What Before the Internet?

ha ha ha … too hot? Goodness, it is so tame and poetically sedate that secondhand bookstores couldn't even give copies away. Back in the 1990s they were everywhere and for give-away prices.

Yes quite, a line drawing book that implicitly seemed to represent sex in the context of love. But still it was hard to obtain. Don't forget that just 12 years earlier, Penguin books was prosecuted under the Obscene Publications Act for printing D. H. Lawrence's 1928 novel 'Lady Chatterley's Lover'. And that was just words! Penguin won fortunately. Only as late as 1967 did the the law change and the UK stop imprisoning homosexual men.

Thought provoking - I mentioned in a previous post my liking of Evergreen and Grove Press for their erotica publications ('60's - ‘70’s). That got me thinking and, on a lark, I did a search on “Victorian erotica” …WHAT A BONANZA!!! Try it; I think you'll be amazed at the treasure trove that pops up!! Enjoy…now, go hang a bag!

I remember looking for information on enemas anyplace I could. Any books on anything medical and I would look for any mention of enemas. I never remembered caring if it made me weird or anything. It felt good and thats what mattered.

Of coarse I did try and leave equipment where I found it to avoid any embarrassing situations as I would hide a porno or anything else. Nowadays it sort of seems exciting to be exposed and everyone knowing.

The first time I ever noticed there was actual enema porn on video and in magazines I was probably 15 or 16 and I was in a shady porno store in a very unsavory neighborhood where no one ever seemed to notice or care that I was not old enough to be in there and ask for an ID or tell me to leave.

There was no internet for all my early life. Just chatting to other people, whose information could be good or bad. Playing and experimenting with others. Medicals were more common in my early years, so I had some practical rather then theoretical experience.

The only thing my siblings and I had was each other. We started explored each other at an early age and continued as we got older, exploring the changes that were taking place. After we were taught personal hygiene as preteens and enemas were our responsibility, exploring went into overdrive.

How did I get my (erotic) information? From my older brother “out behind the barn”. Seriously, we grew up on a small farm 😮. No touchy-feely stuff, just two bros talking.

Then came Playboys my brother obtained. No idea where/how he got 'em, but WOWZERS! 😵‍💫

Then, after leaving home, in magazines/trashy books from adult book stores.\

Pretty humdrum stuff.

I think my favourite soft porn magazine of the 1970s was "Men Only" .Aged 17 in 1975 I was visiting a friend who lived near Marble Arch in London. This was the location of the first "Ann Summers" sex shop. On this particular day Ann herself was holding a book signing event. I recall she was a very sexy Australian blonde lady probably then aged 30ish? Couldn't afford the book but I did buy a copy of the aforementioned magazine at 70p (for which she wrote an agony aunt column) & somehow got up enough courage to ask her to autograph the front cover for me. I was rewarded with a big smile & a felt tip autograph. I mentioned this recently to a friend who said she thought it might have some value as a collectors item if I still had it. I said that it was probably in the loft but wouldn't be worth anything "Why not?" she asked "Because all the pages will still be stuck together!" Yuk.

I was thinking about where I learned about “kink and fetish” and how it has influenced my “secret life”, as opposed to my amazing but sadly “vanilla marriage”…. Long before AOL dial up and even before DVDs, I came across a non-descript little adult book store that was directly in the heart of Times Square, not hidden away on a side street, but right there in the days when Times Square was truly seedy and not the tourist destination of today… Kinematics was unique in that they had booths that played “less than mainstream porn”. They had a couple of booths that projected the movies onto the wall of the booth. They played European fetish videos, stuff that I never even imagined existed…l was hooked and I remember going there anytime I could get to NYC -armed with my handful of quarters.

One day I went and Kinematics was gone as part of the vision for cleaning up Times Square. I was devastated and thought this kink thing was over. And on a whim, I looked in the phone book and found that they relocated to a larger space in the 30’s just off 6th Ave.

This was at the beginning of Video tapes and not only did the have more booths, they displayed 100s if not 1000s of video cassettes by genre as well as catalogues of the various companies that produced content….that is where I found Beth Tyler amongst other specific fetish providers…. I’ll put together a new post reminiscing about folks of “our age” that started their kink journey in the 70s at the transition from magazines to videos and beyond…

Beth Tyler’s catalogue is how it all started for me…

Forum magazine was fairly open to we klysmos. I remember a fabulous letter describing a visit to a specialist enema nurse. She not only carried out a digital examination "you are very constipated but l will soon sort you out", applied a vibrator to his penis, hardened by her working the nozzle between each squeeze on the Higginson syringe and told him to "hold it" until he came, but also offered a cup of coffee after he had showered. Her words, after he had drunk it, "to keep the toilets to hand as it was well dosed with a most effective laxative" give me Goose bumps to this day. If only!!!

Another magazine described a visit to a German pro-dom. He pleaded "anything but an enema". Her response, once he was strapped to her treatment table??? "You are to receive two gallons, and if you release before I tell you I will make you lick it up". Oh my goodness.

Forum magazine. I used to buy this every month from my teens up until, what maybe twenty years ago? Does anyone know when publication stopped? Funny how something has been about forever & then suddenly you find it's not there anymore. I think it was brought to my mind by an image here today of two beautiful women having fun with their strapon. One of my all time favourite letters in the magazine was about a guy who came home from work early to find a female near neighbour giving his wife a sensual anal fucking with her strapon , this being the culmination of a whole afternoon of sexual delights. Thereafter he was allowed to watch the two women enjoying each other from time to time & allowed to masturbate but never to touch or join in in any way. Funny how some images stick in your mind as well as to your tissues...🙄

I definitely think Forum magazine helped to educate a lot of us, even if most of the stories were well written fantasies I do think some of them were true.

@LordJim2 Google tells me regular publication ceased about 2009 although maybe there were a few odd specials after that... think I learned a lot from Forum...

For me, "What before the internet" is Not much. Before the internet, I really had no way of knowing that anyone other than me and my sister took enemas for fun. Everybody that I knew growing up said they hated them. I posted earlier here, that as a newlywed in the early 70's I had not yet confessed to my husband that I liked enemas and I really, really wanted him to give me one. I bought the "Joy of Sex" book when it came available in my book club but was disappointed to find only one single line about enemas, that some took an enema before anal. Not a word that some did it for fun. Back in those days young women in my town would not be caught dead alone in an adult bookstore so it would be years before I knew there were many like me out there, who took or gave enemas strictly for fun.

Not until the internet. Before we had our own computer at home, I used a computer at a local library. Back when you had the flashing DOS prompt, and most was text only, no colored pictures. One evening I searched for "enema" and to my surprise up came a story with a title something like "A Bride's Enema". A story about a bride who was very constipated on her wedding night and her husband gave her an enema with her douche bag. And that started it for them. Wow!!! I couldn't believe that was available to the public.

If I remember correctly @alan20cm It started out as Forum letters, in Penthouse mag before it was published as a separate magazine.

For me, "What before the internet" is Not much. Before the internet, I really had no way of knowing that anyone other than me and my sister took enemas for fun. Everybody that I knew growing up said they hated them. I posted earlier here, that as a newlywed in the early 70's I had not yet confessed to my husband that I liked enemas and I really, really wanted him to give me one. I bought the "Joy of Sex" book when it came available in my book club but was disappointed to find only one single line about enemas, that some took an enema before anal. Not a word that some did it for fun. Back in those days young women in my town would not be caught dead alone in an adult bookstore so it would be years before I knew there were many like me out there, who took or gave enemas strictly for fun.

Not until the internet. Before we had our own computer at home, I used a computer at a local library. Back when you had the flashing DOS prompt, and most was text only, no colored pictures. One evening I searched for "enema" and to my surprise up came a story with a title something like "A Bride's Enema". A story about a bride who was very constipated on her wedding night and her husband gave her an enema with her douche bag. And that started it for them. Wow!!! I couldn't believe that was available to the public.

Many thanks for this very well written comment !! - für sure yes, it was absolutely a " New world ", by opening the Internet, and so be able, to discover things, which were before only existed in our dreams !!

@LordJim2 I think you are right but we are pushing the boundaries of my memory!