Thursday, November 29, 2007

Leaving for BRXX today

So for what it's worth, we're off to Black Rose XX this evening. The packing is MOSTLY under control. I was up far too late last night trying to decide what of all the tools I didn't need to pack. Yes, we've reached the odd point of not what to pack, but of what not to pack.

Personally, I'm convinced that once we're at the hotel and settled in I'll somehow have an absolute need for something I left, that usual ONE THING I didn't know I needed, until I did. Maybe someday I'll get this down to some form of exact science, in the mean time, I'm just trying to figure out the best way to keep everything together, organized, and safe.

Oh, and how to keep crinoline from wrinkling to death. These are the life skills they never taught us in home ec, how to keep fetishwear looking fresh in an overstuffed suitcase... .

We're still at home, but already I've seen a few things that really have me wondering as to how much of this we're actually going to be able to enjoy. At this moment, I'd say we're tottering on some edge between 'deeply conflicted' and 'tell me again why we're doing this?'

But that was part of the point, to see what it looks like over there, complete with all BR's history, underlying assumptions, and 'inside the beltway-ness'. But then, me? I've never really gotten my head around the primarily 'het' end of this. Not that BR specifically is, it just seems to so often end up primarily that way.

Not in that the people themselves always identify as het, but in that history and visibility-wise that's the impression left. While there will be leather and Queers, it's not Leather, for lack of a better way of putting it (with the history and social protocols that entails,) and BR 'queerness' sometimes seems to come down to 'bi-sexual when my owner wants'- almost universally on womyn's profiles. Bi as activity not as identity.

Worse, people tend to mistake Sir and I for a 'het' couple, which annoys me. We're always more complicated than first glance impressions, but many people never get beyond such. Then again, those (who dismiss at first glance based on assumptions) may be the very people I would ultimately find myself least interested in spending time with, as well.

So it's an 'adventure'. BR is its own thing, and part of the reason we decided to go in the first place was to see exactly that.

To the extent I can I'm trying to maintain both an openness to the experience itself and willingness to take fun where I find it. Who knows, I may find myself in the midst of a better time than I anticipate. It is always possible that we'll run across some really interesting people and have a lot to talk about.

I'm actually trying to be somewhat social (despite my hide under a rock tendencies.) I'm interested in meeting other womyn at the event. Naturally, they appear to have only set one night for the womyn's only dungeon, and of course, it's relatively early on in the event, and the womyn's meet-up of sorts is the following day. Completely backwards. That would be an event scheduling pet peeve of mine, it's a structural problem. In any case, some folks will be around at the meet and mingle tonight, so we're aiming to be in for that.

Some of it will no doubt annoy the hell out of me, but if nothing else, the National Gallery of Art is nearby, there are plenty of good restaurants, and there's nothing stopping us from going up to our room, closing the door and enjoying some 'us' time.

Tuesday, November 27, 2007

Last night

Unreal.

I~love~Sir.

Sunday, November 25, 2007

Our anniversary

So as of this weekend, Sir and I have been together 11 years.

That's an accomplishment.

Not just 'together', but having done things like traveling together, overland for months at a time, over and over again, and no, not killed one another. If anything, we travel well together. We spend much more time together than most couples, and yet, it really works. Even I marvel at it sometimes. Most of the time, though, we're so in the midst of living it that we don't stop and think about it.

We came together at a 'play' party that was being held over the course of a sci-fi con 11 years ago. Although that particular weekend, I have the feeling we were both pretty much there for the party far more the con itself.

I'd known him before that, as a friend. Well, even that's somewhat complicated to explain, I suppose the simple version is we have an 'ex' in common. He was her partner for a time, and she was a dear friend of mine I had slept with. They had come to an end by the time he and I finally got together. But she was an important part of that evening that we got together. It was due to their previous relationship and her having spoken to me about their time together that I felt I could trust him.

Ironically, about the last thing I was looking for that particular evening was any kind of ongoing relationship, let alone life partner, certainly not a Sir. But of course, at the time, he didn't identify as a Sir, and that's part of what made everything possible.

In any case, our coming together is a long complicated saga unto itself, and not what I'm trying to write this evening.

What I did want to write about was Saturday morning. In the wee hours, before the sun came up, and just before the moon was full, I gave Sir a token of sorts.

As he has placed a titanium bracelet around my right wrist as a sort of 'collar' that can always be worn I wanted to give him a symbol of his ownership as well. No, not as a form of reciprocity, or as an always worn item, just as a tangible token from me to him.

This weekend does not mark the anniversary of the collar, but it marks the anniversary of our coming together, the beginning of our relationship, and it was that that I wanted to celebrate. The symbolism of the collar goes to the very core of our relationship, my submission to him and trust in him was where we began.

Deciding on precisely what tangible token would be most appropriate was somewhat difficult. Sir is not a jewelry person.

He appreciates the band I wear on many levels, one of which being its "machined" quality and the nearly seamless visual it presents to first glance. It is solid, and hinged, its locking mechanism appears as nothing more than a small black dot on the side. The cuff is smooth, and brushed metal, and 'heavy', (in as much as titanium is, anyway.)

The more I thought about it, was the more I realized that his 'not a jewelry person'-ness was part of what made a bracelet of his own (for his left wrist, naturally) the correct choice, in that he would only wear it sometimes. After searching, I found what I was looking for, a carefully milled brushed titanium piece that in some ways is a matching 'opposite' to the one I wear.

The piece I found for him is openwork, and a series of articulated links, it has a perfectly integrated clasp, easily undone. His is slightly more narrow than the symbol I wear, making it seem lighter, but still very masculine.

If what I wear could be mistaken for a piece of modern brushed metal jewelry, his could could be mistaken for a fancy watchband, sans watch of course.

So there, in the waxing moonlight, almost coming to fullness, I presented him with my small gift. Naturally, he understood it, what it meant, its importance, immediately. And perhaps a bit surprisingly, he actually liked it.

So I wear his band, at his will. I don't cognize the piece of metal about my wrist "mine". I may 'slip' and refer to the two as "mine" and his for clarity's sake, but ultimately, I view them both as his. I certainly wouldn't call the band he wears "mine" or as in any way marking him as mine. It is more a symbol of the fact that I am grateful for the honour of wearing his collar every day of my life. I take none of this for granted.

This past decade has been some of the best years of my life.

We are not married, and to be honest we are both deeply conflicted over the idea of marriage, (despite the fact that we have come to a place where it is being seriously considered) but his collar means more to me than perhaps a wedding ring would.

A wedding ring, for us, would in many ways be about State recognition of our pre-existing. The collar (which for daily purposes I wear on my right wrist) is a huge portion of that pre-existing. It is an integral part of our relationship, and thing without which I am unsure whether our relationship would be. It is about his ownership and responsibility and my relationship to that and to him.

The collar was hard won, and earned. For us, it symbolizes a lifelong commitment to one another, reguardless of whether we are together as a couple or not. I am deeply honoured and proud to be allowed to wear it.

My gift to him was just a small ways of saying so. A way of saying I never forget what it is to wear his symbol.

As for other ways of marking the anniversary, in some ways, they will have to wait. This week is a bit crazy for us, what with preparations for BRXX as well as the rest of our day to day lives, but we both know we will eventually make some real time for us. Probably some over the course of BRXX, but also some thereafter.

I have the feeling that difficult as BRXX may turn out to be for us, at least some of it will be a time and place where we close the doors, shut the outside world away, and just really enjoy being together.

I'm looking forward to that.

Wednesday, November 7, 2007

My Raincheck

So, by way of 'making up for' not getting the whips out over the course of a recent event, Sir had more or less given me a 'raincheck'. Which is what we finally got around to the other morning.

Sir was up early in the morning, and after I came down he eventually headed upstairs to shower saying maybe we could get around to something thereafter. I waited downstairs and went about my morning, not sure whether to expect anything or not. Eventually he called down and told me I was to come up to him.

I came to the big bedroom (which is also sort of our 'Work' room) to find him standing inside dressed all in black with a wicked grin on his face. (Eventually, I may get to a post about the room we primarily use, but for now, it will suffice to say it's "His" room, our bedroom, and clearly his domain. I have rooms of my own as well, although they are such at his pleasure.)

I stood outside the door and undressed (as it's the room I don't wear clothing in without explicit permission, one of our few rules) then by his permission, entered.

At the foot of the bed, there's a soft black bench with low arms at each end and lots of pillows; soft golden chenille and others with a shadowed black ornate floral orchid pattern. On days such as this, it is pulled out from the end of the bed, the pillows set aside, and the bench is then covered with a soft black sheet. It's just long enough for me to lie across comfortably, my head resting on one of the arms. Four black leather straps encircled each of the bench's legs, then come up towards the left and right raised ends. Across each end, Sir had attached two of the highly polished chrome spreader bars, each the width of the bench. On the bed laid several of my favourite whips, and the four black padded leather cuffs. Without saying a word, I knew what laid in store.

He told me to come around to the bed. Then lovingly, he buckled each cuff onto my limbs, first my wrists then my ankles. He crossed the room to the toolbox compartment organizers and pulled out four of the small nickel plated padlocks, then returned to me and proceeded to lock the cuffs onto me. This little 'ritual' of sorts in and of itself is enough to get me into a mindset.

(Soft black leather and shiny polished steel is very much our aesthetic. Metal and leather. Although somewhat ironically, I have no interest in many of the metal cuffs or collars we so often see. I suppose you could say we're both rather selective about our tools.)

He kisses me, and leads me across the bench, face down. Limb by limb, he clips the cuffs onto the spreader bars leaving me unable to escape, and a ready target. He ensures I'm comfortable, then disappears over towards the rack where we keep our whips hung. I'm not blindfolded, but I'm not sure I want to know, just yet, either. So I turn my head and close my eyes, giving over to him, and what he wants.

Anyone who has ever been sensually whipped can readily identify the two primary different sensations, 'thud' and 'sting'. For me, when I'm under Sir's whips, these two have two completely different effects. 'Thuddy' makes me sink, deep into a place where I've very inarticulate, but very pliant, and welcoming suggestion. 'Stingy' on the other hand, tries to lift me off of whatever I'm securely attached to, and leaves me fighting myself, begging for it to stop, and sometimes crying. (This does NOT however mean I actually want it to stop.) Each of these are their own head (and body) trip. It takes someone with a particular sense of timing and ability to 'read' me to combine them both over the course of a brief period. Neither of these are things I entrust to people I don't know well, as both leave me very emotionally raw.

Sir is one of the few people I know who can make me change gears as it were, between the two, and still leave me in a state where I actually enjoy it. Unfortunately, it's not something I find I can do often, and it takes both of us being in a particular state of mind and comfort to actually pull it off.

In any case, without telling me that was what he was about to do, that was the state he worked me into. Working from whips that can, when used a particular way feel more akin to a good massage, on to whips that once I'm warmed up, yes I can take, even though it's a most peculiar kind of enjoyment.

Back at the Floating World, we had found a flogger made of the satin cord it seems every kinky person has worked with or made something out of at some point. Just ordinary fabric store cord carefully woven into a nicely formed handle that felt good in my hand with a bazillion purple satiny tresses. The reason it came home, though, was that each of the tips had been carefully dipped repeatedly in 'tool dip', the rubber coating for tool handles. The balance was nice, and I knew instantly that those tails would sting horribly.

Well, I was right. And THAT will teach me to pick up a tool, having it in mind for use with perhaps a pretty girl somewhere in my future. I should know better. And I should know that just as I was always taught, before you use a tool on someone else, you should have it used upon yourself, so you know, down in your bones what it's capable of. While ultimately, of course I'm fine with all of that, it being the way things are done, and it is simply to be expected, I did not however expect this particular tool this particular morning.

Which led to many cries of "I hate that whip!... Don't stop."

By the time my morning's ordeal was 'over', I was very 'floaty'. Sir released me from my bonds at the bench and let me lay across the bed. We spoke briefly, and then he very matter of factly went over to the small table in the corner and returned with several sets of adjustable clamps with which he heightened my neediness beyond excruciating.

Then he removed them, and left me unfulfilled. He allowed me the cuffs for the rest of the day (actually, I slept in them that night only taking them off the next morning.)

The lovely anguish that is being left afterwards is not something I would normally enjoy. But with him, after this in particular, it was wonderful, feeling that ache combined with the soreness from the whips earlier, it left me constantly aware of HIM as I drifted through the next day or so. It's that awareness, that feeling of being owned, posessed, taken somewhere I rarely go with anyone with trust at the core of it that I treasure above all else.

Friday, November 2, 2007

Hallows

I'll get towards writing about this morning later, but for the moment, just a brief post about Hallows.

Being a Witch (that's another blog!) I find myself furnished a number of preexisting excuses, if you will, for Sir and I to have sex. This often gets expressed something along the lines of "it's a pagan holiday! We should fuck!" Which is only all the more amusing when he brings it up, (Sir, not being a Witch.)

All of which tends to harken back to a wonderful Beltane spent one year with Sir and 'my' girl, this being many years back.

So, it's Hallows and Sir comes downstairs, somewhat annoyed that I wasn't upstairs seeing as to how he wanted me, right then and there. This is a good thing. Spontaneity makes me happy.

But I waver for a moment, and in an extraordinarily rare bit of 'giving him lip', I make it clear I'm busy. (This is deeply out of character for me, I don't do "brat" play.) This of course, cannot stand. (Yes, if my 'not now' were a real 'no' of course he'd respect that, but this is clearly me being 'playful' and we both know it.)

And so he has me stop whatever it was I was doing at the time, kneel on the big black leather couch, and he takes me, roughly.

And I'm happy.

This has everything to do with the dynamic between us. Any real 'not now' would have been clarified, and we would have gone on about our day, getting to sex at a later point.

But knowing one another as we do, we both know I'm 'asking for it' in my own rare way (usually I'd never DREAM of giving him shit!) and what comes next, no matter how much some might mistake it for vanilla what, with the lack of tools and all, is anything but, because we're both working with power, and his Dominance, and my risking, and that's where so much of the magick of the dance is for us. (That, and the smell and touch of leather as I'm being taken from behind never hurts. I am after all, far too much of a fetishist for it to be otherwise.)