Last night after the movie we decided to head over to the strip club. It was my first time, and I've been dying to go since I became legal.

Strippers are a unique breed. They strut around a smokey, dim lit building wearing little more than a head band across their entire body, yet they own you. You just can't mess with the strippers, because if you do, burlesque men will have your ass. And as I sat on a weathered couch and watched countless girls work the pole, I really began to feel bad for them.

I wondered if they liked their jobs, if their fathers knew their whereabouts, if they would tell their children they used to take their clothes off for money. Parading around the club, eyeing men who looked like they were willing to shell out twenty dollars for a lapdance, they perpetuated the ongoing fight of women being seen as pieces of meat by men. Men and women will never be equal, and that's the way it should be. Then I got a lapdance, not by my own choice, but rather forced along by the guys who had brought me. I tried to have a conversation with my stripper. I knew she wasn't going to break down and give me an in depth analysis of her psyche, but I just wanted to humanize her a little bit. But maybe she didn't want to appear human. Maybe it's best if you look at them from a distance and never think about whether they have emotions or if they're hungry or if it creeps them out to shake their asscheeks and mammories in the faces of men who have grown children. I kept comparing my body to each of theirs. I wondered how much money I would make if it was me on that stage with thirsty animals begging for some attention. One kid I was with got two lapdances. It was his first time, and he's kind of a dork, and I know he wanted the strippers to look at him with a glimmer in their eye that was beyond the course of business. He didn't understand why they kept coming around and asking if he wanted a private showing. Because he looks like a desperate hormonal teenager whose parents let him take the credit card so he can buy the newest xbox game online two weeks before it comes out. I kept thinking of those bad dreams I used to have where I was walking around naked and everyone could see and I was so desperate and cold.

The strip club came off as its own alternate universe where social norms need not apply. I guess it was a good experience, and probably something I'd only do once. I'm off to the concert now.