The Words - An Autobiography

Newly Weds

Taking off only the Monday following our wedding, I returned to work at the factory, at the pickle tanks, scrubbing rocket launchers, smelling acid fumes, hating to be away from her so soon, and leaving her alone in our apartment. And having the entire summer, before beginning medical school and her graduate studies in the fall, with no idea what to do with all her sudden free time during the day, she confessed that she was afraid she would go a little crazy.

First, she spent time arranging our apartment with as much of a feminine touch as she possessed. She'd warned and reminded me regularly that she wasn't a typical girly girl. She did not expect to be great at traditional domestic tasks and, unapologetically, stated that she had no intention of making those a long-term priority. Still, she made a point of making things nice as she could in our first home together and preparing dinner most evenings, at least attempting to accomplish that because wives were traditionally expected to do so. And what else did she have to do but sit around watching daytime TV without us owning a TV? And she wasn't suggesting that we run out to purchase one to keep her from being bored. But she did make sure that I was aware that come fall, I would be fending for myself once she was back at school. And I would be the one with time on my hands in the evening.

She had never attempted to cook a meal before. She never had any reason to do so, nor anyone to show her how. But she avidly researched recipes online using a new computer that we purchased for her and the internet connection we had installed and followed directions. And nothing she attempted turned out to be a disaster. Except when it burnt. Because as soon as I climbed out from the shower, naked and no longer stinking of acid fumes, she tended to become distracted since that moment was what she'd been anticipating her entire day and would occasionally forget she had something in the oven.

She also accepted it as her responsibility to do the laundry while she had all day and nothing much else to do. We bought a used washer and dryer from my father so that she wasn't required to go to a laundromat. Shortly after that, she reminded me one evening while she folded a laundry basket of clothes that she wouldn't have time to do all this once she returned to school. We would need to share the domestic duties. And depending on her workload, I may need to take on more than what might seem to be just my share. In fact, she suggested, it would be a good idea for me to start doing a load of laundry now and again in preparation for something I'd never been required to do myself before but would need to know once her classes began. And she didn't want either of us spending our weekends doing chores. She had better ideas about how to spend that time, and for those remaining two months of that summer, not surprisingly, we spent nearly the entirety of our evenings and weekends in bed.

Sex, actual sex, that we could no longer deny being anything but the real thing did improve. Especially since our first, few frustrating and disappointing efforts set such a low bar, simply accomplishing penetration without pain or discomfort for her felt like a glorious triumph. Orgasms, mine, once I was no longer concerned that I might be hurting her, were near, if not quite, the intensity of those I'd experienced all those months that we'd denied that we were having sex or those I'd experienced by myself since waking from my first wet dream. But once having experienced the warm wet embrace of her vagina, I sought none of those things that had given me such intense pleasure and occasionally still would, primarily when my wife insisted that it was my turn - except as foreplay. My wife enjoyed orgasms as intense and satisfying as ever, just not with my penis inserted into her vagina.

The lesser intensity of my pleasure may have been, in part, my focus on hers, rather than only my own, as I could when we'd each taken our turn, not having sex. Once inside her, I went slow, trying my best not to come too soon, waiting to feel orgasmic tension gradually build in her body, for the dilation of her pupils, the widening of her eyes. Cherishing the almost panicked expressions that took control of her face as the world around her was about to be ripped away by wave after intense wave of pleasure. And then those that appeared as though she was in agony.

She swore to me that she came so close, and, even if she didn't come, it did feel good, that she did enjoy it and wanted it as much as I did, but I assumed that all those rambling assurances, even if true, were mainly for the benefit of my fragile ego. The unintended consequence was that I concluded if only I could last a little longer while fucking her a little harder. But the latter rarely allowed me to accomplish the first, even if it often resulted in me coming harder, which she encouraged. Don't worry about her; she'd insist, aware of what I was trying to do, knowing how intent I would immediately be afterward on providing her the pleasure I'd failed to give her while satisfying only myself. Just as before, when we still claimed we weren't having sex if I came, I wanted to be sure she came. Before, immediately after, or both, I wanted to make sure she came. I was determined never to leave her aroused, if only a little, but unsatisfied after intercourse.

I also discovered that the best way to assure she was prepared for intercourse was for her to come beforehand, in any of the ways I'd made her come before. Except, not to complain, I did occasionally discover her too well prepared after oral sex. Or those times she was in the midst of a particularly intense orgasm, and I hurriedly threw myself on and in her before the final waves swept through her body, which was as close to her having an orgasm during intercourse as we'd been able to accomplish. But with her so slippery, wet, aroused, and open for me, there was no resistance to my pubic bone solidly meeting hers when I entered her. There was likely to be next to no friction for my or her additional benefit, which left it unlikely to experience my most intense orgasms. But no matter how comparably weak those may have been for me, when I came, looking into her eyes, I found her still aglow, and the satisfaction of having given her that much pleasure occasionally brought me to tears.

Given all the free time suddenly forced upon her, my wife found herself drawn to magazine articles and online postings that she'd previously had neither the time nor inclination to pay the slightest attention to. And according to what she read and informed me, I was performing a good deal better than average and shouldn't concern myself that my endurance was our problem. Nor my size, which was also average or better. The problem, supposedly, was that a significant percentage of women couldn't achieve orgasm through sexual intercourse alone. Which was simply poor design and, if there was a God, so far as she was concerned, He wasn't much of an engineer, which shouldn't come as a surprise to her, considering her other observations of His creation – such as growing old and dying.

Sexually, like most women, what worked best for her was oral stimulation or my magic fingers, as we'd discovered early on, while not having sex – which she'd since learned was generally considered sex after all by the experts. I still enjoyed what she did with her mouth and hands, and I had experienced more intense orgasms from both than I had so far from sex. Yet, I now wanted those only as a prelude, as foreplay, and not the finale. Perhaps not as intense, but coming deep inside her, looking into her eyes was more satisfying.