuesday morning, when their bodies were found.

No one realized that the trees had hit anyone. “We had no idea,” said Pat Atia, whose house faces out onto Ditmas Avenue on the block between East 17th and East 18th Streets. “I was outside taking pictures of my house for the insurance when a cop said ‘back up, back up’ and I saw a young man dead under the tree.”

The dog was bruised but survived. Neighbors were caring for him.

Yes, it’s the long-awaited cunnilingus post. Many of you – mostly women – have asked me for this post. You’ve asked. You’ve asked. And you’ve asked. I hesitated for a while, mostly because I have no Earthly clue what my husband is doing when he goes down there and I’m almost certain that he’s too shy to tell me.

I wanted to supply you with the info. But how?

Enter Violet Woolf. I met her a while ago. She’s bisexual. She told me a few stories that got me thinking that I wanted her to come to my house and give my husband some lessons about how to please a woman in bed. For instance, she told me that she regularly—using just her mouth and her hands—gave her girlfriend multiple orgasms. The most they counted was 10. Yes, that’s not a typo.

I became even more intrigued when she told me that this multiple orgasm thing was a regular occurrence for her. When she pleasured a woman? Major earthquakes took place in that woman’s womanly bits.

So I begged her to share her skills with you. If you are a woman, print this out. Give it to your partner. Tell him to read it as if it were scripture.

Please note that Violet uses some terminology that most of has have been taught to never say. My first instinct was to clean up her language. Upon further reflection, however, I realized that she used these terms with such reverence that she made each and every slang term for a woman’s vagina sound downright beautiful. So I left it as is.

Here’s Violet.

How to Go Down On a Woman

When Alisa asked me to write a How To guide for cunnilingus (aka, giving a woman head, going down on her, eating her out – which is a particularly odd saying, isn’t it?), my very first thought was, Impossible. You see, I can lay it all out here in vivid detail – all the ins and outs, the tricks, the techniques, but you’re going to have to put them together in a way that makes sense for the woman receiving this gift.

Every woman is different – not only from other women, but also (and sometimes, confusingly) from themselves on a day-to-day (even hour-to-hour) basis. That said, there are a couple of hard and fast rules. For instance, I would never spread a woman’s legs open and immediately start pounding her clit with my tongue or sucking on it voraciously. There’s always something to be said for build up, teasing…making her go get that pleasure.

Take your time getting there. Unless it’s one of those intense sexual hook-ups where the throw-down is in over-drive or you only have 10 minutes until the kids come home from school, don’t go straight for the goods. Take some time to kiss her whole body, every once in a while brush by her pussy – with your lips, your fingers your tongue – just enough to let it know you’re on your way.

Dive in sideways. Have you ever looked at a pussy? It looks like a mouth, just turned sideways. You’ve got lips, you’ve got a deep, warm hole, you’ve got the clit and its hood and shaft sticking out like a tongue. I suggest that you turn your mouth, or your whole body, sideways to meet it where it is – and make out with it. Soft kisses at first, all over. Then, bring the tongue in, lightly at first – keeping your lips glued to hers, literally just like you were kissing her real mouth. Let the tongue go deeper, suck the clit, its shaft and hood (the whole central area of the pussy) in and out of your mouth. Sink your tongue inside her vagina. Have fun – the sensations your lips and tongue are feeling can be almost as delightful to you as they are to her. She’s so soft and warm. Go from light and easy to deep, strong kissing – teasing her, letting her excitement rise and fall, but ultimately building. Note: many women don’t enjoy or can’t tolerate hardcore sensations for too long. It can be too much and actually cause numbness.

Lick from stern to stem. The first – and one of the most glorious – times that I received head, the giver placed her tongue at the bottom of my pussy (below the opening to my vagina) and licked slowly all the way up, over my clit to the very top of my pussy. She used a feather light touch, deep pressure and everything in between.

Use the right part of your tongue. How exactly should you hold your tongue? There are really two options – you can point it, using the hard tip, or you can keep it flat and soft. You’ll have to ask her which she likes more – or maybe she likes it all. But, personally, I love the flat, soft mode.

Make love to the shaft. A surprising number of people don’t know this – but the clit isn’t just a little button floating in the pussy. The button is connected to a shaft – much like the penis. It’s incredibly stimulating to have a finger on each side of the shaft rubbing up and down – just as you would do to a penis. (Up and down can either mean from the base up to the clit or back and forth from the top of the pussy towards the bottom). Of course, the tongue can also rub the shaft and the lips can move around it as they would on a cock.

Add some fingers or a toy. Some women really love and need penetration to achieve orgasm. If this is the case with your woman, add fingers or a dildo to the mix – matching the rhythm of your tongue on her clit to the thrusts of the penetrating tool. Again start slow and build up your pace and pressure in time with what you’re getting from her body.

Be patient. This whole process from the easing down of the panties to orgasm will take exactly…as long as it takes. I know some women that come within seconds, others that take hours and some that just can’t come via oral sex. But they all say that it still feels fantastic. If you’re not in it for the long haul, that’s okay. Cunnilingus is excellent foreplay.

Watch, listen and feel. Remember how I told you that all women are different, all the time? As such, it’s your job as the giver to watch, listen to and feel what’s going on with her. When you’re doing something right, her body will rise and writhe, she might tremble or shake, she’ll get wetter and wetter, she’ll moan, pant, scream, tell you what to do (“harder, more, do that other thing again”), grab your head and pull it in deeper. Or? You’ve got her laying there fairly motionless. If that’s happening, you need to read this again (or better yet, talk to her and find out what she wants.)

So, let’s review the golden rules to giving good girl head:

1. It’s not about you. It’s about her.

2. Follow her lead, her moans, her pushing into you or pulling away.

3. Enjoy yourself. There are few things in this world as pleasurable as licking a soft, sweet pussy while a woman writhes around you, grabbing your hair and yelling out in ecstasy.

Have fun, seek pleasure and always, always, honor the pussy.

candycoatedreality™

It is amazing the tsunami of emotions I’ve experienced since that day… Monday, July 16, 2012. The afternoon a nurse called to inform me, “The MRI scan of your brain taken on Friday, July 13th confirms a micro-adenoma of approximately 5mm in size located in your pituitary gland.”

Ummm, a wwhhhaaattt? Located where? How big? What is a millimeter?  Teary eyed I listened intently, “Oh, I’m sorry… an adenoma is a tumor… a benign tumor… micro because it is small. There is no indication the tumor is cancerous.” Oh, thank God!

So what does all of this mean?  “Well, the doctor who read your scan doesn’t want to diagnose you, so we need to wait for your doctor to decide a course of treatment. Unfortunately, he is out of the country and due back in two weeks.” Huh? Two weeks? That is f-o-r-e-v-e-r!! **sigh** The nurse was a…

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When it Rains, It Pours…For Everyone Else….

Out, about and home

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Out, about and home

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Out, about and home

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