Retiring Victoria; but not her vision

Happy 2010!

After another 7 months or so of fairly intense blogging, I have decided to put Victoria to rest. This time peacefully… the last time I quit blogging out of exhaustion, (in 2006) I removed the entire blog site, and ironically, the web address was replaced by something pornographic. This time I retire her in peace and continue to hold the space. I’m not done blogging about sex, I’m just moving on… to intimographing. The new site is already there; ready to grow - www.intimography.com – but like a newborn baby, it needs my full attention. There are many other artists whose work on sexuality and honouring the human body I wish to present, to regroup, and to honour. And I want to tell you more about the Intimography art workshops that are set to begin in Montreal this Spring.

So I will continue to write, blog and draw, but as myself now, Colette Coughlin. I no longer need Victoria to shroud my identity or anon-o-mize my stories like when I started. What was written under Victoria’s veil was done so with all the freedom of a writer’s imagination, and while many of the stories were true, the persona also allowed me to invent or share others’ experience respectfully, since sex is not always the easiest subject to open up about – although obviously many people need to!

I want to thank the many, many, known and unknown people who have followed both of my blogs, my website and my artwork over the years. As hard as it is to commit to a “job” like this without financial rewards, the other forms of reciprocation; people’s support, comments, and attachment to this vision make it all worthwhile.

Let me tell you what it’s like to write a blog that gets read, followed, and commented on:  when my kids were babies a new kind of grocery cart was invented in Canada with a baby seat attached to the front, facing the person pushing the cart – they’re still around but were new to us then. I often brought the youngest shopping with me and strapped them into this seat, which is pretty much at adult eye level. As I hope is the experience for all parents, my babies stared at me absolutely adoringly from this perch. I pushed them around the store, taking items off the shelves and placing them in the cart, sometimes walking a few feet away and coming back to a pair of the most admiring eyes imaginable, cooing, and a goofy, loving smile. I always did my best to feed my babies healthily, as I have done my best to feed my sex blog readers with a loving, organic vision of the human body and sexuality.  Watching the visitor statistics grow and receiving reader feedback gave me a sense of intimate connection to people as well as a feeling of responsibility to maintain this loving space which has kept me going. I will continue to do this with the Intimography site… in concert with the growing family of artists and sex-positive workers who seek, like Victoria, to make our individual and collective visions and experiences of sexuality something to be honoured and celebrated and not to be ashamed of.

While the extended vision and the new version of Intimography grows over the next few weeks, I will post a simple retrospective of Victoria’s earliest blog work until now – and keep you posted on new developments as they grow. Thank you to my loving, supportive and faithful readers!

xox Colette Coughlin, one last time, as Victoria

Tags: Colette Coughlin, drawing, eroticism, internet, intimacy, intimography, love, pornography, sensuality, sex, sexuality, shame