The Islands

OK--so now I will 'splain why I gave this blog the name I did.

A few years ago a friend of mind posted an essay that gives an interesting view of subcultures and what is it like to dwell in one (or several). So now I am going to do a lousy job of paraphrasing it. Maybe I can get permission to just post a link to the darned thing in time.

Now, said friend comes from a much different subcultural angle than I do, but the main point of the essay seems to hold up.

The cultural world can be seen to be divided into a mainland and a bunch of islands (some large, some small). Some islands are arranged into archipelagos which, perhaps, can be tagged with names. Islands can be near the mainland, or farther away.

Now, the mainland represents "mainstream" or "normal" culture. Most of my local friends would call mainlanders "vanilla". SCA folks would call the mainland "Mundania". Etc.

The mainlanders hold most of the economic might and influence in the world, and many are barely aware (if at all) that the islanders exist. Often their awareness is distorted, spiked by stereotypes and legends. Islanders of all stripes, however, know the mainlanders exist. Since their general survival often tends to depend on it, they also tend to more much more about the mainlanders than perhaps the mainlanders are aware.

So I, and most of my friends, reside on the archipelago of Alternative Sexual Practice. BDSM is here, with all of it's isles. We have the Masters and slaves, the sadomasochists, the D/s crowd, the bondage fetishists, etc. Spanking enthusiasts sometimes get filed under this umbrella label, though individual members of that isle will often insist that they live closer to the mainland, a step away from vanilla sex. You have other folks too--the foot fetishists, the transvestites (not to be confused with the drag queens and kings and performance artists, though these islands do carry a brisk trade with each other), etc.

Close by is the archipelago of alternate sexual identity, or alternate gender identity--the LGBTQ denizens. Of course many folks hold citizenship on multiple islands.

And close by one will also find the body mod crowd, the tatoo aficionados, the modern primitives, vampires of various types, etc, etc, etc.

Sometimes a reciprococity if formed between two otherwise distant islands when a strong enough personality decides it might be useful to fuse cultures. What does Zen Buddhism have to do with BDSM? Besides the kyosaku? Or Paganism? Might I introduce you to my friends?

And there are those of us who may winter and summer on a few islands (I like to winter on the island of sadomasochism and summer on the island of the Spankos) but we also like to travel a lot, for whatever reason.

You get the idea. And Hera knows where I will drop anchor next.

Southwest Leather Conference part deux

So this is my fifth time going to this conference.

My past experiences have been a very curious mixture of complete fascination mixed with...frustration.

Last year I commented that I felt like I was in the right church but the wrong sect.

Well...sorta. SWLC is produced by folks who practice M/s as a spiritual path. I know these folks. I've spent weekends with them. This is what they do and the conference is dominated by that vibe.

I am not M/s. I am not especially spiritual (I've tried--I just can't commit to a path. Sorry).

So why do I keep coming back?

Today I finally clued into the undercurrent that has me so intrigued. If it was a snake it would have bit me on the nose years ago.

Within the Dance of Souls, within Butchmann's, within Slavemaster's practice of cathartic flogging, within a number of other rituals I can name there is one common element....the use of BDSM techniques to promote healing and personal integration and to further one's progress towards authenticity.

Ok. Duh. That only took me 5 years to see.

Do you need to have a strong spiritual practice to do this? I dunno. I am not strongly spiritual, but I am strongly oriented towards authenticity and reintegration. I know atheists who are strongly oriented towards these things.

Do you need to be a master or slave to do this? Heck no! In fact the most powerful experiences I have had within my local subculture have occurred when the master/slave barrier is temporarily dismantled.

Five years ago I participated in my first hook pull. I jumped from receiving my first 3 18 gauge needles a few months before to receiving two 8 gauge hooks in my back. I was scared witless and shitless. I bawled my eyes out when I saw the piercer. Adrenaline and fear induced endorphins killed most of the pain I would have felt, but then I was in for a new round of fear when I had to go *tug* against the darned things. That fear did not completely go away, but I stood my ground through it despite some very valiant efforts on the part of my pulling partner. I held onto a male witness the whole time and cried and yelled my way through it.

And that day I rediscovered my courage. The courage had always been there, but others had told me it was not there.

So this time I pierced myself. I am still processing that. For one thing, I did something that I've historically had a hard time doing. I went to a piercer and asked him to teach me how to do it, on the spot. I was raised to never ask for special treatment or for help.

Then I trusted myself to do it and proceeded to pierce myself with the largest gauge needle I have ever pierced anyone with. I was also raised to never trust my intuition and that day I defied my upbringing and trusted it with sharp objects.

And--well, this is perhaps where my latent spiritual sense kicked in. When I grasped that piercing needle it felt to me like a sacred object, full of power and the ability to heal. It felt like I was taking that medicine within myself by being both the doer and the doee. I completed some sort of circuit.

Now, I have made some fantastic friends in the local scene, and as usual they did not disappoint. At one point during my pull I had a tall friend of mine hitch my rope to a point about 8 ft above my head. I was on tip toes at this point and I slowly let myself down as both rope and skin stretched (I learned how *much* nylon rope stretches). At this point a female tribal witness came up to me and asked me to tell her that "I am beautiful." Leave it to my friends to know where I need to heal. Under the influence of pain and endorphins my monkey mind had completely fled and I was able to actually hear myself tell her that. There was no hiding from it. At this point a male witness whom I have admired from afar for years started reciting affirmations for me. He talked to me about sensuality and usefulness and how I often hide from both by fleeing to my mind. He was there to tell me this while monkey mind was disabled.

And I am still processing.

This is what I mean by healing and integration. This is why I attended Butchmann's 3 times when I had no intention of becoming a master or slave.

Mind you, I do BDSM for fun much of the time. I do it because sometimes I like to scare the tar out of someone or make them scream. I do it because the whole starched blouse disciplinary thing has made me wet since age 4.

However, a part of me lives for that moment when a spanking goes cathartic. I have a flogger that I take to rituals with me to soak up good "ju-ju" because I consider it sacred. It has helped several people. Fun gets me only so far. It is the healing that resonates with my core, whether it is mine or someone else's.

I named this blog "The Islander" because up to this point I feel like I've been wandering rather aimlessly from the M/s crowd to the S/M crowd to the spanking enthusiasts to the modern primitives, etc. hunting for my own island. I *am* wandering, but not aimlessly. I am looking for that which heals and makes whole--or more accurately for that which helps people heal and become whole. I find that medicine everywhere.

Dance of Souls V--Southwest Leather Conference

Yep--my fifth.

I placed my first 12 GA flesh hook today (and the same 11 or 12 GA? needle twice). The fact that my crash test dummy was myself made the experience all the more interesting.

From what I understand, piercing oneself with--whatever--has an honored place in body rituals. The fifth play piercing needle I took was from my own hand and for some reason I find that placing at least one needle in myself during ritual anchors me to the experience. I "own" it then in a very visceral way.

That said, piercing myself with something that large (twice) and placing a hook in myself was several steps beyond mind blowing.

I got the "hit" that I was to do this halfway through the introductory lecture to the dance of souls. I was worried that the piercers may not allow it, so I deliberately sought out the most twisted edge player of the bunch. STF was actually my first choice but I saw he was only doing needles (they formed two teams this year for the sake of efficiency), so I picked Master Z of Texas. He had me convinced of his delightful sick twistedness after I saw what he could do with duct tape and an power stapler at an earlier demo. I figured if I fucked it up he would mop up the blood, grin, and take over. I also had an inkling he might like the show (he did). I asked a couple of SL friends to witness. Despite the fact this was their first dance they did with much love and without so much as a flinch.

I told Master Z where my knowledge of how to do this ended, so he helped me figure out depth and placement on my chest. I actually found that doing it myself made it less painful, even though I probably was twice as slow getting the needle through as he would have been (I wanted to get it to the right depth and I was not worried about whining from my "bottom"). He put in the first hook as I watched.* I asked to put in the second hook after I placed the piercing needle on the other side and to my surprise found doing that part took at least as much strength and a bit more aggression than did shoving the needle through. I was also drunk as a skunk on my own endorphins by this point and the concept of push and pull was not completely registering. Despite this I managed to get the hook 95% through before asking Master Z for help. He gave it a tiny shove and had the grace to tell me that basically I had done the job myself.

Of course I can't adequately describe how doing that made me feel. The word "empowered" comes to mind. Never had I felt so much ownership of anything. This ritual had become, viscerally, mine. I needed that very much. I was also immensely satisfied.

To my surprise and pleasure the subsequent pull was very comforting. My instinct had guided me the correct spots to pierce. The sensation felt maternal and safe and protected, much like I would imagine a kitten might feel when carried around by the scruff by mother. Even when I went into semi-suspension and the pain kicked up that underlying solidity was there. I had, literally, built my own wings and found them more than worthy for flight. I called myself beautiful at the prompting of a witness. I licked my ropes, licked Master D's hand, licked the wood frame, and kissed a female witness twice on the lips. I blissed out and let the whirl of sound go through me...

The first pull was about courage. The second...about building wings perhaps. For what, who knows. Of course more will come to me, verbally and non-verbally, as time goes on. I know though that this was transformative. I feel it.

* Hook piercing is done like any other piercing. The first thing to go in the body is a straight hollow piercing needle. Once the point of the needle penetrates through the skin the point of the hook is placed in the "bevel" (hollow point) of the needle. The needle acts like a sheath guide for the hook as it travels under the skin and the needle is ultimately shoved out of the skin in the opposite direction it went in. It is the curve of the hook, I think, that demands a decent push at this stage. An 11 or 12 GA needle, evidently, stays sharp enough to be reused for the rest of that same person's piercings.

Under Construction

Same Wednesday, different facet. Stay tuned...