P for Pace

There is a P word which dare not speak it’s name in this blog. I vowed I’d never mention it, and thus far I’ve managed to keep that vow. In fact I’ve not even referenced obliquely, not spoken of it fleetingly, nor have I implied it exists in any of the posts. If this blog is about escapism and let’s admit it….more than a little hedonism and fun, then the P word of which I speak is certainly the enemy of those things. We would rather not discuss it…is that agreed? This P word certainly won’t be standing for ‘P’ in the Z to A of Sensual Massage. No, the P word, which begins with P and ends with andemic…shall not be for P. The word for letter P shall be Pace. P for Pace (and not for Pandemic….whoops.. I said it….sorry about that, it won’t happen again). Let’s move on to P is for Pace.

Last year, in a time before the Pandem….(oops, nearly said it again…that doesn’t count as a mention of it…ignore it), I was a guest at a birthday party. It wasn’t a big party, more of a select gathering, I guess around 20 people which is a cool number for such an event. I probably knew about half the people there, the others were new, which for me is an ideal mix; some familiar faces and some new to get to know. The party had all the ingredients for a good time; food, drink, music, nudity. Oh, did I not previously mention the nudity? When the birthday boy is a nudist then the party is nude….them’s the rules. I wasn’t going to complain, far from it, I do like to get my kit off at any opportunity. So at a nude party, you turn up, hand over your bottle of whatever and then you strip off…everything. You leave your clothes in the bedroom and join the crowd in the living room / kitchen (or galley?). It is important to be careful not to lean against the oven in the kitchen or stand too close to the wood burning stove in the living room but apart from that you just behave the same way as if you were wearing clothes. Depending on whether anyone is aroused there may also be places to drape a napkin or rest a canapé. The space we had was quite small so everyone was fairly up close and personal which encourages good mixing and a fair bit of body contact (hmmm…remember that?). You don’t get much space on a canal barge do you? Oh, sorry did I not mention that either? The nude birthday party was held on a canal barge. It was moored of course (because it was after dark) alongside the towpath. The boat was one of those broad beam barges, so not the more familiar narrow boat type, but wider than those, although still fairly tight. Into the cosy living room / kitchen space there was squeezed a baby grand piano, around which most people had gathered. The piano provided the music (depending on whether or not anyone was playing it at any point during the evening) whilst the fantastic spread of food and drink was arranged on an island unit in the galley around which others partygoers had gathered. I think these are the correct terms (i.e. galley etc) regarding canal going craft but I’m sure if I’ve called something by the wrong word someone in the know will correct me. Because it was winter the room was warmed by the wood burning stove and of course the heat from all the bodies in the small space. It certainly made for a cosy and intimate evening. Moored alongside the barge was a narrow boat which was available should anyone want to go and have some other kind of intimate fun. The main boat for eating drinking and music, the next door boat for sex. Oh come on…what do you expect happens at these naked parties….Twister games? Everyone is naked, it’s warm, drinks are had, some people want to get to know each other better… It was possible to see into the narrow boat (shall we call it the sex boat from here on?) moored alongside from the main boat just by peering through the windows (or portholes?) should anyone want to watch the fun next door. The host had prepared the sex boat with everything you might need. He even provided dressing gowns to cover up so as not to offend anyone on the canal bank on the necessary brief outside trip between the boats.

Anyway I guess you’re wondering what all this talk of barges, pianos, nudity and sex boats….has got to do with P for Pace? …or maybe you would rather I just describe what happened on the sex boat?  Sorry! I’m not going to do that because nothing happened on the sex boat as far as I’m aware….at least nothing happened involving me unfortunately, which makes a change I guess. I didn’t see anyone discreetly slip on a gown and jump across the gap between the boats for an assignation next door. Nor did I see anything through the window unfortunately (I did look). Everyone seemed to be too busy enjoying the chat, drink, delicious food and expert piano playing and singing to brave the trip to the sex boat. So what has all this canal boat stuff got to do with P for Pace and massages? Well… I think a canal boat trip is a neat metaphor for a sensual massage. You can’t go anywhere fast on a canal, there’s a pace to canal travel that is slow and there’s nothing much you can do about it. A canal boat trip is also as much about the journey as it is the destination. In some ways it’s all about the journey. It’s a leisurely meander towards a goal where the journey and the mode of transport is just as important as the destination. And for me, that’s very much like a sensual massage.

Think of a sensual massage as one choice of a mode of travel towards reaching a sexual release. You can take other modes of ‘transport’. Some are faster like bashing one out quickly…forgive the crudeness but you know what I mean… or a ‘let’s get straight down to it fuck and go’. They have their place of course. Or you can deliberately slow things down in pace and savour the journey, or even make the journey the sole purpose. For me, arousal by sensual massage is like the difference between a canal boat trip and a fast train journey to a destination. Both modes get you there but the canal trip / sensual massage is at a pace that enables you to really savour and enjoy the journey, which makes arriving all the sweeter. With a sensual massage the pace of arousal is drawn out, each step along the way is heightened by experiencing events in a slow and deliberate pace. The massage will involve subtle changes of pace, sometimes with fast, intense motions, and other times with slower gentler nurturing touch…yet always building in waves of intensity, each wave becoming stronger, more erotic, the pace quickening, the seduction more ardent, more carnal, inexorably moving towards the apex of pleasure. Hmmm, you’ll never think of a canal boat trip in the same way again will you?  

Next letter is O. Yes….you guessed it.