Most of the sexual education in my early teen years came from eight really old Glamour magazines. They were the small thick kind you used to be able to buy for a few pounds, with entire juicy sections about sex and relationships. They were given to me by my aunt, who had been keeping them in her home for who knows how long and wanted to get rid of them.
I can conjure up the distinct scent of those magazines so clearly. My uncle was a smoker, so the pages were laced with tobacco and old paper smell from sitting in his house for so long. The perfume samples trapped in the pages still had their scent, but it was old and musty.
One of them had a cover with Girls Aloud in jewel-toned outfits, sitting astride motorcycles in sexy positions. The headlines talked about weight loss and sexual fantasies and how to get a glowing fake tan.
I pored over them for hours.
I remember one segment where different men described a sexual encounter that stuck with them. One man talked about his first time in the red light district of Amsterdam. One man spoke about staying the night at an older woman’s place and feeling obligated to have sex with her as payment.
One man wrote of his experience sleeping with a woman who had absolutely no blemishes. He said her skin was so perfect, there was nothing to focus on. He found it disconcerting. I always picture this mystery woman’s back turned away from him as she sleeps, her skin perfect and smooth.
These magazines were my first real glimpse into what an adult’s sex life might be like. The sex in these pages was hot, steamy, and even weird. There were tales of strange fantasies and the spice of holiday flings. I read one in-depth story about a woman who felt she was addicted to sex. She eventually curbed this ‘voracious appetite’ (their words) by getting really into exercise. Huh, so she channeled her sexual urges with fitness?
Reading these stories as a teenager made me excited to grow into a woman who would have sexual experiences of her own. I imagined lust and novelty, making eye contact with handsome strangers across the room. I fantasized about witty repartee exchanged over dinner at a restaurant with white tablecloths and dim lighting. My desires were predictable and cliché, really.
Yet, somehow I miss the time when I thought those things were possible. Every sexual encounter I’ve had in the last 3 years has been as a result of a dating app, not meaningful eye contact. I’ve had some fun sexual experiences, sure, but never that instant charge and lust that I thought adulthood would bring. Maybe because that was always an unrealistic expectation? That was a vision of sex sold to me by the magazines, not a realistic depiction of what adult sexual encounters would be like.
I still read magazines or online versions of them, and I do find it refreshing to see that the stories reported in the sex, relationships, and wellness sections of popular publications have more nuance to them now than “Women Tell Us Their Weirdest Sexual Fantasies” or “10 Top Tips to Drive Him Wild!”
For old-time’s sake, I check out the Glamour website. I’m surprised to see that sex or relationships aren’t even categories listed. I find sexual health nested under the parent topic of wellness. It’s interesting to see that a lot of the articles are more product-focused. I take that as a good thing because I don’t remember products made for women’s pleasure taking such a front stage in those old magazines I had.
For all my nostalgia about those smelly pages, I’m at least slightly more impressed with the reading material at my disposal now!
