Who Does the Cooking?

A common assumption in D/s and M/s groups on Fetlife is that the sub/slave does all the cooking and cleaning.

Me and the boy don't do that. The boy certainly does do all the cleaning (as much as I'd like to say he does "most" of the cleaning, the truth is that he does it all, and he does it all with excellence - the hyperbole and a half comic "clean ALL THE THINGS" applies to him frequently) but cooking is MY ARENA.

I really enjoy cooking. It's meditation for me, and it feeds both people's tummies and my own desire to nurture the living hell out of everyone. Plus, I am good at it.

I don't find cooking to be an innately submissive act, as it is sometimes discussed as. In my case, how could it be? I am literally controlling the food that nurtures my subs. I generally have the control over the shopping list as well, the authority is mine.

You know that old trope of a mother in the kitchen, waving the wooden spoon because her kids are getting under foot, so she chases them out? That's me.

The phrase "get out of my kitchen" is occasionally barked. If I am asked "how can I help?" I tell them "sit there and look pretty".

The kitchen is MY place.

... At least until washing up time, then it's my sub's place.

(I'm quite turned on by the idea of a sub chained in the kitchen to do the cleaning... but the practicality always bugs me; what if I want to cook while they're in there? They'll be in the way!)

Thinky Thoughts About Community & Caring & Stuff

This entry is not really about D/s and Leather and BDSM. But this *IS* about community.

A couple of dear friends and I have been busy discussing things recently. Without going into too much detail (as it is still a work in progress), we are formulating a plan to help ease homelessness in a particular marginalized group. The ease will only be slight, as it is a group of us who are also members of this particular marginalized group that are organizing it. The plan so far seems to mostly involve setting up a formal network of sharehousing and private crisis accommodation (that is, just people who have a spare room who are willing to care for those who have nowhere to stay for a short time).

I give this information not because I'm trying to give away our secrets, but because this is the foundation for what I'm going to talk about in this entry.

So. The boy and I are looking for a house to move in together and settle down and all that jazz. One of the things we are looking for in houses we inspect is a spare room that we can put an extra bed and a chest of drawers in, and thus have crisis accommodation for homeless folk in our network. This is extremely important to us; perhaps even more so for me, as I have been homeless myself in the past.

We already have a waiting list of people who are either homeless and have nowhere to go, and just people who are looking to move out of their current place but don't have many options.

In discussing much of the details, I began thinking today about where we would put one person in particular.

This person has a checkered past to say the least, and there are a lot of people who do not trust this person. Some attempts have been made to socially ostracize this person, and I can understand those attempts, though I do not share in them myself (I am in fact friends with this person, but I will come to that in a moment).

One of the sharehouses is not suitable for this person as there is a present social connection involving bad blood, and that is fine. These things happen, and I don't expect anyone to go above and beyond the call of duty in this matter. This network only works if everyone is comfortable and safe and enthusiastic about it.

The other (possible) sharehouse may also not work, as it is a no-pets house and the person in question has a pet.

So that leaves my crisis room, when I finally have one. And that's great, that is why I am planning to have one. From there we can help set up new sharehouses, etc. And I absolutely will welcome this person into my home, because they need it, and because they are my friend.

I know of their past, however, I believe in second chances and redemption, and I have watched this person try their best to improve. I consider them a friend, and I do care for them and have faith in them, despite their past actions. I think social isolation through ostracism is actually quite dangerous, and often only makes things worse. After all, why would someone improve if they are already outcast? Why would they seek to better themselves when no one will allow them to try, or believe in them? Why would they rehabilitate when rehabilitation is not encouraged, welcomed, or even allowed?

So while I do not expect anyone who was wronged to give anything of themselves, I am in a position that I can both care for this person, care for my community, and get a good friend out of it at the same time. It appears to be a win-win situation.

But unfortunately things are complicated.

Today I realized that should this person live with me, things get complicated. Some of my friends may not come visit me if they are living there. Some people may judge me, look me up and down with wide eyes and go "But don't you know what they did?".

I understand these things. I do not begrudge anyone these emotions or actions.

However, I will not change my mind on this course of action.

Caring for our community means caring for all of it. Looking after each other, in a marginalized group, means looking after all of us. Believing that no one deserves to be homeless, means believing that no one deserves to be homeless.

Talking the talk means walking the walk. I care for my fellow people, and I especially care for those who are my brothers and sisters, those who are in the gutter with me and my kind. And if we, as a marginalized group, turn on one of our own, knowing what the rest of the world does to people like us - what does that make us? Where does that leave the person we have thrown out?

While my opinion of this person would be VASTLY different if I did not believe they felt genuine remorse about their past behaviour, I would still try and help them find somewhere to live, even if it was not with me.

Because we are all human. Because we are all community. Because we must love and look after each other if we are to survive.

What Daddies Do Best

Princess came over last night, she's had quite a stressful time recently and not much time to herself. So the first thing I did was put her in a room on her own for a while, to let her breathe and relax a bit. Then I cooked her dinner and gave her lots of cuddles.

She went to sleep in my arms (quite literally, she squirmed and pulled my arms around her until she was pretty much trapped) and every now and then while she was asleep she'd startle a bit and reach up and grab my arms, like she was making sure I was still there. It was pretty cute.

I haven't been sleeping well, so I woke up fairly early for me, and she sort of dozily awoke as well. I made her breakfast and tea and made sure she left early enough to go pick up her passport, which she had to get done today.

About a week ago, my boy (and my best friend) had quite a bad day at work. So when they came home, I suggested we go get something to eat (everyone agreed on KFC) and then I suggested we go to the arcade. Boy went quite happily into boyspace and bounced around the arcade, playing a few different games. I gave him a limit on how much money he could spend, and I looked after coins and supervised while he played, and played games with him when he wanted to play something two player.

We came home and I cuddled the boy a lot, and he went to sleep feeling much better than he had earlier that day. Boy has commented many times that he feels safest and most relaxed in my arms.

Daddies, we do a lot of things. We beat our boys and girls and torment them, tease them, give them orgasms, buy them things, give them orders. But the most important thing we do, I think, is give boys and girls somewhere safe and warm, where they can be themselves and feel good. That's the real gift of a Daddy.

Absent

Been a bit absent, haven't I?

I've been busy, and unfortunately that business interferes with D/s life a lot. Oh, the boy and I have been rumbling along, but I don't have much to report. And I haven't seen the princess in a little while (dear me) but I will be seeing her on Thursday.

I have also been working on my web site a lot, which I will let you know about as soon as it launches :)

A dear friend has asked me to assist him in a complex and beautiful hook pull/rope suspension combination later this year, which I'm very much looking forward to. It will be amazing.

That's all for now... I will do my best to post more in the coming days/weeks. It's just a crazy time at the moment. :)

Family in the Scene

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Being Daddy

Today I was thinking about what it means to be a Daddy... or more specifically, what it means to be so much a Daddy that even people who have no D/s nor parental connection to you sometimes address you as Daddy.

Let's delve into history a bit.

First, not so long ago, I struggled with being identified as a Daddy. I had the "Daddy = incest/child abuse" connection in my head, and even if I battled that down logically, I was still left with a hefty squick factor. I don't know exactly what helped me overcome that (probably desperation, to be honest--trying to find what this relationship with the boy meant to me and how it was supposed to work, trying to find what, exactly, worked for us, etc) but I think a large part of it was also that I began to see that "Daddy" is not always about the paternal parent. Sometimes "Daddy" is someone with authority. Sometimes "the old man" is a mentor, not your actual father. And "father", anyway, is something that we call priests, people who we (generally) assume to be of good and trustworthy character.

And so I began to learn that "Daddy" could mean love and nurture and authority, not a narrow definition in regards to reproduction.

Now let's go a lot further back in history. Let's go back to my childhood and have a look at my mother.

My mother is probably one of the best people in the world. She was (and still is) very kind and very compassionate. She cared for the people and the community around her with great zeal. We had numerous people crashing on our lounge room floor if they had nowhere to go. We had people come round for dinner because they were desperate, hungry, or even just lonely. My mother looked after and cared for everyone, with unconditional love and devotion.

Unsurprisingly, all the people who were connected to my family also began to call her "mum", just like I did, just like my sister did.

Looking back, I'm a little surprised I didn't get jealous. I didn't think "they can't call her that, she's MY mum!". I nodded and understood, because my Mum was everyone's mum, that was just who she was. And as a child, I also knew this: it didn't matter if we all called her mum, because when *I* called her Mum, it had a special meaning that didn't apply to anyone else.

These two things are connected.

For a long time I've been overly concerned with what it means when someone calls me Daddy. While I don't think I was wrong to be, I think that I need to remember the thing I knew as a child: Even if lots of people call me Daddy, my boy and my girl are both saying something different when they say it. They're special.

I think a part of this is lingering worry over the term and its connections. I'm still learning what it means to be Daddy, or rather, I've been under the assumption that I was still learning what it means to be Daddy. Really I've always known, and if people choose to seek that in me then I have no reason to deny them that.

So this is a second coming out, I suppose. I'm a Daddy, that's who I am. It is no longer reserved for only the special ones, but the special ones are still special. I will no longer wince when those who are not mine call me Daddy, because they are simply responding to something that I cannot (and choose not to) change.

(I'm a Sir too, but that's a subject for another post.)

Love, Pressure

Sometimes being a Daddy is a lot like being a father, I suppose.

Last night the boy was feeling upset and anxious, about what we're still not really sure (from what I could coax out of him, it had to do with dwelling on the past somewhat). So I let him have a night off from his curfew. I made him a cup of sleepy tea, gave him some blankets and let him curl up on the couch with me while we watched a Shrek movie. Eventually he felt a little better, so I tucked him back into bed.

Things like that, I don't really feel like they're D/s things at the time, they're just relationship things... and I think that's true, but I think that being in a D/s relationship means that they are D/s things as well. I cuddle and look after my boy because he's my boy, I'm his Daddy, and that's my responsibility.

In the last couple of weeks the boy has been making noises about starting to date again, something that I've been encouraging. He's been feeling more and more toppy recently, and thus needs a sub to play with. One of the things stopping him however is that he isn't really sure what he's looking for - whether he's looking for a relationship or just someone to play with, that sort of thing.

I've been doing what this Daddy does best and asking lots of hard questions to get him to think. Sometimes he gets grumpy and hides under a blanket, insisting that he's hiding from the hardness of all the questions, but of course I chase him when he does this. It's not a case of sticking my nose where it doesn't belong, it's about knowing how my boy ticks - and he doesn't think about things in advance, he's very much a go with the flow sort of person. And that's great, as long as you don't have any desires or plans that require thinking ahead.

Anyway, I am definitely encouraging his interest in dating and topping. For a few selfish reasons (I find the idea hot, of course there is something potent about being the top of another top), but also because the boy is innately a switch, and thus I want all sides of him to be well developed and cared for.

Macushla Farm

For two nights' worth of holiday, this week the boy and I headed out to Macushla Farm, which aside from being a lovely BnB in general is also a Fetish BnB.

It was glorious.

I'm not even sure where to start in talking about it. The cabin was amazing (ugh, I love spas more than life), the little touches were charming (the soap smelled wonderful and felt fantastic), the setting was fabulous (alpacas and kangaroos roaming around gum trees), and the delicious play room/dungeon was one of, if not THE, finest I've ever had the pleasure to patronize.

What to talk about what to talk about.

It was lovely to have just space to be with the boy, to enjoy him and being with him. It was lovely to play with him, though we didn't scene particularly hard or for very long, we did little snippets of play all through the day and night. We spent as much time in the dungeon with each other as we did in the cabin.

The dungeon was so perfect, it gave me dreams of what to do with my own. There was so much furniture, so many options, it was a dream. For the first couple of hours I couldn't focus properly, I was like a child in a toy store, just running about and poking everything, getting a feel for it, playing with it. The ambience was perfect and easily customised, with media centre for music and porn/other dvds, and many lighting options.

Ambience is an interesting thing - I usually play in such ambience at clubs etc, as even though I have BDSM furniture at home I haven't had the ambience so much, so I tend to rely on public events for ambience. With a private place like that, I discovered something interesting: I prefer to scene while barefoot.

This is unusual of course because D-types are usually required-by-expectation to be wearing either boots or at least dress shoes while they do their toppy business. But I kicked off my shoes and immediately found myself more at home.

I've mentioned before that so much of who I am as a top is influenced by my history in martial arts, and thus this is probably not much of a surprise. I love my feet, they let me feel where I am, how my body is, and let me channel my movements. All strikes in martial arts eventually come down to your feet - that's why your stance is so important.

Being barefoot made me feel more stable, like I was connected to the ground. It let me control my body better. It let me feel more 'in the moment'. It made me feel more connected to reality. I found my feet slipping back into stances that I haven't used in years, like I'd never stopped.

So that was eye-opening, and once again made me remember that not only is there no One True Way for this kind of thing, but that I'm a little bit of a freak as well - and I kind of like that!

Another thing that came up for me while I was there was this recurring fantasy I have of a kinky "family vacation". Not necessarily to do with Leather family (although I suppose that can't be helped in this situation), but more to do with the idea of the classic "family" idea, and the "family holiday" trope... and then twisting it up a bit.

I love the idea of having a couple of days away to get my kink on, with my 'family'... Daddy with his kids (boys? girls? any number thereof), the slave(s), and of course the family dog...

I don't have slaves or a human dog right now but that doesn't mean the fantasy isn't there!

I don't know why the idea appeals to me so much, but it does. Perverting the normality of your average person's everyday life. Enjoying and relaxing and taking time out with people I care about without needing to restrict my activities to vanilla-friendly ones.

The idea has reseeded in my mind so much I'm wondering if I could get away with organizing something like it for my birthday, which is coming up in a couple of months... I'm sure I could put a personal ad out there seeking a 'family dog' for a couple of days...

All in all I must say Macushla Farm is an absolute MUST for all kinksters who live in or are even passing through Victoria. The only downside about the place is that you need a car to get there!

Thoughts on Orders vs. Inspiration

I am very much into obedient submissives. If I have to fight you to get you to submit, I'm not going to bother. I am not here to fight your inner battles for you.

Lots of dominants are like this, it's not surprising. But I recently realized that I'm not even that big of a fan of giving orders.

Stay with me here. I know you're wondering how there can be obedience without giving orders - after all, obedience implies there's something there to obey. And it's not that I don't have preferences, or that I don't have expectations. It's just the orders themselves that often fall by the wayside.

I *could* beat myself up about this and think of myself as a bad dominant, but I don't think that's what it is. I think it's that I'd rather inspire a submissive to want to do things, instead of just tell them to do them.

I would rather discuss with my boy why it would be a good thing for him to go to the gym twice a week, than simply tell him to do so. I would rather tell him that I enjoy his service, and then reward him when he does it, than to simply boss him around.

Sure, if I want something specific, I will give an order; but it's usually very small things that I do this for. "Fetch my shoes", "refill my glass", things like that. Anything bigger and I would rather open a dialogue about it and find whatever seed it is in a submissive that wants to do whatever I'm after, and draw it out.

Admittedly this entire concept mostly applies to boys and girls and submissives - I do not know if I would take this same approach with a slave, not having yet owned one. I suspect with a slave I would be more likely to give direct orders.

I have owned a girl before, but she was definitely a submissive and not a slave; it might be confusing as to how one can 'own' someone who is not a slave, but it worked for us... I suppose when I think about it I have a similar relationship with my boy, though the words "ownership" or "owned" have never been thrown around, "belongs" and "belonging" and "mine" have been.

The line between "24/7 D/s" and "slavery" is often a little blurry, I suppose.

At any rate, back on subject, most of this does come back to my dislike of "force". I am a very strong believer in autonomy and consent, and while I am perfectly aware that "forced" rarely actually means overriding someone's autonomy, it still makes me a little edgy. I think maybe this is why it might be different with a slave who has agreed to a consensual-non-consent arrangement; the consent has been given in advance, for an explicit period of time. This is differing from my other D/s relationships I have had, where even though I might be the boss, the autonomy and consent of my submissive is not a blanket statement at any point.

I do want to add a slave to my life sometime in the near future; I know it will be difficult to find the slave that is the right fit with me and my family, but I'm sure they're out there somewhere.

Community vs. Shyness

I'm a very shy person.

Quite a few people have laughed at me when I've admitted this in the past, but that's because I'm a complete nerd for social and communication skills, and thus have learned to fake it pretty well so far.

But the truth is, I'm a very shy person. I'm somewhat insecure. A lot of things affect this, mostly from my childhood (ahh, freudian), but that's irrelevant. The point is that I'm shy.

One of the Things(tm) about Leather is that it's very much about community. About being involved, about taking part, about serving and contributing to the community. That is, in fact, something I quite like about Leather, being that I am a bit of a bleeding heart case myself (which is probably why I attract girls and boys more than subs or slaves or other s-types).

But it's hard to get involved when you are shy.

It's not that I don't want to be - it's simply that I am shy. I'm a little afraid. It's also a lot of energy for me to be social, as much as I love it, it can be very draining.

None of this stops me of course - I'm very stubborn and when I decide I'm in something, I'm in, but doing something bravely anyway doesn't stop it from being hard.

I often come off as rather aloof in Leather social situations, because of my shyness. This is not intentional, it's just me struggling with my shyness. Sometimes the way I can deal with it all is to just be there in body, and keep mostly quiet. Other times I may do the opposite - for example, I write this blog, and I made it public. This is a way for me to be present vocally if not physically.

Shyness may not be very becoming in a Leather Sir, but each one of us is also a person, with our own personal struggles. One of mine is shyness.

One of the main things I struggle with is how to be involved with my community when I am shy (and also as a disabled man who cannot always get out to things, and as a trans man who is not always welcome at things). It means I don't make it to a lot of Leather events, and the ones I do make it to, I'm often very quiet, preferring to listen rather than speak (which is actually generally fine by me as I'm like that in most things, shyness or not).

Contribution is a tricky thing. I try and make it work. At present my main attempt at contribution to the Leather community is to try to be the best man I can be, to be kind and courteous, and to set a good example. To care for my fellow Leatherfolk.

And as with all things, of course, one must look to caring for oneself before that care can be turned outwards. This is also something that I've had to consider for the last couple of months, as life as been pretty crazy.

Shyness vs. Community will be an ongoing struggle for me, I suspect, but we don't grow as people without a little challenge!