Open Mouth, Change Feet (to be continued)

30 minutes ago, I was in my nightshirt. In bed. With the heater on. And listening to Ian Anderson’s “Orchestral Jethro Tull.”

Now? 

Oh, now I am huddlied in a corner of an Irish style pub with a cup of Earl Grey and this laptop.

Err, why?

Was it about a boy?

Nope. No boys in whom I am interested will be in attendance that I am aware of – but you never know.

Was it to hear the live Irish jam tonight?

Nope.  Listening to the recording of Ian Anderson was suiting me quite nicely, thank you.

Well, then why?  Why did you get out of bed, get dressed again and drive half an hour to the pub?

Oh, that. Well, to write.

“OHHHhhhhh, of course!” some of you are saying.  “WHAT?!” others are wondering.

Well, it’s like this. I ran through how comfortable I was and all, and then wondered whether I had anything I wanted or needed to write about tonight, and I do. It’s a blog, a first draft, but here it goes.

I don’t know what combination of effects has me this way. I don’t know if I care, but it sometimes very much gets in my way that I am this way.

What way?

Well, I have a tendency to say what’s on my mind, sometimes everything that’s on my mind, to anyone who will listen, often to email lists. Sometimes I get my hand slapped for it. Sometimes more.

So, after a round of saying a bit too much for some people’s taste on a local events list -oh, what did I say?  

Well, that I was going to one of the Ds parties and was hoping to take someone with me. That alone was probably enough to trigger a few people.  But since I didn’t want to be misunderstood, and because I was fairly sure that almost none of the 800 people on this list really knew what a Ds party was like and had never been in a dungeon, I naturally gave more details. Some were personal, about me, so that whoever might want to go would know a little about me. Some were more about the club itself – what does and does not go on there.

To her credit, the list owner, simply wrote me privately asking why I gave so much detail. I think in the end she understood.

I followed that, as long as I was educating folks, with a note that we do have a fairly active local polyamory group and they give parties and workshops at times, too. I was also clear that I am not basically polyamorous.

Oddly, that’s where someone got triggered enough to reply to the list that she felt that was “disgusting” and it brought up some painful personal memories. Fortunately, in a way, a couple of people replied that that was her business and they couldn’t see censoring me on that basis.

Hmm, come to think of it, maybe I should find a sex list to chat on. Maybe. *sigh*

The point is that I get the idea that people don’t seem to want to hear what I have to say . . .  or something. I can’t really tell. Really. I mean, I know that my interests and what I’m willing to share goes far  beyond what most people will share in public (and some don’t even discuss sex and kink in private, with their own intimate partners, more is the pity.)

What I DON”T know is what to do about it.

Not talking about it, not writing about it does not seem to be an option. I am overflowing with it.

This blog is an outlet, yes, some, but I am not one who writes well into thin air. I’ve mentioned this before. When applying to grad schools, I called the department, discussed it with someone there and then mentally called them up as my audience when I wrote my essays for my application.

Do I have to be the center of attention? 

No, not always, but I do like it.

Am I trying to shock people? 

Not really. I’ve been accused of it. Sometimes I know it seems that way.

Do I think everyone needs to hear everything I have to say?  Or everything I think?

I’m sure sometimes I think that people “need” to hear what I have to say. So far, that’s the only one that has all that much charge for me. Although I am wiling to question all of them. It’s worth seeing what’s there.

This isn’t something anyone else can do for me – not that anything is. But other people’s ideas and stories about who I am, why I write, why I speak up, are unlikely to be my own.

*** this is the version I wrote in the pub.

At this point, I realized that my Next Step would be to do the work on the ideas above and whatever I might find beneath them, and that would take at least an hour, maybe three, and there was a fine Irish jam going on in the next room with some great eye candy moving their fingers at lightening speeds across their instruments and making pretty noises.

Time to pack up and play.

I actually got to sing a few notes and the bouzouki * player made a point to play a couple of things to which he knew I knew the chorus.

I was back in my warm bed by 11:30 pm. Zzzzzz

* http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bouzouki

Sexual Desires

Sometimes people wonder where I am as far as what I look for in a relationship, or, more specifically, in a sex partner. I wrote the list below recently and decided it might be educational to post it. Besides, I am available and single again.

I want a relationship with more peace than stress, one in which both partners take full and complete responsibility for ourselves without blame, and if we find ourselves blaming, we inquire and find the truth. I want the spontaneous right action that arises when truth is engaged beyond our illusions of me/you, self/other, right/wrong.

Oh, is that all?

Anyway, here is a list I came up with when someone asked what I look for in sexual relationship:

1.  Connection – that blissful, rolling, energy-exchange that happens when two people are blissed out together and the energy moves between them. Both of us connect in that space. 
 
2.  Trust – I want my partner to so thoroughly know and trust me that we can fully relax.
 
3.  Relaxation – relaxing into the moments together. (i.e. no stress, no games, no putting on an act)  Just being there and being open.
 
4.  Love – it either can’t be defined or has too many definitions to be meaningful. These 3 less-abused words above combined would be something like it. But i still can’t describe it. 
 
5.  Commitment – a stable, monogamous (unless otherwise discussed) commitment to be wtih each other and not fly away at every little upset, but to stay and use The Work, IAM, or whatever works to investigate our *own* thoughts without blaming the other. I am pretty sure that each person taking full responsibility for themselves is the key, the core, the essence, the essential piece of the relationships I have watched that seem to work really well.
 
I know – where’s the sex? you may be wondering. Without the above, sex is just rubbing the slippery bits together.
 
6. Submission – I would love to some day be able to trust my partner’s lead, not just in bed, but in other things. To have our values and goals and lifestyles aligned so that we could easily speak for one another – but don’t because “whose business are we in if we do that?”  From this trust, flows trust in the bedroom, letting my body bend to your will whether you are spanking my ass or f*king my pussy or talking to me (dirty, sweet, whatever).
 
Yep, still not much on specific sex acts. Those aren’t the most important at all – in sex or in life.  Peace first, then let the details arise. Still, I suppose I should give you a list of that sort of thing, too. Just for fun. 
 
7.  Orgasms – yeah, that’s not exactly a sex act, either, and honestly, I don’t care how I get there. 
     Never stop at 1.  Always a minimum of 2 even for quickies.  Sometimes as many as 20.
 
There’s an exception to that, though – at times when I am totally blissed out – it’s *all* orgasm and counting is pretty meaningless, though there *are* physical peaks that go with the full-body high.
 
My name is Ann and I play for orgasms.
 
8.  Domination – a general description of many acts – getting closer.  If you have read this far, and have some perspective, I suppose I can list a few details:
 
I like to be manhandled, spanked, called names, talked to, told what to do, bent over, bent back, turned over, hair grabbed, mouth forced down on your cock or kissed.  I like being f*ed in the ass. I like being f*ed in the pussy and in the mouth.  I like being f*ed between my breasts and anywhere else you want to f*k me. Come?  Anywhere. Come on my tits, my face, in my ass, in my pussy. Just come!
 
 
Sure, I like deep and sweet, too. That is a lot harder for me to describe because it varies so much from person to person.

 9. After Care – and then I like to cuddle, be held, maybe start all over again.

Post comments if you like, and please keep it courteous!

Love, Ann

“What this world needs more of is loving:  sweaty, friendly and unashamed.”

                                     – Robert A. Heinlein
                                       To Sail Beyond The Sunset

“Those whose power is genuinely absolute are incorruptible.”

            – Spider Robinson
              In both “DeathKiller” and “Time Pressure”

5 Minutes to Deep Peace on Thursday 9/13

You will be entertained at the very least and enlightenment is an option.

http://advancedmeditation.com/cmd.php?Clk=2095310

Thursday, 9/13, there is a teleconference call where you can learn more about this. There will be sample meditations and a chance at a free gift worth $400.

http://advancedmeditation.com/cmd.php?Clk=2095310 

Trust me. You want to try this. The IAM Meditations are the product of the fertile mind of Steven Sashen who is also responsible for much of the Shampoo Method we talk about here every day.

It’s completely safe. I’d trust this guy with my life.

This feeling, this is what we have all been looking for our whole lives. It’s like coming home.

Love, Ann  

May is National Masturbation Month

For today’s blog, we’re going to take a Field Trip.

Literally.

Eric Francis has posted pictures of . . . well, fields . . . and he wrote the most yummy thing on masturbation.

http://planetwavesweekly.com/resources/pw_monthly_may2007.html

Masturbation Month was apparently declared by Good Vibrations. I do recommend them as the number one place to buy sex toys.

 http://www.goodvibes.com/index.aspx

Be sure to follow the link to Eric’s article on self love near the end.

http://www.sexuality.org/authors/francis/howtobe.html

I’m pretty sure I wrote about this last year, too. You can check the May Archive over there on the right.

Happy Masturbation Month!

Love, Ann

Cowgirl Interlude – The Bad Touch (The Discovery Channel song)

The Bad Touch

 – The Bloodhound Gang

Ha ha
Well now we call this the act of mating but…
There are several other very important differences
Between human beings and anmials you should know about

I’d appreciate your input

Sweat baby sweat baby sex
is a Texas drought
Me and you do the kind of stuff
that only Prince would sing about
So put your hands down my pants
and I’ll bet you’ll feel nuts
Yes I’m Siskel yes I’m Ebert
and you’re getting two thumbs up
You’ve had enough of two-hand
touch you want it rough you’re out of bounds
I want you smothered want you
covered like my Waffle House hashbrowns
Cum quicker than FedEx never reach an
apex like Coca-Cola stock you are inclined
To make me rise an hour early
just like Daylight Savings Time

(do it now)

“You and me baby ain’t nothin’ but mammals so lets do it like they do it on the
Discovery Channel”

(do it again now)

“You and me baby ain’t nothin’ but mammals so lets do it like they do it on the Discovery Channel” (Get horny now)
Love the kind you clean
up with a mop and bucket
Like the lost catacombs of
Egypt only God knows where we stuck it
Hieroglyphics? Let me be Pacific
I wanna be down in your South Seas
But I got this notion that the motion
of your ocean means “Small Craft Advisory”
So if I capsize on your thighs high
tide B-5 you sunk my battleship
Please turn me on I’m Mister
Coffee with an automatic drip
So show me yours I’ll show you
mine “Tool Time” you’ll Lovett just like Lyle
And then we’ll do it doggy style
so we can both watch “X-Files”

(do it now)

“You and me baby ain’t nothin’ but mammals so lets do it like they do it on the
Discovery Channel”

(do it again now)

“You and me baby ain’t nothin’ but mammals so lets do it like they do it on the Discovery Channel” (Get horny now)
———

“You and me baby ain’t nothin’ but mammals so lets do it like they do it on the
Discovery Channel”

(do it again now)

“You and me baby ain’t nothin’ but mammals so lets do it like they do it on the Discovery Channel”

(do it now)

“You and me baby ain’t nothin’ but mammals so lets do it like they do it on the
Discovery Channel”

(do it again now)

“You and me baby ain’t nothin’ but mammals so lets do it like they do it on the Discovery Channel”(Get horny now)
 
Love, Ann

Easy Like Sunday Morning? Just a Morning in May?

I re-read yesterday’s blog just now and had the thought that often what I write and what I do are two different things. It seems to take a certain amount of attention for others to notice that.

A man I used to date once asked me a couple of insightful questions.

The first was, “Have you ever thought about being a ‘kept woman?'”

We were driving in the mountains, and while I thought about how to reply to that one, he answered his own question saying, “That wouldn’t change a thing you’re doing, would it?”

I said, “No, but it might make some things a little easier.”

Another time, he asked, “You’re not as easy as you look, are you?”

I was delighted and said, “Thank you for noticing!”

I know that I will speak freely about things many people can barely bring themselves to even think about and that I’ve done many things that seem courageous and daring to others (like move to Colorado without knowing anyone here, and going to a BDSM club, and answering Craig’s List ads, and then actually meeting men who reply), but the truth is that I’m not as easy as all that makes me sound.

Free? Well, yeah.

But easy? Nope.

I’m actually pretty picky once I get past that intial move or meeting or whatever. And that’s a Good Thing ™. I have enough relationship experience to have a serious handle on what doesn’t work and what does work and what might work.

I’m thinking of writing a couple of ebooks. One would be on how to write a good personals ad. The other would be on how to meet strangers from the internet with a few safety nets in place.

I need someone to help me format them and market them.

I saw a blog today . . . hmm. . . something about lifestyle DD (Domestic Discipline) where the person had put a lot of links to spanking sites and was also marketing his own book about DD.

Here it is. The blog writing is repetitive and not that informative, in my opinion, but the way his web site works looks good to me.

http://lovingdd.blogspot.com

I want something like that. Where I can blog here like I do, and anyone who is interested can buy ebooks and go to links (that pay me when others click on them). That has enough integrity for me and would be kinda fun.

Today, my usual brunch group isn’t meeting. Some of them are at a dance group, some are out of town. And wouldn’t you know it? I’m totally in the mood to get out for brunch. I’m going to call a few friends, see who’s vertical at this hour and go have some brunch somewhere.

Love, Ann

Shampoo Series – For Things to Be Perfect, Something Has to Go Wrong

I stopped for coffee this morning after a night of Cricket – not the sport, though he is definitely a sport!

Everyone needs someone they can call and say, “Hey Baby, wanna play?” and have them 9 times out of 10 say “yes,” and welcome you in. He is the epitome of the Heinlein quote, “What the world needs is more loving: sweaty, friendly, unashamed.” In fact, Cricket has read most of Heinlein. He plays very well with others and shares his toys. His toys share him, too. (Thank you!) Usually, I drop my clothes at the door and we head for the shower before we get dirty. 

Okay, so, anyways, I was telling a fellow at the coffee shop this morning, who said I looked familiar (yes, this happens a lot), and struck up a long conversation with me, that perfect isn’t quite what we think it is.

I use the yin yang symbol to demonstrate. You know the one. It’s actually 3 dimensional. Kind of 2 teardrop shapes intertwined. The tail of each teardrop penetrates the head of the other.

His reply was excellent and quotable. I can’t find it in a Google search or on Wikipedia yet, but he says that Navajo weavers leave one end of the rug open because for things to be perfect, one thing has to go wrong. I got chills when he said that.

After I wrote this, Joy sent me a couple of links to some possible back up for this idea.

From the foreward of a book on Navajo rugs:

http://www.nmai.si.edu/subpage.cfm?subpage=shop&second=books&third=Woven

“… Harry Walters uses it: “To make something that is perfect means there is no more room for improvement. . . . If a weaver weaves a perfect rug, . . . she makes a little mistake on purpose—an imperfection. Often we see a little line, which the Navajo call a spirit line, that extends to the edge of a rug through the border. This line is added by the weaver so the rug will not be perfect.” This wonderful attitude toward human acts of creation, so antithetical to typical Western notions, is not only characteristic of, but crucial to, the way Native people think about what we call “art.” As beautiful and masterful as are the Navajo textiles you will see and read about in Woven by the Grandmothers, it is not so much the works themselves that are significant, but rather the process that led to their creation. In the Native universe, the object has always been a secondary consideration to the primacy of the ritual process itself.”

It makes total sense.

Here is another reference in a knitting article on the Grace Cathedral web site. Grace Cathedral is home to Reverend Lauren Artress, who has revitalized the practice of walking labyrinths, one of my favorite spiritual practices. But this is about knitting and makes mention of the Navajo spirit line and Persian carpets:

Back to the perfection idea of approaching a craft…You spent some time on a Navajo reservation and one of the things you observed with the Navajo women weaving is that they would intentionally weave an imperfection into the cloth called the “spirit path.”

Yes. [Navajo women] weave a line that doesn’t belong in the design. It’s called a “spirit path” because on that line, the spirit of the weaver can travel out the blanket so that [she] can go on to weave more. It’s a very common thing. In Pueblo pottery, [the artisans] won’t make a line that completely encircles the pot because it’s thought that anything too perfect will trap the spirit. The pots are made, especially the ceremonial pots, to hold spirit. It’s the empty part of them. It’s the most useful part. And so it’s thought that if you trap the spirit inside with a completely encircled line, the spirit will break the pot trying to get out.

Is the intentional imperfection also an attempt to not rival the gods with the creation of a perfect object?

I’ve heard that more in terms of the Persian carpets. The rug makers would weave an imperfection into the carpet because only Allah is perfect.”
 

I think that yes, Allah or God, is perfect.

What we sometimes have trouble reconciling is the fact that All That Is is God and that means everything is perfect, including the things we judge to be imperfect!

I have definitely had some things seem to go “wrong” and then turn out perfect.

Somehow, this wisdom from the rug felt like exactly what I needed to hear.

I don’t know why, specifically, but I have a sense of it. Like, I have some days where it feels like nothing is going quite right, and then others where I can’t believe what a lucky girl I am! That’s today. I admit I’m having trouble sitting down, and I’m a bit sore in all the right places, but God, I’m a lucky girl!

I also have plans for a phenomenal weekend, and hope to meet two or three new people for various parties and chanting and Beltane activities, not to mention my regular Church of Brunch.

So, what’s the one thing that went wrong so that things could be perfect?

Well, I’m not sure yet, but it appears I may have lost a friend I never had.

Sometimes my rhythms and another’s just don’t match up. We seem to want the same things, conversation is stimulating, then we try to get together, hang out, do things, and at some point, it gets skrunchy and nothing quite works. Gears grind and tailpipes backfire.

Maybe the vehicle of our friendship just needs a tune-up. I don’t know. But something is going on and the flow isn’t quite flowing. We’ve hit some rocks and rapids and it’s taking some skill to navigate the rapids.

So, I essentially blew up, let off steam in an email and called Cricket because he was just what I needed. God bless him. It was an amazing night. I hadn’t seen him in weeks and weeks, and on top of that I’ve been celibate for 2 months, and you know how good that can be for guaranteeing someone is happy to see you when you return.

I’d give my life, literally everything I am and everything I have, for an ongoing intimate loving relationship with a man who wants me, wants to share my heart and my soul, who can be all that I’ve been blogging about lately, whom I can serve and nurture and adore for possibly the rest of my life.

In the meantime, thank God for friends!

Love, Ann

“This is how God is showing up.”

                          – Steven Sashen

Beltane Celebration

“I wanted refuge, not chaos.

I wanted peace, not passion.

I was trapped in my little room of sanctity, in my meditative stillness and solitude.

This wasn’t true freedom. Nor was it love.

As Mykonos pointed out, I wasn’t penetrating the world

with my love and opening “her” into bliss.

Rather, I was pulling back. I was obsessed with myself.”

– David Deida, Wild Nights

 

Beltane, depending on whom you ask, is yesterday, today or even Saturday.

What is Beltane?

It is the holy day (holiday) of fertility . . . Holy Daze of Fertility, Batman!

Plain and simple.

Agriculural communities celebrated Spring and fertility, supposedly having mass orgies & dancing around Beltane fires in order to insure good crops (and probably because sex is just plain fun.) Rumor has it that couples handfasted for “a year and a day” at this time. I’d consider that. In fact, that was kind of what I have been looking for since December. On the other hand, maybe not. I am of at least two minds on that one.

Might as well be. We are not necessarily meant to be sane around this time of year.

Spring Fever? Rutting passions? You know.

May 1, the Full Moon or an astrological degree, that according to one site, is when the Pleiades is on the horizon, which seems to be Saturday and the markers I’ve found for the timing.

Good grief. See what happens when popes muck about with good agrarian timing?

I decided that Beltane is all week, through Sunday!

In fact, if I keep enjoying it as much as I have so far, I may just declare the whole month or even the whole year Beltane. Why not? It’s all pretty arbitrary.

I did Steven Sashen’s Goal-Free Goal Setting meditation last night on the “goal” of having someone intimate to talk to. I found someone a couple of months ago that totally lit that fire and then dropped out. I’m still smoldering. More than that, really.

He left me aching and hungry. I went into sexual abstinence, thinking that Qi Gong classes would support me in this. They did not. Not needing to do their 100 days, I decided not to spend half the summer in abstinence. I noticed that Beltane was coming up.

Beltane has many traditions, some may be New Age fluff, some may be vaguely real. Tom Robbins makes use of some of the Beltane ideas in one of my favorite books of all time, Jitterbug Perfume. Highly recommended reading. See Amazon for excerpts.

Here are some Beltane links for you, if you’re interested:

http://www.cyberwitch.com/wychwood/Temple/beltane.htm

 and http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Forum/7280/beltane.html

from  http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Forum/7280/ which has all the holy days.

You’ll find it on Wikipedia, too. 

So, here I am, ravenous as usual, and wondering what to do with myself (or with anyone else.)

“You know what it’s like to take the Great One

so far into you that there’s nothing left to do

but give it all up to the Lord, don’t you?

Maybe you’ve never done it.

But you know what it would be like.

You can feel it. You know you want it.

You want to be fucked into God, don’t you?

Do you know what I mean, ma?”

– David Deida, Wild Nights

This is what happens when I read David Deida. I stayed up reading almost half of Wild Nights last night. I had an orgasm, found myself thinking of someone I miss, cried, put the vibrator down and the phone rang.

First, Joy called. We’re arranging for me to visit her.

30 seconds later Sean called. He was going to go, but backed out, and is helping me make the trip.

30 seconds after that Taylor called. I hadn’t talked with him in a couple of weeks.

Nice to get what we ask for, isn’t it?

I tied up my conversation with Joy. I called Sean back. I told Taylor we could talk today at a more human hour. I was already an hour past my bedtime (sundown).

Now I’ve been up since sunrise (around 5:15 am), working out some of the details of several projects I need to get on with now that I’m done with some required bill paying activities that will hopefully leave me free for a month to do these other projects like teach, start a goddess center, work on the book this blog is writing and other fun stuff like that there.

Orgasms.

I have not yet had any orgasms this morning.

Why?

Well, I don’t know. I have this tendency to jump out of bed, do some busywork and email, then when all that is off my mind, at least an hour later, go back to the sheets for a while. My bath water is hot. Maybe I’ll play in there.

I think I’ll just leave you wondering.

Love, Ann

“What this world needs more of is loving:  friendly and unashamed.”

– Robert A. Heinlein
To Sail Beyond The Sunset

 

 “He is afraid to fuck. He is afraid to dance with the lady, ma.

He wants to stand back and watch, like a scientist.

He’s afraid to leave his room, to lose his purity

that he has worked so hard to attain.

He’s afraid to lose his precious stillness.

He’s afraid of the wildness of woman.

Everything has to be all tidy for him.

He wants the pussy, but he doesn’t want the slop.

He wants the tit, but not the tooth.

Oh, he is a good man, alright. Look at the light in his eyes.

The light has guided his entire life.

This boy might just make it.

But not until he learns to embrace the lady, ma.”

…

“And I’m not talking about him

wiggling his pecker in her pussy, you know?

I’m talking about the heart.”

– David Deida, Wild Nights

 

Ancient Holy Days

by Astrological Degree

0 degrees Aries  – Vernal Equinox
15 degrees Taurus – Beltane
0 degrees Cancer – Summer Solstice
15 degrees – Leo – Lammas
0 degrees Libra – Autumnal Equinox
15 degrees Scorpio Samhain
0 degrees Capricorn Winter Solstice
15 degrees Aquarius – Imbolc

 

Shampoo Series – Aligning Sexual Preferences

My Muse asked me, “If you knew your partner liked being spanked during sex, would you do that for them, knowing it turns them on so much?”

Ah, Grasshopper, good question.

Aligning sexual preferences with another person can be very interesting!

I used to think that my fetish was fulfilling other people’s fantasies. Maybe for many years, it was. I have witnesses. I have fulfilled more fantasies than most people have ever heard of. Why? I don’t know. I’m just very willing to try most anything sexual – twice.

Why twice?

Because it might be an acquired taste.

The first question I always asked a new lover was: What is your favorite unfulfilled fantasy?

99% of the time when you ask a man that the answer is “two women.” Well, that’s easy. I am bisexual. It can be arranged. I admit it was kinda cool when I got in with a group of Ds people for whom the two women thing was fulfilled long ago. I tried everything in that arena that I was remotely interested in (see the negotiation forms in Jay Wiseman’s book, SM 101,) and some things I was not remotely interested in. Just to see.

Honestly, though, I finished that exploration stuff about 7 years ago. There is nothing at all wrong with exploring every single fantasy you have with a willing partner in a safe way. I say do it. That’s part of how Siddhartha Gautama, the Buddha, found enlightenment. He tried everything, sexual fulfillment, wealth fulfillment, he did it all. And when none of it brought the illumination he was seeking, legend has it that he sat down under a bodhi tree and found God, and was finally fulfilled. Hermann Hesse tells the story beautifully in his book, Siddhartha.

But the Buddha did not get there just by sitting and letting all his desires go unexplored, not without trying everything else first. So go for it!

Now for me, if someone tells me they want to “explore” sexuality I tell them to find someone else. I know what I like. I know what I don’t like. It takes a lot to surprise me. And I don’t like surprises. I like familiarity and comfort mostly. But most of all I want a man who connects deeply and spiritually with me through his eyes, his words and his touch. Someone whose lead I want to follow.

I used to identify as a bisexual polyamorous switch.

That means that I enjoyed sex with men and women, had open relationships with more than one partner at a time, and I had sex as both the Dominant and submissive partner.

The height of all of that was two male-to-female submissive crossdressers I dated, right in a row. Yes, men who liked dressing as women and being submissive. Well, I wanted to give men their fantasies, and it is hard for those men to find women who are interested. So, why not? I was open to it. For about 3 or 4 years, I tried.

When does doing something for your partner go against some kind of boundary of your own? When does it cause you more stress? How do you decide what to do?

Those are the details hidden in my Muse’s question above. He couldn’t see any harm in doing something your partner wants if it really turns them on. He’s Dominant in bed. Very. One of the best. But for someone else? Is there anything wrong with spanking your partner? Well, yes and no.

What if giving a spanking feels harsh, rough or simply unnatural to the person being asked to do that? Many people feel that way about spankings. Some people were spanked as children and hated it. They don’t want to make it part of their sex lives. Or maybe they just aren’t interested. Maybe they are more the submissive type.

I was cuddling with my friend, Terry, a couple of weekends ago.

He was objecting to the way women find him feminine. He said that wasn’t true. He is a man and he can prove it. I can vouch for that. All the parts are there. He has his masculine traits, definitely. But I also see why women say he is feminine.

His first alternate idea was “giver” for the stereotypical masculine role, and “taker” or maybe “receiver,” for the stereotypical feminine role. I am good with that. It’s very much like Deida’s active/receptive polarity that I love so much.

But Terry went one better. Giver and taker both have negative connotations in some ways. Terry and I both like to dance. He switched to a dance analogy and came up with “leader” and “follower.” I can go with those, too. Those terms also have some baggage, but if you’re thinking of dancing, well, you can’t both lead and you can’t both follow. You have to have one of each or it simply doesn’t work.

Polarity is true “chemistry.” But for most people, chemistry occurs when they meet someone who is the same creative energy as their opposite gender parent.

Try this: get a picture of your opposite gender parent and put it side by side with a picture of the people you’ve had long term relationships with. See if you can get a sense of whether they are energetically similar. Look beyond the physical. Do look at the eyes. That’s where you really find the Creative Energy.

Most people never get beyond finding partners who are a bit of an improvement on either their mother or father, but very much the same. People who will relate to them in the familiar ways their mother or father did. Rarely do we go for someone outside this box, and more rarely still do we go for someone who is our same Creative Energy, unless of course, one of our parents was that. That’s not chemistry. That’s not a healthy attraction of magnetic polar opposites. That’s Imprinting. If you want to know more about Imprinting, read the April 24 blog.

So what about the woman who said that her husband would never consider spanking her, even if she really wanted it? She may have had several reasons for thinking so. Here are some of the possibilities:

1.  Her husband considers spanking abusive, and even in the face of his wife’s moans of delight cannot get past the idea that he is hurting her.

2.  Her husband was spanked as a child and swore never to do that to anyone, and cannot rethink it in a sexual context.

3. Maybe her husband thinks it is weird or unnatural, repulsive even.

4.  Or maybe, her husband is not a leader. Leaders spank. Followers generally don’t. Or, put another way, Dominants spank, submissives generally don’t. It is totally contrary to their sexual preferences and sexual desires.

I came face to face with that in myself.

I am submissive, feminine, responsive, receptive and more of a follower than a leader in my romantic relationships.

I can just barely manage to do a tenuous, remotely acceptable impersonation of someone who will spank and dominate if I am told to do so. Then I’m following and I can almost do a credible job of it. Nearly. But I’m not fooling anyone. Not me, not the person who wants to be Dominated and spanked, not nobody.

It is worth noting that some people distinguish between Dominant/submissive and Top/bottom relationships. Dom/sub relationships tend toward more emotional mental, even spiritual roles. Not necessarily role playing, because I fail miserably at acting, but at fulfilling the need to take and be taken sexually. Top/bottom relationships, so I understand, are more about the physical. They aren’t needing the kinds of mental/emotional/spiritual input. They simply want to spank and be spanked (or other activities appropriate to such play).

I’m a submissive. I am not remotely a bottom. Not at all. Not interested. Doesn’t do a thing for me. I am neither a sadist nor a masochist. I am a hedonist. Well, was. I’m not sure what you would call me now. A deeply spiritual lover, maybe. Hedonism isn’t enough. I did that one with Cricket, and it quickly amounted to nothing with Russ.

For a psychological player, like myself, it ruins the whole experience to try to play at something I am not, and most of my partners have been psychological players, too. And now I can’t even “play” unless I mean it. There is something beyond the duality even of the active/receptive or leader/follower duality. There is a place where we are Love loving.

What I really desire most now is someone who wants to be intimate. Intimate in conversation, in time together, in email, in friendship, in companionship, in sharing music together, in dancing, in cuddling, in sharing meals, and yes, in sex. Deeply, spiritually, present and intimate in all areas of our lives. Someone who can be Love loving with me, who can help lead me to surrender totally, through him, but not so much to him, as to God, All That Is, that Life that lives through us.

What about Creative Energy and Imprinting?

My first husband was the same Creative Energy as my father. He was the last Sage Artisan that I know of, except for one man I had sex with once, because we were just very attracted to each other and wanted to know what it would be like. I considered that healing that I was not repulsed by my father’s type.

From then until about 2 years ago, I dated Artisan Scholars like my mother. That often happens. We switch to desiring the same gender parental archetype.

However, beginning about 2 years ago, all of the men I attracted were Artisan Priests. They are the quirkiest! I could find a Priest type of inspirational sharing with them that I enjoyed, but none of the three turned out to be more than temporary partners. I dated two Priest Artisans, as well; again, short term things where we both quickly decided this wasn’t what we wanted.

Do I think I have to have a Priest Scholar like myself? No, not necessarily. I might enjoy that, and yet I also know that I have come far enough to let another person be themselves without requiring that they be just like me. It’s still challenging, yes, but I’m ready for the challenge of deep intimacy with a man “who can fuck me straight to God,” as David Deida says in Dear Lover.

I want someone who wants to give time and energy to this, to go as deep as we can with one another. Nothing less.

And for anyone who is interested, I’m still in sexual abstinence. This is my 40th day.

After today, I don’t care one way or the other. I would love to have someone to break my abstinence with, someone capable of connecting deeply who is interested in doing that with me. I considered finding a surrogate, someone who wanted to ceremonially break my abstinence with me whether or not we became long term partners. That isn’t totally out of the question, but it may be unlikely. Or, I may wait a while longer just to see who shows up. Nature does abhor a vacuum, she wrote, grinning mischeivously. Why do you think I went into the abstinence in the first place?

I may also spend an entire day Saturday, maybe this weekend, maybe next weekend, playing by myself sexually, fantasizing about the partner who can meet me here and go to sleep dreaming of him. Then when I wake up Sunday morning (I am a Morning Person, remember? Although sex is good at any or many times of the day!) so, possibly what I may do is when I wake up Sunday morning, I will bring myself to orgasm, over and over again, invoking that energy to bring the man who desires me as much as I desire him to me.

It has worked for me twice before. Both times I got even more than what I imagined.

Cricket was amazing, but lacked the verbal and spiritual components. Russ was closer still. He is my Muse. I have written every single day since 2 days after we met. His first Love Language is words, just like mine. He has inspired more and better writing than I’ve done in my entire life. But he did not want a full time or romantic relationship of any sort. Nothing wrong with either of them. That choice is theirs to make. They are who they are. I love them both and always will. I simply wasn’t completely clear on wanting just one man to share the rest of my life with me. I was still holding back.

Let’s see how I’m doing now, shall we?

Love, Ann

“Romance can be a holy place, dedicated to the experience of Heaven on Earth.  But that can only occur if the perception of our mutual innocence is a sacred commitment.”

                    – Marianne Williamson, Enchanted Love