(Image from Prowess Pole Fitness)
For the right type of woman, sex work is contagious. Maybe she can’t resist stripping after finding out a friend is doing it, or maybe, if she’s like me, all it takes is one article about an upscale escort to render it a personal life goal. I think of myself as relatively well-rounded in the sex industry because I’ve worked on webcam, in a sensual massage incall, done fetish sessions, and (obviously) prostituted. But there are still some things I haven’t done and want to try. I asked around a little and apparently I’m not the only one with a burning curiosity to explore more aspects of the field. Welcome to our new Tits and Sass column, My Sex Work Bucket List.
1) Work in a ritzy Australian brothel. This one’s all on you, Satisfaction. I guess it’s true that those glamorous TV shows make innocent girls want to become escorts. (Innocent, already-escorting-but-not-in-Australia girls.)
2) Strip. It’s insane to me that I’ve never done this. I almost feel like escorting without having stripped first is like smoking crack before even eating a pot brownie. (I say that as someone who has actually smoked crack, and yes, the experience is exactly like escorting! Just kidding; crack is more fun. I’ve also never eaten a pot brownie but I’m open to the idea.) Given that I’m so goddamned old (30) I worry my time has come and gone for this one. Could I take 6 hours of hard physical labor surrounded by girls just out of high school, only to earn less than I would from a two hour full service date? Could I incite anyone to give me money at all given that I’m Demi Moore levels of bad at dancing? Would I even make it past one shift during which I had to pay to work, or would I get into an intense screaming match with the manager that ends in my first physical fight? We don’t know the answers to these questions, but please don’t take my dream away from me. In my head, I’m a confident young thing with plenty of time to learn spectacular pole tricks, and $20 is the most I’ve taken from the sweaty hands of a sexually aroused man. Plus: the camaraderie! The outfits! The sweatpants boner guy of legend! If I die without having stripped, I’m coming back as a ghost and haunting all the Portland clubs. I mean it.
3) Hustle in a bar. I’m a shy, insecure person at heart, which is why I will be in a wig for every moment of my stripping experience. Lots of makeup and neon diamond net stockings with 6” platforms will make me feel safe and secure. But to have to pass myself off as a sexy chick without those aids? Erm…seems a little anxiety-inducing to me. This is why I don’t have any unpaid sex; I’m bad at picking up men. But successfully scoring a trick at a bar is a huge dream of mine, especially in Vegas, which seems like the big leagues when it comes to in-person hooking. (And trust me, I’m letting my imagination run riot here because I’m sooooooo far from being Vegas hot.) I think it would be a huge rush.
In some ways, hustling in person seems like accepting a kid’s dare to run up and touch a haunted house strip club. I’m not even interested in the the money, which is sacrilege to admit, but it’s all about satisfying my own curiosity and affirming that I’m a real hooker, worthy of joining the pantheon of hard working women from the pre-internet days. I’m proving something to myself with this one — not having fun, not making bank, but testing my own mettle. Maybe we could make a movie about this? And it could have a scene near the end where someone tries to stop me from going up to the hotel room with a cheap guy who insisted he only has $150 and I say, “no, Angelique. I have to do this. FOR ME.” It’s going to be epic. Who wants to be my mentor?
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When you find a ritzy Australian brothel, please tell me. I am yet to be inside one that doesn’t have vinyl covers on the beds (practical? Yes. Ritzy? No). In my experience, a brothel counts as ritzy once the pillow cases are ironed.
Sounds like I might have to make my own brothel then. *rolls up sleeves*
And even the nicest brothel (ahem, sorry, *premises*) I’ve been in doesn’t have a shower that comes out at a consistent temperature every time. If I had a dollar for every minute I’ve spent apologising to clients about how temperamental the showers at work are, I wouldn’t have to have sex with them.
I know where you are referring to, and I agree. However, I will concede that that place was genuinely ‘ritzy’ in a tasteful and expensive looking way, and included furniture that I would quite like to own were I richer. It wasn’t ye olde brothel saloon-ritzy like on tv I guess, more like minimalist mid-century funeral home chic. Maybe you should go to NZ instead, Charlotte. (I’m joking, never go to NZ, the money is horrible).
The money is terrible in NZ? Really? Damnit, there goes my one bucket list idea. I’ve always wanted to go to NZ and work where it’s decriminalized. A NZ stripper once couchsurfed my place and she had great stories about travelling and then stripping in whatever city she was in and that sounded pretty grand too.
The money is definitely better in Australia. There are obvious perks to working in NZ (i.e decrim, although that only really works if you’re a citizen, so without knowing where you’re from I’m guessing there’s a big chance you’d still be working illegally), but you just don’t earn heaps per hour, and it is a tiny market. There’s also not really a ‘high end’ in terms of rates, or a market for dinner date style escorting or multi-hour GFE dates. I mean, that stuff does happen, but it’s much harder to get consistent work doing that. And the rates (i.e what clients pay) are just pretty low across the board – you would very easily earn the same per hour working in a very middle of the road parlour style brothel in Aus as I did at a ‘high class escort agency (which charged about as much as it’s possible to charge in NZ) where clients and management expect heaps from you but for no extra money. Work at a parlour and the money’s even worse, and private money isn’t great either. NZers are often pretty cheap, and there’s def not a big spending culture (or a tipping culture, for that matter!). Plus if you were trying to save money to spend in the US, Europe etc the exchange rate definitely isn’t on your side.
The scenery is nice though!
Boardroom, but i am not very ritzy, so it didnt take them long to start feeding me bs about full rosters.
Are you kidding? Come to Perth, we have some very ritzy places with NO plastic covers on the beds and great showers: Caseys, Esquire, Club 316, to name a few! 🙂
Good tips! I’m sure ritzy exists in Australia, I just haven’t experienced it first-hand myself. Perhaps I’ll have to take a working ho-liday to Perth soon.
I do maintain that even the ritziest genuinely high-end brothel (and I’ve worked in a couple that I would definitely describe as such) appears less and less ritzy the more intimately you get to know it’s inner workings as a staff member though.
That sounds like an amazing movie plot. I would totally go see it.
please, go strip and then write about it! your writing is fantastic!
also pot brownies are really scary.
oh no, don’t tell me that — that makes me want to try them!
I never tried pot brownies either but my limited theoretical knowledge of psychofarmacology suggests they would have a different effect than smoked pot. If eaten, THC is metabolized by the liver into a different compound (don’t remember the name), with longer and harsher effects. Also, takes hours to kick-in so it is much harder to determine correct dosage and as such, easier to over-eat and get a bad experience as the result.
Haha. I’m not one for drugs, but I think if you stripped then it would much be like me trying to sell sex: A lot of psychological interaction, and faking my way through the physical part. I think you could do it, as could I…maybe…
Haha, your closing line about Angelique killed me.
Love this. Charlotte, I am the same in terms of stripping. I’ve always been SO curious but never made it happen, for a variety of reasons. Actually, I did dance at a couple private parties one night in New Orleans, except the owner of the stripper company was also a dancer so we went as a two-girl team. She was a total stereotype, controlling and abrasive, assuring me I could do whatever I felt comfortable with and then getting on my ass for not doing exactly what she said. At the end of the night I made more $ than her, and we told each other in no uncertain terms to fuck off.
I’ve only ever been in a strip club once, also in New Orleans, and it was fucking awful. None of the “dancers” (if you could call them that) weighed more than 100 lbs and no one was even smiling; they just feebly rubbed their nonexistent asses against the pole while quiet, sweaty men at the stage watched. No one tipped. Thank god my friend tripped drunkenly out the door; we needed some comedic relief.
There’s nothing inherently wrong with not weighing one hundred pounds. Maybe they were exhausted or didn’t like the music, so they didn’t feel like performing. I wouldn’t give someone a good show if they’re not tipping me and I didn’t feel like moving. New Orleans has a lot of nice places too.
I’m not saying there is, and I figured I’d take shit for that. I was just trying to paint a picture of a set-up where everyone looked really miserable. That’s all.
I.N. your comment is right on. You can never determine correct dosage and since each pot cook is different, three cookies here might be mellow while one cookie there might obliterate you. I’ve eaten pot food a couple times. The first time my body went numb for 12 hours and the next 12 hours I felt stupid and dizzy. The second time induced my first full blown panic attack that only begun to subside after I puked.
Love the idea of a “sex work bucket list”. One of the reasons I retired from working as a prodomme was that I felt like I done my fetish bucket list, which included masterminding an elaborate kidnapping scene, doing a multi-day session where my client was always in some form of bondage, and doing a “travel” session with one client where we played in multiple cities over multiple days.
Doing some escort sessions is kind of a bucket list sex work fantasy of mine. I’m in my late twenties now and worry my window to live it out will pass me by. I’d love to find an escort who wanted a very occasional doubles partner to work with, I think that’d be the best way to explore it.
Done 2, 3 but not 1. After working in a crappy American brothel, I’m sort of ruined on the brothel experience though since Australia is hooker-heaven its brothels are probably much better.
I’m making you pot brownies next time I see you!
yanno, I was somewhat disappointed when I wasn’t approached, when sitting alone at the bar, while on vacation in Vegas. made me wonder if I looked like I didn’t have money to spend
Wow, I am more offended that she said smoking crack is funner that escorting.