compiled by Brian Peters

Every sperm is sacred.
Every sperm is great.
If a sperm is wasted,
God gets quite irate.

--Monty Python's The Meaning of Life.

What is it about masturbation? "Unnatural" and "damaging," say the anti-sex- except- in- a- marriage- and- then- without- passion- and- only- for- procreation camp; "tacky," "utilitarian," and "less than real sex," say even the cool crowd. And yet they all do it. True, they may do it with great guilt or great disdain, depending, but all the surveys are clear on this one -- there's a bit of Rosie Palm or her dear friends in nearly everyone's past lovers column.

And why not? Certainly it's the safest of safe sex -- the single gravest medical concern being blisters -- and meets even the most hypertechnical definitions of monogamy, and, for the most part, celibacy. And yet it's still great sex. It's double-dutch chocolate cake with whipped chocolate icing and not a single calorie, and that's surely a thing to celebrate. And this month we do just that.

Clean Sheets has always brought you the best of instruction on solitary pleasure -- check out Jaie Helier's "Doing It Yourself -- a Short Handbook for Guys" and H.L. Shaw's "Fluffin' the Muffin" in our archives. And we have to believe that the blur of page requests for the Clean Sheets Gallery and our Fiction aren't exclusively for their academic merit.

But sex, even solo sex, is a many-faceted thing, and what we bring you here is less polished and more personal -- reflections by the Clean Sheets staff on masturbation in their lives.

In my own little corner, in my own little room...

I'm a little embarrassed to describe how I masturbate because it's so...kidlike. Friends keep telling me they started, aged in the single digits and often by accident, getting themselves off with pillows: lying on them or sticking them between their legs, rubbing and squeezing until orgasm was induced. One poor guy claims to have been turned off self-pleasuring forever after he looked up one day to see his nanny standing just outside the door, watching him hump a cushion. He felt so silly it gave him a permanent complex.

Anyway, most people say they sooner or later gave up pillow-pounding and "graduated" to more subtle methods. Intricate little things with fingers, and of course expensive electric toys. I've never owned a vibrator. Among other things, I'm exceedingly sensitive in the relevant areas. Stimulation that's too direct can turn into tickling, and then I'm screaming with laughter, not arousal. I lie on my side, or face down if I'm reading something. I have a collection of old S&M books and magazines, which really do it for me. Otherwise I mostly remember a real-life scene with a current or former lover. I gradually start to press against the pillow which is either under me or between my legs. It's a wonderful, very generalized feeling which seems to warm up my whole genital area and belly -- quite like fucking someone face to face. Because there's no very specific pressure, you can go on forever. Orgasm almost comes as a surprise (so to speak) and it feels like it's all over your body. Afterwards, I like to drop off to sleep for a while.

The stuff of dreams...

Without a doubt, my favorite way is with a loving female partner and it's a mutual affair, most excitingly done while nude dancing (no, not at a club -- sigh). The music, the slow swaying, the feverish fingers, mmmmm, now that's sweet.

Without a partner handy (sorry 'bout the pun), I have to admit I fluctuate between utilitarian (sometimes you just gotta get off) and luxurious. If it's a quickie, I just grab and stroke, come and clean up, then off to other things, but if I have the inclination and time, I get more romantic with my own bad self. I'll play some nice music (even opera arias can do it for me), maybe have a little wine or recreational substances, and begin imagining an erotic scenario with a fantasy or former lover. The fantasy might be someone I've seen somewhere and thought "Hmmmmm...wonder what she's like..." The former lovers I remember what they're like -- heh heh -- so it's Memorex all the way. Messy as it sometimes can get, it's fun once in a while to start with your clothes on and do those "new lover" exploration caresses, watching and feeling myself get hard in my jeans. Okay, I admit it, I'm a hedonist. When it comes to how do I masturbate, let me count the ways...

It's good to be the king...

My favorite way is to lie in bed -- usually in the early early morning. The erection is absolutely demanding at that juncture -- and while it may be a bit clinical to say this, a full bladder really enhances the feeling of insistent urgency.

My right hand encircles the semi-circumsized head and moves what little foreskin the doctors left me with over it, my warm bear paw savoring the length, the firmness of the morning wood. My other hand cups and teases and pinches my furry man-breasts' nipples, sending little electrical impulses all the way down into the seminal vesicles. I can feel the pressure chamber there loading up -- I'm certain of this, don't confuse me with neurological facts. I ride the wave, pushing myself closer and closer to orgasm, not letting myself relax and come, knowing that I will inevitably go over the edge soon enough, despite my best of intentions.

My brain that early is in pretty nonspecific fantasy mode, my thoughts rifling through giant internal mental file drawers of erotica, the mental fingers staggered when they are spiked with ecstasy. I sometimes grasp my cock at the root and feel my heart beating, thump, thump, thump through the blood that has engorged me. Usually my fantasies spill end over end out onto the cutting room floor of my mind, and become spliced into some kind of fuck-loop of purest perversity.

I become some kind of God-King of Sumerian Fuck-Sluts, a passionate Priest-Emperor of a thousand horny cumfuckwhores. I build lovers out of illusion, memory, and my own sweat and then kiss them, fuck them, rape their willing holes, and they dissolve one by one, none of them any one person, each amalgams of many loves. They are all my slaves, my submissives, my wives and husbands, my brothers and sisters, my horny little grown-up girls and boys, my worshippers and my clergy. Every pussy and asshole I've ever fucked is reviewed and remembered and loved once again.

For a moment I close my eyes and feel what it's like to be on the edge of ejaculation, forcing myself to love that moment, to hold on to it, to ask wordlessly, "Now?"

Then it is usually a few more strokes, a few more pinches on my nipple, hard, harder with my fingernails digging into the stem of my tit, my head thrown back and I feel it...like a roaring hot firehose of come, a single screaming silver shot pushing against the little inner doors of my come-factory, pushing up, out, erupting and boiling over, a spurt that catches the air and lights on my big bear belly, that wets both my hands, the one wrapped protectively around my now-sensitive glans and the other still pinching. My favorite come-towel is a soft, soft cotton T-shirt, well-loved and used and no longer fit to wear.

Then, and only then, it's time to get up and face the day.

And now for something completely different...

I'm a top. I know I'm a top, and they know, too. I put them down, on their knees, right where they need to be. Licking my legs, my feet, my shoes, my cunt, I take them and I leave them, needing, giving them what they want and taking the control that lights my brain to a white heat, blinds me to everything but their face, their eyes, their tears, their need, floods my cunt with the power they hand me. I'm a top.

So why is it, in the dark of the night, when they've fallen asleep at the foot of my bed (their proper place, good dog)...why is it when I'm hot, I'm needing, I've come twice from their pleadings and I still need, I've not had enough (never enough for me), why is it when I'm trying to hear their voice again, that deliciously whimpering voice that got me off so hot before, and I'm stroking my nipple (same hand, same pattern, always the same damned fucking stroke), other hand rocking the vibe on my clit (my finger will do it, but I'm too fat, to do myself with my fingers means a cramp in my shoulder)...

Why is it, this voice ringing through my head, deep voice, voice pleading with mistress to please, let him do it, please take him, pleading, submissive...this voice becomes my voice...his voice...his voice saying (echoing through me) "Good slut, fuckslut, sluts don't cum, you know, sluts just need" and my finger rubs, and rocks the vibe, and "Sluts don't cum, sluts just serve. That's right, she'll do you. All of you? Sure, just line up, she's got a good mouth, a cunt mouth..."

And it's not until I can hear it, feel it, full kinesthetic fist in my hair and cock in my mouth, panting, licking the air (craving cockwhore), cock sliding in my hair, "Bend over, get it ready, slut, you think this is for you? Fuck no, fuck you, sluts don't cum slut's don't cum sluts just serve...serve...serve"

I'm a top. No, really.

While you were sleeping...

Sex is like a Lay's (pardon the pun) potato chip to me, 'cause I cannot have just one. So, my favorite time to masturbate is right after my lover and I have just had sex. No, it doesn't matter whether I just had an orgasm or not. I want more and he isn't quite capable just yet...I'm still basking in the afterglow and even though he is more than willing to continue onward, I kind of like the sexy, secretive way I choose to masturbate. You see, my favorite way to self-pleasure is not by myself, but rather, with what I would term a "blind audience." When my lover is sleeping, (and bless his heart for trying to keep up), I would slowly...quietly...stroke myself. As the fervor builds, I would use my fingertips to part my already sex drenched self, and languidly rub my clit. Now, here's the fun part. I would move as close as I can to my unsuspecting boyfriend as I continue to tease and torture myself with my trembling fingertips. If I'm lucky, his hand will be exposed, and I will press myself onto it. If it's a true lottery night, he will be on his back and I can touch him while touching myself. The second I make hand contact with his sleeping member, I burst into a delicious orgasm. It just feels so taboo! Since I'm a noisy little thing, I pretend to be snuggling up to him just as the big bang hits. Nights when I know he is in a really deep sleep, I will utilize my vibrator...I think the soft humming sound keeps him asleep. Another favorite is spread eagle, on my bed, with my vibrator as my lover is getting ready for work in the morning. I hear him in the shower and then, I begin. I close my eyes, tune him out, and almost pray that the door opens and he catches me. For me, the thrill of "getting caught" sends me right over the edge. I rarely fantasize, because the excitement of thinking about him watching me is more than enough. Admittedly, sometimes, a threesome with this cute redhead we know does enter the picture...

Does he know I do this? Yes, of course he does. I tell him everything. It makes for a very arousing conversation and a great lead in for some really hot sessions. Sometimes, he even pretends to still be in the shower, and then swings the bathroom door open, hoping to catch me!

He hasn't woken up or caught me yet...but I suspect when the day/night comes that he does, masturbation will be the last thing on my mind.

Applause, applause...

I've been a regular masturbator, (with forced periods of abstinence) all my life, whether living with someone or living alone. It's different; shouldn't be mistaken for a "substitute for," and certainly not done with a "better than nothing" attitude. It's safe, and limited only by the imagination. Having said that, my moments of greatest pleasure are watching (oh, so live) a woman masturbate, using any number of aids; an absolute, all-time turn on for me, or for an added boost, two women doing each other, or a man and woman doing it, two men and a woman, or a bunch...get them all on the bed. Wonderful! I like a lot of noise, a lot of grunts, a lot of words, sighs, shouts, bells and whistles...and I like a lot of eye contact...and I like the crescendo to be a jumping up and down on the edge of the bed shoot out. I usually don't have control over what comes after. Applause is always nice.

In the best of company...

I love masturbating for an audience of one, and I do it before sex, during sex, and after sex. He watches quietly, closely, and usually joins in with fingers and tongue, doing those things I can't do myself. And when I get close to orgasm, he nudges my hand aside and takes me there all by himself.

When I'm alone? I do it the same way, but imagine him there, watching. If he's unavailable, Antonio Banderas sometimes fills in...

Henry Miller and Anais Nin?...

Most likely I've been polishing my pole since infancy (did you know that we have sonograms of male fetuses masturbating?); at least, my earliest recollections (from six or seven) have the earmarks of well-developed ritual. I think, too, that my favorite adult ways of "doing it" were all set in childhood.

My most pea-brained self-stimulation is more about stress-relief than sex. I lie on my back or lean rigid against a wall. I use my right hand or both hands -- two fingers underneath, just below the frenulum, thumbs on top -- and, well...jerk off. When I was seventeen it took about a minute and a half. On a particularly stressful day, I'd do it three or four times. Not any more. Sigh.

Masturbating when it has some connection with sex is a lot sweeter for me. Basic mode is flat on my back in bed, feet tucked cozily under the covers. My fantasies are almost always specific and concrete, and about someone I love or someone I lust for. My fantasy climaxes when I do. I'm a long-distance ejaculator: semen has ended up streaking the mirror at the head of the bed, pooling in my eye socket, or festooning my beard like Christmas tinsel. (A lover once told me about a guy who shot a big glop right up her nostril.) Fantasies when I masturbate are hopelessly vanilla, though often crowded and improbably gymnastic.

The last ten years or so I've added lube to my more leisurely and erotic self-pleasuring. I use dozens of different strokes, switch hands, go fast or slow, tease, stimulate my cockhead much more intensely than I ever could when I was young, and, sometimes, go as deep into erotic frenzy as I do with the most intense partner sex. A couple of years ago I bought a "Fleshlight," a large, silly jellylike concoction that does everything but offer post-coital conversation. I jam it under the mattress edge and hump the bed, or wedge it into a pile of pillows on the bed so I can look at my collection of Rafaelli photographs. Being able to launch my whole muscle mass against my arousal is gloriously satisfying. I refuse to tell you what combining the Fleshlight with my wife's Hitachi is like.

I love watching and being watched, and I can trace that back to the fun of playing doctor as a kid, too. Mutual exhibitionistic masturbation is a great way of refreshing my lifelong marriage relationship, and can be a tender, hot way of revealing myself and learning about a brand-new lover. It makes me self-aware and daring. I like it best standing, legs braced apart, or lying face to face, legs interlaced.

I have a lover who lives ridiculously far away, and much of our sex is on the phone. That's triggered a lovely cycle of inventiveness and deliberate intensification. We have Henry Miller and Anais Nin comes, and on the best days, our orgasms are positively Tolstoyan, even biblical. Recently we've been making videos for each other, with our lover on the speaker phone, conducting. The loop upon loop upon loop of erotic feedback involved is beyond anything that I can safely describe in this merely "adult-rated" magazine. God preserve us, and may the FAA lower airfares.

Jack and Jill...

I am one of those people who loves getting caught with her hand in the cookie jar. My partner generally goes to sleep much earlier than I do so I am often left with an hour or two to amuse myself. Some nights when I'm feeling frisky I crawl into bed and begin to stroke myself. Light, little gentle touches usually get me excited quickly and, like most people, my breathing quickens and deepens as my excitement rises. My favourite experiences are when my breathing wakes my partner from his sleep and he joins in. He learnt early on in this game that I love mutual masturbation and would much rather that he pursue his own endeavors than join mine. The two of us will lie there in almost perfect silence. The only sounds being our quickened breathing and two sets of fingers performing their duty. Who climaxes first depends on how much time I was playing before I get caught and what kind of dream my partner was having when he was awakened. Usually I reach the finish line first and then devote my attention to encouraging my partner by means of a wayward whisper or a helping hand. On other nights he orgasms before I do and then lends a helping tongue to my expedition. That tongue almost always leads to a later night than intended and two very sleepy people the next morning.

Brush and floss and...

The house I lived in before had a water pik, and by and far that has been one of my favourite ways -- I was pretty clean!

If I am home by myself, I lay back on my bed and use my personal massager -- I like to use the different heads and different speeds, depending how much time I have on my hands (so to speak). If I'm just doing it because I need it, I don't really think of anything but if I am toying with myself, I like to think about my submissive man -- what we have done, or what I want to do with (to) him. The only time I masturbate with him is when I do it right after he comes in me and I use our combined wetness and my fingers.

I like him to masturbate for me and either talk him through it on the phone -- me at work, him at home -- or even better -- I love to watch him, or lie down with him and whisper naughty things in his ear the whole time.

And one to grow on...

I've always had a dream, just a fantasy that arrives unbidden in my mind. I dreamed it for years, often while touching myself, always when I wanted to come, and even often while making love to some very nice man in some very nice way. I once was not sure what it meant, or why it would always be the same dream over and over again, or how I could even imagine such things. I always dreamed it about a woman named Serena, who was me but not me. I wasn't sure why the man in the dream never had a specific face or identity, but rather was just a type, a powerful, controlling, dominant man. When I floated into this fantasy, I was both repulsed and attracted, but always soaking wet, and though the fantasy has many endings, it always starts out the same way...

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