Melting “Vanilla.”
The first in a series of 3 answers to questions I solicited in Twitter. Enjoy!
One of the first times I had to “out” myself to a potential partner, it was a bit awkward, to say the least. And unexpected, because the conversation started innocently enough: on theater.
I was sitting at Timo’s (RIP) having tapas with guy I’d just met a few days prior. I was talking about my involvement in theater. He’d asked what I’d one that he might have seen, and I rolled off the names of a few of the shows I’d done with Crowded Fire, yadda yadda. I kind of avoided specifics on 69Stores: One Pervert’s Tale. This was a first date, after all, and I figured it wasn’t really first date material, yanno?
He pressed on.
“You did a solo show?” he drawled “What the hell did you have to talk about for a whole show?”
One thing about me: I hate lying. SO, I took a deep breath.
“It’s about my discovery of and involvement in the SM community.”
“What, like kinky shit?”
“Yes.”
Well, it turns out that he actually knew some of my compatriots in the Scene. As a former driver for, and now part owner of a pizzeria, he had delivered many a pie to a local Professional House of Domination and, over the years, befriended the main Domina.
What?
Prodommes need pizza and wings too.
Well the long and the short of it is that he was skeptical of the whole need for “Community,” as he did not see his sex life as something he needed to discuss in a classroom setting.
Fair enough.
The real Moment of Zen came when we wound up going back to his place.
And the making out commenced.
And once it was evident this was going to lead to more than making out, I was a little concerned.
See, the Wednesday before, at Bondage-A-Go-Go, I’d been the recipient of the most straight up fucked up beating I’d ever received. I was covered from boobs to toes, front and back with serious welts cuts and bruises.
Not necessarily the thing you want some guy to see on a first fuck, especially if he’s not kink-identified and somewhat skeptical of the scene.
But whatever.
He was cute 6′ 4″, blonde-haired blue-eyed lanky, really really really into me, and hung like a walrus.
It was pretty dark so the physical evidence of the savage beating was not an issue…that first night.
It wasn’t a problem until the hung-over morning when he pulled me over and looked at my body.
“Holy shit. Oh my god. Baby, why would you let someone do that to you?”
Sigh
“Um….because I enjoy it. I get off on it. Why do people play football or rugby or go rock-climbing or skiing? It is thrilling and fucking dangerous and sometimes you wind up injured. But it is worth it.”
He was dismayed, but that didn’t stop him from fucking my brains out again.
And so it went.
This was the beginning of a longer and more convoluted story, and despite an odd false start as a purely booty-call relationship, we later wound up dating for almost 3 years.
And despite not being “kink identified” he did make many inroads into kink. I almost cried the day I went to his little apartment and he showed me the eye-bolts he’d installed in the beams above his bed.
See, when you are submissive, and female in a heterocentric relationship, it isn’t all that tough to come out. I think that many men are just fine with the idea of being in control of their partner, and their partner’s sexuality, and a little rough-and-tumble play. Broaching the idea of kink as “a way to play” is a great start. Many people assume BDSM is a big scary monster looming in the close, waiting to grab rape and pillage.
And while it can be (prays fervently for lovingly brutal tender and sexy ravishment, in Ganesha’s name, Amen!) it doesn’t have to be.
If you are a bottom, or a submissive, or into service, offering to make a weekend built around lovingly and erotically waiting hand and foot on your partner is a great way to actively demonstrate how sensual and wonderful that exchange can be.
Handing over the reins to your partner might seem like a Big Deal, but it doesn’t HAVE to be. I believe integrating it into your life is a better way to go. Lifestyle Kinksters don’t always strap on boots and heels and corsets to play. Sometimes it is just a matter of who gets the business end of the spoon or the tip of a knife while dinner is being prepared. Or that knowing look when you go out for dinner and a movie and you know your partner ordered you to go commando, and you do, and the lights go out in the theater and you aren’t allowed to close your legs…. ahem
If you are a top or dominant, it might be a tougher row to hoe. Many people see dominance as scary, or people who get off on taking power as potentially abusive. But if you spin it as a way for you to “take care” of your partner, a more “parental” kind of thing, it can be less threatening. Many people like the idea of being “Daddy’s Little Girl” or being the recalcitrant schoolboy. Bedroom games do not always lead to real life dynamics, but they sure can.
More often than not, people have kinky fantasies.
What they lack is the permission, the freedom, to feel comfortable about them. TO feel safe, to know they won’t be exposed to ridicule disgust horror or abandonment because they have dark desires. Fear of abandonment is very powerful. You have to weigh your need for kink against your willingness to face those potential reactions.
It can be scary to tell someone you love that there is a part of you with which you aren’t familiar. But if you keep it a secret and are unfulfilled, that has the potential to slowly erode your desire and generate small resentments that can resonate further than you ever expect.
And you probably already are engaged in power exchange, even though it might be subtle. Drawing the hesitant bottom or the uncertain submissive out of their fantasies and into real life can be a worthy endeavour, or at the worst, you know where you stand, and can take appropriate steps to have your needs met.
Never trying means never knowing…and for me, that shit is un-fucking-acceptable.
