Mistress Matisse's Journal

2011-06-01T00:22:00.000-07:00

Hi. So, yeah - I'm not blogging so much these days. Who knows, this blog may live again some time, but not right now.

If you're new here, check out the archives for seven years of articles about sex, BDSM, sex work, polyamory, and various other topics both sacred and profane. The last few years have tags, or employ an advanced Google search to find keywords. If it has to do with sex, I've probably written about it.

I twitter here.

My articles appear in the Seattle weekly newspaper The Stranger, and the complete archives of those articles are available here.

There are links to the right for my professional website, the Flickr feed, and various other bits of goodness about me. You can email me: MistressMatisse at gmail.com

If you've been a regular reader of mine - thank you! Your support has always meant a lot to me, and it continues to do so.

2011-03-28T04:49:00.000-07:00

The latest column in The Stranger, about the way one should measure one's success as a top.

And an answer to a question about collars and the subtleties of BDSM relationships.

***

Under My Protection and Collars of Consideration

I saw some questions about this on a kink community board I’m on, so I’m using them as a blog-prompt for myself.

Q: When someone says, “So-and-so is under my protection”, what does that mean?

That phrase may or may not mean that two people involved are playing together. The general translation of that sentiment, in my mind, is: “I’m fond of this person, and either because of his/her newness to kink, or just general emotional issues, I perceive her/him as being vulnerable to predatory personalities. So go ahead and chat them up, it’s all good, but just be aware: you fuck with them, you’re fucking with me. And you don’t want to fuck with me.”

Your mileage may vary, of course. But that’s more or less what it means when I say it.

Q: What is a Collar of Consideration?

A tiresome bit of pretentiousness? Collars of Consideration, indeed. What am I, a kinky seminary or something?

Oh, all right, I don’t really mean that. I mean: I don’t do that sort of thing myself. I don’t generally use collars very much at all. (Although they are pretty to look at, and sometimes useful, too.) Some other people place a lot of meaning in them, and that’s fine. And whatever you want to call them is also fine with me - as long as you don’t pretend that there is some sort of universally agreed-upon BDSM system of ranking the person wearing them according to the title of the collar, or its color, or its material, or anything like that, because there is not.

I suppose you could say a “Collar of Consideration” might be the kink version of a Promise Ring – the people involved are engaged to be engaged, if you will, in a committed D/s relationship. That would be my take on that.

As always in BDSM, when in doubt, politely say to the person you're talking to, "I don't want to be rude, but I'm not sure I understand the etiquette here - can you tell me what that means, exactly?" That'll pretty much cover you no matter what.

(Originally published April 2010)

2011-02-25T23:38:00.000-08:00

I have neglected the blog lately, so here's a bit of catch-up. A Stranger column about Why Nerds Rule The BDSM Community . And the one before that, about How Not To Have An Open Relationship.

Now, the podcasts. I know you like the podcasts, I read all the emails you send me about them, and that is great, because TwistedMonk and I like doing them. There have been technical problems, but Monk has wrestling manfully with the issues for months. It has been crazy-difficult to get iTunes to update the data, but we think - emphasis on the think - we have it all fixed. (With the fabulous assistance of another sexy podcaster.) So I'm publishing a fresh one to my hosting site to test it out. Please cross your fingers that iTunes recognizes it and updates the listing on their site. If not - well, back to the drawing board.

2011-02-16T00:04:00.000-08:00

Been missing my podcasts? They are soon to return, but meanwhile, enjoy me on Dan Savage's podcast, Savage Love!

2011-02-08T12:29:00.000-08:00

Another of the Blog Greatest Hits: Occasionally the tables are unexpectedly turned on the the Mistress...

***

So I got handled by a lot of strange women yesterday. And I spent a lot of money for the privilege, too.

Let me back up a bit. I have had hardly anyone booked to see me this week. Usually when it’s slow I try to shake the tree a little, entice some more people into my clutches. But this week I just decided to say the heck with it and let it be slow. I have been taking care of a lot of little personal chores, and I decided to book a bunch of time-consuming girlie-maintenance stuff. I have a facial today at the Calidora Spa in U Village, for example. I like the facials I get at my dermatologist's office, but you have to book so far in advance there, and of course they have no evenings or weekends, so I thought I’d go see if Calidora was any good. Wish me luck that they don't do something terrible to my face.

But yesterday I got a manicure and pedicure at this little salon near The Big House, called Hoa. I’ve been getting my nails done there for a few months now, and they’re very nice.

They were particularly nice yesterday. I am a heavy tipper, especially with spa-type service stuff. If you’ve ever hustled for tips as a major chunk of your income, then you know how really happy it makes you when someone is generous, so I am. I think word has gotten around about that at Hoa. They always massage your legs up to the knee when they give you the pedicure, and they usually massage your arms up the elbow. But I got what seemed like an extra-long foot and leg massage, and the girl doing my hands was rubbing up my arms, to my shoulders, and then my neck. It was extremely blissful.

I said as much to the girl massaging my shoulders. Many of the ladies there do not seem to speak a whole lot of English, although it’s sometimes a little hard to tell. But she understood my smile and my sigh, and she smiled back at me and rubbed more firmly. Seeing us, the girl doing my feet smiled too. I mentally added another five dollars to both their tips.

So I’m sitting there is this big black massage-chair with the rollers going up and down my back, with one girl massaging my feet and legs and another lady massaging my arms and shoulders, thinking, “This is like sex.” And then I thought, “Actually, this is like being the client of a sex worker. And I am totally fine with that.”

An hour later I emerged from Hoa, fingers and toes gleaming, and went to Nordstrom to just quickly return a bra I’d bought online that didn’t fit. Or so I thought.

I gave the bra and receipt to the salesgirl. She said, “Did you want to get something else?”

I replied, “Well, I’m looking for a bra with a really smooth line for under tight knits. Do you have any suggestions?”

“Have you been fitted here before?”

I admitted I had not.

Well, that would never do. Ignoring my unfinished protests, the salesgirl conducted me to the dressing rooms, led me into a little cubicle and closed the door, brandishing her tape measure. “Let’s just have you take off your shirt.”

Meekly I obeyed. She turned me around and lassoed me with the tape. “First we’ll just get your rib cage measurement.” I could feel her breath on my hair.

“Okay,” she said briskly. “I’ll be right back with the Measuring Bra.” I wondered if the Measuring Bra was like The Sorting Hat. Was it going to sing a song about my boobs?

She returned with a beige lacy bra that looked like something my grandmother would have worn, with big high cups. I must have looked dubious, because she said, “Oh, it’s just the Measuring Bra. We’ll find you some different ones. But let’s just take you out of that bra and put you in this one.”

I thought, I just laid eyes on this girl ten minutes ago and she’s telling me to take off my clothes. And I’m doing it. Is this how people feel when they come see me?

I took off my bra. The salesgirl - or Mistress Underwire, as I was beginning to think of her - eyed my breasts and held out the Measuring Bra to me. I have never had anyone hold out a bra for me to slide my arms into, it was sort of strange. I had to step up fairly close to her to get all the way in. Hi there. Nice perfume. Then she turned me around and hooked me up in back.

“Now I want you to just bend over at the waist.”

Okay…. I’d heard about this, actually, bra fitters telling you to bend over. So I did. It was a small room, not much bigger than a closet, and my ass bumped into her hips slightly. In the mirror, I had a glimpse of her standing up close behind me, adjusting the straps, as I leaned forward. I have a mirror hung next to my spanking bench in my dungeon, and I see myself in that position with people a lot – only I’m the one standing up straight. But not, until now, had I ever seen anyone posed like that in a Nordie’s dressing room.

She had me stand up and turn around. The Goddess Of Uplift studied my breasts thoughtfully, tugged at the sides of the bra slightly, and then said, “Let me just…” And stuck her hand into the cup and repositioned my boob. Then she put her fingers under the cups of the bra and shook my breast gently. And then she did the same with the other one.

Now, I wasn’t upset by this, you understand. I was quite clear it was all in the line of duty. But – you have to admit it’s a bit funny. Maybe it’s just me, but I couldn’t help thinking, Um, yeah, you’re playing with my breasts, there. Just sayin’.

I think it would have been different if I’d come in expecting that. But since I didn’t, I was a bit bemused by having a strange woman dressing me up in lingerie and arranging my boobs - which she referred to as "breast tissue" - to her satisfaction.

Of course, I'd been wearing the wrong size bra. I think you always are when you go to a bra fitter. I thought of myself as hovering between a big B cup and a small C. But according this lady - no, that was wrong, I should wear a D. Which is hard for me to fathom, but okay, bring them on, I'll try them.

So the Demi-Cup Domina went away and came back with an armful of bras, and matching panties for everything, plus some yummy blue lace lingerie, since I’d mentioned that to her. And she tugged and shook and got me properly strapped into everything. She was a positive whirl of Nordstrom-ly helpfulness, in a sort of just-do-as-I-say-and-no-one-gets-hurt sort of way.

I’m kidding, really. She was fine and she found me a lot of stuff I needed. Obviously one doesn’t tip salespeople, but I hope she gets a nice commission off me.

She’d probably make a really good dominatrix, though, if she ever wanted to go that way.

Originally published May 2008.

2011-01-27T23:06:00.001-08:00

I’m expecting a bit of heat from the blogosphere about my Stranger column on Ms. Nickie Blue’s recent video for Kink.com. Here’s a few points that my 500-word-limit didn’t allow me to make...

Yes, I did trade some email with Nickie Blue. She’s a lovely woman, she seems like a charming person, and I wish her the best in her career.

I have some thoughts about the video as a piece of erotic art, separate from the offstage controversy. But I will save my review of the video, lest those remarks get mixed up with this.

Whether people think Ms. Blue is, or is not, a “real” virgin because she’s had anal sex doesn’t matter to me. She says she hasn’t had vaginal penetration before, and I am certainly not going to contradict her. For one thing, that would be mean-spirited and presumptuous. For another, I watched the video of her having sex with Mark Davis, Jack Hammer* and James Deen. There are certain unmistakable facial expressions, noises, and body language that any woman who has ever had and/or seen uncomfortable vaginal penetration will recognize. They are not easy to fake convincingly, and Ms. Blue displayed them exactly. That was a not a woman who’s had lots of vaginal sex just flexing her Kegels. So I’m just fine with her identifying herself as a virgin.

On one level, I have no problem with Ms. Blue creating her porn-star brand around her virginity. It seems obvious that from a business standpoint, she’s going to need a new schtick soon, but that’s not a major problem. I re-invented myself in the sex work industry half a dozen times or more – most sex workers do. I respect Ms. Blue’s acumen in identifying a marketable feature of herself and capitalizing on it. She’s clearly tenacious and driven, and those are very good traits indeed for an entrepreneur.

But I also have a strongly held opinion that sex work, like BDSM and polyamory, is advanced sexual behavior. It is not a place to learn the basics. It is not a place for virgins.

You see, in business, there is something called opportunity cost. That means: the cost of an alternative that must be forgone in order to pursue a certain action. It also refers to the benefits you could have received by taking an alternative action. And in sex work, an opportunity cost can be emotional.

So I’m not saying oh, virginity is this sacred thing. But people generally benefit from learning to do new, emotionally-loaded, intimate things in a low-stress setting, with people they trust. Ms. Blue will incur an emotional opportunity cost for experiencing vaginal penetration for the first time in a highly stressful setting with men with whom she did not choose and with whom she had no emotional connection.

Only a woman who has a certain amount of sexual experience can make a reasonable judgment on how she will feel about, say, having sex with a stranger. Or having sex in front of an audience. Or both. A sexually inexperienced woman has no basis for predicting how she’ll react emotionally in the situation. Thus, it’s unrealistic for her to expect to be able to regulate her feelings about it, either in the moment or after the fact. (Of course, even having sexual experience is not a guarantee it’s going to be a positive thing for her.)

So I hope Ms. Blue’s emotional opportunity cost for this performance was low, and that her gain from it, both in terms of her paycheck and boosting her future career, is high. But that will be the result of luck rather than an informed opinion, and luck is not something she should rely on in this game.

Something I observed in reading other sex workers writings on this: Sex work activists don’t like to talk about the emotional costs of doing sex work very much. I’m sure it’s because it would be easy for anti-SW readers to perceive us as saying that sex work is emotionally damaging to women. That’s not at all what I’m saying.

But sex work is one of the many jobs which requires what sociologist Arlie Hochschild called "emotional labor" and emotional regulation. Sexual emotional-intelligence, in other words. For some women, sex work speaks to a particular set of talents and skills we possess, and the challenges of it are, overall, interesting and positive for us. For other women, that’s not the case.

So you should not do porn, or any kind of sex work, to explore your sexuality. A happy and emotionally-healthy sex worker is someone with the tools and the desire to facilitate other people exploring their sexuality. As you go along in sex work, you’ll learn what particular types of sexuality you most enjoy participating in, and gravitate towards the appropriate setting for that. But getting into corporate porn to "explore your sexuality" is rather like joining the military to explore your issues with aggression and formalized hierarchies. You certainly will get an education, but it’s unlikely to be a smooth and enjoyable process.

Virgins aspiring to sex work, think it like this: Actors rehearse, athletes train, and musicians practice. If you want your sexuality to enrich the lives of other people, and you want to be happy doing so, learn your skills in private. Then go forth and make the world a sexier place.

***

*Special good wishes for a speedy recovery go out to porn performer Jack Hammer, who was recently diagnosed with bladder cancer.

2011-01-24T22:01:00.000-08:00

I continue to mine my own archives to bring ya'll some long-form amusement... This is a story about what happens when women cruise each other. Originally posted Saturday, February 05, 2005.

***

Maybe I Should Get A Septum Piercing Or Something…

Because I must look too normal. I realized this last Wednesday evening when I was changing clothes in the locker room at Gold's on Broadway after my workout. A woman I'd not seen around before walked in, set down her bag on the next bench over from mine and started getting her gear out.

She was a very butch woman – I mean, so butch you might have mistaken her for a guy. Unless, of course you'd spent a lot of time around butch women, the way I have. Most of my female lovers have been pretty butchy. I've always enjoyed that feminine-blending-into-masculine energy. And then I married a transman, so I'm well-acquainted with all the shades of gender expression a female-bodied person can achieve.

I was struck by this particular woman because she very closely resembled an ex-lover of mine, whom I just saw last week for the first time in – god, it must be well over a year. Frankly, although I wish her well, it's always a little unsettling for me to see her. (Especially when she flirts with me, as she did last week.) This woman and I went through a couple of rather tumultuous cycles of breaking-up/getting-back-together, and while I wouldn't exactly say she broke my heart, she chipped it a bit. It was a highly emotional connection for me, and while it's been about eight years since we broke up the last time, seeing her still arouses in me an uncomfortable mix of affection and pain.

So I suppose this woman in the Gold's locker room must have seen me glance at her a couple of times, and maybe she caught an odd expression on my face, because she turned to me, and said in this half-defensive, half-condescending tone of voice, "Yes, I am a woman."

Christ, I thought, do you have me pegged wrong. Aloud I said, "Yes, I was just thinking you look kinda like my ex-girlfriend."

She had the grace to look somewhat embarrassed, muttered something vaguely apologetic and retreated to the bathroom stalls.

But I thought, God, do I look that straight? That's scary. Okay, I don't have a labrys tattooed on my ass, but still… And I know butch women get a lot of shit for walking around in the world looking and acting like they do. But for god's sake, we're on Broadway, in the queer Mecca – lighten up, sister. I hate to think how you'd have reacted if I'd been cruising you.

I related this story to Max over dinner, and then we recalled another women's locker room story of mine that's rather at the other end of the scale. We used to work out at Olympic Athletic Club in Ballard, and they have a big, sort of open shower/hot tub area in the women's locker room. Now, Ballard's not a big gay area, but one day when Max and I were working out, I spotted two cute women who were clearly queer, and lovers. One of them I'd describe as a tomboy-femme, and the other – well, let's call her butch-of-center. Nice, I thought, and then went on through my workout.

Later, I got undressed in the locker room and went down the tiled passage to the showers. As I walked, I saw the two cute lesbians sitting in the hot tub, facing me. Now, contrary to porn-video fantasy, women rarely cruise other women, and almost never jump each other in places like, say, gym showers. But still, these two women were most certainly…watching me walk towards them. I could almost hear the strains of "Standing on the corner, watching all the girls go by…"

I took in the fact that they were looking at me, and I happened to be in the mood to play along. So as I walked towards them, I let the towel I was sort of casually holding up to myself slip down a bit to see if I got any reaction.

Definitely watching me. That's nice. Now, the showers are arranged in a semi-circle around the hot tub, so when I got there, I stopped about three feet away from the tub and let the towel fall away from my nude body completely, as I paused to wrestle with the complex issue of just which shower stall I should go into.

Hmm, let's see – that one? (Perform180 degree swivel, toss the hair, arch the back a little bit.) Or, no, maybe that one over there? (Turn back the other way, shoulders back, deep breath.)

I watched from the corner of my eye - they both had smiles well-laced with sensual appreciation, and the butchy one giggled slightly, which caused her girlfriend to jab her in the ribs with her elbow.

Without quite making eye contact, I let a slight smile hover around my lips. Then I hung up my towel on a hook and stepped into one of the stalls.

But - what's this? It looks like someone left a bottle of shampoo in here. Huh, imagine that. Gee, I wonder if it belongs to anyone…

I stepped back out of the stall and took a few steps towards the women in the hot tub, holding out the shampoo bottle. I made eye contact with them, smiled slowly, and then said, in my best magnolia-blossom drawl, I asked, "Is this ya'lls shampoo?"

The butch woman stared at me wordlessly for a moment, like she'd been struck by lightning. It was charming. Then, as if reflexively, she shook her head and said, "No."

But the minute after she said it, she sort of squeezed her eyes closed and put her hand up over her face. You could see her mentally kicking herself and thinking, "Fuck! Why did I say that?"

The femme gave her an affectionate, pitying smile and said to me in velvety tones, "Oh – I'm not sure… Can I see it?" and held out her hand to me.

So I walked closer to her, letting my hips sway a trifle more than is my custom, bent over the tub slightly – barely audible intake of breath from the butch – and handed the femme the white plastic bottle. As I hung over the water, the steam rose gently from the tub, misting my face with warm, dewy beads. She turned the bottle over in her hands a few times, and then looked up at me.

"No, I don't think it's ours," she said. But she didn't hand it back to me. She just looked at me.

It's hard to say what would have happened if we’d been alone. Based on my experience of how non-casual-sex-oriented most women are, I can't really make myself believe these women would have seriously made a pass at me – but I suppose anything's possible.

However, we were not alone in the locker room, and at that moment, another woman walked into the shower area. I cocked an eyebrow and smiled at the femme, who gave the tiniest shrug and smile and handed me back the bottle. The butch woman sank a little lower in the water and grinned sheepishly at me from under her wet bangs. I went and took my shower, and when I came out, they were gone. A droll and gently erotic little exchange that left me smiling.

2011-01-14T16:11:00.001-08:00

Just to show ya'll that I have not abandoned you: a repost of a scene Jae and I reminisced about the other day - spanking the Bicycle Man. The photos are not for the faint of heart.

***

Smack

Now, not everybody I see is into heavy intense sensation. But I do have a handful of boys who like it as heavy as I can dish it out.

I’ve written about this kind of scene before, and that may have been what prompted a gentlemen I’ll call the Bicycle Man to come see me. Like the guy in the column, Bicycle Man also likes impact on the ass, just as hard as I can do it. (I can actually get him to the "enough" point, though.)

There are so many different pleasures in BDSM - I could never settle for just one. But there is something viscerally satisfying about hitting something as hard as you can, and since I’m a sadist, I particularly like it when that something is a nicely responsive human body.

And since I’m a generous person, I decided that Jae should meet Bicycle Man, too. I'm strictly a gym queen when it comes to athletics, but Jae played softball in high school and college. Golf, too. She’s got a serious swing.

The three of us had a great time. Wanna see? (The usual disclaimers apply…)

Me lining up the stroke.

She swings and…

The bounce-back.

I do sort of bat like a girl, though, don't I? Jae has great follow-through.

We did catch one stroke just at the moment of impact.

But Jae and I are sure we could capture still more spanking art, so the Bicycle Man will just have to come see us again sometime…

(Original Post: Tuesday, April 17, 2007)

2010-12-31T02:47:00.000-08:00

I've been really bad about not updating recently. And this URL is due for a big overhaul soon, so if you see it changing, don't panic. The content will not be going away, it'll just look different, that's all.

Meanwhile, the two most recent Stranger columns, for those of ya'll who missed them. Why Don't Men Wear Strap-Ons? and What's In/What's Out 2011.

Happy New Year!

2010-12-15T03:19:00.001-08:00

Two important points before you read this. One: in this blog post, I make some sweeping, gender-based generalizations, and I make them in a somewhat tongue-in-cheek manner. I am aware that not every man or woman feels, thinks and acts in the ways I mention. This is a light-hearted blog post, not a feminist manifesto, so don’t get your gender-neutral panties in a twist, please.

And two: naturally every man of my acquaintance is an exception to all these statements. Naturally I’m not talking about any man I have ever known personally here. My goodness no.

Dear Mistress Matisse

I'm a 27y/o submissive bisexual woman in a D/s relationship with a dominant man named Tom. We were both fairly inexperienced when we met, and sort of stumbled into finding out we were both kinky. It's been really great. We're well matched and are enjoying trying out every little thing our perverted minds can come up with.

However, part of my sexual history has been pretty unpleasant. I was in an abusive relationship for nearly two years, and I had crappy experiences when I was growing up due to a combination of naivete and skeevy bastards. I've dealt with it in therapy and I certainly don't consider it as defining my sexuality. But it is there, and anyone I get into bed with gets a disclaimer: I have triggery points, and although I want to enjoy myself with you something we do may hit them. This history doesn't really have anything to do with kinky sex, and working through it has been more about learning to trust partners in general than anything else.

In getting closer to Tom I've shared more of that history with him. However, he hasn't ever really dealt with this sort of thing before- he grew up a bit sheltered, and has never been close to someone who's been working through, say, depression or trauma. Dealing with this freaks him out a little, and he doesn't really know what to do. It's not that he doesn't want to be there in the event that I need him, and I've said that I would tell him what I need in the event that something does come up. Honestly, it's happened just once in the time we've known each other (nearly a year now) and most of the time all I need is a cup of tea and some time alone/a hug. But it's the idea of psychological instability, no matter how minor, that unsettles him.

But since I talked about that part of my history (and really not anything near what I would consider the worst of it) he's been treating me differently in session. It feels like he's holding back and not doing everything that he wants to. I think that he's worried about bringing up bad history, but it's pretty frustrating. I don't want him to treat me with kid gloves- that's hardly the point of this endeavor. But it also makes me feel like he doesn't trust me enough to tell him if something's getting too intense, or as though he feels like he needs to take responsibility for my feelings. While I love that he doesn't want to hurt me (in the bad way) I really don't like that. He's said that he doesn't want me to ever get to the point where I need to use my safeword- that part of being a good dom is being able to know if something's getting too intense, that him crossing that line would be a personal failing on his part (and yes, he used the words 'personal failing'). I disagree - sometimes shit happens in session. It's not pleasant, but you move along and get back on the horse, assuming that things haven't been royally fucked up. And I wouldn't be playing with him in the first place if I thought he was the kind of person with whom things could get really bad.

I really like this guy, but I'm not sure what to do about this. Is it an intimacy thing that needs to happen over time? Am I missing something really obvious? Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

This is not a wildly unusual situation. You’re both new at this. He’s still building his confidence as a top. Most people have to do that when they first start out, that’s normal. There’s not a magic-bullet answer for this, it’s simply a matter of time and experience.

You may, in all innocence, have overshared a bit and spooked him. It makes a top - especially male tops - nervous when you spend a lot of time telling them about how you might freak out if this or that happens. Believe me, everyone has their triggery points. We know this is emotionally intense stuff - that is why it’s hot. If it's true that all you’d need is tea, space, or a hug, then in the future, go light on the foreshadowing and just ask for that if it comes up.

I do think there’s a broader context to this, although you may not care for my ideas on the subject. But here goes: consider the possibility that you’re overthinking this - and that you’re being a bit controlling, too. You talk about wanting him to trust you – what would it look like if you decided to trust him, and his process? What if you said to yourself, “Okay, I want Tom to feel and behave this certain way, both because it would align with my wishes and because I think he’d like it too. But he isn’t choosing to do that. However, he communicates to me, both verbally and by continuing to do scenes with me, that he is enjoying what we do. I’ve told him what is true for me. Now I am going to stop second-guessing him and trust that he is the best and highest authority on what’s best for him right now.”

Luckily, whether it’s his nerves or you being too controlling, or a combination of both, the solution is the same: stop trying to do anything. Whatever is in Tom’s head is not yours to deal with. The thing you have complete control over is your own behavior. So you can choose to play with him, or not. You can ask for certain activities, or not. And then you can accept that Tom is the sort of top, and the sort of man, that he is. Or – not.

***

Here is where I go off on a tangent that’s not directed at the writer herself, but more at the culture in general. The idea that a woman can change how her male partner feels about things annoys me. Of course, I don't think anyone should try to control any other person's feelings, regardless of gender. But I get a lot of letters that sound much like this - and they are always from women. Men have their own brand of bad habits (Lord knows I have discussed them extensively here), but I just cannot imagine a guy writing me this sort of letter.

I place the blame on women’s magazines, publishing all those stupid articles about Ten Tips For Fixing Whatever The Hell Is Wrong With Your Man! It’s sort of borderline when said fixes are purely external. I have known and loved men who I thought really needed a different haircut, or some clothes from, say, the current decade. That’s minor stuff, and some men are happy to have a woman tactfully offer help with such things. Some aren’t, and then you have to either deal with it or not. But he couldn’t be that awful, or you wouldn’t be with him in the first place, right?

However, I strongly disagree with the idea that a woman should try to redesign the inside of a man’s head. If you want a romance with someone who thinks just like you, date other women. Men are different from us. Really. Their view of the world is neither better or worse than ours, it just – is. I myself think men are sort of like the Federal government. They do certain important jobs really well, but it’s best to keep their official duties simply defined. As far as I am concerned, the duties of the men in my life are: lift heavy things, defend me from hostile insects and rodents, tell me that I’m beautiful, and make with the sexy.

Perhaps there are some refinements to those tasks - cooking dinner, helping me with my taxes, clearing paths through crowds, et cetera. But I think with men, it’s best to stick to job requirements that are observable to the naked eye. If you tell a man what you wish to have done, he’ll either do it, or else he won’t. But if it's something both of you can see, then it's easier to discuss. Telling a man you want him to feel differently is hard to measure, and doing so rarely yields a satisfactory result for anyone, in my experience.

Again, I’m being somewhat flippant in how I’m expressing this. However, I am serious when I say: it is a mistake to try to get someone to change how he thinks and feels. If you don’t already like how he thinks and feels, then why are you with him?

So you want a tip, ladies? Here’s a tip: take the man, or leave him, just like he is. You want to fix something around your house? Re-upholster your couch. Or clean out the gutters, or organize your spice cabinet, or whatever. But fixing up a man? Bad idea.

2010-12-04T03:42:00.000-08:00

I have something for both the poly people and the kinky people today. And if you're both, go you!

Seattle people: My darling Max is teaching a class this Sunday from 2-5pm: Rope Bondage 201. Like all of Max's classes, it will be partly about techniques, and partly about the abstract elements of a scene. And it will be wholly awesome, so you should go. More info, here.

And: the latest Stranger column, about unproductive behaviors that certain types of male/female couples fall into, when seeking a woman to join them. How Not To Be A Dunning-Kruger Couple.

2010-11-29T01:31:00.000-08:00

As I muse today about how the important people in my life have a habit of evolving outside of the boundaries I anticipated placing around the relationship... Please enjoy a story about me, Max and Jae, originally published here, in July 2004.

Me, Max, and Jae

As Max and I approach the fifth anniversary of our first date, I’ve been thinking about the fact that if my submissive, Jae, didn’t have such a big clitoris, Max and I might never have gone on that date at all.

Max and I had been encountering each other socially in the BDSM community for a while before the thought crept into my head: You know, he’s actually sort of attractive. I examined that idea with surprise, because Max belongs to a group of people I had, until that time, regarded with a distinct coolness. He’s a heterosexual male dominant.

Understand, it wasn’t that I thought that all straight male tops were jerks. Just most of the ones I’d met. As my acquaintance with Max progressed, I liked him more and more. But I was baffled—his behavior didn’t match my concept of a straight Master. He never engaged in verbal pissing matches with other dominants over who had the biggest kinky repertoire. He didn’t act as if every submissive woman was his potential conquest. And he didn’t leer at Jae and me with that sleazy can-I-watch? energy when he saw us together at parties. There was something almost irritating about his refusal to be an overbearing twit. Being sexually attracted to a walking, talking challenge to your assumptions really isn’t the most comfortable state of mind.

Jae noticed. “That Max guy—you like him, don’t you, Mistress?”

I shrugged. “He’s okay—I mean, for a breeder-boy top. But it’s easy to be cool when you’re just chatting at an event. I bet he’d be different if he was playing.” As I said the words, an idea formed in my mind. “Yeah, I bet he would be different. And I think we should see for ourselves.”

“What do you mean?”

“I think I should set up a little test for Max. Sure, he’s Mr. Suave if we’re just talking, but I want to see what he’s like when he’s playing with a cute girl.” I gave Jae a meaningful stare.

She grinned. “I’m game.”

So, a few nights later at a play party, I asked Max to help me do some rope bondage—his specialty—on Jae, as part of a longer scene between she and I. Unaware of the undercurrents, Max agreed and we decided we’d tie Jae to one of my favorite bondage props, a six-foot, solid wooden stretcher.

I took her aside. “Okay, are you ready?”

She nodded. “Want me to get naked?”

“Yeah. No, wait—let’s give the guy a break, there’s absolutely no way he’ll be able to maintain with your coochie in his face. Leave your panties on.”

“Whoops,” she said. “I’m not wearing any.”

I rolled my eyes. “I should have known. All right, I think there’s a stray pair at the bottom of my toy bag, go dig through there and put them on.”

She went off, and Max and I set up for the scene. The plan was to essentially lace Jae to the board with ropes, so that we could then stand the board up and lean it—and Jae—against the wall.

She returned, wearing a black lace thong that I recognized as a pair I’d used as a gag in another scene. Doubtless a little the worse for wear, but perfectly serviceable as a fig leaf. Or so I thought.

Jae lay down on the board and we began to wind the ropes tightly around her body. Max displayed no particular interest in Jae’s near-nudity, directing his attention mainly to me as he talked about types of ropes and knots. I chatted back at first, but as we were tying her legs, I became distracted by a wardrobe malfunction. Not mine—Jae’s. Each time we wrapped rope around her legs and hips, the fabric of the panties was pulled more tightly, and it was becoming obvious that there was a small rip in the stretchy lace. And that rip was pretty much dead-center over her clit.

In a lesser woman, this might not be so bad. But Jae likes to call herself “well-endowed,” and while I haven’t gone around measuring other women’s clits to get a statistical sample, I think she’s right. I could already see a bit of pink flesh just barely contained by the fraying fabric.

“I think we should stand the board up, and then put some more rope through her legs, to support her,” said Max calmly.

Nothing in his tone or his manner suggested that he’d noticed anything unusual about Jae’s underwear, or, in fact, that he was noticing Jae’s body in any sexual way at all. I felt that now-familiar flicker of annoyance that he wasn’t living down to my expectations. As we got on either side of the board to lift it upright and set it against the wall, I thought, All right, cool cat. You’re doing good so far. But let’s see how you handle this.

Aloud I said, “Okay, why don’t you show me how to do it.”

He picked up a coil of rope and knelt down in front of the board, with his face roughly even with Jae’s waist. He threaded the rope through the handles of the board and then between Jae’s spread-apart legs, creating a harness for her lower body. And when he tightened the ropes in the creases between her thighs and the outer edges of the thong, it happened. The tension of the ropes overstressed the already-stretched fabric, and it ripped open to reveal Jae’s labia and clit, squeezed forward by the pressure of the ropes holding her in place.

So much for the fig leaf, I thought. The contrast between the black lace and the pink flesh was quite striking—I could not have drawn more attention to Jae’s clit if I’d painted red concentric circles around it. And with Max on his knees in front of her, his face was about six inches away from the target.

I crossed my arms and waited. Now he’ll say something stupid, I thought. How could he not? Her clit looks like Pinocchio’s nose, for God’s sake.

He finished tying off the line and stood up. “I think she’ll be okay for a while like that, but you’ll want to watch her to make sure it’s not too much pressure on her femoral artery.” He smiled at me. “Let me know if you need any help getting the board back down.” And then he walked away.

“Well, fuck me,” I said softly. I looked at Jae. “Did you see that? He didn’t even blink. Your pussy pops out like a jack-in-the-box and he doesn’t say shit. That’s impressive.”

“Maybe he’s gay,” said Jae, a trifle sulkily.

“Oh honey, it’s not that you’re not pretty. I think he just has very good manners.” And I think I’m going to have to reevaluate my whole position on straight male dominants.

An hour later, I found Max and handed him a coil of rope. “I think this is yours. And thank you for your help.”

“You’re welcome. And thanks for asking me, it was fun.”

I smiled at him. “So, I was wondering, would you like to go do coffee sometime?"

2010-11-17T16:12:00.000-08:00

I have a new Stranger column up, and I’m expecting some blowback from it, either on the Stranger page or elsewhere on the web, because I am pushing a hot button: I am suggesting that the BDSM instructors should not teach – or even demonstrate – high risk practices in short, beginner-accessible classes. So you should read that column first, because the rest of this post discusses it.

This column sprung from attending a breathplay class taught by Lee Harrington here in Seattle recently, part of which made me uneasy. Let me emphasize here that Lee showed us a lot of fun, no/low risk ways to limit or change the way someone breathes. Lee is a very engaging speaker/performer, and has a lot of good things to say about the psychology and theatre of breathplay. It was only part of the class troubled me, and that was the part with demonstrations of strangling, and the part where Lee put a plastic bag over his head and taped it around his neck.

The good part of this was how well Lee Harrington – with whom I’ve been acquainted for some years – took my criticism. He listened to my opinion thoughtfully and without defensiveness, and we had a really good dialogue about it privately. For now, he’s not teaching the class as a stand-alone offering. Handling criticism well takes grace and maturity, and Lee displayed an impressive level of both. I respect that a lot.

Breathplay is a touchy issue for BDSM people. Even the mere word breathplay is tricky. It’s a bit like the word “bondage” – it covers a very broad range of activity. Let me reiterate that I have no problem with the milder end of breathplay, either doing it or teaching it.

However, as with every kind of BDSM, there is a scale of intensity and risk in breathplay. And there are specific practices at the high end of the overall activity where the risk of harm is so high and so uncontrollable that I don’t think they should be taught to a general audience. Strangling people unconscious, or suffocating them unconscious with a plastic bag or some similar thing like plastic wrap, is very high risk. I think BDSM educators should be actively discouraging those behaviors.

And I don’t think it’s repressive, or a waste of time to do that. This is not about shaming people for their turn-ons, or preaching a just-say-no sermon. It’s no different than Max teaching people not to suspend people by just their wrists. Yes, it looks cool, you see it in the movies, and there are porn pictures of it online, but in real life, that’s likely to damage someone’s hands in a severe and/or permanent way, so he instructs people not to do that. There are other ways to tie people up that are hot and sexy and far less likely to result in physical damage.

In the same way, there are ways to play with breathing that are far less likely to result in someone being harmed. That’s what we should be teaching people to do. I have no illusions that everyone will stop doing intense strangling and suffocation. But I believe that the BDSM community can and should influence some people towards safer types of play.

For some people, the idea that they are deliberately and purposefully risking death is part of the thrill of strangling and suffocation. They feel it’s the ultimate expression of trust, although I don’t quite understand how it expresses trust when a lot of risk is beyond the conscious control of the top. Doing a scene like that - one where, if things go wrong, someone dies on the spot - is called edgeplay, and I admit openly it’s not my kink. But obviously if you like playing with the possibility of death, then safer breathplay will not appeal to you.

Fans of strangling like to invoke martial-arts masters as examples of how choke-holds can be done safely. To them I say: if you and your partner are, in fact, both martial-arts masters who have been trained in this, then yes, you can assess your risk differently. (I say both because being schooled in how to respond to a choke-hold in a way that minimizes damage is part of why that works as well as it does.) And doing even a properly-executed chokehold while alone with a sexual partner is still a different situation than doing it in a ring surround by judges and officials, and with emergency medical help standing by. But I acknowledge that some people have superior training.

However, the vast majority of people in the world - including me - are actually not trained martial-arts masters. For us, using martial-arts masters as an example for what’s safe in breathplay is a bit like using professional racecar drivers as an example of what’s safe to do while driving I-5.

So to my mind, if you want to be educated in how to apply chokeholds, then go to martial-arts school. It will take longer than two hours, for sure, and it will involve more effort than you just showing up and sitting on a folding chair. (And way more than - sweet Jesus - reading about it and watching porn of it online.)

But guess what? Gaining true mastery of any BDSM technique takes work. If you want to do high-risk play, but you care so little for your partner’s safety that you’re not willing to spend time, effort and money to learn as much as you possibly can about how to do it, then I don’t have much respect for you as a player.

I have some other thoughts about the culture of breathplay as a part of the BDSM community – there are a few curious anomalies about it that I want to discuss with some people I know and respect who do breathplay. And I’m actually pondering a follow-up column to this one, if I can get a Seattle-area martial-arts instructor to answer some interview questions for me about learning and using chokeholds. So look for more questions and analysis about this in days to come…

EDITED: I think free-diving school would be the best way to learn about suffocation. Obviously it's slightly different being in the water versus having a bag over your head, but it's my opinion that the science of it would be similar enough to make that practice slightly less high-risk.

2010-11-10T03:07:00.000-08:00

A random silly story…

Regular readers know I like champagne, and lately one of my favorite brands has become hard to find. Billecart-Salmon Brut Rose is it's name, and there’s apparently some issues with suppliers/distributors here in Washington. Very annoying. Thus, anytime I’m someplace that sells wine, I’ve taken to checking to see if they have any inventory sitting on the shelf.

Yesterday I was in the QFC on Broadway, buying some mundane items for the house, and I walked by the little glassed-in room where they keep the pricier wine. By chance, it was unlocked, so I stepped inside to just see if there was any of my pretty pink bubbly. I figured it was a long shot, but hey, worth checking.

I was studying the shelves of champagne when the wine steward - a dark-haired guy, rather nice-looking - walked up and politely inquired if he could help me.

“I’m looking for Billecart-Salmon rose. I don’t see any here, but if you have any bottles that aren’t out, I’ll take them.”

Now, sometimes when I’m in a non-kinky setting, I’ll say something, and without my meaning for it to, it’ll come out sounding rather… Mistress-Matisse-y. I don’t know why. An occupational hazard, I suppose. It wasn’t like I snapped my fingers at the guy or anything. I just accidentally dropped into a bit of the command-voice, you might say.

And he heard it. He paused in what he was about to say and regarded me quizzically, but with good humor. Then his eyes dropped to the item I was carrying tucked under my arm like a swagger stick. He made a small gesture towards it. “Got a big evening planned?”

I was carrying a toilet plunger. One of those really big ones.

Naturally I cracked up laughing. “Oh yeah, I have a hot date,” I replied, taking the plunger out from under my arm and brandishing it slightly. “And nothing goes with a plunger like Billecart-Salmon. I mean, obviously.”

He grinned. “Who could argue with that?” He then admitted he didn’t have any, and we spent a few minutes discussing the merits of other rose champagnes in a slightly frisky manner. I held the business end of the plunger and used the handle as a pointer as we looked through the shelves.

Him: “Have you tried the Henriot rose? I think it would go well with plungers.”
Me: “Hey, I only have this one. I’m not that kinky.” (Yes, I said that. Sue me.)
Him: “Well, there’s the Laurent-Perrier. I think that’s so good you should have proof of birth control when you buy it.”
Me: (laughing)
Him: “No, seriously. Even if you’re alone.”

So there you go. Carry an odd accessory, cop a Mistressy attitude, and you’ll get lots of personal attention from wine guys. Just don’t buy any Billecart-Salmon, because I want it.

2010-11-06T13:34:00.000-07:00

A link to my latest Stranger column: an interview with Sex At Dawn author Christopher Ryan, about life after one's book is published.

And, a little word-rant of mine, first written in 2004, polished up a bit and presented for your amusement.

***

BDSM Word-of-the-Day: Domme. Noun. Pronunciation: 'däm
Domme is a made-up word, the faux-Frenchified and feminized offspring of the abbreviation, "dom", which of course means "dominant". Both dom and domme are used as nouns: "he's a dom," or "she's a domme". But be aware that both words are pronounced exactly the same way: they rhyme with the name "Tom". "Domme" is absolutely not pronounced "dom-may" or "dom-mey".

Even aside from some people's cringe-inducing tendency to mispronounce this word, it isn't one of my favorite terms - it just seems clunky and affected. When I came out into the scene, people used the words "top" and "bottom" as flexible generic terms to indicate someone's dominant or submissive role or behavior, and I still use those terms a lot, even though they've fallen out of vogue. I was taught to use "Master" and "Mistress" mostly as terms of specific address, and only occasionally as descriptive terms.

Another thing: a "sub" is either an underwater boat or a sandwich. I realized this word has drifted into mainstream culture, and I'll cut non-BDSM folks some slack about using it, though I may wince slightly. But for someone involved in the scene, using the word "sub" to refer to a person is extremely gauche. I really feel that there is no punishment too strong for people who say or write "subbie" as a pseudo-cutesy way of saying "submissive".

Also undesirable is saying "subbing" to refer to either a status or an activity. "Chris is subbing to Pat." Don't say that. You could say, "Chris is Pat's submissive." Or, "Chris is submissive to Pat." Or if you are speaking of a scene rather than a ongoing relationship, you could say something like, "Chris is submitting to Pat tonight at the party."

One last word rant: Dom-i-nant, when used in this context, is a noun. If you are a person who likes to be in control, you're a d-o-m-i-n-a-n-t. When you are playing with your partner, you dom-i-nate them. That's a verb. As you can see, they're spelled differently, and that's because they're two different words. If I see one more personal ad or profile saying, "I'm a dominate Master," I'm going to give someone an enema with a pureed Webster's dictionary.

Language is a beautiful thing. Words are very important. So don't fuck with them or the Mistress will kick your ass.

Original version published Tuesday, May 25, 2004

2010-11-01T01:31:00.000-07:00

I realize I'm cannibalizing myself here a fair amount lately. What can I say? I have phases where I want to write a lot, and then phases where I don't as much. My real life is so extremely delightful lately that I'm just busy living it.

Be assured I'm not going away. I have collected a number of stories that will see the light of digital day sometime in the future. I have a pair of Stranger columns in the chute that I'm quite pleased with, so those are forthcoming. And there's always my Twitter for 140-character bursts of whimsy, fashion-porn, and occasional bits of (I hope) brilliance.

And, now a story I've told before. It came to my mind over the weekend, as some female pals and I were talking about sexual approaches that were doomed to fail.

***

What Not To Say

In spite of sometimes-considerable provocation, I try not to talk too much here about the recent, real-life bad behaviors of people I encounter. At least not so that they could identify themselves - it just seems too unkind. I have a lot of power in this forum, and I try to use it only for good.

However, there are exceptions to that rule. So while this is not my story, it's from a reliable source, and it's so breathtakingly bad that I had to say something.

Not long ago, a woman I know moved to a new town - not Seattle - and she went to a munch where she knew no one. A man there introduced himself and was very friendly to her, as men will be. In fact, one might reasonably say he was hitting on her.

Nothing wrong with that, exactly. He just didn’t do it very well, you understand. Apparently he was a bit too forward with the social touching, for example. I have met this man myself, and I have my own observations of his social skills, and what she said lined up with my impression of him. But my friend is a laid-back girl, and so she just shrugged it off.

Okay, fast-forward: the munch is over, she’s leaving, and he’s walking her to her car. And with no obvious pretext whatsoever, he turns to her and says, “So where are you on your cycle?”

She looked at him. “Excuse me?”

“Are you close to your period? You just look kinda puffy, like you’re retaining water.”

My pal told me this, and my jaw dropped open in disbelief. “No, he did not say that to you. He did not.”

She closed her eyes and laughed a little, ruefully. “Yes, yes he did.”

Sweet Jesus Christ. I was dumbstruck with astonishment by this tale. I cannot believe that any man past the age of toilet-training would be so stupid as to actually say this a woman. I mean any man, to any woman, at any time, ever. Neither Max nor Monk would dream of ever saying something like this to me, even though there have been times when I was retaining so much water that I should have had a freaking salmon ladder built over my abdomen. If you have a female partner, yeah, sometimes you can tell when her body looks a little different. But only a flipping idiot would remark on the matter to his or her beloved. The correct response, if your girlfriend says, “Do I look puffy?” is “No, sweetheart, not at all.” If really pressed, you might squint thoughtfully at her and say, “Well, maybe your boobs look a little bigger. Otherwise, nah, you look great.”

That’s how you handle it with a woman you’re intimate with, and it doesn’t seem like you’d have to be real clever to figure that out. So I am astounded at the thickheadedness of a man who thinks it’s cool to tell a woman he just met, whom he is hitting on, that she looks puffy. I mean, what are you thinking? How could anyone imagine that such a remark would endear you to a girl? Saying that kind of thing to women is a really good way to grow cobwebs across your cock.

It's barely possible that this man thinks he's such a True Dominate Master that he can say things like this and women will find it acceptable. He'd be wrong, of course, but it's the only even-slightly-comprehensible explanation I can think of. (I suppose he could be a menstruation fetishist, but he didn't say so, and that still wouldn't make the remark any less horrifying. )

Ready for some extra-bonus-wrongness points? This man is himself a rather large fellow. Nothing wrong with that, but if you’re going to go around telling women you just met they look puffy, you invite their examination of your figure, and if it speaks of a lot of high-sodium snacks, it makes a girl think, Well at least my puffiness will go away in a couple of days, buddy.

Super-extra-bonus-wrongness points: when they got to her car, he tried to kiss her. I am so not making this up. I am not. I could not have made this up if I tried. It’s so wrong. (She dodged it, thankfully.)

No, she didn’t tell him he was a prat, she’s too polite, and plus the whole thing caught her off guard. But you can bet she’ll be avoiding him in the future.

Now, I don’t know that this fellow reads this blog. I hope he doesn't. But in case he does: yes, I’m talking about you. I am sure you’re mortified by this. However, note that I did not name or describe you, or mention the city, and I could have. Unless you tell them, no one but you, the woman involved, and me know that it’s you. Your best response would be to keep quiet and learn something from this. I don’t think you’re evil, but I think you’ve done some socially inappropriate things, and yes, sometimes you’re gonna get called on that. It’s a growing-up process. You seem active in your pursuit of the ladies, so here’s my advice: Your hands should be kept more to yourself until such time as a woman makes it clear she wants you to touch her. And your unflattering and too-intimate remarks on a woman’s appearance should remain unsaid forever.
(First published: Tuesday, April 01, 2008)

2010-10-21T15:19:00.000-07:00

I found out today that Jezebel.com wants to link to my latest Stranger column: The Great Polyamory vs Polyfuckery Debate. I'm charmed and flattered, and quite curious to see how Jezebel readers respond to it...

2010-10-18T23:46:00.000-07:00

I forget sometimes that there's a whole little section of columns I've written for The Stranger that do not appear under my byline in their archives proper. They are over on the the personals site, Lustlab. Here's one from some years ago that I selected to place here today, but you can enjoy all of them here.

***

Anatomy of a BDSM Party

10:40 p.m.—Max and I arrive at our host’s home and stash our stuff with the 20-odd other bags of BDSM toys sitting near the front door. The assortment of luggage reflects the tastes of the owners: black plastic tackle boxes full of needles and sharp toys, architects’ document tubes containing long canes and crops, and black leather duffle bags loaded with floggers and paddles.

10:42 p.m.—I take a look around the room, waving to a few people. I’m guessing there are about 40 other BDSM people present, and if past experience is anything to go by, about half of them will be people I know well, a quarter of them people who I know slightly, and the rest of them people I don’t know at all.

10:44 p.m.—I put the beers we brought into the ice chest and we then fall into conversation with some friends standing by the host’s dining-room table, which is loaded with yummy food. I eat strawberries and remark to Rose that her breasts, which are attractively displayed in a transparent T-shirt, are so beautiful that it’s difficult to restrain myself from touching them. She smiles and invites me to go ahead. Max and I aren’t in full-on cruising mode tonight, but we’re open to doing some casual play if the right situation presents itself, so gently squeezing Rose’s tits is an auspicious beginning for the evening.

10:50 p.m.—Rose introduces me to a tall boy who has blue hair, blue eye shadow, and a blue-trimmed corset, all perfectly matched. The three of us chat about the pains and pleasures of wearing high-heeled shoes.

10:58 p.m.—Mingling in the living room, I sit down next to another female friend and ask her about the pretty brocade bustier she’s wearing. We then get into a discussion about the relative merits of dating people already in the BDSM community versus meeting someone presumably vanilla and then “turning” them. I profess myself to be firmly in the first camp, but she offers some spirited debate on the matter, based mainly on what she sees as the slim pickings available in terms of already-kinky single men.

11:07 p.m.—Brocade Bustier and I are joined by a third woman, wearing a long black gown, and the three of us get into a hilariously bitchy conversation about how one can identify undesirable dating possibilities.

11:10 p.m.—Three women laughing together attract male attention, and we are joined by a guy in a black leather vest. We warn him that he should not attempt to participate in this female-dominated conversation.

11:14 p.m.—The guy in the black leather vest leaves. Apparently our discussion of bad combovers, and the relationship between men’s cars and their penis size, displeased him in some way. We are not greatly troubled by his departure.

11:28 p.m.—I find Max and we walk downstairs to the basement, where the BDSM play is happening. There’s a light flogging going on in one corner, and across the room a local bondage artist is putting a rope body harness on a topless woman, who is giggling. The main attraction for the voyeurs among us, however, is tattoo/body modification artist Gypsy Jill*, who is suturing glittering crystal and rhinestone beads onto another woman’s back, breasts, and shoulders. There are matching beads already woven into her hair. It’s clearly going to be an elaborate piece of body art when it’s finished. The woman being sewn on quivers occasionally, but it’s impossible to tell if it’s from pain or pleasure. Otherwise she sits quietly, watching herself and Jill in a mirror that’s been placed in front of her chair. A handful of rapt observers stand at a polite distance, murmuring amongst themselves in low voices.

11:49 p.m.—Max and I are enjoying just seeing our friends, but we’re also still considering who, if anyone, we might pounce upon. So we go back upstairs and wander out onto the deck, where several nude people are sitting in a hot tub. A black-haired woman in a black leather corset, puffy tulle skirts, and high laced boots is sitting next to the tub in a plastic chair, holding a laughing conversation with a naked woman as she splashes in the water. Sounds float out to us from the living room, and everyone’s head turns for a moment as we all hear the familiar thwack sound of a flogger landing on someone’s flesh. A few people stub out their cigarettes and stroll inside to see who’s getting flogged, but most of us just smile and go back to our conversations.

12:11 a.m.—After an amusing group discussion about how to get one’s BDSM toys through an airline baggage check, I go back inside to get a drink, carefully avoiding the backswing of the corseted Mistress who’s flogging a shirtless man as he leans up against the wall. I bend over to get a can of pop out of the ice chest, and as I straighten up, a male friend standing a few feet behind me grins and asks if I’ll get him one too. I obligingly start to bend over again before I remember: I’m wearing my extremely short leopard skin skirt. I stick out my tongue at him, and then pull up the hem of my skirt for a second and flash him my ass cheeks.

12:26 a.m.—One of the guests has recently appeared in a spanking and corporal punishment DVD and has brought a copy to the host, who promptly pops it into the player. It’s actually a pretty good DVD, as such things go, but there is no tougher audience than a roomful of hardcore perverts like us, and our response is something that, if filmed, might be entitled Mystery Science Theater 3000: The Fetish Movies.

1:00 a.m.—Despite some kinky possibilities here, Max and I decide we’d prefer to go home and fuck each other like crazed weasels, so kiss a lot of people goodbye—some more enthusiastically than others—and leave.

***

*Who is much missed by people who knew and loved her. Requiescat in pace, Jill.

2010-10-14T22:28:00.000-07:00

As the readers of my Twitter already know, I'm out of town for a few days. I'm enjoying a few days in Chicago with an intimate companion. I'm back Saturday evening, and I plan to spend Sunday recovering what I'm sure will be be a delightful trip.

But if you wish to see me, drop me a note and we'll plan a rendezvous for next week. I have missed seeing far too many people I'm fond of lately. You know who you are... So let's play.

2010-10-12T02:58:00.000-07:00

Even more than I want to kiss Matthew Inman, I want to kiss this cartoonist for drawing this cartoon. Because I feel this way ALL the time, and I'm eternally grateful to Allie Brosh for reminding me that other people suck at being grown-ups, too.

You have to go read the whole thing. This one panel does not do it justice. What, you have to go to the bank? Forget that. Internet!

2010-10-06T13:16:00.000-07:00

The newest Stranger column, about the Edward Bagley case in Missouri. I have some strong opinions about people who take my culture and do bad things with it.

2010-10-05T02:04:00.000-07:00

Letters To The Mistress

Dear Mistress Matisse

Why is the BDSM community so reverse-sexist? I have seen your columns about people abusing slaves and it is always men who abuse women. Why do you not speak out about the women who abuse men and hold them in slavery and fear? We are human too and it is not right that we have to suffer, pay money, be denied our rights just because we are the slave. If you are really the fair Mistress then you should speak of this too.

Huh. I’m a little confused by this letter. I think what the writer is talking about is legal cases, like the utterly awful-sounding Edward Bagley case in Missouri, where BDSM is used as a false justification for non-consensual abuse.

(Google it if you want, it's so ugly-feeling that I don't even want to link to it. And be aware that the Bagley case has not gone to trial, so this is all theoretical. The defense has not, in fact, presented BDSM as a rebuttal to the prosecution's charges, and they may not. Everything you read about that case is only alleged, not proven. But I remarked on it on Twitter a few days ago, and I have a column coming out this week that concerns it and cases like it.)

Quite simply, I haven’t written about parallel cases like that involving female defendants and male victims because I’m not aware of any. It is true that women can – and do – physically abuse men non-consensually. But I have not seen any cases where a woman was accused of imprisoning a man against his will and subjecting him to ongoing, systematic abuse that caused him to literally and constantly fear for his life.

(Note: I am excluding cases of a mother/caregiver abusing a child. I know that happens. I refer to cases of two unrelated adults.)

But if you know of any recent (say, the last five years) US cases where a woman has held a man captive, and the relationship between them was described in ways that mimic BDSM relationships, feel free to draw my attention to them.

Separate completely from the serious abuse question: I am highly amused that the writer seems to be saying he’s a slave, but he doesn’t want to be “held in slavery”, suffer, or be denied his rights. I know a number of slaves, Masters, and Mistresses who would say that was the exact point of slavery. I certainly have talked to a lot of men who fantasize about that precise arrangement. I think if there was a woman who was accused and convicted of such behavior, she’d probably get a lot of love letters during her time as a prison inmate!

2010-09-29T01:18:00.000-07:00

Massage and Misdirection

I have gotten – as I presumed I would – a lot of replies to the post yesterday about sex workers using the word massage. Let me reiterate that I have much respect for licensed massage practitioners. My mom was one for years, and she was definitely not a sex worker and did not want anyone to ask her for sex. So I’m all down with LMP’s having boundaries about this.

I will also repeat what I said yesterday: some LMP’s do engage in sexual behavior in their massage sessions. I know ya’ll don’t like to admit that, but it is true. So it is not a matter of only people who don’t have licenses muddying up an otherwise pristine profession.

That said, I completely agree that if you do not have a state license, you should not claim you do. I do not support anyone pretending to have medical skills they do not possess.

Several people suggested that sex workers should use the phrase “sensual massage” and only LMP's should use the phrase “therapeutic massage.” I would not be adverse to that, but it’s not an option. This is a state-by-state issue, but here in Washington, if you don’t have a state license, you may not legally use the word massage professionally. At all, period. If I’m wrong on this I’m sure someone will correct me, but last time I had a lawyer run through this with me, I was told that the fine for using the word massage if you did not have a license was substantially higher than the fine for a first-offense prostitution charge. The former is a thousand dollars, and the latter, five hundred. The LMP professional organizations apparently lobbied hard to get that fine very high, and since the state is never adverse to taking money, they agreed.

So at least here in Washington, ya’ll do own the very word massage, which is why you see ads offering “Sensual Touch”. That’s a sex worker trying to avoid having an LMP see her ad and report her to the state, because that's often the way unlicensed people get into trouble.

But see, sex workers are really not the problem. They are not the people asking LMP’s for sex. It’s the guys, right? (Yes, I’m sure that women sometimes solicit sex from an LMP, but I doubt it happens a lot.)

Men, as a gender, want sex and pursue it. You can think what you want about why that’s true, and whether that it is a good thing or a bad one or – as I myself believe - a morally neutral impulse that must be judged in context. But in general, that’s what they do.

And you will never change men’s behavior by changing women’s behavior. The world is full of examples of women trying to seem sexually unavailable to avoid unwanted overtures: by adopting face- or body-concealing styles of dress, not going to certain places, never being alone in the room with a man, et cetera. (Although many of these rules were designed by men trying to make 'their' women unavailable to other men.) But my point is: nowhere in recorded history have men responded to women emphasizing their chastity and unavailability by saying “Oh. Well, all right, we’ll stop asking, then.”

It would be great if simply by altering a word or two in an ad, sex workers could ensure that LMP’s who didn’t want to be sexual were not asked for sex. (Trust me, sex workers would love it if they got all that business.) But there will always be men in the world who either honestly don't perceive sexual boundaries until they are firmly explained, or else just don't respect them. No matter what women do, we cannot change that. We definitely don't have to just passively accept it. But it is fruitless to think "If only women acted like this, men would never act like that."

So the existence of sex workers is not the reason that some men ask LMP’s for sex. Men ask LMP’s for sex for the same reason they ask anyone else: because they want it. And that’s unlikely to change.

It can be frightening to be the object of a sexual overture you don’t want. But women who are not sex workers will never succeed in making themselves safer by isolating and stigmatizing women who are. The idea that they can is, I believe, a really clever shifting of blame on the part of certain unethical men who pursue sex from women in inappropriate ways, but who don’t want to be held accountable for their actions. “The woman tempted me!” It’s as old as the Adam and Eve story - and just as mythical.

2010-09-28T04:57:00.000-07:00

From The Mailbag

Mistress Matisse:
I read your column often and was glad to see you reminding erotic/sex workers that they flourished before Craigslist's erotic services section. Please for the sake of boundaries and the sake of other professionals could you possibly ask them not to simply move to the therapeutic services section? As it is, it is impossible to advertise in the Stranger or the Weekly as a legitimate non-erotic therapeutic massage therapist. Or a waste of time, as all the respondents are looking for sex. When sex workers co-opt the words "therapeutic massage", it makes it extremely difficult for a whole group of people who are also highly trained to practice their profession.
I have nothing against sex workers until they start pretending to be licensed massage therapists, which creates an expectation in the public mind about what real LMPs are willing to do which is mistaken.

This letter elicited several different responses in my mind. For one thing, I don’t think the writer honestly believes that I can bring about a change in anyone’s behavior simply by saying, “Hey, sex workers - stop calling yourselves massage therapists.” She knows, and I know, that isn’t going to happen. She is simply venting her annoyance, which is human nature. God knows I do it all the time.

And I have some sympathy for her. I, too, wish to practice my profession in peace, without being pestered by people I don’t wish to deal with. That’s an understandable thing to want. And as every small business owner will tell you: it’s not an easy thing to get.

But let me ask you massage therapists a larger question: why do you think you’re more entitled to use the massage than sex workers? I don’t mean that in a hostile way, I respect that you're hardworking business people. But I’m sincerely asking you to examine your assumptions. I have known many people who did non-sexual massage who complained vociferously about this, so when the author of this letter speaks of sex workers “co-opting” that word, she is not saying anything I’ve not heard before.

So really – why do you have a right to the word massage that other people don’t have? Because you paid a school to teach you techniques and then test you? And then you gave the state some money and they gave you a piece of paper? If sex workers had the option of going to school and getting a piece of paper that legitimized us, I’d be more inclined to say that was a fair argument. If there was a system like that in place for us, I'd go, in a heartbeat. But we are not permitted to do that.

I think this sense of entitlement is based on the idea that touching someone in a non-sexual way is inherently better and more legitimate than touching them in a sexual way, and I don’t accept that. What I’m really hearing here is: you don’t want anyone to even think you’re a sex worker, because whether you admit it or not, you think that’s a bad thing to be. And you can’t really expect me to back you up on that.

(Besides, plenty of people who have LMT licenses actually do engage in sexual behavior, either sometimes, or all the time. So it's not like there's a hard-and-fast line there.)

I will grant you that some of this is probably a simple desire to have your business model be easily understood by potential clients, and some not-wholly-unreasonable fears of having an unpleasant encounter. I can relate to those concerns, I share them. But I don’t support putting sex workers in a language ghetto. Do as we do, and address the issue with potential clients however you see fit. But it is not our job to enforce your boundaries.

2010-09-24T02:30:00.000-07:00

Hello, my lovely readers... Here's a link to my latest Stranger column, in which I smack some of my professional colleagues with Mistress Matisse's Riding Crop Of Cluefulness. But only the whiny ones. So if you don't whine, then you will not have red marks on your butt when you get done reading. Hope you enjoy it either way.

2010-09-22T00:56:00.000-07:00

I got some responses to my letter from the kinky man with Asperger's Syndrome that were both thoughtful and helpful, so without further ado, here's what my readers had to say...

(First letter) "I'm a high-functioning Aspie top - and probably have sex work to thank for that. When reading people is your job you learn how to break it down and evaluate the signs eventually, or you don't eat! I've had clients, platonic friends, and lovers with Asperger's, also.

Possibly the best thing he could do is try to find a playmate that's also an Aspie - specifically a high-functioning one (likely to never have been diagnosed). They'll be able to read his cues somewhat while understanding his mindset, how he thinks, and the kinds of communications and instructions he'll have to receive. I do agree he shouldn't advertise in his dating profile that he has Asperger's, however it might help simply to state the facts on interacting with a new potential top: "I apologize in advance, but I don't always read subtle cues very well, especially socially. The more literal you can be the better - I want to do my best to understand and follow your wishes" goes a long way. If they're in the know, they'll be clued in, and even if they're not, they'll get it and know how to respond.

As far as actually finding this person goes, he can try geek haunts and Aspie haunts as well as kinky venues. The levels of overlap have become a cliché...

I think the advice you gave about when to disclose was great. As far as face-to-face venues, it's funny, but he might be best served to try to find an environment with some level of stated (rather than unspoken) etiquette or protocol. Casual situations are often the hardest because the rules of the game are so unclear. If at least some of the mores are stated upfront he'll feel more confident going in which will make all the difference.

In time, his weakness will also be his strength - he'll be able to use his pattern-finding, logical, literal mind to anticipate his Master's needs and wishes. He just might need more sample data to get there at first."

***

(Second letter) "I have had the pleasure of having my questions answered by you, Monk, and Max the times and your question related to the BDSM/Autism overlaps my professional life a little bit, so I thought I might at least attempt to offer a coherent opinion. Professionally I work with teenagers with sexually acting out issues (read as poor limits, poor communication skills, social interpretations, etc) that have gotten them into legal issues. The large majority of the students I work with are somewhere on the autism spectrum and face challenges like your reader mentioned about social cues, non-verbal communication, etc--all things that are vitally important when discussing negotiation in BDSM, safety limits, and all the facets that go into the before-the-scenes work.

As this reader goes out in search of their experiences, I think your suggestion of a spotter/canary is ideal. Someone who isn't is knowledgeable about the local BDSM Community, but is able to help assist with communication and sometimes translate between the people in the scene could be helpful until the reader begins to pick up on cues academically rather than internalize them non-verbally as many non-spectrum/Asperger’s/autism people do. I think the reader's decision to communicate their individual circumstances is also important. I think many tops expect effective communication from the other half of the scene either verbally or non verbally. Knowing in advance that the person you have hog-tied with a tens unit attached to the good china may not respond the way you expect them to is probably vitally important.

I would also say that once the reader has made some positive connections in their community having partners that they get to know (like in any good relationship) the social anxiety will go down. There won’t be the fear that the top will go too far, or that the lack of effective communication will put someone in an unsafe situation."

***

(Third letter) "I thought I'd point out one potential resource the letter writer might want to look into: FetLife.com. If he joins and does a search on groups for neurodiverse kinksters there are a number of communities that may be of use to him. I think connecting with others with Asperger’s Syndrome and other non-neurotypical kinksters will help him find valuable help that is specific to his situation instead of just the general social anxiety assistance that's out there. Finding a mentor who has dealt with similar problems could go a long way towards helping him. Once he has learned from someone else's experiences and has a few new mental tools under his belt, he'll be better equipped to start looking for partners."

***

My readers rock! Thank you for the information and support. This is how a community should work, so kudos to you for taking the time to be helpful!

2010-09-20T01:37:00.000-07:00

From The Mailbag

This is an interesting question. I can give my take on it, but I have no specialized knowledge of the issue. If any of you have an educated opinion on Asperger's/Autism and BDSM, I’d be happy to hear it.

As a man with Asperger's seeking Master/Slave and bondage scenarios (as a submissive) I have been struggling to find and negotiate safe and successful scenes and am looking for resources or advice on doing so. My usual Asperger's and Autism related resources fairly consistently advise avoiding kinky activities entirely, but since I have no interest in vanilla sex or relationships, that is advice I intend to ignore. So here I am, trying to find out the safest ways to ignore it.

(In case you are unfamiliar Asperger's is related to Autism. In my case resulting in very literal communication, difficulty with non-verbal communication and fairly pronounced social anxiety - particularly as group size increases. Apologies if this question is outside your interest or comfort zone to address.)

The social anxiety aspect of my Asperger's has meant trying to attend local workshops has been of little value, and I have exclusively been using the 'Recon' website, but have specifically run in to three recurring problems (which I suspect will sound similar to the problems of just about any shy or nervous dater, but please bear with me.)

Mentioning Asperger's directly in my profile proved to be problematic, quickly attracting contacts that quite clearly saw it as a vulnerability to exploit (being evasive or suggesting outright dangerous scenes) and leading me to conclude it is not something to disclose early.

Unfortunately, omitting this very important information about my disability and personality, but still seeking all of the scene, safety and limit information that my prior reading has insisted is important... seems to lead tops to perceive me as pushy or unreasonable or such. Or so I assume from the frequency with which previous expressions of interest transform into complete silence.

The few occasions where I have progressed to play, despite me (I think!) being very good at following instructions have always lead to dead ends - despite being told fun was had and that more scenes would be good, contacts have always progressed into silence. I am at a loss how to find out where I’m going wrong ~without~ disclosing the Asperger's and how important explicit instructions/expectations are.

So finally getting to the point I would like to ask you how, when and where you think it would be safest and most sensible to mention (and explain when necessary) my disability to potential Doms... both with such online resources as Recon and face-to-face venues if I ever gain the confidence to actually dress and step through the door.

My initial answer to this would be: what you are describing also happens to people who do not have Asperger's Syndrome. Naturally I cannot know if the people you communicated with and played with declined to pursue things with you because of that. But the fact is: statistically, most online communications of this sort do not turn into meetings. Of the meetings that do happen, most don’t turn into long-term relationships. They often don’t even turn into a second date. This is true of straight vanilla people, and it’s even truer for those of us with highly specific erotic taste.

And every online dating/hookup site is rife with unscrupulous types looking for the vulnerable people. That is why I constantly push people to make real-life friends – and by friends I mean: people you don’t have sex or play with – in their erotic community. Having kinky friends helps you distinguish nice people from bad people, and if you’re someone who has trouble reading cues, a pal who can act as the canary in the coal mine would be a very handy thing.

One question: can you talk to your doctor about meds to ease your general social anxiety? I know people who take occasion-specific medications for that, and I know people who take a daily dose of something that helps. I don't think that pharmaceuticals are the magic answer to every problem, but sometimes they are a tool worth considering.

So my overall opinion is: just keep trying. Be careful online, try to find a buddy who’ll go to events with you, and be prepared to kiss a lot of frogs. And I think you should disclose this before you play. I know that as a top, I’d be unhappy if I felt my partner had deliberately withheld an important piece of information about himself. If you think this is a crucial factor in your BDSM experience, then you need to tell people about it before the scene. Good luck to you!

2010-09-17T01:57:00.000-07:00

Now and then, I get emails from kind readers saying, "Hey, isn't this your picture? Did you know this person had it on his/her site?" It's sweet of people to look out for me, and I really appreciate these notes. I have indeed had trouble with people who are not me using my image - this one in particular remains a favorite.

But the image someone told me about most recently - it's supposed to be where it is. My friend Malixe shot it some years ago, and I believe it was in the first Seattle Erotic Art Festival. The print from that show hangs prominently on the wall in the playroom of a man I know here in Seattle. When I go to parties at his house, I smile to see myself presiding over a room that has undoubtedly seen some very kinky activity.

Click here to see a larger version of "The Strap-on", as well as Malixe's other work. (Unless you're at work, in which case, click later.)

2010-09-13T00:33:00.000-07:00

BDSM techniques, in today’s new podcast: Monk and I answer a reader letter about putting Altoid mints and Listerine Breath Strips in female pink parts. Naturally, I talk some about boy bits as well. Plus, why you’ll want some milk on hand for this type of play. About nine minutes, not work safe!

(A note about iTunes: some helpful folks have told me that iTunes is pulling from the from old hosting URL, and that's why my podcasts no longer show up there. That is indeed the case. What I haven't had time to puzzle out is how I change that. This is the only thing I can find about it on iTunes, and these instructions don't make any sense to me. Unless some brilliant person can tell me what I'm missing, I'm thinking I'll just have to re-submit the podcast as though it were new. Annoying.)

2010-09-08T02:11:00.000-07:00

Sex Workers and Money Management

"Dear Mistress Matisse... (Edited for length, but some nice compliments, thank you!)... I am in search of advice (of course). I am an escort and a student in Vancouver, BC and was intrigued by what you wrote in your interview with Belle de Jour (who I also love) about "Sex Worker Units" because it seems to be a common way of thinking when you are making so much money in so little time and enjoying yourself to boot.

While I try not to personally think like this, I can see the temptation to buy nice things and worry about my student loan payments later. I try to find a good balance of paying off my debt and enjoying my life but I have no idea how I should be saving and spending when my income fluctuates so much (how much I work depends on my studies). Saving more when I'm making more makes sense, I can figure out that much, but beyond that I am in the dark about what to do with my money.

I have done extensive searches on Mistress Google for financial advice for escorts (almost nothing) and financial advice for when your income fluctuates (more, but not all that informative) and haven't come up with much, especially because there always seems to be the opportunity to be working more or investing better (or at all). I know you are not a financial planner or an advice columnist but I was wondering if you could point me in the direction of some helpful resources either online or what kind of people I should be talking to in person. Although I do not plan on escorting forever, I will probably be doing it for the next few years at least and so should have some kind of plan for the money that I earn."

I am not - by any means - a financial whiz. But I know someone who is, so I asked him for his advice on this subject, and just trust me when I say: this is advice worth taking. Really.

***

He says: "You (Matisse) have actually talked about this when you talk about managing the business as a business. Before one talks about investing, you have to put your financial house in order. Get your credit cards paid, have medical insurance, a couple months expenses in the bank, etc.

For books: I recommend: The Complete Idiot's Guide to Personal Finance in Your 20s & 30s, 4th Edition. It looks like an excellent starter to me - it starts with "housekeeping issues" then moves to investing, etc.

For hiring a professional: First of all, you want to deal with a Certified Financial Planner - CFP - a fairly difficult credential to get and the gold standard in the industry. They have to pass rigorous test, serious continuing education and maintain professional standards like a CPA or attorney. I believe they have them in Canada as well.

Secondly you want to deal with a CFP that is fee-based, not commission-based. The fee can be a flat charge for a plan, an hourly fee like a CPA or a fee based on the assets managed. At times you will see one person who offers 2 or even 3 of these choices.

Ask for a statement of anticipated fees in writing, using terms you understand, before retaining them.

Finally they need to sign as a fiduciary to you in regard to their work. I think for someone starting out or with limited investable assets they are frequently well served by in independent CFP rather than one at a major investment firm that is pushing their people to have relationships with a minimum level of fees.

Now for a very prejudiced comment - my experience is women CFP's are on the average more focused on helping their clients and more diligent about maintaining their education then men who are more focused on the bottom line. (Mistress’s note: the person speaking is a man.) You can go online and to the national CFP site - get names of people in an area - find out if they are still accredited etc.

The killer is most people never get the house organized and the catch 22 to that is they can't hire someone like a CFP because there is no money to do so. I really wish there was a service that could help people budget but I have never found an affordable one.

The major reasons that you hire a CFP is not that they are geniuses, the next Warren Buffet. Rather, they do three things -

1. Create a plan or structure.
2. Harass the hell out of you to start saving and keep saving.
3. Will hold your hand and keep you from selling out when things are down, and from getting carried away and thinking you are Warren Buffet when things are good.

1 and 2 are critical. Number 3 is far more essential than virtually any client thinks. Effectively, they must be superb tops. I am not kidding on this statement.

Final recommendation - in most major cities you will find that universities, colleges and most frequently junior colleges have continuing education departments - classes with no credits - frequently for 4 or 6 weeks, one night a week - taught by professionals who are building their business. These can be a great bargain and I strongly recommend them. I would not, however, go to one that did not have a sponsorship by a recognized educational institution. Again, start with a financial planning class, then move on to an investment class."

***

Thank you so much to the lovely and wonderful man who gifted us with his expertise!

2010-09-06T02:44:00.000-07:00

From The Mailbox

A little over a year ago you wrote a column about connecting with your strap-on and taking control. I did not read this article. My (former) girlfriend did. It set off a flame in her that set our sex lives aflame.

Now here I am a 26 year old honest outgoing man in the dating world. The type of women I attract to date are no where near interested in strap-on play. In fact, when broached I think half-hearted is a much too strong statement.

So what are my alternatives? There are lots of professional services out there. And while I understand this is (at the present time) something considered a specialty. However even understanding that there are only so many times that I can find a couple hundred extra dollars lying around. Where is it possible to find casual strap-on fun? I would love to learn. I have been told to just wait for the right girl but surely there are better ways than trying to date a girl then bring it up and freak out a great girl and start all over again. Thanks for taking the time to read. I've been typing this in a rainy tent. Hard to sleep with your mind on important topics right?

Good lord, did someone really tell you to just wait for the right girl to fuck you in the ass? Seriously? Someday your Pegging Princess will come? I can’t believe that’s the case, but I’ll tell you I find the idea highly amusing.

There seem to be a lot of men out there seeking casual strap-on sex, because I get a lot of letters like this. Now, I think men wanting to get pegged is great – the world would be a better place if more guys eroticized their butts. It’s the insistence on it being casual that baffles me. Given that women who enjoy this seem hard to find, you’d think these guys would be inclined to hang on to a girl who wielded her dildo with skill and panache.

It always makes me wonder if there’s a subconscious Good Girl/Bad Girl thing happening. As in “Good girls – the kind I want to date seriously – are not interested in fucking me in the ass. Only Bad Girls - the kind you don’t marry – do that.”

I can see why the average man would think that. Any woman who deviates from the most conservative standards of female sexuality – very few lovers, only in the context of a committed relationship, sexually receptive but not aggressive, and only engaging in very mainstream sexual activities – can be branded a slut. Mr. Average Guy doesn't want his girlfriend to have been a slut with anyone else. He just wants her to act that way with him. (How she is supposed to learn to do this is a mystery.)

What Mr. Average Guy need to realize is: participating in Good Girl/Bad Girl sorting only perpetuates you not getting what you want, sexually. As long as women fear being labeled Bad Girls, they are going to remain unwilling to do anything that might earn them that tag.

The solution is both practical and politically smart: seek and seriously date Bad Girls. Or, as I prefer to call them: Sexually Adventurous Women. And then you’ll have to sort through those women to find one (or more) that you’d like to be in a relationship with.

This is what I do. This is what almost every person whose sexuality is non-mainstream does. Yes, once in while one gets lucky and just randomly becomes attracted to another person who shares a highly specific sexual taste. That’s a special sort of magic when it happens. But as the letter-writer points out, that isn’t usually the fastest and best way to go about it.

And pray, dear gentlemen, do not tell me that you cannot even begin to imagine how to find sexually adventurous women. You’re looking at the bright square thing in front of you, right? Series of tubes and all that? Start working the web.

No, it will not be as easy as simply seeing someone, thinking “She’s attractive,” and beginning a pursuit. I know that even the most mainstream of relationships is not easy to obtain. But, if you want a more fulfilling sex life, you are simply going to have to put even more effort into it. That means seeking out a certain kind of woman, making yourself attractive to her, communicating about what you want, finding out what she wants in return, and creating opportunities to try that out. Only then you will have transcended the status of Average Guy and become that most attractive creature, the Sexually Adventurous Man.

2010-09-03T13:01:00.000-07:00

Since my return from Georgia Tuesday, I've been spending time relaxing and enjoying the sensual pleasures of these late-summer days. More frequent blogging will return soon. But meanwhile, the Twitter feed will keep you up to date on my thoughts of the moment.

Event For The Seattle People: if you're a fan of beautiful women's feet, you should know about this party. Seattle Footnight! Thursday September 9th, from 8pm-midnight. These are fun events, I've gone to several of them before. I'll be at this one, and so will my lovely friend Lady Lydia, as well as other lovely ladies. Check out the site and register for the party!

2010-08-30T21:03:00.000-07:00

Ah, the miracle of the internet. From a sunny front porch overlooking the ocean, I give you: a new Stranger column, about a subject dear to the hearts of sexually-adventurous women everywhere. Limits, Conditions, and Consequences.

2010-08-25T01:26:00.000-07:00

A brief note about schedules, both real and virtual...

I'm out of town for most of the next week, visiting family down in Georgia. But I'm back as of September 1st, and I'd be happy to make times to see people after that.

And I will be mostly unavailable through Sept 21st to Sept 26th, as I'll have yet another round of family visiting here in Seattle.

Someone told me today, "You almost never blog anymore." I don't think that's quite accurate, I do try to blog as least twice a week, three times if I can.

But it's true that August and September are frequently the most challenging months of the year for me. I am my normally-busy self, and then I must also devote big chunks of time to the annual visits from both my family and Max's. I can't blame them, this is a lovely time of the year in Seattle. But it does seem like eight weeks of an almost ceaseless stream of guests, all of whom require a lot of my attention.

And if something has to get thrown overboard, time-wise, it's going to be the blog. Sad but true. However, as September rolls into October, the pace of life should slow down enough to make thrice-weekly blogging a more reliably sustainable goal. Meanwhile, enjoy the nice weather.

2010-08-23T02:01:00.000-07:00

What Do You Do?

A pal of mine asked me a question yesterday, and I’m just going to pop off an answer here. This will not be the most polished and perfected set of remarks I have on the subject, because I’m having a madly-busy week. But it’ll give a sense of my position on the subject.

The pal in question is a girl who became a sex worker (as I recall) about a year ago. She’s struggling with the question of: when to disclose to new acquaintances and potential dates that she’s a sex worker.

She’s the forthright type, which is a nice trait in a person. So when people ask her what she does for a living, she’s been telling them the unedited truth. On one hand, I can see why she’s doing that. We should not have to lie. I love what I do, and I think our profession should be considered as honorable as any other. People who work for the IRS don’t have to lie about what they do. Nor do sales reps for drug companies, or parking-meter enforcement. And sex workers generally make people much happier than those professions.

But in the real world – it’s an issue. If someone has just met you, and in the first hour of your acquaintance, you tell them you’re a sex worker, they are going to make snap judgments about you based on that. It’s just a fact. Occasionally – very occasionally - people say something like, “Oh wow, what a cool, interesting job that must be!” Usually not, though. Neutrality is the best one can hope for in that circumstance, and a lot of the time, they are going to have a negative association with the industry. And you can’t un-ring a bell. Once the information leaves your mouth, it’s out there, and you cease to have control over how people react to it and who it will be repeated to.

So sometimes being perfectly honest right from the get-go is a luxury it’s wiser not to avail yourself of. I recommended to her that she take a little time, get to know people better, and let them know her, before gifting them with this information about herself.

I don’t see this as failing to support sex work activism. There is a difference between doing political activism and conducting one’s personal life. Being a sex work activist is not the entirety of any person. We all have other facets to our lives. Supporting sex worker rights does not mean you have to sacrifice the chance to let people get to know the whole you. You can create connections and trust with people before you start raising their consciousness. That’s an okay choice to make.

She said “I don’t want to lie to people.” Well, no one likes to lie. My response is that it’s not anyone and everyone’s business to know what I do with my time. Just because someone asked me the question does not mean they are entitled to an honest answer.

Still, it’s not usually required to speak a lie, if your conscience is finicky about that. One can just be evasive and vague. In the past, with people who were clearly just casual social acquaintances, that’s what I did. “I’m between jobs right now.” Not technically a lie, since I was never actually on a professional date when I said it.

I have friends who enjoyed spinning amusing stories. “I’m studying astrology through an online school.” Or “I’m a professional babysitter.” The arts are always a refuge: “I’m an actor, a dancer, a musician, a poet.” Frankly, most people are not on fire with curiosity about what new social acquaintances do for a living anyway. They’re simply making polite conversation. It’s usually easy to make a vague reply and brush past the question.

With sex it’s a trifle trickier, because I think if you’re going to have sex with someone, that does entitle them to a higher level of disclosure. Since this girl is polyamorous, she has a little wiggle room here, because I don't think it's an absolute requirement that you always tell people the exact circumstances in which you have sex.

But it is only ethical to tell someone, before you sleep with them, “I have sex with other people. And the people I have sex with, also have sex with other people.” That’s the rock-bottom requirement, in my eyes, for even a casual one-night stand with someone you picked up at a party. Once your potential sexual partner has that information, he/she can make a choice about whether to proceed or not.

(You’d think anyone who was open to a party-pickup would assume their partner of the night was no virgin and make safer-sex choices accordingly. But trust me, I wound up on the wrong end of that assumption more than once before I learned: Say. It. And make them tell you, “Yes, I hear you, I understand.”)

With dating someone you hope might be an ongoing partner, my formula is this: have the first date. Do not tell them about being a sex worker - and don’t have sex. Just have a nice getting-to-know-you date. On the second date, towards the end of the time, tell them. And no matter what, do not have sex with them that night either. Make them go away and think about it. If they come back for a third date, okay, proceed towards sex in whatever fashion the two of you choose.

And you have to accept that you’re going to lose a lot of potential partners after that second date. I wish that wasn’t true, but it is. This is one of those times when I say, “If being a sex worker was easy, everyone would do it.” Pursuing a career in sex work is not a consequence-free choice. Naturally, nothing in life is really consequence-free. But one sees the effects of this choice rather sharply. However, it does make you deeply appreciative of the people who do truly accept you.

2010-08-20T01:39:00.000-07:00

Today I'm running an article that was originally published in online magazine Filthy Gorgeous Things. It's on how I feel about the space in which I play.

***

They say you remember lessons best when you’re in the place where you learned them. I believe that, because when I walk into my dungeon, I always remember the lessons I’ve learned about who I am, and what I can do.

I said “dungeon” – but actually, I rarely use that word, because it isn’t one I much care for. I’m a dominatrix, a consensual BDSM player, not a priest in the Spanish Inquisition. The rooms where I play are not cold, hard, impersonal spaces. They are an extension of me, of how I play, and what matters to me. I’m not a cold woman, and I am not distant. I’m not interested in trying to scare you with a space that looks like a jail cell. If I frighten you with anything in a scene, it will be with the heat and the intimacy of my gaze.

So rather, call these rooms my salon, my boudoir, my private chambers. The walls are deep red, and the ceiling is black. When I told the painter what colors to use, he looked at me quizzically and asked, “What kind of room is this going to be?” The thick carpet is black, too. When I bought it, the salesman said, “Black? You’re sure you want black carpet?” I gave all of them the stare I use to quell unruly submissives. They didn’t question me further. My word is law in these rooms. I do not apologize for who I am, nor do I have to justify my wishes. You don’t challenge me here - you do as I say, or you leave.

I have heavy curtains over my windows, because I want the outside world to go away when I’m here. I have large mirrors on my walls because I want to see everything, and I want you to see it too. I will not allow you to think that your desires are ugly and should be hidden. In these rooms, we will speak of them and look at them and love them.

There is furniture of a special kind – furniture that’s tautly upholstered in slick, shiny black and trimmed with gleaming metal. A table large enough to lie down on, a tall chair with a seat that forces you to sit with your legs spread wide apart, and something that looks like a particularly large and sturdy prayer kneeler. I designed all these pieces, and they were built especially for me by a man who wanted to occupy them.

I was already an experienced dominant when I met him. But in the scenes I did with him on the furniture he crafted for me, I went deeper into my capacity for sadism than I’d ever been before. He trusted me enough to tell me where he wanted to go – right up to the brink of unendurable pain. I trusted him enough to take him there. My challenge was to listen to him and not to the disapproving voices in my head that said Stop! You’re going too far! On these pieces of furniture, I learned how to really call forth, direct, and trust my talent for taking people’s bodies and minds through intense sensations.

I carry a sense of power and an awareness of what I am capable of with me everywhere I go. But I am told by people who know me that a subtle change comes over me when I walk into my space. In the rest of my world, I can be as polite and correct as a diplomat. Here, the filter of socially acceptable behavior comes off me. I feel utterly myself in these rooms. I do nothing I don’t wish to do, I say whatever it pleases me to say, and I indulge myself in whatever pleasure take my fancy. Paradoxically, the more license for selfishness I permit myself in these rooms, the more generous to my partners I become. When you call yourself “Mistress”, most people assume you’ll be a mean bitch – and I can be. But when I am freed from any expectation of kindness and compassion, I find that I also have much of those traits to bestow.

I can play in other places, and I do. But this space is special to me. I’m proud of what I have created here. These are not just rooms. When you’re in my space, you’re inside my head. And if you’re in my space, it’s because I want to get into yours.

2010-08-18T00:36:00.000-07:00

A new podcast! First, Monk and I have a brief discussion about our ability to fight off an attack by maniacal clowns.

Then we answer a letter from a woman who wants to be a sex worker, but who made the mistake of asking strippers for advice about being an escort. I discuss my thoughts about sex work hierarchies, and how sex work businesses are like Fight Club. Hope it’s educational… (About ten minutes.)

(Note: I'm aware the show is not currently showing up in iTunes. I don't know why. I'll investigate and fix that as soon as I get a chance, but that probably won't be instantly. This is a direct-download link, if you prefer that to the above one. Hope that holds you for now.)

2010-08-13T02:41:00.000-07:00

A new Stranger column, to amuse you on this sunny Friday: a discussion about the eternal allure of crazy bottoms.

Frankly, I thought it would be a flame-fest by now. The last column, about monogamists dating the polyamorous, is still garnering me hate mail. But apparently it's okay for me to talk about people being batshit crazy, as long as I'm not suggesting that anyone can be happily polyamorous. Good to know.

2010-08-11T01:50:00.000-07:00

It's a new podcast! In this episode, Monk and I briefly discuss how the Zombie Apocalypse would affect my diet Mountain Dew consumption.

Then, we read and answer a letter from a dominant woman who feels nervous about her scenes. Key point: she’s eighteen years old. How should a young kinky person build confidence?

And I also have to blow a kiss to Monk, because this is the Official Weeklong Celebration of His Birth! No mere birthDAY for Monk, no no! He has a whole week! (Perhaps longer, if the bourbon and cute girls hold out.) So Happy BirthWeek to you, sweetheart!

2010-08-09T01:41:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I read an article about non-monogamy in New York magazine by bloggers/sex-advice-givers Em and Lo entitled "The New Monogamy". It seriously annoyed me, and I’m going to critique it, so this post won’t make a lot of sense unless you read that first. So go do that.

Em and Lo offended me pretty much right out of the chute, with their talk about their ideas about what non-monogamy for their boyfriends would look like.

“We each recently began toying with the idea… of arranging happy endings for our boyfriends at a Chinatown massage parlor, as a sort of gift in honor of long-term monogamy. Who knows where the idea came from? Was it something in the air? Pure generosity? Or a way to beta-test an idea? And could we go through with it? Probably, if we handled the arrangements, we agreed over a bottle of red one night at a Brooklyn wine bar. Naturally, we imagined the most clinical of hand jobs administered by wizened, grandmotherly ladies. But still, we took it as a sign of the times and of our evolution.”

Aside from the fact that I know a number of super-hot-looking women who are, in fact, grandmothers – are Em and Lo really of the opinion that arranging for your lover to be given a hand-job by a woman you’re strongly implying will be not-very-attractive is evolved? Really? Wow. To me this implies that Em and Lo’s partners are so sex-starved and indiscriminate that pretty much any female would excite them, which flatters no one in the equation. And I wonder how Em and Lo would feel if their boyfriends arranged for them to be gotten off by some wizened, grandfatherly men? Would that be evolved, too?

But tacky remarks about sex workers aside, I have a huge issue with the title and premise of this article. Saying that couples having sexual contact with other people is “The New Monogyny” is flatly absurd. Monogamy is when you don’t have sex with other people. When you do, that’s non-monogamy. Neither of these concepts are new, but apparently the existing lexicon isn’t cool enough for Em and Lo. Because when you say the word polyamory, Em and Lo explain that:

“…in most people’s imaginations, you’ve got on the one hand your earnest, hairy polyamorists (see San Francisco) and on the other, doughy, middle-aged swingers (see Minnesota or HBO). These are the bogeymen of today’s hipster open relationships—if we swing tonight, can a purple muumuu and a relocation west be far behind?”

Some of the people Em and Lo discuss in this piece are being monogamous. They simply acknowledge to their partners that they have sexual thoughts about other people, and share their fantasies. Which I think is just fine. But, in a stunning example of Orwellian newspeak, people who do actually have sex with more than one partner are described by Em and Lo as “the new monogamists”.

The New Monogomy looks much like the old in some ways: Em and Lo are blandly confident that the One Penis Policy is the only viable way to do open, honest non-monogamy. Because they didn’t meet anyone who they thought was attractive who was doing anything else. Sexual attractiveness seems to play a very large role in who Em and Lo think is a New Monogamist. Don’t be a grandmother, apparently, and don’t be hairy, or "doughy". This how they described their meeting with one pair of New Monogamists:

“To our pleasant surprise, however, there is absolutely nothing skeevy about Siege and Katie. They’re smart, funny, polite, hip, attractive, self-deprecating, and affectionate with one another. And that’s the most disconcerting thing of all. Call us snobs, but it’s easy to dismiss suburban swingers who show up at orgies with a Tupperware container or Bay Area hippies missing the irony gene. But when a couple like Siege and Katie decry strict monogamy? It makes you wonder, How old-fashioned, socially programmed, and ass-backward am I?”

Um, yeah, since you asked – you’re snobs, ladies, and you are indeed pretty ass-backwards. The one-line disclaimer you tagged on at the end about how, oh, okay, you’ve learned your lesson and you won’t make fun of those crazy swingers anymore? I’m unimpressed. You are not qualified to write knowledgeably about a minority sexual community, because your outlook is provincial, your research is shallow, and you don’t even try to hide, let alone really examine, your bias. Stick to tips on blowjobs and pubic hairstyles, that’s about your speed.

2010-08-04T01:40:00.000-07:00

A look back at old posts in the much-beloved silly-phone-calls archive, 2004: A Near-Goddess Experience.

(Follow and read the linked posted first, or this won't make sense.)

The amusing thing is that sex workers and their clients using spiritual mumbo-jumbo as a code for sexual behavior certainly isn’t new. Long before I was ever a pro domme, I worked at some places where we did “spiritual healing” and “chakra alignment and release” etc. Uh-huh. We called ourselves priestesses - I'm serious - and we all had names like Astra and Moon and Gaia. The men who came to us were referred to seekers.

They were okay places to work, but the hardcore Tantra/spiritual-sexuality stuff is really not my thing. I know some people resonate with it. But it just felt silly to me, and frankly, it was a often a struggle for me to keep a straight face during the initial conversations with new clients, when one was required by the management to use that lexicon.

Fortunately, at least half the time, once the guy and I had established to each other that I’m cool/you’re cool, I would confess that I wasn’t really all that woo-woo, and he would give a big sigh of relief and say, “Oh thank god, I’m not either, but I thought I had to pretend to be.”

Honesty. It’s such a lovely thing, and it makes life – and certainly sex - so much easier. Is that a spiritual belief? Namaste.

2010-07-29T02:30:00.001-07:00

The new Stranger column, about what happens when monogamous attempt to rustle the polyamorous. It's sure to provoke either winces of recognition or indignant argument. Enjoy!

2010-07-28T01:22:00.000-07:00

If you have a cock and a tape measure, I need a little favor from you.

No, I do not want to know the size of your cock. What I want to know is: what the measurement from your mouth to the base of your groin? And here’s the important part – I need the measurement of it taken while you are lying down.

That’s an odd request, isn’t it? Let me explain… You see, I am having a charming piece of kink equipment made for me by some superb local craftspeople. This is a vacuum bed. (Click through for a larger image and an explanation of how it works.)

I’ve been thinking of getting one for years, but I’ve always been put off by the fact that the person inside, while rendered truly immobile in a fashion that does induce an intense psychological response, would not sufficiently accessible to me.

However, lately I have seen examples of vacuum beds with, shall we say, greater access. So I asked Seattle latex designer Tonya Winter if she could create something like that for me. She’s hard at work on it, and her design incorporates a gusset with a flap of latex at the crotch, a few inches around, that could be either opened, to provide access, or smoothed shut and secured in some fashion.

So essentially she is creating an envelope of latex for me, and it will have two holes in it. One to breathe through, and one for access to those nicely sensitive places. So the question becomes: where does one place those holes relative to each other? Latex does stretch, but one has to have some idea of the average distance from mouth to groin.

Naturally I have some boys on hand, as it were, that I can measure. But I’d like a greater sample. Who knows, if that number turns out to vary quite widely, I may end up having more than one envelope made. But I wish to start with the measurement that’s more or less in the middle, statistically. And I’m sure that my lovely readers would enjoy knowing that they had contributed to this design.

So if you'd like that as much as I think you would: lie down – because that’s the position people will be in when they are in the bed – and measure from your mouth to where your cock joins your body. Send that to me, and just for good measure, tell me your height and approximate weight. I’ll be ever so grateful to each and every one of you.

2010-07-27T00:57:00.000-07:00

Books I’m Reading Lately

There’s been Sex At Dawn of course, of which much has already been said. I’m enjoying it very much, and I recommend it. But I have other books going on as well.

One of them I consider half professional training – given that I do speak in public on occasion - and half sheer curiosity about what must be a challenging way to make a living: Confessions of a Public Speaker by Scott Berkun.
"Confessions of a Public Speaker provides an insider's perspective on how to effectively present ideas to anyone. Highlights include: how to work a tough room, the science of not boring people, how to survive the attack of the butterflies, and what to do when things go wrong, the worst-and funniest-disaster stories you've ever heard (plus countermoves you can use). Filled with humorous and illuminating stories of thrilling performances and real-life disasters, Confessions of a Public Speaker is inspirational, devastatingly honest, and a blast to read."

And then there is my penchant for anything historical, lately expressing itself in the true-crime genre: The Suspicions of Mr. Whicher: A Shocking Murder and the Undoing of a Great Victorian Detective, by Kate Summerscale.
"Summerscale delivers a mesmerizing portrait of one of England's first detectives and the gruesome murder investigation that nearly destroyed him. In 1860, three-year-old Saville Kent was found murdered in the outdoor privy of his family's country estate. Scotland Yard Det.-Insp. Jonathan Jack Whicher was called in and immediately suspected the unthinkable: someone in the Kent family killed Saville. Theories abounded as everyone from the nursemaid to Saville's father became a suspect. Whicher tirelessly pursued every lead but with little evidence and no confession, the case went cold and Whicher returned to London, a broken man. Five years later, the killer came forward with a shocking account of the crime, leading to a sensational trial. Whicher is a fascinating hero, and readers will delight in following every lurid twist and turn in his investigation."

And also: The Devil's Gentleman: Privilege, Poison, and the Trial That Ushered in the Twentieth Century by Harold Schechter.
True-crime historian Schechter delivers a thrilling account of a murder case that rocked Manhattan at the turn of the 20th century. Roland Molineux was a proud member of the Knickerbocker Athletic Club, where he was considered a talented but snooty sportsman, repeatedly instigating spats with the club's athletic director, Harry Cornish. Roland doggedly wooed Blanche Chesebrough, but when one of Molineux's romantic competitors, Henry Barnet, died, Cornish was poisoned (he survived), Roland topped the list of suspects. The sensational trial became one of the costliest in New York State history. Schechter expertly weaves a rich historical tapestry—exploring everything from the birth of yellow journalism to the history of poison as a murder weapon—without sacrificing a novelistic sense of character, pacing and suspense. The result is a riveting tale of murder, seduction and tabloid journalism run rampant in a New York not so different from today's."

2010-07-19T23:23:00.000-07:00

A New Podcast

In this podcast, Monk and I riff about phallic-looking microphones, and then read and discuss a letter from a reader pondering how to begin a polyamorous relationship. How do you treat the Other Significant Other? Monk says "Treat them as you'd wish to be treated." I agree - with some qualifications. Also mentioned: the value of just keeping your mouth closed.
Listen to it here... (About ten minutes.)

2010-07-15T01:30:00.000-07:00

Linkage to this and that...

The new Stranger column, in which I wax nostalgic about flying blood, and reveal the problem with Mormon vampires.

And Monk's latest video-blog on Carnal Nation. Leather History: Bound To The Past, about the Leather Archives And Museum. (Located in Chicago, serving the world. Yeah, I was there when Joe Bean trained us all to chant that phrase back to him whenever he mentioned the place in a speech. I think he eventually got sick of hearing it. But hey, when Joe trains you, you stay trained.)

And - I have fresh podcasts! So look for those in a day or so...

2010-07-12T23:37:00.000-07:00

From the 2004 archives: letter from the infamous Tampon Man.

Now this? This is a good old-fashioned weirdo letter. It’s sort of sad - I hardly ever get this kind of email anymore. (And god knows I don’t get actual snail-mail letters like this anymore, although once in a great one, The Stranger forwards some entertainingly strange missive sent to me at their office.)

What makes it a classic? It’s not the fetish itself. I have known perfectly charming men who found bloody women erotic.

No, it’s the writing style. The bludgeon-like use of capital letters! The insistently interrogative multiple question marks! The jarring juxtaposition of the flowery, hyper-submissive phrases with slightly offensive made-up words like “cuntsume”. And the bizarre rhetorical questions, that remind me of advertisements for snake-oil, or personal-injury attorneys.

Sheer length also counts – the original of this letter was about four pages long. I do not lie.

He also gets bonus points for the use of then-current events as emotional reference points to sell his concept. Menstruation = Weapons Of Mass Destruction? That’s bold branding, people. Bold!

I just think it’s a shame people don’t put the same sort of effort into writing oddball letters as they used to. Now they just Twitter or text. Sigh. Passing of an age.

2010-07-08T00:42:00.000-07:00

Podcast fans: listen to the Part II of a podcast Monk and I did with Richard Wagner of Dr. Dick's Sex Advice.

And, a plug for a show opening this weekend. SHINE: A Burlesque Musical. From the web page...

Internationally-acclaimed comedy cabaret duo The Wet Spots (John Woods and Cass King), in collaboration with Theatre Off Jackson and the Seattle Erotic Art Festival, will present 12 performances of SHINE: A Burlesque Musical July 8 to 18, 2010 at the Theatre Off Jackson.

A recent winner of a Vancouver Ovation Award for “Outstanding New Work”, SHINE is a tassel-twirling original, full-book musical about an infamous burlesque theatre and the family of talented misfits who try to save it from demolition… or worse, respectability.

It looks like a great show, and I know that some of the performances are sold out already, so get your tickets soon!

2010-07-06T01:13:00.000-07:00

I just finished polishing the final draft for the next Stranger column, so in honor of that, my answers to a few often-asked questions about me and The Stranger.

I get a lot of emails telling me the columns are too short. I love hearing that you like my column. I wish it was longer too. Writing something interesting in 490 words is very, very challenging. Very.

But, The Stranger sets my word count, and I cannot exceed that. It's a business decision. Each dead-tree page of the paper costs money to print. In order for The Stranger not to go bankrupt, the paper can only be so many pages long. On each of those pages, there is a certain percentage of space dedicated to editorial content (like: my column), and a certain percentage of space dedicated to the advertising that pays for the paper. Removing an ad so my column could be another hundred words long would make you and me happy, but it doesn’t make business sense for The Stranger. And I’d like them to stay in business.

So there is no wiggle-room on the column length, that's it. If I write it too long, someone else will cut out parts to make it shorter, and ooooo, writers hate that. So it behooves me to make it the right length.

Maybe you should just print the first part of the column and put the longer version online. We tried that a while back, actually, and I didn’t like it. I had a lot of people coming up to me saying, “Hey, I read the first part of your column, but I keep forgetting to go online and read the last part. What did it say?” This is the sort of question that makes a writer want to scream. Apparently The Stranger didn’t like this system either, so we scrapped it, for which I am profoundly grateful.

You should write one version of a column for the Stranger and do a longer version of the same column for the blog. That would be a rather unprofessional thing to do to The Stranger. They don’t pay me a lot of money, but they do pay me, god love ‘em. And when you pay me to write something, you get an exclusive.

The fact that certain words are printed in bold? I get many emails about this. No, I don’t do that, it’s not under my control. Someone at The Stranger does that. If you have an opinion about it, I’m sure they would be happy to hear it.

There's about a 7-day gap between my submitting a column and it being printed. The column I turn in today, for example, will be in the paper published next week. There's some cushion there, time-wise, in case an editor reads what I turned in and decides he wants a big revision of it, but that very rarely happens for short pieces like mine.

If you're imagining me at The Stranger editorial offices, verbally sparring with the other staffers like a kinky Rosalind Russell in His Gal Friday, I fear I must disabuse you of that charming notion. I am very rarely in The Stranger offices. I just email them a column when it's due.

The person I submit to (yes, yes, I said submit!) will show me whatever edits he's making to what I turned it. But our exchanges about it are usually pretty brief. My mother was an editor for years, and I learned from her that while all writers think every single word they write is like the perfect tear of a unicorn falling upon a golden page, editors... don't. They are not butchering up your precious creation just to be mean, it's their job. And they get cranky if you spend a lot of time arguing with them about the placement of a comma or some such thing, because they're on a deadline and they have a damn paper to put out.

Most of the time my column doesn't get edited very much. It galls me only slightly to say that the edits that do get made are usually an improvement, because the editor has a fresh eye.

I choose my own topics, too. Very occasionally someone from The Stranger will make a suggestion to me about an idea, and when they do, I usually do it.

Can I reprint this very recent column of yours in my small publication? I cannot grant you permission to do that. Obviously people do, and I cannot stop them, but once again – The Stranger paid me to write that for them. It’s rude, at best, for me to then turn around and immediately give it away to someone else.

It’ll be ten years this fall that I’ve been writing for The Stranger. Ten years. That’s hard to believe when I stop and think about it. I’m grateful they took a chance on me then, given that I had no noticeable writing credentials when I pitched them the idea. And the way the newspaper industry has gone, I’m damn lucky to still see be seeing my name in ink-on-paper. I have no plans to quit, so we’ll see what the next ten years bring to me, in my adventures in tabloid journalism.

2010-07-01T01:25:00.000-07:00

To entertain you... My new Stranger column is on the site, about Seattle's pro domme houses. (Or, the lack thereof.)

Also, a podcast I did with Dr Dick of Dr. Dick's Sex Advice is up. It's fun, it's kinky, and it's also very silly. Go listen!

2010-06-30T00:01:00.000-07:00

Special People

Dear Mistress Matisse,
I am contacting you for some advice about getting started as a courtesan. I've been trying to navigate into this world, but keep getting lost. I'm wanting to get myself through acupuncture school, and I have this idea that I'd like to share my excess sensual and healing energy with a very special clientele...people who want what I have to offer. How do I go about finding my niche here?

Let me begin by saying your motivations for getting into sex work, and your ideals about how that’s going to look, sound lovely. Sharing sensual, healing energy with special people? I thoroughly approve of that idea.

Now that we’ve established that, let me correct you on some points, my dear little special snowflake. No one “gets started” as a courtesan. That word is not a job title, it's a professional accolade. Saying one wants to get started as a courtesan is like saying one wants to get started as a movie star or a supermodel. It is a status conferred upon a woman by the people she meets, and I for one do not say it lightly. I have met a few women I think genuinely merit this description. But not many.

So, you want to be a sex worker to put yourself through school? All right then, you must begin as everyone else in your job description does. I’m not sure if you want to do sensual touch (ie, massage with a happy ending) or be an escort. But I’ve written a lot about how to get started in all types of sex work, so search and ye shall find.

As for finding very special people? That too takes time, and a lot of careful sorting. Obviously there are people in the world that simply aren’t suitable. Then there are people who are harmless, but just… weird. But you know, for the most part, I would not wish away my meetings with the emotionally incomprehensible people I have encountered in my travels. They are educational. They keep you rooted in the reality that world is full of people who see things quite differently than you do.

Every sex worker deals with a certain number of clients who, whether they know it or not, are wounded in some way. The thing is: people who seek sexual healing are not always the easiest people to deal with. They are not always happy, or self-aware, or seemingly appreciative of what you give them. If this was easy, everyone would do it.

But if you never have a client who’s a challenge, you’ll never develop the emotional skills necessary to become a courtesan. I’ve had some amazingly satisfying sessions with people who initially did not make a good impression on me. You see, I consider it my job to find something special and likeable, something I can connect with, in every single person I play with. With people I click with right away, that’s easy. There have been times in the past when I’ve had to work really, really hard to see something special and likeable in a client. But - those were the people who needed it the most.

And when you really, truly do see something good in them, they can feel that, and they respond. That’s what a courtesan does: she shows people that they all possess something special, and by showing them that, she heals a little of the hurt done by an indifferent world.

So it’s true that you do sometimes just find special people. But in a certain sort of way, you have to be the one who makes both of you know that they're special.

2010-06-28T22:37:00.000-07:00

Archives
I went back through the blog archives to see what I was writing about around this date in years gone by. I found an entry talking about the soundtrack to “Things To Do In Denver When You’re Dead”, and my forays into a legal brothel in Nevada in 1995.

I also ran across this helpful list of “50 Tips For The Working Person”. By working, the author means sex-working, although I suppose some of them would apply to everyone…

2010-06-24T02:01:00.000-07:00

Letters To The Mistress

Dear Mistress Matisse,

I am in a poly relationship with a man I’m engaged to. We’ve been together almost three years. He is very, very vanilla and I consider myself “mocha chip”. I’m not overly kinky but it is a very important part of my sexuality.

The problem is this: we have a “no marks” policy. The rule was created back when we first started dating and he was still with his ex-girlfriend. She would get extremely jealous at any hint that I existed so bite marks and scratches were a huge no-go. We’ve kept the policy since she left, although I’ve tried to revisit it a bit lately. I have recently found a man who has…one particular toy I’m interested in trying, a violet wand. The wand can unfortunately leave a bit of a sunburn-like burn.

My partner says he’s okay with marks as long as he doesn’t have to see them; which basically means that if I play with the wand, I can’t have sex with him until the burn has gone. His argument is he doesn’t want the reminder of the things I’ve done with other guys.

Now, I have found traces of his other girlfriends in his room. Once I had to point out a necklace one of his girlfriends had left on his bed. This happens fairly often given that he’s a messy person (so am I) and I’ve gotten used to it. The necklace was from a girlfriend I didn’t like so I had some trouble with it and he told me I’d have to get used to it as it would happen from time to time.

So I’m seeing a double standard here. He can leave traces of other girls in his room and I have to get used to it (which I have) but I’m not allowed to leave traces of other men on me (which I haven’t, yet). I’ve tried to broach the subject with him and he doesn’t seem to get the double standard. Recently when he brought up the no-marks policy I flat out told him “so I’m not going to find any more necklaces then?”

I’m getting to the point where I’m thinking of refusing to have sex with him whenever he leaves traces of his other partners in his room. I don’t want to do this as I know its passive aggressive and silly; especially since it doesn’t bug me that much.

I worry that this is a sign of things to come. I went to a kink-themed party at a local bar and he refused sex with me for almost a week after, citing it felt “weird” to have my sexual energy from the party transfer to him.

Is having sex with a t-shirt on my only option to have my kink and fuck him too?

Here's the technique part of my reply to this: Violet wands do not always leave marks. Occasionally they do. But - especially if you keep moving the wand around, and don’t keep it in one place for more than a few seconds - it probably won’t. I bet you could have this man test your skin someplace inconspicuous, like your lower leg, and see if you seem terribly prone to being marked by it. That would inform your future play choices.

That said: your fiancé needs to get right on over himself. This is indeed a double standard. And yes, you’re right, it’s a bad sign for the future, so draw a line in the sand. I don’t think you should refuse to have sex with him over things that don’t really bother you. I think you should just do whatever kind of kink you want, and if Mr. Vanilla can’t handle the “energy”, then he just won’t get to look at (or have access to) your pretty naked self, will he? The loss is his, not yours.

It is rare for anyone to willingly give up a situation where they are getting everything they want (like: having sex with more than one person and not having to hide anything), and nothing they don’t want (like: seeing some evidence of your partner doing the same, and having to handle some feelings of jealousy about that). Some people would rather field irritated remarks from a lover than relinquish such an arrangement.

Luckily, you have complete power over the only thing that matters: your behavior. Tell him, calmly and kindly, that you are going to do BDSM play that may occasionally leave a mark or two. If he is offended by looking at you, you can fuck him with the lights off. Or you could blindfold him. Or – and I think this is the best option - he can just grow up, work out his issues, and give as good as he gets.

2010-06-22T01:44:00.000-07:00

Online translators are responsible for a lot of unintentional comedy in the world of email. I got this note recently, and I will preface my remarks about it by acknowledging that no, I don’t speak French, so I probably couldn’t do any better.

That doesn’t make it any less silly-sounding to read, though. It’s entitled “Gynarchy.”

…you can enhance your role as a dominatrix is a dream to be able to worship your gorgeous. You seem to be the incarnation of female supremacy. We would be happy to support you through our site as we do for free.

It is a small team that is dominating the initiative on this site gynarchy. We strive to make it as close as possible to the values we wish to defend. We try to find independent dominatrix could recognize themselves in the gynarchy.

Our universe is female domination and we made some changes to make it more ergonomic and more dynamic future. We plan to continue this adventure in improving a little closer making it accessible to a wider audience, including women.

We would like to add your site to ours with your comments, or your photos. Know that we are far from the BDSM community and that we operate quite independently.

The team gynarchist

It took me a minute to understand that the sender was inviting me to place photos and ad copy on a French website for professional dominatrixes. I was too busy thinking: “gynarchy? Is that really a word, or is this some made-up kink slang like domme?”

So I looked it up, and to my surprise, it is a real word. I had not heard it before. It means, of course, “rule by women” and matriarchy has always been the word I’ve heard used to refer to such an idea.

The Universe of the Gynarchy! Kinda sounds like you’d be entering The Matrix, doesn’t it? Similar outfits, I imagine. And similarly righteous goals, as apparently The Gynarchy defends the values! Of what, I’m not sure. But I'm glad The Universe of the Gynarchy is going to be available to women, too - that seems like a good move, PR-wise.

And it’s ergonomic as well. No RSS in The Universe of the Gynarchy, nosireebob!

Gynarchy! It’s the word of the day, people. As the nuns used to tell us: “Say it three times and use it in a sentence. Then it’s yours forever.” Whether you want it or not, because this is a Gynocracy!

2010-06-17T03:30:00.000-07:00

In my last column, I talked about sex (or at least, dating) without BDSM. In the new Stranger column: a discussion of BDSM without Sex.

2010-06-16T00:48:00.000-07:00

Wow, a lot has happened!

Which is pretty much always the case with me, so let me try to catch you up. The Naked Girls Reading? Much fun. I wish I had an audiotape of it, because no description of mine can do it justice. Except to remark that it was great to meet a lot of new people - and that I loved hanging out with Tamara the Trapeze Lady and Jo Weldon. Tamara and I have known each other for years, we danced together at the Lusty Lady back in the day. Jo Weldon and I have not spent a ton of time with each other (although with Jo, it's always quality time), but we have such a seamless consciousness-of-kind that she can just about finish my sentences, which is almost spooky.

You see, I consider women like them my professional peers, although they both have different career paths than me. Both of them were sexual outlaws who decided what they wanted, saw that it didn't exist, went out and worked really damned hard, and created it. I love being around people like that.

And aside from just respecting their accomplishments, it is immensely cool to be around other women who have also lived lives that are much less-ordinary, and who are perfectly at ease about that. After the reading, Jo Weldon addressed a question from an audience member about class structures and hierarchies in sex work by remarking matter-of-factly, “Going from taking off your clothes in front of a roomful of people to pissing on people for money? That’s a lateral move.” If I hadn’t been on the other side of the stage, I would have kissed her.

The whole event was great, the producers are wonderful, and I’m super-pleased to have been asked. Perhaps I’ll be asked back again sometime. But whether I’m there or not, you should definitely go, so here's a link to the calendar.

What did I read at the NGR? The theme of this was: "Evolution As Sex Workers", so I went through my stacks and found the books I read when I was just starting out in the industry. One was a sex worker memoir I got a hold of when I was a teenager, called “Working”. The author’s name is Dolores French, and it’s a great book. French writes with both candor and compassion about her lengthy career as an escort. I read a bit about how French got started finding and screening clients her client, via snail mail, in the seventies.

And I read two selections by Patrick* Califia. I knew from the start that I would read something by Califia, because when I was very young, and very sexually different, and utterly clueless about how I was going to construct the life I instinctively knew I wanted to live, Califia’s writing, both the essays and fiction, had a huge effect on me. It was from her/his writing that I learned how to be a sexual outlaw with dignity, honor, integrity and kindness. "Melting Point" is one of the books I read from at NGR. The story is entitled What Girls Are Made Of, and it's about three peep-show dancers who hijack a bratty butch-dyke for certain nefarious purposes.

My other selection was from an essay that is the preface to Califia's short story collection, "Macho Sluts". Califia’s essays are about the sexual-minority politics of the late 80’s and 90’s – which means now they seem like Ancient History. But it’s very useful to understand where the kinky/queer/gender-queer/whatever community has come from. I see the ghosts from these bloody battles over gender and sexual behavior hanging around even now. I have a fantasy about teaching a class entitled “The History Of Sexual Minority Community Politics, or, How To Not Spend Countless Hours Bickering Over The Same Old Bullshit”, because I see some of the newer activists getting caught up in some of the same old arguments that I heard when I was a little baby sex radical.

So, while some of the specific incidents and publications Pat refers to are long-gone, the way s/he analyzes and critiques the various debates are quite useful. If this interests you, I’d start with a book called "Public Sex: The Culture of Radical Sex."

Whew! I think that's enough for one day. More about nakedness tomorrow...

*At the time of publication, Patrick was Pat, and identifying as female. Since then, Patrick has gender-transitioned from female to male, so the same author has different writings published under both names. I have not yet figured out a way to express this that isn't terribly unwieldy.

2010-06-14T23:40:00.000-07:00

As God is my witness, I am going to blog again soon. Like, within 48 hours. Highlights will include:

My thoughts on performing at The Naked Girls Reading

Things a beautiful woman said to me while we were naked. (And not at the reading.)

My thoughts on IGNITE Seattle and why polyamory would be a great topic for that.

The concept of wingmen (or women), and on the Pick-up Artist philosophy and books in general.

Indulge me just a bit longer, faithful blog readers, and you shall be rewarded.

2010-06-10T01:32:00.001-07:00

I am being bad about writing this week, because I'm busy reading bits of books out loud, in preparation for my appearance here on Sunday: The Naked Girls Reading.

From the producers:

As some of you might have heard, June marks the closing of a well known and important epicenter of Seattle's nude activity: The Lusty Lady peepshow. Over the years, The Lusty has been made famous through books such as Erika Langley’s The Lusty Lady and documentaries such as Julia Query’s Live Nude Girls Unite, which documented the San Francisco Lusty’s struggle to become one of the first unionized strip clubs in the US.
Just one day after the close of the Seattle landmark, Naked Girls Reading will pay homage to the Lusty Lady by featuring a cast of self identified sex workers reading their favorite selections on the topic of evolution. As we continue to struggle with economic hardship, how do we evolve as people? How do we evolve when we lose our jobs? How has the sex industry evolved over the years? Change is the only constant and we will be talking about moving up and moving on. Joining us will be regular reader and co-producer Jesse Belle Jones, special guests Jo "Boobs" Weldon, Mistress Matisse, Tamara the Trapeze Lady, Paige and our wonderful hostess, Elsa Von Schmaltz!

As always, our event is held in West Hall, on the second floor of the Oddfellows Building, 915 East Pine Street.

To purchase tickets in advance, please go to
http://www.brownpapertickets.com/event/91418

Purchase a general admission seat for the price of $15 advance/$18 at the door, or a seat at one of the front tables for $20 advance/$23 at the door. Tables seat up to 4 people.

Doors open at 6:30, show runs 7-9pm.

Also, we continue to support the Seattle Public Library and
ask that you join us by bringing books or monetary donations.

Yes, that's right. Six gorgeous women - including me - naked, on a stage, reading out loud to you. What else could you possibly ask for? Get tickets before they sell out!

2010-06-08T00:29:00.000-07:00

TwistedMonk and I recorded what I am calling a "Quick and Dirty" podcast last week. We didn't have access to our usual sound-studio, so this is lower quality than we prefer, but it's better than nothing, right?
In this edition, we answer a reader's fashion question, and discuss using one's kinky attitude to get the attention of dismissive salespeople. About ten minutes.

2010-06-07T01:32:00.001-07:00

From The Image Vaults
Another one from the self-portrait file: Nude With Bars, circa 2001. I was experimenting with single-light set-ups, white paper rolls, and odd bits of junk I found at Re-Store. One of the better results.

.

2010-06-04T22:15:00.001-07:00

After a slight delay: My new Stranger column, in which I discuss the difficulty with dating normal people.

2010-06-02T00:47:00.000-07:00

Max is producing some fun kinky events in the next few days, so let me tell you about those!

***

Max is pleased to welcome Australia's Mark, Lani and Aleni to Seattle.

Mark is an internationally renowned bondage instructor and has done erotic bondage performances throughout Australia, New Zealand, Europe, Japan and the US. He is a passionate and skilled rope artist and top with a notorious, sexually charged energy and an open, down to earth teaching style.

Mark has been Master of DV8House since its inception in 2001. Aleni - an experienced lifestyle Mistress - has been his slave since before DV8House was established. Lani came into their lives in 2006 and soon discovered rope and "the magic held deep beneath the strands".

Full bios and workshop descriptions are on Max's web site: www.BondageLessons.com

Ins, Outs and Roundabouts of CBT by Aleni - Friday June 4th 6:30 PM - 8:00 PM - at the CSPC.
This hands-on Cock and Ball Torture (CBT) workshop covers bondage, chastity, piercing, electricity, sounding, pegs and saline infusion. Aleni discusses anatomy, safety, and methods - and why CBT is so much fun! This workshop is packed with information and hot demos.
Max's web site http://BondageLessons.com/2010-06-04-cbt.htm
FetLife event http://fetlife.com/events/19099
FetLife discussion http://fetlife.com/groups/10631/group_posts/639846

Advanced Japanese Floor Work- Saturday June 5th 1:00 PM - 2:30 PM - at the CSPC
Suspensions aren't everything - quality erotic floor ties are just as powerful, don't require a hard point and involve less risk. Inspired by Mark's recent trips to Tokyo, this is your opportunity to learn authentic Japanese floor work, as influenced by the biggest names in Japanese bondage.
Max's web site http://BondageLessons.com/2010-06-05-advanced-japanese-floor-work.htm
FetLife event http://fetlife.com/events/19100
FetLife discussion http://fetlife.com/groups/10631/group_posts/639848

Yoko Zuri (Sideways Suspension) - Saturday June 5th 3:30 PM - 5:00 PM - at the CSPC in Seattle
The Yoko Zuri (Japanese sideways suspension) is more than hanging from one side. Learn the little details that make these ties work. See how you can transition from a Yoko Zuri into other positions, allowing your scene to flow in beautiful, powerful and balanced ways.
Max's web site http://BondageLessons.com/2010-06-05-yoko-zuri.htm
FetLife event http://fetlife.com/events/19101
FetLife discussion http://fetlife.com/groups/10631/group_posts/639849

Erotic Rope Energy: Finding the Bond Beyond the Bondage - Sunday June 6th, 2:30 PM - 5:30 PM - at the CSPC
Join Mark and Lani as they delve into the erotic connection between top and bottom and demonstrate how to bring sensuality and eroticism into your rope play. Bring your rope - this is a hands-on workshop.
Max's web site http://BondageLessons.com/2010-06-06-erotic-rope-energy.htm
FetLife event http://fetlife.com/events/19102
FetLife discussion http://fetlife.com/groups/10631/group_posts/639850

2010-05-31T22:14:00.000-07:00

Quick And Dirty Podcasts

Monk and I have been so busy the last month, we have had no time to get down to the studio where we usually record our podcasts. So while it offends Monk’s production-quality sensibilities, I persuaded him to record what I will call some “Quick and Dirty” audio files, on a little consumer-grade digital voice recorder I have. I personally think the sound quality is perfectly fine for what it is, and it means that we can read some of the letters that are stacking up.

In this podcast: a kinky college student asks about how to handle kink-negative parents. (About ten minutes.)

2010-05-28T01:06:00.001-07:00

Photo Archives
I was looking through my photo files the other day and found a bunch of images I took of myself some years ago. I'd forgotten that one of them was used on a book cover. This is the original, taken in 2001.

And this is the book: Many Kisses: Stories of Dominant Love. I suspect I'm not being perceived as "the dominant" in this image, but I don't care. It's just nice to know it's out there.

2010-05-27T02:14:00.000-07:00

An announcement for some cool people I know… Please re-post this anywhere you like, I’m trying to help get the word out!

Starting in June, there will be a support group for partners of trans, genderqueer and gender-variant-identified people at Seattle Counseling Services. It’s scheduled for Wednesdays from 6-7:30pm. For more information, call Kristen or Gina at 206.323.1768.

If you don’t know about Seattle Counseling Services, you can read about it here. Seattle Counseling Service is a unique resource for the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) communities….(more.)

Seattle Counseling Services is a good organization - I used to answer the crisis hotline for them, back when they had one. The training to do that volunteer gig was lengthy, and it was a big time commitment, but it was really interesting. It was also one of the things that taught me: I am a kind person, and I can give advice if it’s asked for, but I am really not cut out to be a therapist.

I think it’s a patience thing. A good therapist does not just tell you what to do, they help you figure it out and tell yourself, if that makes sense. Although once you’ve gotten there, they may say, “Yes, yes, that's it! Now go do that!”

But they do have to be patient with what is sometimes a reeeeeally slow process with people. Patience is not my strong suit. I myself tend to move through things, emotionally, at a pretty brisk pace – especially if it’s not a very pleasant emotional experience. People who pause and ponder those experiences at length can make me want to snap, “Oh, come on, quit maundering on about this.”

Obviously there are serious tragic things that require time to mourn and heal from. I don’t mean those sorts of things. I mean the sorts of things that a stiff drink and a shopping trip and some laughter with friends will greatly dispel, if one simply gets off one’s butt and does them, instead of just rolling around with the back of one’s hand pressed to one’s brow, wallowing in angst.

Ah-hem. Not that I have a big opinion about it or anything. But, anyway, you can see where that point of view would not be viewed favorably in a therapist. So it’s a good thing I can, in fact, just tell people what to do. I’m much better suited to that.

2010-05-26T02:43:00.000-07:00

I'm still getting caught up with Real Life. So, a look back at some of Mistress Matisse's Greatest Blog Hits.

From the last few years:
Nazi Play
S/he's A Lady
The Bank Job
Bad Approach
The Bra-Fitter
D/s And Relationships
Must One Bottom Before Topping?
My Wedding Photos
Getting Your Partner Into Kink
Getting Started In Life As A Kinkster
And, my favorite: What Not To Say - The "Puffy" Man.

And, from the dusty vaults: Older Greatest Hits (Hint: Lots of Silly Phone Calls in this list.)

Fresh material soon!

2010-05-20T02:01:00.000-07:00

A new column in The Stranger, which poses (and, to some degree, answers) the question: so what are all the freshly unemployed strippers in Seattle going to do for a living now?

My sincere thanks to all the ladies who responded to my plea and spent some of their very valuable time telling me about their future plans. I only wish that I had enough space to put all of your answers in the column. It was wonderful to hear from you, and I wish all you the best of luck in your fresh new endeavors.

2010-05-18T23:49:00.000-07:00

Letters To The Mistress

(Edited for length, and for identifying details)

Hello Mistress Matisse,

I recently attempted to make a foray into the sex work industry and f-ed it up royally.

A little background: I come from a very conservative family. I went to Catholic schools my whole life, graduated from the U of Deleted (where my father works), and then moved to X City for work. Currently, I'm 26, working a regular full-time job, working on my master's degree part-time, and I just got hit with an expense (school-related) and need some cash. So I contacted a local dungeon about working as a pro-sub. I e-mailed them some photos (you can see my face in two of them, which becomes important later), my bio text, and they put me up on the site. A couple of days later, I received the following e-mail (in my alumni email account, which means that whoever sent the message has access to the alumni directory, and therefore is faculty, staff, student, or alum.)

Hello
Aren't you Bill's daughter? I recognized at the website. You have really grown up, I have not seen you in many years. Will give you a call when I'm in X City.
Mr. Brown

Creepy, right? I have no idea who “Mr. Brown” is. So I contacted the Mistress to fill her in and asked if I could please submit headless photos and change my pro name (which was close to my real name). She gave the OK, and the site was altered. Then I wrote Mr. Brown back and simply said:

Hello,
I'm sorry, I'm afraid I don't recognize your name. With whom am I speaking?

A few days went by with no response, so I calmed down a bit. And then I received this earlier today:

Hello Jane (or is it Mistress Jane now?)
So it is you. I am an old friend of your parents. Of course this is not my name but you will recognize my face. I will let your parents know they have a good girl :)
See you soon.
Mr. Brown

Creepier and creepier. I had chalked the initial message up to dirty old man-nes, but this makes me uncomfortable, and I now worry that he might try to blackmail me. I suppose that if he does, I'll just have to come clean to my parents (which would pretty much be the end of the world, and I’d *definitely* prefer to avoid that).

Do you by any chance have any suggestions on dealing with this guy? I have no idea if he has screen shots of the original images on the site or not. (But I suppose he could lie about that, anyway.) And even if I meet him, I'm afforded no safety, because he could still send my parents information anonymously, and it would be my word against his. Gah. What kills me is that I haven’t even started yet -- this is my first day 'on-call.' Jesus.

***

Something about this letter sets off my bullshit detector. I have no idea why people make up odd situations and send me letters asking for advice about them. But they do, and there's something about this letter that seems phony to me.

It's too urban-legendy, for one thing. Too classic-cautionary-tale. "See here, Nice Catholic Girls, if you so much as put one little toe into the waters of sex work, your parents will find out instantly and it will be the End Of The World!"

But let's allow for the possibility that the writer of this letter is on the level. Some jerk-off is messing with her head. But blackmail? No. How exactly would such a person tell her family anything without revealing himself? "Hi Bill, long time no see! Listen, somehow I just happened to be on this pro domme site recently - I have no idea how I got there, really - and I saw pictures of your daughter, and ect..." Yeah, right. That's gonna fly real well.

Hell, if he's employed by the university, and using that email system to make sexual overtures towards women, she could probably blackmail him. Not that I endorse such a thing, because I think that's reprehensible. But most men who've gotten anywhere in life have something to lose in a game like this, and they know it. They do not want to start outing or blackmailing people, not at all. They are more likely to run in the other direction from a woman who'd be able to identify them.

Thus, I doubt this guy is who he says he is, and I doubt that he's going to do anything. In this age of Facebook, it would not be hard to come up with someone's hometown, parent's names, ect, and use it to jerk some girl's chain. If she just started sex work, I doubt she has all that info locked down. Someone with way too much time on his hands pulled some stray bit of data from the domme site - or else he knows someone who works there, who let it slip in conversation. He cross-referenced it with social networking sites, and bingo, instant harassment material.

That would be extremely unusual, but it is possible. I think the more likely answer is that this scenario is either partly or wholly fabricated. In my personal experience, I know of exactly one woman who was outed to her family by a stranger/would-be client. It's very rare. When people get outed, it's usually by another family member, or an aggrieved ex. In fact, if this story is completely factual, then it's probably some ex-boyfriend of the writer doing a bit of cyberstalking.

But the chances of someone being identified by a mysterious old family friend, who taunts and threatens them with exposure, within mere days of posting a photo on a relatively obscure site? (As in: not like Craigslist or some such place.) Them's some real long odds, in my vast experience. It just smells wrong to me.

Also: there are not that many pro domme houses around, and a lot of people who want jobs at them. A lot. That this person says she got taken on by one sight-unseen, with no personal connections, is fishy. So there's something hinky about this part of the story, too.

Perhaps I'm being too skeptical. So if the writer of this letter is real, here's my advice. Do nothing and say nothing. Don't respond to any further communication from this person, ever, no matter what he says. If your parents say anything, act astonished, cry, and deny everything. Say this weirdo has been pestering you with his sick sexual fantasies, and that you've been too frightened to say anything. Those pictures? Those are Photoshopped. They aren't of you. Deny it and keep on denying it, steadfastly. He has nothing tangible, after all, and your parents would much rather believe you than him.

And then read The Gift Of Fear.

All the other women reading this: this situation, if true, is the sex work equivalent of getting hit by debris from space that's re-entered the Earth's atmosphere. There are good reasons for some people not to do sex work, but this story isn't one of them.

2010-05-17T23:26:00.000-07:00

For those who want to see me soon, some schedule updates…

I’m in town this week until Thursday, although my time is filling up. In general, it’s best to book time with me at least two or three days in advance. It’s always okay to ask me for last-minutes dates - but it’s usually not easy to get them!

I’m out of town from Friday the 21st until Monday the 24th.

And that is the end of the really crazy travel schedule I've been on for the last two months. It's been great fun, but I'll be glad not to be on any planes for a bit.

I expect I’ll do a few little getaways here and there, and naturally I’ll be as busy as I normally am. But I plan to be mostly in Seattle for the next couple of months. Which I like.

2010-05-15T01:56:00.000-07:00

My internet failed me yesterday. So I was not able to mention, in a timely manner, that it was the birthday of my very beloved darling, Max. He is surely the most amazing man in the world - and I do know a lot of amazing people.

But there's no one like Max. Happy birthday, darling!

2010-05-13T02:03:00.000-07:00

People like to ask me hierarchy questions. “What’s the most extreme thing you’ve ever done? What is the BDSM activity you like better than any other? What’s the biggest dildo/needle/sound/whip/whatever you’ve ever used on someone?”

Short answer? Really fucking big.

The real answer: I dislike trying to construct hierarchies. And those sort of questions just don’t make sense to me. Why does that matter? Really, why is it even of interest? If someone wants to play with me, it’s better for him/her to present me with their options than try to elicit some story, and then offer to go one better. Because believe me, the vast majority of people are not going to be able to just zip to the front of my “extremely intense play” line. If I detailed some of the insanely mean stuff I do to my most wonderful masochistic boys, many of you people reading would whimper and fall into fetal positions on the floor. I’m smiling and tapping my fingertips together just thinking about it…

But I digress. There are some types of hierarchies I can help with. Here’s one I get often: I’m just getting started in BDSM, what toys should I buy?

Well, BDSM is an activity that can absorb a lot of money – if you want it to. But it’s also one that crafty people can get down with - making your toys is big in the kink scene. (How do you think Twisted Monk got started? Making rope for himself, that’s how.)

But buy them or make them, here’s my list of First Things To Have In Your Toybag.

1. Leather restraints. They don’t have to be leather, if you’re a vegan. But they should be some strong, thick material, 2 inches wide or more, and they should have either buckles or a LOT of Velcro or both. The point is that you can get them OFF quickly and easily. (If you’re going to use rope on limbs, you better already be a Boy Scout or a climber or a sailor or something, and know your knots very well. ) It’s handy to have four of them, for obvious reasons, but even two will do for a start. And while bondage purists will shudder at the thought, I went years just clipping them together with, yes, a double-ended snap from the hardware store.
2. But some rope is handy to have. Five feet is a good length for attaching a limb to a bedpost or a chair or whatever.
3. A thumpy impact toy. The classic flogger, or the basic leather paddle, something simple. There are lots of vanilla-purposed things in the world you can whack people with, but I think it’s classy to have at least one toy that says “I have but one purpose for existing and that is to smack your ass.” (Or wherever.) Alternate Option: A long, thin, flexible impact toy creates a stingy sensation, and I do love cane-type things, but often, that’s a slightly tougher sensation for a new bottom to eroticize and process. Not always, though, so experiment carefully.
4. Clampy things. Wooden clothespins will do fine, but it’s easy to find pervertibles in this category, so have fun at the dollar store.

Other things that come in handy, in no particular order: soft, smaller millimeter rope or cord, about a yard long, is useful for tying up cocks and balls. (Thick cotton bootlaces work nicely. Tie a bow, so you can untie them quickly.) A paint stirrer. A scrub brush. Plastic wrap. A black scarf, suitable for gag or blindfold use.

Those simple things will get you a surprisingly long way, properly deployed. The equipment isn’t the point, really, I’ve done whole scenes with stuff I found in my purse. I once had a hot encounter in the front seat of my car, with a girl who’d recently had her tongue pierced. I had this bottle of liquid candy stuff - “Sour Drops” or some such thing. Anyway, I tied her wrists to the headrest in my car with a shoelace and forced her mouth open and dripped this intensely sour stuff on her tongue and wow, she acted like her head was going to come off. It was charming.

So one simply has to be creative. Have fun!

2010-05-11T01:16:00.000-07:00

From The Mailbag

I would like to serve a couple. It’s been hard to find dominant men who are physically and intellectually superior to me but I would like to. Is it possible to be trained in finding a dominant man?

Trained in finding a dominant man? Um, I think that’s called dating.

But seriously – yeah, a good top is hard to find. I think, by your letter, that you’re a gay man who wants a male/male couple? That’s a competitive market, so you have to go where the ducks are. Have you ever attended IML? Largest collection of kinky gay men I know of. It’ll still take some time and effort to find a pair of Masters Right, but it’s a start. (Oh, and note the standard of beauty in those photos. If you’re not already there – get thee to the gym. A good haircut and some snug jeans will help, too.)

***

Well met Mistress,
I was hoping you could help me decide whether I or my boyfriend was right. My boyfriend is into BDSM but I've never had any real experience. We tried having him spank me but I didn't really care for it because within the first few smacks I feel his hand actually peeling off my ass. Is it supposed to reach that point right away? After telling him I didn't care for that he's not been willing to try anything else telling me it's just not who I am. I want to give this all another try but now he isn't willing. Am I right to want to try again or is he right that after that couple tries it's proven this path isn't right for me? If I should give it another try do you have any suggestions?

My opinion is that your boyfriend got his feelings hurt when you criticized his spanking technique. We tops are sensitive that way.

And I’m noticing that this question is framed in rather defensive way – “whether I or my boyfriend was right.” You would do better to try to shed that attitude, overall, in love. I myself say that in relationships, sometimes you have to choose between being right and being happy. By that I mean: if you insist that your partner always acknowledging that you’re right when you think you’re right, you’re going to have a lot of arguments that really aren’t about anything substantial. People don’t always like to admit we were wrong. And many times, the disagreement isn't about anything life-threatening anyway. Why bicker about trivialities? Smile and let it go.

In this case, I understand you're trying to bring about a certain result. So how about if you stepped away from the I’m right/he’s wrong dynamic and asked him “Darling, I'm sorry I sounded so critical of you, I didn't mean to be. What would need to happen for you to feel comfortable trying some BDSM with me again?” And then whatever he asks for, do it.

***

Hi, Ms Matisse.
I wanted to ask an honest question. Do you know here in Seattle metro area where a gal who has the desire for "casual" intimate strap-on play might go to seek out a man who wishes for same? I know that's a loaded question. But I am not looking for a long-term commitment. Just someone who would like to spend some erotic time together every once in a while, when the schedule works out for both parties. Yes, I have had paid strap-on experiences, two of the three pleasurable. However, as with many people today, budgets are not what they used to be, so I really do not aim for that again. I also own a couple of toys (nothing huge!), and enjoy self stimulation. However, the sounds and sight is all part of the situation.

Dear man, I’m sure this is an honest question. And there’s nothing wrong with you wanting this. But in the longer version of this letter, you told me you were 47. Have you really reached that age without realizing that most women do not operate like this, sexually? Here’s a quote from a longer post I wrote about men looking for no-strings sex.

"It’s not that women never ever have erotic contact with someone who they don’t want a capitol-R relationship with. That happens sometimes. But my observation of women and casual erotic contact is that is doesn’t happen in a vacuum. I myself have met people and thought, damn, I’d tap that. Like, right now. Not often, but it’s happened. However, note the order of events: first I met them, then I decided that nakedness needed to happen. On the other hand, if some friend of mine had called me up and said, “hey, Matisse, I got this guy here that wants to do X erotic activity with any willing female, you interested?” The answer would be “Hell, no.” Because for me and for many women, sexual desire is reaction-based. Maybe it’s smell, a pheromone thing. Although women have been seduced via letter since people started writing them, so it can’t be just that. Whatever makes attraction happen, it has to happen first. Asking to be granted erotic access to a woman’s body before she has decided she’s attracted to you is hopeless."

So some women do have casual sex, yes. And I would imagine that some percentage of them would be into strap-on play. But there is no special place to find them that's separate from the rest of the sex-positive world.

Thus, to have the slightest hope of this, you’re going to have to widen your own gaze. You told me you weren’t into BDSM, but strap-on play is often associated with kink, and so if you want to find women into it, the logical place to look is kinky places. And you’ll probably have to think more about what you’re willing to give, rather than just drawing a lot of lines about what you must have, and what you won’t give. (i.e., a committed relationship. Or money.)

It’s still rather unlikely that you’re going to find a woman who’s willing to fuck you up the ass, casually yet intimately, every once in a while, with no strings attached. But I wish you luck anyway.

2010-05-09T03:03:00.000-07:00

Hey there ladies!

I'd like to speak to some women who worked at Honey's in Everett, Rick's in Seattle, Sugar's in Shoreline, or Fox's in Tacoma. I'm writing a piece about what happens when dancers get thrown out of work. Are you going to go dance at Deja Vu? Leave Seattle and find a more dancer-friendly town? Get a straight job? Or go onto some other type of sex work?

Drop me a note and tell me of your career plans. All contact information will be strictly confidential, just tell me what name you'd like to be quoted by!

MistressMatisse AT aol.com

2010-05-06T05:18:00.000-07:00

I've been being lazy for a few days, my dear readers, but I will be more in a writing mood soon. Meanwhile, enjoy the newest Stranger column: The Naked Truth Is Not Online.

2010-05-03T02:47:00.000-07:00

Letters To The Mistress

I have been interested in BDSM for some time, and would very much like to become a part of the community as a submissive where I live. I have read multiple books on the subject, spoken with people in the lifestyle online, and searched the hell out of google. However, I have never had sex, BDSM or otherwise. I was wondering if you think that it would be better to have a vanilla experience first or just jump right in to the good stuff.

Okay, this is a complex question. First, let’s back off and define our terms here. BDSM is not, actually, sex. It is a large set of activities and attitudes that may be erotically charged for most people, most of the time. But not everyone, and not all the time. You can do BDSM without having sex. I frequently do so, and I am not unusual in this. So do lots of other people I know - Max plays non-sexually with people all the time, and so does Monk, and as I think about it, so do just all about all my friends.

I have some BDSM play-partners with whom I never have sex, in even the broadest and most comprehensive sense of that word. I have some BDSM play-partners that I sometimes have sex with, but not other times. And I have some that I always have sex with. It really varies. Thus, you can engage in BDSM while still remaining a sexual virgin. I’m not saying you should, I’m just saying they are two different things that you may or may not wish to combine.

You don’t say how old you are, and I can’t give a razor-sharp answer without knowing whether you are fourteen, or twenty-three, or forty, or what. Neither do you tell me your gender or sexual identity, which would also shape my answer somewhat. And what's true is that I can't really tell a stranger on the internet what would be best in this situation, it's way too delicate and individual.

But I get asked somewhat similar questions by inexperienced people all the time. Here’s a quote from a longer, previous post I wrote on the subject of virginity and BDSM… Go read the whole thing.

“…BDSM is graduate-school sexuality. You take all the usual complications and confusions of a non-kinky romantic connection and overlay it with this intense and still rather taboo way of relating and being sexual. Creating and maintaining a kinky relationship is tricky, and it requires skill, persistence, and work. Dating in one’s teens and early twenties is often the boot camp where we get basic training in how to interact with the objects of our desire. Clearly that’s easier if one is heterosexual, monogamous and not kinky. But even the most dismal and banal of dating encounters – like, say, my high school dates – teach you things. Thus, I think if you aren’t going on dates with people, you should. Don’t have sex with anyone – unless you really want to. Just get some practice in the rituals of beginning a relationship. There will be hideously embarrassing blunders that will make you writhe to think of afterwards. We all have those, I assure you. Me included. But you don’t get good at something without some trial and error."

I hope that gives you some sense of how I think about BDSM and adult sexual relationships. Good for you for researching and learning all you can. Now go talk to real people in real life and see how that feels to you. Take it slow and easy, but take it. Having a good BDSM relationship is like getting to Carnegie Hall – practice, practice, practice.

2010-04-29T04:30:00.000-07:00

What am I reading lately? A little of everything…

I bought, but have not read yet, this one: In the Devil's Garden: A Sinful History of Forbidden Food, by Stewart Lee Allen. It appealed to my noted weakness for history-of books.
“Lust, gluttony, pride, sloth, greed, blasphemy, and anger--the seven deadly sins have all been linked to food. Matching the food to the sin, Stewart Lee Allen offers a high-spirited look at the way foods over time have been forbidden, even criminalized, for their "evil" effects. Food has often been, shockingly, morally weighted, from the tomato, originally called the love apple and thought to excite lust; to the potato, whose popularity in Ireland led British Protestants to associate it with sloth; to foods like corn or bread whose use was once believed to delineate "lowness," thus inflaming class pride…the real focus is on the human response to a primal pleasure--eating--and the way people have sought to control it, in every society and every culture, through prohibition.” (From review.)

He's Just Not That Into You: The No-Excuses Truth to Understanding Guys, by Greg Behrendt. The press around this book – and then the movie – annoyed me so much that I refused to read this book when it first came out, but for some reason curiosity overcame me lately.
It wasn't a demanding read, to say the least. It’s a lot like a long magazine article. Pretty thin text for a book, although Mr. Behrendt has gone on to write more books in the same vein, so apparently some people think he has something new to say. Overall: meh. I agree with some of what he says: some people do chase after people who are obviously - well, not that into them. Unfortunately, I doubt this fluffed-out Cosmo article is going to dissuade them. And much of the time, I think Mr. Behrendt slides from clever flippancy into repetitive heavy-handedness. When it comes to wittily capturing the social patterns and dysfunctions of love, he is no Jane Austen.

Speaking of love, here’s one book I will not be buying: Marry Him: The Case for Settling for Mr. Good Enough. I have previously expressed my opinion, both here and in the Stranger, about Ms Gottlieb’s plan of: “Marry any half-way decent man who asks you, because being married, even to someone you don’t love, is better than being single. Plus you need his sperm to get pregnant, and his income to support the little devils.”

I will note that the author, in spite of having stated, in print, that her standards for marriage are extremely low, is still not partnered. Why am I not surprised? I could have told her that. Oh, wait, I did tell her that. This looks like a classic case of saying you want something, but then sabotaging your stated goal as hard as you can. Why she’s doing that I can only speculate.

***

In good print news: Check out The Stranger's article about local kink artisans and entrepreneurs. Featuring, of course, Twisted Monk! Plus, Scott Paul and Tonya Winter - it's a great piece.

2010-04-26T00:41:00.000-07:00

From The Archive

Last year on this date, I posted what is surely one of the most charming photos ever taken of an action-movie hero:

Makes me happy just looking at it.

Then, in 2008 on this day, I posted a sort-of-kinky-but-not-really photo of Monk and I in bondage together.

And today in 2007, I posted a tour, with photos, of my pretty pink box. It's probably not quite what you think...

Three years, with three different but all delightfully kink-inspired posts and photos...

2010-04-21T12:51:00.000-07:00

While I zoom off to Las Vegas, here's my latest column in The Stranger, about the passing of a Seattle sex landmark, The Lusty Lady.
Bye!

2010-04-19T03:11:00.000-07:00

I would be remiss if I didn't mention a charming girl I met lately. Actually, we had met once before, and I recently re-met her. She's a make-up artist who works with Craig Morey, and I met her last year, when she did my face for that shoot.

She came back again last week to be my stylist again, and that's when I found out she herself is a model. And what a very lovely site she has! SpankAmber.com

Also in the land of photos - a man named Scott Church took a gorgeous picture of my darling Max's handiwork in Atlanta a few weeks ago. I think it's a hot image, but it is not for the faint of heart.

The interesting back-story to this image is: Max had single-tailed the model the day before, to their mutual satisfaction. Then she came back the next day and said she wanted a picture of her cool marks... But she felt like it would be a better photo if he whipped her a bit more.

What could he do but oblige her? Thus, the marks are pretty intense, and Mr. Church did a lovely capture of them.

2010-04-16T03:17:00.000-07:00

The first sample from the shoot on Tuesday...

I don't have the CD's from the shoot yet - but Craig was kind enough to email me a preview. I think this one turned out nicely, don't you? The pose isn't quite the same as the Winslet/Vanity Fair shot - I think I slid down more on my stomach in some of the other versions of this, to more closely copy it. But it has some of the same mood, I think.

I didn't Photoshop this, and I don't think Craig did much, if anything. So what knocks me out how perfectly he got the light on me. And that's just natural light, by the way. The photographers among you will appreciate what a feat that is. I'm a big fan of natural light for photos. All those awesome white-dress pictures of me from my last shoot with Craig are done in natural light.

This time, Craig had one strobe that he used for fill-light in some of the other shots. But there are big windows in front of me and on my right, and he just used reflectors and fiddled with the curtains to provide the perfect blend of light and shadow. Look, you can even see where I've been doing all those damn lat pull-downs at the gym!

This was taken in the suite at a certain hotel in San Francisco. Every time I've stayed there, I have looked at the enormous windows all along two walls and thought "The light in this room is so pretty. I really want to do some photos here." My hopes are fully realized by this result. I'll show you more as I get them.

2010-04-13T00:05:00.000-07:00

I was tired of having the old post still be at the top of the blog. But I'm out of town, I'm writing a Stranger column, and I have a photo shoot today. Thus, I have no brain cells to devote to creative blogging.

So instead, let's make fun of this hideously ugly and ridiculously expensive dress. When I look at this, it reminds me of that doll my grandmother had on the back of the toilet, the one with her skirt over the extra roll of tissue. Didn't everyone's grandmother have one of those?

Or maybe it looks like a feather-duster. Or perhaps some faux-kinky sex toy, I don't know. What it does not look like is a dress any reasonable woman would pay $6,600 for.

Bye!

2010-04-08T13:51:00.000-07:00

This blog post will not make much sense to you if you didn’t read my column last week, and the blog post that went with it. You also need to read my column this week, and if you want the fullest possible perspective, listen to the 50-minute-long audio file linked from it.

***

Let me preface this by saying clearly: Ms. Febos, I do not think you are a bad person. I don’t harbor any personal rancor towards you.

I am not attempting to “silence” you, either, and to demonstrate that, I asked the The Stranger to make the audio of our entire conversation available for download so people can hear exactly what you said when I interviewed you.

For the readers, let me also just run down the timeline of how our meeting came about:

• I arranged this interview with Ms. Febos, via her agent, on March 15th, and I told him that I would publish my review of "Whip Smart" in advance of her Seattle appearances the weekend of the 27th/28th. I had a personal email exchange with Ms. Febos subsequent to that.

• My review of "Whip Smart" was published in print and went live on the web on Wednesday March 24th.

• Saturday March 27th at 5pm, Ms. Febos walked into an interview with me – without having read my review. In fact, she admitted that while she had heard of me, she had actually never read anything I’ve written.

That was not a smart way to handle a professional situation. Ms. Febos teaches writing to college students. One wonders what she would think if a student of hers showed up for class without doing any homework whatsoever.

So it’s true that I didn’t like her book, but books are not people. I was completely prepared for this interview to reverse my opinion of Ms. Febos’ perceptions of BDSM and sex work. It failed to do so.

I don’t wish you unhappiness, Ms. Febos, but this not about just you and me. This is about some bigger issues. That’s why you are making another appearance in my Stranger column this week.

***

In many ways, Ms. Febos is a striking example of what happens when people write about kink and sex work in cultural isolation. She is not a part of the BDSM community, nor is she participatory in any sex-work activism circles, so she has not been educated by leaders in those communities on how to talk about them without putting her foot in her mouth.

She’s getting a remedial education now, and not just from me. I’m sure she’s not enjoying it. Judging by the difference in both her tone of voice and in the answers she’s given in her more recent interviews, Ms. Febos is adapting quickly to the feedback she’s gotten. That’s good. But it does indicate to me that her perspective on her experiences is still very much evolving. That’s understandable, because according to my calculations, Ms. Febos finished writing "Whip Smart" when she was just twenty-six years old. I myself shudder to think of the book-length memoir I would have produced at twenty-six. That’s the tough part about writing: once the words are out there, you can’t unwrite them. They take on a life of their own - but you still have to stand behind them.

Aside it just being too soon for her to write this book, I think Ms. Febos’ post-addiction views about BDSM sexuality and sex work have been largely shaped by vanilla people - 12-step people, therapists, family – who have a very one-dimensional view of kink and sex work. She has not put herself in situations where kinky, sex-working people who are smarter than she is can raise her consciousness. I could tell, talking to her, that a lot of the experiences and reactions she thought were uniquely hers were, actually, experiences and reactions I’ve seen people have time and again. Some of them I’ve had myself.

One's experiences are not either right or wrong, they just are. But the conclusions we draw from them can be either accurate and insightful, or – not. When I had some of what I might call the Universal Kink/Sex-Work Experiences, I had the advantage of having like-minded people to turn to and say, “Hey, this weird thing happened and I’m feeling X way about it.” Not everyone in my communities always dispenses Solomon-like wisdom. But you can’t get education; you can’t get perspective, if you never talk to anyone who knows more than you do.

I have been asked why I can’t just “be nice”, and say nothing critical about Ms. Febos’ words. No, I cannot do that, because I am part of these communities, and I would not be the person I am, or have the life I do, without them. When I was just beginning to understand who and what I was, writers like Susie Bright and Patrick Califia literally changed my life by brilliantly and ceaselessly refuting the lies that are told about people like me. And I would not be here now, safe and sane and happy, without the kinky, sex-working people in my everyday life who corrected me when I made mistakes, and told me truths I didn’t always want to hear. So while I didn’t necessarily like it at the time, it’s a damn good thing they did it, and now I owe them.

At the end of the interview, Ms. Febos said something that explained a lot to me. She said, “Learning how to do something new in public is so uncomfortable.... I’m not good at being a beginner at anything.”

I thought to myself, And therein lies the problem here. Because she is a beginner when it comes to talking and writing about BDSM and sex work. Unfortunately, by publishing the book, Ms. Febos has placed herself in the expert’s seat. Now she has to learn, in public, to handle her discomfort in that position.

2010-04-07T03:08:00.000-07:00

Travel Plans And Bondage!

Here's what my fast-moving life looks like for the next few weeks...

I’m going to be in San Francisco April 12th -15th. I always like visiting there, but on this trip I have a shoot lined up with awesome photographer Craig Morey, and I’m particularly looking forward to that!

I’m back for a few days, and then I leave again, this time to go to Vegas. I’m gone from April 21st to 24th.

I don’t want to lose touch with my favorite Seattle boys in the midst of all this traveling, and I do have time available to see people on April 19th and 20th. But that will go fast, so if you want to see me, drop me a line, quick! Or catch me after the 24th.

Other events: Want to learn rope bondage? Register for my darling Max’s two-day Bondage Intensive, April 24th and 25th. He’ll take you from complete novice to stylish rope-rigger in two fun and education days.

2010-04-05T03:42:00.000-07:00

Under My Protection and Collars of Consideration

I saw some questions about this on a kink community board I’m on, so I’m using them as a blog-prompt for myself.

When someone says, “So-and-so is under my protection”, what does that mean?

That phrase may or may not mean that two people involved are playing together. The general translation of that sentiment, in my mind, is: “I’m fond of this person, and either because of his/her newness to kink, or just general emotional issues, I perceive her/him as being vulnerable to predatory personalities. So go ahead and chat them up, it’s all good, but just be aware: you fuck with them, you’re fucking with me. And you don’t want to fuck with me.”

Your mileage may vary, of course. But that’s what it means when I say it.

What is a Collar of Consideration?

A tiresome bit of pretentiousness? Collars of Consideration, indeed. What am I, a kinky seminary or something?

Oh, all right, I don’t really mean that. I mean: I don’t do that sort of thing myself. I don’t generally use collars very much at all. (Although they are pretty to look at, and sometimes useful, too.) But other people place a lot of meaning in them, and that’s fine. And whatever you want to call them is also fine with me - as long as you don’t pretend that there is some sort of universally agreed-upon BDSM system of ranking the person wearing them according to the title of the collar, or its color, or its material, or anything like that, because there is not.

I suppose you could say a “Collar of Consideration” might be the kink version of a Promise Ring – the people involved are engaged to be engaged, if you will, in a committed D/s relationship. That would be my take on that.

As always in BDSM, when in doubt, politely say to the person you're talking to, "I don't want to be rude, but I'm not sure I understand the etiquette here - can you tell me what that means, exactly?" That'll pretty much cover you no matter what.

2010-04-02T03:10:00.000-07:00

Another letter, because there’s a bunch of them stacked up in the mailbox…. This came to "Mistress Matisse and Twisted Monk", but I’m just giving my take on it. I have a feeling Monk would agree with me, anyway.

I'm lost and need some advice.

This all began several years ago...13 to be exact. Me and 'Master J' have been best friends for as long as I can remember, but thirteen years ago things got serious when we were in sixth grade. We got together, and I revealed my kinky side, to begin with he tried to be just as kinky as I, but lately it seems that he is getting bored of the lifestyle, he claims that He has fulfilled his every fantasy, but in the process he has forgotten my greatest fantasy...to be his loved pet. I tried to remind him by making my own collars, he brushed it off. I even bought two very nice, semi expensive collars...of them one was locking. He only locked me after I asked him. It didn’t feel like any collaring that I have ever read about.

Should I give up my kinky side to live with him happily? I don’t want to leave him, he is my Master, my lover, and my world. How can I rekindle the spark of kink that we once had? Is there anyway to make him see how I truly feel about being his pet?

Okay, honey. Let me first say: I’m sorry you’re having a hard time in your relationship. Mismatched sexual desires are indeed very frustrating.

But I keep doing the math here and coming up with this: most sixth graders are 11 or 12 years old, so unless you and Master J flunked a whole lot of years in school, ya’ll are now about 25 years old.

You’re saying you began having a serious master/slave relationship with this guy in sixth grade? Really? You want to know what my significant sexual milepost of sixth grade was? I French-kissed a boy for the first time. That the full extent of my sixth-grade sexiness. I was aware of my own sexuality at that age, and looking back I can see there was kink mixed into it even then. But I didn’t have any sophisticated language or concepts for how I was feeling, I didn’t know exactly what to do about any of the concepts I did have, and I sure as hell was not capable of creating a complex, structured kinky/sexual relationship with another person. I was also not capable of falling in love with anyone in any meaningful, mature fashion at that age.

And it’s perfectly appropriate that I wasn’t able to do those things. Because even if she/he has started puberty, a twelve-year-old is still a child, mentally and emotionally. So I think you’re exaggerating a bit when you say you’ve been serious with this man for thirteen years. No, what you’re saying is you had a childhood sweetheart, which is fine. And then you had a teenage boyfriend, which is also fine. And you two fooled around with kinky stuff in whatever fashion you did, exploring the different flavors of this mysterious thing, sex.

Now, at twenty-five, you’re both truly adults – and he’s changed since he was twelve. Well, yeah. Most people do change a lot between twelve and twenty-five. You grow up, basically. It appears that you’ve grown up to be a kinky woman, and he’s grown up to be a man who isn’t interested in having a master/slave relationship with you. I don’t think it’s a question of getting him to see how you truly feel. Buying collars and asking him to lock them on you seems very clear to me. I would guess that he sees it – and he just doesn’t want to do it.

Do I think you should give up your kinky desires to stay with your childhood sweetheart? Um, no. Naturally "should I stay or should I go?" is not a question I can really answer for anyone else. But what I can tell you is that trying to get an unwilling partner to dominate you is the single most doomed-to-frustration endeavor I can imagine. Even if you succeed in getting him to do it… you’re still getting him to do it.

My personal opinion is that you’ve just begun your life as a sexual adult, and you have a long way to go, believe me. Kiss your adolescent romance a fond goodbye and go find a guy who really wants to own you.

2010-03-31T01:11:00.000-07:00

Today, a selection from the dusty vaults: a blog post from this date (more or less) five years ago. It’s not exactly a phone calls post, but rather one of my humorous takes on the voice-mails I used to get.

Since I no longer have a public phone line, I no longer get to experience the mingled amusement/exasperation of listening to such things. Like many mingled things, it’s less exasperation and more amusement when it's all firmly in the past. But occasionally - very occasionally - I miss the controlled but raw feed of utterly random input from anyone with pocket change and a copy of The Stranger.

2010-03-29T21:40:00.000-07:00

Letters: Advice From An Expert

So today, I decided to let my very best friend in the whole world take a crack at the Letters file. In addition to just being a smart cookie, Miss K also happens to be a therapist, which makes her a handy pal to have. Her advice is advice worth taking. Thus, without further ado...

For the past two years I have been dating a man in what can only be called an abusive relationship with a woman he's been with for over a decade. Typically the abuse, which from what I can tell started about five years ago, is verbal, but it is occasionally backed up by threats of or actual violence (such as punching, throwing things or biting).

I've discussed the abuse issues with him, but if you know anyone who's been in such a relationship for a long time, you know how futile that can be. So I've been continuing to see him, enjoy him, and offer him whatever support I can while not entangling myself in their issues. Since my relationship with him is long-distance, I've managed to draw a pretty thick line between me and her.

About a month ago, she found a book I'd given him on emotional abuse. You can imagine the consequences. Their relationship is one with a veto, and apparently the veto has no time limit, because she's used it. The thing is, he wants to continue to see me, but in secret. I've always considered myself an ethical, upstanding poly person, and normally I wouldn't consider cheating. But every rule has its exceptions, and I'm wondering if this is one of them. In another situation I'd insist that he stand up to her and tell her he plans to consider seeing me if he does in fact want to. But he'll be punished--severely and for a long time--if he stands up to her and says he wants to continue to see me. And while I don't have any illusions that I can save him (until he's ready to save himself), I also don't want to withdraw the love and support that could eventually help him find the strength and courage to leave this situation.

In short, my ethics about how to deal with a friend and lover suffering in an abusive relationship are in conflict with my ethics about honesty and disclosure in multiple relationships. What's an ethical slut to do?

***

Miss K says: An ethical slut must do what's right for herself, and allow others the opportunity to do the same for themselves. You must consider this as any other poly relationship: If you would not see someone secretly under normal circumstances, you must not do so here either. Your love and support, while valuable, can still be made available to him if/when he decides to change his circumstances.

In the meantime, he is an adult who knows his options, and only when the pain of maintaining the status quo becomes greater than the pain of changing will he make a move. Your removal from the situation may turn out to be just the thing that tips those scales. Besides, who are you to keep him from his misery?

It comes down to this: You are not his only resource. You are not even his most important resource - that title goes to his own will to survive. Step back, maintain your ethics and open-heartedness, and let his process unfold.

2010-03-25T23:49:00.000-07:00

Here's my newest column in The Stranger. It's a review of a book called "Whip Smart" by Melissa Febos.

Before you go read, hear me say this: it's a critique of the book. It is not a critique of the author as a person. There's been a fair amount of negative reaction in the BDSM community to the book, and to some of things Ms. Febos said in her recent NPR interview. I myself thought Terry Gross was condescending and ill-informed in that interview, although I've never been a fan of hers anyway.

Ms. Febos had been scheduled to appear at the Center For Sex Positive Culture, but that appearance was canceled by the author/her publicist. I have not been told first-hand the reason for that, but what I have heard is that Ms. Febos was upset by some comments made on Fetlife about that interview, by people who are presumed to be CSPC members, and thus declined to read there.

Now, I understand why all this is happening. BDSM people are a marginalized subculture, and thus we are naturally sensitive to being unflatteringly characterized. We also dislike it when people seem to be claiming to represent us when we did not elect them, so to speak.

However, Ms. Febos has not, that I know of, explicitly claimed to be a spokesperson for the BDSM community. Popular media likes to label people. For the moment, Ms. Febos has been assigned the label of The Dominatrix, and it's been implied that her experience is The Experience Of All Kinky People and also of All Sex Workers. But I have not heard her say that herself - not exactly, anyway.

My criticisms of her book aside, I have some sympathy for her in this matter, since, on a smaller scale, I get the same sort of thing myself. People read something I wrote about my life and think that I'm saying something about them, or they read carelessly and respond to something I never said at all. It's very frustrating.

But at least for me, those criticisms have happened over time, in small bites, and I can take any useful ideas and use them to tailor future pieces. A book is not a dynamic thing, it's just there. And my own little measure of fame has also grown slowly. I have had time to get used to moving gracefully in each stage of it, whereas Ms. Febos has been rather suddenly thrust into a larger arena.

As luck would have it, Ms. Febos is reading her book at Elliot Bay this weekend, and I have scheduled an interview with her for Saturday afternoon. I'm going to let that be her opportunity to clarify her feelings about the BDSM community, and on this aspect of publishing her story. I would bet this will be the only author-interview she'll do with someone who is also a dominatrix, who also writes about her life. Ms. Febos is now a writing teacher, but I hope she'll find it refreshing to not have to teach another interviewer Pro Domme 101.

2010-03-24T03:24:00.000-07:00

Time for another podcast! In this one, Monk reads an original poem – or at least, we hope it is original – sent to him by a reader. And he reads it in the voice of William Shatner, because the William Shatner-voice makes everything better.

Moving on, we read a letter from a kinky person asking how to keep a pleasant sexual tension alive in a long-term relationship. This is a type of question that we get a lot, so we both have plenty to say about it. As a man who’s been happily married for over twenty years, Monk waxes particularly eloquent. High point: he compares BDSM to Pokemon. I’m serious.

About fourteen minutes.

2010-03-23T04:24:00.000-07:00

Back in Seattle, and busy catching up on my life. Because of all my travel recently, I had to regretfully turn down far too many charming invitations from intimate friends. If you're one of those people, drop me a note and we'll talk about a rendezvous.

And if you're a local fan of foot worship, you should know about this party. Seattle Footnight! April 1st, from 8pm-midnight. These are fun events, I've gone to several of them before. I'll be at this one, and so will my lovely friend Lady Lydia, as well as other beautiful women. Check out the site and register for the party!

2010-03-11T23:39:00.000-08:00

A new Stranger column is up - this one about that very annoying "You're Kinky? You Must Have Been Abused As A Child" myth... Enjoy!

2010-03-10T01:56:00.000-08:00

Take AIM

A delicate subject, STDs, but occasionally one I can find some humor in. Take what happened to me a few months ago…

Now, I’m not monogamous, and neither are my partners. We’re all as smart and as careful as we can be, and I actually have great confidence in smart-and-careful when it comes to STDs. For my entire sexual life, using latex protection and basic safer sex practices has served me and my partners very well indeed.

But you can’t get complacent in these matters. Thus, I go get tested (for everything) rather more frequently than most people. Sometimes I’ve done it through my regular healthcare provider, but more often I use a stand-alone testing center, and I usually don’t do it under my real name. Why? Because I trust health insurance companies about as far as I could throw an overpaid Wellpoint executive. God forbid something serious should ever happen, but if it does, I want to know about it before it gets into any medical record with my name on it.

And there are plenty of ways to do that. This outfit, for example. You make the appointment online, show up, let them jab your arm, pee in a cup, and boom, you're done. In and out in twenty minutes, get your results on the phone in three days. Sure, it’s more than a $15 co-pay, but you cannot put a price on peace of mind.

So last November when I was booked to shoot with Kink.com, the prospect of getting an Adult Industry Medical test did not alarm me. My first reaction was: Cool, it’ll be time for me to get tested anyway. I won’t have to pay for it this time.

But then I thought: No - this is connected to my real name. I want to know for sure I have a clean bill of health before I sign my name to anything. So as ridiculous as it sounds, I scheduled myself for a medical screen about two weeks before I was due to take the AIM test for Kink.com. What? Control issues? Me? Like I said, I just call it peace of mind.

When I booked my private appointment, I chose a different lab than the one I’d been to previously. This isn't like going to the neighborhood pub, where you want the bartender to call you by name when you walk in the door. It was in the same area, though. Medical business always clump together like bunches of grapes, and this was no exception. At the appointed day and time, I showed up at the little no-frills lab and gave my usual fake name to the two people behind the counter.

Even though intellectually I know this is a big ole whatever to these lab techs, one does wonder: what do they think of people who come in for full-battery STD testing? I’ve never had anyone say anything to me, but it’s nicer when they don’t look at you funny.

This pair seemed pleasant. One of them was a nice-looking guy, clearly gay, with a round face, chunky glasses and thick, spiky hair. The other was a woman who made me think: this is a nice girl who’s trying to look a little edgy, with magenta-red hair and some tatts, but who still seems like a rather sweet, earnest, small-town sort of girl.

After a few minutes of fumbling around in filing cabinets, they found my appointment paperwork and led me off to the blood-drawing area. I’m not afraid of needles – even when they’re going in me - and I’m pretty easy to get blood from, so that went smoothly. Then the nice red-haired girl handed me a little cup with a plastic lid, like a Tupperware container for a single shot of booze. She indicated where she’d drawn a black line on it with grease pencil.

“Now - I know this is kinda tricky, but you see this little mark? If you can fill it up right to that line, as close as you can, but please not go over it…”

I smiled and took the container. “It won’t be a problem.”

Three days later I get the call: all clear. Which is what I had expected, but it's always nice to have one’s beliefs confirmed. So, okay - bring on the official AIM test. A few days after that, I called the Kink.com office in San Francisco to get the where/when details.

“Um – you’re in Seattle? Looks like there’s a lab in, what is this, Lynnwood? Is that good?”

“Good lord, no. That’s way far away. Is there a place in Capitol Hill or First Hill anywhere?”

There was more noise of papers ruffling on the other end of the phone. “Okay, here’s one that says Capitol Hill.” I scribbled down the address, day and time on the back of an envelope, tucked it in my calendar, and thought no more about it.

When the day came, I started driving towards the address and thought, “Hey, wait a minute, this address looks familiar…” Yeah, you guessed it: it was the very same lab I’d been to less than two weeks before.

Damn, I thought, there must be a dozen labs like this within a mile! What are the odds? I should have gone to Lynnwood. I walked up to the doors. Well, maybe there will be different people working. I’m under a different name, so…

I went in, and there they were: Chunky-Glasses-Boy and Nice-Redhaired-Girl. Oh, this is going to be slightly awkward.

They looked up, smiled at me, and then looked puzzled, in a way that clearly expressed: “Hey, we recognize you, hi there! But wait - you were just here before. Why are you here again?”

“So, yeah, hi.” I pulled out my ID. “I, uh, was here recently, but today I’m here for an AIM test, under this name.”

They both stared at me perplexedly for a moment, then a look of comprehension flashed across the boy’s face. He crouched down and began rummaging through some folders in a plastic milk crate that was shoved far back under a desk. There were quite a few of them, I noticed.

His co-worker continued to look confused. “A NAME test?” she asked in a loud voice, looking from one of us to the other. “What’s a name test?”

He stood up and elbowed her sharply in the ribs, eliciting a small ow! “Cybernet Entertainment, right?” he asked me.

“Yeah.”

Hr frowned at the file he held. “But you’re not a nineteen-year-old male.”

I laughed slightly. “No.”

More rummaging. His associate had lapsed into silence, but she still looked baffled. He eventually flushed out my (new) file, and the three of us went into the blood-draw area, where I turned away and made rather a long business of setting down my bag, taking off my jacket, and slowly tugging up my shirt sleeve, waiting until the whispers behind me stopped.

When I turned back, the boy had taken himself off, and the red-haired girl was smiling at me with an expression of apologetic friendliness. I smiled back to indicate: It’s all right, darlin’, I didn’t take no offense, and laid out my arm for the needle. We chatted lightly of minor matters, and she remarked to me all her friends were phlebotomists, too. “We kinda all hang out together.”

I know some people who’d like to crash those parties, I thought to myself, watching my blood trickle into the plastic vial. But I didn’t say anything. The girl had been clued in that I was a kinky porn star, I didn't want to overload her brain completely.

As I pulled down my sleeve, she turned to me with the familiar little cup and the same earnest expression as last time and began to recite, ““Now - I know this is kinda tricky, but you see this mark I made…” Then she stopped. “Oh, wait, you know how to do this, don’t you?”

“Oh yes,” I replied, “I certainly do.”

2010-03-08T03:47:00.000-08:00

If you’re a sex worker who likes her career, and if you talk about it and read other people’s thoughts about it at all, there comes a point when you realize you’ve heard all the standard anti-sex work arguments before. The trouble is the people making them think they’re new ideas, and trot them out to you as though you hadn’t already answered them 3,458 times.

I have toyed with the idea of making a quick reference, flow-chartish sort of handout to give people. It would list all the usual lines of attack and all the answers to those lines. But I doubt that anyone who’s going to say these things would pay any heed to that.

However, FurryGirl had the charming idea to create Bingo cards with all the standard anti-sex work talking points on them. (And so did Renegade Evolution.) I have certainly sat through many, many meetings and lectures and panel discussions where one could have gotten to Bingo! very quickly with one of these.

See the larger version in the original blog post by Furrygirl.

Still, I have to say I like the idea of creating a drinking game with them even better. I don’t know what one would win as a prize in such a Bingo game, but I’m certain doing shots of something strong would make the experiences of listening to offensive drivel like this much more enjoyable. Perhaps some sort of board game - that included drinking. A roll-and-move style of game, not unlike Monopoly. Some of the squares would say things like, “You Got A Book Contract! Collect Two Hundred Dollars.” Other would say “Your Strip Club Got Raided! Lose A Turn.”

It’s certainly far more entertaining than arguing with anti-sex work people…

2010-03-05T00:09:00.000-08:00

I’m excited about what’s happening in my dungeon today: I’m getting the carpet swapped out! No, that's not some bit of sexual slang, I mean carpet. Kinky, huh?

Okay, maybe it's not sexy to you. But I’m very happy with my place. Buying my own house was an extremely big deal to me, and I’m still pleased and proud of it. I love having a place I own to play in, it makes me feel way more private and secure than I ever did in rented spaces. I have a strong sense of “mine!” about my house. It’s an extension of who I am.

That being the case, I’m constantly seeking to improve it. Last year, I renovated the whole first floor, and part of that was removing a wall between two rooms to make them into one bigger one. The main playspace has thick black carpet, blood-red walls, and a black ceiling. I actually brought the black paint down around the top edge of the wall, to a picture-rail style of molding that’s about six inches from the ceiling, and the result is that the room seems taller than it is. It all looks very sharp, and nicely finished.

Except that one-third of the newly-redone space was still carpeted in the same deep gold carpet as the rest of the house. Can you say clash? It’s been driving me crazy, looking at it. But, as remodeling always does, the whole extravaganza cost me more than I’d projected. So I gritted my teeth and waited until I could afford to pull up the gold carpet and put in the black without feeling guilty about a not-absolutely-necessary expense. Which would be – now!

I have other plans as well, but my other projects are all on the main floor. First is getting my terrible crumbly popcorn ceiling sheet-rocked over. (It’s less mess than scraping it off, I assure you.) Hopefully I can have my unbelievably big, ugly, 70’s faux-river-stone horror of a fireplace mantle taken out at the same time, and the boys can sheetrock that, too. And some new lighting fixtures, some new sliding doors, and a new coat of paint – and I think that’ll probably be most of my remodeling budget for the year!

The stage-by-stage remodeling will probably be going on for a couple more years – I still have two more really dated-looking bathrooms (think: avocado green cabinets and glittery metallic-bronze tub surrounds) and a kitchen that’s pretty beat up. But that’s all right. I’m connected to this space, in a way that I haven’t been to any other. I love my house, and it loves me right back. I’ll give it anything it wants.

2010-03-03T00:52:00.000-08:00

Another podcast, and another riff from Monk about how I’m playing with my nipple. Even though I’m not.

Then, letters: the first is from a listener asking about jealousy and threesome sex/BDSM. Threesomes are fraught with peril, in my opinion. The best threesome experiences I have had were in situations with three previously-uninvolved people.* The emotional stakes are considerably lower when no one has ever slept with anyone else before. An established couple plus one? That’s a very tricky situation. But it's a common fantasy, so Monk and I step through some of the ways it could happen.

Next, a request for guidance from a BDSM person who’s wondering about how to answer her friend’s question: “Am I cut out to be a slave?”

The last letter asks, “Is it fair for a people in a polyamory group to veto the partners of other partners?” Monk and I both have some opinions about the term “veto” and making rules that create the illusion of control over other people. I predict they will not be universally agreed-with, but what would be the point of listening if you already agreed with everything we said?

About twenty minutes.

*I did have a three-way romp not long ago that was quite, quite lovely, and it was with two people who were - let us say they were previously involved, if not precisely a couple. But - they are both exceptional people.

2010-03-01T01:33:00.000-08:00

I love this fun and informative graphic about men's sperm. I have only one thing to add: pineapple. For men and women, pineapple makes all your body fluids - and trust me, I mean all of them* - taste sweeter. I love fruit, and I eat a lot of it, and I think pineapple has a much more noticeable effect than any other fruit. So if you want to taste better, eat pineapple, or at least drink the juice.

(*Okay, I guess I don't know about the taste of one's blood. But sweat, spit, girl secretions, and piss? Absolutely. I also have a theory that drinking lots of diet pop makes one's piss sweeter - all that aspartame, sucralose and acesulfame potassium coursing through one's system. That's based only on remarks made to me about my particular flavor though, so I have no real evidence whatsoever to support this idea. However, if some scientist wants to do a controlled study, I can certainly supply taste-testers.)

View this image full-size, in a new window, here on the OnlineSchools site.

Link via The Sexademic

2010-02-25T23:35:00.000-08:00

I have a new column in The Stranger about a topic I'm frequently asked for help with: handling intense jealousy.

***

And a calendar note: I'm out of town from March 15th to March 22nd. I'm going somewhere warm for a few days, which should be lovely. And then I'm going to Kinkfest!

2010-02-24T23:43:00.000-08:00

It is Thomas Cromwell’s fault I have a bunch of new books.

What? Yes, I know he’s been dead for almost 500 years. Cromwell being the sort of guy he probably was, I’m sure he’d be pleased to know he was still influencing people. Especially a woman like me.

It happened because I wanted to read Wolf Hall, a novel about Thomas Cromwell by Hilary Mantel. So I went to That Big Electronic Bookseller and found it. Easy, right? I should have been gone in sixty seconds. But no. On the same page was this:

The First Tycoon: The Epic Life of Cornelius Vanderbilt by T.J. Stiles.
“A gripping, groundbreaking biography of the combative man whose genius and force of will created modern capitalism. Cornelius “Commodore” Vanderbilt is an American icon. Humbly born on Staten Island during George Washington’s presidency, he rose from boatman to builder of the nation’s largest fleet of steamships to lord of a railroad empire. We see Vanderbilt help to launch the transportation revolution, propel the Gold Rush, reshape Manhattan, and invent the modern corporation—in fact, as T. J. Stiles elegantly argues, Vanderbilt did more than perhaps any other individual to create the economic world we live in today.”

I am a total sucker for biographies. Not quite as bad as I am about “The History Of…” books, but close. So okay, into the cart. But you know how it goes. The crack dealers then showed me this one:

Titan: The Life of John D. Rockefeller, Sr. by Ron Chernow
“Born the son of a flamboyant, bigamous snake-oil salesman and a pious, straitlaced mother, Rockefeller rose from rustic origins to become the world's richest man by creating America's most powerful and feared monopoly, Standard Oil. Rockefeller was likely the most controversial businessman in our nation's history. Critics charged that his empire was built on unscrupulous tactics: grand-scale collusion with the railroads, predatory pricing, industrial espionage, and wholesale bribery of political officials. The titan spent more than thirty years dodging investigations until Teddy Roosevelt and his trustbusters embarked on a marathon crusade to bring Standard Oil to bay.”

Well, hell, if you’re going to read about Vanderbilt, you have to read about Rockefeller, right? Click. Oh, look, on the same page: business books!

Selling in Tough Times: Secrets to Selling When No One Is Buying by Tom Hopkins
Hopkins lobbies for a return to basics to maximize sales in an economic downturn. The first step is to save existing business by going the extra mile, making human contact, and initiating loyalty-building campaigns. Hopkins shows how to quickly tell if a client is right for you, reduce sales resistance, woo clients from the competition, and cut costs while continuing to appear successful.

Yep, that’s my dirty little secret. I don’t read a lot of BDSM porn. I read sales-technique manuals, and they make me kinda… hot. Look, don’t judge me, okay?

But that one led me to: Ignore Everybody by Hugh MacLeod and then Fascinate by Sally Hogshead. I did not ignore. I was fascinated. And it is very dangerous for me to have a Kindle and a credit card.

2010-02-23T00:05:00.000-08:00

Mistress Matisse’s Tips For Happy Polyamory, #17

Thou Shalt Not Oust The Incumbent Partner from his/her living space so you can have a date with the mutual lover. This is a violation of important poly tenets Root For The Home Team and (the self-explanatory) Be Very, Very Nice To The Primary.

I have come to the conclusion that one of the reasons my poly life runs rather smoothly is that we have physical space to spread out in. The Big House is, as you may have inferred, fairly big. And I have my own domain as well. (Don’t think for a minute having space for my poly adventures didn’t figure strongly into my choice of workspaces.)

Because nothing creates disgruntlement like a situation where Partner A wants to come home from a long day at work, flop on the couch, eat pizza, and play video games, and Partner B is running around lighting candles and putting on sexy music because they have a date – with someone else. Partner A may very well be able to go over to a buddy’s house and flop/eat/game over there, but there’s probably going to be some resentment about that.

And resentment is what kills relationships. People think it’s the big things, but it’s not. You can forgive your lover One Big Mistake a lot more easily than you’ll forgive ten thousand niggling little irritations.

For one thing, petty resentment is what erodes the sex in relationships. (Any romantic relationships, not just poly ones.) It’s because it’s the easiest thing to deny a partner without actually having to cop to there being something wrong. Most of the time, people don’t consciously think, “Oh, fine – make me wash your dirty dishes again? Turn the TV up to eardrum-shattering levels even though I asked you not to again? See if you get laid tonight.” But the resentment takes root, and it is subtly poisonous.

Everyone annoys his/her partner sometimes. But if you want to be happily poly, you should strive not to let your other involvements impinge on your sweetie’s preferences and comfort, and that starts with not denying them the simple creature comforts of home.

If you're the non-domestic partner, make sure this isn't happening. You do not want the resident partner to be feeling resentful about something as easily fixed as physical space/privacy and start associating that feeling with polyamory in general and you in particular.

Therefore, if you want to have a hot date with someone who lives with a partner, have the date elsewhere.

2010-02-22T00:36:00.000-08:00

It's time for a new podcast!

Show notes: First of all, I was not playing with my nipple while we were recording, all right? Let the record show. The bomb shelter we’re doing these things in is freezing cold, so I was actually wearing a leather jacket. A motorcycle-style jacket, so that’s two layers of leather over my chest. You could not have found my nipple with a sonogram. That’s just Monk being silly.

Our first question is a letter from someone who asks what to do when you’re caught in a sexy, kinky situation and you want to do bondage, but you have no rope? Monk and I free associate about improvised bondage equipment. (We did not use the microphone cables for bondage, though. The sound guys frown on that.)

Then a BDSM newcomer asks: explain to me why exactly I should get involved with the BDSM community? The short answer is: they’ll teach you things you might not otherwise know, and they’ll be support for you when things are tough.

Lastly, a sex worker asks a question about emotional relationships with clients. It’s a nuanced issue, and I get sort of uncharacteristically woo-woo about my feeeeeeeeelings in this one, so don't say you weren't warned.

Enjoy!