The Reverse Cowgirl
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Origin Story of a Sex Writer
Porn star, Las Vegas, NV | Photo credit: Susannah Breslin
This week in my newsletter I share an excerpt from my memoir, Data Baby: My Life in a Psychological Experiment. This episode takes place early on in the book. I believe it was 1997 or thereabouts. At the time I was living in the Bay Area, where I grew up. On this particular night, I ventured out to the strip clubs in North Beach in San Francisco. It would prove to be a fateful series of events.
I thought it would be interesting to write about the strip clubs in the North Beach neighborhood of San Francisco. I was curious about these enigmatic clubs on Broadway that I had seen but never entered. As a kid in the back seat of my parents’ Dart, I had been driven through San Francisco and spotted The Condor (which, in 1964, became one of the country’s first topless bars). Out front, a towering sign featured a supersized blonde, impossibly busty. Her name, I would find out later, was Carol Doda. On the sign, she wore a black bikini with blinking red lights for nipples.
Doda was the opposite of my mother and her friends, who considered makeup, heavily styled hair, and revealing clothes tools the patriarchy used to subjugate and objectify women. But Doda wasn’t anyone’s tool; she was a legend. She was America’s first topless dancer of note, and her surgically enhanced breasts were billed as “the new Twin Peaks of San Francisco.” When I was in graduate school, I had seen an episode of HBO’s Real Sex about strippers, and I was struck by the revelation that strip clubs were places where intimacy was for sale. Sure, it was transient, transactional, and most often conducted between a guy with a handful of dollar bills and a dancer in a G-string and not much else who twirled seductively around a pole on a stage, but there was something real about it. The strippers reminded me of the girls I had hung out with in high school, whom everyone else had deemed slutty.
“Oh my god, Susannah, make up your mind!” Anne laughed as we stood at the corner on a Saturday night. Broadway was teeming with drunk guys, sailors on leave, and couples on the prowl for something more interesting than what they had already. I scanned the glowing signs. Roaring 20’s. Big Al’s. The Hungry I.
“This one!” We ducked inside. As we moved down the black hallway toward a red velvet curtain, I worried what someone else in the club might think. I, a woman, was in a strip club. As I pulled back the curtain, it dawned on me that wasn’t going to be an issue. There was one thing the men scattered at the small, dimly lit tables around the room were paying attention to, and it wasn’t me. It was the half-naked girl on the stage.
Nonchalantly, we took a seat at a table near the back. We ordered a couple of overpriced drinks. I took a sip: It was straight orange juice. The cocktails were alcohol-free, thanks to a California law that prohibited the sale of alcohol in fully nude strip clubs. It didn’t matter; my head was buzzing from the drinks we’d had at the bar around the corner.
In one smooth movement, the statuesque brunette dancer teetering on the highest heels I had ever seen peeled off her dental-floss-thin neon-green thong. She tossed the thong to one side, grabbed the pole, climbed up it. High above the crowd, she wrapped her thighs around the pole and bent over backward, throwing her arms open like an inverted angel.
The academic world in which I had grown up was right across the Bay, but it may as well have been a million miles from where I was. I studied a solitary businessman sitting at the next table. His tie was untied. His jacket was slung across the back of his chair. His eyes were glassy. He had been hypnotized. In this world, women had all the power, and men were at their mercy. I didn’t want to be a stripper; I was too shy, too insecure, too inhibited to take off my clothes in front of strangers. But I wanted what she had: the stage, the audience in awe, the men gawking at her. As a kid, I had longed for attention. This was an orgy of attention. As a pubescent teen, I was left to figure out my sexuality for myself because my mother was so unhappy. Here, sex was on parade, for sale, everywhere I looked. In the Block Project, I was the object, the one on view, the child studied by researchers from across tables in Tolman Hall’s austere experiment rooms. Now I was the voyeur, the looker, the scopophiliac. It was intoxicating.
As we sped back to the East Bay in the early-morning hours, I watched the city get smaller in the side-view mirror. My father was dead, but for a few hours I had forgotten about that. I could write about this. I could be a gonzo journalist, like one of my favorite writers, Hunter S. Thompson, and immerse myself in it. Sex would be my beat.
Buy Data Baby here. Read more about my book here. Listen to an interview with me here.
(This post originally appeared in my newsletter, The Reverse Cowgirl: “What Carol Doda Taught Me.”)
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Unicorn Love
This afternoon, I decided to go to an adult toy store. Awhile back, I had read about a line of sex toys that were, well, out of this world. I don’t know if you’ve ever heard of Creature Cocks, but they’re billed as “The Original Fantasy, Sci-Fi Monster Dildos.” If you’ve ever wanted to get intimate with a Radioactive Reptile Thick Scaly Silicone Dildo, a Gargoyle Rock Hard Silicone Dildo, an Orion Invader Veiny Space Alien Silicone Dildo, a Monstropus Tentacled Monster Silicone Dildo, or a Hydra Sea Monster Silicone Dildo, this product line is for you. In fact, I had seen Creature Cocks in the silicone flesh before. A few months ago, I had gone to an adult store in Sherman Oaks, and I had stared at a display of Creature Cocks, but I hadn’t bought one. I wasn’t sure what I would do with it. I had this idea I would keep it on my desk as a sort of talisman, but ultimately, I couldn’t decide on which one and left.
Recently, I read on AVN—which one could argue is the Variety of the adult business—that XR Brands, the company that produces Creature Cocks, was releasing even more Creature Cocks in new enhanced designs. These Creature Cocks were even more out there, among them a Sea Stallion Vibrating Silicone Dildo with Remote and, the one that really caught my eye, a Centaur Explosion Squirting Silicone Dildo. As a long-time watcher of “Shark Tank,” I had to wonder what need was being met. Was there really a demand for not just centaur dildos, but centaur squirting dildos? The answer was clear: Yes. In any case, I was curious to check out the new models.
When I arrived at the adult store, I was the only customer there. I said hello to the guy working behind the counter and found the Creature Cocks display between two doors marked Employees Only and under a sign that read DO NOT OPEN PRODUCT. (I wasn’t going to, but duly noted.) I scanned the boxes, considering the Swamp Monster Green Scaly Silicone Dildo (disturbingly, it had eyes), the Space Cock Glow-in-the-Dark Silicone Alien Dildo (were those blue … testicles?), and a Makara Glow-in-the-Dark Silicone Snake Dildo (I shuddered at its 18-inch length). A woman walked into the store and inquired about a remote-controlled sex toy. The guy behind the counter explained the cheapest one they had was $130. This was more than she expected to spend, she explained. I handled a large black box that contained a Mystique Silicone Unicorn Dildo. The toy’s rainbow color was aesthetically appealing, and it seemed like it would be hard to go wrong with anything unicorn.
At the register, I inquired about the new Creature Cocks products, but he explained they weren’t in stock at the store yet. “Do a lot of people buy Creature Cocks?” I asked, passing the unicorn dildo to him across the counter. “Yeah, people get them all the time, actually,” he told me. So, I wasn’t the only one. After I paid, I headed for the door. “Have a great night!” he called after me cheerily.
When I got home, I pulled the box out of the bag. YOU’LL BE ENTRANCED AS THE RAREST OF CREATURES, THE UNICORN, PENETRATES YOUR PLEASURE GARDEN! the front of the box promised. I opened the top and withdrew the dildo; it was nestled in a plastic container. I touched the dildo’s bottom tentatively (according to the box, this was the STRONG SUCTION BASE); it felt like rubbery flesh. I removed the dildo from the plastic shell; the toy was heavier than I had expected. I stood the dildo on my desk. It was thick and tapered, tan and blue and purple, covered in spiraling ripples. For some reason, I had expected it would do something, but this wasn’t a vibrator. Instead, it sat there, listing slightly, next to my keyboard.
RIDE THIS UNTAMABLE BEAST ALL THE WAY TO FANTASTICAL PLEASURE, the box demanded. I attempted to pick up the dildo, but it had suctioned itself to my desk. With a tug, it came loose. I waved the dildo around. It wagged pleasantly. I wasn’t sure what I was going to do with it, but I was sure of one thing.
I had a unicorn dildo.
This post originally appeared on my newsletter: The Reverse Cowgirl.
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Consider the Woodsman
Porn set, Canoga Park, CA | Photo credit: Susannah Breslin
“Two of the [male porn stars] I interviewed have since died.” Read the rest of my latest Reverse Cowgirl newsletter: “The Hard Thing About Being a Male Porn Star.” Subscribe to get it Sundays in your inbox.
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A Rough Trade
Porn star Jesse Jane, Las Vegas, NV | Photo credit: Susannah Breslin
“Where do porn stars go when they die? I don’t know, but I hope it’s heaven—or something like it.” Read the rest of my latest Reverse Cowgirl newsletter and subscribe: “They (Still) Shoot Porn Stars, Don’t They?”
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The No-Sex App
“If X is a raging erection, Threads is the blank, phallus-less space between a Ken doll’s legs.” Read the rest of my latest Reverse Cowgirl newsletter: “Threads Is the Least Sexy Social Media App in Human Existence.”
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The One About the Woodsman
“In 2017, I wrote a fictional short story about a male porn star.” Read the rest of my latest Reverse Cowgirl newsletter HERE. Don’t forget to hit it the pink button at the bottom of the newsletter to subscribe.
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The Voyeur
“I took the above selfie in late 2018, in one of the experiment rooms in Tolman Hall, a Brutalist building on the north side of the U.C. Berkeley campus, in which I was studied from chilhood and into adulthood.” Read the rest of my latest Reverse Cowgirl newsletter HERE, and hit the pink button at the bottom to subscribe.
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Porn Valley, USA
What We See
“The images feature hardcore sex, fetishists, erect penises, the unhoused, the seemingly dead, freaks, the mentally ill, exhibitionists, masochists, sex workers, psychos, criminals, mobsters, a hooded figure removing a string of anal beads from his anus, and other types.” Read the rest of my latest Reverse Cowgirl newsletter HERE and then subscribe by hitting the button at the bottom of the newsletter.
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Home Is Where the History Isn't
“As a child, I was spied on (think: me, in an observation room with a researcher standing on the other side of a one-way mirror); as an adult, I became a spy (think: me, notebook in hand, observing a scene from the view from nowhere).” Read my latest Reverse Cowgirl newsletter here and don’t forget to subscribe.
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Gold Diggers
The Tingle
“I bought a poster (you can see it in the photo above) for an X-rated 1978 movie called ‘She Did It Her Way.’” Read the rest of my latest Reverse Cowgirl newsletter here. Don’t forget to subscribe while you’re there.
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The Theatre
“I took this photo of the Tiki Theatre on Friday while standing in the street on Santa Monica Boulevard as traffic approached.” Read the rest of my Substack newsletter. Subscribe to get it in your inbox weekly.
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Plans in My Head and Other Things
I sent out another newsletter. (Don’t forget to subscribe; there’s a button at the bottom of the post.)
This one is mostly a roundup of various things that were in my head, from my brief, non-interactive sort-of-encounter with A Famous Man Who Talked to His Penis to My Estate Sale Meanderings Involving a Former Playboy Model to this idea I have for an article that would involve me touring the last remaining adult theaters in Los Angeles.
That last thing, that adult theater tour idea for an article with pictures and such, was inspired by an experience I had writing this article about virtual reality porn for The Atlantic.
To wit:
On Santa Monica Boulevard, near the 101 Freeway, the Tiki Theater was still standing. Years ago, I’d photographed it, but I’d never been inside. “It’s porn movies,” the man in the front booth emphasized when I paid my $14. “I know,” I replied. In the gloom of the tiny theater, four men were scattered around on random chairs. On the big screen, a cheery blonde was performing oral sex on a man who seemed to be appreciating the attention. On the TV set that had been erected next to the bigger screen, a different porn movie was playing. Neither one had sound. It was not quite 9 o’clock in the morning. In this hidden world, the porn was real—almost too real.
That was a bizarre experience. And you know what they say about bizarre experiences. It’s best to repeat them. In any case, I’m not sure where to begin, although it would be cool to present it online as one of those maps, like one of those Eater maps. Let me know if you’d like to design one for me.
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I'm Only Happy When It Rains
Strip club, Hollywood, CA (Photo credit: Susannah Breslin)
Check out my latest newsletter at The Reverse Cowgirl:
“They had tattoos and did crazy acrobatics and I think one girl had a tramp stamp that read FUCK YOU or maybe FUCK YOU PAY ME.”
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All the Smut That's Fit to Print
Dancer with money, Las Vegas, Nev. (Photo credit: Susannah Breslin)
A couple new things:
I wrote a Forbes post about a strip club CEO:
“Pandemic? Fuggedaboutit. Two years of dark news, quarantining, and masks have resulted in a surge of consumers who want to go out and have fun. The strip club business may not be pandemic proof, but according to Langan, it’s pandemic resistant.”
I wrote a newsletter about the story behind that story:
"I had forgotten about that fact, and several other details in the piece, like the dancer who made $800 to $1,000 a night who told me: ‘I have a lot of spunk.’”
Don’t forget to subscribe to my newsletter here.
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The Hidden Pervert
Estate sale, Encino, Calif. (Photo credit: Susannah Breslin)
My latest newsletter is out. It features the perversions of dead people’s houses. Read it here. Subscribe here.
I’d assumed the place had belonged to an older gay man who had spent his final years contentedly rendering artistic homages to the penis, but when I got to the bedroom, I realized the deceased resident had been an older woman.
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Scenes from My Life as a Sex Writer
My latest newsletter is out. It features a walk down sex writer lane. Read it here. Subscribe here.
Interestingly, I’d forgotten many of the things that I’d done and which I’d referenced in the piece. That time I went to a sex dungeon in Van Nuys. That all-girl porn star orgy performance art at a downtown gallery. The ex-prostitute looking to buy the oldest brothel in the country.
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The Reverse Cowgirl Is Back!
Illustration by Chris Bishop
In 2002, I launched what became an iconic blog: The Reverse Cowgirl. Now it’s back, as a Substack newsletter: The Reverse Cowgirl. Don’t forget to subscribe!
The RCB, as I referred to it, had what could be described as a prurient focus—after all, its tagline was: “in which a writer attempts to justify the enormity of her porn collection”—but it was also, as I write here, a way for me, a writer, to “share my crazy life working the sex and porn beat, from Porn Valley to the Playboy Mansion, and I was intoxicated by the opportunity that sex blogging afforded me: an uncensored venue where I could write and express whatever I wanted—without censorship.”
Read the rest and subscribe here.
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