Lucinda Diva

Aussies rate their most trusted professions: Sex workers make the top 40!!

2011-06-22T02:53:00.000-07:00

I was very excited to see that we are moving up (albeit at a glacier-like speed) in the most-trusted-professions stakes! As a colleague noted, we have been bumped up above mechanics and taxi drivers this year. Given that it's from a poll of Digest readers that makes it even more extraodinary LOL. The link to the article is below, and here's the list reproduced. Very glad to see we are above pollies and am disappointed to see police come in 12th. Don't these Digest readers know any police? I'd have moved them well down the list if I'd had a vote... As for religious ministers WTF?
1. Paramedics
2. Firefighters
3. Pilots
4. Rescue volunteers
5. Nurses
6. Pharmacists
7. Farmers
8. Medical specialists
9. GPs
10. Veterinarians
11. Armed forces
12. Police
13. Childcare workers
14. Teachers
15. Scientists
16. Dentists
17. Bus/train/tram drivers
18. Hairdressers
19. Psychologists/counsellors
20. Chefs
21. Judges
22. Accountants
23. Cleaners
24. Plumbers
25. Waiters
26. Weather forecasters
27. Mechanics
28. Builders and labourers
29. Shop assistants
30. Religious ministers
31. Charity collectors
32. Financial planners
33. Lawyers
34. Bankers
35. Council workers
36. Tow truck drivers
37. CEOs
38. Celebrities
39. Sex workers
40. Journalists
41. Taxi drivers
42. Real estate agents
43. Car salesmen
44. Politicians
45. Tele-marketers

Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/national/australias-most-trusted-sex-workers-trump-pollies-in-public-confidence-stakes-20110622-1ge82.html#ixzz1PzrqyQwbhttp://www.theage.com.au/national/australias-most-trusted-sex-workers-trump-pollies-in-public-confidence-stakes-20110622-1ge82.html

You can have an epiphany in the strangest of situations...

2011-04-24T16:10:00.000-07:00

One day I had an epiphany. I was standing over a client who had a shoe fetish. I felt very powerful. And beautiful. I was in my designer knickers, push-up bra and six inch CFMs. My foot was on his chest. I glanced at the mirror. Hmm… Barbarella-Barbie-Meets-The-1930s-Rhino-Hunter. Pretty cool, even if I say so myself.

The client wanted a dominant fantasy. He was cute and clean-cut in a Country Road, late 30s ex-surfy kind of way. He fantasised about being ‘executed’ by ladies in very high CFMs. He wanted me to beat him and then ‘execute’ him. It was a bit of a dilemma as I was working from a hotel room and was a bit worried about the noise. Also I didn’t have any B & D experience at all, and no gear either.

So I shut him inside the wardrobe – naked – and marched around the bathroom in my heels for about five minutes. I had to force myself not to laugh when I caught sight of myself in the mirror. I let my footsteps get slower and slower as if I were walking closer and closer to him. Then I flung open the wardrobe door and dragged him out. He looked absolutely terrified; he was in a foetal position with his hands crossed in front of his dick.

‘Please don’t hurt me. Don’t hurt me,’ he whimpered.

I had NO IDEA what I was doing, So I pushed him onto the ground and kicked him for not calling me ‘Mistress’.

‘Yes, Mistress. Yes, Mistress.’

I kicked him again for speaking without permission. I can tell you, there is nothing like kicking a man when he’s down.

He begged me not to hurt him anymore, so I didn’t. (Mainly because it was too much like hard work). I made him do it to himself. I shouted, ‘Drag that butt up and down the carpet until I can see some carpet-burn.’ Actually, when I think about it in hindsight, it was a lot of carpet-burn.

Then he started saying, ‘Yes, beautiful assassin. Yes, beautiful assassin. No, beautiful assassin.’ I struggled to keep a straight face.

I told him that as punishment for annoying me, he had to go back in the wardrobe for a while. Then I sat down for a little rest. Okay, it was more of a medium-sized rest.

I dragged him out of the cupboard again and pushed him onto the ground. Then I straddled him and slapped him around with the travel iron that reception had thoughtfully provided.

Although I’m not a B & D kinda gal, my experience with this man also helped change the way I felt about myself. I realised that I could enjoy the power I had over men. It was no longer just about the money, the dressing up and the escape into another role.

I learned that there’s nothing like the power of the pussy.

* Disclaimer: I don't pretend to know anything about B & D and yes, it can be dangerous if you don't know what you're doing. If you're thinking about trying it, go to a professional!

Reality and hypocrisy

2011-04-13T23:55:00.000-07:00

Getting back into welfare and the real world was the answer for me. It made it easier to handle all the hootenanny that goes with the sex industry. I was more than aware that the industry is just a fantasy world where people play roles. But it is still easy to get sucked into it. Once I went back to day work I reminded myself of this, and then it was easier to maintain separate identities. Over the next few years my friends divided into two groups: those who knew I worked and those who didn’t. I stopped seeing people who didn’t know that I worked and rarely saw those who did know but failed to support me.

I was happy with my ‘double life’. I am what I am. And Scarlett is a part of who I am. The friends who disapproved of my choice of work were hypocritical in my view. They had cared for me before, and I was still the same person. It was their perception that had changed, not me.

The ironic thing was that when I started hooking, a lot of my friends went out every weekend, met guys and bonked them. I found it difficult to understand why they gave it away for free to dickheads who used them and then put them down behind their backs. Worse, a couple of my friends-in-the-know expected me to listen to them bang on about their demeaning situations and then changed the subject if I wanted to talk about hooking. They would say – get this – they didn’t want to discuss it because it was too “degrading”!

I didn’t find hooking in the slightest bit degrading. In fact, my self-esteem skyrocketed. Generally speaking, guys aren’t nearly as fussy about women as we think they are. Those few that are tend to be unhappy and unsuccessful in their private lives, which is not surprising. I found sex work to be skilled, complex, financially, and even personally, rewarding – if the client was exceptionally nice, good looking or fun in the sack.

Hooking was a revelation. I discovered many things about myself, about men, and about making money too.

I consider myself to be cute. My mother on the other hand was a stunning woman even into her early 60s. She looked very much like the singer Wendy Matthews – all cheek bones and long, long wavy hair. She was also sexually competitive and used her sexuality to get what she wanted in life. When I was young, she used to tell me that I’d never be pretty and that I would always be fat (I was a size ten mind you). She suggested I develop ‘presence’ to compensate for my plainness.

Sometimes I wonder if I subconsciously decided to become a hooker to prove that I was just as good, if not better, than my mother. Knowing that men would pay for my looks, my company and my body did make me feel smug, even though I kept the feeling secret.

I wanna be 'straight'...

2011-04-02T17:33:00.000-07:00

After a few months I decided to leave Scarlet’s and join an escort agency. I didn’t like hanging around upstairs; I never knew who was going to come up. And that was a worry because I had started looking for day work.

I rang an agency listed in the paper. They told me they were legal even though they weren’t. When I found out its real status, I confronted the receptionist. She told not to worry, “Agencies in Queensland never get busted” she said. It’s true; they didn’t, and they still don’t.

The agency set-up was pretty easy. I nominated the times I was available (if I wanted good shifts like Friday and Saturday nights they’d make me do a crap shift like Tuesday night as well), then they paged me with details of each booking. I rang them on the client’s landline once I arrived, and they would ring me back at the end of the booking to check I was okay, and to see if the client wanted to extend.

I kept up my contacts at Hollywood’s and World By Night. After a while I started moonlighting at the agency set up by the two guys from the south side who had approached me at Hollywood’s. They were really great – they often drove us to bookings themselves if the client hadn’t used them before. And they gave me the hours I wanted because they didn’t have a lot of girls. I worked with them for about six months until my list of regulars from the other agency got too big to manage.

By this stage I had returned to part-time welfare work during the day. I was working with families of people with disabilities. I wanted to avoid jobs where I might end up face-to-face with working girls I knew.

Once I settled into my new, albeit compartmentalised, routine I felt that I had the upper hand in my dealings with men and the world. I cruised along in part-time-sex-worker-land for another seven years. I took breaks now and again from the agencies. And they took me back because they knew I wasn’t nicking their clients or ripping them off.

I also started escorting down at the Tweed on weekends, which was a lot of fun. I’d drive down on Friday afternoons and work through until Sunday afternoons. I got a weekend sitter. She was a uni student who still lived at home, so she and her boyfriend played happy families with Tuxxy. They looked after Tuxxy too well. He became very full-figured that year. In an effort to reduce his resemblance to a beached orca I bought him a really cool leopard skin collar and harness so I could take him for walks. Then I found a padded leopard skin cat coat as well. But Tuxxy would not cooperate. He lay down on his tummy and tucked all his feet in like a fat leopard-skinned turtle and refused to move. I dragged him around outside a few times, but it was no use. The only thing I got out of it was a set of cute photographs. I went back to portion control and left Tuxxy’s meals in Tupperware containers with strict instructions.

When mobile phones became readily available I left the agencies. I took out an ad under a new name for night time appointments and went out on my own. Easy peasy. About a year later, Vanessa and Sabine moved to Sydney. Things got a lot harder for a while post-Fitzgerald, and quite a few ladies left town. They asked me if I’d go with them, but I didn’t want the industry to take over my life.

I cruised along, managing both my lives with minimal impact. Initially however, I encountered some minor problems that I hadn’t anticipated. When I first started working, I kept my secrets to myself. But after a while I found it more stressful than actually working. I found myself lying, directly or by omission, to people I cared about. One day it all got a bit too confronting. I missed two calls; one at 12.25 and one at 12.47 while my mother was visiting. She asked me why I hadn’t answered the phone and I mumbled some excuse about not seeing her often enough and not wanting our time together to be interrupted. I couldn’t very well say, “Sorry Mum, but I have to go and fuck someone for money. You understand, don’t you?”

A respectable face in the world: The two faces of Lucinda

2011-03-29T19:51:00.000-07:00

I figured that if I went back to a respectable day job and maintained that face in the world, I could hook part-time and put the money towards getting real control of my life. Hooking was ideal; I could work minimum hours for maximum dollars, and it wouldn’t interfere with my ‘normal’ life.

My friend Imogen had similar ideas. She left the club shortly before me and within weeks was working with an escort agency. She’s one of the sanest people I know. She’s a very intelligent woman with a post-grad degree. She escorted part-time and made shitloads of money. She bought her first apartment in a funky, inner city suburb when she was in her early twenties and a successful small business within a year after that. Imogen left the industry as soon as she achieved her goals. Like Imogen, I decided to make my own luck. From then on, I didn’t look back.

I had a job topless waitressing a couple of nights a week at a strip club called World By Night by then. It gave my body a chance to rest from the gruelling workouts I endured at the club. World By Night was a well-known strip club with an illegal brothel upstairs called ‘Scarlet’s’. One night a couple of ladies didn’t show up and they asked me if I wanted to work ‘upstairs’. I spent about a minute thinking about it before agreeing. I’d seen how much money the girls made.

The first time wasn’t so bad. I’ve known ladies who were terrified, desperate, or even turned on, by their first experience. I just felt relieved that it went smoothly. The client was in his late twenties and not bad looking. He’d had a few drinks but was easy enough to handle, especially compared with the drunken yobs I came across in the clubs. Once I’d figured out he was harmless, I kind of left my corporeal self. I simply zoned out into my own headspace until it was over. I found it quite easy to focus on a single client, and it was gratifying to be paid for it. Dancing is quite different – you have to suck up to guys for inordinately long periods of time and pretend to like them and be having a great time so that they tip or book you for private dances. Hooking is much easier: the guy pays, you have sex with him, and then he goes. No one else gets a free look in, and you don’t waste time schmoozing up to guys who just want your time for free.

It was easy to pull the guys, especially once they got pissed. They had to go past us to get to the toilet, so we picked them off as they approached. Once again, I learned the ropes pretty fast. While we used condoms for penetrative sex, we didn’t use them for oral. So I refused to provide oral. It did cost me some clients, but not many. Some men told me that giving oral sex was very important to them and they loved it. I love it too, but not from a stranger. You didn’t know where their mouths had been, and if their breath was anything to go by, you didn’t want to know. You have to draw the line somewhere.

Successful long-term hooking involves careful management of boundaries. We don’t get as much enjoyment out of the experience as some clients like to believe. Most of them thought it important that I orgasmed too, so they spent time making sure I got off (or pretended to get off) before they did.

Dancing or sex work?

2011-03-24T23:55:00.000-07:00

When I was the real me, I occasionally worried about the longer-term consequences of what I was doing. But when I was Scarlett, I was carefree. I focused on becoming her and enjoyed the respite from my responsibilities. I felt like I was on holidays most of the time. It was great. I knew I would only be able to play the young-and-foolish card for a short time, so I decided to make the most of it. At this stage I had absolutely no idea that the industry would become such an important part of my life.

My fitness levels increased from all the dancing and massage, and I developed some killer calf muscles from prancing about in my CFMs. But it was very hard and tiring work.

We got less than half the takings and in between bookings we had to stand around in high heels and talk to potential customers. Some of them had no intention of putting their hands into their pockets, but every intention of putting them in ours if they could. We had to look immaculate. And we only got paid if we were picked. We were like the Barbie dolls I once wanted to be, only about five times more expensive than the inanimate varieties.

After a few months, the work conditions frustrated me, so I left to work in another club that provided contact lap dancing, although it wasn’t called that in those days. This club was less restrictive, but it had its own hazards.

At the new club, I learned even more about clients. The first lesson was to never turn your back on a man during private dances. Clients lost their inhibitions at the drop of a hat. If you did turn around they just dropped their dicks out. They’ve got no shame at all. I can’t tell you how many times I saw a client cum in his pants and leave the club with a conspicuous stain on the front of his trousers. We should have offered a dry-cleaning service as well — we would have made a fortune.

Some of the strippers, working ladies and dancers used to meet up late at night at Hollywood’s, a bar in Elizabeth Street. It was the only place open after three o’clock in the morning. Vanessa and I hung out there a lot. It was an illegal dump run by a couple of Brisbane’s pre-Fitzgerald vice kings who got to know us well. (This was a bonus for Vanessa because she had developed an aversion to entry stamps after reading The Diary of Anne Frank. She developed the notion that she must have been Jewish in a previous life, so she couldn’t stand to be branded).

I met two guys there who were interested in setting up a small escort operation on Brisbane’s Southside. They cleared their plans with vice king Hector Hapeta, who had a big slice of the industry, and had an agreement as to the areas they could work. They were both black-belts-plus in Zen Do Kai karate and took the safety of the girls seriously. They asked if I’d be interested in working for them. I was tempted, I must admit. I was starting to realise that dancing and hooking had a lot in common.

Some girls don’t feel the same way. They feel unable to cross that boundary, and what’s more, they enjoy dancing because they see themselves as performers. A friend of mine, Emma, told me once, ‘When you’re stripping, every angle of your body is on display to someone, so it has to be in tip-top condition’. Her body was in incredible shape. ‘But taking that final step is something I just wouldn’t do’, she said. ‘Selling my body is just too personal.’

I could see her point of view, but I found the male pack mentality of the club more than degrading. It was the main reason I left dancing and took up hooking. Dealing with clients one-on-one is much easier than dealing with hoards of drooling men. You’re the one in control. And even if it is not a conscious thing, the client very quickly learns the rules.
It seemed like a natural progression to move into escorting after a few months of experiencing the club scene. So I decided to graduate to fully-fledged hooker status, but one with a difference.

More on my working history

2011-03-23T00:33:00.000-07:00

The club offered clients nude dances up against a one-way mirror, and ‘extras’ at our discretion were actively encouraged. We’d go into a separate room and dance against the one-way mirror. The client remained in the cubicle on the other side. The client’s room was pretty basic, so it was easy to clean up. Now that was a horrible thing, especially when they came onto the mirror. I’ve never looked at Mr Sheen the same way since. It was beyond me why they didn’t wipe it off themselves. You’d think they’d be embarrassed to leave it up there but they weren’t.

They had no idea that we could see them, but we could. When their profiles overlapped with ours on the mirror we could see a lot. Too much actually. It was quite revolting seeing their dribbling mouths open and tongues hanging out as they wanked themselves off. I’d be moving around, rubbing myself up and down the glass, and they would do it too. They’d follow me as I moved, like a kitten in a pet shop window – but a lot less farking cute. As I got used to the work, I found one of the hardest things about the job was trying not to laugh as I wiggled about in nothing but my CFMs.

The first night passed in a blur. I tried to pace myself and limit the number of alcoholic drinks I accepted. I had enough trouble walking around in my shoes as it was. At the end of the night, Tony told me he’d had good feedback from clients. He rolled his eyes and said he was relieved I’d gotten some nice lingerie. (When I got to know him better he told me that he had never met a girl before who wore undies as nasty as the ones I’d worn for the interview).

At three am I stepped out of the club and back into the real world. My senses were heightened. The air felt cold and smelled clean after the warm smoky fug of the club. I’ll never forget how elated I was; I felt so free, like I had been re-born. I felt that my life was full of infinite possibilities and limited only by my courage and determination.

I hailed a cab. The driver made a big deal of sizing me up. I just didn’t care. It was hard to believe that less than 24 hours ago I’d run into Vanessa and gotten her help. I came out of my reverie close to home and got the driver to drop me off around the corner so he didn’t find out where I lived. I made a mental note of the cab number just in case.

I’d made over $300 dollars that night, which was the equivalent of a week’s wages for a check out operator or bar attendant in those days.

My cat Tuxxy was frantic when I opened the door, because he’d been alone all night. He wouldn’t leave me alone. “Now you know how I feel, when you’re out all night you dirty stop out,” I muttered. I checked his water then crashed on the bed, fully dressed. He lay next to me, purring maniacally. Occasionally, he leaned over and bumped his nose against mine. We slept together until lunchtime. It was the first proper sleep I’d had for days.

When I woke up, my body ached all over and I was dehydrated from the work and a mild hangover. I still had the Valium, because I was too scared to lose control in a place like the club. I took a long bath and scrubbed all the makeup off my face before taking a long look at myself in the mirror. I felt a bit disassociated from myself in some ways but looked just the same on the outside.

I settled into the club pretty quickly. After three months I was an old timer; the place had an astonishingly high turnover. I soon found out why: lots of the girls provided full service on the side. Tony used to send his friends in undercover to ‘test’ the girls, so there would be big staff sweep outs every couple of months. Someone told me he wasn’t concerned about the sex; he was pissed off that he didn’t get a cut.

Vanessa and I became good friends over the next few months. We got together for breakfast a couple of times a week and often went shopping for work gear. She enjoyed introducing me to her world and actively sought my approval. When I got to know her better, she told me that she had always felt that I didn’t like her. I had to admit that her life was quite different from how I had imagined it. And the work was more empowering than I could ever have guessed. She started pestering me to give up dancing and start ‘working’. She nagged me endlessly to try the escort agency she worked for. But I resisted.

I didn’t want to break that final taboo. I was afraid of losing myself in the maelstrom that was the heady age of the early 1980s before the Fitzgerald Inquiry. Drugs were openly bought, sold, and consumed at that time. Organised prostitution was rife. Everyone except the police and politicians knew where the illegal brothels and casinos were. I kept my mouth shut and my head down. The police socialised with ladies like me at clubs. They would tip us off about places that were about to be raided. We’d be arrested and give false names. The owners would simply fork out the fines and that was that. We didn;t even have to appear. There were hardly any problems because everyone knew the rules, and for the most part they stuck to them.

My life became unconventional, and exciting. Glamorous even. I was working all night and dressing in a more conspicuous way. And yet I felt strangely invisible. People looked at me with a mixture of curiosity and contempt if I went out for breakfast in last night’s clothes. But they didn’t see me. I was relieved, relieved to be making money and relieved to be overlooked. There was me and there was my alter ego, Scarlett.

Ode to a working girl

2011-03-09T01:35:00.000-08:00

Resting, head cupped in hands, I’m watching dust motes rise in a sliver of sun when he suddenly asks me to leave.

Isn’t that what they say? That clients don’t pay us for sex but to go away?

And after I did the big nasty on the floor with that little hairy dog watching, all reproachful harp seal eyes and endless scratching.

Momentarily startled into action, I step out into the inner-city urban wasteland in my short cotton dress and knee-high boots.

Aching and tired, I feel good nonetheless, with the satisfaction that a good night’s work-and momentary revival brought on by the early-morning chill-bring.

My favorite client rings to ask where I am, so I tell him I’m hawking my wares on the street in platform shoes and hot-pants,
He tells me to ‘stay put’.

Smiling and stretching in the cool air, up and up towards the warming sun, anticipating breakfast, I suddenly realise that I’m not wearing sunscreen.

And you thought I was going to say underwear, didn’t you?

This old slapper is nude modelling... Who would have thought?

2011-03-09T01:15:00.000-08:00

I’ve just started nude modelling! Before you get too excited, it’s not that kind of modelling. I’m doing some gigs as an artists’ model. And I’m loving it.

I wondered how I’d feel about taking my clothes off for a living after such a long hiatus because I’m carrying quite a lot more weight now than when I was working. But yes, truth be told, I get a big kick out of seeing myself stretched across an artist’s page in all my gorgeous nakedness. I’ve also gotten to see my vagina from a few new angles…

It’s interesting how people view you. And how different their views are when compared with one’s own skewed reality. I’ve got a new appreciation of the beauty of a woman’s body, warts and all (not literally people!). And I love the way they see me.

Being an artists’ model and being a sex worker are similar in some ways. Both require patience, tact and the ability to zone out while looking like you’re paying close attention. Both require you to be bendy and stretchy. And both are self-confidence building. After all, who doesn’t love being the centre of attention?

I’m modelling for two classes. One’s a private class of half a dozen middle-aged men and women who live in the same suburb and whose children go to the same school. The other is at an art college and consists of about 20 students, most of who have never done figure drawing and are in their first year of study.

The smaller, older class participants chat and have great taste in music (and wine!). At my first gig with them I was plied with copious amounts of alcohol. (Is chardonnay still considered tacky by the way? I confess to being stuck in the eighties in more ways than one). And they listen to The Stranglers. How cool is that?

The downside is that they talk a lot about their kids. I’m not that fond of ankle-biters I must say. And they talk about greebly stuff like the nit plague at the school! Do you have any idea how hard it is to recline gracefully and remain completely still for up to 40 minutes while people are talking about nits? It tests my patience more than the most demanding or needy clients ever did...

I’ve just come back from my second class with the art college students. It’s a bit unnerving because, unlike the other class of nit-natterers, no one talks. At all. I get up there and waive my arms around, trying to bend into awkward poses ‘in the round’. Because it’s a big class, I’ve got students watching me from every angle. And I do mean every angle.

I’m on a big dais, which just kills my knees by the way each time I have to clamber on and off it. It’s not easy being graceful wearing your nude suit and climbing over stuff at the same time.

Next week we are doing ‘action’ poses. This sounds a lot like hard work. And I thought I had signed up for the lounging-around-naked-on-lots-of-soft-comfy-cushions-and-fake-furs-for-hours-at-a-time class!
And that having a pretty face and big boobs was all that was required. Ouch! Try stamina. Now, where can I get me some of that?

PS I did learn a really cool trick; when you’ve got a long pose to do, always do it lying on your back with your face under the light. It gives you an excuse to zone out with your eyes shut…

Stay tuned for more tips and tricks on how to be the perfect artist’s model…

For Jeffrey

2010-10-10T02:56:00.000-07:00

An old and dear friend of mine from my straight life passed away a couple of weeks ago. He was very ill with cancer, and when the doctors found it had returned it was shocking news given that he had been given the 'all clear' just two weeks earlier. The worst part was that his lung collapsed two days later and he went back into hospital and never came out, passing away just 17 days later.

He was a lovely man, passionate about life, music, poetry and learning and strongly committed to social justice. In the last few years of his life he was with a very special woman who, along with his daughter, really changed his life.

This is the poem that was used in his funeral service. Jeffrey was a man who always fought against injustice and spoke his mind, no matter what the consquences:

In Memory of W. B. Yeats

by W. H. Auden

He disappeared in the dead of winter:
The brooks were frozen, the airports almost deserted,
And snow disfigured the public statues;
The mercury sank in the mouth of the dying day.
What instruments we have agree
The day of his death was a dark cold day.

Far from his illness
The wolves ran on through the evergreen forests,
The peasant river was untempted by the fashionable quays;
By mourning tongues
The death of the poet was kept from his poems.

But for him it was his last afternoon as himself,
An afternoon of nurses and rumours;
The provinces of his body revolted,
The squares of his mind were empty,
Silence invaded the suburbs,
The current of his feeling failed; he became his admirers.

Now he is scattered among a hundred cities
And wholly given over to unfamiliar affections,
To find his happiness in another kind of wood
And be punished under a foreign code of conscience.
The words of a dead man
Are modified in the guts of the living.

But in the importance and noise of to-morrow
When the brokers are roaring like beasts on the floor of the Bourse,
And the poor have the sufferings to which they are fairly accustomed,
And each in the cell of himself is almost convinced of his freedom,
A few thousand will think of this day
As one thinks of a day when one did something slightly unusual.
What instruments we have agree
The day of his death was a dark cold day.

Rabbit caught in the headlights

2010-10-10T02:24:00.000-07:00

I was way too wired to sleep when I got home. I couldn’t eat a thing either, I was so nervous. I was elated about getting the work, but had no idea what I had let myself in for. I spent the whole day reminding myself I could always back out.

By 7.15 pm I was on a bus on the way to the pub to meet Vanessa. Although I was wearing jeans, a T-shirt and sneakers, I felt strangely conspicuous.

Vanessa and Sabine had already had quite a few already by the look of them. They waved me over cheerfully. Their casual attitude made me feel a little reassured. Sabine ploughed me full of advice and gave me some Sorbolene 'for the massages' along with a plastic bag full of lingerie. Vanessa gave me some Valium, but warned me not to drink if I was going to take it.

The time ticked by so fast. I hung around until I couldn’t avoid it any longer. I dropped a couple more tequila slammers before I left. Okay, it was the eighties. Vanessa squeezed my arm. 'We’re with you babe, the girls will look after you,' she smiled encouragingly. I nodded to both of them, not trusting myself to speak.

Feeling overwrought, I walked down the road towards the club. My stomach was churning and my body shook. I felt nauseous. The guy on the door recognised me and grinned cheerfully. He told me his name was Vince. I told him I was Scarlett. He waved me through.

I walked around the bar, not sure where to go. There were quite a few guys drinking already, and they looked at me curiously. At that point I nearly backed out. They could see me. The real me without my gear; it felt terrible. I stood like a rabbit caught in the headlights until the woman behind the bar came up to me. 'You new?' I nodded dumbly. She introduced herself as Lee and led me out the back.

I found a space and started unpacking my gear. Lee introduced me to the other girls. It was so hot. The room was airless and stank of cigarette smoke. She turned to this stunning woman, Crystal, and asked her to look out for me. Crystal asked if I had 'worked' before. She took me through the ropes. 'Don’t worry,' she said, going through my gear. 'You've got some nice stuff. Once you’re done up you’ll feel different. The guys won’t recognise you.' It was true. Once I was kitted out I felt strangely invisible and like someone else entirely. I had become Scarlett.

'Ready?'

I nodded. She tightened up my bra straps, pulled my boobs up and almost out of my bra and pushed my head down to "foof" up my hair. Putting on a practised smile, she said, 'Let’s go get ’em!'

She took my hand and pulled me down the hallway. We stepped out from behind the bar. It was quite dark, and to my shock I realised that the place had filled up a lot. 'Smile,' said Crystal as she pushed me forward into a sea of faces and loud music.

A very tall man in a suit approached me. He touched my arm. 'Hello love, can I get you a drink?' I was away.

Back on planet earth

2010-08-11T22:43:00.000-07:00

Hi everyone,

I've been just so, so busy over the past couple of months and then I got sick: hideously, mind-numbingly ill, which was followed by three weeks of pneumonia.

I'm still hacking up chunky green stuff and barking like a seal but I'm no longer infectious: thank you higher power.

Some of my friends made up a roster to come over and do washing, walk my animals, bring me dinner, etc. Dunno how I would have managed without you, so thank you; you know who you are and you're going to be remembered in my will.

I've recovered enough to THINK ABOUT taking an interest in things again and am currently in some kind of nesting phase where I am enjoying being at home and doing sweet FA.

Reality is about to start nipping at my heels and I'm making false promises to God that I will get back into a routine by Monday. In the meantime, I'm enjoying a time-out and will think of some interesting things to write in the next day or so. My synapses haven't had much of a workout lately and my brain feels like it's about ready to fire up.

I'm listening to Madelaine Peyroux a lot at the moment; romantic old-world kinda stuff, and other than drinking rose-hip tea *sulk* that's been about it.

Hope everyone else is getting through the flu season okay. Is it my imagination or do we seem to get sicker each year? I blame the hormones in non free-range chicken and lot-fed beef...

Luci xx

The talking dick

2010-03-18T01:17:00.000-07:00

I was at work today in my straight life and we had a teambuilding thingo. All good fun. I work for a great organisation that reflects the best in community orgs when they work well: a work environment that is challenging and funny, with flexible work conditions and quirky people.

We all had lots to say and had to resort to using a talking stick. I dunno if you've used these before but they are surprisingly effective. Everyone who wants to speak has to wait until the stick is passed to them. It stops interruptions, controls group dynamics, etc.

I had a bit of trouble not laughing though. It reminded me of a meeting I had with Miss Nikki VIP and a couple of friends only a week ago. I'm involved in this very cool new organisation called Respect Inc., the new sex worker organisation in Queensland. We were talking through some sex worker issues and having trouble controlling the conversation, so we unwrapped the new vibrator Candi had bought for taking sex work instruction photos and used it: our very own talking dick. Complete with veins and looking real enough to give me nightmares about holding it, it certainly dried up my conversation quick smart. I've seen some funny things used as gavels to control rowdy meetings but I'm not sure how I'd cope with someone hitting the table with a silicone penis to restore order...

Is sex work inherently dangerous?

2010-03-10T15:35:00.000-08:00

I was just reading my newsletter from the good folk at the Prostitution Licensing Authority and thought, wait a minute!!

In their lead article, they say that the nature of sex work means that we are prone to suffer violence. I just can't agree with that. I think that certain kinds of sex work may carry more risk than others under certain circumstances, but it's really the laws that make it risky, not the nature of the work itself.

In Queensland, it's unlawful to work with another worker or to have a receptionist or 'maid' unless you are a registered and licensed brothel. It's conditions like these and the criminalisation of street-based workers that puts workers at risk, because criminalisation drives people underground, makes it harder for them to claim their rights and when people know you are alone or are unlikely to press charges, they take advantage of that.

Such statements aren't just wrong, and I acccept that the PLA has to tread a fine line given the ignorance and bigotry - not to mention hypocrisy - of our political leadership (a term that I use in its loosest sense), but I'd rather they just left that out than spread misinformation.

What do you think?

The interview

2010-03-05T22:09:00.000-08:00

He smiled and invited me inside. Two rough-looking security guys eyed me up and down. With their matching moustaches and tattoos, which I later found out were common among practitioners of Zen Do Kai karate, they were a bit intimidating.

They were drinking spirits and openly snorting lines of coke off a bench in the kitchen. They smiled as I walked past feigning nonchalance. One of them was cooking eggs and the whole scene was kind of surreal. The place smelled of stale cigarette smoke, spilled drinks and something rancid that I didn’t try to identify: I made a mental note to bring my own food if I got the job.

We went down to his office, which was under the stairs and very squashy. There was only room for one chair and he sat in it behind his desk. I stood in front of him feeling very self-conscious. I fidgeted, not quite sure what to expect. He asked me to turn around slowly a couple of times. Then he asked me to take off my top and skirt and twirl around. As I did it, my heel got caught up in the hem of my skirt and I almost fell over. I couldn’t look at him and stared around the walls of the office. He told me I had a nice body, and asked if I thought I’d be up to the work. I straightened up and looked him in the eye, oblivious now to the fact that I was half naked and said, ‘Yes. Definitely’.

Then he noticed the gold cross I had worn ever since my Confirmation. It sat right between my breasts. He laughed. He told me to keep it on; the customers would like the quirky touch. Well he didn’t say ‘quirky’, he said ‘weird-arse’, but I got the drift.

I left feeling immensely excited but nervous. He told me to get some nice underwear and that I would ‘pick it up easily’. I was to start work at ten o’clock that night. As I left, I realised that none of them had told me their names.

I stepped out into the brightly lit, stinking hot afternoon to find a taxi. The sky was that really bright, white light that meant a late storm was coming. Luckily I didn’t have to wait long for a taxi, one pulled up right away and I didn’t have to walk in those shoes. Being a Doc Martens kind of girl, I was having a lot of trouble standing up in them, let alone walking in them. I felt even more manky with this taxi driver, who asked me if I ‘worked there’, ‘when’ I worked, ‘what went on in there’ types of questions. I just stared out of the window. He was so creepy that I told him my address was a street away from where I lived so that he wouldn’t know where I lived. As I got out of the taxi I suddenly realised that I had to walk in those heels to my house. Worse, I had to walk in that outfit. I kept my head down and prayed that none of my neighbours were home.

I was way too wired to sleep when I got home. I rang Vanessa to tell her that I got the job and to arrange to meet her before work so that she could lend me some gear and go over the routine with me. She was cross with me for waking her up. It didn’t even occur to me that she would be sleeping. She told me that afternoon naps were essential and that she had to get off the phone. She complained that she would have to get up now to get a drink in order to go back to sleep. She told me not to eat anything so that my stomach would look flat before banging the phone down in my ear.

My first foray

2010-02-25T00:11:00.000-08:00

Apart from my dressing up and Barbie obsessions, my other main influence was, I’m ashamed to say, my middle-class Catholic upbringing. I did what middle-class Catholic kids do: I went to uni and studied socially worthy and patronising subjects and ended up working in welfare. I worked for a community-based organisation and really loved it. It was crappy pay for the hours and insecure too: We were governed by a curious mixture of government bureaucracy and a chaotically divided and inept management committee that barely kept the wolves from the door. But I felt like I was making a difference in my little corner of the universe, right up to the point that I got fired…

Our program funding was not renewed. Being young and optimistic, I thought I’d get another job right away. But it was the 80s and not only was welfare not in vogue, Gordon Gecko was the pin-up boy of stockbrokers and the ‘greed-is-good’ brigade. I spent a month looking for work and eked out my income working some casual shifts waiting on tables at the local shops in New Farm.

My break came when my sister introduced me to a friend of hers, *Vanessa*, a peep show dancer-cum-masseuse with a great line in hairy jackets, my favourite one being a white fake fur. It was resplendent with red fluffy hearts and she wore it with panache. With her matching ugg-boots, she was easily recognisable and a well-known figure. After I got over the shock of meeting her, we discovered that we had something in common other than my sister: her mum was a former client of mine from the community organisation I had recently gotten the arse from.

Vanessa enjoyed the freedom and lifestyle that her work brought her. She told me that if I wanted to give it a go that she could ‘do something’ with my appearance and that I could easily get work. I was excited by the possibilities. I suppose what I really mean is that I was excited about the money. But I was scared and hung out another five weeks until all my money was gone.

I hated the idea of going on social security; I’d had enough dealings with the SS to know they could be fucky if they wanted to be. But in reality, and I didn’t realise it at the time, I thought I was too good to go on welfare. Even then, the stigma of the sex industry seemed more appealing than the stigma of being on welfare.

I gradually let Vanessa talk me into it because it was just too hard to admit at the time that it was ultimately my choice. Well it was either that or sell my cat, Tuxedo, for medical experiments. So one day I went back to her place and we spent hours sweating through endless bizarre outfits, hairpieces and six-inch ‘cum-fuck-me’ (CFM) heels, while she flirted on the phone with various minders to get me an interview with her boss, Allan.

Once we had decided on an outfit she made me sit on her bed while she made up my face. I remember that her room was very hot. We went out onto her balcony, but the air outside was completely still. It was one of those stifling Brisbane summer days when everyone looks at the sky and prays for rain in the evening to cool things down.

When Vanessa finally finished with my face and hair, I took my first real look at myself in the full-length mirror. It’s only now when describing it that I realise that at the time I felt too ashamed to really look at myself. I literally didn’t recognise myself. I looked like the brunette from Bananarama. Knowing that I didn’t look like me made me feel strangely safe, like I was in disguise.

Vanessa called me a taxi and I tottered out on her CFMs. I was wearing her leather mini-skirt and a gold halterneck top. Vanessa had trowelled tons of slap onto my face. You can only get away with it when you are really young *sigh*.

The cab driver gave me a knowing look and smirked. My confidence deserted me and I felt overwhelmingly exposed and panicky. My halter neck was too revealing to wear with a bra, and I remembered then that my knickers were nasty. The cab driver ogled me in the rear vision mirror every chance he got. I felt hot, sweaty and manky.

I paid off the driver when we got to the Valley and staggered clumsily down the lane in Vanessa’s CFMs, tripping over bags of rotting rubbish, bottles and cans to knock on the back door. After an eon this guy opened it. He was a parody of a pimp and I suddenly had to stifle a laugh. He wore a lot of gold chains and rings, and he had hair all over him—except on his head. Even the backs of his hands were hairy. To cap it all off, he was wearing white pants and a disgustingly loud shirt, the kind that guys wear to bad taste parties nowadays.

2009-11-03T19:01:00.000-08:00

My name is Lucinda. My twenty-year involvement in the sex industry has been an amazing journey. On the road to sexual and financial emancipation, I’ve had some truly incredible experiences: hysterical ones, disgusting ones and the odd life-threatening one too.

I have encountered excitement, boredom, high heels in strange places, gadgets, goodies and sugar daddies. I’ve been confronted with fetishists, some of whom are obsessed with their mother’s underwear (yeah well, if they think form-fitting undergarments are sexy who am I to argue?) and others obsessed with cult figures such as Princess Leia. I’ve worked on my own, from hotels and from home, in great brothels, bad brothels, and for escort agencies.

You name it; I’ve seen it, ‘done’ it, and survived to tell the tale.

People are so judgmental about working girls. It’s one of the reasons I wanted to write this blog. The only people more stereotyped than us are used car salespeople and politicians. And who wants to lumped in with them?

As for the way we are portrayed in the media and popular culture, it’s sometimes priceless but mostly just depressing!

I’d describe myself as someone who has learned how to exploit men for fun and profit, while giving them what they think they want. A highly satisfactory win-win situation, even though clients might actually not come out on top, so to speak. Friends in the know see me as a quasi-counsellor; providing solace to the lost, the fallen, the unattractive and the socially inept… But there’s a lot more to it, just as there is a lot more to the clients and people that provide support services to us, such as taxi drivers, receptionists, web designers, body guards and friendly concierges in hotels.

This is my story… the ins and outs of the industry from a working girl who has been around for a while and seen some dramatic changes to the industry, for better and for worse.

So whether you are simply curious about my fascinating industry, a client looking for information and what we really think, a woman contemplating giving it a go; or a man wondering what makes us tick, then this is the blog for you.

The girl with the nasty undies

When people ask why I started escorting, I give them my standard flippant answer. 'It was my parents’ fault. They didn’t buy me the Scarlet O’Hara Barbie that I wanted for my birthday. In fact I never had a Barbie'. There, I said it. I loved Barbie dolls, clothes, and dressing up. I still have a shameless preoccupation with latex body suits and other slinky fantasy outfits.

Getting dressed up was one of the best things about hooking. I used long dark hairpieces and looked a lot like the brunette from Bananarama; it’s a look I played on shamelessly and with considerable success. Men are such visual creatures; I found being able to describe myself as looking like someone they knew to be a surefire way of luring them in.

I always tried to look great on the outside, but I have to admit, sometimes I was slack in the undies department. Being part of the cottontail generation, I love sensible undies. And like Vegemite, they’re something I’ve never grown out of. Funnily enough, some of my clients loved my plain white cotton undies even more than I did. Throughout the years I steadfastly refused to give them up even when I was ridiculed by other working ladies. When I was working I would slip into a G-string just before seeing a client (mmm… butt floss!). But from time to time I’d forget and wiggle provocatively out of my designer dress to reveal seriously frumpy knickers. Some of my great Kodak moments…

OK, so why did I really get into hooking?