A New Devious Chapter

We're coming into the busiest time of year, so I figured this week would make a good time for a check in for everything as a whole. Right now, I'm still feeling productive.  It's keeping me upbeat, and motivated.  Things at home are... About what can be expected, which is frustrating, but I'm aware enough to not let it really affect me deeply anymore. I've been a lot more social lately, and I'm trying to balance that with everything else going on.  However, it's helping me feel a lot better mentally, and less drained than I was earlier this year. On the downside though, I'm craving contact. I want snuggles, and hugs and affection well more than any social time right now.  Luckily, Lux is visiting soon, so I'll get that. Everything considered, I'm not doing too bad right now in my brainspace.  Still not where I want to be, and still a ton of things to worry about and do, but I've gone through a world of improvement from the beginning...

I will fully admit, that there are some things out there that will make someone completely incompatible for me.  They won't stop me from being friends with a person, but I know myself enough to know that certain traits will kill any chance of attraction happening. Lux and I have a lot of friends in the rope scene, and it's often an awkward thing for him, because he will start to talk to people, and develop some amount of interest, but as soon as he says he doesn't tie, they immediately distance themselves from him for any sort of play or anything.  Despite the fact that they might also be masochists, or enjoy power exchange, or any number of other things, because he doesn't enjoy rope topping, they won't give him the time of day in regards to any play. I've dealt with similar things in a few cases, but not nearly as much as him. A friend of ours, who has voiced having no attraction towards Lux met a boy while at camp recently.  Despite making countless pro...

I spent some time curious. Seeing what other people are writing about when it comes to a few of the things I want to teach.  Taking ideas to help adapt classes, and build them in a more accessible way. Except, a lot of what I saw on similar subjects were near the complete opposite. Things like how to speak to dominants in a pleasing way. How not to get angry with a dom. How to ask for things without annoying a dom. Just a pile of things that slowly made me frustrated. All of these things muddle communication.  They dismiss emotions, and create an assumptive and unhealthy scale for a relationship.  They felt like my dynamic with Thrax, where I had to say what he wanted regardless of how I felt.  That my frustration with his lies and bringing them up was wrong.  That my constantly asking for what I needed, or things he promised should have just been ignored. Even if it isn't straight abuse, it doesn't help encourage any sort of healthy communicatio...

I've been reading a lot of things lately about why people stay in abusive relationships, and how they wind up in them and such. All people who have their own reasons, and stories about things. It brought to mind that both of my siblings, as well as myself, have had abusive partners.  My brother is with one still, and my sister only isn't with one now because her current partner is completely dependent on her (I know those are not mutually exclusive, but he is legitimately afraid he would not survive without her care). And it gives me that absolute definitive proof that we grew up in an abusive situation.  We were raised that emotional abuse was normal.  That it was an aspect of love.  That just because my parents stayed together and were abusive toward each other, they would be abusive toward us and it was fine. They just assumed it was how things worked, and it's why they are nearing 40, and still in unhealthy relationships.  I fought from my daughter's...

I don't play with a lot of people. I have no problem with meeting people, and making friends, but I don't do a lot of pick up play. And even more than that, I encourage vanilla time with kinky friends.  Long conversations about silly things, baking, and lots of fun mundane things. I like the process of becoming friends.  I like learning about people, and having quality time.  When I meet new people, getting to have the time to build a real connection with them is my favorite. Unfortunately, I find that a lot of people don't stick around for things like that.  If they don't get the time to play, they leave, and honestly, I'm ok with that.  I don't wait a long time, but I do give people a bit of time for me to actually get to know them.  I want to learn that they actually have interest in me and not just the idea of play. I want to learn what we can do after. I want to know what to expect from you the rest of the time. Honestly, I w...

I feel like for a long time now, we've tried to fight against the idea of "industry standard" appearance. Various body shapes, without some cookie cutter size and expectation of beauty. We encourage instances of magazine and marketing spreads that aren't touched up and altered digitally. And yet, when it comes to our personal social medias, and building an audience on them, we are making it easier and easier to alter our appearance.  There are tons of apps which can change the shapes of our faces, or our bodies, or completely change the appearance of a photo.  It's become a tool that everyone uses, and it's become the new normal. Hell, I've seen beauty youtubers make tutorials about how they use facetune.  Most new phones actually come with a "beauty filter" as the default setting to the front facing camera. The average person now has simply accepted the tools to change appearance, and still claims that mass media photoshopping is wrong...

With everything going on after Pennsic, I took a week mostly to recover and clean up before telling myself that I had to get back to work on all the things I had intended to make while camping but didn't. And what I couple of weeks it's been for productivity. I finished and published one book, which people have been enjoying.  I made two things a friend asked for, a gift for Squishy's friend who has a birthday coming up, and started a new "modest" scarf for myself.  Oh, and something for Squishy too. I've been getting Squishy ready for school, hunt down things she needed, and get her on schedule. All the classes I want to put together have gone into the beginning assembly phases. Another coloring book is about three quarters of the way done. I've also looked into more methods of making money off my art, to really try and turn this into a career. There was also one day when I got a huge kick in ass about the possibility to not be able publish ...

There are certain things we need to be sure to hold ourselves accountable for in casual settings.  We all need a level of self awareness and control, no matter what we're doing, or our orientation. One morning at Pennsic, while we were all still shambling about and putting ourselves together, sipping coffee, and waiting on the shower, one of our camp mates was talking about her night.  She had met up with a well established domly person who no one is really terribly fond of, and was chatting with him.  Apparently at one point he started trying to use his domly voice, knowing he has tried to establish this over decades, and she responded by calling him sir. She said it was compulsory, and while upset with herself, acted like it was just a reaction to domly behavior. Lux and I spoke about this.   About our disappointment on both parts. That domly person sure as hell shouldn't be trying to manipulate people he thinks might be submissive with spea...

While at Pennsic, one of the people in our camp started on the spiel about brats.  Something about having to keep them from bratting out of wanting something. And, if it were a smaller circle of people, I would have spoken up, and I still should have, but I kept quiet. I should have said that if people are bratting in order to get something, you aren't encouraging clear communication, or answering that communication with what they need often enough.  That sometimes people, including me, have bratty behavior as a sort of affection, or just because it's part of their personality, rather than because they want something. That if someone is being bratty all the time to where you keep expressing you don't like it, they're not a brat, but an asshole. I feel like that person just had too old of an image of what bratting is, and promotes too much alongside that, rather than being open to the idea of things being outside the stereotype of brats acting up for attention....