CHRIS Grady is talking about his dangly bits. Apparently he’s not entirely satisfied with what he’s been apportioned. This isn’t an intimacy he’s chosen to share with me alone. Chris is standing on a stage in front of roughly 60 people (male and female) contentedly discussing his naked body and his sexual preferences.

Welcome to the Sex School for Grown-Ups, a series of lectures about the touchy-feely, puffy-panty, rolling around under the covers business which most of us would probably prefer not to discuss in public. Going further, I’d say it’s safe to assume the majority of the adult population would quite happily lock all that frisky Freudian fun and fumble away in a padlocked trunk labelled: ‘Oi! Back Off, Bud! Never You Mind How I Get My Kicks!’

Not Chris, though. His trunk is swinging wide open and he’s happy to share.

He informs the audience at Glasgow’s CCA that he works in theatre as a creative producer, has a wife, children and, rather late in life, discovered a passion for naturism.

This desire to get naked in front of like-minded individuals eventually led him to explore the polyamorous and trans lifestyles. His wife, he says, is happy for him to enjoy these excursions.

Winnie the Pooh

Chris is perhaps not what you would immediately expect a polyamorous expedition-leader to look like. He may spend his free time in the buff, but he’s not in possession of a buff bod.

In truth there’s something of the Winnie The Pooh about him. A slightly pudgy, amiable, softly-spoken chap, it’s not hard to imagine Chris ambling through the Hundred Acre Wood with Eeyore in tow, on the hunt for Christopher Robin and a tree full of honey.

However, it’s not the placid English forest of childhood innocence that Chris has spent years wandering, but the lush, verdant rain forest of adult relationships.

He’s been a naturist for 20 years. A period of time, he says wryly, that has been spent: “Coming to terms with my lack of an Adonis body.”

Perhaps more problematic than this physical drawbacks has been the lack of a connection with his fellow naturists. They may have come together through a love of the all-together, but that doesn’t necessarily mean they have much else in common.

“When I’m with other naturists their conversation invariably ends up being about holiday destinations, caravan specifications or where to park,” he sighs.

This is rather frustrating for Chris, being an arty sort of fellow. However, he has enjoyed some success in combining his interest in nudity with a passion for theatre. A while ago he organised a special performance of the musical Hair. The show is celebrated (or notorious, depending on your taste) for a particular scene where all the actors appear naked on stage.

But even though Hair is already fairly transgressive, Chris wanted to push the boundary of what is acceptable further still. He arranged a special performance where it wasn’t the actors, but the audience, who appeared minus their clothes. A triumphant occasion according to Chris, who recalls the event with relish. “The amount of genitalia at eye-level was quite staggering,” he says.

He’s now a passionate advocate for something he calls Clothing Optional Theatre, which, I’m assuming, could give a whole new meaning to the Shakespearian line: “Is this a dagger I see before me?” (Nope, Macbeth, it’s not. That’s a very different kind of pointy weapon you’re staring at.)

Hug radar

Chris isn’t the only speaker at the Sex School for Grown-Ups. There’s a moving and rather brave speech from a bloke called Hussein, who declines to give his second name. He discusses his struggle to overcome an addiction to online pornography and forge a more intimate and loving relationship with his partner.

An artist called Sharon McKay chats about the erotic aspects of her paintings, and a scientific-looking fellow called Michael Dresser, who is a certified member of an organisation called the School of Consent, draws a diagram for us to study. It has an X axis and a Y axis and could easily be the sort of sketch an economist would provide to explain fluctuating demand and supply in the retail industry. It turns out to be a graph used by Michael to attempt to describe, with mathematical-like precision, when it is, or isn’t, acceptable to give someone a hug.

Personally I’d hope that most people are in possession of a fairly well-attuned hug radar, and are fully aware when a friendly squeeze is warranted, and when it’s not. For instance… visiting your aged grandma? Hug away. Showering with a bunch of strangers in the gym? Hold back on that hug, fella.

But maybe I’m being too flippant. After all, the sea of sexual relationships is stormier than it’s been for quite some time. The old maps and navigational tools that brought voyagers safely to shore don’t seem to be working as competently as once they did. We are living in the era of the Me Too movement; of allegations regarding the behaviour of Harvey Weinstein, Prince Andrew, Kevin Spacey and many others.

Sexological bodyworker

So perhaps the Sex School for Grown-Ups provides a sort of lighthouse to help the unwary and naive avoid being dashed on the jagged rocks of romance. There certainly seems to be a hunger for this sort of event. It’s a Saturday evening, the enticing bars and clubs of Sauchiehall Street surround the CCA, yet the lecture hall is packed.

Alison Pilling and John Fraser, who jointly organised the evening, believe that people can indeed be educated to enjoy sex in much the same way as the rudiments of trigonometry are learned, or the salient points regarding the Battle of Bannockburn.

Alison, who is based in Yorkshire and is an 'intimacy and consent' coach, says she found herself, at the age of 48, unfulfilled and floundering in the ways of the flesh.

“I always had this idea that there was more to sex than what I was experiencing,” she says. “I’d had fairly conventional relationships. Nothing that was as good as I thought it should be.”

So she started to explore and learn.

John had a similar experience. In 2014 he trained to become a Sexological Bodyworker, which means he helps couples and individuals to enjoy better sex lives. He was also a Glasgow-based divorce lawyer for over 30 years, though stopped practicing earlier this year. He says the bodywork training he undertook has made him comfortable and relaxed about his own body, and the bodies of others: “It’s really made me much more confident,” he says. “And much more male. I’d always been a very intellectual guy. I was confident with ideas and arguments. But I was a lot less confident sexually and physically. That’s all changed now.”

But surely this whole evening has been an attempt to intellectualise what is essentially a physical act? There have been speeches, theories, graphs. Yet at the end of the night everybody remains fully clothed. And we’re all vertical rather than horizontal.

Alison and John smile. “Obviously the idea isn’t just to have a series of lectures and leave it at that,” says Alison. “We certainly don’t want this to just be an endeavour of the mind. What we’re interested in is broadening people’s ideas about what’s possible and what’s out there. So it has to start with talk, but we’re also very much about action!”

For more information about the Sex School for Grownups: www.sexschoolforgrownups.com