Can I just say how immensely grateful I am that I don’t have to process my relationships very much? You know, the “honey, where is our relationship going?” kind of talks. I know chicks are supposed to be the ones who initiate those, but truthfully, I am usually happy to have, oh, about five minutes of that kind of conversation, and after that, I’m pretty much done with it.

I’m not saying processing one’s relationship is bad. There are stages of relationships where there are legitimate questions to be resolved. I’m just glad when I'm done with that phase.

Now and then in my life as Matisse, I have occasion to touch base with someone about our relationship. Ideally, it looks something like this…

“You’re really awesome, you know that? I love being with you, and I hope we keep doing this.”

“I think you’re great, too, sweetheart. And yeah, this is a very good thing, we should keep doing this.”

That is the perfect little check-in. I like that. And if we really need a course-correction, that’s fine, just let me know - succinctly. I'll do the same.

What I really don’t want to do is get into a big heavy conversation about where the relationship is going, and yeah, once in a great while I meet someone who tries to go there. Interestingly, they’ll usually do it really fast, like the first or second time I meet them. I think maybe they’re trying to impress me as being a really sensitive guy or something? But I’m so not into it. One of the things I like about my career now is that I get to have these fun interactions with interesting people…and then they go back to their lives. It’s one of the reasons you’ll rarely see me pick up a stranger at a play-party. I like variety, but I get all my need for that met in my very own dungeon – and as a bonus, I don’t have to talk about my feeeeeeelings… Because my feelings about erotic-BDSM relationships usually run the gamut of:

A) Mmmm, I like doing this, this is fucking hot.

B) Oooh, that feels good, do that some more. (This often involves my feet, which are a primary erogenous zone on my body.)

Not really much to process there. It’s all hind-brain stuff, very basic. So when someone tries to engage me in a meaningful dialogue about how I feel about it, I tend to furrow my brow at him quizzically and say, “…Fine.”

(Note that this is different than talking about what types of activities/scenes we have done or might do. That’s a delightful type of conversation.)

So if you are moved to ask me where our relationship is going, know that my favorite answer is, “How about to the dungeon?”