I recently was a party to one of the oddest, and strangely most fulfilling, experiences of my life. There are so many names we could have used but we finally settled on "Whack Fest '08."
On the most basic level, Whack Fest was just a bunch of dudes jerking off in a room. It was so much more than that though, there were rules and codes of conduct that needed to be followed. It was a game, a contest of wills and determination. By the end of it, there were so many tissues around the room someone might have thought there was a flu epidemic and we were under quarantine. Things got wild, to say the least.
We'd decided that the only way to tell who was the manliest man in a group of men was to see who could beat themselves up the most in one day. Whack fest was all about survival, making it to the end of the day while also proving to your fellow men that you were able to produce quantity as well as quality. It was the most American thing we could think to do, not that we were assaulting ourselves for the troops or anything.
Things started out as you'd expect with a roomful of dudes going to town on themselves. There was a TV playing a stream of porn titles throughout the day. A couple of laptops were strewn around pointed at different websites. Some over-eager contestants tried to race ahead and lead the pack while others decided to go the way of the tortoise and pace themselves. I can't imagine a loser being declared amongst our lewd group, but there would definitely be a winner that stood tall above the rest.
Conversation for the first couple rounds was flowing freely. We would talk about school and the weather in between and during flogging sessions. Some complained about politics until the rapture would make them forget why they were upset in the first place. It was just us dudes exercising our right to be free-spirited and natural. Natural, of course, meant naked. We decided to go totally bare out of necessity rather than try and wear any type of clothing that would only become so soiled it would need to be burned after the game was over.
Our initial enthusiasm quickly wore off as the horror of what we were doing started to sink in. I remember looking over at "Weird Balls" and seeing tears rolling down his face. He was really beating his dude up. He was beating dude like he owed him a couple years worth of back rent. In Weird Balls' eyes there was sadness and fear. Of course he was sad, he was abusing himself almost to the point of self-mutilation. I think he was afraid because he knew he liked it and the capacity to enjoy that kind of abuse is a very scary thing indeed.
It was weird that we settled in to relative synchronization but as round 5 came and went, everyone still seemed to be going strong. "Dirty Dick" jumped up, covered in sweat and fluids with his eyes all bloodshot and asked everyone if that was where we wanted to be when Jesus came back. I answered him with a series of grunts as I proudly marched onwards to round 6. As I shook it off, I looked Dirty Dick in the eyes and told him he could quit at any time. I imagine that I was a frightening sight to behold with one hand choking myself purple and the other proudly locked on my hip. Dirty Dick came to his senses and started in on himself again but for the rest of the day he was quiet save for a few times I heard him reciting the lord's prayer.
By round 7 or 8 everyone had settled comfortably into a spot in the room and there wasn't as much moving around anymore. "Hairy Ass" stopped talking and started hanging his head low as he turned his back on us to sit and look out the window. He probably wanted to keep in touch with the outside world because we weren't exactly human anymore. We'd all become robots, our primary objective was self-gratification. This was the goal, but it was slowly becoming less gratifying and more like work. We'd finally reached the most important phase of the endurance trial. Since it felt like work, only those with the strength and will power would outlast the rest.
Covered in drool, tears and about as much semen as the navy, the room stunk like a whorehouse in mid-July if the air-conditioning was broke and it was dollar day. Someone suggested a change of venue. I don't remember a lot of the details by this point, but I knew I wasn't going anywhere. I was slumped against the wall, slowly pumping away while my eyelids drooped and sweat began pooling around my ass on the floor. It was a pretty good spot to be, I remember reflecting, for when Jesus came back.
Immanuel Kant once said that 'a man gives up his personality when he uses himself merely as a means for the gratification of an animal drive.' He was right. I was a heaving, sweating beast with only the intention of winning on my mind. Every time I minded my own business was a step closer to winning. I'll be damned if I wasn't stewing in my juices though, in more ways than one. I learned the joys of being ambidextrous as I was left to my own devices more often in the later rounds.
There was one quitter before, but round 10 saw a wave of people tagging out because they "couldn't take it any longer" or "felt sick from the stink" or "were afraid if they continued they would never be able to sleep again." 4 people were left after the 10th round. Myself, Dirty Dick, Hairy Ass and as I started calling the final man "Mr Kleenex" because of the stack of dirty rags he had surrounding himself. He was like an island surrounded by balled up tissue and tears.
The four of us would last another 6 rounds without much to mention. The only thing missing from this sinner's sauna was the steam. It was hotter than satan's asshole in that room and the air was thick and humid. The window was almost completely covered in condensation when Hairy Ass finally decided to call it quits. He said nothing. He did not even bother to pick up his clothes and after about a half hour we realized he wasn't coming back. We didn't see him for a couple days afterwards either. I imagine it was the shame he was feeling that kept him away from the rest of us for those few days. I know I had trouble looking these warriors in the eye for a while. Then there were only three.
Another round over and Dirty Dick congratulated us for lasting so long and picked his things up and left. He seemed smugly full of self loathing as he walked out with no confidence in his step. What happened next has never been repeated until now.
It took a few moments to see clearly through the haze what had happened, but Mr Kleenex and myself realized at about the same time that we were really the only two left. I made eye contact with him and with a nod from each of us, we locked stares and wouldn't break it until there was a winner. When one of us would start revving our engine up to the red-line, the other would try as hard as they could to follow suit. I watched another man's pupils dilate in release 3 times before I'd had enough. I couldn't take it anymore. My hands and man were battered and bruised and I felt so dirty that I knew even an hour in the shower with scalding water couldn't make me clean again.
Exhausted, beaten up and sorry for being alive, I slumped all the way to the floor and fell asleep in my own muck and mire for I don't remember how long. When I woke up, Mr Kleenex was gone and I knew that it didn't really matter that he went one more round than I, neither of us would have ever gloated about our victory. There were no losers, like I said. Curiously though, there were no winners either. None ever spoke of it again in fact, so winning and losing lost all meaning.
No one's talked about that day since it happened and I doubt anyone ever will. I made up some descriptive names to be used so as to protect the innocent. That's horseshit though, as I was there, and in that room there were no innocents. You can't watch a group of men shake their steak and walk away thinking everything is going to be all lollipops and dandelions ever again. Part of me died in that room, and not the part that I was trying so hard to choke to death. In that death, though, came about the birth of a new part of me. Sure, I can now say that I was a part of one of the greatest adventures into social experimentation that ever existed, but I can also say I truly know what it is to be human.
No comments:
Post a Comment