Bi

H texted me the other day to tell me that she came out to her mother over Skype.

This needs context.

H is bisexual. I've always known she was bi. I remember the first day I met her. Evidently I didn't know she was bi then, yet I've never officially been told. I just kind of... knew it. Nevertheless, I've never considered it any form of massive secret, which is probably why I'd never considered the ramifications of telling her parents. Even though they had managed to live through 27 years without knowing.

More context needed.

H is from Australia. Her mother is British, so she has dual nationality. Her mother is also younger (not by a vast amount, but enough to seem a different generation) than her father, whose age is around the 80 mark and works as a practising surgeon in an Australian hospital somewhere. She speaks, like most people I know do, with reverence about her father, although she has some reservations at times. The main one being that he doesn't need to know she is bi. I think it's an unspoken fear that he will find out, although, as I've pointed out, there's nothig wrong with it.

I looked at the text with interest, sent something back and then continued blogging for a while - at which point my 'phone rang. As I pressed the receiver button, it dawned on me that the impact on H may have been much greater than that on her mother. Calling me was a bit of a no-brainer, though. Sexuality revelation, uncertainty: call ILB. Simples.

The key point, as I perceived it, was this. H had come out to her mother on the proviso that her mother doesn't tell anyone else (including her father). Her mother's reaction was not what she had expected; she was calm and gave the standard "oh, that's all right" response. Despite that being the best you could hope for, it must have been unnerving. A shouty disowning response may have been more of a dramatic confrontation, but not one that's likely to end particularly well. Part of my brain tinkled, "maybe she knew already." It's been 27 years, but I've never met H's mother, so I'm not sure how good she is at working stuff out. Not that this matters, as she said she was fine with it. She didn't make it a big issue either, and that's commendable.

Evidently the problem, as H saw it, was what her mother would do with this information. She's in Australia, and H is here, so that's actually pretty okay, seeing as it's THE OTHER SIDE OF THE WORLD. H was afeared that her father may find out at some point - either by her mother passing on the information by accident, a friend of her mother getting the information and passing it on, or her mother reneging on her promise to keep schtum (although I don't think she'd do that; still, you never know) - and disown H.
I reassured her that although her father may disapprove, there's not much chance of a total disowning, or even a partial one, on account of the fact that your daughter may be bisexual - very few people are that heartless (although, sadly, it happens). Plus, her father may be in denial rather than give a knee-jerk reaction if he does find out.

H also told me that she followed up her coming-out with, "but at least I'm not gay!". Seems like an odd phrase, but it softens the blow a bit. I did put forward that, if she were gay, coming out might be a little easier. Not due to any particular thing, but it may be, in her mother's mind, a more significant event. It shouldn't be, but it might.

I asked H why she came out. H told me that, at the age of 27 and with a possibility of returning to Australia at some point in the not-too-distant future, there's always the possibility of finding some sort of partner (although she's not the marrying type - something else she told her mother; she doesn't want to get married) - of any type (she's single at the moment), and if this all happens, the parents are going to want information. Her mother already wants information anyway, and asks about all her friends in very leading ways via Skype. One of those nice things that parents do. What if it's a girl? That was her reasoning. Seems fair to me.

Anyway, I listened and I talked. She felt a lot better. Job done.

Apologies for the extremely disjointed manner of this post. There was a lot of stuff to write and no discernable order to write it in. I hope it makes sense. I'm also hoping for a time when you shouldn't have to be scared of your parents' reaction to your sexual orientation, and it shouldn't actually be news to be divulged in a serious moment. But that's wishful thinking.

Might be nice though, right?

Soft Porn Sunday Special: Threesome

So. It's Easter - happy Easter. I thought I'd do something special for Easter, but it was difficult thinking of something non-Jesus, non-chocolate and non-rabbit related. If you want to read about my religious views, go here. But this is far more interesting.

I'll tell you what I did earlier this week. It's not really related to Easter.

Back when I was a young ILB, I used to watch L!VE TV. I think everyone did, specifially since it came as a free channel with cable packages. And my gran had cable. There came along, in the channel's twilight years, a couple of low-budget sexual programmes of their own making (although they probably should have just stuck with Compromising Situations). Blonde, Busty and Keane (groan) was one, although no actual sex happened in that, just a little nudity. The other, Threesome, was far more interesting. I actually used to watch it, and then when L!VE returned (albeit briefly) in 2003, on occasions where I had access to it, they'd show it again and I'd watch it again.

My recollection of this show is somewhat sketchy. Hilariously, its IMDb page doesn't actually list its three main stars - Emily Booth, Anneka Svenska and Taylor Dean - as particularly important, hiding them under "extra cast". I know Emily "Bouff" Booth - who lives near me, apparently - is trying to leave this show behind, but I doubt that's the reason.

As far as I can recall, Threesome was something of a cross between soap, sitcom and drama. Helen (Svenska), who is a sexy writer, lives with Eve (Bouff), who is a sexy actress and model. David (Dean), Helen's sexy boyfriend, moves into the same apartment, and lots of sex occurs. Or not, because the stars rarely get their kit off in the first few episodes (except the first ever scene, which has Helen riding David). How do they circumvent this problem? Simple. Have Helen write erotic fiction and film some sex scenes in soft focus with Svenska narrating what the characters are doing.

Yes, this is very cheap. Very cheap indeed.

With the exception of the episode Solo, which has Helen and Dean going on holiday and consisted mostly of Bouff rubbing herself and moaning a bit, and the episode where David (who, apparently, is a photographer) had a model over to take pictures off and ended up screwing her, very little sex occurred between the leads until the second half of the series, in which essentially a triangle happens (gosh! didn't see that one coming!) with Eve wanting both David and Helen, Helen wanting David, and David wanting Eve. Or something like that. It doesn't really matter because still no real sex occurs.

Or it does, but it's very brief.

I did manage to catch the last epiosde at one point, in which they manage to reconcile all their differences by having a threesome. In soft focus. But there are some tantalisingly quick sex scenes in between beginning and end, which tend to focus on Helen/Eve, but some David/Eve and a few Helen/Davids. So I went a-searching, and found... nothing.

It took me ages to even find anything related to Threesome. It seens to have been edited out of history and there's no DVD available (or even VHS). Via some very inactive forums (and a lot of patience and constant searching on Rapidshare), I downloaded about as close as you're going to get to a collection of the sex scenes from Threesome. Very few actually depict sex, and most merely imply it - and the dialogue is absolutely terrible - and they all lack the longevity, plot, music, cinematics or even eroticism to get close to getting me off whatsoever. That's why the scenes aren't really suitable for SPS - there isn't much to write about 'em!

But maybe, because of its relative obscurity, and the fact that nobody would watch this for good quality acting or good quality sex, Threesome acts as an interesting curio. It's in no way special, but I kept watching it, maybe for the implicit idea that eventually we'd have a full-on sex scene featuring both the actual actors and a good length. Evidently this didn't happen, and I wasn't happy with that. But, as an example of what not to do, Threesome stands on its own two feet, because in many ways it was actually putting in a very good attempt at being an erotic soap opera (it's better than Eden at any rate). And, you know, it's got Bouff in it and I've always been curious about her ever since I saw her in Bits.

I may share these scenes at some point. I doubt many other people have them at all. But if anyone's got all the episodes on VHS, I'd buy it. I actually would. Just to see if it works any better than memory serves.