JACLYN LYTLE
The Fulcrum (University of Ottawa)

OTTAWA (CUP) — It’s late and the street corner is dark. Lacking a streetlight, or even the neon glow of an “open” sign, there is something sad about this scene.

The night is dreary and cold; spitting rain slowly drenches the sidewalk and the hair of the woman standing upon its pavement. Flaunting torn fishnets and a set of old stiletto heels, she peers out into the dark night, eagerly awaiting her next prospect.

Her eyes lift excitedly as a car approaches, and she adjusts her skirt to make it sit as short as she can. Illuminated by little more than the moonlight, the girl leaning in through the open window of the car paints a striking vignette.

The scene screams: This is what a prostitute looks like.

Or is it?

A tall, natural-looking woman with long, dark hair falling into her makeup-free face, Tara Miller* does not look like a stereotypical prostitute. Instead, she is the picture of an eager student, clutching a coffee and heavily laden with a backpack full of books. A daughter, activist, undergraduate and a girlfriend, Miller is a woman of many interests. She is also a sex worker.

“I’m pretty open about it,” said Miller. “I think it busts a lot of myths about who is a sex worker. I think people perceive me to be smart, independent and involved in political activism. I do all these things, and am also an escort. That really challenges [people’s ideas] of who is an escort.”

Getting involved in the underground

Miller has not long been involved in the sex trade. Relatively new to her profession, she explains that her choice to become a call girl was not based upon necessity or intimidation as some people might expect. In fact, Miller came up with the idea on her own and, after spending some time weighing the pros and cons of her tentative career, was inspired to take the plunge into prostitution last fall.

“I met someone in one of my classes who outed themselves as a sex worker as their introduction,” Miller explained. “After talking to her, I did some research for three months, going back and forth with the idea.”

Some may say her indecision could reveal some apprehension. On the contrary, Miller says her desire to involve herself in the sex trade has always been firm. “This was something I wanted to do,” she said.

A bit unsure of how to get started, Miller is thankful for the experience of meeting another more experienced sex worker who proved instrumental in helping her prepare for her foray into a new career.

“She basically became my mentor,” Miller said. “The first thing she did was grab a piece of paper and wrote down all the things I needed to do, and then helped me book a hotel for the next week.”

After so many months of deliberation, Miller said she was both anxious and excited for her first encounter with a client.

“All of a sudden it was coming. Bam,” said Miller. “I was super nervous, but I’m really glad that it happened because it gave me a deadline.”

Dealing with the day-to-day

Now that she has made a name for herself in the Ottawa sex scene, Miller is more than used to the everyday experience of engaging in sex acts for money. Still, she admits there are some aspects of the job that still surprise her.

“I thought it would be little work for a lot of money,” she said. “In reality, there is the time I put in with actual clients, and also the time I put into advertising, maintaining a clean space, and maintaining my body in a way that is appropriate to feminine gender norms. That takes up a lot of time.”

Charging $220 an hour, Miller does make good money, especially for a student. Although her full-time studies are important to her, Miller admits that she is often forced to sacrifice school to focus on her work — at least for the time being.

“It’s really good pay, but I have a hard time balancing school and work,” she said. “I’m prioritizing work a lot because that’s the way it needs to be in the beginning. It’s like starting a business.”

Luckily for Miller, however, her academic excellence does not require her to work more often than she would like.
“I’ve been on a four-year scholarship since I started university,” she said. “Right now, this is just covering my rent and living expenses.”

Monstrous misconceptions

While Miller admits to being stressed by the extent to which her work detracts from her studies, she is clear about the advantages to focusing on her work while establishing herself in the industry. The most important benefit is the luxury of defining her services on the basis of intimacy, instead of just sex.

“I want to offer an intimate encounter, not just a quick fuck,” she said. “Some escorts are okay with doing the most extravagant shit”¦ and not talking to their clients at all, but I want to build a connection with the person that I’m with. I find that it helps my performance, and I enjoy it more.”

Miller feels the type of connections she is able to establish with her clients would surprise most people.

There’s a misconception “that all clients must be inherently over-sexual beings who want to release their frustrations on prostitutes,” she said. “My clients are actually great people who I have great conversations with during sessions.”

Establishing an intimate, private connection with each of her clients has even allowed Miller to learn some important things about herself.

“I’ve learned a lot about how I interact with strangers and how my body interacts with strangers,” she explained. “I never thought I would be able to be so intimate with someone; to convey that sense of intimacy is something I didn’t know I could do.”

Miller regards the suggestion that her work may be dehumanizing with utter disdain. Instead, she feels that involving herself in her new career has been an extremely constructive experience.

“It has actually been really positive,” she said. “I feel so much more comfortable with my body, [and] in general I just feel great all the time.”

Changing our attitudes, one hour at a time

Though Miller has learned a lot about herself and about her clients, she notes that the most important part of her experience thus far has been the way it inspires her as an activist.

“On the surface, it’s women selling their bodies to men,” she said. “But, in a nutshell, my encounters with clients have been more about pleasure and consent than my encounters with men outside of my work.”

Already involved with various body-positive groups in the community, Miller is passionate about advocating for the rights of sex workers in both a legal and a social sense.

“To decriminalize sex work is not going to remove the stigma. It’s a start, and maybe it will give us more access to resources that are not available now, like health care and police [protection],” she argued. “The battle [won’t be] over after these laws are changed, which they are going to be. The government is putting out a preposterous argument saying that it’s not their obligation to protect sex workers.

“We aren’t asking for protection; we’re asking not to be endangered. There’s a difference. The law is actively putting us in danger. What we want is to be left alone.”

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image: Candace Gray/Flickr