WEEKEND AT PORKY’S—MANAGING YOUR STY

With ponies and puppies getting the lion’s share of the attention in the BDSM menagerie, it’s time for all the sows and piglets to get their due attention. Learn the proper care and feeding of your porcine property. Little piggies love rolling in the muck, and you’ll learn easy recipes for creating a sty in your backyard that your little porkette will never want to leave.

Join Sir Farmer Brown and his submissive, piggy sue, as they show budding farmers how to balance the various demands of a piggyamorous household, especially when one little piggy wants to go to market, and the other little piggy wants to stay home.

ABOUT THE PRESENTERS:

Sir Farmer Brown is a well-known presenter in the Midwest, having founded the Cedar Rapids Muckrakers club in 1995. He organizes the midwest’s largest annual fetishist convention, FarmFest, and is the owner of Livestock, a manufacturer of dungeon equipment specially tailored for ponies and cows.

piggy sue joined his farm in 2003, and is sow-mother to slave petunia and slave wilbur.

"The Theatrical Dom"

I'm an actor and a Dom, so my next few words may come as a surprise: I hate Role Playing. My hate is not the Don't-you-dare-call-me-Daddy-again kind, but the Why-the-fuck-would-I-want-to-play-with-a-woman-who-sucks-her-thumb kind. I don't like a scene where you play 'Pretend'. My philosophy: either you is or you isn't. Or as it was phrased by Master Yoda (who owned a few Twi'lek slave girls in his day), "Try not. Do. Or do not. There is no try." Then again, he's not the most reliable spokesman for the BDSM lifestyle. After all, he also said "Size matters not", and we all know how wrong that is...

I prefer to keep my reality in the real world, and my fantasy on stage. You want to talk about Role Playing? In the past 5 years, my onstage roles included a womanizing lawyer (the uber-Top Billy Flynn from "Chicago"); an anal-retentive Englishman who liked to play with live dolls (the closeted gay Henry Higgins from "My Fair Lady"); a philandering schlub of a white-trash bottom in "The Great American Trailer Park Musical"; a dancer with enough neuroses to keep a Freudian psych busy for years (the bipolar Bobby from "A Chorus Line"); and a mob enforcer with a knack for the Shakespearean double entendre (the aptly named Gangster #2 in "Kiss Me Kate").

What role could I play in the bedroom that I couldn't play on stage? Okay, maybe a priapric diaper wearer with pierced nipples and a ball gag, but that's about it. Fantasy is so much richer in the theatre. In the bedroom (which I prefer to a dungeon, which never seems to have a thermostat handy), I can just focus on the reality of pain, pleasure, and that razor-thin line where the two of them meet.

There's a phrase directors and acting teachers use often, "Be in the moment." To an actor, that means to focus on the situation I'm in while I'm on stage; listen closely to what the other actors are saying; and not pay attention to the audience, the lights or even the stage manager in the wings frantically gesturing me to hide my erection during a love scene. It's like when subs are in their subspace; when actors are 'in the moment' they have a place where they go inside themselves that's detached from the real world. And when the show's over, and the actor comes down from 'the moment', they need a particular kind of Aftercare that we in the theatre call 'binge drinking'....

For whatever reason, I haven't met many actors who've adopted the BDSM lifestyle in their Private Lives. I'm one of the few that straddles both the BDSM world and the musical theatre world. I think they tend to be mutually exclusive, anyway. Imagine an ego-driven actress admitting she has a submissive side, or a fame-seeking actor willing to be exposed as a 'perv'.

But I'm going to try living both lives to full. And I'm going to do it with the same name. (Gasp!) Yes, that's right, no handles, no monikers, no aliases. No Sir, no Lord, no Master. The name I enter the dungeon with is the same name I enter the stage with: Drew.

My pet project here is to link those two worlds, in a quest to create the first BDSM musical in Broadway history. For the past couple weeks I've posted the occasional song drawn from musicals, but I've converted (and perverted) the lyrics to the BDSM lifestyle. Will a full-scale BDSM musical be far away?

"Coming Attractions"

My blog output has been slowing down of late, but I promise that I'm working on a whole host of informative posts for the near future. Be on the look-out for such subjects as:

"Safe Consensual and Insane"
Negotiating the "Bedlam" scenario

"The Suspension Bridge"
An advanced Shibari technique broken down for beginners in 1208 easy steps.

"Oh, Don't Be a Baby"
Why your needle fanatic freaks out when you try to remove a splinter from her finger.

"Remember When: Jarts"
A retrospective look at an 80's Edge Play fad.

"Will Rogers: Out of the Lifestyle Closet"
What he really meant when he said "Give a man enough rope..."

"Clown Play"
If it's hard for your pain slut to keep a straight face while you're wearing a red nose, you're not doing it right.

"The Search For Intelligent Lifestylers"

I like to think of myself as moderately intelligent. Do you want proof? I can read a person's entire profile. And understand it!

Intelligence, like water, seeks its own level. So I'm drawn to profiles of women who display some measure of the quality. Almost to a person, their profiles headline in clear unmistakable phrases, "Looking for intelligent Dom". These searching subs then provide a laundry list of what they think is Intelligent and what they think is Neanderthal, a checklist of Don't and Do's for the Doozies who write. What the subs are doing is thoughtfully sprinkling the path to their secret hideway with bread crumbs, knowing that only the most astute of trackers will be smart enough to read the clues.

They're right of course. Most "Doms" who subsequently write to the sub make the same mistakes as their predecessors. Even after reading the sub's complaints! So, the subs post even more complaints about the small-brained Neanderthals who just can't take the hints.

Now, I'm not only intelligent enough to write a witty Introduction, but I'm wise enough to sprinkle my letter with so many of the sub's suggestions as to make it fool proof. So I thought. Turns out I was a fool to think that supposedly intelligent subs really want an intelligent Dom. After sending off my cleverly worded E-mail, I almost always receive some variation of standard form letter, "Thank Y/you for writing, but Y/you are not what W/we are looking for at the present time."

I'm a writer, so I'm used to that. But when it comes from a sub who complains long and loud about the louts who write, I can only laugh at her distress. She doesn't really want an intelligent, imaginative and experimental Dom. What she really wants is a Neanderthal with a larger cranium.

"Hard Limiting My E-mail"

I've come over to the conclusion that trying to develop a relationship with a sub through extended periods of email exchanges just isn't working for me, and I think it's been failing many of the folks here who are looking for mates. While platonic friendships can be easily built and maintained through email, for Doms and subs who hope to learn something vital about the person they're talking to, the process of email does not always live up to expectations.

To understand why I feel that way, here are some excerpts from a recent article written by one Daniel Goleman, and published in the Oct 7th edition of the New York Times entitled "E-Mail is Easy to Write (and to Misread)". The article is specifically about the workplace, but it applies to any situation where we rely on E-mail.

The article focuses on "the emergence of social neuroscience, the study of what happens in the brains of people as they interact. New findings have uncovered a design flaw at the interface where the brain encounters a computer screen: there are no online channels for the multiple signals the brain uses to calibrate emotions.

"Face-to-face interaction, by contrast, is information-rich. We interpret what people say to us not only from their tone and facial expressions, but also from their body language and pacing, as well as their synchronization with what we do and say....

"In contrast to a phone call or talking in person, e-mail can be emotionally impoverished when it comes to nonverbal messages that add nuance...to our words. The typed words are denuded of the rich emotional context we convey in person or over the phone. ...

"Still, if we rely solely on e-mail..., the absence of a channel for the brain’s emotional circuitry carries risks. In an article to be published next year in the Academy of Management Review, Kristin Byron, an assistant professor of management at Syracuse University’s Whitman School of Management, finds that e-mail generally increases the likelihood of conflict and miscommunication.

"One reason for this is that we tend to misinterpret positive e-mail messages as more neutral, and neutral ones as more negative, than the sender intended. Even jokes are rated as less funny by recipients than by senders.

"People who know each other well, it turns out, are less likely to have these misunderstandings online."

I guess that means that if you're already friends, go ahead an E-mail each other. But woe to you if you're using E-mail to communicate with people you've never met before.

According to Clay Shirky, an adjunct professor in New York University’s interactive telecommunications program (he studies things like Facebook and chatrooms, etc), "When you communicate with [people] you only know through electronic channels, it’s like having functional Asperger’s Syndrome — you are very logical and rational, but emotionally brittle." His conclusion: "social software" like e-mail "is not better than face-to-face contact; it’s only better than nothing."

While I have no intention of cutting off email exchanges that are intellectually stimulating or that build friendships, if you're interested in developing an intimate relationship with me, don't be shocked if I suggest we talk on the phone or meet face-to-face after 5 or 6 emails. Anything more than that is a Hard Limit.

"The Aftercare and Feeding of Your sub"

Doms, are you the kink equivalent of the vanilla guy who rolls over after getting his rocks off and goes to right to sleep? (Hey, I just thought of this: men have, without thinking about it, been practicing orgasm denial on their mates for millenia!) If you're going to lash your subbies ass to tatters, at least stick around long enough to dress the wounds. It's not so much her comfort you should be concerned about. It's things like hyperventilation, shock and nasty infections. Always keep a first-aid kit handy and use it. (The disinfectant stings. She'll love it!). And give her plenty of fluids, during and after, especially if she's bawling up a storm (and especially if bathroom control is part of your thing).

It's not a contradiction to both cause pain and to ease pain. It's really the difference between "acute" and "chronic". During a session, you're causing acute pain, and those are the symptoms you're to deal with. Later, she'll be dealing with chronic pain; in fact, she's probably looking forward to enjoying the bruises all next week.

Too, unless your Master/slave dynamic calls for it, the Dom should never say to his sub, "Clean up your mess and come to bed." C'mon guys, didn't Mommy Domme teach you to put away your toys when you were done playing? It's only right that you should be the one to put the dungeon back the way you found it, while your aching subbie drags herself to bed and a night of satisfying sleep.

"There Has to Be a Better Way"

(WARNING: Some of the views expressed in this post may not be suitable for children under 13.)

I made the decision to join the collarme.com community (and to reactivate my old bondage.com account) because I'd just moved to New York City and thus had few friends here. I thought about going to the NYC Munch or to Paddles, but I'm just not a public player. So, I decided to try to meet people (read: subs) on sites like this one. Yes, I've met subs online, but it's just not the same as RL. There has a better way to develop connections with people than by sending bytes of ourselves flying around cyberspace on fiber optic wings. An online site like this is only a means to an end. Collarme.com, like life itself, is merely part of the journey, not the destination.

All my successful relationships were built the old-fashioned way: either through hookups engineered by trusted friends, or after working/living alongside someone long enough to build trust. Trust can't happen online, no matter how long you IM someone. At some point, every relationship has be fleshed out; you have to look your prospective partner in the eye. That's why I'm going to suggest to prospective partners, early on in relationship, that we meet face-to-face - in a safe environment, of course. It's easier to size a person up that way.

Be honest about this: if someone is a skilled liar, and is spinning a yarn about how he's a buff 30-year-old, wouldn't it be better if you found that out sooner, saving you considerable time and grief? or would you prefer to find out later, after you've already invested numerous emails, sleepless nights and pulled heartstrings? It's common sense to check him out early on. Get it over with and then get the lying bastard out of your life.

Yes, there are creeps and stalkers online, just as there are in the real world. You have trust your instincts. If you can't do that, if you can't go with your gut feeling, then you don't belong online in the first place. If someone asks a correspondent, "How do I know you're not lying?", the correct response is "How do you know I'm not telling the truth?" You see, if you lack the skill and werewithal to judge the difference, then the internet is too dangerous for you.

Here's a common sense suggestion, one that I'm going to try: invite the prospective Dom/sub to meet at the monthly NYC Munch (http://groups.yahoo.com/group/NYCmunch). C'mon folks, think about it: If two people share an interest in the D/s dynamic, then logically they should go where those interests are on display and celebrated.

What's the purpose of having a vanilla first date. Safety? Does anything think, for even one second, that the people around you in a cafe care who you are, what you're doing there or what happens to you? This is New York City, where the official motto is "I'm not getting involved!"

On the other hand, at a Munch, there are wise and mature people who will know that this is a first time meeting of two people who met online. Believe me, they will definitely be looking out for the interests of the sub, especially if the meeting doesn't turn out well. I can't think of a safer place to be. And if I want vanilla, I'll go to a Dairy Queen...

Seven years ago I made several decisions that completely changed my life. I divorced my faithless wife, left the strict religion I was brought up in and choose a new career. Most of all, I realized I was a Dom who was trapped all his life in a sub's body. It was the most exhilirating year of my life, and I'm still enjoying the ride.

My first girlfriend after my Change Of Life was instrumental in my coming out of the vanilla closet. She had no experience with the Lifestyle, but she was looking for a man who had a little bit of 'pirate' inside.

It wasn't until after I let her go (she had issues left over from her previous boyfreind that she hadn't resolved) that she was, essentially, a sub looking for a Dom. If I had been aware of D/s then, I wouldn't have been so quick to let her go. (I'll talk more about her in future posts.)