The very first monologue in The Vagina Monologues is “Hair.” It begins, You cannot love a vagina
unless you love hair. – This, is something of an outdated sentiment it seems
these days.

Why discuss this? Two reasons, firstly, reading some
articles yesterday on the effect of porn in our bedrooms, and secondly, because
I modeled nude yesterday.

The reality is that nowadays, having no hair down there is
very much a norm. Much of that is the proliferation of what it looks like in
porn, and long from men associating that look with an 11 year old girl, they
associate it with sexual maturity. From a woman’s point of view, this is often
not so. I’ve had a few conversations, and run the gamut myself from all kinds of
ladyscaping, including the nothing at all – for myself, not for my lovers,
though that plays in, of course. But for the majority, it’s like another
accessory we get to play with.

However, in art, in drawing and in painting, it’s a
different world. I’ve been in art classes where we’ve had live models, and
those with hair are much nicer to draw or paint. There’s a feeling of
femininity about the look, the fluff, and the mystery. It looks mature,
basically. There was the girl with nothing, clean as a baby’s bottom – but
really, is that the association you want to make when looking at a woman?

The associations have skewed and diverged somewhere along
the line. The artist yesterday made her own approving comments about the state
of my ladyscaping, and confirmed that many of the women she sees now don’t have
any hair, and it’s, again, nicer to draw this way. Let’s not say it’s the
Amazon. We have pride. But, I knew what my job was yesterday, so I “dressed”
accordingly.

To tangent from the above, yesterday, I did model nude. It was my first official drawing 3 hour
session. Recently, I’d modeled for a photographer friend of mine, but I was
very wary of that, considering the state of the interwebs, and the fact that
employers, my students’ parents, my students, all have access to it. But, I
trust this photographer a lot, and I knew his vision was not porn, but art, and
you wouldn’t really be seeing me, as much as shapes and crooks of arms and
legs, etc. That said, … nervous fun as it was, I don’t think photography is for
me. It’s just too close to life, and for whatever reason, for me, feels too
close to intrusive and the fuzzy edge of my own values about my body.

So, drawing. Much better. You get a real sense – she says
from her one day’s experience! – of what the artist wants – it becomes a
collaboration and a mutual exchange of artistry and creativity. I loved it. I
had a great time. It was physically
demanding, and I’m getting to learn my body and the limits of my body, but I
was also surprised at how well I could hold some of the poses.

And luckily, some were laying down. The artist is currently
working on a “death pose” series, so there were some gawky awkward, laying
down poses to do. We worked for 3 hours, we chatted, we listened to music, she
drew, I posed, it was lovely.

And at the end… she paid me. I got paid!! I wasn’t expecting
that at all, as I thought this was just a trial “let’s see if I have what it
takes” session, but she handed me a check at the end and was very pleased with
my work, and is going to forward my info to other artists, and she wants me back again in a month! How ‘bout them apples!

So, the female form, live, in the bedroom, in the studio –
stylized in the interwebs – who is to say what is beauty, what is reality? I
have nothing against porn – I’m known to visit on the occasion it strikes, but
ladyscaping is personal. And too, I do believe and hope it remains that
sex is personal – not virtual.