HOW I BECAME A WHORE AT THE AGE OF 55

 

HOW I BECAME A WHORE AT THE AGE OF 55

I was one of those wives. I was the family breadwinner, working shifts and overtime. I didn’t cut my hair for seven years. I got fatter and more dowdy. In my spare time I took myself seriously. Political activism on the Left, the peace movement, interfaith activities, parenting courses, family pancake breakfasts on Saturdays. I was quietly and slowly building a crisis.

Spiritually, I moved in the high mysticism of Julian of Norwich, Rabi’ah of Basra and Lalleshwari – the great lovers of the Divine. Love led me into the void, however, into the high emptiness of what is not. Apophatic spirituality sees God by what it is not. God is so elusive, so beyond human understanding, that we can only discern what God is not. We can only speak of what God is not. Of course that doesn't stop our attempts to step onto the pages where 'the ink leaves only a blot'. Here is that most refined of mystics, St John of the Cross:

nada nada nada nada nada
nada y au en el Monte nada

The best of this language points away from language. It deflects itself, tricks us with an allusion of a riddle inside a joke. It folds its arms and points both ways and says 'He went thataway!' It subverts the very moment of reading it.

While almost heretical, such dark mysticism remains within the great religions. But it holds the seeds of transgression, as I found out when studying the extremes of the lives of these great mystics, who sought only the Beloved and left all human norms and values behind.

So I was set up for something dark, individualist, antinomian and dangerous. On my own, I began a magical practice that was based on. the Left Hand Path Draconian current.

It was not easy for me to ask for what I wanted, and even harder for me to work out what that even might be. Because what I wanted was sex, or at least the expression of sexuality, and that was entirely new for me. The demonic entities I was working with at the time had to drag it into my consciousness, against my  will.

My first exploration into Darkside sexuality came up with this:

 RED CORRIDORS

There is a deeper unity

Of blood and salt and semen

And my own good fluids.

I walk the red corridors of my inner realm.

I hail what I find there.

Its name is Sacred Lust,

This portal to Lucifer’s Throne

Our rivers commingle.

We are returning to the sea.

I deliquesce like salt in water.

I effloresce like fire.

 

Meanwhile my ordinary life began to unravel. At the time I described this as the V of dissonance. It seemed at the time that I could have my job, my failed marriage, my income and my house, or I could have self-knowledge. The two things diverged more and more, like a V widening. As it widened over time I could no longer stay in contact with both arms of the V. In the same way a spark can't jump a widening gap between two wires. In the end, and suddenly, I lost my career and my household, and struck out elsewhere.

I am explaining this about my own life in order to impart some moral seriousness to the issue of sex magic. This stuff really does change you. When I say, this is a steep and crooked path, and it has its perils, I know what I am talking about.

That was how at the age of 55 I was living in a strange town, in an expensive and beautiful house, supporting a male friend who was not my lover, unable to make a living. It was the magic that had done it. I had a menial part time job and when I did the math, I acknowledged I could just about pay the rent if I worked full time, and nothing more. This friend, who was gay, alcoholic and a serious criminal, had experience in the sex industry. He encouraged me.

So I went op shopping, bought some second hand lingerie and some Royal Doulton towels, spent some real money on my first ever pair of high heels and learned to totter hilariously in them by putting a mirror at the end of my long hallway and walking up and down in front of it.  I then spent a couple of days practising sitting on things, put an ad in the local newspaper, and pronounced myself ready to go. Clio Magnum Rossi was born.

I whored from first principles. I’d had only passing acquaintances with sex workers. I had never been in business for myself. I had only ever worked for wages and paid my taxes. Now I was embarking on a life off the grid and on my wits. I think that it was my ‘beginner’s mind’ that enabled me to keep the magic in focus. I had nothing else to teach me. 

My practice was dedicated to the goddess Astarte. Thus it was always magical. I will speak later of incorporating magic into sex, and vice versa. 

My clientele consisted mostly of older men who wanted a sexual experience with someone their own age, someone who did not remind them of their daughters. Many were single. They often wanted someone they could have an intelligent conversation with, and they often wanted someone who took a unique interest in them. Just as there are experienced whores, there are experienced clients. These guys have a knowledge of the trade, know what to expect and how to act, and shop around for sex workers they like. I had regular clients whom I got to know well. When I retired, a few of them thought that I would then sleep with them for free, or they became sad because they did not know what to do next.

Younger clients were often influenced by some of the more extreme forms of porn, where women supposedly enjoy doing things that are actually physically unusual or painful. I would need to teach them otherwise. However, I also enjoyed what is often called Porn Star Experience. This is a form of sexual encounter that often has a script, where behaviour and facial expression are exaggerated, and where you kind of mug for an imaginary camera.

My domming practice emerged out of a gap in the market. Clients asked me for particular services, and I would try to work out whether what they wanted was feasible. After a while I sacked two clients, one a dom and one a sub, and used them for professional supervision. I did unusual things, again working from first principles. Some of these I will describe later.

I sought advice from the NZ Prostitutes Collective, about the business and safety side of things. It was only later, after moving to a bigger town, that I met other sex workers. Then I worked in some very ropey brothels, and briefly ran my own, until it was shut down by the city council. 

I worked in the sex industry for two years and retired at the advanced age of 57. Up until recently I still got the occasional text. I am memorable. 

You learn things from sex work you would not learn any other way. I recommend it for those with the right personality. I like to think, despite mixed evidence, that there was a time where sex work was sanctioned and valued for the healing, caring work it is.