Jealousy, Monogamy, and Power

It's been a long time since I've made a post, I do have things I want to write about; I've been working on something to do with ethics and the role they play in poly and bdsm relationships, but have not had the time to get it down yet, I hope that I will do so soon. In the meantime I would like to share an essay on jealousy, monogamy, and power by Pepper. I came across this a few months ago but have only recently had the chance to read it. I do understand that it is quite long and appears to be technical, however it is a fantastic read that discusses how jealousy relates to monogamy and how it can negatively impact both monogamous and non-monogamous relationships. I hope you enjoy it, I did.

Needles and Staples

Saturday night I had my first introduction to sharp, pointy implements, namely needles and staples, neither of which I had ever seen firsthand. A number of my Emerald City friends very much enjoy poking people with sharp objects, typically eliciting an endorphin rush for both parties. I thought I knew what to expect from the numerous FetLife pictures I'd seen, but as I watched Lorelai weave needles in and out of people's skin, I questioned how I may react to the sensation.

As I've said before, I typically only bottom to feel the sensation, as I don't receive a buzz or a high from play and this I feel ethically responsible to do before I'm willing to play with someone the same fashion, but as I watched needles of varying gauges being woven into skin and out of skin I wondered if the sensation would be all I would receive this time. Needles seemed to garner a slightly more intense reaction than other types of play I'd experimented with and while my stomach wasn't doing flip flops; I was curious as to how I'd react. I figured a little self discovery would be a good way to start....so grabbing the stapler I punched a staple into my left forearm. A slight prick to be sure, but nothing more intense than a tattoo needle with a little bit of blood. When Lorelai was finished with her willing demo bottom, I told her to poke away.

As she readied my arm with alcohol, donned a fresh pair of latex gloves and massaged the soon to be pricked location, she checked in and instructed me to take a deep breath in and out and repeat. I didn't watch, but I could feel the needle getting closer to my arm with each exhale. As I relaxed she pounced....a slight prick was all I felt, the sensation was interesting and it took longer to feel the exiting prick than I would've expected, but once it was done, it was done. Nothing ground breaking, no endorphin rush, no blissed out feeling. Just a sensation that came and went. She ended up making a 3 needle button on my upper left arm, while Buffy stapled my right arm 6 or 7 times. You can feel the needles in your arm, as a button consists of needles deeper in the tissue underneath the previous needle in a circular pattern, but it was more pressure than anything and by no means painful. At one point Matisse, feigned applying pressure to the raised skin in the middle of the button, to which I said, "Be my guest." And she did. I later asked her how much pressure she applied and apparently she leaned into it pretty good, but again nothing. The blank expression on my face as she released the pressure, I think almost confused her as she walked away fanning her face....sadists enjoy pain resistant bottoms and that is apparently I.

To see if I could evoke a different sensation I spent some time slapping both the staples and the button, but all I could muster was some blood. After about half an hour or so, Lorelai removed the needles and Buffy the staples (I love that the body staple remover is very similar to a paper-based staple remover, gave me a good chuckle). As she was removing the needles, Lorelai asked if she could twist it during removal; consent was granted.....Now imagine if you will a needle threading through the skin of your arm and instead of being pulled straight out, said needle was bent upwards, twisted and dug into your tissue over the 15 seconds or so. Is that picture in your head? Good, that's what happened as my final needle was removed to the point where it had an acute angle at its mid-point. But again only a slight prick and blood.

Now I'm not trying to boast or make claims that I'm a heavy bottom, I just found it curious that all I encountered was a slight sensation when the prick actually occurred, which was very contrary to the woman to my left who when stuck with a single needle stared into Buffy's eyes and cooed in a soft tone, "Your eyes are shiny." Now that's a blissed out reaction to needle play.

Of course needle play wasn't the only thing that occurred during the post-HUMP party, there was of course bondage, flogging, single tails, and a lot of public sex, very different from your typical kink party and came primarily from the Burner population there. How long did it go on for one might ask....let's just say I'm glad that Saturday was the night we turned the clocks back this year.

Sir C Workshop

Just finished attending 2 workshops by Sir C, who is in Seattle from New York doing weekend workshops at the CSPC. If you're in Seattle tomorrow there's one more tomorrow called Basic Hojojutsu, he's a fantastic teacher and you should do your best to attend, and the best thing is, you don't have to be a CSPC member to attend. The second workshop was Sir C "Upping the Ante" and spent 2 hours demoing how to be mean, giving me many fantastic ideas, many of which had their "ante upped" due to all the kinky locals in attendance, they are a devious bunch, which is why I love making trips down here on a regular basis. One of the more interesting things I learned was that squirting water into someone's ear induces vomiting, something that wasn't demoed today, for obvious reasons, but would be very interesting to try at some point in the future. It's a medical technique to test brain dead to see if someone's alive or not. I also found out some very interesting ways to use pop rocks in conjunction with saran wrap and given that I know someone that loves to be saran wrapped, I'm excited to test it out in the near future. I came away with a lot more sadistic ideas (you can never have enough!) that I hope to employ soon and share with the blogging world, but I must run off to a Hump play party with some very kinky people here in town. I'm looking very forward to it as it'll be my first official Seattle private play party and I've convinced someone (it wasn't hard) to show me needle play, not on me necessarily but I've never seen it live (I have no idea why) and am looking forward to it.