5 Things I Learned Writing Porn Descriptions
It’s a dirty job, but someone’s gotta do it
Many moons ago, I had a gig where I was writing descriptions of porn scenes, giving a blow by blow of the action that viewers could expect to see — and perhaps giving them more masturbation material in the process. I recently read Greyson Ferguson’s story about how he wrote profiles for escorts and it brought back all kinds of memories — which made me rummage through old files to reminisce about the work I did — and I realized I had some war stories of my own to tell, and I learned some important lessons from that experience.
At the end of the day, how many ways can you really describe a blow job?
1. I mostly find porn boring.
I’m not saying I never watch porn. Far from it. I have turned to porn for a little inspiration in the bedroom or at the keyboard when I’m writing erotica. But watching porn when I’m not already horny, or writing about fictional people who are horny, is like watching paint dry for me. Since I had a job to do and my mind wasn’t on sex for pleasure, it really honed in on the details of what I was watching, just as I would with any other movie — and the critic in me found plenty of problems. Bad lighting, boring sex, ridiculous dialogue, you name it. I’m sure once in a while I found something that inspired me to have some quality time with a sex toy, but for the most part, all it did was induce a bout of boredom.
2. But I was still able to find ways to amuse myself.
There’s no denying the work encouraged long periods of ennui, but that didn’t mean I wasn’t able to amuse myself when I was writing those scene descriptions. I took every opportunity I could to interject something funny — or at least, funny to me — into my work. For instance, when I had a scene featuring a character named Aria, I wrote all about how she would make your cock sing. Did anyone like my humor? Or even notice it? Probably not. But porn is known for its parodies and puns, so maybe at least one person appreciated the effort.
“Okay, here’s tab A, it went into slot B, they came, the end.”
3. I had to really stretch to find new ways to describe the sex.
I often have this challenge when writing erotica, and I certainly had it writing for this client. There really is nothing new under the sun in porn and at the end of the day, how many ways can you really describe a blow job? At least in erotica, there is some context, there are characters I’ve gotten to know, they have shared experiences that means the sex can be more prolonged and sensual. That helps. But writing about porn scenes that were only a few minutes long was more like “Okay, here’s tab A, it went into slot B, they came, the end.” Who were these people and why were they fucking? Who knows! They certainly didn’t bother to tell the audience.
4. The scenes stuck in my mind more than I was comfortable with.
I’ve never really been a huge consumer of porn, and until that gig, I certainly didn’t watch it daily. For some reason, when I would finish up for the day, the scenes would linger in my head and I would often go to sleep seeing unidentified naked bodies just thrashing at each other on a loop. I wasn’t sure why this was happening, or what it says about how my mind works, but it wasn’t at all erotic and oftentimes it was rather unpleasant.
5. The experience was more significant than I originally thought.
I’ve had boring gigs before, so that was nothing new to me. The constant porn playing in my head was something new, but I got used to it. All things considered, writing porn scene descriptions wasn’t bad. In fact, the client was nice, the work was easy, and I made pretty good money. Plus it was a precursor to my current erotica writing. Although when I started writing and publishing erotica eight years ago, it felt like it came out of the blue, but looking back, it really didn’t. There were a few touchpoints along the way that led me here. I had a stint as a telephone sex operator, I briefly had a gig writing about female catfights, and then this porn scene writing situation. None of these things lasted long and none of them were ideal, but it’s difficult to argue with the things that ultimately led me to something I love.
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