If you like pina coladas...

I was tired of my lady
We'd been together too long
Like a worn-out recording
Of a favorite song
So while she lay there sleeping
I read the paper in bed
And in the personal columns
There was this letter I read...

Bob was just out of college and living near the city when he finally had the courage to answer one of the personal ads that he'd seen in the local alternative paper. The keywords that caught his eye included "firm" and "discipline" and "corporal", and the ad looked a little less threatening than some of the others. It turned out to be from a woman about ten years his senior who had a predilection for spanking and paddling. Bob enjoyed a relationship with her for several years, eventually discovering that he preferred to be the spanker. He learned to appreciate the rhythms and the sensual feel of flesh under his palms. Bob kept up his relationship with her right up until his marriage.

"If you like Pina Coladas
And getting caught in the rain
If you're not into yoga
If you have half a brain
If you'd like making love at midnight
In the dunes on the Cape
Then I'm the love that you've looked for
Write to me and escape."

Bob's wife knew about his interests, and at first seemed to share those interests, herself. They settled into a middle-class community just a few minutes north of the fictional home of Rob and Laura Petrie, and Bob found a job with a well-known financial firm. Rotary Club, Junior League, and not long afterward, PTA meetings took up most of their social time. Life looked pretty well.

Over the next couple of years, though, he found her interest waning as often happens when newlyweds slowly become an "old married couple". Bob found fewer and fewer outlets for his interests and alternated between asking her - almost to the point of nagging, and long periods of sexual disinterest.

I didn't think about my lady
I know that sounds kind of mean
But me and my old lady
Have fallen into the same old dull routine
So I wrote to the paper
Took out a personal ad
And though I'm nobody's poet
I thought it wasn't half bad:

As Bob's wife became more involved with the kids and local clubs, she apparently lost any interest in their spanking play. Bob became more and more depressed over this, and at some point stopped talking to her about it because he was tired of feeling frustrated and hurt. Unfortunately, it also meant that they would stop talking to each other about the rest of their relationship as well. Their level of intimacy - emotional as well as sexual - declined.

"Yes I like Pina Coladas
And getting caught in the rain
I'm not much into health food
I am into champagne
I've got to meet you by tomorrow noon
And cut through all this red-tape
At a bar called O'Malley's
Where we'll plan our escape."

At some point Bob began picking up alternative papers and looking through the personals. He really hadn't any intention of carrying out anything nefarious - he just wanted to remember what it was like to feel young and sexy and desirable. He just wanted to recapture some of those fading memories of the fun times he'd had. He just didn't want to forget...

And at some point, he couldn't help himself. He placed an ad.

He got a response. A woman who wanted to meet in the next town. He replied, assuring discretion and explaining his own situation. No sex. Nothing long term. No strings. Just a desire to meet, talk, and if agreeable, to take her over his knee for a few minutes.

She agreed to meet him. They set a date and time to rendez-vous at an out-of-the-way bar. Bob left work early, drove to the restaurant, and walked in. He looked around the crowded room and spotted her instantly. She was looking at him, waiting in a booth near the back corner.

It was his wife.

So I waited with high hopes
And she walked in the place
I knew her smile in an instant
I knew the curve of her face
It was my own lovely lady
And she said, "Oh it's you."
Then we laughed for a moment
And I said, "I never knew."

And just like that it was over. One house, two cars, three children, and fourteen years of marriage.

She had set him up.

In a perverse twist of fate, an example of life not imitating art, but parodying it, Bob's wife did not suddenly rediscover her sexuality. She did not have a secret fantasy to spank or to be spanked. She was not trying to rekindle the spark in her marriage. No, she was tired of the charade of a marriage. She no longer wanted to be with a husband who had no interest in her, who would only accept a relationship with her on his own terms.

It would be years before either of them would understand that this is exactly what the both of them wanted; each would only settle for their own idea of a relationship, and instead of compromising or negotiating, they fought. Sometimes passive-aggressively, sometimes bitterly, but never with the idea of creating a situation in which both of them would feel loved, cherished, and respected.

This scenario is the nightmare that many of us on the vanilla-fetish edge fear; that our desires will end up destroying us, that our love-mates will become our enemy, that one small piece of our lives will upset the balance and ruin our hopes and plans, separate us from our home and children, perhaps ruin our reputation with our families, friends, work associates.

I met Bob long after this happened, after his wife moved halfway across the country, after the children had mostly grown up without him in the home, and after he had several more failed relationships because of his fear of opening up about his interests to them. He now compartmentalizes his relationships in order to avoid the pain; he sees some women romantically, and some for purely fetish interests - and never the twain shall meet.

Maybe I'm still too close to Bob's situation for perspective; our own marriage has only recently gotten a toehold in the escarpment of intimacy after some years of drifting apart and we're both moving carefully. I've found myself at times wondering where the hell my libido is vacationing because in the course of rebuilding our relationship I've had to - or at least I've felt that I've had to - put some of my sexual concerns into the background while we deal with other issues.

I don't have a happy ending for this. No pithy comment or words of lucid wisdom, except perhaps an acknowledgement that sometimes even when we think that we're communicating, we forget that we need our ears as much as our mouths.

That you like Pina Coladas
Getting caught in the rain
And the feel of the ocean
And the taste of champagne
If you'd like making love at midnight
In the dunes of the Cape
You're the lady I've looked for
Come with me and escape

Rupert Holmes
Escape (Pina Colada Song)

How do I get my partner to ...?

It's a truism that one of the most asked questions on any sex forum is "How can I get my partner to...?" And while I'd venture to say that it's one of the most asked questions on any forum, I'm going to deal strictly with sexuality.

It probably goes without saying that one needs to keep the lines of communication open, but that's pretty easy to say from the safety of my comfy chair. For those of us who are already wresting with the idea that we have kinks in the first place, it's doubly difficult to open these discussions up with partners that we, through years of association, believe will be horrified, sickened, or run screaming into the street. That said, however, we also need to understand that not talking about them certainly isn't going to get us anywhere.

Unfortunately, when some of do initiate the conversations, we - and this applies mainly, although not exclusively, to men - often get it wrong by addressing exactly the kinds of things that our partners least want to hear, often ignoring the most important things that we should be addressing, such as our thoughts and feelings about the activity. For example, on the chastity and orgasm denial web forums I often see questions like "How do I convince my wife that she should use a chastity device on me and get her to enjoy the control that it will have over me?" And unbelievably, so many men read the websites promoting the "benefits of keeping your man in chastity" and are stunned when their wives or girlfriends don't seem to care about having their man "under control."

First of all, if you are already having a problem in your relationship, then understand that bringing up a kinky desire is not the way to start improving your emotional intimacy. If your wife won't even discuss sex, let alone your kinks, then you have a serious communication problem that you need to solve before you move on to other things, be it chastity or bondage or golden showers. Until the both of you are talking to each other, you won't "convince" her of anything, except that you're being insensitive.

Too, even if you can manage to begin a conversation, understand that not all women have some fantasy of being a dominatrix to a chaste male slave husband. To many people, the very idea of it is "kinky", and as we all know, nice people don't do kink. Who else but a sick perverted kinkster would want a few hundred dollars worth of plastic or metal wrapped around their cock and balls?

On the subject of chastity devices, most of the chastity-oriented websites point out the many benefits for the partner, saying in essence: "Your husband will worship and you and adore you because he'll want to please you so that you'll allow him an orgasm."

Yeah, okay.

When you present it to your wife, are you pointing out how she could order you around and assign points for when you cook dinner, wash her car, make breakfast, do the shopping, give her a massage, etc.? And she still didn't go for it? I wonder why not? I'm sure it's not because she was thinking, "That big jerk! Why doesn't he do those things for me NOW? Why do I have to indulge some kinky fantasies in order to get him to be more attentive?"

See, so many of the websites have all these rules about earning points, scheduled releases and orgasms, and all sorts of things that actually make it a real pain in the ass for someone who doesn't care for those kinds of game in the first place. A woman who isn't naturally dominant or who doesn't have much interest would probably ask "What's in it for me that I shouldn't already be getting from my partner?"

Anyway, my point is that if you're not already communicating intimately, then you have an issue in your relationship that needs to be addressed before you try to involve your partner in your kinks.

Kink-timacy

I get questions. You get answers.

People read my stuff on the various web boards, Usenet groups, and Yahoo groups, and because (I hope) they perceive me to be articulate and sensitive, they email me. These are usually people who tend to "lurk", that is, read those groups without breaking their anonymity to post. They are also usually men. And they usually email to ask me about chastity and orgasm denial, or sometimes about introducing kink to a vanilla partner.

I am fairly articulate and sensitive, and because I'm also very introspective - and very handy with tools - I tend to research something until I'm, well, maybe not an expert, but certainly in the intermediate class. When my wife and I decided to use OD and chastity play as a way to have some compromise between my desire for D/s kink and her desire to have nothing to do with whips and chains, I set about reading as much as I could. Eventually I stopped asking questions and started answering them, especially in several Yahoo groups where I've logged well over 1,000 posts on those topics in the last several years.

I'm frequently asked about introducing some kind of kink to a more vanilla partner, and more often than not the person who has emailed me is already pretty worked up about the entire situation. I feel badly when this happens, but I well understand - I've been there: got the T-shirt, the postcards, and the henna tattoo and hair beading at the sidewalk vendor. And I'm going to share the gist of some of those emails and my responses in hopes that they will offer some support to others walking down this road.

About two years ago, someone wrote that his desire for some kind of femdomme kink was so strong that they could no longer keep it to themselves, but that his partner had no interest - in fact, refused to discuss his desires at all. He was concerned that by bringing it up he had ruined their relationship.

Let's get this straight right now: "Kink" does not ruin your relationship; rather it is the incompatibility, the inability of two people to come to some understanding or reconciliation of the kink. Our own problem is that we so often face the kink issue alone, completely out of context of any other aspect of our relationship.

Your partner could have an issue with your job, your other family members, or certain other lifestyle choices, and you would either work it out or part ways with the understanding that not everyone is going to be compatible with each other. Unfortunately, when we deal with kink we often bring in other issues: Your partner doesn't always understand your kinks, and there really aren't any easily available resources for help and support. Also, so often in anger our partners will make us (or try to make us) feel ashamed, sick, perverted. Never mind tht they are usually reacting out of their own insecurities about sex, the problem is tht many of us are already wrestling with feeling perverted or sick - in part because we have nowhere to turn when we need to discuss our desires. And too often we're afraid that they will tell our family or friends; the idea of being "outed" creates anxiety and sometimes we again try to bury those desires in order to avoid the pain.

But if kink is something that's very important to you, then not bringing it up early in the relationship will end up being a relationship killer at some later point. And if the kink itself doesn't kill the relationship, then the slow erosion of your psyche will kill it later on as you draw away from your partner, from the relationship, and lose the intimacy that you need to stay healthy.

Take a look at this passage from "Getting Close" by Barbara Fast:

In building an intimate relationship, trust is the major structural factor. Once you have trust you can risk emotional honesty. You can open yourself to your partner and reveal the good and the bad within you [....] Because we are afraid to risk, we settle for mediocre lives...which are really quiet desperation. Risking intimacy is a difficult, challenging task but you must always keep in mind the fact that if you settle for a life with little or no intimacy, your life will be measurably impoverished as time goes by.

Unfortunately, many of us are ashamed of our kinks. Because we haven't brought up the subject with our partner early on, it seems like it gets more, not less difficult to raise the issue the more involved we are. Soon it becomes easy to imagine parents, relatives, cow-orkers, ministers, etc., staring at you and asking derisively "Ugh, what kind of sicko would want that?" and letting those feelings of embarrassment and shame over-ride our desires for something that's not normally shown on tv.

For anyone in that position, I'm going to recommend picking up the short, easy-reading book at Greenery Press called "When Someone You Love is Kinky" by Dossie Eaton and Catherine Liszt. It's written in plain, slightly humorous, easy to understand laguage for people who are vanilla at heart. It's meant to provide some understanding to people who have a kinkster in their lives. Perhaps you might consider spending the $17 on the book and giving it to someone that you've been dating for a while, with the caveat "Before this relationship goes any further, there's something that you need to know about me."

I know a guy who is into spanking, but he's really embarrassed by it. He goes between telling women right up front, or not telling them at all. The problem is that after dating for 6 or 8 months, he takes a huge risk: if he tells them and she flips out, then they've both just wasted 8 months, and there's a lot of hurt on both sides. But he can't bring himself to mention it early because he doesn't want to "risk" losing a potential partner. His thinking seems to be that someone who's emotionally attached is more likely to stick around; unfortunately his experience seems to be just the opposite.

And look, we have to accept that some kinks are going to be easier to deal with than others. As they go, chastity play is probably pretty mild, at least, if approached as a game. I think that most people can deal with kinks when they look at them as something "fun" to do, instead of as a lifestyle choice. On the other hand, if you don't get that out of the way soon, then you're just begging for emotional heartache. I've read posts in other groups from people who have decided to get their kink issue out of the way by the third or fourth date. This way, if the potential partner isn't interested and they can part as friends.

Indiscrimination

Orgasm Denial and its cousin, Chastity Play, are kinks tangentially related to BDSM, although they are often practiced by folks who consider themselves to be "vanilla". OD can be practiced as a simple "tease and deny" game, which makes it appealing to both men and women who either don't or won't look at the underlying D/s dynamic.

And for the moment, we won't look at it, either.

A few years ago, my wife and I were negotiating some kind of sexual play that would satisfy my own desires for D/s, yet wouldn't make her feel ridiculous by squeezing into leather corsets and shouting orders (my jokes that it's not the "shouting orders" part that makes her feel ridiculous is usually met with a cold stare). As we talked about what might work, she mentioned that she used to enjoy it when I wore one of my home-made chastity devices because she liked the idea of being in charge of when I would get to have sex (further jokes along the lines that she's usually in charge of that anyway were again met with cold stares). Having a machine shop to play with allowed me to build a device that was a cross between the vaunted CB-2000 and a Stallion Guard, although it was uncomfortable to wear for long periods. Accordingly, we purchased the (at the time) new CB-3000. I've made some modifications to the device to enhance the comfort and security for long-term wear, but in general it has worked well for us. It does not create unsightly bulges under street clothes, and once my body adapted, I became able to wear it for very extended periods without removal.

But this isn't about our experiments in "enforced" chastity.

I subscribe to a number of web groups dealing with Orgasm Denial and Chastity Play; at first because I was hungry for information, and later because my own research and experimentation allowed me to pass along some tips, tricks, and thoughts on the idea of chastity. I've become a fairly regular contributor in about a half-dozen groups, and as I read the posts that come in looking for support or answers, I've noticed a trend that disturbs me a bit: the chastity groups seem to attract "Do/me subs" who, despite the fact that they rarely have a significant other in their lives, are only too happy to pass along their ideas of what chastity, orgasm denial, and general submissiveness "should" be, seemingly without regard for how relationships tend to work in real life.

I confess that after seeing this for several years, I'm still amazed that men write to these web groups professing their indiscriminating desire for a woman - apparently any woman - who will keep them permanently "locked up (the vernacular in the Chastity community for being kept in a device), and "forced" to dress in women's clothes, to be a "sissy maid", to have them take other lovers, and to be humiliated in dozens of other ways that would surely end a more "normal" relationship in a New York minute. Generally I avoid comment - there's an unspoken rule in the kink world that one does not jump all over another person's kink, no matter how distasteful it may be to you. After all, what would your parents or grandparents, your pastor, or your cow-orkers say about your own kink?

But the other day somebody posted a variation of the above-mentioned messages in several of the groups to which I subscribe, which read in part:

I am going to be honest and blunt to the point

I have decided to spend the rest of my life in pursuit of one goal and that goal is to live for a womans pleasure and in such a way to maximize her pleasure and happiness to the actual exclusion of any for me....I think the best phrase to simplify this thought is that I dont have to cum as you cum for the two of us....looking for someone to help me achieve this goal and who might be selfish enough to have it as her own goal....anyway ..would love to talk to you ....

Leaving aside for the moment my pet peeves of bad spelling and grammar, I read this several times trying to get into the mindset of someone who would post this. Then I tried to get into the mindset of someone who would want this for themselves. I gave up, and then gave in to my first impulse. I posted a response, for which I'm expecting to get my wrist slapped by the group moderator:

I read this and all I could think was "How sad for both you and this undetermined woman."

What you've essentially done is to post a personal ad saying "I don't care who you are as long as you indulge in my self-denial kink."

Seriously, while you use all the pleasant and flowery terms, the fact is that you're merely offering yourself up to pretty much any woman that comes along. How would an offer like that make any woman (or man) feel special and worthy of such an offer? It smacks of someone who has so little self-worth or value that they don't seem to care who takes them up, so long as they get to fulfill their own little fantasy with some nameless mistress.

I can't imagine what would motivate a woman to take you up on this.

I've been flamed in the past for responding to messages in such a way as to rain on somebody's parade. I don't know what came over me, but I just had to say it. I'll admit that this is partly fueled by my own enjoyment of this kink as something that can stay on the vanilla/kink border; and that the men looking for indeterminate women to humiliate them will eventually become the majority in this community, turning off the couples who are looking to try something new to spice up their vanilla sex lives. I've corresponded with probably a couple of dozen newbies who had questions about denial and chastity, but did not want to get involved in any BDSM. I think that reading posts like the ones above would probably scare them off.

Lately I've been reading the similar reactions to the Domme-less subs from other bloggers, including the ever-articulate Richard Evans Lee who seems to be as tired of the men who can't separate their fantasy D/s life from the real world as I am. It makes me think that perhaps I need to take a break from the web group world in order to regain some perspective.

By the way, this post represents the first departure from my Live Journal blog. I had been mirroring the LJ posts here, and I may continue to do so, but I will probably keep this web log for the more specialized topics and the more kink-related topics.

Sometimes being a grown-up really sips through a straw

Years ago, before I had kids, I saw some cartoon in which the parents - upon discovering that their various children had sleepovers or were out for the evening - said "Ok great, let's do something we don't get to do when they're home!" In the last panel it shows them going to be early and falling asleep.

Before I had children, I used to think that was a pretty stupid cartoon.

The stepson is pretty much moved out of the house; "pretty much" being defined as he sleeps at his girlfriend's place and has moved a portion of his clothes there. In fact, he rarely comes home except to interrupt important conversations with my wife, or to store his musical equipment, raid the fridge, do laundry, etc. He's been out for about a month or so.

And this week our daughter is at a sleepover camp. First time for her. Entire week.

So, you know what that means. Yep, we both worked late and came home exhausted.

I borrowed the company pickup and overloaded the back with old branches from some pruning I did over the weekend. Then I drove it back to work and dumped the brush over the embankment on our property. I got home about 8:30 pm, minutes before Mrs. Edge who was trying to catch up on paperwork undone because of her vacation a couple of weeks ago.

I showered and cleaned my new piercing (did I mention my new frenum piercing?), then I heated up the leftovers from our half-eaten dinners from the nice restaurant the night before, added some steamed broccoli and cauliflower, and we had dinner at 9 pm. Then she took more paperwork into bed to read. I checked my messages and locked up the house. We were probably both sleeping by 10:30 for the first time in months. In fact, I suddenly dozed off while reading an old Travis McGee story on my Palm Pilot, dropping the device on my chest, startling the both of us. That was funny because usually she nods off before I do.

Anyway, we were both more well rested this morning. Hope it lasts until tonight.

Yes, we have no bananas today

Unbelievably, I don't have some sex-related observation to make today. In fact, I'm willing to wager that after my piercing heals that I'll be a bit less obsessive about my wang and will actually be able to hold conversations with regular, normal people.

For those of you - those very, very, very few of you - wondering about my wang: I got nuthin' for ya. Sorry.

Today we drove the daughter up to sleepover camp. We hung out to make sure that she'd be okay (she's an independat, introverted type like her dad, poor thing), and we took the long scenic route home through the undeveloped woodsy parts of the state, and on the way home I thought it would be nice to stop at a nice restaurant for dinner, since we wouldn't have to worry about a sitter. Then we hit the grocery store, and when we got home I cut up a pineapple that's been sitting for a week, and I made a kick-ass smoothie. Pineapple chunks, strawberries, orange juice, vanilla yogurt, some ice. Aaahhhh, delicious.

Now it' s10:30 and we're gonna head off to bed and chill. I'll soak my wang for a few minutes, and read some more Travis McGee.

*woot* - It works! - *woot*

Okay, here's the sitch: The daughter is at a sleepover, so my wife and I get the house to ourselves. Cool, right? She tells me this at 6:15 pm, so I'm thinking in an hour we'll be on our way out to dinner and home early for some well-earned playtime. Haven't been in the mood since last Thursday because I've been too sore from my new piercing (did I mention that I've got a new piercing?) .

Unfortunately, she ends up having to work late. :-(

No worries, I get ready to go out for dinner, and she brings DD to her friend's house - where her mother (one of my wife's friends) begins venting about her own husband, their marital problems, how they haven't had sex in a year, they never talk to each other, money woes, etc. Not realizing this, I'm leaning back in a chair reading an old Travis McGee novel and beginning to doze off, when she finally gets home at 8:30 or so. She thinks I'm still in the bathroom getting ready, so she settles into the living room to read the paper. I'm wondering what's taking her so long in the bathroom, until at 8:45 we finally get our act together and head out to a local dining spot, hoping that the kitchen will still be open. We have dinner and wine, but by the time we get home I'm starting to snooze and I want a shower and some sleep.

But just when the evening looks wasted, I perk up slightly from the shower. We're both in bed, and I'm showing off my piercing. Then she pulled out a letter she had recently found, something that I'd written to her back in 1989 - back when we were dating. It was an erotic tale, not one of my best (and why the hell didn't I use paragraph spacing? I hate that!), and before long we were both feeling interested enough to make an attempt at some kind of sex. My firm - very firm, in fact - erection didn't seem to bother the piercing. So, what the hell, right? We have a strap-on harness which I carefully donned, and chose one of the realistic fleshy dildos, and in a few minutes we were experimenting. She was concerned that the straps or unusual bending might catch the barbell, but fortunately everything went along pretty smoothly. So, after she'd had a few orgasms in a couple of different positions, I upped the ante.

"I've got some condoms in the drawer. Maybe we could try this out and see how the barbell feels inside."

We talked about if for a minute, but figured that if it was starting to hurt, then I could just carefully withdraw and we'd go to Plan B (Rule No. 2: There is always a Plan B). So I removed the fleshy, silicone thing and unwrapped a Trojan Extra-sensitive, and then began the comical task of unrolling the very snug latex over a very sensitive piercing. Damn, now I understand why some guys lose it when putting one of those things on! I ended up needing to unroll extra and carefully stretch the rolled ring over the sides of the barbell. And then some of the creases caught some spare skin, and then I couldn't adjust it... I was lucky to retain half an erection by the time I finished.

For those non-savvy about piercings, it's recommended to use a condom to keep germs and secretions out of the fresh hole, and also to help keep the barbell from moving around and stretching the skin.

Anyway, a few minutes of making out again, and I was ready to go. My wife claimed to be pretty well lubricated (she wasn't lying), and so we began. I guided myself carefully, until my head was just at her entrance. To get a little more control I shifted to the "push-up" position, and slowly eased my engorged head deeper into her, until I could feel her lips just start to close around me. A slight sudden pinch, and then I was in. I pushed in a bit further and stopped. A little more. A little more. A little... ooch! Okay, that's far enough!

It was slow going, but worthwhile. The metal pin held the sensitive underside of my cock out a little further than I am used to, and even with the condom there was some movement of the barbell against the thin skin around the holes. We found a comfortable positions, and continued. I think she may have had a small orgasm, and we stopped after five or ten minutes. At some point she tried to raise her hips to get me into her a little deeper, but that hurt, so we took a break. We ended up swapping positions, and she got on top. I made her move - an inch back, no up, no a little frontways... ah, that's better - and she carefully rode me until I was very close to the orgasmic edge. Since she was concerned that I would lose my sensitivity, but even with the condom I was feeling everything in glorious Technicolor. I wondered if I was just overly sensitive because of the new-ness of the piercing.

Naturally I asked how it felt to her; in the missionary positions she can feel the balls slide in on the bottom just after my head slides in on top. She claimed to feel the balls slightly deeper in, too, and it was enjoyable. She wondered if it might not feel sore after a half hour or more, but I think that with some lube and no condom it should be better. While she was on top she could still feel them nudging her inside. I had to ask her several times not to get too carried away, and in fact, I had a moment in which I just couldn't help raising my own hips and it pinched like hell! Dammit, that pinched! We stopped for a few moments, and continued, since I was pretty close to the edge. Apparently she was pretty close as well, because I told her that if she wanted I would be willing to wait a few more days before coming. She went over the edge seconds later, and - according to one of our new rituals - after I asked for her permission, so did I. Wow! It lasted almost a full minute and was very intense, even though I had been trying to move as absolutely as little as possible. Damn, I hope they're all like that one!

In the past I've complained that after sex she immediately gets up for a towel, so there was some irony in that this time I was the one who hopped out of bed. I had another few moments of comedy as I now tried to get the damn condom off - again, trying to stretch the rolled ring around each bead. And again, I pinched my already sore frenum, and checked carefully for pulls or torn skin. Everything looked okay, so I gave it a warm rinse and a quick saline soak before returning to bed. We talked about it for a few minutes and then went to sleep. I tried sleeping commando, as it my habit, but I woke up at some point and got nervous that in my tossing and turning I'd catch the barbell, so I slipped on my new boxers and went back to sleep.

This morning I woke up with a major woody, so I'm pretty certain that everything is going to be working just fine.

Oh, and we were going to take pictures last night, but sort of forgot about them in the playtime. That's okay, it's still a teeny bit discolored - a few more days should clear that up.

TMI - More Healing

Okay, this sounds stupid, but today I used a urinal for the first time in a week. Yay, me!

Wimmins don't realize the sheer amount of manhandling that we mens gotta do in order to relieve ourselves. I mean, sure, it looks easy, just stand up, unzip and let go, right? The problem is trying to manuever the equipment over the minefields of elastic waistbands while sharp metal zipper teeth lie in wait on the sides.

Okay, normally this isn't a problem, but for the last week I really didn't want to risk even further pain and bruising to the most tender part of my body.

A New Convert

Okay, I'll admit that I was mistaken. I like boxers.

A long time ago I had tried some scratchy, bulky boxer shorts and I hated them Uh. They got tangled up in the legs of my jeans, they rubbed the wrong way, the seams scratched me, and I had to keep sticking my hands down my pants to adjust the legs. Pain in the friggin' ass.

But as I mentioned a couple of days ago, my frenum piercing was rubbing and feeling irritated (I did mention my new piercing, right?), and by the end of the day I would be very uncomfortably shifting and adjusting my crotch. And the area was red and feeling raw. Grr.

So the other night when I was walking in the door, my wife was walking out to pick up some little things at the local W*lm*rt, so I decided to join her. I spent a good fifteen minutes of my life that I'll never get back digging through the racks of underwear for cotton boxers. Not the poly/cotton blends, but 100% cotton. What cracks me up was that out of the four rows of Haynes and BVD and several other brands, the overwhelming majority of boxers were in Large and X-Large sizes, with the next greatest number being in Small. What the hell? I managed to find only half a dozen 3-packs of Mediums, several of which were some gawd-awful pattern, or had some reason that I didn't like them. I picked one of the two packages that looked okay, mumbling that I was only doing this so my piercing (did I mention my piercing?) would heal properly and that I'd be able to get through the workday without having to wear a kilt.

The next day, I wore some loose, baggy shorts (I have a pocket fetish, so I wear cargo shorts) and could feel the breeze coming up my thigh. Several times I stood over the floor grates for the A/C and let the cool breeze air things out.

Aaaaahhhhhhh!

I'm wearing a pair while I type this - dark red ones. Mmmm, the cool breeze from the open window is flowing up one side and out the other. It's almost better than going commando.

This weekend I'm going back to get a few more pairs.

TMI - Healing

Damn, all day yesterday the pierced area was irritating me. Not hurting, just itchy and uncomfortable, and I just couldn't get any position that felt okay.

Most guys tend to be comfortable with their penis hanging slightly to the left or right (I'm a lefty), and I kept reaching my had into my shorts to adjust myself to hang right to see if that would help. Nada.

Anyway, last night I had a nice shower, hung out in some loose exercise shorts (commando underneath, of course) and felt much better when I woke up. Got dressed for work, but my underwear on (BVD briefs), and started feeling irritated again. I reached down to adjust myself and then I realized: it's the stubble! I didn't notice it with my fingers yesterday, but this morning I did. Obviously, my frenum being much more sensitive, it was getting too rough, especially with snug underwear keeping things in such close contact. So I gave myself a quick hot compress and did a quick shave around the base and the front of my testicles.

See, I shave two or three times a week; the last time was Thursday afternoon, right before I went to the piercing studio. I hadn't wanted to shave because I didn't want to irritate the area, but apparently the area was irritating itself. I feel a little better this morning, although I'm going to look for looser underwear later on. I just read the aftercare instructions from Tribaletic, and while they're pretty much the same as the ones I got from Green Man, it does mention that tight clothing could irritate the piercing and that one should wear loose clothing while it's healing.

I guess that means boxers instead of briefs, huh?

This won't hurt a b... Ouch!

My friends from SSG keep asking about pictures. Here's the scoop: Quite a few months back, I thought it would be cool to get a frenum piercing for my birthday in June. I sort of chickened out, but only by a little. I checked out the various online groups and forums to find which studio in the area was most reliable. I settled on one, Green Man Studios (greenmantattoo.com), and late on Thursday afternoon my wife and I drove to West Hartford.

Here's my slightly edited Usenet post about the experience:

Okay, I'm crazy. I finally did it. This afternoon, about 4 pm. It's obvious that I'm hitting the middle aged crazy mark.

The wife and I drove up to a place in West Hartford that had been recommended on several online groups and by word-of-mouth. I had 3 to pick from, but frankly, driving by one of them really put me off because the location was kind of icky. I'm sure it adds to the atmosphere, but I crossed it off the list. I flipped a coin between the other two.

The woman at the desk took down some info, including needing to see my driver's license to make sure that I'm old enough and don't need my mom's permission. ⁽¹⁾ We went to a clean and professional looking room upstairs, where I immediately had to ask for the men's room. Five minutes later I was okay. Funny, I wasn't nervous until then.

We went over some of the choices, and I opted for a 10 gauge, 5/8" (16mm) stainless steel barbell. She said it was a pretty typical size and shape for a frenum piercing.

My wife was very interested and supportive, but not enough to opt for her own. Maybe next year. ;-)

For the technically minded, it was kind of interesting. She used a surgical clamp to hold the frenum (actually, about a 1/4" lower) skin, and spent a minute making marks to make sure that it ended up straight; that is, perpendicular to the axis. Despite the almost 100º heat outside, I had shrunken up as if I had just taken a dip in the Arctic Ocean. Geez, it's only a little piercing, nothing to get nervous about. Right?

So as I'm trying to regain my nerve, my wife pipes up to ask when I could get a PA or a few more to make a frenum ladder. As they start chatting, I interrupt to mention that maybe it would be a good idea to just let me get through *this* one first. Geez.

I vacillated between watching and closing my eyes, but it was hard to get a good view because I was leaning back against a medical bench. After I was cleaned and prepped, she took a needle that was shaped like a large, thick hypodermic (without the syringe part) and held it in position.

"Okay, take a deep breath, and let it out."

Inhale. Hold. Exha... "Ouch!"

"Okay, we're all done. That wasn't so bad, was it?"

I pried my fingers from around my wife's hand, and took another breath. It did sting, but it was less than a second. I nodded that I was okay, and said something to the effect that "I'm forty eight years old and I just pierced my cock. What the hell was I thinking?"

She gave me some instructions on aftercare, which I was pleased to see was pretty consistent with the stuff I'd read online and in some of the other groups. I spent the rest of the evening trying to keep things comfortable. It was probably four or five hours before I got the nerve to pee, and happily, everything looks fine. I've got my sea salt and other cleaning supplies, and except for some general soreness, I seem to be fine.

I was gonna take a before and after pic for my interested friends, but I figure that some are already feeling faint just reading this through there fingers.

Next up: maybe I need a tattoo!

⁽¹⁾ Remembering my mom's reaction when I pierced my ear back in 1979, I'm pretty sure that she'd refuse to give permission for getting a stud through any other part of my body. Interestingly, back then I was on the wild edge because I had an earring. Now I'm way behind the curve... although I'm pretty sure that none of my over-40 friends have one, and most of my under-30 friends don't either. I'm also pretty sure that most of my friends, no matter what age, would freak to hear this; I'm kind of conservative appearing and acting nowadays.

Okay, I guess I'm gonna actually have to take some pics before I can even discuss posting them.

Welcome to The Edge of Vanilla

For those of you reading my original blog "The Tao of Me", I've moved to this journal (taking some of my favorites from the old one) for two reasons.

One is that the BloggerBeta was giving me some technical problems that made things inconvenient. I'm all about simplifying my life, and instead of hacking everything, it seemed easier to start from scratch.

The other is that the title of this blog is a better reflection of the direction that I'd like to see my journal take; an exploraton of sexuality and relationships, but with an acknowledgement that my own sexuality and thoughts and desires tend toward areas that seem to be just outside of the mainstream.

For old readers and those that know me through other groups and forums: thanks for continuing with your support and feedback.

For those who have just discovered me: I hope that this will be interesting enough for you to become regular readers.

Tom Allen