1. Write down your least favorite chore.
2. Now elaborate: Why do you hate doing the dishes so much, for instance?
3. Cross off the chore and write "sex" in its place.
4. Now read the sentence or phrase you created.
OMG: "I don't like sex because it's tedious and I always get it on my hands." Giggle, giggle.
This isn't a slumber party game -- it's a typical icebreaker used at a Slumber Party. Yes, Slumber Parties, Inc., the company that's on the forefront of a growing trend: in-home get-togethers American women are hosting and attending to sell and buy, no, not Tupperware, but lubricant, lingerie and vibrators.
The company is successful because it, apparently, gives women what they want: a discreet way to obtain information and products that might spice up their love lives. It's providing merchandise that female consumers are grabbing up by the vibrating handful. It's filled a void in the sex sector of this country's economy.
All of this information is well and good, and perhaps makes for a mean stock tip, but does it have anything to do with relationships? It does, because when there's smoke there's fire, and when there's a relationship there's generally something sexual, if not sex itself. Therefore, a trend in sex says something about the state of the sexual relationship in the United States. In short, when it comes to talking about sex, we all tend to be a bit teenage.
In some ways, Slumber Parties are a step forward in the evolution of the way we think about sex. The products and presentations are geared toward mild experimentation, romance enhancement and a little creativity between the sheets. On the other hand, the clever marketing minds behind the company have declared these gatherings "slumber parties," conjuring up images of tee-heeing 14-year-olds, truth or dare and calling boys to hang up and scream -- or scream and then hang up, depending on how much you really like him.
We digress. But not really. "Slumber Parties" is perhaps the most appropriate name. After all, most of us probably had our first quasi-candid conversation about sex at a slumber party. Late into the night with the lights out you turned to the most experienced one of the bunch in your best attempt to figure out what a blowjob was without making it seem like you really cared. Or that you would ever participate in one. Because ew, that is soooo gross. In the days of real, s'more-making slumber parties we talked about sex by making it seem silly or gross so that it wouldn't seem as scary as maybe it was to many of us.
And in a way, this seems to be the M.O. of the Slumber Parties concept that caters to grown women today. Sex talk at a Slumber Party might start out with ew, gross, and move to silly. This teasing, somewhat teenage, transition, plus a few bottles of wine, loosens up the group in no time. "Peppermint Pecker" mints, for instance, warm up the audience just enough to make "Nympho Niagra" cream positively palatable.
The modern woman, or man presumably, is well-educated, sexually aware and capable of dealing with mature topics. So isn't it a bit of a shame that we still need to give the sex capsule a juvenile coating to make it easier to swallow?
A Francophile will tell you that it eez because les Americains do not undairstand what it eez to be, uh, how you say, sensual. Yep, Paris is the city of love and rumor has it that we Yanks got nothing on a Parisian in the sack. Americans are stereotyped as being downright prudish at times -- queasy and out-of-date when it comes to the affairs of the ... well, you know. And sometimes this seems a bit true.
Obviously, we Americans have no problem having sex -- any maternity ward or Trojan condom factory will make that clear to you. So why is it so hard for us to talk about it? Any relationship, whether between the Surgeon General and the nation, or the quarterback and his cheerleader girlfriend, will benefit from a little honest sex talk. Even if you blush, it's a step in the right direction.
Being a grown-up when it comes to sex doesn't mean you have to have more or less of it or buy a pair of fur-covered handcuffs or even tell your best friend. It just means that the word "penis" doesn't always have to be in a punch line.
Megan and Meghan's column runs bi-weekly on Tuesdays. They can be reached at fanale@cavalierdaily.com and moran@cavalierdaily.com.
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