Who I Am in “Real Life”

February 13, 2010 Who I Am in “Real Life”

People who watch shows like “Secret Diary of a Call Girl” or fantasize about whoring but would never do it have this idea that, for whores, there’s the “real life” and the “secret life”, and the latter is a stressful but nonetheless small and even fake diversion from the former.

People who watch shows like “Secret Diary of a Call Girl” or fantasize about whoring but would never do it have this idea that, for whores, there’s the “real life” and the “secret life”, and the latter is a stressful but nonetheless small and even fake diversion from the former.

It’s true that I feel like I have two lives, but — my “secret life” is the real one to me. My “real life” where I have dinner with the in-laws and volunteer for community benefits is the one in which I feel fake and lonely. Strangely, the people who don’t have the faintest clue of who I really am? I don’t let their presence determine which part of my life is real and true and better.

All my customers who are worth at least their weight in feathers understand that I’m a real person with real interests and real friends. Sure, they don’t know my legal name or home address or the fact that I volunteer for [insert local organization here]. But they understand that I can be a woman who fucks for money at the same time as being a woman who seems pretty goddamn normal to the rest of the world. They understand that whoring and sitting at home watching Lost with a blanket wrapped around me aren’t mutually exclusive. They don’t think that, because I whore, I can’t possibly enjoy a good book or have a degree with honors from a good university.  The rest of the world? I don’t trust them to get that.

You have no idea how many times I’ve bitten my tongue when people use “whore” to mean “worthless”. When people say that “sluts” have no morals. When people make fun of sexually active women by saying they’re probably diseased. When people say that anyone who could fall in love with a whore is a pervert who likes used goods. My customers aren’t the ones saying this shit, people. The people saying it are my family members and friends and acquaintances and people who love me and know that I would never, never be that kind of girl.

I am that kind of girl.

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