Male Dominant

On further reflection, the term is a non sequitur.

Sorry, dear...

My girl is searching for a male Dominant in her town. Now that I am not serving in that capacity, she misses serving, and she wants to find her own space in the D/s space without my overarching presence. Finding a male Dominant who is worthy of her, who speaks from integrity and not ego and in whom she wishes to invest is a laborious and challenging task.

She mentioned a new D prospect the other day. She said that he interested her and that they planned to meet. I didn't ask a lot of questions other than those that would help her make sure (and help me make sure) that he seemed safe and sane. We are both invested in her gaining independence, and that requires me to stay out of the way...not particularly easy for either of us, but we are working on this dynamic change.

Speaking with her evening before last, I have no idea why I started to wonder, so I asked her his last name, which she provided. I immediately flashed on the times when he and I and an old lover of mine and another femme lover of ours were together. He wasn't a D then, and never mentioned BDSM at all. I told my girl that I knew him in the biblical sense and she said, "But he didn't recognize your name!" I reminded her that I changed my entire name in the ensuing years.

She was monumentally frustrated that seemingly yet again, I'd gotten someplace first. I said, "Ah, but honey, you are the first to get him in the kink sense!" She was not mollified by that. She told me that she needed to start keeping an Excel spreadsheet of my exploits. I said that would be easy, as the names I can remember are only those who make a lasting impression, and they are few.* But, heck, at least her D made THAT list!

She was then vexed at the prospect of whether to tell him who I am. This mystified me (and still does). I suggested that she bears him exactly ZERO responsibility to confess her lovers, former or current, and the fact that there is some slop over between the three of us is absolutely of no import. I asked if he had confessed his partners to her and she said no.

As always she will make her way, and I hope for her happiness and her safety. I also hope that this man treats her with respect and that he is worthy of the gift of her submission, should she choose to give him the honor of the gift. He'd damned well better treat her well.

The JC Pyramid

The thing about being a freak is that freaks don’t feel freakish to ourselves. From the inside out, I’m just me, plain ol’ person I’ve been hanging out with for fifty years and change.

I don’t look like a freak…unless I try. I don’t walk around wearing BDSM buttons, no sign on my body says WASBO, HASBIAN, BI and PROUD, STRAIGHTISH, or MY GIRLFRIEND IS MY SLAVE or In My World, men are always boys. I do a reasonable job of passing in the world. A pretty darned good job, I think.

I’m not an asshole. I am direct, and I do mostly speak my mind, especially around politics and issues that require a critical analysis, and where someone is giving someone I care for a bad time, and most always if someone is beating up (figuratively or literally) on someone who cannot properly defend him or herself. I can get animated in my vexations, but I barely EVER direct them at an individual. I rail against ignorance and stupidity. I am assertive when dealing with people but I seldom cross the line into dickishness. At my core, like Hillel, who said about the Talmud, Do unto others, all else is commentary, I believe in the Golden Rule, and I work diligently to live by it.

Given that, I am perpetually amazed and typically amused when people fear my reactions to situations. I worked for an organization that was hiring a marketing director. As director of development, this hire would be my counterpart, my partner. I was deeply invested, as was the entire management team, in making the right hire.

The fourth interview we conducted was with a mature woman who wore a conservative navy business skirt suit and an American flag on her lapel. Picture the Pillsbury Dough Girl meets Betty Crocker. The interview was a group affair, executive director, director of admin, me, clinical director, another upper level clinical person, and our exec admin assistant. The clinicians and admin sat across the table from me. ED sat nearest the end the table where the interviewee sat. My pal, the director of admin, sat next to me. After some preliminary questions, I found myself screwing up my brow. I realized that the woman whom I’ll call Yvette didn’t seem to be answering any question directly.

All assembled noticed the same thing. My boss observed that she brought some material with her and asked about it, thinking that perhaps when she had the opportunity to speak about her work directly, perhaps she would be clearer. She passed around a couple of press clips with articles she did not write. Huh? I asked about the initiative that inspired the articles and again, her answer made no apparent connection with my question.

Finally, I said, Can you tell us about ANY initiative with which you’ve had success?

Oh yes! she said. This was the JC Pyramid. I was working with a group of doctors and I realized that they were very egotistical. So, I taught them about the Pyramid.

As she said The JC Pyramid, I thought I misunderstood her. She said that she taught the docs they are on the base of the pyramid – she made one with her hands, forefingers tented at the top, then thumbs connected, making a triangle. The docs were at the bottom, where they served the people. The people were in the middle. And JC was at the top. The JC Pyramid.

I was frowning the kind of frown you get when you’re mightily confused. I looked across the table at my coworkers as I interrupted Yvette. Their eyes showed deer in the headlights as I opened my mouth. I was further confused by their response. I just needed to understand what the hell this woman who would be my partner MEANT. My Jewish ears hadn’t even grocked the initials, JC, much less have a clue what she meant. I thought maybe she’d said JC, but my brain went to JAYCEE, as in the service club – the Junior Chambers of Commerce. What the hell are they doing on the top of a pyramid? How’d I manage to miss THIS bit of the heterosexual hierarchy?

I said, I need to stop you so you can go back and clarify for me – did you say JAYCEE? Like the service group?

Her first response was far and away the most eloquent. She turned purple from as far down her shirt as you could see with a modestly opened blouse. That flush enveloped her in the most luscious aubergine I’d ever seen on a human. She said, Well, it could be Allah or Buddah or…

At this point, ALL eyes in the room were on me. Each woman around the table, excepting Ms. DoughgirlCrocker looked at me as if to beseech my good behavior. WHAT THE HELL DID THEY THINK I INTENDED TO DO? I was purely trying to get the information we needed to make a good hire. And post JC Pyramid revelation, all I was trying to do was to keep from busting a gut.

My boss was first to recover from the JCP revelation and she cleared her throat and asked me, “Do you have any further questions?” I had already put my hand on my forehead and was looking steadfastly down at my yellow pad. I simply shook my head in the negative.

As she made nice with Ms. DGC, and walked her out of the room, I had to bite my lip. Hard.

As soon as she left and they were far enough down the hall that nobody would hear us, there was a thunderstorm of guffaws, cackles, and screams. By the time my boss returned, we were well into snotty nosed snorts and pants peeing. After my boss had disgorged her own cacophony of merriment, I got serious and said, ‘WHAT THE HELL DID YOU ALL THINK I WAS GOING TO SAY?”

Those whimp-asses got all embarrassed and not one of them would admit that of which they feared. What could they say? I fear your wild reaction because I believe that you are a freak?

No matter, I will always have the JC Pyramid to guide my way. I am inoculated forever more from petty ignorances such as theirs.

Do YOU have the JC Pyramid in your life?

Have You Tuned Your Trandar Lately?

A friend observed the other day that I've developed good "trannydar," which I edited to trandar. Sometimes when I see a man, I see his face with makeup on and I'm possessed to ask him whether he's ever considered dressing. I don't guess that is a common question. However, I've never one time been blown off when I ask. And so far, never been told "no." Of course I'm selective, but the affirmative answers makes me really wonder.

Sliding along the gender continuum is a helluva lot easier for women* than for men. A female can wake up in a negligee, change into jeans, a button down shirt, boots and no makeup, walk out the door and never get hassled. She comes home, takes a bath, and dons Versace, all sequins and slits and leg, perfect stockings and garter, then tucks into bed that night in boxers.

Were a male to try the same range of outwardly oriented gender display as expressed through clothes and makeup in public, he would very likely incur the wrath of someone. Even if he dared wear some black eyeliner (in which most men look scrumptious!) while wearing his regular work apparel, eyebrows would raise and he'd likely suffer consequences, particularly if he worked in a blue collar .... no, hell, forget that, no matter where he worked, unless he was a hair dresser or a rock musician ... he would be derided or much worse. (I know, I know, there are no doubt exceptions). And, of course, there are exceptions for women. Some would suffer repercussions for dressing in a manly way. Still, not the same.

I wonder, if we weren't so freakin' judgmental about differences, how much more slippery would ALL our places on the continuum be? How much more would you slide back and forth along that vast panoply of choices in lifestyle, gender, and sexual expression if you had no fear of reprisal? How differently would you live your life? I would love to know.

*Lemme just say that I am very aware of the struggles of transgendered folks, and my observations about the ease with which women can move without reprisal in no way is meant to make light of the internal struggles of an MtF as she struggles to express that which is within. I'm only speaking of the permissiveness afforded women (because women are generally seen as less important, hence less of a threat) than men in our outer expressions, not of the inner struggles of gender which any of us holds.

Office Crack Up

Sales guy comes into my office and tries to get a bunch of names and locations of folks to solicit. We chat, I give up zero info with a smile, and he looks on my desk for the ridiculously often standard engraved name plate, seeing none, says, "I'd love to say thank you for helping, but I can't find your name." I say, "you may just call me Oz, the all knowing." Yuck yuck. I say, "My name is Jesse." He says, "Gee, that's great. I haven't had a Jesse since..." I'm totally going to let that line go, it's work, afterall, and I have a modest commitment to not making too much sport at the expense of others when I'm workin' for the Company, but he gets totally PURPLE and chokes all over and then I'm really laughing. He's walking out the door, fast, and says, "Well, gee, some people make people happy by coming and others by leav...I MEAN...OH HELL..." as he RUNS out the door.

So happy I could help....

Filling Up Space

We fill up space: with stuff; with noise; with busy-ness.

Having only what we need; hearing the power in the silence, we can live unadorned. Life lived inwardly breeds integrity.

When we face our addiction to stuff, when we learn to sit in quiet, we shift focus from externalizing, from hoping that someone or something else will fill us up.

It's an inside job.

And we die alone. No matter how much stuff and how much noise surrounds us.

Learning to be peaceful with little, with deep quiet, with our aloneness, such a powerful gift.

We can only give this one to ourselves.