Renaissance paintings

My relationship with masturbation began sometime when I was about 10 or 11, although it had been developing for a while. I was in the 5th grade, and we had, after much anticipation and fear, completed the dreaded one-hour puberty class surprisingly painlessly. Though maddeningly vague and cutesy, it did, thankfully, explain to me what an erection was — a phenomenon I had experienced for years, and that I was wholly convinced was a freak mutation unique to myself. Somewhat reassured that my body was not entirely as deformed as I had thought, and alerted to the fact that the link between sexual thoughts and erections was not, in fact, coincidental, I began to explore my genitals with slightly less shame.

At this age, I was in a peculiar dilemma. I was without a brother or any male friend I felt I could comfortably speak openly to about these matters. I was already a raging mass of hormones, but I took very seriously my parents' threat to ban me from the Internet (a favorite new toy) if they found I'd been looking at "dirty sites." Perplexed, I took a course of action that I am entirely sure Michelangelo would not have approved of, and began using Encarta 95's collection of Renaissance paintings for sexual gratification. Yet to discover the orgasm, I gaped at paintings of a nude Venus and nymphs with a tiny erection and an awed expression. After the Sistine Chapel lost some of its arousal, I progressed to the old issues of National Geographic in time, in an amazingly embarrassing but very educational journey of self-discovery, absorbing an abnormal amount of information on Renaissance humanism and the behaviors of nomadic African tribes for my age. In retrospect, I'd prefer to look upon the extent of my nerdiness to be humorous rather than humiliating, but I still shudder to think what might have occurred had my mother happened upon my stash of Renaissance art.

Fortunately, at age 12, after a year or so of this decidedly unorthodox manner of arousal, the rate of discovery of my own sexuality greatly accelerated. Now in the middle school, I became close friends with another guy, and we began spending many weekends at each other's house. Initially, we glossed over sexual subjects in hushed, insinuating tones, but as our friendship progressed, we eventually became increasingly open with each other. One night, in his bedroom at his house, his older brother (who was about 14) entered as he occasionally did. This time, however, he had a furtive look and carried a package under his shirt. With a sly look, he revealed its contents, and to our mortification found it to be a Playboy he had borrowed from his friend. As the three of us stared in awe at the pictures (myself finding them to be infinitely superior to any Da Vinci work I had seen), it became clear through our briefs (which we had been lounging in as we prepared for bed) that we all were sporting erections. My friend and I tried to discreetly cover ours, but his brother got another sly look in his eye and asked us if we wanted to see something cool. Our nods abruptly stopped as he shamelessly dropped his underwear and began furiously rubbing away at his penis, which he proceeded to do until reaching climax, thoroughly coating his hands in mostly clear semen as we stared in awe. Assuring us that this felt tremendously good, we shyly removed our penises and attempted to recreate his brother's show, though neither of us climaxed — I found the beginning of the orgasm to be such an intensely uncomfortable feeling I couldn't continue.

In the months that followed, my attempts to climax were mostly fruitless. The sensation of needing to urinate often ended sessions, and when I did push on, I experienced a weak imitation of an orgasm that discharged, to my great nervousness, not semen but urine. Deciding that the possibility that my tubes were somehow tangled and that I would never be a normally functioning male (which trumped the threat of my mother's wrath), I searched online for support, and happened across JackinWorld, which was among the most fortunate dates of my life to that point. With the site assuring me that I was not in fact broken, and that it was normal for a 12-year-old to not ejaculate semen, I assumed a renewed confidence in my privates and went to work a few times every week, just to check if I could ejaculate yet. After a few more weeks, I succeeded in expelling a few drops of clear, sticky fluid, and was so overjoyed I immediately ran to my friend's house to share the good news. Unfortunately, this last climax had apparently drained my reservoir, and it was another week before I ejaculated semen again. After this, my testicles apparently kicked into high gear, and my masturbation sessions became infinitely more satisfying. I began masturbating with my friend on a regular basis, in front of each other and assisting each other, to our great mutual satisfaction. His brother joined in a few times, but the mechanics of this were slightly awkward, and we mostly just kept to the two of us.

Sometime much later, after my friend and I had been masturbating each other for nearly a year, my father decided — with rather poor timing — to explain masturbation to me. Good-intentioned but obviously uncomfortable and bumbling, he explained to me nothing I didn't already know, and he did so poorly that I thanked God once more that I had found JackinWorld when I did.

Thanking God became slightly uncomfortable for a brief spell around the same time, when my Catholic priest explained during confirmation that self-pleasure was a sin — I wasn't too sure if the Big Guy would appreciate my crediting him with something that the devil had apparently given me. My stint with Catholicism, however, was short-lived and mostly at the requests of my family, and I quickly decided that any religion in which the main deity didn't want me to enjoy life wasn't worth dedicating my life to. I didn't completely renounce my faith, but learning to start living my life for myself instead of the church helped relieve the post-ejaculatory guilt that plagued me for a while — and I decided that if masturbating sent you to Hell, then Heaven must be a pretty lonely place anyway.

In the years since, my masturbation habits haven't changed a lot. I still have mutual sessions on a somewhat regular basis with my friend (and a few others now, as well). I've tried anal stimulation (which, despite multiple attempts, never seemed to get me off any), and I've tried different grips, but I stick mostly to the old "fist" grip, which I find to be tried, trued, and impossible to beat. I'm enjoying the ability to wank whenever I want, and I'm looking forward to years more of safe, healthy, and prostate-friendly fun to come.