Desert wadi

I don't know at what age I discovered that my penis had some possibilities beyond peeing. But by the time I was 9 or 10, I became acutely conscious of it growing stiff, and that it felt good when it did. Part of that growing awareness combined with an increasing love of nudity. That of course met with disapproval, and I began having private nudity and fondling sessions with myself by the time I was 9 or 10.

No adult ever discussed the penis or sex with me, and my brothers and I remained ignorant of sexual reproduction until we learned about it from friends and from each other. I was 14 and already heavily into masturbation before I learned what men and women do to make babies, an idea that I found appalling and that I still consider absurd.

Around this time my parents, moved by what I did not know, suddenly left a thick book on the bookcase titled something like Sex and Eugenics. The title page said the author was an M.D., but even I, in my state of relative ignorance, recognized that he was a fool. He had a section on masturbation, male only of course, and warned sternly that when a boy does this thing, he emits with his ejaculate a mysterious fluid that saps him of manhood, a juice that apparently does not flow out when engaged in duly sanctified marital intercourse or in "wet dreams." Clever fellow, that penis. Despite its absurdity, the book did endow me with a sense of guilt regarding the practice, and I tried again and again to stop or at least slow down. I marked on a calendar any "pure" days, which rarely ran to more than two in a row, and when I failed as I always did, I'd spend the rest of that day really making up for lost time, since the day was already a failure.

Finally, somewhere around age 16, I recognized that the fight wasn't worth it — that masturbation surely was doing no harm — and so I leaned into it full force thereafter. I don't think I've missed a day since then, although not always with orgasm. Now I'm in my mid 70s, which means that I've been giving myself pleasure for some 60 years, despite being married (quite happily by the way). Partly from my choice, partly hers, we haven't had sex together in at least 5 years, but we do maintain close physical contact.

Sexual intercourse was fun, yes, but for me nothing can compare to masturbation. Often after coming to orgasm during intercourse, I would wake up a few hours later and slip into the bathroom to do it right.

I have had some masturbation encounters with men, the earliest when I was already in my 40s. These I count as some of the most powerful orgasms that I have known. But there never was any emotional connection; it was purely physical, with no commitments, real or implied — two horny guys showing off their things and shooting.

Over the course of these years I have masturbated in a staggering variety of places, public and private: on wooded trails, on mountaintops, in desert wadis, in public restrooms, in cars while driving, in my jeans on a crowded bus and on the red-eye from coast to coast, out windows and into sinks, in movie theaters and on park benches, in my backyard and on a nude beach, beside superhighways and on city streets, on my chest and in my mouth, dry and wet and with fur and fabrics of every kind, in sand dunes and in the ocean, in locker rooms and swimming pools and hot tubs, in the middle of drill fields and into my sock in a double bunk in a barracks — all have been anointed with my semen. Yes, I've been seen (many times), and no, I've never been arrested — mostly because of luck, but also because I never called attention to what I was doing and I never did these things in the presence of children.

Nowadays as I enter my happy dotage, I ejaculate much less frequently, although I give my penis a nice workout every day just to keep it healthy and strong. And when I do reach orgasm these days, the spurt is pitiful in quantity and projectile force, ending not with a bang but a whimper. But as the coach said, what's important is how you play the game. And the bright side is that I have developed delicate sensitivity in my nipples, and I can keep it all going for long stretches.

I forget who it was, perhaps Mencken, who said that a fundamentalist is someone who fears that somebody somewhere is having fun. I would advise any young man to start each morning by looking in the mirror and saying softly and with firm conviction, "Masturbation is fun and good for me." I recommend that you gently explore your body, touching and tweaking and stroking and probing and fondling with care, and don't worry about what the fundamentalist is fretting about. Be generous — let those who need guilt have your share.