Ranty rant... apropos of nothing really

I think my main issue with some poly people is that they think they are somehow a much more evolved sexual being than the rest of us mere monogamists, poor backward traditionalist-types,  unhappy face. They believe, and will tell you, ad naseum, that they have transcended the petty jealousy and illogical emotional responses to non-traditional relationships. they will quote at you the SCIENCE behind non-monogamy and how we have been tricked to accept patriarchy defined constructs of relationships. They not only have read ALL the literature regarding the subject, but LIVE it each and every single day. Their relationships are tight. Their communication skillz are so much better than my, yours or anyone else's communication skillz, yo.

To which I have only one response: Fuck you. 

If relationships were logical we’d all look like Mr. Spock. 

Excerpt

All she wanted to know with complete trust and absolute certainty was that, despite the terrible things she did to him, despite the tender atrocities he allowed her to inflict on his body and his spirit, that he still loved her, still desired her, still wanted to be with her. The truest definition of unconditional love she had never experienced.

She didn't want to explore how lustful he felt or how beautiful he thought he thought she was: those things were too facile, too trite. She wanted to examine how difficult it was, how filled with longing, pain, uncertainty and anguish but ultimately filled with peace and joy these moments between them could be. She wanted to test him, an irrational desire to see how far she could push him, or push him away. Would he stay? She was almost too afraid to find out. But the need to know, that certainty she craved, drove her.

"Come here Adam, " she whispered.

He left his place, seated on the floor by the bay window. He was watching the rain. He crawled on all fours toward her, head down and quickly yet smoothly as he had been taught. She watched the patterned muted light from the window cast shadows along the skin of his naked back, dappling on the muscles alive and moving. When he reached her he rubbed his face on her silk nylon sheathed crossed legs, without her permission, without asking. A small infraction this unexpected and ardent gesture of affection, it would serve to answer her questions today. He would have to be punished.

(c) 2015 from the forthcoming The Weft and the Weave

Beginning

"Do you trust me?" she asked. She paused, waiting, a heavy silence between them. The question was more than it seemed, carrying the weight of her life, and his; a burden almost too great for the four small words.

He thought for a long moment, she could see the workings of contemplation on his face, could swear she heard the grinding gears in his head as he imagined every possible reason, every pro and every con, every foreseeable circumstance to come that he would be called upon to trust her, and his reaction to her question every time.

Finally he answered: "I do". Simply, boldly, with a breathtaking strength punctuated with a heartbreaking meekness. He looked at her, into her eyes, waited.

She smiled, a bit forlornly. "You shouldn't." she replied.

(c) 2015 from the forthcoming The Weft and the Weave

So I've joined NaNoWriMo this year. Going to try and write 50,000 words towards my novel over the month of November, finally. Buddy me over at http://nanowrimo.org/participants/petitebete

Journal October 6, 2015

Perhaps I am just old fashioned.

I am theoretically and mentally perfectly fine and accepting , even an enthusiastic supporter and defender of the so-called poly amorous and ethically non-monogamous lifestyles. I understand it on a conceptual and empirical level, I know people who have made it work for them and I admire their openness and all the consistency of communication it takes to make the lifestyles work for them as well as it has.

However, on an emotional level, the level I unfortunately or fortunately seem to operate the most from, I don't think it's for me. I used to think it was and I did try, but I can feel it in my gut and in that bit of battered muscle in my chest above that I'm just not cut out for it.

I am a monogamist traditionalist romantic at heart, and this it seems is a state almost vilified in the circles I now inhabit and roam. The newest and most counter-culture kink is wanting to be with only one man for the rest of my life. Yes, I can almost hear you shudder at the thought.

For me, and only for me I am not casting any judgements on anyone, I cannot engage in the intimate act of sex if I do not have any tender feeling for the person opposite me. No, that's not entirely true, I can, physically, and I have in the past and may do so again some desperate and achingly lonely day in the future. But merely engaging in the physical act is just not enough for me, or it comes with such a heavy cost of feelings of guilt, shame and lowered self-esteem to make it a wholly unappealing prospect. Again, only for me. If you have found the magic button that allows you to have all the sex all the time without regrets or philosophic nostalgic pondering then you ride 'em cowgirl! I envy you.

I know I should more firmly embrace the hard won feminist liberties of being able to enjoy my body and have sex as easily, readily, and frequently as I so choose without succumbing to the cultural baggage of guilt or slut-shame or any of the myriad other ways I self -sabotage my post-coital high. But I can't. I do give it the good old college try though, engaging in casual and "friends with benefits"  type relationships, but in the end I cannot help but feel somehow cheated. It is as though I realize, sometimes too late, that men invariably consider me good enough to fuck but not good enough to date, or to spend time with, or share interests with or introduce to friends or in any other way get to know me beyond the bedroom's four walls. I am never good enough it seems. And all I ever wanted was to be good enough to someone, other than myself of course.

I will admit to a bit of false advertising, of caving to the inevitable truths of the experience of a 40 plus woman dating in our world today - the "wants to date but nothing serious" tag or the "exploring non-monogamy" buzzwords sprinkled throughout my dating profiles. Why? Because dating in your 40s is fucking hard. I am not the young pretty and pretty dependent arm candy the men my own age, post-marriage and/or post-divorce, seem to desire and chase in an effort to feel themselves needed again. I am not the "cougar" looking for young men that will come to me to learn tips and techniques to make their same-aged future girlfriends moan, or to exchange their sexual stamina and vigour for a monthly allowance and/or for me paying for everything because I am "mature, and have your shit together". It reeks of mothering far too much for my liking. So labeling myself, or perhaps mislabeling, as "open-minded" and other quaint and culturally up-to -the-moment euphemisms for being just "down to fuck" is my leverage in an ever shrinking and shark-infested dating pool.

What gives me pause and pain are the occasional men who, being on the same wavelength as I , tell me that although what we engage in is casual for the moment, they are not averse to it developing into, possibly someday maybe, a Relationship. The dangling carrot in front of this romantic's nose. The carrot that makes me decide against better judgement to sleep with someone on the first date, to open myself up and make myself vulnerable when I am usually, perhaps to my detriment but mostly for my protection, very guarded and very cautious. The carrot that whispers to me "Can't you just see yourself with him in 5 years? Can't you just imagine spending Christmas with him, being introduced to his family?" and, against all internal warning systems, I can imagine it and I do. Yet these same carrot-dangling men invariably have sex with me once or twice, three times if it's a slow week and they haven't plans on book-ending weekends, and then slowly, or abruptly, disappear. Ghosting, in the modern day parlance. I am left to wonder what did I do or say that was wrong? What about me wasn't good enough? I'll never know.

It's not the sex that I take issue with, not the casual usage of my body, time, talents or affections for his or our mutual pleasure and reward, it's the intimacy taken for granted. I can have and have had in the past the rutting, usually at the local sex club or swinger party where I didn't even ask the man's name, my focus being purely physical and immediate. But if you and I have had 4-hour long phone conversations, shared ideas and beliefs and stories and the small vulnerabilities of our lives, if we`ve not only had the great sex  (in my home! a rarity in itself) but felt comfortable enough to sleep together (snoring and all), and my god if I`ve gone so far as to make you dinner or breakfast the next morning, when you suddenly and inexplicably lose interest in even texting me hello in the following next few days, I have to wonder was it all worth it? Was sacrificing intimacy at the altar of sex just for the chance of companionship worth it?

I am beginning to think it is not. I am beginning to think that I would much rather be alone and not risk my heart anymore and not risk repeatedly being made to feel, through omission or deed, that I am for whatever reason I cannot fathom (and I can fathom oh so many) not enough.

The desire to dominate

I want to see how far I can push myself and my capability to inflict pain. I want to see how far I can push my sub, how far he will let me go, how far he will trust me. Because trust is a frightening thing to me, it is so foreign. I trust no one. I want to look at trust and examine it up close and in its most extreme representation.

I think it is emotional intensity, intimacy and pure love hyper-condensed into a session or scene. What it takes most a lifetime to discover about themselves and their partner, a lifetime if at all to feel and reveal about ourselves, happens in a few hours for us.

I want again that out-of-body experience, the mild fugue state that I felt the first time I whipped someone. It is delirious intoxication, the mix of power, sexual stimulation, and psychic release. To feel the dissipation of a lifetime of moral code imbedded in me evaporating off my skin. To be all instinct, no clear or rational thought, no guilt; giving way to only endorphins and emotions. I want to be the cause of someone’s pain and sexual gratification, irrevocably twisted and twined together, and of their freedom. To be breathlessly thanked for helping this person on their silken path to transcendence.

I want to be the reason a sub cries, or cries out. To make tears fall then lick them off the face, the sweet salt sting on my tongue, and then to comfort. To feel the strange combination of extreme revulsion at the sub’s weakness and the absolute tenderness of affection in that moment for this human crumbled at my feet. To destroy him utterly, then carefully and lovingly put him back together again. To be that necessary, that needed, like air which we do not notice until it is gone. To cause the suffering, then remove it, assuage and comfort, then give him great pleasure. Because despite my ability to demonstrate extreme cruelty I am also capable of extreme tenderness. That is the dichotomy I live.

Because I love this person I will give him his fondest wish, his deepest darkest most unspeakable desire. Because I love this person nothing he desires is strange or abhorrent to me. And because he is willing to suffer for all this makes him beautiful to me. Because I love him I want to own him, to be mine and mine alone, and give him all my attention, all my effort, all my care.

I want to be the only one who makes him scream, cry, cum. I want him to close his eyes and see my face, feel and smell my skin. Whenever you feel arousal it should be because of me. Whenever you feel pain it should be because of me. When you cum it should be because of me. I want to be the only one that twists together your pain and your pleasure, woven and knotted together.

But you must first earn it. You must prove yourself and be made worthy. Is my great love not worth a little suffering, a little pain?