I don’t know if employing the services of escorts is more in vogue these days, but talking about escorts certainly is.  It’s hard to miss the books, the television series and the blogs.  Most of these offer what seems to be a bit of an airbrushed take on the profession.  I have a hard time buying it.

Is prostitution necessary? Yes, I think I’d have to say it is, perhaps serving as some kind of relief valve for society.  And it shouldn’t be illegal.  Cleaned up and regulated, certainly, but we don’t have to look far to see what happens when we apply legal prohibition to human vices.  War on Drugs, anyone?

There’s a fantasy element to the escort scene, to be sure, both for men and women.  It’s far removed from the dirt and danger of street hooking.  If it’s not quite respectable, then escorting has at the very least a veneer of acceptability, conferred by the involvement of large sums of money.  Maybe there’s a class aspect to this, too, since the escorts we hear about in popular media are not renting themselves out to bus drivers, or autoworkers.  They’re well-treated by senior executives, entrepreneurs… and senators and governors.

The stories we’re told often suggest that the men shell out as much for an emotional connection as for the sex.  I doubt that’s really the case, very often.  I remember a line from a 1990s comedian.  He talked about how no one goes to McDonald’s because the food is so terrific.  You can get a better burger at any number of restaurants.  But you can get a McDonald’s burger in seconds!  He recommended a new slogan:  “McDonald’s… it’s ready.”  I suspect instant gratification has a lot to do with the escort market.  If you have a phone, a few hundred dollars and little time or interest to put into acquiring the unpaid variety of sex, Secret Nights™ is for you.  "She's ready."  All major credit cards accepted.

I’ve also heard, and I’ll bet you have too, about the purported advantages of escorting for women.  "I work for myself.  My hours are flexible.  I make a lot of money."  Surely there’s some truth to this.  Yet there must be huge disadvantages as well.  "I can’t have a normal love relationship with a normal person, because of what I do to pay the bills.  I have to lie constantly to my friends and family.  The longer I do this, the greater the gap in my résumé, and the less chance I have of ever securing a regular job again."

Another thing about escort stories is that the women involved tend to be portrayed as educated, accomplished and cultured – more along the lines of a classical courtesan of past ages.  This leaves me skeptical, and it’s not quite my own experience.  No, not that kind of experience. 

A few years ago, I lived in a mid-to-high end condo in a relatively good part of the city.  It was near some nice hotels, and made a convenient HQ for escorts.  Soon after moving in, I met a woman by the pool.  Very pretty.  We chatted briefly and thereafter we greeted each other frequently in the elevator.  As a naïve young man, it took me awhile to twig to the lady’s chosen work.  One day, back at the pool, she invited me to join her and a group of her friends having an impromptu party on the sunny deck.

It was enlightening.  It didn’t take long before they began to talk business, a constant flow of pre-mixed drinks loosening tongues and, I imagine, removing worries about an outsider in their midst.  These attractive, young(-ish) women, were all in the same industry.  I got to listen in on a kind of escort “focus group”.

These were not the escorts of soft-focus literary fantasies.  Not educated, not refugees from office life, not the aristocratic courtesans of old.  My impression was that they were probably perfectly nice girls who came to the city without much in the way of work credentials, and who opted to take a couple of shortcuts in life.  It also seemed to me that it had cost them on a number of levels. 

They certainly partied hard.  When they worked, they were out late and lamented their drinking and drug use, though they didn’t seem disposed to slowing down.  When they weren’t working, they were out late, almost always with each other, because it was hard to keep “civilian” friends.  And getting out of bed in the afternoon regularly begins to take a toll as you enter your 30s.  Beneath their tans I could see early signs of a life that was harder on them than they might once have anticipated.

And there was something else.  Perhaps a kind of coarseness, or callousness, and a certain hard cynicism.  I’m no expert, but I’d surmise that it had something to do with treating their clients, and themselves, very much as a form of commodity in constant value transactions.

This is nothing but anecdotal evidence, of course.  I’m sure there are many escorts who could object that their own situation is different and better.  And my final take on this is purely subjective.

At the end of a long, hot afternoon by the pool, my acquaintance from the condo made a tipsy approach to me.  I have no idea if she was offering to spend personal or professional time with me.  Either way, I begged off as politely as I could.  I’d seen and heard a fair bit.  And for the life of me, I couldn’t find a damned thing sexy about this woman.

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