Note: This story was dynamically reformatted for online reading convenience. >The Dress, Part 0 Ok, so I finally decided to go through with this. Some time ago I posted a thread asking for help locating an old story of mine -" a dozen or so years old -" from the days when the USENET newsgroups were pretty much the only game in town. There was no Voyeurweb yet. There were no websites yet to provide eye candy to the millions of incipient porn addicts around the world. Pics were downloadable, usually blind (no thumbnails or previews), but were universally tiny, grainy, scanned from print and came down your telephone line in units called baud. The concept of mega-bits-per-second was still a fantasy for the common schmo. These were still the dark ages, when the promise of the internet as we know it still could be seen only as a glow over the horizon.. Well it was back in the dark ages that Mrs and I actually turned a corner that took us away from the rather narrowly-drawn lives we had been leading and down paths increasingly marked by the more vibrant colors of sexual adventurism. (Lest anyone be confused about us -" always withn the bounds of a solid marriage.) Came a time when we were approaching the Christmas season with its various parties, both compulsory and not. Mrs at the time was a partner in a rather progressive company and was obliged to attend the annual party thrown by the partners for the benefit of all the employees. It was always a fun event, with part of the fun being the way that the barriers normally separating the various tiers of the company tended to get nicely blurred. Mrs moved easily among these tiers, so this party made for some great mixing. In prior years, Mrs had always attended the company Christmas party in very conservative dress. She was, after all, a partner. She felt bound to that image. After a couple of years, however, it was clear that that was an unnecessarily conservative view, and I was hoping to see her limber up a little bit. For years we had been practicing nudists, so the mere fact of showing skin was not at issue. We had already been to one Lifestyles convention (stories elsewhere) so being overexposed and even provocatively exposed was not at issue. It was, understandably, the social and professional context that was at issue; this event was about her business, her partners, her staff, her professional reputation -" all those things matter in real life. I respected that, but sill hoped to see her loosen up a little bit. I believed it should be possible for a strong, professional woman to be confidently sexy, and carry it off with class. So, well in advance of the anticipated party, I set myself the task of finding Mrs something to wear that would at least be more flattering than her traditional fare, and, hopefully, at least get into the grey zone of -sexy -. That turned out to be a very challenging task. In those days, Mrs formed her opinions almost instantly upon trying a garment on, so I had to come up with options that would appeal to her tastes almost instantly while also fitting perfectly. She -(TM)s mellowed on this tremendously over the years, but at this time she was likely to accept or reject within 5-10 seconds of putting a garment on, leaving little room for persuasion or adjustment. I took the task on in masculine fashion. I took one of her dresses that fit her very comfortably and measured it out. I found the shortest dress in her closet that she wore comfortably and measured its length to give me a benchmark. Of course, I hoped to find something shorter, but not so much shorter to trigger her reject button. With these measurements in hand, I went shopping. Ladies, I -(TM)m sure you have plenty of experiences having to fend off pushy salespeople, but you have NO IDEA what it -(TM)s like to be a man shopping in a women -(TM)s clothing store/department. Every salesperson/associate seems to think that men are complete idiots, utterly helpless, and without any clue or taste. Five feet into the store/department and I -(TM)d be glommed onto by some lady who just couldn -(TM)t get her mind around the fact that I knew what I was doing and she didn -(TM)t. More than a few times I had to get downright rude to get them to leave me alone. Anyway -" I looked long and hard for anything -interesting -. Anything that caught my eye I would hang up straight and measure out with my own tape measure, comparing to my benchmark numbers. (Never mind S, M, L, size 6, 7, 10, 9/10, etc. There -(TM)s too much variation in those sizing systems to trust.) I ended up with a suite of 5-6 dresses of lengths varying from ankle (too long for my taste, but that dress had other properties I liked) to what I guessed would be a bit above mid-thigh (probably too short, but that dress had other properties I hoped *she* would like) and various lengths in between. The longest was a slinky black ottoman that I anticipated would just flow over her body, bringing out all her curves, but being flat black, was otherwise quite conservative. The shortest had a black base, but was overlain with silver spangles, making it quite festive looking. The base was slightly sheer, but only from certain points of view and in the right kind of light. The fabric was stretchy enough laterally that I anticipated it would fit comfortably even if my measurements were a little off, though it measured out well anyway. The day came when I had all these items together and tactfully sprung them on her. She was taken a little aback, because I -(TM)d never done anything like this before. I could see her having a flinch of negative reaction at first, thinking that I was trying to force her into something she would not be comfortable with, but as I stressed that I was just trying save her shopping hassle and that everything was returnable, she warmed to the idea rather quickly. Whew! We started with the ankle-length black ottoman. That was a good move. Without either of us ever speaking of it this way, she was impressed that something so conservative would be among the items I had bought. There was a little stumble when I stopped her as she started to try it on and asked her to remove her underwear for the practical reason that they would stand out under the clingy fabric. She glared at me and put it on over bra and knickers anyway. The prospect of going to the company party sans underwear was NOT acceptable. Ok. She had never worn a dress like that, but she immediately liked it. She kept remarking on how wonderful the fabric felt. Looking at her reflection in the patio door, she admired the silhouette she cut. And, she realized that her underwear really did mess up the lay of the fabric, so she consented to take them off -" just for now, just at home -" and she tried it on again. Perfect. She *really* liked it. But there was no chance she would wear it to the company party. There was no way she would go without full under armor. But, it was a keeper. We still have it and it -(TM)s still a favorite, and, she always wears it nude beneath. We proceeded to shorter and shorter lengths, finding disappointment in each one until we finally arrived at the last option, the shortest, the silver and black. After the first dress, she had left her underwear off, so the first noteworthy thing about this last dress was that it slid easily on her skin and just slipped into place as if designed specifically for her figure. She somehow -felt - it fitting perfectly, because she smiled subtly without even looking at her reflection. As she adjusted it, she realized where it fell on her body and she gulped; her face flashed a little nervous smile and she muttered, -This is shooort! - Indeed it was. With this dress there really was no point in trying to gauge its length by the traditional -inches above the knee - -" that number would be too large to be meaningful. It is more clear to say that it stopped about two inches below the edge of her butt ... maybe a little more if she tugged it, but it wouldn -(TM)t stay. She then turned toward her reflection in the patio door, turning this way and that, obviously happy with what she saw. Then, without even looking back over her shoulder at me she said, -I can wear this. - In many long-term experiences it is possible to look back to identify turning points. That simple phrase -I can wear this - was ours. It doesn -(TM)t matter that -I can wear this - meant -with bra and knickers and pantyhose and an overcoat. - She took the step that put us on a path in a different direction. She took it with my help, and we set out on that new path together. It was the right choice at the right time for us. THE DRESS that made the difference remains in Mrs -(TM)s closet, and gets pulled out once in a great while for special occasions, though no longer with bra nor knickers nor pantyhose nor overcoat (well ... maybe the overcoat) Way back a dozen years ago, I was posting now and then on alt.sex.exhibitionism using the nic -NoMan -. The experience just described and the ensuing events leading up to and through the company Christmas party attracted some considerable attention from the a.s.e. -community -, so I chronicled those events in several pre-stories and one large concluding tale. Unforunately (or maybe fortunately) the pre-stories seem to have been lost, which is really the reason for this post. The final tale was also lost to me until recently, but I had some good luck and finally found it -out there - with the help of yahoo. I was going to edit it -" for many reasons, including a little embarassement at the writing style -" but I finally decided to post it in its original form. Sort of a time capsule. So without further ado, please enjoy, THE DRESS, Parts 1, 2, & 3. For length reasons, these will probably be posted as separate threads; I -(TM)ll have to see what happens as I try to post them. (Please do not confuse this or any part of it with another thread that has plagiarized my title.) Pix (a.k.a. NoMan)