Warning: If you are offended by explicit sex acts, photos, and paraphernalia, do NOT read or visit this page. No kidding, do not go further. I have no intention of offending anyone, but I have every intention to enlighten and entertain those who feel free to express their sexuality and erotic desires. 

Upon learning Barcelona’s Erotic Museum was voted one of the top ten sexiest museums in the world, I determined to visit it. Gina was a great sport and joined me. Inside, there are over 800 erotic artifacts on display, spanning from the Upper Paleolithic era through today. We enjoyed Picasso and Dali’s lesser-known sensual artworks, lessons about the kama sutra and Pompeii, and a peek into the world of fetishism, sex machines, and phalluses—lots of phalluses. 

Toto, I have a feeling we are not in Kansas America anymore. And now that my former state of Florida is banning Encyclopaedias, Thesauruses, Dictionaries, and more from schools just for defining sex, it strengthens my determination to write candidly about my experiences of sexual freedom here in Spain. Repression damages the soul and body; expression heals and frees our being. 

What I have experienced here in less than two months has been incredibly healing and freeing from the shame, guilt, and judgment of a repressive religious and American upbringing. I have been enclosed within a cultish sensory bubble, perceiving but a tiny sliver of an immense world. I feel like I have been stuck inside that bubble, looking out for most of my sixty-five years. 

I am coming to believe that our perceptual view (specifically the part of those surroundings that we can sense and experience) is so limited. Yet, for some inexplicable reason it doesn’t feel that way. To us, it feels all-encompassing. It is all we know, so we easily mistake it for all there is to know. This viewpoint is an illusion, and it is one that virtually everyone shares. Please understand that this is not about European superiority now that I have escaped the confines of America; it is about diversity and freedom and the fantastic world that awaits our discovery if we dare. 

To paraphrase American naturalist Henry Beston, “We move finished and complete, gifted with extensions of the senses we have lost or never attained, living by voices we shall never hear. We are not brethren, we are not underlings; we are other nations, caught with ourselves in the net of life and time, fellow prisoners of the splendor and travail of the earth.”

Our senses filter in only what our institutions have brainwashed us to believe is right. Therefore, we must CHOOSE to learn about the rest. Our intuitions and programming will be our most significant liabilities, and our imaginations and questions will be our greatest assets. If we dare, our curiosity tells us that all is not as it seems and that everything we experience is but a filtered version of everything we can enjoy. Our world expands and deepens when we pay attention to other cultures and viewpoints. It reminds us that if we dare to take this journey, pleasure is to be desired, taboos broken, and boundaries destroyed.

Senses and experiences that seem abnormal only appear this way because we are so limited and painfully unaware of our limitations. Perhaps the only true quest—would be not only to visit strange lands—but to possess other eyes to see the unlimited universes that await us. Every day can be like approaching a Van Gogh and seeing what the brushstrokes look like up close. It means that whenever we exhale, we purge the shame, guilt, and judgment from our body, causing our senses to come alive in new and extraordinary ways.

So hold onto your horses, or whatever your vehicle of enjoyment may be, because the next few posts will not be for the faint of heart and prudish of spirit. It is for those who dare to hope there is more to this life. Much more. 

Here are a few of myriad photographs from our visit. Click photo to enlarge.