Open Forum Friday: I Hate 69

I’m just going to throw it out there in a way I haven’t, before: I don’t like to 69.

Whew. That was liberating. Let me say it again: I don’t like to 69.

Now, don’t get me wrong. I’m not repulsed by the idea of mutual simultaneous oral sex. If I’m in the heat of the moment and a guy whisper’s in my ear, Let’s 69, baby, I’m not going to wrinkle my nose, scoot myself away from him in repulsion and declare, “Icky-poo!” If I’m sucking on a guy and all of a sudden he makes a dive for my junk, I’m not going to inform him in a chilly voice to get the hell out and never return again.

The act of 69ing is fun enough, I suppose. It doesn’t make me lose my hard-on. It’s not repulsive in itself—certainly not like a guy squirting his leftover enema juice in my face, or someone asking me to drive finishing nails through his scrotum. (Both of which have happened to me, by the way.) In fact, on the list of Things I’m Officially Not Into, it probably ranks as one of the more arousing and enjoyable activities. But the simple fact is, I’d rather do just about anything else but.

Sometimes it seems that when I look back on all the guys who’ve hit on me during a one or two-week period, I can sense a statistically-skewed distribution of some sort. A trend, if you will. A couple of years ago I hit on a streak of guys who came to me with pre-lubed holes, which is something I haven’t encountered since; week before last I had several guys tell me something I hadn’t heard before, which was slight variations on, “You’ve aged really well.” (Thanks a bunch, fuckers.) I’ve had weeks of flakes, and weeks of slutty bottoms who want multiple cocks.

This last week was the week of the 69. I logged onto Manhunt a couple of times and I’d come back to find my inbox had accumulated a couple of letters with the subject line 69??, but no body. A reader sent me a lot of photos he’d collected from somebody’s Tumblr of guys going at it in a 69 position, and emailed them to me with all-cap message, THIS IS WHAT I WANT US TO DO. Guys kept mentioning it in their come-ons in a way they haven’t in a very long time. It was as if Oprah had featured 69ing in her book club or something, and suddenly everyone was hot to try it. (Is there a lot of 69 in Fifty Shades of Grey? Is that what’s going on?)

As I said, I like oral sex. I enjoy receiving it. I enjoy giving it. There have been times in the past, when I was much younger, that a guy would be sucking on my dick and I would feel guilty simply laying there and enjoying it. It’s tough for me sometimes simply to enjoy something without giving back. So if the guy’s meat was within sucking distance, I’d reluctantly suck on it too, mostly out of guilt. I’d rather have been sucking on it while he lay back and relaxed and enjoyed, not while he was working on me.

My experience of oral sex is entirely pleasurable until the moment comes when I take another man’s dick into my mouth. At that point, it’s almost too much sensation for me. Where before his tongue running over my cock head would make me gasp and groan and arch my back and wish for more, if I am having to divide my attentions between my own dick and his, suddenly that tongue simply feels like sandpaper—unpleasant and even painful. What’s a delightful slippery sensation when I’m sliding in and out of a mouth solo, suddenly becomes awkward and grating on my dick when 69ing.

It’s almost as if the pleasure centers in my mouth when I’m giving head switch off the receptive pleasure centers of my dick when I’m receiving it—except that if a third party is sucking me while I’m eating dick, I’m totally in hog heaven. I don’t know what the difference can be, unless it has something to do with the upside-down positioning required in a mutual 69.

I’ve done quite well managing to talk my way out of 69ing through most of my life, since I’ve pretty much always felt this way. Yet I feel slightly guilty when I encounter men for whom the position is a main course, who think that more than anything else it represents deep-down wallowin’ pig sex. Two dudes chompin’ on each other’s hogs. Yeah man! That’s the stuff! When I’m with one of those fellows I feel as if I missed the boat somehow.

I’m throwing this out to my readers to find out what they have to say about the matter. Is 69ing overrated? Am I doing it wrong—or is there something I should be doing to make it better? (And if so, do you want to help me practice?) Or is there a relatively mild act of which you’re not fond, yourself, and feel mildly embarrassed about admitting? Let’s talk it over in today’s open forum.