Compatibility & Intimacy

There is a concept that the Mean Man refers to often. He calls it inverting the triangle of intimacy and he wrote about an essay about it a few years ago that can be read here. The idea is that in the bdsm community, we do these intensely intimate acts with people whom we may not know the basics about their lives and personality. Without getting that information first hand, humans tend to make assumptions about each other. "I like bondage and they like bondage, so we must be alike!"

This is something I have struggled with in the bdsm community quite a bit. I am not much for casual play, in fact it makes me extremely nervous. Usually I  know someone (or at least know of them) for a year or more before I get to the point of making a date.  The Mean Man teases me about putting people on a "2 year plan" when I tell him of a new crush.  That seems to be the average time length between me meeting someone new and hopping into bed with them. This whole bdsm thing is pretty damn intimate and I am not emotionally geared to random, fleeting intimacy with someone I'll probably not play with again.

What I have noticed I can do is slowly draw out that delving into intimate activities stage over years. I have some people in my life with whom I enjoy regular play dates that deepen a bit more each time we play. We just happen to only play once a year or so. It's very freeing to not have to worry about fitting these people into my daily life and a tremendous gift to pick up where we left off each time we get together. Online venues such as Twitter and Fetlife give me that little peek into a public part of their personality that helps me to avoid the trap of filling in the blanks with my fantasy of who I want them to be.

Occasionally, I will be approached by someone online or at a play party and I may seem to not appreciate the compliment that is within a request to play. Please understand my intimacy triangle is wide side down and I don't have hours enough in the day to get to know everyone who approaches me to see if we are compatible. Introduce yourself and we'll get to know each other in the community and see what happens in a few years.

"Bags are packed and I'm ready to go..."

Well, my bags are 3/4th packed for the trip to Shibaricon. Trying to fit two rope tops into 2 carry-on bags and 1checked bag is extremely difficult. If the Mean Man wasn't a photographer, we could probably do it. Now that I know we are going to have a second checked bag, I will probably add a few other things (such as the block and tackle) back into the mix. If we are going to pay for another piece of luggage, might as well maximize and fill it.

With about 20 minutes of packing this evening, we should be all ready to go. This afternoon I intentionally left open for packing, but I don't quite need it. I am fitting in lunch with an old friend as a treat for being so organized.  I think a nice long bath after waxing the kitty is in order, too. Since I have the time. Now that SEAF is almost completely wrapped up, I have tons of free time that I don't know what to do with it.

And in case you are looking for something to do tonight, check out Entwine, a performance by a dear friend of mine. My date is canceling on me due to an illness in her family. If you want to meet up with me, let me know. It would be great to have company.

Teaching as a Fetish

Overhead projectors an transparencies. Slideshows. Dry-Erase boards. A podium. A stack of notes and reference books.

These are the accouterments of my fetish. Things have to be just so; there is no winging it.  I will go off the syllabus and lesson plan, but I need those in place as a starting point. I have co-taught with other presenters who write their lesson plan on the bar napkin 30 minutes before the class start time and that does not work for me. It feel so incomplete. The entirety of the ritual is important. Reading; researching; correlating notes; writing out the plan; doing the run through and getting feedback; rewrites; an finally, class set up.

You would think with all the emphasis I place on prep time that I would freak out and lose my cookies if a workshop went off track. The opposite is true, though. Because I do all this prep, I can go on and on in an off direction, and the plan helps me figure out if I have covered all the point in the wandering. I once brought an early draft of my lecture notes instead of the final. Using the outline that I give as a hand out turned out to be all I needed to trigger my memory.Thank goodness I know my shit, eh?

New Suspension

Last night I went to the Grind's 10th anniversary. It was packed! I have been attending Grind semi-regularly for the last 6 years and it was interesting to realize that much the crowd has changed over the years. With the addition of the Chill and the RAW space, there hasn't been the same kind of packed, intense energy that was there last night. Even though the wait for a hard point was about 90 minutes, I loved the crowded feel. I hope people will remember how much fun the Grind is and attendance will be up.

Perhaps that is a bit tacky that I want there to be more people there so that I can get lost in the shuffle and ride the energy of a big crowd. I love playing at the Grind where the loud music and dark atmosphere envelope me and my partner, allowing us to create a bubble.  Exhibitionism isn't really my thing. If everyone would turn their backs while I was playing, that would be perfect. Yay for big crowds. Boo for big crowds watching me.

When we finally did get our turn on a hard point, it was toward the end of the evening. It always makes me a bit nervous how people when people start gathering when the Mean Man starts setting up a suspension. I did my stretches and focused on him and his movements. While I trust his knowledge, skill and experience when setting up his rig, its a good habit to watch a top make their rig. There is always the chance that I will catch a minor mistake and I always learn something. Tonight he had the block and tackle up, which meant we could get more creative with positioning since he could do all the tying on the ground and then lift me.

Trying to decide what to do is always tricky. I have so many persnickety body parts, figuring out how to tie me can take up a good portion on a scene. An inversion that could be turned into a hog-tie. Right-o! I love inversions, as they are so easy on my spine when he uses a 2 column tie on my legs. Hog-ties are a favourite of mine, as well, so restrictive. Yum!

With all the tying done, the Mean Man hoists me up. Laying underneath me, he swings and spins me while I feel him up. I love the feel of my hair swaying and losing and regaining eye contact due to the swinging.

"Ready to go up the rest of the way?"  As soon as I nod yes to his whispered question, he attaches an up line to the back of my chest harness, loops it through the ring and pulls to raise my torso, extending my back into an ever increasing arch. Halfway up, each pull elicits a loud groan from me that has people moving and looking over at our scene. A little embarrassing, but he starts me slowly spinning, so it's not easy to focus on what is going on around me any longer. My whole world consists of me and him and our connection. As the discomfort builds, he encourages me to move and I discover he has rigged the up lines so I can change the balance of my legs. I twist my hips so as to lie on my side and he uses one of the loose lines trailing from my bonds to spin me around. Tucking into a ball, I spin faster, building momentum. Releasing the tension in my body causes me to unfold and slow into a gentle, arching spin. In between  spins we lock eyes, touch hands and start the sequence again, looking for new variations.

These are the components of a good rope scene for me: connection, creativity, intensity and pleasure.

Shibaricon in 8 days!

Since SEAF concluded, I have been looking over the notes and outlines for the classes I'll be teaching at Shibaricon.  I do this every time I am scheduled to teach; add new information I have learned since the last time I taught a class.  Normally, there is only good that comes from these rewrites. Shibaricon, however, has their act so well together that the presenter information can no longer be changed. The deadline was a while ago, which is good for them getting things to the printer, but it sucks that I just made my handout better, but they have the old one.

The first page of the handout for "Stretching and Conditioning for Bondage" is going to be different. If you are are planning on joining me for that class, don't bother printing it out.  I'll be making copies for attendees. By all means, download it and take a peek, just keep in mind that the one I give out on Sunday the 30th will have more and diferent information.

Also, the "Head Games" class is going to be much more rope bondage focused than the description will lead you to believe. Of course, I will include a lot of info about general bdsm shenanigans that involved the head and neck.  If you do hair bondage, floorwork where the bottom tends to roll around, head bondage, partial and or full suspension, or you happen to be a rope bottom who has a head and neck, you are definitely going to get a lot out of this class.

Poetry you can sink your teeth into.

David Jones. You have to say the name long and slow, really pull on that "n" to make the sound resonate.

This man is a poetic genius and savant. Have you ever met someone who spoke do lyrically and true it made your spine shiver? David Jones is that man. His words, whether crafted or extemporaneous, will take you on a journey full of depth and emotion.  He gives birth to both light and dark children (his poems) and loves them equally, he says. Though I suspect he favours the dark ones with their sharp wit and cruel observations about humans and their emotional shenanigans.

I am pleased that a dear friend has set him up with a web site. Keep your eyes open for some video of him reading. The man doesn't really read, so much as perform his poetry.  

my friend is performing!

Do you like weird performance art or modern dance?

Cody, the progenitor of the Creature performances, has a new dance piece that is showing at the end of this month. I adore watching her move and she often times takes the road less traveled, delving into the darker side of happy things. Admittedly, if I heard that Cody was going to sneeze on stage, I would still want to check it out because she is so talented.

Brown Paper Tickets is selling tickets for both the Thursday May 27th and the Friday May 28th performances, both with 8pm start times. I am going to attend the Thursday evening showing, as I will be at Shibaricon on Friday.

It's that kind of day.

I want to stay in bed and masturbate all day. Unfortunately, I do have to work and run two errands for SEAF.  And I did promise myself I would go around Greenlake this afternoon.

So, I can't stay in bed all day, but I think I will get back in bed later in the afternoon. I already had a lovely time this morning with my hand and a story on Literotica. My evening plans fell through, so an auto-erotic date would be one of the best ways to spend the evening.

It's really too bad that I have stuff to do. The last time I spent all day in bed masturbating I got up to five orgasms. It would be fn to try and break that record!

Art for Sale!

This is one of my favourite photographers. Not only as an appreciator; she is also to work with. I have suffered for her art and it is so worth it! You can go to her blog for more info and you can view images on her Flickr account or her DeviantArt profile.

She only puts her prints on sale like this once in a great while. The last time she did, I gave myself a present of 2 small and 1 large print. Her botanical shots are truly breath-taking, more so because they are unusual for her to do. I have a print of a curled fern frond in black and white that is simple and lyrical. It's a shame they don't seem to be either of the links she provides. That is the hazard of following an artist for a long time, you have fond memories of a certain period they went through that they have moved on from.

Corset photo.

Fulfilling the request for a photo of my new corset from One Wilde Knight. It's a bit low and loose in the bust, so I have to be careful about how high or when I raise my arms or my nipples peek out. It does make a fun party trick, though.

Photo courtesy of Michael Rosen.

Well, now. A bit uppity aren't they?

While I have never been a fan of Facebook, this article left me a bit disturbed. I feel very similar to when I discovered that *I* was the product radio stations were selling to advertisers. Nope, I don't think so.

I just spent 20 minutes navigating through all the various privacy options and menus in order to  put some damage control on what is "public" info about me. I opted out wherever possible and took a bunch of stuff down. I am not going to hardcore route of taking my profile down. I don't use it often enough to make much of a difference if I leave, and therefore not much of a protest vote.

Bike porn.

While on a walk, the Mean Man and I came upon an Enfield motorcycle. We couldn't tell if it had been restored, or was a vintage replica. Either way it was gorgeous and it felt a bit sacrilegious that it was parked on the street rather than in a garage. Looking at the bits of rust on the pipes, we discussed proper motorcycle care. The Mean Man burst out, "If I left this bike out on the street, you would chew my ass out for not bringing it into the living room during the winter!"

Damn right I would harass him. Some bikes are art that deserve to be babied and cared for so indulgently.

Almost human.

Putting on a Festival as big as the Seattle Erotic Art Festival takes a lot of time and energy from a lot of people. I am not the only one who is tired and shell-shocked, by any means. 

All of us on the organizing committee have different ways of decompressing. One leaves town and spends a long weekend in an undisclosed locale without internet or cell reception. Lots of sleeping happens. Me, I lay out in the sun with a good book. I started reading What the Dog Saw: And Other Adventures by Malcolm Gladwell and thoroughly enjoying it. So with book in hand, I went out and found a nice out of the way place where I can get nekkid in relative privacy.  Luckily, the only person around who could object digs the idea of naked people outside his window. So I should be set for the summer!

Today I had company. You would think that after such a huge social event such as SEAF I would relish some alone time. Nope, I was eager to find someone with which to share my sunny hide-away. Armed with blankets, lemon water and sunglasses, a dear friend, with whom I can share my stresses and woes, headed out for a few hours of lounging. One of the best parts was knowing that next time we meet up, he may be the one who needs to vent. It's good to have a friend who you can spill your guts to and know they aren't going to think ill of you, no matter how much you whine.

Cathartic conversation is better than a good book. Sometimes. But I still want to get back to that book.