Nothing happened

It's been a spankless week. When work gets very demanding, I have to go into overdrive, completely competent and wired. It doesn't position me well mentally to be bent over someone's knee. Although it would probably do me some good. Sometimes it seems like more full-time submission would do me good, but H is not very interested in that kind of hard work and I just don't switch that easily, so I think it would be very difficult.

The crop I mentioned in an earlier post arrived a couple of weekends ago and H gave it a test run on me. I don't bruise that easily from a spanking but the crop left me with bruises that lasted about a week and a half! H has this terrible lazy habit when spanking of sitting on one side of me and, as he gets into a rhythm, he tends to hit the same spot over and over on the "off" side. This is bearable in a hand spanking but excruciating with the crop! He seems to like the result, though, which is a lot of whimpering on my part and the tendency to dissolve into abject submission much more quickly.

Afterwards I was too exhausted to complain much about the big butt-plug he likes to use on me. All in all, a good night for him and I was glad to try a crop, since I have had a fantasy about it for such a long time. Obviously it will have to be used sparingly, though!

Links & musings

You can see I've added Sweetness Follows, Agony Aunty, and Panties, panties, panties to the links. Sweetness is just a sweet blog with likeable people (and the occasional very hot description of something-or-the-other). Agony Aunty supplies us endlessly with excellent pictures narrated in a third person style reminiscent of Miss Manners (take a moment to imagine Miss Manners with a spanking implement of some kind if you haven't already, and you'll see it was meant to be). Panties (&c.) has funny chats and some truly alarming big panties, plus lots of beautiful pictures of Hiromi in smaller ones.

I have not been updating because, on a spanking diary, what do you say when you are not currently being spanked. Of course now it occurs to me this is something to write about as well.

It is all about my love-hate relationship with spanking. Sometimes I think there is this natural conflict between my feminist, independent side and the part of me that wants to be subdued and not really have to bother with thinking things out. Maybe that's even healthy or at least healthier than just squelching down that other side and pretending it isn't there. Another way to look at it, though, is that there are times when spanking just doesn't make sense in our relationship. As I've said, H sees no conflict, being happy to spank me when I seem to want it and not when I don't.

Sometimes I think living in full-time submissive mode instead of just "asking" (often non-verbally, good thing H is good at figuring out what I want) for a spanking when I feel like I "deserve" one or just think the idea is hot, would be actually very good for me in certain ways. It's such a struggle to keep up with everything a lot of the time, I tend to let things slide, be late, not pick up the house as I should, all small things that add up to making you feel like your life is orderly and comfortable. I want to do those things but I'm bad at making myself. More structure would make it easier, I know. Also, as far as fantasy goes, this is incredibly hot.

But there are days and moods when the thought of submitting to someone else's best judgment of what I should be making a priority completely repels me. There are enough days like this that I think the fantasy has to be a fantasy. I realize some people view this resistance as natural and part of a "journey," something to overcome. To me, it never feels like that. It feels like something very central and crucial, something I should never ignore. There are parts of my life, too, that are probably not compatible with a more consistent top/bottom kind of relationship or even the easy, daily spankiness of Dan and Bethie's life, although I often envy it.

Are there lots of people out there with fantasies that just can't possibly be done in their real lives? If so, does it make you feel a little crazy, or have you just found a way to accept it?

Pretty pretty pictures

I think I am going to be too busy to post this week, but I ran across these nice pictures in a preview. The usual problem, they're not very realistic, but they are lovely.

Kinds of happy

There was a time when I didn't worry about what I was, and I barely remember it now, but I remember lying awake at night, fantasizing about being spanked by an older woman in front of boys my own age that I liked (which fantasy sums up my sexual orientation and fetishes all at once... wilder than fantasies I have now!). These fantasies were elaborate and exciting in some way I couldn't figure out. I was too young to know they were sexual exactly, and at the same time, I sensed I shouldn't tell other people about them.

And there was a time when I was only a little older that a boy I knew, a family friend's kid who was about a year younger than me, proposed a "spanking game." That's what we called it: "The Spanking Game." I maneuvered to be the spankee as often as humanly possible, and the boy seemed happy enough with his role as spanker. We played this clandestinely for a few years whenever his parents would come to visit my parents. Although there were some close calls, we were never found out.

The same sense that made me the spankee and not the spanker was (I think) behind a lot of my not-so-good boyfriend choices in high school and college and after. I stayed with boys who didn't treat me well because I felt like their opinions (even their poor opinions of me) should carry more weight. I was looking for someone I could trust with that kind of responsibility. Then I discovered feminism. Wow! It was like having a light turn on after years of stumbling around in the dark. I was responsible for myself, and no one else was, or should be, responsible for me. No one should treat me a way I didn't want to be treated.

Except part of me still wanted to be treated a way I didn't want to be treated (but if I want to, does the not-wanting-to count?). Part of me wants to be bent over the arm of the couch and spanked, topped and pushed to the limits. A lot of writers on submission and spanking and DD or any of the above dismiss feminism or say it got this wrong, the part about submission and head of household and fantasies of dominance. The arguments are that it's natural, or that we can't change it.

There are lots of things we can't change about ourselves, though, like the kinds of things that make us mad or happy, the tones of voice and strategies of interaction that soothe us or make us nervous. That doesn't mean these things are "hard-wired," just that our environments do a darned good job as a kind of software-writing machine so thorough it feels like instinct.

H doesn't seem to feel a contradiction. He is a feminist, we share household chores and decisions as a matter of course, and he spanks me. End of story. What's all the fuss? I wish it were that easy for me. There is a small part of me, though, that says what I find easy about spanking and submission is the same thing I found easy about all those terrible relationships so many years ago. When you give over control to someone else, what a relief it is, because no matter what decisions are made, you don't have to think about it, you don't have any responsibility for what comes next.

That's meant to be a criticism, but it feels like relief. Is it so bad, wanting sometimes to leave someone else in charge? Not because of some cockeyed theory about "power relations" being "natural" but because there are so few ways any of us really have to ever escape responsibility, even for a little while? Some feminist writing says the whole notion of being excited by domination, by submission, feeds into a culture that traffics in those two things to the detriment of too many people. That feels true to me. But even if it is, I wonder how many things I have to give up, things that work for me, to service a goal that is largely abstract. Can't I work in the world for more equality for women and come home to be spanked? It isn't domestic violence; just an arrangement that works for us, and if it works for slightly suspect reasons, I wonder if that is so different than how most of us live our lives.

Extras and inconsistency

After a really exhausting weekend (there was even more sex after the earlier-mentioned goings on... I not only trimmed, but shaved completely smooth and bare, which H just finds very hard to resist, so, wonderful oral on that so sensitive bared skin, and returning the favor) it's hard to slip into the workweek persona, competent and tough and not the least bit breathy or likely to turn to mush in the face of authority figures. That switch never gets easy, but there is that little shivery second when I sit down on a still tender bottom and flash back on the weekend's activities.

In other ways of being a fish out of water, I wonder sometimes how I wound up with H when it's girls, otherwise, that make me go all warm in the important parts. (H does, too, but not very many men do, although a few do.) It's simple in one way... I met H when I was very young and still figuring things out, and now I have been with him for years and years, and love him, and he still turns me on. It is strange, though, feeling like the bulk of one part of you doesn't match up with the life you lead. Even though in other ways H is home and everything I love. In the movies people solve things like this by having a big epiphany. In real life we just muddle along trying to be true to ourselves as many ways as we can. At least here I can talk about one thing I have to hide everywhere else.

Pink Bottomed Girls has an interesting post about how you wind up with a boy in a relationship between two women. Now if I could only convince H of the utility of having a girl in a relationship between a man and a woman... Oh well, at least I can look, and he doesn't mind that. That isn't the type H would go for, he likes someone curvier and femme-ier. I like boyish girls (although there are exceptions).

Someone in our neck of the woods put up one of those "Being gay is a choice" signs. Couldn't that be misinterpreted as encouragement? I am not sure we get much choice about what we are. Or I'd be happier as a one-man woman (not that I am unhappy exactly, but aware there are other ways I could happily live). And straighter, because that's easier. And I wouldn't like spanking, because it's inconvenient to hide the toys from the dog-sitter when you go on vacay. (But I like to like spanking. Now if I could only transform into one of those feminists who finds it empowering, instead of the kind who finds it troubling. *Poof*! No, you are who you are.)

More links

I won't normally be posting this much, but it's been a quiet (in some ways!) weekend, and I realized there were at minimum two more blogs I had to link to. One is Spanking Bethie because, how can you link to Spanking Blog and not link to Spanking Bethie? It's so interesting to read Dan's take on something and then hop over to Bethie's blog and hear the whole story from another side. And the other is Punishment Book, which I like so much for its thoughtful take on relationships that involve elements of domestic discipline (or whatever you want to call it). It makes distinctions about consent and mutuality that are really important and is well worth reading for that alone, but also, some of it is really hot. Theory and sex in one neat package, who can ask for more?

Spanking & over-analysis

Hmmm... Ordered the riding crop, couldn't convince myself not to at that price. Like most girls who love the spanking, I already have some toys, but mostly innocuous things that no one would really recognize unless they saw H. wielding them (a really good leather belt, some kitchen implements and the like). This is actually my most blatant spanking-related purchase so far. That's strange for someone who's been fantasizing about spanking since first grade, and getting it pretty regularly for twelve years or so from H., probably. But I'm conflicted about this (can I really be that feminist if I like someone to take me over his knee and smack me until I whimper?) and it shows. One of the things I would like to do with this diary is find a way to accept this about myself. Thirty-odd years of just dealing with the contradiction hasn't been particularly satisfying, so...

While the riding crop is making its way to me in the mails, H. applied some other toys last night, which completely eradicated our first set of plans (go to the movies). It took me a long time to see the benefits of a shaved vulva, but H. was very convincing in his enthusiasm, so it was his job to shave me, which he enjoys immensely. We started with that last night. Once I was trim, he ran his hands up and down me, past the arch of my back and up to my wrists, pinning them behind my head... His other hand found my breasts, teasing my nipples until they were hard and aching, then twisting them until I thrashed and whimpered. I hate it when he does that, and at the same time, it makes me wet, it makes me shaky and excited. When he's doing it I want him to stop more than anything else, and he won't, and then once he's done, I just want him. He teased my clit (and I feel so defenseless like that, shaved, the wetness seeping out between the lips and betraying me, my hands behind my head, pinned). Then he changed directions and spanked my pussy, hard, until I was trying to get away. This makes me wetter, even when it hurts like bejesus, and he knows it. Finally, he flipped me, toying with my clit and cunt while he spanked my ass with his hand, and then he made me get on my hands and knees, and spanked me with the belt, then fucked me from behind. Then he stopped... He put four fingers in me, filling me absolutely right to the edge of pain, and rubbed my clit until I came helplessly, and past that, until I begged him to stop. And finished himself off with my legs wrapped around him.

Usually that's enough for us, and we did get up, go about our evening, and so on. But I was still feeling grateful (and horny) later that evening, so when we got back in bed to go to sleep, H. got a very elaborate handjob. Which he followed up with one for me, my arms pinned, toying with me and spanking my pussy (which is quite sore today, shouldn't that make me annoyed instead of happy?), and finally fucking me until I came again. Then he pulled out, still hard, and I kissed down his chest and put him in my mouth—I could taste myself on him, he loves that, loves putting his fingers in my mouth after they have been inside me—and sucked his head and shaft until he came again.

He is feeling very friendly today, I can't imagine why ;). We had a nice talk last night about what turns us on, and spanking doesn't turn him on as much as it turns me one, which I knew or guessed, but it does turn him on that I get so turned on by it. It is strange to imagine that this is a generous act... Then again, twisting my nipples until I beg him to stop (not that he does...) turns him on quite a bit, and to me that says that maybe he just is not spanking me hard enough.

In life outside the bedroom, we have a very equal relationship, sharing chores and cooking, both of us working and earning roughly equivalent paychecks. If anything, I am the one who usually makes our vacation arrangements and plans (he doesn't seem to mind me saying "I just bought us tickets to Aruba, ask off for the 7th, 8th, and 9th?") and am more likely to pick the restaurant or decide what we'll do next. He is easy-going and happy to go along in most cases (and if not, he lets me know). Sometimes the switch between the bedroom and real life leaves me a little dizzy (how do I live in both of these places and not fly apart from the contradiction?), and maybe that's what I like about it.

Links & kinks

Just to get us started, I've linked to a few sites I couldn't possibly live without. My So-Called Lesbian Life mysteriously and consistently comes up with some of the hottest photo erotica of women, although this isn't the focus of the blog, and the posts are good reading as well (note: this is not an erotica site, just a good blog whose writer also has excellent taste in erotica). The Spanking Blog is classic, by far the best blog on spanking I've found, and it has a little something for everyone (which also means that sometimes the day's offering doesn't turn me on, but a fair amount of the time, it does). Pink-Bottomed Girls I can't recommend strongly enough, and Heather Corinna gives you a chance to look at her stunning photographs (and stunning body, although it hardly matters whether she is clothed or nude, as these are just amazing works of art either way). I keep looking for a book of HC's photographic work and not finding it, so it must not exist, but if not, why not? Her work is so good...

And now, some shopping, because I am a girl on a budget but I love the toys. For instance, this leather crop from a saddlery shop is awfully appealing at that price tag, and these lovely straps may tempt me (and if something tempts me, I can usually tempt H. once it arrives... he is susceptible to suggestion, extremely so, when a. barely-there panties become visible or b. my hand goes inside his zipper... which would make me a "brat" in some relationships, but this one doesn't work that way, about which more later.)

My profile photo 

Introduction

I'm not sure quite what I'll do with this space, except that as a person with a life that's mostly pastiche, fragmented, I want a place where I can assemble some of the pieces. Anonymity—thank God for the internet's weird and wonderful assemblage of (dis)honesties—is a way to work out what's going on in my life, and maybe a way to talk about my interests in a place where no one knows me. It's difficult being a very feminist feminist who enjoys bdsm (or—it's easy, but try finding someone you can talk about it with), or a bisexual out to some people and not others, depending on their capacity to hurt you, or a monogamous wife who loves her husband while knowing she's more easily cut out for polyamory (if only he was, too!), and for loving women, and who nonetheless doesn't want to leave a life she loves with a man she loves.

I don't anticipate a blog (a diary, really—there won't be a lot of linking to news stories here) will solve these difficulties, and would I really want them solved, are they really "difficulties" or just the usual quandaries of identity we all wrestle with in one way or another? But I'm ready at least to have these conversations somewhere outside of my own head, at least from the safety of (relative) anonymity.