9/23/2020

Apologies for the delay in posting! My state was on fire for a while and nobody could breathe, and then I had technical trouble with my drawing tools. But the fires are dying down, the air is… not too bad, and Ben came over here and fixed the problem with my tablet (thanks Ben!). Here’s a short piece for now, and with luck I’ll get a longer one up soon.

Alternate Reality #1

In my freshman year of college, a sex educator comes to campus and, by some miracle, I don’t employ my usual strategy of deciding I already know everything. During her very informative talk, she mentions “S&M” as a normal sex variation, and describes some typical behaviors.

Pow. Now I know. It takes a few months to work it through, but at the end I realize that my sexuality is inescapably linked to pain and power.

It isn’t easy to find partners in 1973, but soon I learn that if a person has had their tongue loosened with wine or weed, they might confess to fantasies that match mine. I start experimenting, learning more about what works for me and for them.

One day, a man tells me about a session he’s done with a professional dominatrix in San Francisco. After several days of waffling, I gather up my nerve to call her. I ask her about her work, and she takes me on as an apprentice.

I quit school – which isn’t doing me much good anyway – and move to San Francisco. After a year as an apprentice, I start taking clients of my own. All the money I can spare goes into the acquisition of fetishwear and toys, and my reputaton grows. 

I start teaching workshops at the kink gatherings that are just starting to be an important function of the coalescing leather scene. I write a book, then another. By the time my age and weight start eating away at my client list, I have a decent if not brilliant income from book royalties and speaking fees.

On a speaking tour in my early forties, I meet a man, fall in love and get married. He’s vanilla, but we fumble our way toward an open relationship so that he can have boyfriends and I can have play partners.

We have no children.