Thursday, June 09, 2005
Good For the Gander
The first time didn’t count, but this second time gets full credit. I can now honestly admit to being a gropee.
Time #1 didn’t count because it took place in what the theorists call “remissive space” - a place where normal social rules have been suspended. Typical examples of this are halloween, conventions (as in, “hey big boy, you in town for the convention?"), and the era 1967-1978. In my case, it was one of the last ren faires to be held in Agoura, outside of LA. I was not a faire geek, but for some reason I decided to attend that particular year’s faire in tunic and hose: it was the early ‘80s and the tights were only a step away from those damned omnipresent legwarmers anyway. It was a more innocent time. I was coerced. Okay, I don’t know why the hell I went to the faire dressed as a wanna-be anachronism, but that’s what I did, and that’s all I can say about that.
At some point I was in the middle of a big confused mass of people, and I distinctly sensed an invasion of my personal privates: somebody pressed a rigid finger against my service entrance, if you catch my drift. I spun around and briefly caught the eye of a laughing, blowsy woman in her middle years, blonde and zaftig. She was not in any kind of thematic costume and was probably pretty buzzed. We were moving in opposite directions; the crowd closed between us and she got away with her brazen buttpoking scot free. But I figured, she was drunk, and I was sort of asking for it with my tight black tights and flagrant ‘tude, and it was the faire, after all, where wenching was a scheduled agenda item, so it all sort of seemed proper, if not actually right. Ultimately, I decided that it wasn’t anything worth my attention. I was a gropee of opportunity, but not one of active choice. And thus endeth incident one: that which did not count.
Years pass - about twenty of them. I stop wearing tights, stop going to ren faires, leave LA, maintain inviolate corporeal boundries, never get inappropriately touched on the nether climes by a stranger again. Until recently.
You know about the 38 by now if you’ve been reading this site for any time; I ride it to and from work daily, and I see and hear and smell a lot of strange and wonderful things there. It’s a busy, busy bus. By which I mean, biz-ay. It’s a world unto itself. So: I was riding the 38 to work one foggy morning, my messenger bag at my feet and my pod phones in my ears, bopping along to some cheerful piece of auditory entertainment or other. I’d wound up standing by the back doors and lots of folk were shuffling past me out of and into the bus at every stop.
We came, eventually, to Powell street - the first real downtown stop, where the last of the tenderloin streetfolk, the first of the financial district businessfolk, and most of the union square retail folk disembark. The crowd surged for the door and I grabbed a pole, leaned in to give them all as much room as I could for their comings and goings, continuing to enjoy my own private world of thoughts and musics, not letting the bumps and jostles of my fellow riders bother me more than I could help. I was taking the ordinary occasional knee to the thigh, getting whacked by purses and gym bags and briefcases as the people streamed past me down and out the steps. I just ignored them and let them go on their way, playing the part of the courteous rider.
And then I got tagged. Among all the random lumpings and thumpings to which I was subjected, I suddenly felt something different: a quick pressure at the very upper reaches of my left thigh, just at the juncture of my buttly crease. This particular sensation was different from the others - warm, focused, firm, and distinguished by bifurcation: two specific points of contact, lightly, playfully pressed toward each other, one at the outer aspect of my thigh, and one burrowing near it at what one might call my inner aspect. A curious, investigative probing, transmitting a subtle, almost electric energy to my rump.
By the time I recognized that this was a distinctly unique sort of touch, it was already over. I turned quickly to see who’d done it but it was too late to tell; the crowd was flowing in random and untraceable ways down the steps and out the door to the seething sidewalk. I tried to reconstruct the event mentally, to trace it back to a primary causal source, but there was nothing to work with. I couldn’t even distinguish the gender of the gooser - though the gentle, supportive nature of the contact leads me imagine it was feminine in origin. But that’s no more than a guess.
What was for sure, was that it had happened. I supposed I should have felt complimented - so I did. I finished my ride, went to work, came home again as if the world had not utterly changed. But it had. My fondled rump knew the truth. And now I can never again honestly say that I’ve never been groped. I have truly and well been subjected to the classic posterior pincers maneuver. Now I need a new aspiration.
Heh. I said ass.
