If I heard anyone say of me `fucking comes to her as easily ‘as breathing’, I would agree more than willingly because the expression could be taken literally. My first sexual experience, and many others since, took place in circumstances which could lead one to believe that oxygen has an aphrodisiac effect on me. My nudity feels more complete to me out in the open than in a closed room. When the surrounding temperature, whatever it may be, can be felt by an area of skin it doesn’t normally reach, such as the small of the back, the body no longer presents an obstacle to the air, it is penetrated by it and is, therefore, more open, more receptive. When the atmosphere which embraces the vastness of the world adheres to the surface of my skin like a myriad tiny suction pads, my vulva also feels as if it has been drawn out and dilates deliciously. If a gentle wind blows across its threshold, the feeling is amplified: the labia feel bigger than eves gorged with the air brushing past them. I will speak later, and in more detail, about erogenous zones, but I can say even now that even the gentlest attention to the oft ignored area which links the anal depression to the triangle where the labia meet – that under-rated rut between the arsehole and the beginning of the cunt – is guaranteed to subjugate me, and that feeling the air against that part of my body is more intoxicating than high altitude. I like opening up my buttocks and my legs to the flow of air.
Excerpt from Catherine Millet, Sexual Life of Catherine M, Serpent’s Tail, 2003