text:
Buy your tickets in advance on Eventbrite for an extra ticket in the door prize giveaway! Door prizes include Pink & White queer porn DVDs and Tantus silicone toys!
The Gender Book's crowdfunding campaign is funded! But you should still go buy a copy for yourself right now
I am extraordinarily excited about the official launch of printed, finalized copies of The Gender Book!
The Gender Book is a project by Robin Mack, Jay Mays, and rife (yes, my rife), who have been working on it for years, literally years, along with hundreds of folks who have contributed and offered constructive criticism along the way. The whole project has been released one page at a time for anyone interested in commenting and giving feedback. Because of that, it's more than just one book written and illustrated by three folks—it's a community collaboration, one that has been generated (I mistyped "genderated," hah) by the communities that the book attempts to explain.
This is a big deal.
I have never seen another book like this out there. There are no genderqueer or trans or nonbinary primers in the way that this book attempts—and in my opinion, succeeds—in being.
Robin, Jay, and rife don't have any specific gender credentials. They don't have gender degrees, they don't get paid to study this stuff. This book was a community service. They looked around and saw that there was a significant lack of a clear, concise primer on non-binary gender, and decided to take on the project to make one. Partly because they didn't have their own research to rely on, they turned to the communities, and launched surveys to get content for the book. Hundreds of people responded to the surveys, and the book has been slowly built from the data, and from the experiences of rife, Jay, and Robin's lives in the genderqueer and trans and gender non-conforming communities—with their friends and lovers and acquaintances.
See first, they made a mini Gender Book, now called the Gender Booklet. It was just a quickie, but that was so successful they decided to make a full-length full-color book. The book has been available as a PDF download for free from thegenderbook.com since the first draft was complete, though it has never been available in print.
Drumroll please … Until now!
Pre-order the book now, and support their crowdfunding campaign to get this
Here's The Gender Book's origin story according to the creators:
Three years ago, my friends and I noticed a ton of discrimination and just a general lack of education around gender in our worlds. We said, "Why isn't there just a book you can hand your therapist and say here, read page 29 and you will understand, see you next week." Based on your site's content, I think you know what I mean. We thought there should be a resource you can read in one sitting. It should be illustrated and as fun as a kid's book while going into some real depth and true stories. The book should help people come out and educate their friends and family. Surely a book like that exists, right?
Nope … It didn't at the time. We (a writer, an editor and a genderqueer artist-that'd be me!) decided to make our own book. After three years and countless hours of work, drawing, researching, editing and coloring pages, the manuscript is now complete and we're ready to go to press.
The Gender Book is launching a crowdfunding campaign in December to get printed hardback and paperback copies of the book made available to those who
The final book is 94 pages, includes the original, updated Gender Booklet as a tear-out, some reprints of the original surveys the book is based on, and more. It's made to be accessible to everyone—from queers inside the gender nonconforming communities to gay guys and lesbians who don't understand the new politics of gender to your grandma.
Check out some of my favorite images from the book:
There are other perks, too. Like for example, some prints of the creator's favorite pages from the book, custom art, coffee the creators—all sorts of things.
And, if you are so enamored of this project that you want to support it and help out, you can become a Gender Scout, which is the super exciting Gender Book street team, who earns badges doing things like writing poems about gender, making videos, or writing articles (like this one) to help spread the word about the book. I've had fun contributing things like this:
This is one of my favorite videos from The Gender Book, which shows the processing of making a page from start to finish, and is basically rife's creative process sped up 200 times to see it in fast-forward (make it full screen to get the full effect):
Also! As an added bonus, everything donated TODAY Dec 3rd will earn extra $$ from Indiegogo's #givingTuesday campaign. Sweet!
OH WAIT! UPDATE: The Gender Book has been fully funded! Holy crap you guys. I'm so excited to hold a book in my own hands in the spring!
(Also, did I mention that I bought the very first copy?! I'm so proud.)
(Also, did I mention that after the first 100 donors, rife did 100 pushups while our friend read out the first 100 donors' names? Hottt.)
BUT while that means that—whew—I won't be posting every day about how you should fund The Gender Book, you still should STEP ON IT and donate to get your copy of the book. This is the main (only?) way to get a copy, I don't know if it'll be printed again.
Hole Hunger
Too much time away from you and I get hungry for your holes. There are so many metaphors for "fitting"—puzzle pieces and two halves, the children of the sun and moon from Hedwig—but that would be too trite and I'm too jaded to believe we're "made for each other" or that it's been you I've been searching for all along.
"When the student is ready, the teacher will appear," a mentor of mine said just yesterday.
That doesn't stop me from saying those things to you anyway. They are fictive truths, things I stretch to be more romantic, much like telling you you're a filthy faggot slut or that you're mine, all mine, and I don't care what you want, I'm going to use you.
Of course the truth is, I do care.
Of course the truth is, we own ourselves the most.
Of course the truth is, well, you actually are a filthy faggot slut, so I have you on that one.
Of course the truth is, all relationships end, and who knows how long we'll have for ours. What I do know is that I will do my best to love you well, and that for you, for us, that means the hole-hunger I get from not filling you recently enough.
When I fill you, it is the most singular act I can do. It is the only thing I am doing, this focus on how much your body gives, how strong your muscles are, which are holding you up, which are holding me up, and how sacredly redeemable all things are in that moment of sliding in. We start again, like every day every breath. We open deeper, and in that opening find more strength and more of ourselves to give.
I do not understand my craving for a tight fit, resistance to my entry, those moments of giving in and giving over. I only know the thing that drives me, still, after all these years, through all heartache and loss and grief and strife and insecure creative hustle, is the ever-present faith of loving, and being loved, just right.
Do you like queer smut? Next week, I bet we can make you blush.
I'm really excited about the Best Lesbian Erotica reading that Amy & I are putting together! We picked up two big boxes of BLE from Cleis Press headquarters today and are almost completely ready for the big day.
The books look beautiful!
Our lineup is incredible!
I'm working on getting someone to record video—I do have some leads, but if you are in the Bay Area and want a comp ticket to go in exchange for helping with video recording, let me know please. I would love that. I'm trying to get more videos of my work up online.
It's an experiment, doing the release party with a kind of high cover price ($20 at the door) that includes the thing that the release party is for (a copy of Best Lesbian Erotica 2014). I'm not sure if that's going to mean more people show up, or less, or people show up and want to donate instead of getting a book + ticket (which we're allowing with our "no one turned away for lack of funds" policy). The general culture of book readings in New York and Seattle and (from what I can tell) San Francisco is that they should be free, and then that people will buy the book to support. But instead of that, we're including some other goodies (like door prizes! And wine & snacks!) and making sure that everybody gets a book.
Here's the details. I hope it'll be an incredible turnout! I'll be reading my story from the book, which also happens to be the lead (first) story, called "A Good Workout," which is my first published butch/butch erotica piece.
It's been interesting, changing my reputation and my perception to others as a "femme-oriented butch" to a faggot butch. I have pages and pages to say about that, but for now I just want to share that when I read this last year at an erotica reading, another butch who was reading after me stood up and declared, "I'm a REAL butch. I ONLY date femmes."
I was kind of speechless and stunned. It was definitely for audience laughs, for impact, and to set her apart from me and my story, but it also kind of stung. Plus, ugh, I really don't like anyone who uses the phrase "REAL ____" to try to describe how there is One True Way about just about anything, especially around gender.
I'll write a bit more about that later, but for now, just know that I've got a controversial faggoty butch story (set in the locker room at a gym) and I'm looking forward to sharing it with you all in person.
The holidays are upon us, and what better way to celebrate than with the brand spankin' new Best Lesbian Erotica 2014 West Coast release party! Each year, the Best Lesbian Erotica series captures some of the best smut stories by well-known and brand-new authors. Come hear readings from 2014's collection edited by Kathleen Warnock. Join us for an exciting reading from the new 2014 collection and beyond.
Featuring Amy Butcher, Jen Cross, Carol Queen, Sinclair Sexsmith, BD Swain, M'kali-Hashiki, Cheryl Dunye, Xan West, and Jiz Lee!
$20 at the door includes the price of a book!
Buy your tickets EARLY from Eventbrite and receive an EXTRA ticket in the door prize giveaway, featuring fancy silicone toys from TANTUS and queer porn DVDs from PINK & WHITE.
Books will be for sale—bring $15 extra and get yours signed by the contributors. As Kathleen always says: buy one for Grandma!
Queer Smut: Best Lesbian Erotica 2014 release party
Thursday, December 12, 2013, 7-9pm
Center for Sex & Culture
1349 Mission Street between 9th & 10th, San Francisco
Cost: $20
Includes a copy of the book Best Lesbian Erotica 2014
No one turned away for lack of funds
Get tickets now! Eventbrite
"Pick a hole. You know what happens next."
Content warning: This story contains Daddy/boy play, lots of ownership/possession, force, and some humiliation. Everything depicted is between consenting adults, intentional, and previously negotiated to be well known that this is what we want to play with. The whole thing is based on an actual morning text message exchange with rife, and edited to make it more of a story.
I wake him slow in the morning. Light comes in easy through the blinds, gold on his skin and the bed. Our limbs are tangled as they often are while we sleep together. He is in small little boy briefs and nothing else, which is what I prefer he wears while he sleeps, and one of our rules is to respect my preferences and execute them to the best of his ability. (The flip side of that is that it is my responsibility to suss out my preferences, and to make them clear and known. It's quite vulnerable, and transparent, more than I am used to being. And good practice.)
He shifts as I wake, getting out of bed to pee, drink water, and put my dick on. When I come back, he curls into my armpit and shoulder, snuggles his cute little boy butt up against me, pulls my arms around him tighter and sighs. Still drowsy and not really waking yet. He could cuddle for hours.
I let my mind wander to what I'll do to him, getting hard. He is soft and warm against me. I slip the tip of my finger into his mouth and he suckles in his sleep. Sucking and then drifting into sleep slowly, pausing, then sucking again.
"Good morning, little boy. it's not time to get up for school yet, but Daddy wants that ass of yours just for a little while. You've been wriggling against me all night."
"Ohhh. Daddy …"
"I like the way all my soft warm skin feels. When I wrap around you all night and you writhe and press, you get me so hard. Feel that, little faggot? You get Daddy hard. Pick a hole, little one. You know what happens next."
The quiz is here! What kind of s-type are you?
In preparation for a big project that Rife & I are creating, we looked around to find a really good online quiz that talked about the different kinds of submissive identity and what they meant, but the only ones we found were … well, not so great. So we decided to make our own!
Oh, and for those of you who don't know, the phrase "s-type" refers to the submissive, bottom, slave, or other type of person who gives up or gives over authority to another in D/s and other power dynamic structures. It's the umbrella term, to attempt to talk about that side of the power dynamic scale as a whole and lump y'all together. I know you're actually quite different in what you do and what you like, but for the sake of this quiz, you are all together for now.
And ta-da, here it is!
It is—disclaimer disclaimer—just for fun, and of course however YOU self-identify is precisely what your identity is. This is just for fun, and perhaps for the beginnings of more conversations or some explorations of what different kinds of s-type energies and pursuits you might have.
(One of the answers is "not an s-type," so those of you who aren't s-types, you are invited to take this too, if you want.)
And of course, for the record, it's hard to pick just ONE answer. Multiple answers in here probably fit for you, or you might say, "Well, I wouldn't do that unless it was protocol/unless my Dominant asked me to," but for the sake of the quiz, let's just suspend disbelief and pick the one you'd most like to do, assuming there is protocol or permission.
Etc etc identity is complicated, and no quiz can actually capture all the nuances that are the unique YOU. So it's just for fun.
If you feel so inspired, I would love to hear what you thought about it in the comments! Did you get the answer you thought you would? Does it match how you think of yourself? Is the description (somewhat) accurate to the category?
This is kind of the "soft launch," if you will, so I'd love to hear what you think.
The Secret New Project is so fucking close to ready, I am ITCHING to tell you all about it. I have a few more things to finish up (but I think I can finish those up today!), and then I'll be sending out some preliminary invitations to the new exciting ecourse that I'll be doing in January.
If you want to be among the first told about this new ecourse, join the mailing list. I'm going to send out the details there before I announce it here. (You can unsubscribe at any time, I don't sell your contact info duh, and I usually send out less than one email a month with some updates about what's going on in the Sugarbutch world.)
Ask Mr. Sexsmith: Tomboi vs RodeoH brief-style harness?
Dear Mr. Sexsmith,
Have you tried the Spare Parts Tomboi Harness? I saw your review of the RodeoH and agree with the lack of clit stimulation. I was wondering how the Tomboi compares. Would love your feedback before spending $80 on it if you have any!
Hi Luke!
Yes, I have tried the Tomboi harness. I think it's better than the RodeoH in fabric and fit—the RodeoH is so much cut like girl panties, not like boy briefs, that drives me nuts particularly. But just like the RodeoH, there's no particular tight fabric that goes near my bits like on a regular harness (of any fabric), and it really doesn't do much for my own stimulation. The hole for the dildo to go through is also quite high—most harnesses are made for them to ride on the pubic bone, not get right aligned with the clit or lower, so it's hard to have sensation from the back of the cock/base of the cock, too.
Your milage may vary, of course! And both the RodeoH and Tomboi leave pretty decent room for good access under a cock for your own bits to be stimulated, so that is a plus for a lot of people.
But for me, I know I need a lot of direct contact, kind of hard, and often repeated, so it's really hard for me to use any brief or underwear harnesses to have enough stimulation to get off. I definitely think the Tomboi is better quality and will last much longer (I've had RodeoH's fall apart after just one or two times through the washer). Still, it's a lot. If you are going to invest, I'd wait for one of those sales days that Babeland or Good Vibes has—often online, often around the holidays—and at least cut it down in price.
I do think it's super fun for packing and wearing a dick out. Oh—and I do think wearing a cock that has balls can sometimes increase the sensation, too, since sometimes the balls hang low enough to stimulate me a little more. Just one last thought
I hope that's helpful! And hope you find a good harness that works well for you.
The Spareparts Tomboi briefs harness
Coming Out Genderqueer: An Open Letter to My Family & Friends
As published on Facebook, where I could tag at least 20 of 'em.
Dear family & friends,
Especially friends from my childhood and high school years who have found me for whatever reasons on Facebook, and family with whom I'm not particularly close, and coworkers from previous jobs who I have perhaps never had this chat with:
I have something to tell you: I'm genderqueer. That means I live my day-to-day life somewhere between "man" and "woman," often facing all sorts of daily interactions where the general public doesn't "get" my gender, from kids in the grocery store asking, "are you a boy or a girl?" and their mom hushing them and turning away, to little old ladies in the women's room staring wide-eyed and backing out of the restroom slowly, only to then return with a confused and self-protective look on their face, to service industry folks saying, "Can I help you, sir? Uh, ma'am? Uh … ?"
That confusion, that in-between state, is precisely it. That's who I am. I'm neither, and both. I'm in-between.
You may already know this about me, just from following me on Facebook and doing whatever sleuthing you've done about my projects. You probably know I'm queer. But, if you want to know, I'm going to explain a few more things about my gender for a minute.
If you want to delve a little deeper into my particular gender, I consider myself butch, I identify as masculine, and I consider genderqueer part of the "trans*" communities, using trans-asterisk as the umbrella term to encompass, well, anybody who feels in-between. I've been identifying as "butch" for a long time—perhaps you've heard me use this word, an identity I consider to mean a masculine-identified person who was assigned female at birth. I consider myself masculine, but as I delve further into gender politics and theory and communities, the boxes of "woman" and "man" feel too constricting and limiting for me to occupy them comfortably.
I have for years thought that it was extremely important for people like me—masculine people with a fluid sense of gender and personality traits, who don't feel limited by gender roles or restricted by gender policing—should continue to identify as women as a political act, as a way to increase the possibilities of what "woman" can be. That's really important. And I still believe that is true, and heavily support that category.
Problem is, "woman" has never fit me. I had bottomless depression as a teenager (perhaps some of you remember I was sent to the principal's office once for "wearing too much black"), plagued often by the idea of "woman" and adult womanhood. I could not understand who I would be in that context. And honestly, I still can't.
But—even though it is in some ways harder, living outside of the gender norms—this in-between makes so much sense to me.
ON PRONOUNS (This part is important.)
For a few years now, I've been stating, when asked, that I prefer the third-person pronouns they and them when referring to me. That means, if you're speaking of me in a sentence, you'd say, "They are about to walk the entire Pacific Crest Trail, it's true," or "Did you hear they just published another book?" or, "I really like spending time with them."
See? Easy.
Lately, when people ask what my preferred pronoun is, I have been saying, "I prefer they and them, but all of them are fine and I don't correct anybody." I don't mind the other pronouns. They don't irk me. But when someone "gets" it, and honors the they/them request, it makes me feel seen and understood.
There are other options for third-person pronouns which are gender neutral—or rather, not he or she. "They" is the one that I think, as a writer, is the easiest for me to integrate into sentences. I completely believe in calling people what they want to be called (that has always been one of my mom's great mom-isms), so I always do my best to respect pronouns, but I still struggle with the conjugations and the way those words fit in a sentence.
Some people—particularly those (ahem like me) who were English majors and for whom grammar rules are exciting—think the "singular they," as it's called, is grammatically incorrect. But it's not. It's actually been used in literature for hundreds of years. Here's one particular article on the Singular They and the Many Reasons Why It Is Correct. Read up, if that intrigues you.
I haven't sat any of my family—immediate or extended—down and said, Hi, I'd like you to use they/them pronouns for me. I don't generally tell people that unless they ask. I've been thinking a lot lately about why I haven't told you, what I'm afraid of, and what is keeping me from this conversation.
I'm not particularly afraid that you won't "get it" or that you won't honor it. If you don't, that's actually okay. I am part of some amazing trans* and genderqueer and gender-forward communities full of activism, respect, advocacy, and understanding, and I'm very lucky to feel whole and respected in that work.
And really, I believe that the very vast majority of you actually really wants to know, wants to honor my choices. I think you are probably curious about this. But for whatever reason, my (and probably your) west coast sensibilities are keeping us from having a direct conversation.
So, here ya go. It's not particularly personal, but it's the beginnings of something, and it's my offering to you to talk about this, if you want to.
See the thing is, by not having this conversation with you, by not giving you the opportunity to respect my gender and pronouns (even if you think it's weird-ass and strange and don't get it), I'm limiting our intimacy. I'm not giving you all the chance to really know me. And maybe … you want to. Maybe this will open up something new between us.
Or maybe you'll just go, "Huh. Okay. Whatever." That's fine too.
If you have questions, or want to talk about all this gender stuff, I am open to that. Ask away. (You don't always get a free pass to ask weird questions, so you might want to utilize this opportunity.) But before you do, you might want to check out The Gender Book for some basic terminology, concepts, and ideas.
Sorry I haven't told you yet. I've been telling myself that it "isn't that important," but actually it's been a barrier between us, in some minor big ways.
That kid who was in English class with you in high school,
Your former coworker,
Your cousin,
Your nibling (did you know that's the gender neutral term for neice or nephew??),
Your grandkid,
The older sibling of your childhood friend,
Your best friend from 6th grade,
That queer who was crushed on you before they knew they were queer,
PS: Feel free to steal this idea for your own Facebook pages.
Review: Rug Beater Paddle, independent toy maker on Etsy
The first thing that comes to mind when I consider what to tell you about this handsome Rug Beater Paddle by Kink Nerd Toys is something rife said recently: "I wouldn't give it to a beginner." It is a mean, intense instrument that hurts—more than you would expect—and can do some serious bruising.
Check it out.
I highly recommend bottoming to any impact toy before you use it on other people. Of course, everyone's reaction to a toy is different, so you may love it or hate it and someone else may feel the opposite, but regardless, you'll have a better sense of how it feels, what kind of impact it has on your body, and then how you would use it on others.
Some of the marks this toy left on rife:
A few of my thoughts and tips about this toy:
* Start slow. Really slow. Much slower than you think you should. Wait until they arch into it and are really ready for it to go any harder.
* Try beating in some small patterns: five rapid very soft, then three slower and medium hard, then five more soft. Or five soft, one hard. Or fifteen soft, three hard. Experiment.
* It's quite hard, so I would only use it on pretty dense, fleshy parts of the body. I've used it on rife's ass and thighs primarily. Using it elsewhere seems too intense, and that there's not enough muscle or flesh to absorb the strong impact it makes.
* It leaves beautiful marks. If you have someone who marks easily, this might make little knotwork patterns in their flesh. Gorgeous. Rife doesn't particularly mark easily, and it leaves marks on him fairly well.
* Great toy to explore sadism and masochism. It definitely got my inner sadist riled up to see him squirming in pain, trying to take the beating well, both of us testing out the limits of what we can give and receive.
I love having this toy in my toy box, and will definitely use it again. Particularly when I want to give a painful beating, when I want to leave marks, when I want to go slow and work up the bottom to taking a lot.
It's a great price for something this mean. If impact play, pain, sadism & masochism, and beatings are the kinds of things you like, I highly recommend the Rug Beater Paddle.
And hey, isn't some consumer holiday coming up really soon? Check out all the stuff by Kink Nerd Toys—Kimber makes all kinds of things and they're quite affordable. Excellent way to build a more varied toy bag without spending a whole lot of money!
Thanks for the paddle, Kimber! I've been getting lots of use out of it.
The Great Reader Mini-Interview of 2013, Part 5: In which you recommend Stone Butch Blues & Fried Green Tomatoes, and give good advice
What's your relationship with sugarbutch.net and Sinclair?
—Alison, http://a1tg.tumblr.com
I still think some of my favorite posts are erotica, but I also know that the theoretical posts have changed my life in a completely literal sense and now that I am growing into my own versions of an alternative gender identity and kinky identity, they are more important to me. But mostly, it's just the whole thing. Everything you do lets me know that somewhere in this world are people that think like me.
—Roux, http://www.queerlyroux.com
—Emily, https://twitter.com/EmLuft
What advice would you give your younger self about sex, gender, or relationships?
What one resource has had the most impact on you, and why?
Anything else to add?
—Roux, http://www.queerlyroux.com
—Emily, https://twitter.com/EmLuft
Video: Sinclair reads Five Blow Jobs (And oh yeah, hi)
Hello I'm back!
I've returned from Seattle, after teaching a handful of classes and visiting friends and having a day-long meeting for a new exciting collaborative adventure (more news of that coming soon).
Rife came with me and we brainstormed all sorts of things for another new exciting thing that he and I are going to be running in January (if you're signed up for my newsletter, you already know that I revealed the first inkling of what I'm planning there at the beginning of November. And I'll be sending out an invitation via the newsletter before posting it here generally, so if you want to know, sign up!).
What these new exciting 2014 goals also mean is: my fall 2013 touring is OVER. I loved visiting everyone in so many places and having so many great conversations (Hi Lauren! Hi Aaron & Lila! Hi Taffy! Hi Stephanie! Hi Che! Hi Katie aka the girl that won the porn! Hi Adriana & Appy & Ebony! Hi Jing!). I'm traveling—for pleasure!—for winter solstice, but aside from that, I won't be back on the road until the spring.
I have a love-hate relationship with traveling/touring. I know it looks all glamorous from the outside, and I know for years I've always heard musicians (especially, since we always had Rolling Stone in my house growing up) saying it isn't all that great, you spend so much time alone on a bus. And that's one of those things that I've always said, Ya know, I believe you, but I'd also kind of like to experience that for myself. Not that I expected them to be wrong, just that I still wanted to see what that was like.
It was easier to tour when I was based in New York. I wanted out of that city as often as possible. Now that I'm in a city where (I think) I actually want to be for a while, it's harder to leave, harder to be far away. I want a routine at home, I want a workout schedule, I want a work schedule, I want the same thing for breakfast every day for a week because it's easy and filling and good. I want to get up and have my morning routine all set and go for a run and shower and meditate and write something before I even look at Facebook.
So that's some of my goals for the rest of November (which is only ten days! Ahh!) and December and January until I start traveling again. I want to write more. Hone my routine. (And hopefully fight off this cold that I can feel is brewing.) I have a pile of questions to answer and ideas to follow through with. I'm really looking forward to being at my desk and figuring some of this stuff out.
I'm going to try to get more videos up in general—more of my spoken word performances, more of my teachings, and more Ask Mr. Sexsmith questions answered by video. Amazing the quality that some little hand-held phone device can record these days, isn't it? I just keep saying, "We live in the future." The things we can do right now … I just think it's really cool.
Rife took video of my performance at Good Vibrations for The Big Book of Orgasms release party last week (last week! Was that only last week? Feels like a month ago), so it's here for your viewing pleasure. It's me reading the rife story Five Blow Jobs, which as you may or may not remember is dirty story.
DailyCal wrote up a review of the reading and said this about me:
That would be this story. "The most edgy story by far"? I'm not so sure about that—many of them were awesome and intense. Though I guess not a lot of them were kinky, most of them were about straight-up sex, so maybe that's why this writer said that about mine.
Okay that's enough introduction, don'tcha think? Thanks rife for recording this. Hope y'all enjoy.
Protected: A poem I've been writing for eighteen months
Review: Bondage cuff and bow tie by Rand Leather
Rand Leather (on etsy or on follow on tumblr) is a one-man-show out of Maine where Matthias Rand makes all kinds of leather goods from scratch. In addition to these bondage cuffs and bow ties (which I'll tell you more about in a minute), I've also seen chest harnesses, suspenders, and even leather dresses that he's made.
If you liked that Aslan Leather binder harness that I posted recently, but you want something a little differently shaped, check out Rand Leather's binder harnesses. They are custom built and beautiful.
The cuff and bow tie were the items Rand Leather sent to me to check out.
First: the bondage cuff!
I love it. I wear it often. I love that it is an accessory that is also a toy and tool. See, it unwraps from around the wrist to have two square-rings (what do you call them? Square o-rings? Square metal bits?) along the leather that, when you snake the other end through in an S shape, makes a pair of handcuffs.
It works exactly like a bondage belt, only miniature!
It's become one of my staple outfit pieces at recent leather events and I've worn it at IMsL, Northern Exposure, and Queer Invasion (to name a few this year). (Also, that tells you I've been really behind on reviewing. Sorry!)
Now: the bow tie!
It has not become the staple to my fancy leather dress collection that I would have expected. I think mostly that's because I've discovered that I just don't like wearing bow ties that much. I love the look on other people, and I keep thinking that I could rock it if I just had the right one, but it doesn't quite fit. Too nerdy? I mean, I am pretty nerdy. Maybe it's the proportions.
I think part of it, too, is that I have a pretty large chest and I don't like having things on my neck or upper chest. It's hard enough just binding, which often pushes my breasts up higher in order to flatten them and makes wearing a tie right under my chin really uncomfortable.
The bonus is, it looks really really adorable on rife. So here he is modeling the beautiful leather bow tie.
These pieces are both available on Rand Leather's Etsy store, and both the bondage cuff and the leather bow tie come in other colors!
How things start to melt open
After the poem "The Last Time I Slept in This Bed" by Sara Peters
If you've ever ripped apart your own body
in order to find the missing sugar cubes
you are certain you once stored
in your throat, you know what it feels like
to stay too long in a bed that no longer
comforts and enshrines you in a velvet
black sleep, allowing your individual
download and collective restart.
Once you find the point of entry,
pray it open until it is a gaping maw,
a cavern as wide as the world, that could
fit all of your broken hearts in just
one glimmer of rainbow. A silver needle
can stitch that right up. Every scar
on the right side of your body, every
stretch mark on your left. You have
no reason to stay, unless you are
secretly tied to the moon and unable
to stop her shine from creeping
toward your wrists when the velvet curls.
It is not an original practice to wallow
in grief, to become stuck thigh-deep
in tar wearing cement boots. Don't
smash your own feet with sledgehammers
to move on. Maybe instead just insert
the tip of the parasol, let it sink
until you can work it deep
under the surface of all that has you
held back, and open it. You can use it
as the easiest magic carpet. You can bet
that spring will come as the world turns,
as she always has, for the entirety
of this planet's thoroughest days.
Review: Love Bump, aka Shilo's Balls by New York Toy Collective
I have long ranted and raved about Shilo, the pack and play dildo by New York Toy Collective, but I haven't much mentioned Shilo's Balls, offically called the Love Bump.
I had my hesitations about the Love Bump. It's kind of odd to be able to add and remove the balls from the dick, kind of … disembodies them in a way that is weird. I have had mixed feelings about balls in general, through my 15+ years (!!) of using a strap on for sex. In the beginning, I was often shamed by my partners for wanting dicks with balls, or for wanting anything that looked realistic. It was deemed "not lesbian enough" and only very non-realistic looking dicks were approved in that relationship.
Now, there is nothing wrong with wanting a dick that doesn't look realistic. If that's what you want, I totally support that. But in my book, it's not okay to shame someone for wanting something that you don't want. I'd love to encourage us to talk about things in terms of "our personal likes and dislikes" rather than "why someone else liking something that I don't like is bad and wrong."
As the trans movements have grown in the recent decades, so too have the options of realistic looking strap on dicks in feminist and queer toy stores. More and more of the dicks are realistically shaped and colored. I've heard a lot of folks wanting for less realistic colors lately, actually. (Which is why it's exciting that NYTC is offering the Shilo in other colors!)
And as the options have shifted, and my own sexuality has evolved, and as I've had more permission to be cock-centric and cock-based in my sexual play, I've been gravitating more and more toward strap on dicks that roughly match my (white) skin tone, realistic shapes, and balls.
I like how the balls feel. I like the weight. I like how my underwear cups them a little bit, and holds them, cradling. I like having them sucked on and played with. I like how they hang and smack against the person I'm fucking.There are a lot of things that make Shilo's Balls really cool. Like:
1. Detachable.
I've never seen "balls sold separately" on a dildo before, so this is new. It seems a little odd and, like I said, disembodied, except when you realize what some of the perks are: a) removing them to have a more discreet package (or adding them to juice up your package, if you want that), and putting them on when you are ready to play; b) turning them upside down when fucking face to face in order to stimulate the person's clit (assuming that they have a clit that wants to be stimulated in that way); c) adding them to other dildos.
2. Silicone.
Like NYTC's other products, the balls are silicone and can be sanitized in a 10% bleach/90% water solution, on the top shelf of the dishwasher (with no soap! Assuming that your dishwasher gets hot enough for sanitizing, check your model), or in cock soup boiling water for 5-7 minutes. It's beautiful quality silicone, too. Mostly matte, not shiny, pliable, soft to the touch, feels good. I think NYTC has some of the best silicone offered.
3. Vibrator.
I have to be honest and tell you that I haven't played much with the vibrator. I get pretty over-stimulated, so I don't tend to turn it on. I'd like to try it out a little more, though. You know. For science. And for my thorough review to report to y'all.
4. Juuuust right.
Their size is excellent and matches the Shilo so, so well. They—both Shilo and the balls—feel like a good size for my body, too. Not too small, not too big.
So, in conclusion: Highly recommended if you're interested in adding some balls to your strap-on play, regardless of whether or not you have the Shilo. It can be a really fun addition for more sensation, for gender play, or for other role play during strap on sexy times.
Pick up The Love Bump from the New York Toy Collective, or at your local awesome feminist sex-positive queer sexuality resource shop.
Free eBook Download: BDSM murder mystery about dogs & neighbors
During the month of November, in celebration of National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo), author (and my good buddy) Amy Butcher is giving away ebook copies of her award-winning Nanowrimo novel Paws for Consideration.
Of course, if you get the ebook version, you will miss out on the awesome flip book—illustrated by Amy—in the upper corner of the book, which features Daisy the person zooming around in her wheelchair while Skittles the dog pees on the page numbers.
From Amybutcher.com:
"Paws for Consideration won the Gay Category at the 2013 San Francisco Book Festival. That now makes Paws for Considerationan "award-winning novel" . . . who knew?
It's also National Novel Writing Month. Another cause for celebration not only for all the crazy writing happening but also because that's where Paws for Consideration got it's start.
So throughout November, you can download a free copy of Pawsthrough Smashwords. Enter your email in the form [on Amybutcher.com] and we'll send you the download code. And if you enjoy, please give a shout out on Goodreads."
Paws is an easy fun read, full of jaunts all over the Mission and Castro in San Francisco. I read it on a plane in basically one sitting last year when it came out, and I laughed out loud and cried when Skittles was found and was moved as the neighborhood characters found a way to come together and puzzle through someone's death. I like how Daisy navigates through the heretofore unexplored world of BDSM in the Castro, the perspective is sweet and curious and accepting.
Oh yeah, there are play parties and sex and masturbation and flogging scenes and leather dungeons in this book too. And also lots of dogs.
It starts like this:
The voice of Daisy-the-person carried way beyond the dog in front of her. She was the morning wake-up call for her neighbors, as regular as the bells ringing out from the steeple of Mission Dolores, only higher pitched. She patted her generous lap again, encouraging Daisy-the-dog to come closer.
To the canine, it wasn't clear where chair began and person ended. The way this creature moved, the wheels and the whir, were disconcerting. But she smelled good—of oily chicken scents and warm lint—and she wasn't moving now. Daisy-the-dog decided to take a chance.
Now, don't you want to read the whole thing? Go download it now.
Big Book of Orgasms: Blog Tour!
Today's my day on The Big Book of Orgasms: 69 Sexy Stories blog tour … BUT I am running around like a crazy person getting ready to
1. Zoom into San Francisco and read at The Big Book of Orgasms release party (where I'm going to read Five Blow Jobs, FYI)
2. Go right from the reading to the airport
3. Catch a red-eye overnight plane to New York City, where I will
4. Teach a writing workshop at Columbia tomorrow, Thursday, and then
5. Perform a spoken word set in the evening (also at Columbia), and
6. Host an open mic to encourage the students to share their own work.
Maybe I shoulda waited to put up the hottest parts of the hottest parts of the stories post. Oh! Hey, those of you who are here for the blog tour? Go read that post. It has some good quotes in it.
So, consider this my Big Book of Orgasms placeholder until a) my schedule dies down, and b) I actually read more of the book (oops). Which I will. I love the short-shorts.
Your Body Remembers
Your body remembers
how to split open a peach
on the seam
with your teeth. With
your determination
and another slice of whiskey.
Cleaved palm heart
like a matricide, nothing
the silence and side-eye
can ever overcome. Ever
is a long time. More
like to be for now,
as the universe spins
her giant eye
of centrifugal force
like a tilt-a-whirl. None
of us fall off. None
of us split open
until we are forced
to. For some reason
we value our innocence,
our intact virginity.
But there is a method
of pottery mending
that fills all cracks
and breaks and repairs
with solid gold,
and proves then
that by breaking a thing,
one makes it even more
than before. On a good day,
could be like this. We
could be even
at the broken places.
Your body remembers
back before your feet
touched the floor
when you sat down,
after your first hairs
began to grow, what
it felt like to sit
down after the first
curious penetration.
Like a gap that
wouldn't close.
Innocence is unnecessary
for worth, wisdom, and
wiles. Scars are required.
All those risks and
failings. Finding
homes, nesting
in our rafters,
making us try harder,
do it again, better
this time. Your body
knows what to offer.
Knows where your
place of power lives.
Knows how to exchange
breath with the earth.
Knows how to pray. Not
like a night hawk stalking
a shrew but like
the holiest of holy wells
and a thousand-year trek
of your people
that allows you
to reach one
perfect pocket-worn pebble
out over the very center
of the mystery, and
let go.
Dirty Queer Sex Workshops in Seattle November 14-17
I'm coming to Seattle November 14-17, and I'm teaching FOUR classes in a row at Wild at Heart and also at the Foundation for Sex Positive Culture.
I would absolutely love to see all of you in the audience, and I'd so appreciate all the wisdom you would bring to whatever topics you were interested in discussing. my classes are much less about me telling you all the smarty things I know and more about facilitating a guided discussion with the intention to elevate the conversation to whatever the next level may be for you. I love learning new things in the conversations about these topics—and many of these are my very favorite things to teach and talk about!
Rife will be coming with me. He'll be demo bottoming for the Leaving Marks class, and for Advanced Cock Confidence. (That means we will probably be demonstrating a rough blow job. And you'll get to see him receive some bruises, and show off his cuttings and burn marks.)
PS: I'll be bringing porn DVDs from Pink & White to give away!
PPS: I'll be doing individual sessions, too, if you are interested in 1-on-1 time with me.
November 14: 7pm, Cock Confidence at Wild At Heart
$20/Individual, $30/Pair, $40/Triad – pre-registration
$25 per-person – at the door
Registration through Brown Paper Tickets: http://cockconfidence.brownpapertickets.com/
November 15: 6:30pm, Advanced Cock Confidence: Graduate Level Strapping It On at the Foundation for Sex Positive Culture
Cost: $25, $20 in advance.
November 16: 6pm, Leaving Bruises: Biting, Punching, & More at the Foundation for Sex Positive Culture
Cost: $25, $20 in advance.
November 17: 7pm, Queering Power Dynamics
$20/Individual, $30/Pair, $40/Triad – pre-registration
$25 per-person – at the door
Registration through Brown Paper Tickets: http://queeringpower.brownpapertickets.com/
How to Chomp: Erotic Biting for Pleasure & Pain
"I'm surprised more people don't talk about biting. It's pretty practical – I think it should be a conscious part of a dom's tool kit. When I first apply pressure, her whole body goes tight like a bowstring. It makes me feel like I control every inch of her in that moment, and she's balanced, waiting for my next decision. All this without any equipment, with both hands free? Awesome." —K
I love biting during rough sex. Love it.
It's something I do so automatically that I've learned I need to make sure to explicitly ask anybody I mess around with in a BDSM/play context or a sexytimes context a) whether or not they like to be bit and b) if it's okay for me to leave bite marks. And if it is okay to leave bite marks, to be clear precisely where those marks should or rather should not be left. This negotiation is also about the time that I request that if I do leave marks, that they send me pretty pictures of them the next day. (That's my favorite part. Well, that, and the actual biting part.)
I basically learned all of that the hard way—messing around with girls and starting to bite, then having them stop me mid-bite with some anger or frustration or safeword. Don't do it that way. Ask if you can bite. You don't have to sit them down before you start kissing and say, "So, I really like to bite, preferably somewhere on the fleshy part of your chest or on the top of your shoulder, how do you feel about that?" You can do it while you work your mouth on their neck, shoulders, fingers, mouth. You can do it when you start to go get gloves or condoms or your cock or flip the lights off (or on).
You should ask about hickeys and leaving marks from sucking on someone's skin, too. Don't leave marks unless you know you can. Figure out how to suck to leave marks and how to suck to not leave marks. Practice on someone who will let you practice on them. And remember, each person's skin is different, and marks differently. What marks on one person may not mark the next, and vice versa. So go slowly. Learn to recognize the way skin looks when it starts changing, and be smart about it. Stay within consent.
Okay, enough of that leaving marks / consent PSA. You get the point, right?
Oh! Another thing I love about biting is that I always have the tool with me, my mouth, and I can use it anytime anywhere. I don't need to set it up or get it out or do anything special, it's just right there, and conveniently placed. It's a wonderful tool for a sadist, or for someone who wants to display some possession—either by leaving marks or by making them squeal and squirm and stay in a submissive space through some masochism. A good bite at the right time can tip somebody over the edge and make them come that much harder. But, there are some things to be cautious about.
So, let's say you have a green light of consent, that this person you're messing around with in whatever way loves being bit. How do you do that? What are the safety risks? How do you cause maximum pleasure (or pain)?
Where to Bite
Technically, you can bite anywhere on the body, but some places are more suited for deep bites than others, and some places are pretty dangerous if you bite hard. You can cause internal damage, and nobody wants that. Generally, if you know about impact play and where to hit somebody, you can translate that to biting: The places on the body with big muscles and lots of flesh are best to bite, the places with less flesh and more bone or less padding on the organs are not good to bite.
If you haven't taken a beginner BDSM class that teaches the places on a body to impact, I highly recommend that. Most BDSM groups have a Safety Orientation type of meeting. Go to it! Meet some cool people, while you're at it.
And because I couldn't find a decent image of the Where To Impact Body Map online anywhere, rife made a beautiful drawing and color coded it to indicate where and where not to bite.
Click to make it bigger!and/or Click here to buy a print!
This is not necessarily meant to be a comprehensive chart, and please consult a BDSM educator AND YOUR PLAY PARTNER for the places their body likes and doesn't like to have heavy impact. Each person is different. Use caution and your best judgment.
Personally, I find the places that my mouth kind of naturally lands to be the best places to bite, and for me that tends to be the upper chest, shoulders, and upper arms, and the inner thighs and butt. I have a tendency to bite when I'm coming while strapped on and fucking someone, so that often means their my mouth is in line with their shoulders, either their upper chest if we're face to face or their upper back if I'm behind them. I know how to gauge my bite in this position, either biting a little recklessly and hard or just a slow close down of my mouth so I have something to do with my jaw while coming.
But, those are all examples of biting for my pleasure. Perhaps you're doing it as part of a display of possession or more from a service topping perspective, which is also awesome. The first thing you want to do there (after the 0 step of CONSENT of course) is to find the bite.
"Finding the bite" is something kd diamond spoke of when we talked about biting tips when I was hanging out with her in New York City last weekend. The idea being that while you explore their body with your mouth, you start upping the impact of your teeth, starting with some nibbles, and if they seem responsive to that you keep going, and you find the spot on their body that yields well, and that they give you a very noticeable response (moaning, sounds of joy and pleasure, leaning in to your mouth). Once they do that, you know you've found a good spot, and rather than moving on, bite deeper right there.
How Hard to Bite
Deeper? How much deeper should you go? As with everything else, it depends on the person, so always listen to them and their body.
I attended Felice Shays's Playing in Dangerous Neighborhoods: Advanced Rough Sex workshop through LSM in New York City when I visited last weekend, and she had some great things to say about biting. We talked about it a bit after, too, and I took notes.
First, she stresses the difference between speed and intensity. Most of us tops or sadists or dominants or D-types want to have maximum impact when we're doing something thrilling like biting, and so often we do that by going really fast, but that actually taps out the receiver much quicker than if we do something slow and deep. Slow and deep can open up new channels and let the s-type bloom into the submissive space. Quick and hard can be shocking, cause flinching and even panic. Felice highly recommends intensity over speed.
Which is not to say that speedy hard bites are never okay to do—they can be, sure. Just know that it'll be a different impact on the person you're biting than if you go slow and deep. Depends on what the purpose of your bite is.
So once you've found the bite, and you want to go slow and deep, what do you do with your mouth?
Different Ways to Bite
Let's distinguish between a couple different kinds of bites:
- Slow bite: Close, then sink your teeth slowly. You can go deeper with this kind of bite, because you are slowly upping the intensity and letting the receiver of the bite get used to it. If they start having more of a pulling away reaction than a leaning into it reaction, that's your cue to back off a little (or stay right where you are) and not up the intensity any more.
- Dragging teeth: This was a good tip that Felice mentioned specifically about biting genitals. Genitals are amazing sensitive places and some people really like them being bitten, like a lot. A) Consent (duh), and B) every body is different, and C) if you're going to be putting your teeth directly onto someone's genitals, you should have some conversations about being fluid bonded. But after that: Go for it. This is probably not a very good place to chomp, and not a very good place for a deep slow close (though some places, like the inner thighs or the pubic mound, might be okay for that). But delicately clasping their bits in your teeth, and then dragging your teeth, could be immensely pleasurable.
- Chomp: That's the speedy hard bite I was just mentioning. With little or no warning, you just open your mouth wide and chomp down on someone's body. This can be lovely and have a wonderful effect, particularly if the person you're biting likes to be surprised, likes the big adrenaline spike of pain, and likes to feel the bruise throb after you remove your mouth. But generally, I wouldn't suggest this with someone you haven't played with much, and with someone that you don't know likes this kind of bite. The people who like it really like it, but I think I'd argue it's the least universally enjoyed type of biting.
- Other kinds of bites? I imagine there are many more kinds (like "love nibbles"), but these are three of them. Got more ideas?
As the Receiver of Biting …
You can help the person biting you by being honest about your reactions, not enduring things you don't like (unless enduring something is your fetish, but that's a slightly different conversation), and giving lots of feedback, either verbally or with your body language.
If you can, use the numbers or colors systems to give feedback, by rating a bite 1-10, 1 being "I barely felt that" and 10 being "that is as much as I can take bordering on STOP RIGHT NOW." Remember that what feels like a 6 today might feel like a 3 tomorrow and a 9 next Thursday, and depending on where you are in the scene, and how erotically stimulated and aroused you are, bites (or any kind of body impact) can feel different. Keep your feedback coming, however you can.
The colors system is using the words red-yellow-green to let your biter know how you're doing, like a traffic light: Green means go, yellow means caution (and often means "pause / back off / please stop what you're doing but don't stop the scene") and red means STOP everything now and check in. It'd be very useful to hear "yellow!" if a bite was getting waaay too deep and you needed it to stop, or if you were really enjoying a deep slow bite to hear "green green greengreengreen," as an indicator that you are requesting the biter keep going.
When During Sex to Bite
Depends … people like different things, of course, so check in with the person you're playing with. (I know, I know, that's my constant disclaimer, but it remains true. For that matter, you probably shouldn't ask me when during sex or where on their body they want to be bit—ask them. Ask them. No seriously, ask them. I know it's hard to bring up, but talking about it is so important.)
I'd say there are two main times during the sexytimes act that I'd encourage biting: Toward the beginning, during the ramp-up to bigger, rougher, deeper play, and during orgasms.
In the beginning of the play, biting can be a great way to explore someone's body. Often as we're warming up and making out and getting into more and more foreplay, we do a lot of kissing of the neck and shoulders, sometimes the chest, so that can be a great time to try out some light biting and to slowly ramp it up.
And if you know you have someone who likes moments of sensation or release as a way of tipping them over the edge, you can strategically place a bite on one of those places you found before when they are getting closer and closer to orgasm, and it could sometimes be the thing that sends them over the edge. It probably takes some practice to do this, but the reaction and release (and beautiful bruise you may get to see later or the next day) is an amazing reward.
Bruises from biting on rife. Left: bite marks on his upper chest and upper arm (bruises on his chin are not from biting). Top: Bite marks on his upper back. Bottom: Bruises on his ass from punching and paddling, and one big dark bite mark.
Dangers of Biting & Safety Tips
There are some places on the body you don't want to bite hard, both for safety (like the possibility of damaging an internal organ or tendon) and for pleasure (biting down on the tendons of the neck is not pleasurable for most recipients, for example). Take a Where To Impact On The Body kind of class, ask your local BDSM pervert educator, and know the person you're playing with.
Do not bite arteries or tendons. That is unpleasant, and dangerous. Aim for the fleshy, meaty, bite-able parts of the body.
There is also the risk of breaking the skin if you are a hard biter. Breaking the skin is bad. The human mouth is generally a very dirty place, with all sorts of bacteria, and a human bite can be more easily infected than a dog bite.
Know your mouth. Notice if your teeth are generally completely flat on the bottoms, or if some of them have edges or chips or points. Those teeth are more likely to break skin. For example, I've never full-on broken skin with a deep bite, but I have one particular tooth that is very pointy (my "vampire tooth" canine) and it often leaves more of a red mark than the others and has drawn a teeny tiny bit of blood in a puncture on a rare occasion. Know which teeth are sharp. Do you have braces? That'll change your impact as well.
If you do break the skin, clean it well and monitor it closely. If anything looks out of the ordinary, see a doctor. Get it checked out. It's an easy treatment, but it can be bad if not treated.
What about bruises?
Bruises are not necessarily bad for you, not harmful to you or your muscles, and will heal well on most people without much specific care. But again, know your body. If you're anemic, you may bruise a whole lot easier than someone who is not, for example.
Some people swear by things like Arnica, a homeopathic cream meant to help heal bruises and bumped tissue. After Miss Calico did a bruising and Arnica experiment a few years ago I've been more skeptical of Arnica's value, but as the kid of some hippie parents, I still often take it orally if I'm trying to heal my body from bruising.
Keep an eye on the bruises as they heal. Usually, healthy bruises will go from a slightly red mark at the time of impact to dark purple or black as they bloom, and then fade to shades of lighter blue, sometimes green, yellow, and back to your regular skin color. It's harder to see the fading process on people with darker skin, easier to see the fading process on people with lighter skin. Know your body. Get to know the process of how you bruise and how you heal. If anything looks out of the ordinary, get it checked out (preferably with a kink-friendly doctor so you can say things like "happily consensual!" with a big smile and they will get it). It is normal for a bruise to "travel" a little bit as the tissues and blood vessels slowly repair.
If the bruise gets lumpy or hard, get it checked out. If it stays dark and doesn't seem to be fading, get it checked out. If anything seems out of the ordinary, get it checked out. And share the knowledge that you learn with the people/person you are playing with—it's helpful for them to know your body, too!
In Conclusion ….
Biting is one of my favorites. For control, sadism, possession, sensation, and leaving marks, it's a fantastic tool, and one I use often. Get consent. Know your body, and get to know your play partner's body. Every body is different, but if you get to know each other you can figure out what will cause maximum pleasure (or pain) (or both) and impact and beautiful bruises. Know the risks that you're taking and keep yourself and your partner as safe as you can.
That about covers my thoughts on bruising! What are your thoughts? Do you love it, hate it? Agree with my tips, or think I'm wrong? Did I leave something critical out? Any other types of bites or safety tips or things I'm missing? I'd love to know.
The Great Reader Mini-Interview, Part Four: "Shut up and get hit," Communion, and fun erotica
What's your relationship with sugarbutch.net and Sinclair?
I've been reading you on and off for about four years now. I love your erotic writing and, as a fellow butch, have felt a kindred sense of discovery with you as I've come into my own. It's refreshing to read your perspective as it mirrors some of my own experiences.
PS: I saw that you were attending QI in Hartford. So am I, and fuck, I'd love to suck your cock.
—Simon Hoardash
—elspeth, https://fetlife.com/users/2485909
What advice would you give your younger self about sex, gender, or relationships?
—Kat Heatherington — http://yarrowkat.livejournal.com
—Shereen, http://twitter.com/ShereenSamuels
—Ashlee, http://femmeandfists.tumblr.com
What one resource has had the most impact on you, and why?
—Kat Heatherington — http://yarrowkat.livejournal.com
—Shereen, http://twitter.com/ShereenSamuels
—Ashlee, http://femmeandfists.tumblr.com/
The hottest parts of the hottest parts of the stories: The Big Book of Orgasms
If you're a fan of reading erotica—and chances are high that you are, if you're following Sugarbutch—you probably know Rachel Kramer Bussel's work. She's one of the most prolific erotica editors and writers currently curating and creating dirty books and stories for us to read and explore, and I'm a huge fan of her work.
She's included stories of mine in a variety of her anthologies, and I'm in a brand new book of hers called The Big Book of Orgasms: 69 Sexy Stories which also features many of my favorite queer erotica writers, including BD Swain and Xan West.
The Big Book of Orgasms joins a few other "big book" anthologies of short-short dirty stories, including Girl Fever and Gotta Have It and Frenzy (the latter two I have stories in), and they continue to be some of my most favorite anthologies. They're so easy to read. It's like the "good parts" version of other erotica anthologies, where in this one, the writers only have a couple of pages to give you the point of the story, which is usually the hottest part of the story.
The hottest part of the story isn't always the orgasm part (very often the tease is what does it for me, for example), but it's definitely one of the hottest parts. So basically what I'm saying is, this book is the hottest parts of the hottest parts of stories. Amazing.
So next week, on Wednesday November 6th, I'll be reading at the Polk Street Good Vibrations toy store in San Francisco, along with a handful of other contributors to the book, to celebrate the release of The Big Book of Orgasms!
The Big Book of Orgasms: 69 Sexy Stories (Cleis Press) is editor Rachel Kramer Bussel's latest and greatest erotica anthology. This climactic collection of pansexual short shorts are perfect for bedtime reading to a lover or on your own. Whether getting off from exhibitionism, voyeurism, hot wax, dirty talk or a very special pair of blue jeans, the characters in The Big Book of Orgasms go all out for the Big O. From vanilla to kinky, and everything in between, there's something for all erotic readers here. At this special reading, Bussel will be joined by contributors Lily K. Cho, Malin James, Crystal Jordan, Donna George Storey, B.D. Swain, Virgie Tovar, Sinclair Sexsmith, Jade A. Waters and Xan West for an evening of steamy stories that's sure to leave you hot and bothered.
Time: 6:30 – 7:30pm
Where: Good Vibrations Polk Street Good Vibrations Polk St. store 1620 Polk Street (at Sacramento Street), San Francisco, CA 94109
… The only problem is, I'm not entirely sure what to read. This book includes a story about Kristen, and traditionally, at book release parties, it's customary to read the story that is included in the book. But I don't think I can read a story about how good she is at sex and how much I loved fucking her, in public, right now. Maybe someday I can, maybe it'll feel like fiction again, or like my own writing, but right now it just feels like ouch.
So what do I read?
Options are … well … I could read a different piece, something about rife or something more fictional. I could read someone else's story from the book. I could write to Rachel and ask her what she recommends. I'm not sure what the best option is, for this one.
And while you're at it, if you're in or nearby to San Francisco, why don't you come see me read, and get a copy of the book signed by some of the amazing contributors? It's been a while since I've had an erotica reading, I'm looking forward to it.
Review (& Photos!): Aslan Leather TG Chest Harness
Last year, Carrie Grey, creator and owner of Aslan Leather, custom built me one of his leather TG Chest Harnesses. I've worn it a few times over the past year, like at IMsL and to a couple of smaller play parties, but just this month I wore it to Folsom Street Fair—and whoa that was quite the experience!—with rife and his dog.
I really don't like crowds, or hot weather, so being in an extremely crowded blocked-in couple city blocks on a sunny day was not my ideal situation. But it was really fun to see so many kinky people in one place. Fascinating, really. (I particularly liked Vivian Fu's photo essay of this year's Folsom.) We eventually made it to the women-and-trans area, and then promptly camped out and didn't leave that space until we were ready to head back to Oakland. I liked their gender policy: the women-and-trans tent included anybody who does identify as a woman, has identified as a woman in the past, or will identify as a woman in the future. Clever, I thought.
I got a lot of compliments on the Aslan Leather chest harness. It's hot and comfortable and unique for someone with a chest like mine (36DD) to be wearing something like that. I left it over my binder and tee shirt all day, but had it as a possible option to wear it bare chested.
Here's the Aslan description:
To order please provide the following measurements: Chest, cup size (if applicable), height. This is a custom piece made to order so please remember to include your measurements.
Please note! The measurements part is important. When I wrote to Carrie requesting this piece, I gave him my measurements, but I was wrong. Very wrong. I gave him old measurements that I thought were accurate, but did not account for the weight I have recently gained (lots of which, let's be honest, ends up in my chest). That sucked—the first binder he built for me didn't fit, and he had to go back and basically remake the whole thing.
Don't send the wrong measurements. Get someone who knows how to measure bodies for outfitting well to measure you, and get a current measurement.
Carrie snapped a few photos when I tried it on in the Aslan studio in Toronto last fall:
I kept hoping to wear it during a photo shoot and get more better photos of it, but I haven't had many (any?) photo shoots since I picked it up (oh except for that one with Meg Allen, but we were taking professional shots and not really kinky ones, which is why I didn't wear it then). I'd still like more better photos of me in it, but I don't want not having the perfect photo to hold me up in telling you about how awesome this is. And hey, the holidays are coming up, right? Don't you need a great present for somebody in your life, or yourself?
I like the way it looks! And it feels really good and fun to wear. I even like the way my chest looks naked underneath it. I wouldn't have expected that.
Thank you, Aslan Leather & Carrie Grey! Pick up your very own Aslan Leather TG Chest Harness over on Aslanleather.com.
The Great Reader Mini-Interview, Part Three: Personal accountability & self reflections, Kink, and Do Your Research
What's your relationship with sugarbutch.net and Sinclair?
Keep doing what you are doing. I know you have had a tough run of it lately, but I admire you for staying true to who you are, what you want/need, and wearing your scars for everyone to see.
— PolyAnna/Josette Sheridan, http://lookingthrough.us/
What advice would you give your younger self about sex, gender, or relationships?
2. Don't even bother trying to date somebody who isn't kinky; it's not going to work.
3. Being attracted to trans men, after some years of only being into butch women, is okay and doesn't change your fundamental self. You can still keep your queer card and just love who you love. Most of your ex-girlfriends will eventually turn into men, anyway.
4. If you're in a D/s relationship with someone who breaks down your self-esteem and violates your boundaries, that's not D/s: that's abuse. Even if they buy you shiny presents.
— Anne Campbell, https://www.facebook.com/riverbend
—Cathlin Star, http://cathlinstar.blogspot.com/
And then I would give her a hug and tell her that it was going to be ok.
— Clara S., http://thethirdrose.tumblr.com
— Tonja Hewlett, https://www.facebook.com/EnterprisingFae
What one resource has had the most impact on you, and why?
Maybe this is just as much about the book as the editor…. I've met Joan (she lives in Melbourne, Australia) and her partner Dianne and find her to be such a valuable elder to have in the community. I love the way her writing is so political, and that class and race are made so relevant. I also love that although Butch-Femme influences her whole life, it's not in such predictable ways and has changed and morphed as she's gotten older/grown.
Shes so involved in movements around Israel/Palestine and I see her out at refugee rallies monthly. She's so engaged with the younger queer community here still and puts in so much time, for this and many other reasons I really respect her and she has taught me a lot. <3
In an attempt to look more queer and attract more attention from people that I thought I wanted I really played down my femme side to look as "queer" as possible so I guess I'd like to tell my younger self that there would be someone who would love your femme side and wouldn't read you as any less queer for it. More specifically, would know all the ways that you were sexy just for her.
—Cricket, http://beatingthebinary.tumblr.com
—Kachina Addison, http://www.facebook.com/kachina.addison
I want more.
I want more.
Crave it. Seek it. For every inch you give, I want two. For every mile you run, I want five.
It's not that I'm never satisfied. I am. Maybe the satisfaction comes in the wanting, the striving. The way I give you a new edge and you nod and work and sweat and labor and your best comes from you, just a little more than you expected. That's when I relax, and ask for it again. Again. Until your best striving is normal and I ask you for more. Always more.
That's the point, more than the individual acts. I don't really care if my house is kept precisely or if my water glass has ice and lime. I care if you're trying. I care if you're working for it, paying attention.
It's not that I'm proud of this, exactly. I don't say this to brag. This tendency often makes things quite complicated, adding unnecessary layers of needs and request—unnecessary to our day-to-day immediacy, but more necessary to my long term satisfaction. It's why I moved to New York City, remember—I wanted things to be less easy.
It's not that the work is the point, either, but that striving is the best way for me to stay on the edge. The brink of something new. The cusp of growth. And that is the broader purpose. When I keep you carefully balanced there, I keep myself balanced there too, in that place of holding your safety ropes, not certain exactly how far to push, exactly when to force just a little more, try just a little harder, you can do it, you can take it for me, just a little more, just for me, just for me. And when you do, when I push through that last resistance to open you just a little further, it opens up something in me to meet you, and we swirl, double-helix vortex, touching the infinite, touching god.
The Great Reader Mini-Interview, part two
What is your relationship to sugarbutch.net and Sinclair?
You and I went through a breakup at the same time. I found that your silence matched my silence and i never once questioned it. When you finally found words again I felt them with you. and I found myself speaking to you through the screen consoling, and sharing my experiences. I wanted to tell you that we would be ok. That even though things ended perhaps under different circumstances, we were feeling the same pain, the same stages of denial and rejection and loss, and I felt like you brought me home a lot. But I also felt like I wanted to bring you home with me too. It was therapeutic and it helped me out a lot.
What advice would you give your younger self about sex, gender, or relationships?
—Julie May Richardson, http://instagram.com/julie321
What one resource has had the most impact on you, and why?
Anything else to add?
— sumner, https://twitter.com/Butchkind
The Great Reader Mini-Interview, part 1: National Fisting Day, embracing gender complexities, and more
Oh hey there! I'm writing this from my sister's house in Brooklyn, where I'm staying while I'm doing a couple of workshops for colleges this week. It's been an incredible whirlwind lately, with college touring season starting and the Outside the Boxes: Celebrating the Queer Body Erotic workshop that happened in Oakland this past weekend. (It was incredible. You should've been there. Really.)
I love fall. I love fall everywhere, but fall in New York City is especially special. It's stunning. The colors the trees the air crackling the people, the scarves! The coats! The boots! People are so well-dressed here. Honestly I miss the east coast "look" over in the Bay Area. (Granted, I'm mostly in Oakland, but the California / Pacific Northwest Casual look isn't my favorite style.)
It's the end of day 2 in New York, my first return since I left in April, and I'm starting to feel that deep New York exhaustion. I bought inserts for my boots. I keep taking off my leather jacket because it's not really real leather (shhh) and the mostly-plastic of it is awful for the humidity that doesn't allow my body to breathe. My skin sweats in the leather and smells musty when I take it off.
But, I took my sister's big oaf dog to the park today, collected some fallen red leaves with bright veins, took some photographs, plotted out my Best! Sex! Ever! workshop for some cool queers at NYU and then hung out with them while we talked about what that might mean and look like, what really good sex is, what the barriers are to getting really good sex. And then we had a giveaway for some Pink & White queer porn DVDs.
I really like my job.
But! That's not why I'm writing you. I'm writing to post the beginnings of the Great Reader Mini-Interview of 2013.
I got 74 mini-interviews in response to that call. SEVENTY FOUR. Thank you, each of you, each of you seventy four people, for taking the time, for spending a few minutes and filling that out. I read each one as they came into my inbox. I laughed. I teared up. I was moved and touched and said, "really? Really??" at some of the praise about my work. I wrote notes about resources. I'm excited to share them with you.
And, as that many came into my handy-dandy google doc spreadsheet, I wasn't sure how I was going to post them. 74 individual posts? Two a day for thirty seven days? That seems overwhelming and like I'd be flooding my site unnecessarily. Post ten and save the rest? Post them all as an e-book? (Who would read that, except me?)
I finally figured it out: I'm going to post snippets. Maybe that seems obvious, but it took me a while. I'm taking my favorite line or phrase or paragraph or answer from each interview. It might be hard because your WHOLE ENTIRE INTERVIEW is probably incredibly awesome, but I just don't have the space to reproduce them all. So they must get cut.
I'm going to take 7-8 at a time and edit them down to one central quote for each person, and then post those all together in one post. So there'll be about 10 of those. After that's all done, I might (might!) put them together in a free ebook kind of thing, but we'll see about that.
Ready? Ready! Without further adieu, here are the first seven interviews.
The Great Reader Mini-Interview of 2013: Part 1
What is your relationship to Sinclair & sugarbutch.net?
My favorite part of the blog are the links to other queer sites/organizations. The most memorable email I've received was for National Fisting Day 2012. I'm lucky that I had opened the email on my phone because I was greeted with a giant picture from FTM Fucker. I had never seen trans men in porn before and it was amazing. Since I was following Sugarbutch for a while before that email I had already been exploring and realizing how queerness can be sexy and empowering. Basically I love how this blog has taken me on a journey to discover a community that I feel like I belong to.
I've been empowered to express my gender and sexuality is ways that I've never even anticipated. At his moment I genuinely feel like I am attractive and loved. That is something that I haven't felt before and I know many queers around me are struggling with themselves. Being a kinky butch bottom is a badge I wear with honor.
—Sarah Garnett, https://twitter.com/lohidoesnttweet
What advice would you give your younger self about sex, gender, or relationships?
She will get breast cancer and it will change you. Walking alongside your wife will be the hardest, most sacred journey you will ever take. You will want to run away. You will want to quit. But, you won't. Because, YOU are strong. You are fearless. You are fucking awesome!
After 8.5 years of fighting, she will die, in your arms. At first, you will think that you are going to be lost and drift. But, you will be found, and you will be fucking AMAZING! Trust that you DO have the strength. When the community you weren't looking for, finds you, embrace them, for they will get you through.
There will be a second act. I am just starting it now, but trust me – it's gonna be rad!
—Dree, http://motherbutch.tumblr.com & http://dreesdaydream.tumblr.com
You already embrace your gender … "issues" isn't the right word … complexity, now embrace others, as they have needs and their own complexities too. It's too easy to get lost in yourself, as others lose themselves within themselves too, so go out and play!
"A person not improving him/herself, endlessly becomes him/herself." Self discovery is good, gaining insights from others sharing as they go through it is also good; not sharing is bad, not growing/developing/improving is worse.
—randy, https://fetlife.com/users/309032
What one resource has had the most impact on you, and why?
— Cookie
— Elise, www.ehmworks.com
Plus, for me, someone who laughs about life with me and lets me argue it out out loud.
Anything else to add?
I thought therefore that it is time that I speak to you directly and let you know that I am still here, and not going anywhere, and that I am sure that there are a lot more like me, faithful and interested readers who are just too shy to comment, or believed they have nothing of substance to add.
We read you, we like you, and we'll be here.
PS If you ever make it to London, England, I'd love to buy you a pint and meet you in person.
What kind of comments you could leave
In keeping with the Comment Zen idea, here's some things you could reply to this post with:
- The places the mini-interviews resonated for you
- Whether you'd like to see all of the mini-interviews in entirety or if the best quotes are enough
- Your favorite thing about New York City
- What you'll be doing on National Fisting Day October 22nd
Thank you!
To the femmes on whom I've crushed this past year
If you think I'm not kicking myself for not making a move when I had the chance, you're wrong.
I wish I made a move. Although really, I wish I had had the capacity to make a move. Explain it through the spoon theory, call it the grieving process, call it heartbreak, call it post-poly trauma and fear—whatever it was, I was not in the place to play, fuck, open myself up, make an offer, make a move, or hell, sometimes even flirt. I wish I had been.
These past eighteen months, there were moments my life continued on without me, me being pulled along behind the autopilot me who somehow managed to eat and sleep (no small feat). Sometimes, I had no idea you, beautiful kick-ass femme, were there, making a move on me, giving me The Eyes, putting yourself out there. Sometimes, three months later I found your email in my inbox and felt puzzled, where'd that come from? Why didn't I even see that before? Wtf? Sometimes, I got so excited and turned on and pleased to receive an offer from you, and I plotted scripted wrote schemed what I would say back, and by the time I actually went to reply, it'd been too long and the connection felt broken.
Time is wonky in grief, in heartache. I wanted to be in an open poly playful place, and so I think sometimes I came across that way. But in retrospect, I was more shell than soul, more fear than fire. I couldn't bring myself to our interactions—maybe you didn't know. I didn't know, either. Rather than defend myself, I just want to tell you that our moments, whatever we had, were special to me, and let you know that I wished I'd been there with my whole self instead of the half-ghost version you got of me.
To D:
Who took me out on a walk and talked so sweet of flowers and foliage, who held my cheek so gently in your palm before we kissed. Who wrote me a tender-hearted letter that broke my heart a little with kindness. Thank you.
To N:
Who fed me the most amazing wine and cheese and pot and smiles (that way your eyes smoke your lips part velvet you toss your bangs), you nourished me when I was incredibly dark. I'm sorry I didn't know it better at the time. I still feel I owe you an apology. I still think of your hair falling in my face and on my skin, and how your lips felt when you whispered in my ear. Birds and photographs and more wine, and I hope you found an amazing place in New York to shine your gifts.
To A:
Your legs for miles and the way you move, your laugh and quick wit and ease. We've basically co-topped, more than once even, and when you made it clear you wanted to play (I think your text said, "I'd like to suck your cock," thank you for being direct) I froze. Saw you the next day and neither of us spoke on it. Didn't even text you back until later. In another context, I would've begged for the chance. I still feel like a dunce for that one. I've learned so much about poly watching your relationship(s) from a friendly far, and I admire how you play and hold people in such high respect. I can't wait to see you perform again. The way you move your body … I can't take my eyes off of you.
To C:
And your curls and handfuls of ass and knee socks and drag act. I still have your dirty story in my inbox and I feel stupid for not writing you back. I hope that wasn't our only chance to play, because I can fuck better than that. Maybe someday I'll work up the courage to ask you if I can prove it.
To J:
My beautiful (temporary) canvas, thank you for letting me mark you up, paint bruises and scratches and teeth marks into your gorgeous skin. And thank you for the photos after, they came at a time where it helped to be reminded of my own power, and the ways stunning creatures like you will sometimes allow me to borrow some of yours.
To T:
My fellow judge, the only one who asked me about my pronoun, the one I knew was 'my people,' particularly when you dipped your head just a little and then egged me on in writing: "And then what happened?" I barely remember the dirty fairy tale we started to tell, but maybe sometime we'll get to finish it.
To D:
A kind of femme I almost don't recognize in writing, but I recognized your markers. I recognized you in person. Your ferocity calls me still. I wish I'd had time energy spoons spunk to write you languid sexy stories you would read over your tea, slitting open the envelope with a dirty knife. I'm intimidated by your politics and youth and clarity. I ache to think of your mouth, my hands on your skin. How will I get another chance? I hope to be more ready when I do.
To L:
And perfect crisp white hotel sheets, and joints in the park, and your lipstick that never came off, and the way your hair looked in curls on the pillow in the mornings, and how much I wanted to stay sequestered with you, and your patience empathy understanding holding, and your gentle fist, and your heart-shaped mouth, and your jeans on the grass by the airport. I got a piece of myself back because of that weekend, a piece I didn't know I was missing. Watching your hands speak I remembered those words I've hidden deep, wondered if you were speaking to those places when you slid inside me. I have already mailed you a dozen little 'thinking of you' packages in my mind, but in reality I have had no follow through. (Not just with this. With everything. Unopened mail unpaid bills unorganized paper.) I know you understand grief. Do you also understand how much I am grateful for you taking your time with me? How rare it has been for me to let someone explore those inner canyons? Thank you for being strong enough to offer to hold me, and for letting me return the exploration of your own folded in secrets. I want more of you, want to fist your hair again, bruise your knees against the floor, hold you down. Want to kiss your ankles and make an offering on my knees, though nothing really compares to what you gave me when you plucked me out of my chest and handed me back to myself. Thank you.
And to you:
You who attended my workshop in Noho or DC or Seattle or Chicago. I noticed your eyes, the way you bit your lip, how you looked me up and down, how you checked out my package, how you waited your turn and didn't know what to say. I didn't know what to say either. There is often a performer/audience teacher/student power dynamic I try not to exploit (unless, you know, I have permission). But let me be clear here, now: I noticed you. Fuck, I wanted you. My mouth watered at that glimpse of your skin. Maybe I was particularly worked up that night before I even arrived, but more than once I didn't wait to get back to my hotel before remembering your mouth and twinkle and just-barely-too-long of a glance, and I got myself off. Coming with a grunt and a sigh in a stalled bathroom, keeping someone waiting, licking off my fingers and thinking of your lips.
At another time, in a different year when I was not so lost, I would have tried to ask, to flirt, to be bold, to make it clear I was game if you were, to have boundaries, to ask for yours, to try things, to write you back, to be curious, to connect, to feel our hearts beat together (if only temporarily). I may have missed my chance, but I still want you to know that I think you're extraordinary, and whoever did get the chance to feel your fingertips roam, to taste your skin shined with sweat, to read the book of your scars, to hear your breathing shallow and release, to be anchored down by your weight, was lucky. I barely know you, but it seems clear to me that you are luminous.
Protected: Making Peace: in which I (attempt to) explain what happened over these last eighteen months
Hey readers! I want to (mini-)interview YOU!
Partly because I want to encourage this Sugarbutch space to be more conversation and less me prosthelytizing or preaching or complaining, I would love to deepen some of my relationships with my readers. That would be YOU. And the first way I know how to begin to do that is to get to know y'all a little bit better.
So, would you like to do a little mini-interview? Here's the questions below.
If you read through this and decide you don't want to do the mini-interview, or if you never get around to it, that's cool. I'd still love to start following the blogs of many of my readers. So, if you have a blog, and you read Sugarbutch regularly (or often or sometimes), I'd love to know where you write, too. Leave your website URL in the comments and I'll create an RSS feed of all of them and start keeping up with y'all.
Now, on to the Great Reader Mini-Interviews of 2013!
Answers can be as long or as short as you'd like. Here's the form! If you prefer to fill it out in a separate window and keep perusing Sugarbutch, or if the embedded iframe below is acting up for whatever reason, here's the link to the Google form unembedded.
I'll collect responses until October 10th, and will start publishing them that week for everybody to read.
Protected: Making Peace #21
Protected: Making Peace #20
Protected: Making Peace #19
Ask Mr. Sexsmith: What happens to the stuff on the anal toys when you boil them?
Dear Mr. Sexsmith,
Ok, this is a really dumb question. When you clean silicone toys used during anal sex, do you boil them? I know that you can clean silicone toys by boiling, or by soap and water, or 10% bleach, or by the top rack of the dishwasher. But like, if you boil them, does the leftover lube/etc stay on the pot? Do you wash the pot afterwards? Do you have a separate sex-toy pot for sey-toy cleaning? Why bother dirtying something else, especially something else used in food preparation?
Thanks for any help.
Hi Christy!
I am not an expert on toy cleaning, really—I have my own way of doing it, but I'm not always sure that's the right way. Since my activities as of late are very low-risk (currently, I have one person I share toys with), what I do feels adequately good enough.
And, I have less knowledge of the healthcare side of cleaning toys and STIs than some of the other sex educators out there. So, instead of stumbling through my own answer, I asked my buddy Sejay Chu what their thoughts were on this question. They worked for Planned Parenthood doing sex education, and are one of the best workshop presenters I've ever seen. Their depth (heh heh) of knowledge is astounding. (And plus, they're super hot, so that's always a bonus.)
Sejay wrote:
(B) Before doing any cleaning intended to sanitize (bleach, boiling, soap, etc.), it's best to always scrub the surface gunk off first. Kinda like you "clean the dishes before you clean the dishes" for the dishwasher — if you have a dish with globs of food & grease on it, just tossing it in the dishwasher probably won't get rid of the globs of food & grease very well… get my drift?
Bleach, boiling, soap, etc. is intended to get the microscopic bits and do a good job of it, but it can't do that very well if it's blocked by a (relatively) gigantic mound of whateversonyourtoy. So do a preliminary scrubbing to get the gunk out of your sanitizer's way.
(C) Some people use a sex-toy-only pot, and some just wash the pot afterwards. It's a matter of preference, not necessarily cleanliness. Things you cook in pots tend to get boiled or super hot in the process of, y'know, cooking anyway, right? But if it "icks" you or the people you live with to eat out of something that boiled a buttplug yesterday, it might be worth the $10 pot. Plus then you can call it a "sexpot," hehe.
(D) Just FYI, some dishwashers don't actually get hot enough temperature-wise to disinfect the way you'd want to, so be weary of that.
Thank you Sejay! The number (B) point was basically going to be my point too, which is that I'd use a mild soap to scrub down all the toys before doing the sanitizing of boiling it.
Sanitize, by the way, is more accurate that "sterilize," even though most sex educators tend to say "sterilize your toys by boiling for 8 minutes, 10% bleach solution, or washing in the top shelf of the dishwasher." However, in order to actually sterilize something, you need an AutoClave or some other hospital-strength unit. But as soon as something is exposed to the air, it's no longer sterile. Regardless, what we're doing is sanitizing sex toys, which kills most (idk, 99.9%?) bacteria and any STI viruses. (I learned this at Catalyst East in March and I've been meaning to write a post about it ever since—that I've been saying "sanitize" all these years and all along I had never actually sanitized my toys! I don't think it's just me, I think it's a common mistake of words that sex educators often use. (Or maybe it is just me, and everybody else knows this difference, and I was the one always equating the two.)
Also, if you are worried about the extra santorum* on your toys or on your cookware, I suggest using a condom with anal sex toys, because that will add a protective layer to your toys and make them even easier to clean.
I didn't know that (D) about the dishwashers. Sejay, do you know what the required temperature is, and how to figure out if your dishwasher gets that hot or not?
And, I love the idea of having a (C) sexpot, but I tend to just use the biggest soup pot in the house. I clean my toys first, and clean the pot after. All good!
* Definition of santorum: that frothy mixture of come and lube and other rectal contents created during anal sex. See: Savage Love, 2003. (I think the word "frothy" is the key part of that definition, personally.)
Free download of Visible: A Femmethology Volume Two
Have you read Visible: A Femmethology? No? It's your lucky fucken day, because Volume 2 is available for Kindle download for FREE from today until the 21st.
(Also: Don't own a Kindle? No problem! This book can be read with the Free Kindle Reader App for your Web Browser, PC, Mac, iPhone, iPad, BlackBerry, or Android Phone.)
It's true! Homofactus Press sent out the news on their mailing list, and included a little bit about why:
"Please help us push the book to the top of Amazon's lists. We are a micropublishing company and rely on you to spread the word about our work. Please forward this newsletter to two friends – just two – you know will want to download Visible: A Femmethology, Volume Two for free. And ask those two friends to forward it to two of their friends, and so on."
I'd say it could be more than two, it doesn't have to be just two. But either way, download and enjoy!
Visible: A Femmethology Volume Two includes my piece, A Love Letter to Femmes, and many other beautiful essays, praise, and thoughts about femme identity. But that's not why I'm telling you about it—I'm telling you because it's a great book and there aren't that many recent publications out there on femme identity.
Ask Mr. Sexsmith: First time with a girl
Hi Sinclair,
I'm in a bit of a pickle. I've been out for ages, but for reasons not worth getting into (for instance mostly due to lack of opportunity, not lack of interest or any deep seated issues) I'm still completely inexperienced when it comes to girl-on-girl sex. I have however had a fair amount of boy-girl sexcapades.
But now I have the opportunity to get some girl-on-girl action and I don't want to tell her it's my first time. I know I should, but I'm too embarrassed to admit that despite years of being out I'm a 28 year old queer virgin. I want to be a good partner and please her in bed but I need some direction. Will she expect me to go down on her the first time we go to bed together? Any websites or great tips to impart? Any help you can offer would be great.
Thank you Sinclair. You and your words have been helping me get off for ages. Now I'm hoping you can help me got off with a partner.
Hi Carly:
As a budding baby dyke, I relied on books. Nothing But the Girl and Best Lesbian Erotica 1998 spring to mind, because in 1998 and 1999 I was obsessed and barely out. I left my boyfriend of six years in August 1999 to move into a crowded little apartment on Capitol Hill in Seattle with a dyke I barely knew, eager to have my own room, my own space, a place for my own desires. It wasn't until April 2000 that I slept with a girl. She was in my nutrition class, and we had the same birthday. "Did you just say it's your birthday?" "Yeah." "It's my birthday today too!" We talked and started sitting together. I put my hand on her knee under the table, and she let me. Kissed me in front of the school after class when we went our separate way. "You're bold, touching my knee like that," she wrote in a note later. "I like bold." She invited me to her house for lunch.
She'd never been with a girl either, but she like me (and you) knew she was interested and had some sexcapade experience. When we started getting undressed (awkward light from my only bedroom window that faced the parking lot, shaded by a fringed grey shall, moon poster up over my bed, feminist books stacked in every spare space), kissing, oh she was a good kisser, I had no idea what to do or what it would be like or how to please her. But when she paused and said, "I don't know what to do," I could feel my relief, at her admission of what we were both feeling, and knowing that she didn't know what would to do meant I could step in and take the (gentle) lead.
Oh, I thought. I know what to do.
I didn't, not really. But I suppose in some ways that was the beginning of me as a service top, taking some limited control and having bodily permission to touch in ways that pleased her. That's all I wanted to do: feel her, please her, touch her in ways that she liked, connect with her.
That's all sex is, really. Sure, the orgasm part is a really nice added bonus—but not everybody comes at all, not everybody is able to get off with a partner, and almost nobody comes with a new person the first time.
Carly, you wrote this to me in March 2012 (and I am so behind on advice/ask me anything questions, this year has been impossible, see: the Making Peace series and the last 18 months of this site), so I presume you weren't waiting on my small piece of advice before you went for it. So hopefully, this advice comes too little too late. Hopefully this is all irrelevant. Hopefully, you'll comment on this saying, Oh! That was me! But I totally forgot I even asked that. I've been fucking for eighteen months now, I have this completely different other question now.
But just in case you haven't, and just in case there are other folks out there who read Sugarbutch and dream about queer sex but maybe haven't had much of it yet, this is my advice to you.
Will she assume that you will go down on her? I have no idea. Depends on the person. Personally, I think going down on someone is an incredibly intimate act, and I wait quite a while after starting to date someone to do it. Also, I am STI-aware and don't go down on someone without a barrier unless we are fluid bonded, which also often happens after a few (or quite a few) dates (or never), depending on our agreements and how in-depth we go into our own STI histories and whether or not we have other partners or whether we're going to go get tested again. I have dealt with this differently with everyone I've dated, but the short answer is, I think, no, you shouldn't assume you will go down on someone on your first date or in the first month or so, and if you decide you want to, it should be after you get to know them more and have some safer sex conversations.
Don't assume anybody is going to come the first time. I believe you are responsible for your own orgasm—in general, not just the first time—so if you want to get off, assume you'll be getting yourself off. And make it totally okay for her to get herself off, too. Offer to watch, if she finds that sexy. Or offer to help, in whatever ways would be helpful (lick her nipples? Kiss her? Hold her down? Whisper sexy things in her ear? Shove your cock in her mouth? To each their own …).
Unless you have a strong power identity established already, and do a bit of negotiating, don't assume who's going to top and who's going to bottom. Just feel each other. You're getting to know each other in a new way: physically, energetically. Go easy, take each other's cues. It's a complicated physical dance.
To get ready for your first girlon-girl time (or whatever—y'all know that I mean to extend that to other genders too, right?): Jerk off a lot. Notice what you do, how you touch yourself, what feels good. Try those out on her body.
And pay a lot of attention to how she responds. If you can talk, ask how to touch her, ask what feels good.
Feel into your own body, and follow the pleasure. What would feel good right now? Tell her that, and ask: "I really want to kiss you right now. Is that okay?" "I have this urge to spank your ass, would that feel good for you?" "I have some soft pretty rope just … right there … I wonder if you'd like it if I used it?" "Can I introduce you to my favorite vibrator?" "I really love using a strap-on, do you like penetration?"
As I have been thinking on this answer, I kept saying to myself, Self … damn. If only there was a Girl Sex 101 primer that I could point Carly to for more tips and tricks and ideas about communication and negotiation and following pleasure and how ladyparts are awesome and different and the same.
And then I realized that maybe there's not a perfect one of those right now, but there's this:
That Allison Moon and KD Diamond are building, and you're just in time to get a copy for yourself by supporting their Kickstarter.
What is it? Well …
Girl Sex 101 is a road trip in a book! Combining fiction & comics with solid sex-education, Girl Sex 101 does what no sex-ed book has done before.
A collaboration between author and sex-educator Allison Moon (the Tales of the Pack novels about lesbian werewolves) and artist kd diamond (founder & editor-in-chief of Salacious Magazine) Girl Sex 101 is loaded with fun, color illustrations and entertaining stories that offer far more than the standard sex-ed fare.
Plus, "Girl Sex 101 is a collaborative effort of over 15 independent educators and artists, featuring fun & informative guest viewpoints by sex-ed superstars" like Megan Andelloux, Tristan Taormino, Jiz Lee, Carol Queen, Julia Serano, Tina Horn, Ignacio Rivera and more!
So clearly you should try that too.
I also recommend these books:
Take a look at the rest of my women & sexuality category on my Amazon A-store, maybe some of those books will resonate?
I wish I knew of other good resources! So I figure this is a great time to ask the readers. Hey, readers! What do you recommend? What books or websites or sources? What are your best tips for queer sex for the first time?
PS: If you asked for advice from me in the past few years, and never received it, I'm sorry. I know many (hundreds, actually) of you have emailed me questions or asked me questions, and I haven't replied. It's because I have not been on top of my shit in the ways I would like to be—it's not because your question wasn't fascinating. It probably was. It's just that I haven't been on a schedule or replying or corresponding in the ways that I want to be. But, I'm sorry you reached out and said something possibly vulnerable or sweet or real, and never got anything back in return.
If that question (or a different question) is still relevant to you, the way to skip the queue and come to the top of the list is to send me a donation or book a 30-60 minute session with me over Skype or over the phone. I'll address your question, and more.
Two years with Rife
When I think about the past two years, and trying to put some sort of something together to explain how it's been, I think in photographs. That one where he's picking raspberries with his bare hands, crouched in his brown tee shirt, raspberry juice running down his wrists, pink staining his tongue. The one where he and his dog are surveying the moonscape of northern Yukon right before we turned past the "Welcome to Alaska!" sign. The one he called "doing important boy work" where he was sitting in a jock strap and nothing else on the porch at the ranch writing in his leather boy journal, writing reflections on tasks for me or writing about feelings of service and submission or writing a book report, I don't know what the task was, but I'm sure it was important. The one with his dimples in that orange-red light that I looked at over and over before I really knew him.
I'd put together a collage post, an essay in photographs, but that doesn't feel good enough, because who knows what you'd see. Maybe you'd see what I see, all the sweet boy tasks and dimpled smiles and creating art, but you wouldn't see so many of the other things: the quiet contemplation, the complexities, the intensity of inner landscape, the artistry, the precision, the majesty.
It's not easy, this intimate loving. I don't know how it could ever be easy. It's a practice of stripping away blocks, stripping away defenses, reminding myself over and over to let in, take in, open up, drop that protective layer. What a horrible thing to do, and how beautiful. What else is there, really, than to let someone see who I am as true as I possibly can.
This is my best truth, I whisper to him over and over, with each breath, while I sleep, while my lips touch his fingertips, while my key fits his lock. Right now, I am ruined. Right now, I am running. Right now, I am ruminating. Right now, I am rubber bouncing away. Right now, I am rumbling. Right now, I am rushed. Right now, I am a ruby shining. Right now, I am rusted through and I fear one touch will crumble everything. Right now, I just need you to hold me, take your hand and put it there, hold me from inside.
I have loved enough to know not to make grand declarations while I fall. I know I have said the same things, again and again. Falling always feels like that: brand new, awakened, like nothing else ever before. And it's true. This time, it's green green in all her shades, babygreen and lime and chartreuse, fresh mown grass, pine and spruce, fern and jungle, tea and olive, so many options. Let's spend the life of our relationship cataloguing all of the hues and saturations, all of the chroma and light, every kind of value there may be. Let's memorize the hex and RGB codes and recite them in each other's ears when we need to remember the secret language in which we speak. This green that is growth and renewal, from budding seed to moss covering the old growth. Every stage, none more valuable than the other. None needing to be hidden. No forest does their mourning in silence, hidden away in holes or caves. Trees fall out in the open, unapologetic. This is my direction. I will now lay down to rest. We heard that great snap on the outer point trail and both looked to the canopy: which one would it be? The clear sound of tree death echoed, but it took a moment before falling. Like a ball bouncing tall tall tall and then less and less until the sound waterfalls. The tree was a waterfall as it descended, mortal, unrooted.
This is what happens. Unrooted I descend, mortal, and no one to be worshipped. And yet he does it anyway. So devoted, he whispers, and I whisper it right back. My noblesse oblige, my responsibilities, the placement in his life I continue to earn daily as I am to be and act from my best self. The deepest of forest greens. Living with him seems small compared to owning him.
I don't know why I crave the power I do, nor does he know why he craves the submission he does. We puzzle, we theorize, we study, we muse. And we give to each other in these ways that we have always craved. Something in me didn't know what I wanted was to own, to master. The verb, the job title—not the honorific, not yet (maybe that will come later). But as I study this path, I realize I've always been on it. Always been trying to encourage something more, and making do with my own limitations.
I've been making offerings my whole life, holding up gifts, looking at paths and asking if they wanted to walk it with me. This is the boy who has taken my hand and said yes. This is the boy who showed me paths he's discovered, too, but had not yet walked, knowing the essentiality of having another with him. This is the boy who has been offering, over and over, to take more if they wanted it. I want more. I want the edge. I seek the razor on which we can both balance. I seek the calling to be my own best self. I seek one who will stay at my feet not because it serves him, but because it serves me. That is a fine line of difference, but makes everything change.
Right now, I am shining in the oldest forest, crackling descent to the earth, digging up rubies. Doesn't green shine brighter when there's red around? Isn't my heart just oh so ready to pour this blood into the earth? Isn't there so much more to love than heartbreak? Isn't there so much possibility, when puzzle pieces find each other? Aren't we so ready, so prepared and ready, to live our way to the answers, live our way to the creations of our quiet, deepest callings?
I don't know what happens next. But I know this is the beginning of year three, and I'm listening. I choose.
"Under the Desk" Featured in eLust #50
Welcome to e[lust] – The only place where the smartest and hottest sex bloggers are featured under one roof every month. Whether you're looking for sex journalism, erotic writing, relationship advice or kinky discussions it'll be here at e[lust]. Want to be included in e[lust] #51? Start with the newly updated rules, come back October 1st to submit something and subscribe to the RSS feed for updates!
This Month's Top Three Posts
Featured Post (Molly's Picks)
Readers Choice from Sexbytes
All blogs that have a submission in this edition must re-post this digest from tip-to-toe on their blogs within 7 days. Re-posting the photo is optional and the use of the "read more…" tag is allowable after this point. Thank you, and enjoy!
Protected: Making Peace #17
I'm about to go back on tour. 2013-2014 workshops! Bring me to your school!
It's that time of year again … I am about to get back on the road and do workshops at colleges.
This year, I've narrowed down my workshop offering seven academic workshops:
- Fucking with Gender
- Build Your Own Gender Toolkit*
- Identities in a Label-Free World*
- Becoming A Queer Leader*
- Flirting Fundamentals
- The Dating Toolkit*
- The Sexual Politics of BDSM
* Starred workshops are brand new for 2013-2014, though frequently built upon other workshops I've offered in the past.
I also have some kink workshops, but I'm still working on gathering all of those together into a PDF.
I will continue to do talk about custom workshop requests, and I've got a Big List of All The Workshops I've Offered over on mrsexsmith.com in case there was this one workshop that caught your eye but you can't remember what it was and it's not on this new list.
Currently, I have these trips planned—and I have many more in the works that are just not quite finalized! If you are going to school somewhere near these places? I'm looking to add on gigs while I'm already going to be visiting. Get in touch with me or my intern Lori at [email protected].
10/6-7, Claremont Colleges, Claremont, CA. Writing ourselves into existence workshop, queer theory class, spoken word performance!
10/16 NYU, New York City, Best Sex Ever workshop
11/14 Wild at Heart, Seattle, WA – Cock Confidence
11/15 The Foundation for Sex Positive Culture (FSPC), Seattle, WA – Advanced Cock Confidence
11/16 The FSPC, Seattle, WA – Leaving Marks
11/17 Wild at Heart, Seattle, WA – Queering Power Dynamics
My appearances calendar is always updated at mrsexsmith.com/appearances.
Here's the PDF for this year's workshops (which you can download here if you prefer):
I'm really excited to get back out there and have more conversations with all of you. Did I mention that Pink & White gave me a box of porn for me to bring to you for giveaways?
Protected: Making Peace #16
Making Peace #14
Doors Openings
In my last apartment, none
of the doors shut completely. I
hung hand towels over the tops
to make the seal tight enough not
to open with just the slightest
push. In this new apartment,
the doors all latch firm shut, but
I keep crashing into them, throwing
my shoulder into the wood, touching
them with my toe, a small kick,
an elbow, a slight push, expecting
them to open. Though the truth is,
they would all open, eagerly,
with trembling pleasure, if ever
I uttered the softest request.
Protected: Making Peace #13
Five Blow Jobs
After the workshop. I haven't had enough of you (will I ever get enough of you) and strip you bare, glove my hand, slide two fingers inside you, sideways on our huge bed. The lamplight is different than the bright white of this room during the day, more warm, orange-yellow-gold and more full of shadows, and the shadows and the gold fall onto your skin like paint. In the car on the way back I couldn't resist (can rarely resist, it's so hard to resist when part of our dynamic is built around taking what I want) and slide your small fingers into my mouth. You miss the exit. Your fingers are blunt and I trace your jagged nails with my tongue, suck the salt from the pads, taste the day on your skin. I pull your wrist down to your pelvis and take two fingers in my mouth again when my two fingers are inside you, gently pressing, not a lot of motion, and I start to suck you off. Up and down your fingers like a cock. I hold your g-spot and feel it quiver in my fingers. I let your fingers out of my mouth so you can touch your clit, and keep my tongue on the back of your hand. You shudder and convulse against my mouth, your cunt grips my fingers. You slide your fingers back in my mouth, eager, and I taste you, just a little, at the tips, and I do it all over again.
On the side of the bed, but you're not supposed to be coming that day, and you do. It sneaks up on you in a moan, but before you can really come you stop yourself, blurting out, "fuck!" again, and it's the second time you've come without permission, and you're in trouble. You back off and look at me shyly; I am laughing at your distress, you just feel so bad for defying the rules, and the guilt is more than enough punishment. I can feel how bad you want to please me. I am enjoying this too, too much: your attempts to do things just right and your scrambles to fix it when you are so happy, so pleased to be serving me, servicing me, kneeling before me, my cock in your throat. It's enough for you to see that look on my face, that ecstasy you're causing, that overwhelming lust and adoration as your tongue hits the head so soft and slow as you suck it down, which makes me want to pulse and shoot, makes me feel my balls (as if I had them) contract and swell, cocked and loaded. You move back toward my dick with your lips parted and I push you away. "No—I think you're done sucking my cock. You lost that privilege when you came without asking. Down. Kiss my boots."
Long slow aftercare. I let the beating settle into your body—the belt, my hands, the restraints on your ankles and wrists. After some time on the bed I move us to the chair so you can sit on my lap. You wrap around me, sink down. You quiet and calm and I ask, "Ready to suck my cock again?" You say yes, quickly, in a whisper, and kneel between my knees. I loosen the harness and touch my clit under it while you suck me down. (You're not supposed to come today, still; one of us may as well.) "Good boy," I breathe as I watch your mouth, tongue, lips, my cock down your throat. I let you guide it. I let you slide it however deep you want. I push a little, because that's what I do, but mostly I just concentrate on the feeling and the sight. I almost come but it's too much, I get overstimulated and don't have the right angle so I get up and take my jeans off, my socks and shoes and briefs, and spread my legs wider, get a better grip under the harness. You start in again and I imagine what your mouth would feel like. I know every inch of it, know every ridge of the roof and every tastebud on your tongue and every valley of your teeth with my fingers and my tongue, but fuck how I wish I could feel those with my cock. We are making do with what we have and you are an expert at sucking me down, swallowing, and I think about how I'd get tight and build up pressure, ready to shoot. You moan around my cock and I feel it in my pelvis and I feel you squirt on my ankle and foot, you're straddling my leg. "Ohh fuck you're in trouble," I manage. You whimper a little, give me those eyes, those sweet little boy eyes like you would do anything for your daddy, you're sorry, you didn't mean to, you couldn't help it, and it doesn't take long before I'm over the edge for you, coming in your mouth, yelling out and curling my spine and feeling how I'd shove and come to the back of your throat. I breathe, my body stills. You sink down onto your belly and put your tongue to my foot, clean it off, suck my instep. With your head still down low, you say, "Am I still in trouble?" and I laugh.
You walk over to me with your cock on, hard and thick and fitting you, jutting out from your hips. "Can you stand?" I ask. You nod. I sit on the edge of the bed. You let me feel it, with my hands and along my lips, my jaw, getting to know its new contours. I put my tongue on it, kiss it, and you shudder. I like feeling how hard you are in my mouth. I can't take it as deep as I think I can, but I try, again and again, wanting you so far inside.
You start on your knees at the end of the bed after I have kicked you, hit you with my belt, after I told you to pick a number and you picked three, after you took more than you thought you could, after you crawled for me, after my hands in you at the edge when I said come on and shoot that load for your daddy, little faggot and I shove in, impatient and hard, to the back of your throat. You gag. I keep going. I hold you by the hair and work my hips so it goes in and out of your mouth. You gag again. I keep going. I stand over you and you rise up a little higher and I keep fucking your mouth. I wrap my hand around your throat. I pinch your nose closed and shove in. You look up at me, pleading, in a rare moment of eye contact. I don't let up until I count to ten. I take my dick out and let you breathe and do it again. Count to ten. Sometimes I hold my breath with you, but I always let mine go before you do. I fist your hair and shove in deep. My hips shake against your mouth. Come on, little boy, take it, that's right, that's how I like it, fuck, yeah, give me that pretty little mouth, take it deeper, you can do better than that, fucker, do it, suck it down, yeah that's right, nice. You stumble back a little and my fist holds you up.
Featured image courtesy of Crash Pad Series
Ask Mr. Sexsmith: Help! I want a decent pack 'n play cock!
Hello Sinclair,
My girlfriend and I have been looking for a decent pack 'n' play cock but can't seem to find any that seem decent, and it's hard to choose over the internet.
I read your 101 on packing cocks, which was useful and helped me know what to look for. Unfortunately, all your recommendations have been discontinued.
Do you have any more recent cocks you could recommend? (If it's a UK website, that would be a huge plus as postage can be really expensive to get it over here.)
Thanks very much. Regards,
In recent years, there have been generally three cocks that are considered "pack and play": The Silky (aka the Bendy), the Goodfella, and the Tantus VIP Supersoft. All of those are outlined in my Cock Confidence: Pack & Play article here.
However …
Not to be all dramatic about it, except that OMG IT IS JUST BASICALLY THE BEST THING THAT HAPPENED TO PACK AND PLAY COCKS EVER, a company called New York Toy Collective rolled onto the scene in 2011 and they are producing a brand new pack n play silicone cock called the Shilo.
And it is really, really good.
I think it's so good, in fact, that I have teamed up with NYTC and I have a few of their cocks that I carry around with me and sell myself. That started because I kept RAVING about them in my workshops, but they weren't in toy stores yet. Now, they're in many stores, like Good Vibes and Babeland and Smitten Kitten. I don't know if they're in the UK yet, though (I don't think so).
So, wait, backing up. Let me introduce you to the Shilo:
Made out of silicone, with a "proprietary core" (which apparently means "we can't tell you what's in it, but it has layers of silicone and other plastics") that makes it bendable. BENDABLE. So you can tuck it down into your pants and then bend it back up straight and fuck with it well. I mean well.
It is 6 inches of insertable length, and 1.5 inches in girth. Which is a great size. A really really good size. A slightly larger than average size when it comes to cis penises, but perhaps slightly on the small side when it comes to strap-on cocks. Let me assure you that it is excellent for a) blow jobs, b) anal sex, and c) um all the other holes and fucking too. I often switch to a slightly (or massively) bigger cock when I want to really go at it for a while, but it is excellent for fucking. And because it's very bendable, you can get it right to the g-spot or p-spot really easily.
Clean it like you'd clean any silicone: place in boiling water or on the top shelf of the dishwasher (no soap!) or wipe down with a 10% bleach solution.
Shilo is available in 4 skin tone colors, because more choices help you pick a shade that is closer to your skin tone. AND it now comes in blue/black, pink/blue and fierce pink!
So you can buy them online from various stores now, or from nytoycollective.com, or you can buy them right from ME. I'm selling them for $135, and I would much prefer to sell them in person, but I am willing to mail them to you. That'll be $135 plus shipping (which varies depending on where you live. If you're in the US, it'll be flat rate priority mail).
Email me, [email protected], if you want one with the color and your address, and I will bill you via Paypal.
Or, of course, you can pick it up at your local queer feminist sex-positive sex toy store, which hopefully you already patronize frequently and support in many ways, or online from NY Toy Collective directly.
Protected: Making Peace #12
Protected: Making Peace #11
Protected: Making Peace #10
I quit.
In the past two months, I've resigned from two major positions that I've held for the past few years: Media Chair on the BUTCH Voices Board, and national women's coordinator and New York City coordinator for the Body Electric School.
There are various reasons for both of these resignations, and I'm not sure how much to really go in to here, so I'll opt for very little.
I've loved working with both of these places. Body Electric, I have loved you since I set foot in my second workshop and cracked open my whole body and let something new flood in, some sort of pleasure-spirit cocktail that got me high and holy and eager for more. I'm still open to being a part of Body Electric in some form, but I'm no longer coordinating workshops (this October's Outside the Boxes workshop will be my last one).
BUTCH Voices, I have been so touched and relieved and humbled to get to know all of you board members and advisory board members and steering committee folks, and I am lucky to have you as friends now, after doing this amazing community service of putting on the 2013 national conference. Media Team, special shout-out to you and all your amazing work you put in to our look and feel and communications. Thank you.
I'm so glad I did it. I'm glad I said yes to both of those, I'm glad I served those organizations. But unfortunatley, neither of them are sustainable financially, because the amount of work put in isn't equal to the compensation I receive. It's not just monetary compensation, and I didn't go in to either of those jobs expecting that—but it's also community compensation, contacts and networking, energy, gratitude, friendships, experience, and all those kinds of things. And it just hasn't been enough.
Maybe it would be enough if I was sustaining my own financial self, but I'm not. I need to be more careful about all those hours I've spent volunteering my time and giving my time away for very little. I need to make smarter financial and energetic decisions. I need some serious self-care time, as I continue healing and moving forward from this transition.
And! I have some exciting new things in the works.
I'm finally starting to treat what I've been calling my "freelance" work over the past four years or so as an actual business, and trying to make some decisions accordingly. I'm doing a lot of re-visioning and planning in order to re-launch my business in three parts: writing, teaching, and coaching.
I recently got new business cards, which are actually bookmarks, and they are focused on this three-part business strategy thing:
They're bookmarks that double as business cards, or business cards that double as bookmarks. What? It's not like you have to identify as just one thing, anyway.
Want one? Ask me for them next time you see me in person, I'm carrying them around pretty much everywhere.
I've also got some new plans brewing to continue erotic embodiment workshops and collaborations, but nothing is official or public yet, so I'm just going to be secretive and let you know that new things are growing, and hopefully I will tell you lots more soon.
I'm excited for these changes! I'm not sure if they'll work or not, but I want to keep trying. I'm practicing being determined, keeping my tenacity up, building strong movement forward.
What It Means
To Love You
An adventure for which I
have been preparing, long before
we met. A practice in honesty
with myself and others. A crow
bar opening my ribcage wider
than I thought it'd go. A pill I swallow
to make all the colors brighter.
A zipline I can't let go of for fear
of plummeting back to where
I've already been. A breakfast
in bed, lazy, perfect on a weekend.
A heartbeat to which I can count out
a 4/4 rhythm and always
carry a bass line. A harmony.
A tune I can almost make out of
a song I know so well but can't
quite remember. A return to
myself. An exercise in becoming
supernova without exploding.
A crazy idea that just might work.
An adoration. A prayer with my whole
body, starting at my lips. A midnight
candlelight canopy garden of treasure.
A menagerie custom made for me.
A secret I hesitate to share because
I want to cherish it enough for the
whole world. A promise, but I'm not
yet sure for what. An anchor in my
marrow. A pen full of ink and not
enough paper. The slick oil of finger-
prints on glass. A smooth river stone
large enough to balance on one
foot. Lit birthday candles that won't
blow out. A hike into the shady forest
with a picnic and a fairy tale. Your skin
shined with sweat. A relief. A tribute.
An ache that fills me more than any
ache should. A symphony of leaves.
A choir of hiding places. A quilt from
old tee shirts. Look, that's from my
first concert. You saw that same tour,
but we didn't know yet
what that meant, either.