Healey - Letters to my Fanny

Dear... um, Dear... er... OK, lets go with Fanny.

Sorry, bad start. Its just hard to know what to call you. Which is a bit of a giveaway. Fanny sounds so childish, but then vagina doesnt feel friendly enough. Ive called you so many things to get a laugh: minge, growler, hairy falafel, pink trifle (I know, Im sorry); the list is endless and becomes even better or worse after a few drinks. I should probably apologize for the name-calling. Soz. I also need to address how badly I have neglected you. Im not entirely sure why, but I am slightly nervous of you. You have been a bit of an unknown entity. And even at the age of thirty-four, you still are.

Perhaps this is a result of being at a girls-only boarding school from the ages of ten to eighteen. However, I suspect it is probably a mix of many different things: being English; being from a family that didnt talk about sex; having three brothers; being more comfortable in a jesters role than a sexy-time role; idolizing Sigourney Weaver/Ellen Ripley from Alien. But, dear long-suffering Fanny, the time for reconciliation is here. You have given me an incredible bite-her-bottom-cute daughter and now an equally lovely son who smells like biscuits, and I think you deserve some appreciation.

So thank you, a million times thank you, for the good times, the bad times and the ugly times. I promise never to trim you with scissors whilst texting ever again that was callous and we both suffered and I wish someone had told me that rushed, inexperienced self-waxing can result in your lady garden looking like a toddler has tried to papier-mch it with candle wax. I could have done without the repeated cystitis, if Im honest. But no biggie, definitely my fault and rectified now that Ive learned the magical lady trick of going for a wee after sex which as far as Im concerned should be on the curriculum and always staying hydrated, just not with sangria.

I hope that now I am gently entering my fourth decade we can be friends. Maybe even more than friends. I wonder whether, after writing this, well be on intimate terms rather than dancing around each other like two suspicious street dogs.

I hope so.

All my love,

Cherry x

So, people, let us discuss sexual pleasure and maybe even our love apparatus.

Um. Hang tight.

This is a touch awkward.

Not something we talk about all that freely, given how modern and liberal and emancipated we all think we are.

I think part of the problem for me has been my discomfort with being overtly sexual; Im far more at home being silly. I usually go for Halloween costumes that involve boiler suits and blood-splattered make-up rather than sexy witch or seductive vampiress. Im particularly thinking of the time I went to a freshers party as Eminem with a chainsaw made from a cardboard box and chicken wire. I did not pull.