Falling for a Provider

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Wwanderer

Kids, don't try this at home
My own puzzle

Originally posted by occasionalhobbyist
It's interesting as everyone tries to pin down motivations and relations, and develop some kind of litmus test for them.
It is probably no more than a matter of my own odd and twisted approach to life, but I do not even understand the urge to do this in general (never mind hobby contexts). Why is it a good idea (or useful) to classify one's significant human relationships into one of a finite set of specific categories, each with their own predefined limits and expectations and so forth. I guess it helps when you have to decide who you are sending xmas cards to this year and such, but otherwise I always feel that these categories are limiting or distorting and that it is easier and more graceful to think of each important relationship in one's life as essentially unique.

-Ww
 
Ww: I think I finally have a speck of comprehension.

I side with Skelly on my prefered mode to the hobby. I think if you were to chat with the wonderful woman I've described in this post, she'd tell you that I'm annoyingly cautious and regularly second-guessing far too much that the heart tends to tell me. I don't apologize. It's uncharted territory for me, with lots of uncertainties, and so this is how I proceed.

When I started out in this hobby some 9 years ago, I did it to fill purely physical desires. And, frankly, I was a pretty angry guy who was looking for trouble.

Sometimes, this was fine. Other times, it led me to places that weren't so hot. I remember one time having sex with a young, plump pimple-faced girl, couldn't have been more than 19, in the front seat of my car. She cried afterwards. I did not provide a compassionate shoulder, was too much wrapped up in my own shit.

My lack of humanity in that setting bothered me greatly. Obviously, it still nags.

A short while later, a streetwalker offered to make me feel like a stud in a porn movie, with an afternoon of BBFS. Trust me when I say that it was not worth it.

I recall another time, picking up a streetwalker who was so drunk that she puked in my lap, opened the car door and wandered off screaming into the night. Me with my dick hanging out. That was fun.

Over time, I evolved a set of rules to deal with this. I no longer pick up streetwalkers. And while I prefer incalls and AMPs, I try to aim for a price point where I feel I'm not being completely exploitive of them. (Not criticizing here; my definition of 'exploitive' is completely subjective and rules out a lot of things that probably involve lots of free will.)

So, I gravitate toward indies and mid-market incalls that aren't quite as trafficked as the ones I frequented when I arrived in NYC.

But, this puts me at risk of the sort of thing that I described in the beginning of this thread: a real relationship with a person who is a prostitute because of an exercise of free will (or at least one who remains a pro for that reason.) Someone who can stand on her own two feet and who has as much fucked up humanity as I do.

And so, I've fallen. For one. And as much as it's a bit of torture, and requires things of me I was not sure I'd be capable of, it has added a lot. It has made me recognize that my stereotypes of whores are not always right. (Not that they're always wrong.)

It also makes me recognize that I think it's really shitty to hunt whores as a 'dreamboy.' (not that all dreamboys do, but some...) Most of the time, we talk about what a bad idea it is for the guys. But, isn't it a bad idea for the girls too? I mean, if it's a mutual accident, fine. Bad john, bad 'ho, now act like adults and figure out how you want to deal with it.

The walls exist for a reason, I think. A very good reason. They protect us from ourselves. They represent our bargain that we can fulfill our physical desires without guilt or repression.

But if you're going to schedule extended dates with providers and court them in pursuit of a relationship outside the commercial sex arena, I just think you're running the risk of misleading yourself, fucking up an already unstable relationship (rooted in commercial sex as it is) and hurting someone else.

Someone who, I established above, I now recognize is another human being.

I like my rules. I'm sorry I busted them once. I'm doing fine, but the vast majority of the time, I'm going to stick with my rules. Walk the fine line. Be a human. Flawed, fucked up, but human.

That may be all I have to say.
 

Slinky Bender

The All Powerful Moderator
Originally posted by justlooking
You go to a bar, get "friendly" with a cocktail waitress, it's pretty easy to tell if your "relationship" has gone beyond mere professional "flirtiness": you go somewhere together in her off-hours. Because even though the "professional flirtiness" is part of her job, it's incidental: her essential job is to sell you drinks. If she sees you when you're not working, you can assume you're "friends". You don't have to agonize over it.
But how about:

You go to look at a $10 million apartment,get "friendly" with the Real Estate Broker, and (you think) it's pretty easy to tell if your "relationship" has gone beyond mere professional "flirtiness". You go somewhere together in her off-hours. Because even though the "professional flirtiness" is part of her job, it's incidental (you think) her essential job is to sell you an apartment. She fucks the shit out of you. She tells you what a great guy you are.

You still sure that she's doing it because she's being truthful? And it has nothing to do with selling you that apartment with the $600,00 comission?
 

Wwanderer

Kids, don't try this at home
Originally posted by justlooking

1 - I think he ignores the fact that a sex worker can genuinely like you but still view you solely as someone she has a business relationship with.

2 - So the problem I have with Wwanderer's position is that I think it's not worth it. I don't like to always have to be agonizing over whether the other party has the same view of our "relationship" as I do

3 - The very ambiguity that he seems to find interesting to me seems to be nothing more than a wholly unecessary source of discomfort. So I think it's just better to treat all these relationships as business ones. It keeps me from agonizing over things that really don't matter. And it keeps me from acting inappropriately, too.

4 - * This is all assuming that you're still seeing her only in connection with paid sessions. If you spend a significant amount of purely social time together, then of course there's no ambiguity. But this whole dispute has centered around Wwanderer's insistence that that distinction is too "bright line" and arbitrary. I have to repeat, though, that I find it hard to believe that anyone can credibly claim "friendship" with someone who has never agreed to spend significant non-working time with him.
1 - If she genuinely likes me and I genuinely like her, then I would consider that some sort of friendship, at least a low intensity/grade one, even if we also have a business relationship re time together. In other words, my definition of friendship is based on mutual feelings, not on the context of how you spend time together. I can see the sense (internal logic) of your take on friendship, but I wonder if mine even seems intelligible to you?

2 & 3 - Right. I guess that is our difference, and it is just a matter of taste I suppose. I don't find the "agonizing" to be agony, so to speak; rather it is enriching or interesting to me. I would say the same of SC's "strings". I guess I just like complexity.

4 - I am a little confused here. I have repeatedly emphasized the importance of non-bedroom activities in establishing any sort of real relationship with a provider, but I guess you mean to emphasize that there has to be off-the-clock socializing for it to be a real friendship. That does make sense to me, but in all the real cases I know it is an impossibly ambiguous standard to apply until/unless the lady retires. For example, suppose a provider friend and I meet for lunch, have a long personal chat and that no money changes hands at all except that one of us buys the other lunch (it could even be her treating me); we then go our separate ways with no more sex than a hug and a peck. I think, but am not sure, that this sort of encounter would go a long way towards validating our relationship as a real friendship in our eyes. However, I don't understand why this appears to you to be a good litmus test. If I were inclined to worry that her motives were business ones rather than personal/friendship ones, why wouldn't I see the lunch as a simple "clinet relations" activity on her part. Lots of people I do business with will buy me a lunch, or even a fancy dinner, and spend it socializing with me, but in many cases it is totally clear to me (not that they are even trying to fool me) that their motives are strictly professional. It is not that hard for me to tell which is which, whether the context is my business life or my hobby one.

-Ww
 
Originally posted by slinkybender


But how about:

You go to look at a $10 million apartment,get "friendly" with the Real Estate Broker, and (you think) it's pretty easy to tell if your "relationship" has gone beyond mere professional "flirtiness". You go somewhere together in her off-hours. Because even though the "professional flirtiness" is part of her job, it's incidental (you think) her essential job is to sell you an apartment. She fucks the shit out of you. She tells you what a great guy you are.

You still sure that she's doing it because she's being truthful? And it has nothing to do with selling you that apartment with the $600,00 comission?

Before or after the closing.

PS - Never pay 6% on a 10mil property
 
1. Yours is intelligible, but I think you're missing a distinction between "friendly" and "friends".

2-3. If you like to agonize, far be it from me to stop you. These discussions are all about warning other (perhaps newbie) readers that what you're advocating leads to agonizing (with, in my view, little or no real upside).

4. a. This is EXACTLY the problem.

b. (Note that I've said "significant" off-the-clock social time. I agree that the occassional lunch doesn't do it.)
 
slinkybender

If I were going to talk about this seriously, I'd say the broker is (non-jokingly) closer to the prostitute than the cocktail waitress. Her work relationship with you isn't over until the deal has closed.
 
Originally posted by Wwanderer


To me, the idea of hobbying for the "sex and nothing but the sex" would be akin to (say) playing golf for the exercise and nothing but the exercise, i.e., with no willingness to enjoy the satisfactions of mastering a skill, competition, being outdoors in beautiful scenery, the companionship of other players and so forth. If all you want is the exercise and care nothing for the rest, fine...different strokes for different folks and all. But it sure seems an odd approach to living and having fun to me. I guess I am just more of an opportunist than that at heart.

-Ww




I sincerely hope you are not assuming that because that is my approach to seeing prostitutes that that is my approach to life. Nothing is further than the truth. To use your example, I don't golf just for the exercise but for all the things you describe and more. As is the case with other pasttimes, hobbies, etc.

But I do hobby for one particular reason and one particular reason only. Always have and, after this lenght of time, feel confident that I always will.

Have never had the desire to use it to experience anything other than physical release. I have other avenues to explore those feelings, friendships, etc. that I am looking for.

So to that extent I agree that if someone viewed all their activities in such a monopurpose way, it would be a strange and even sad way of living. But I do have one and this is it.

And yes it is obvious that that is why I don't understand other approaches to it. At least from the non-intellectual perspective.
 

Wwanderer

Kids, don't try this at home
HNS and OH

Originally posted by howardnotstern
in my recent debacle of a relationship with a provider, before it turned ugly i did do a couple of things right i think. ...
Originally posted by howardnotstern
i have tried to describe these aspects. retrospectively i am grasping for rules to apply, not real successfully
Originally posted by occasionalhobbyist
Ww: I think I finally have a speck of comprehension.

I like my rules. I'm sorry I busted them once. I'm doing fine, but the vast majority of the time, I'm going to stick with my rules. Walk the fine line. Be a human. Flawed, fucked up, but human.
HNS & OH, I am very impressed (really...no sarcasm, just in case it isn't clear) by both of your abilities to write so eloquently and effectively about your personal experiences. I am not sure I would have the courage to do it here, and I doubt that anyone would have the patience to read it told in my verbose style.

My main comment is about the rules you both speak of. Saying what I have said before, my only hard rule is not to apply rules ot my significant relationships with people. I find that that approach has served me well. That said, I should be clear that the overwhelming majority of my encounters with providers do conform to something close to what I take OH's rules to be. I am pleasant and kind, I hope, but I make no attempt at all to get behind her mask and am not even inclined to do so. It is only in rare cases that my thoughts and intentions even stray in a dreamboy direction, and it is of course even more rare that events move us in that direction.

-Ww
 
Re: HNS and OH

Originally posted by Wwanderer
It is only in rare cases that my thoughts and intentions even stray in a dreamboy direction, and it is of course even more rare that events move us in that direction.
And if you Dreamboys would say things like that more often, instead of the constant smug (I'm sorry but I have to say it) insistence that the Dreamboy approach is the way to the best commercial sex, these discussions wouldn't go on as long as they always seem to.
 

Wwanderer

Kids, don't try this at home
Originally posted by justlooking

1 - These discussions are all about warning other (perhaps newbie) readers that what you're advocating leads to agonizing (with, in my view, little or no real upside).

2- (Note that I've said "significant" off-the-clock social time. I agree that the occassional lunch doesn't do it.)
1 - Why is that what they are "all about"? Looking after newbies and warnings to anyone are not my motivations at all. Mostly I want to hear what other experienced and intelligent hobbyists have to say about their experiences and what they make of my views. (Plus, of course, I just like to hear myself talk.) Btw, I suspect the newbies are only reading the review type posts, not these endless rambling debates we so love.

2 - Perhaps we have achieved understanding. "significant" is obviously a very ambiguous term, and that standard would lead one into a gray area you'd find uncomfortable or annoying and which I would find intriguing. "There is no explaing tastes."

-Ww
 
That's what they're "all about" because that's why I (and I would be willing to bet every other participant on my side of the debate) feel compelled to go on at length about it. You're a big boy. I have no desire to convince you that you're not experiencing what you think you are, or to warn you of the risks of it. But I feel that, writing as we are for a big audience, there's a responsibility to them: newbies, lurkers, etc.

(And I don't know why you think they're only interested in "greek in New Jersey" posts.)
 

Wwanderer

Kids, don't try this at home
Originally posted by SkellyChamp

1 - I sincerely hope you are not assuming that because that is my approach to seeing prostitutes that that is my approach to life. Nothing is further than the truth.

2 - I have other avenues to explore those feelings, friendships, etc. that I am looking for.
1 - I am assuming nothing about you personally (why should I) but am glad to hear that it is not a general life philosophy on your part. There are some people who try to be so "strict with themselves" in general...and yes, like you, it seems a bit sad to me.

2 - I equally sincerely hope that you are not assuming that I do not also have such other avenues to explore in my life. In fact, restricting the arena to sexual relationships, I have a wife of over 3 decades, a mistress, have had affairs with married and single women since I married, had quite a number of lovers when I was single...and so forth. I can't seem to get enough of this particularly aspect of life and find it, in all of its complexity and manifestations, to be one of the very best things in my existence.

-Ww
 
i do not mean to imply that i believe the dreamboy approach is the shining path to the best commercial sex. i do not. and i think for me as well as ww rarely do my conscious impulses or do events actually move in that direction. my subconscious impulses are another matter. at least until this recent event, they had been held in check.

as my attorney and best friend put it when i was suffering the emotional fallout of recent events, and i thought my head was going to explode, "well, this is life's way of telling you that your approach of getting involved with all these strippers and ho's instead of dealing with women from the straight world may not be completely valid"
 

Wwanderer

Kids, don't try this at home
Re: Re: HNS and OH

Originally posted by justlooking
And if you Dreamboys would say things like that more often, instead of the constant smug (I'm sorry but I have to say it) insistence that the Dreamboy approach is the way to the best commercial sex, these discussions wouldn't go on as long as they always seem to.
I apologize to you and to all if I have seemed smug in this regard. It was not my intention, and I do not think that I actually feel smug about it, just happy.

But, in any case, it is a simple fact of my own experience that by far the best and most rewarding commercial sex for me has been in a Dreamboy context. That is perfectly consistent with it being only a very rare situation. Newbies, lurkers and such should make what they will of that information. Let me make no other attempt to spin it.

-Ww
 

Wwanderer

Kids, don't try this at home
Originally posted by howardnotstern
as my attorney and best friend put it when i was suffering the emotional fallout of recent events, and i thought my head was going to explode, "well, this is life's way of telling you that your approach of getting involved with all these strippers and ho's instead of dealing with women from the straight world may not be completely valid"
Is he, or any experienced man, under the impression that "dealing with women from the straight world" will not also frequently lead to extreme emotional fallout and feelings of impending cranial detonation?

-Ww
 
You see, THAT is where we disagree BIG TIME.

If you don't think that a customer's getting involved with sex workers is exponentially more likely to lead to hurt than his getting involved with "straight" women, then our experiences are so different that it's no wonder we have so much trouble understanding each other.
 

Wwanderer

Kids, don't try this at home
To the putative newbies and lurkers reading this thread

I rather doubt that there are many of you out there, but I certainly don't claim to know for sure. If you are, it would be really great if you would pipe up, even just briefly, to let us know that there is an audience in the house, so to speak. It would be even better if you gave us even a quick hint of your own views.

Please consider doing so!

-Ww
 
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