Erin O'daniel is a gender expansive Queer Writing in Duluth (stolen Anishinaabe land), Minnesota

2017’s An Orgasm a Day

It’s the beginning of December and I’ve started to reflect on the year. These past eleven months have been so good to me. I can’t help but wonder if some of the goodness has come from committing to having an orgasm a day last New Years. 

Committing and having fun with such an endeavor seems to have been the perfect way to tailor my year. I opened myself up to pleasure in a new way and radiated satisfaction daily. I’ve drawn in new/old sexual partners, a professional promotion, an arts grant, a writing residency, this new blog, new friends, infinite amounts of fun and beauty in wildness plus become stronger as a creative queer feminist womxn.

When I jotted down the idea on January 1st , I had no idea what was waiting for me.

At first, most of the orgasms were had in the early morning with my vibrator o’choice. Fantasies abounded about folx of all genders, sizes, shapes, races. All identities joined me in bed and complimented whomever I chose to be that morning as well. My genderqueer self was safe to fly freer than free.

I have the original 11X14 piece of thin onion skin typing paper I wrote on with blue permanent marker. It still hangs in my studio of my third floor apartment.  I’ve wondered a few times what the dozen dog-sitters who’ve stayed in my place over the last year  thought. Were they like, “WTF!?”. Or after spotting the sign did they jump on board and  commit to something so adventurous, powerful, fun, simple?

Committing to cum everyday of the year was about choosing to re-create the amount of space and time pleasure takes up in my life. I’ve built an incredibly satisfying routine in my daily Duluth life. I’m efficient, creative, introverted + extroverted, outdoor-exercise focused, obsessed with the literary arts, and spiritually driven. All these things equal a full and delicious life in the wilds, with friends, at work, in my studio, at the library, and meditating. But hello… where was the making out? the moaning? the naked magic?

I recently read Ester Schere’s Book Mating in Captivity. It’s a brilliant take on partnering romance, the erotic, and domestic life. One of her strongest beliefs is that the “erotic isn’t efficient”. A light bulb went off for me when I read those words. My struggle, as a self- identified sex positive person living in Duluth, Minnesota, is the pervasive sex-is-invisible-not-okay-to-talk-about-enjoying culture of this place. Combined with my own dedication to a satisfying “schedule” packed with other kinds of pleasure, I’d become… estranged from the erotic. My decision to evoke more sensuality and incorporate daily orgasm at the beginning of the year came after I realized nothing resembling “making out” wasn’t on the list of marvelous things taking up space in my life. 

I’d also noticed a particular pattern. When I traveled, I was wide open to meeting someone and becoming sexual, intimate, romantic. There was something about letting go on the road that reconnected me without effort with the erotic. Part of my goal by orgasming once a day, was to open myself up to such goodness at home where the ordinary reigns supreme amongst a Scandinavian saturated culture that prides itself on efficiency, productivity and prudishness.

AhHHHHhhhhHHHHH! I’d become my Swedish grandmother. Actually, my Swedish roots are fiery and sensual to the max. While I don’t know much about my grandma’s sex life (a favorite family story I have heard 103 times goes… in the late 40’s she poked holes in her stash of condoms hoping for a third child with my grandpa who was satisfied with the two they already had), she was one of the most exuberant, sensual and alive people I’ve known in my forty years on the planet. She was awake to the pleasures of life and inspired me to be the same. So my most beloved personal experience with Swedes is a good one. However, after fifteen years in Duluth (ten of which I’ve worked in sexual health) that follow lives in a half dozen other places I’ve called home around the country, I can confidently say I’ve met more sex negative people here than anywhere else.

And it had affected how I was prioritizing pleasure in my life. Voila! I decided to orgasm once a day to evoke something different in my life, reconnect with my voracious sexual appetite. I brought this part of me to Duluth and have watched it wane. Now, though, I was back in the driver’s seat, having fun, and using minimal amounts more electricity every day. 

If measured by growth, expansion, joy, and increase in overall pleasure, I report 2017 to be a “successful” year. I sit here early in December and ask myself what I want to create space for in 2018. Yes, to continuing with the orgasms and wild amounts of erotic beauty unleashing itself in my life. I believe I’ll stay committed to an orgasm a day for multiple reasons (fun, health, manifesting genius the practice seems to be, etc.) and compliment it with this blog. While I’ve been writing entries for the last year, I recently hired a brilliant web designer (themildwild.com)  to help birth the project. And yeSSSSSSssssSSS!! here is SIMC live for your enjoyment. My end of year blessings are plenty. May this site create as much deliciousness in your life, as it has in mine.

Happy holidays! and I hope you have a fabulous pleasure-filled new year.

This is How Love Looks to Me

Queering My Community