I had just completed my sophomore year in college. I grew up in Boston and had spent my entire life in New England. Now I was attending one of those prestigious but rather prim ‘seven sister' colleges of which my mother and my two older sisters were both alumni. And that was after years at a dreary preparatory school my mother, too, insisted I attend. After all, mother, grandmother before her, and my two sisters had gone there and it was another of those absurd ‘family traditions' to which they insisted I, too, adhere. While in some ways it is advantageous to grow up privileged, as I had, it can also be very stifling. Especially in that austere world of the New England aristocracy. We were all so damned ‘civilized' that sometimes I wanted to puke. Often when your upbringing is overly refined and ‘proper,' as mine was, one's imagination becomes very fertile. One dreams of wallowing in more tawdry terrains, of transgressing the bounds of propriety, of deviating sharply from the expectations of polite society... of being free and wild! And this is especially true in the sexual domain where three centuries of Puritanical influence have had their effect on the sexual climate of the region and, in particular, its more ‘proper' denizens.
Now that I was in college I was better able to exercise that freedom I had so long sought -- but only to an extent. For the ‘prestigious' New England four-year women's college in many ways only continues the constraints of the kind of childhood I had experienced. Freedom was still stifled, now not only by an old-fashioned puritanism, but by a new form of shrill puritan body of belief -- a pervasive feminism which insisted, no less than the pulpit, that only certain beliefs and behaviors were ‘proper' for a woman. And so, still, I longed for the open, unfettered, spacious freedom I had so long sought. A freedom where I wouldn't have to constantly conceal my needs and desires from others who would think them inappropriate.
And naturally, as is the case with so many women my age, the freedom I was especially eager to taste at this stage of my life was sexual freedom.
You see, I am blessed (or cursed, some would say) with a intense, sometimes rapacious libido. I was aware of this from the first early simmering moments of my sexual awakening. My girlfriends had long regarded me as being ‘boy crazy'. My chronic yearning for pleasures that could be achieved with the opposite sex -- and with one's own fingers! -- had grown steadily to the point where I can now honestly and unabashedly claim that I am quite thoroughly addicted to sex. It's probably not too much of an exaggeration to say that I am addicted to my own surging, volcanic libido. Maybe one day if this gets out of hand I'll need to visit one of those Sexaholics Anonymous chapters and confess to my many excesses. But for the time being I am more than happy wallowing in and gorging on hefty doses of uninhibited eroticism.
So the plans I had made for this summer excited me with their prospects. I would be working as a waitress in the dining room of a very expensive and luxurious Wyoming dude ranch. One of my friends in college, Beth, was from Wyoming and had already worked at several of the area's ranch resorts during high school and college, for several summers now. Through her efforts I was able to obtain a summer job out there, in dude ranch country.
Beth had often regaled me with tales of the kind of easy freedom and looseness people out West seemed to enjoy, so very different from my own rigid upbringing amidst the cotillions and country clubs of New England. Now I was eager and curious to experience that kind of world for myself.
Though I had been to Europe several times and even lived in London for a year as a little girl when my father was stationed there as a diplomat, I had never really spent much time outside of New England. But I was young and adventurous and was always eager to broaden my horizons. And when Beth started telling me, with a lewd little wink, about the manly men out in Wyoming that sure was extra incentive! Beth knew very well how eager I always was to familiarize myself with all the varieties of masculinity! As a red-blooded twenty year old American woman I’d had my fair share of experience with men. But now I was ready for more. A lot more!
Finally I boarded the plane which would take me to Salt Lake City. Beth would pick me up there and we'd drive up to Wyoming together. I booked a night flight, hoping I could sleep the night, and arrive in Salt Lake City the next morning without wasting a day flying. But the flight was almost completely booked and it was hot, noisy and very uncomfortable, even though I managed a window seat and was lucky enough not to have anyone sitting in the seat next to mine.
With the flight so heavily booked the stewardesses had more than their share of work. And I had to admire how they went about it. Briskly and with a smile, no matter how much pressure they seemed to be facing. And, believe me, with crying babies,
fearful flyers, and the cranky demands of a myriad of flyers there was a lot of pressure.
I especially noticed one of the stewardesses, one who seemed to show real grace under pressure. Her name plate said ‘Christine.'
Christine was a real knockout. I’d heard to men in the boarding area say to each other that the stewardesses at this new airline were said to be rather attractive. And this Christine was so overwhelmingly chic and svelte that I would've expected her to be a fashion model. She was tall and slim and blond and had a perfect figure, even in those dully tailored outfits stewardesses are forced to wear. Christine was assigned to my section of the plane and she was very helpful, getting me a couple of aspirin when I needed them, and just smiling and generally being very being courteous, which, believe me, you can come to appreciate on an overbooked flight with a lot of grumpy, dissatisfied passengers on it.
Well, if I thought I could just drop off to sleep and wake up in Salt Lake City nice and rested, I was wrong. Instead I was having terrible trouble getting any rest. It was late, and the plane was dark, and everyone but me finally seemed to be sleeping. I was squirming in my seat trying to fall asleep too, when Christine approached me.
"Would you like a blanket?" she asked me.
"I looked everywhere for one, but there didn't seem to be any more left," I said. Since this was a fully booked flight, the few blankets and pillows seemed to have quickly disappeared from sight almost immediately.
"Let me go see if I can find one for you," she said with a sweet, gracious smile.
Soon she returned with a blanket.
"Here you go," she said, unfolding it for me.
I thanked her and covered myself. Maybe now I could finally get some sleep.
"Mind if I take this seat next to you and try to get some shuteye myself? I had to give up my usual seat to a mother with a crying infant."
"No. Go right ahead."
I was sitting in the window seat and she took the seat beside me.
"Here, we can share this blanket," I said.
We draped the blanket over ourselves and shut our eyes. But still I couldn't sleep. Maybe I'd have to get more comfortable. I was wearing a pair of very tight jeans and they were digging into my crotch. Not the sort of garment you should wear on a cross-country flight. A loose dress would've been a much wiser and much more comfortable choice. But as usual, I wouldn't listen to my mother's very sensible suggestions and insisted on wearing a pair of sexy but much too tight jeans.
It was dark, I was covered by a blanket, so I thought I could discreetly take off my jeans and get a little bit more comfortable
I guess all my squirming must've woken up Christine, who had fallen asleep.
"What are you doing there?" she asked drowsily.
"I'm taking off my jeans, and trying to get more comfy so that maybe I can finally fall asleep."
