2:05PM - Monday February 2, 2004
Blame it on Heinlein
So I was thinking this morning about the different kinds of media that have helped shape me into the woman I am today. Mostly I thought about the books and magazines I was reading in my youth and teen years, and I had a little giggle. Here then is my new answer for people who insist on asking me why I get piercings and tattoos and then stretch said piercings larger and larger:

"So okay, you know when you were a teen and you read Sassy and Cosmo and stuff? I was reading National Geographic."

Ba-dum dum.

Seriously though, that IS what I was doing. We'd always had a subscription to National Geographic, and when my brother and I were little we had subscriptions to Owl, Chickadee and Ranger Rick--all kid-oriented nature magazines. We were total camping and nature nuts, and we grew up gardening and composting and going on hikes in the woods. Good stuff. National Geographic got me interested in other cultures, tribes people and their body art, ancient Aztec gods, mythology, geography... and all sorts of other fun stuff.

I really think I can trace my love of body modification back to my days of spending rainy afternoons wiht a stack of National Geographics. I thought those African women and men were some of the most beautiful people I'd ever seen. I loved the all the rings and scarification and big stretched ears and weird hair--for a kid like me they were it.

When I was a teenager, I had my own subscriptions to Isaac Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine, Analog: Science Fiction Science Fact, and OMNI. Heh. I also had a checking acocunt and a membership in the Science Fiction Book Club. I know I've already mentioned my teen book club addiction and how I learned all about sex by ordering books about it, but I DID read other things, too. Mostly it was science fiction and fantasy--I devoured the stuff.

Asimov, Bradbury, Ellison, Heinlein and others shaped my life. Heh. I remember Heinlein in particular because when I was a prudish fourteen year old, I thought his sexual values were freakish. All that premarital sex and group marriages and stuff jsut seemed kind of icky to me. And now look at me, all polyamorous and proclaiming that the only way I'd ever get married is in a multi-person, multi-gender ceremony in Vegas, with the condition that it MUST be performed byan Elvis impersonator. Heh.

So yeah, I'm a pierced, tatooed, shaved-head polyamorous kinky freak, and I blame it all on Heinlein and National Geographic. Go tell your mom.

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