Diary of a Likely Call Girl

In the UK, Belle de Jour’s book is “the Intimate Adventures of a London Call Girl.” In the US, Puritan-founded nation we, it’s “The Diary of an Unlikely Call Girl.” I read it, and found myself thinking, ok, active and varied sex life, time as an exotic dancer, broke and in the big city, this is ‘unlikely’ how?

I suppose for the average white-bread book shopper, being white, middle class, educated, not addicted to any drugs and not burned with a curling iron as a child qualifies as unlikely to enter a sex-based trade.

I’m white. Middle class. I have a BA and an MFA, one from an excellent school and one from a state school that was convenient and close. My parents live in a nice house, and I live in as nice a house as my parents (an amazing realization when it hit, btw). I don’t do any drugs – I’ve never done any drugs. I’ve never smoked a cigarette except for that two weeks in 9th grade when I really wanted Cindy to like me and even then I couldn’t figure out how to inhale. I don’t even drink (alcoholism on both sides of the family, plus I dislike the taste, plus I was so unpopular in high school that learning to choke down beer wasn’t going to help). My parents were not abusive, though they demanded high standards (“6A’s and a B? Why did you get a B?) and there was rather a lot of teenage rebellion on my part.

But…

Age 6? 7? 8? I surprised a man later arrested for pedophilia (Disney World babysitter, no less) by kissing back and asking for more kisses.

I actively – as actively as a thirteen-year-old can – let a friend of a family friend seduce me into a handjob with some mouth in the car on the way home from a canoeing trip.

When I did something to the car – can’t recall if it was a ticket or a mashed bumper – in 11th grade, possibly 10th, probably 10th, and my parents told me I couldn’t drive again until it was paid for, I called up an older friend (30’s at least, or prematurely all grey) and told him that I would have sex with him for $100. I remember coming out of the bathroom in his apartment having changed into a red silk shortie slip and high heels, nervous and shaking, I remember having missionary sex on the pallet bed in the corner of his unfurnished apartment, I remember another night he drove me 5 hours to my first rock concert, I was supposed to be spending the night at Becky’s and instead I slept the whole way back on the floor of the white van…



I started exotic dancing as a senior in high school. I was not popular. No-one openly admitted it if they thought I was pretty. I left school at 2:30 and worked the 3-10 shift (a shift I made up myself, always the creative worker) and danced in a teddy stolen from my mom’s drawer while guys told me how beautiful I was. One day my English teacher gave me a lift to work.

Dancing turned out to be a good way to make money between high school and college, and between college and more college. Long after I stopped, I still kept my thigh-high boots, combination lock and pasties in a box, only a few years ago admitting that I was now too old, it wasn’t a back-up job any more.

I read Mayflower Madam and was impressed by Sydney Biddle Barrows’ desire to run an escort agency as well as any business could be run. I read Belle de Jour and was not impressed by the lack of literary climax in her book, but noticed that she was certainly popular.

And I started thinking – could I make money as a dominatrix? Well, probably, I play that role well, but there’s not much market for it where I live, and it looks awfully complicated to set up a dungeon and build a clientele, let alone acquire all those props and costumes.

So this is what’s left.

I’ve been blessed with muscular intimate parts, a decent body and the ability to playact. I have a husband who pretty much loves me no matter what I do, though I’m sure not telling about this one, and a lover who knows all about it but also knows it doesn’t count, unlike the men I personally fuck to turn him on. I have a Safety Friend.

And right now I am fending off 30 private messages on one board and 10 on another, hearing that someone’s saying something bad about me in a secret area of a board (I can’t think why), and stressing about turnaround times on emails so I won’t give lousy customer service or alienate a potential client. I’ve always said, I’m never going to work less hard at anything I do, so I might as well work for myself. I can’t give less than a good job.

I think it’s going to kill me.