Mistress Matisse's Journal

Post-4th Party

Don't forget the "Bondage Is The Point" party on Sunday night at the Wet Spot. My darling Max usually teaches a class in the afternoon before that party, but this month he's presenting the people from the Suspended Animation Burning Man crew, who are doing a class called "So You Want To Tie People Up."

This workshop will teach you everything you need to know to start tying people up. In addition to technical skills, we'll focus on the "soft" skills required to put together a successful bondage scene.
We'll talk about why we do what we do, basic rope techniques, several different bondage positions and how to choose a position that's appropriate for your particular play style. We'll also spend some time talking about the psychology of bondage and the steps involved in putting together a fun and successful scene.
Suspended Animation rocked Burning Man last year and performed at this year's Seattle Erotic Art Festival (SEAF). Come see what all the excitement is about.
MORE INFO.

Happy Independence Day!

Labels: bdsm techniques, events

Read or Listen

I uploaded a new podcast, here. First Monk and I read a letter about safewords, and make mention of my two favorite safewords: vomit and lawsuit. I promise, those two words will capture any top's attention, anytime.

We also talk about the challenges of doing BDSM with a partner who is hearing-impaired. I make a verbal slip at one point that I must correct: I mistakenly say, "They can hear ME," which is not what I meant. What I was trying to say was: a hearing-impaired person can talk, and I can hear THEM. Didn't come out right. Whoops.

And I did a short piece of writing for Filthy Gorgeous Things, an online magazine about "sex for artists, thinkers, and sensualists." So enjoy that...

Labels: links, podcast

Here's my new column in this week's Stranger. Enjoy!

Labels: column, kink/sex in the news

Dear Mistress Matisse,

I enjoy reading your blog but I am very curious about your relationships. I know that you are "poly" and you talk about Monk and Max, are they BOTH your primary partners? How does this work? I'm very curious about how you manage TWO primary partners plus other "minor" partners... Is there somewhere you have written in more detail about this? I would LOVE to read about how it all works logistically and what your deeper thoughts and feelings are about it and what problems you encounter. I searched your blog a bit but couldn't find. If you could direct me to where you have talked about this I'd be grateful.

Darlin’, some days I myself wonder how I manage it.

But I just celebrated my five-year anniversary with Monk, and in August I will have my ten-year anniversary with Max, so manage it I do. (Yes, they are both my partners. I don't use words like primary or secondary much any more.)

Everything I’ve written for public consumption is either here, or in my searchable article archive on The Stranger site. I can assure you that I am not maintaining any other websites with my writing on them. Good lord, I can barely keep up with this one!

Also, check out the podcasts. Monk and I have talked about various poly topics a lot in those.

To dig through the archives here: There’s a search box up in the left corner there, but oddly, it doesn’t seem to go all the way back to the beginning of the blog. I suggest you go to the Google Advanced Search page, paste this url into the “search within a site” field, and then enter polyamory.

As far as deep thoughts/feelings/problems - well, I have written some about my own experiences being polyamorous. But this is not an anonymous blog. And not only is this not an anonymous blog, it's a professional not-anonymous blog. Obviously the rules are different for me as a dominatrix than if I were a grade-school teacher or something. But still, I’m a real person, and my name and my career are attached to everything I say. Max and Monk are real people too. You might say we’re all a bit exhibitionistic, or we wouldn’t be doing this. But even so, there are lines of privacy I am not going to cross in blogging about us.

And I have other partners who need a much higher level of privacy. While I like to blow them a kiss here occasionally, it’s important to me that I give them that.

Thus, I am not willing to give out a lot of deeply personal details about specific incidents or challenges between me and any of my lovers. That’s private.

So I hope you find what you're looking for in previous posts/podcasts. I get a lot of requests for more information on various subjects I mention, so everyone please take this as a first step for digging deeper into whatever you’re curious about.

Newer readers who enjoy me being bitchy: do the Google search on the phrase: ring ring. I no longer have a public phone line, so I don’t get calls from strangers. But back when I did, I lambasted witless callers with sadistic glee. Ah, those were the good times. Not.

One more bitchy note: good people, I am resigned to folks using all caps in casual emails, but dear sweet Christ, please do not use quotation marks for emphasis. It makes it look like you’re being condescending, implying that the opposite of what you're saying is true. I am not “poly”, I am poly. (I don’t know what’s up with putting quotes around minor.)

If you don’t know the rules for quotation marks, read this. If you do know the rules, and want a good laugh, read this.

Labels: letters, Max, Monk, polyamory, relationships

Here's a confession that reveals me as either an optimist, or a masochist, I'm not sure which: I just read the newest Anita Blake book from Laurell K. Hamilton, "Skin Trade."

I'm sure the irony of that title is accidental, but it's amusing given that the whole series has turned from paranormal action/mystery into kinky soft porn. Not that I have anything against porn of any variety, but I liked the old Anita Blake, who fondled her guns and killed people (or monsters) a lot.

And it wasn't as if they were even good porn. The new Anita did way too much processing with her emo-monster lovers, and had tons of hand-wringing angst about all the kinky/poly fucking she was doing. You'd think a woman who raises the dead and executes vampires for a living would learn to say, "Oh, all right, fine, so I fucked a couple of bloodsuckers and shape-shifters! Who cares?"

What I can say about the latest book is: it is not as wince-inducingly terrible as the last half dozen or so. It's not nearly as good as the first seven books, which were as yummy and addictive as crack-sprinkled brownies. It's... okay. There are good parts and oh-come-on parts. The ending is weak, but endings are never Ms. Hamilton's strong point in these books.

It has Edward in it. Edward ain't the charmingly creepy sociopath he used to be either, but still, I like him. It also has Olaf, the serial killer who has a crush on Anita. And heaven bless us, it's only got three (I think) sex scenes, and they're all not so terribly long and tedious.

So, it's a vampire novel that doesn't suck. For Ms. Hamilton and her creation, Ms. Blake, that's a good step.

Labels: books

Another episode of Family, the polyamory web-cast series... Enjoy. (If you like train-wrecks, that is. Yeek.)



Amusing trivia: I've been to St. Cloud's. It's not terribly far from the Big House. I certainly have not ever witnessed a scene like this one, though.

Labels: polyamory, video

Yes Means Yes

From the mailbag: This is an edited-down version of the letter, mainly because the original is very long and includes a lot of unnecessary detail.

And actually, I don’t think this letter is real. There are a lot of little things about it that set off my bullshit alarm. All of them could just be explained away, but my gut just says: fake. I don’t believe this girlfriend exists, I think the writer made this story up. It’s possible she does exist, and that she is the one making up the story and feeding it to her lover, but I’d bet money that someone is lying here.

But what the heck, I’ll answer it anyway. Because maybe it’ll be useful for someone else who’s contemplating a bad idea.

I'm male, 24, my girlfriend is the same age.… She has problems: Child abuse, substance abuse, alcoholism in her family and herself, huge eating disorder problems, rape. Now she's been raped a second time, and this time I feel like an accomplice. She told me that she'd been getting offers from a guy she'd met who ran a high-class prostitution agency. She has money problems, and it was incredibly tempting despite her revulsion for it.

I’m wondering where, exactly, the girlfriend met this guy? It’s not the usual bar-pickup line. But here’s the short answer: Anyone who says “Hey baby, I run a high-class prostitution agency, and have I got a deal for you!” is a lying idiot, or worse. Run, run, run away from anyone who tells you that.

Also, if you feel revulsion at the idea of sex work, you should NOT do it. We all do things we’re not crazy about doing in life. But, revulsion? That’s a no. This seems really simple and obvious to me, and yet I do see people acting like deep emotional responses are things they can just dismiss, without consequences, if they’re inconvenient.


Okay, see, here’s where the story goes sideways to me. Twelve thousand dollars? And she didn’t smell a rat? Really? Because a quick search on Google will pull up escort rates for any city, and if one is going to spend two weeks torturing oneself, I’d think that would include a little internet research.

But, more advice, on the off chance it’s real: do not fuck people to get a job - even if that job is fucking people. If anyone tells you that you have to audition for a job as an escort, walk away. Only sleazeball pimps want freebies, and there are some of them around, which is why I always worked for female agency owners. (They weren’t all straight, but they never hit on me.)

Here’s how quality-control works in a good escort service: The first couple of clients they send a girl to will be regulars who’ll give the boss a report. They’re always guys who dig seeing the brand-new girls. They don’t expect smooth patter and practiced moves. If the girl messes up in some truly spectacular way, and the client is angry, the boss sends another lady for free and eats the lost money. But that doesn’t happen too often, because agency owners get good at knowing who’s going to work out, and who’s too crazy. If the girlfriend in this story exists, she is broadcasting “crazy” on every channel. No good agency is going to send a brand-new crazy-acting girl on a 12K-for-one-night date. Even if there were 12K-for-one-night dates to be had, which there are not.

The next day, she goes back to her apartment and finds a 1200 dollar dress. Goes to the hotel, but the client doesn't show. Calls the guy: his phone's been disconnected. This whole thing was a con. He's just a rich FUCK who saw someone he wanted and invented this entire thing. There was even a call from another one of his "girls" saying not to do it, that prostitution was the worst decision she'd ever made. I can't figure that out...maybe sometimes he actually is a pimp and the call was genuine, or maybe it was part of the scheme just to test her, or make her feel worse because that's what get's him the fuck off.

Well, stranger things have happened, I suppose. That seems like a lot of effort, and when I add up the costs of what he presumably spent, this guy could have just hired a lady for the night. But some people do get off on playing games. I can’t figure out the phone call from the other woman, either. But whatever it was, it was a red flag that your partner unfortunately ignored.

So basically she got paid with this dress, is what it sounds like. That's not cool, but everyone gets stiffed for a fee at one time or another in the business. You just have to handle it and move on, and not make the same mistake again.

She can't go to the police because of the humiliation if it got out, because she has no evidence of any kind, because he's covered his tracks too well anyway. Now who knows if he has an STD that maybe she has now. He has pictures of her.

Yeah - no, sweetie, you do not go to the police if you do something illegal and you get ripped off for the fee. That would not be swift.

But wait, wait, wait – STD? Did she have bareback sex with this man? Yes, I know condoms don’t prevent everything. If you decide to be an escort, you’re deciding that you’re willing to take some risks. But not using condoms is extremely stupid.

I could have stopped this at any point; I could have told her no like she clearly wanted me too. I knew how much it was hurting her, but I kept saying it was her decision because I wanted the money for her, because I wanted to be true to my bullshit theories, because secretly it turned me on. I was supposed to protect her, to turn her life around, to make everything better. I used to have daymares about her being raped again and being powerless to stop it...but this is worse. Not only was I not powerless, I helped by being so fucking logical and always talking about "cost-benefit analysis." I was conned just like her, and it was the perfect fucking con: it didn't seem too good to be true because the huge amount of money was balanced by the fucking pain she was feeling!

The last sentence of this paragraph is from Bizarro World to me, I can’t even parse that. But for the rest of it: no, you’re not supposed to “turn her life around, make everything better.” She has to do that. See my previous posts about this: You can’t love troubled people all better. And sometimes help is just the nice word for "control". It’s sweet to be loving and protective to some degree towards your partner, but you are not her parent. For whatever reasons, you thought and hoped this would be okay, so you said you were cool with it. Turns out you were wrong. I hate being wrong, too, but no one is right all the time.

And you’re definitely going to hate this part: I don’t think your girlfriend was raped. I think she was ripped off, but that’s different. She’s a grown person and she consented to the sex. Even if she hated it, he did not force her, correct? No violence, no threats, she wasn’t afraid not to? Yeah – that’s not rape, to me. It’s a lousy situation, and she’s justified in being mad. But I don’t agree that if a guy promises you X if you have sex, and you do, and he breaks that promise, then you were raped. If you retroactively withdraw sexual consent, after the sex is over, because you're angry at your sexual partner, then you render your word meaningless. That’s a dangerous precedent. If yes doesn’t really mean yes, why would anyone bother to get consent in the first place?

Labels: advice, letters, relationships, sex work