“ During Babylonian and Persian solstice celebrations masters and slaves exchanged places. In each household, one slave was picked to be the master. In the palace, a mock king ruled in place of the true king.”
Tonight is Winter Solstice, and House Daedalus will be celebrating Persian style, with mitda reigning as Master for 12 hours from sundown to sunup. Wish me luck – I'll need it : ).
Someone I know, a thoughtful person herself, complained recently about my “reinventing vocabulary” in reference to how I write and speak, and it triggered a number of thoughts about vocabulary in general and mine in particular, which in turn triggered thoughts on issues I have had in my development as a whole.
Not that I do, or do intentionally, reinvent vocabulary (well maybe sometimes I do prefer my own terms for certain things, such as "absolute enslavement" :P ). I have a fair background in both phenomenology and the philosophy of language, particularly with reference to Hegel, Heidegger and Derrida, and so the language that I most naturally use includes terms and structures that are not unusual in these writers but are not so commonly used. But along with this I have some Asperger's traits, and fundamentally for me all language is in the first place a foreign language, English as much as symbolic logic, and am often non-verbal for long periods, so language that is unusual and seems foreign to other people doesn't seem any more foreign to me that what is deemed common parlance. I developed my sense of language despite, rather than because, language in general is a natural or easy thing for me. But I developed enough of a sense of language to serve me decently in what I do because I also had an ability for languages, whether foreign or not :).
My aspies traits have been a concern for me very recently in general. I'm not unhappy about having them – I enjoy the abilities I have as a result and I'm not upset by having had to make a slight extra effort with things like language. I learned language quite well in spite of aspies, and learned other things - such as how to judge people's perceptions of oneself - that are more difficult for aspies people than for the general population. Overall I'm quite content with the combinations of abilities I have developed - I was lucky enough that my aspies traits weren't so severe that I couldn't overcome things that I found necessary to overcome, and I learned many of the things I learned when I was too young to actually notice that it took me more or less effort than other kids.
The reason it has been a concern, then, is not particularly regarding myself, but regarding emmie and her son. Both of emmie's sons are diagnosed autistics, but the younger one really fits the description of someone with aspies more than autism, while the older one fits the description of a medium to medium-high functioning autistic more accurately. I haven't spent a great deal of time with her older son, who lives with his father in another state, but her younger son lives with us and is currently 9, which seems to be an important age for a kid with aspies. According to child development guidelines 9 to 11 is the age when children generally become social personalities. Up to that point children are an odd combination of self absorption and parent-centrism, they don't come across as completely self-interested, simply because their “self” is still integrated with those that raised them, usually their parents in this society.
But between 9 and 11 years this changes, and kids suddenly take an avid interest in one another. Peer pressure first really develops at this age and so does the need to be close to other kids, rather than first looking for parental/teacher acceptance and only later for acceptance by peers. Along with this comes the development of, not self-awareness, but awareness of how one is perceived by others. Aspies and autistic kids are often labelled not self-aware but this is a mislabelling of the fact that they are not aware of how others perceive them. They are aware of their actual “selves” quite strongly as far as I can tell. A striking difference between a fully autistic child and an aspies one, for me, is the difference between not knowing that one is perceived as “ different” or “odd”, vs. knowing it, but not necessarily understanding it or being able to change it.
So her son is having difficulty integrating with other kids at the age that they are all beginning to do so with each other. This could be a very temporary thing, where her son is delayed developmentally and will start to develop that kind of other-kid-awareness a bit later, or it could be a fundamental short-circuit in his wiring – I simply don't know enough about aspies or her son to be able to judge. From being aspies myself, in a less apparently severe way, I know that an aspies kid “can” learn that kind of awareness even if it's not altogether natural or easy. But I don't know if that's true for every aspies kid or just for some. And if it can be learned by any kid that is by definition aspies and not fully autistic (if there is a hard-and-fast line, which seems doubtful) I don't know about the best way to go about helping a kid learn it. The kid has ample reason to learn it – at present he gets picked on and his reactions to things – or more precisely how he allows people to see those reactions – makes it all the more likely he will continue to get picked on. Kids are sensitive and emotional creatures. It's not that “normies” don't get sensitive or have emotional reactions to things, but they learn more quickly than an autistic child what reactions are acceptable to show in front of whom, and what reactions will cause them to be made fun of or treated as “weird”.
This kid has it both good and bad when it comes to the severity of his difficulties. From the limited exposure I've had to his elder brother, he has much more of a chance than the elder sibling of living an apparently “normal” life. Where the elder child will always be treated as disabled in certain functional ways, the younger one may be treated as having been “developmentally” delayed, and may always be “odd” in certain ways, but will likely generally be treated as having “caught up” with everyone else. I use scare quotes on “caught up” because, as with many aspies kids, he has definite abilities as well as disabilities, and overall is very intelligent, so much so that despite an obvious learning disability he is in a regular school at the right grade for his age and is on the school's honor roll. There are many ways where he will always be “ahead” of the average kids in his classes. Not that you have to have aspies to be intelligent or have abilities, he is simply one of the lucky kids that despite whatever problems and issues he might have, he has these abilities to fall back on.
I hope that with further study, partly of aspies syndrome, mostly of emmie's son himself, we'll be able to figure out ways to help him overcome the areas where he does have difficulties. The extra effort it takes him will be worth it in terms of living the life that he will eventually want to choose for himself, and with certain other things being relatively easy for him, he should have spare energy to use on overcoming his issues.
I haven't had much time to keep up with my blog lately, what with working an 8 hr day and spending 4 hours in the car in total to get there and back. Not that I don't want to keep it up, but it gets grinding and I was definitely looking forward to the weekend.
Keeping up an M/s relationship in these conditions poses its challenges as well. The girls need direction and I'm often not as available as I would like to provide it. I have ideas as to making the task of setting tasks and reviewing them more efficient but that in itself takes energy and time to implement. So we're all getting by.
Preparations for mitda's surgery are not as far along as I would like, as a family we have to realize that the person primarily responsible for meals, shopping and a host of other things will be completely out of commission for some time, and everyone has to pick up the slack no matter what their personal schedules look like.
We went to a dinner party mostly made up of M/s couples, triads etc. tonight and it was a welcome social relief from the draconian world where I work, and the current pressures of home life. It made me remember why we do these things. Not, obviously so that when we go out we have M/s people to go out with, lol, but watching the interaction and feeling so at ease because these people understand how we are and how we choose to live confirms me again in following our hearts and minds and living as we want to.
We spent much of this rather longish day a little high on vicodin and flexeral. After the stress last night and the sorting it out this morning we all needed a mental vacation, at least I did.
The girls remain as they were as far as our relationship goes. There will be no more “topping from the bottom”. They can make requests, yes, but they cannot and will not be upset if the requests aren't granted.
On a happier note they get fitted tomorrow for their hallowe'en constumes. God knows what I'm going as though. Maybe I'll go as the host, who always dresses as a Texas rancher. Of course he has the ranch to back him up, our 12 sq ft or so backyard doesn't really count :).
During a conversation Saturday night a Master friend of mine brought up the “Master's inner critic”, in the sense of the following situation. When living 24/7 in an absolute enslavement relationship it can be easy for the Master to get lazy at times. Suddenly there's a “wait a minute, s/he didn't do ... while s/he was doing ... - ah well, let it go this time, the game's on ...”, and this happens a few times in a day, maybe multiply that by a few days, and you've suddenly let a few dozen “ little things” slide.
Then suddenly you decide you have to correct him/her and set things straight. But the “inner critic” is saying “oh yea, come down on him/her NOW after you were too lazy to do it the other three dozen times”, and it becomes a difficult thing to do. And if it keeps on going the AE dynamic is lost completely, the slave no longer expects correction, and the Master loses the ability to do it and just lets the relationship lapse.
Ironically that very thing happened to me seemingly directly afterwards. Having been faced with two slaves suffering from the muted grays, browns and blacks of the depressive end of the bipolar spectrum, and having been home to take care of some things that I wouldn't normally have time for, I found that all of a sudden E. was making dinner every night (or scrounging McD's or KFC for the family), the bedroom, master bathroom, kitchen and closets all looked like thermonuclear test sites and at 7:30am the only person even close to being awake and prepared to leave the house was myself, so I was taking the kidlet to school while E. got ready for work, and my two slaves snored peacefully in bed.
Time to bring out the heavy guns! Yep, I sent an EMAIL, lol. Detailing what wasn't done and that it had to be done from now on.
Or else!!!!
Or else what?
The inner critic was hounding me on that one but I went ahead anyway. Tonight the kitchen, bedroom, master bathroom and closet have all been cleaned and nitpicked over, we had a wonderful birthday dessertfest with mitda's mother, and while these sorts of things are not a cure for bipolar depression we've discussed emmie's situation in particular and come up with what I think is a workable plan to help her learn some new coping skills, as well as get her medications sorted out in a short amount of time, all without taking her near a hospital.
Critic, be damned.
Self-identification is a mysterious thing to me. People self-identify in all kinds of ways. For me it can be Master in an M/s relationship, bipolar, software architect, English-Canadian living in the US, all kinds of things that have overlapping and contradictory features.
For instance the English-Canadian background I have tends me towards socialist ideas. It can be difficult working out human ownership when one doesn't fundamentally believe in private property. And the bipolar throws a huge curve into everything, especially when both of my slaves are also bipolar. But being a Dominant is obviously not a bipolar tendency, if only proven by the fact that my two slaves ARE also bipolar.
So we tell ourselves our self-identifying stories and try to make the best of our possibilities. I am enjoying things the way they are going and I very much credit my family (current) for that.
Last night mitda decided to try her luck grilling some chicken quarters. After all, it can't be that hard to grill something, men do it!
So she caused a bit of a conflagration. By the time she called me out to 
help the grill temperature gauge had hit its maximum of 800 degrees and the chicken was literally on fire. The bacon she had wrapped around the chicken didn't help matters, but the fact that all three burners were on high and the lid was closed was the real issue.
After letting the grill cool I went ahead and baked the chicken at about 350 degrees to cook it through, and we had very blackened chicken for dinner. Surprisingly it didn't turn out that bad. It was quite edible.
I had an interesting experience last night. Jubal is in grad school to get a Master's degree in counselling (yes he plans a kink-aware practice). He interviewed me as part of his schoolwork. The particular thing he was training himself on was how to ask open ended questions. I found it quite neat that, despite knowing he was testing some technique, the technique remained effective.
With slave training I believe the same thing applies. Although the slave is aware of his/her training and the techniques applied the techniques still work just as well. In some ways they work better because the slave is involved and immersed in his/her training and is optimally working as hard at the training or harder than the Master.
I had a few criticisms of Jubal's techniques but overall he did a good job. Talking about personal issues with a family member is never easy, and it worked quite well and helped me personally somewhat in figuring out an issue I have at the moment. Not that it's a big issue like childhood molestation or anything, it's a simple work issue. But it's all the little issues that add up.. And it's the little issues that slaves have that a Master has to take the most time dealing with.
E., emmie's husband, has found a new interest in mastery over the last little while. He had been making tentative steps towards it for some time now, first recognizing a dominant nature in himself, but wanting to express it by being a "service dom", then moving closer to actually dominating by assisting in mitda's punishments.
Dominating in a TPE sense is very different than the dominating done in a scene or at a play party. While I don't hold, as the originator of the term TPE did, that people involved at a play party or in a time restricted scene are not really dominating or submitting but just playing at it, there is a wide variance between dominating someone in that situation and becoming someone's Master 24/7/365, with all the responsibilities that go with it. Derrida has said that "responsibility is excessive or it is not a responsibility. A limited, measured, calculable, rationally distributed responsibility is already the becoming right of morality." I once made the mistake of trying to take a day off, and as E. himself put it, the results were "clinically interesting" and "personally terrifying".
So despite earlier misgivings about his desire to shoulder the responsibility, E. has decided that he would like to master a slave of his own. Of course this changes the dynamics of our little M/s family just by being a stated desire. Not that I'm against the dynamics changing, we are here to help each other grow in whatever ways we happen to grow, and I'm looking forward to seeing E. develop his mastery. But if / when he discovers the girl he wishes to enslave to himself things will become very interesting indeed.
Changing things has already had its effects felt in such an intimate and complex relationship as we have. E. has altered his relationship dynamic with emmie and they will be working out how the marriage is to progress on a slightly less egalitarian set of terms. And this will not be necessarily a simple or easy change for either of them, with 7 years of marriage behind them. mitda went through a sudden panic of feeling "unnecessary" and had to be metaphorically dragged back into the fold. Of course she is necessary. And she is as involved in these changes as fundamentally as any of us, if not as immediately as emmie and E.
So altogether an interesting and challenging set of developments., I am looking forward, in a sense, to being able to mentor E. with the little I know of mastery. And of course it is a push to me to learn more, so as to be able to share more. Not that I wasn't pushed to learn more already. It will be a push as well, I think, to emmie's submission, and while mitda already behaved towards E. in a submissive manner I expect that to increase and deepen. Of course the girls are still enslaved to me, they pledged their being to mine and I would not trade either of them for the world. If and when E. does find his own girl she will be his and his alone, I am a happy, satisfied, and occasionally overworked Master to mine.
After a local munch yesterday evening we invited another TPE couple out for dinner. In one of our first public M/s situations we had gone to a conference/party that included a talk on TPE given by this particular couple. They are an impressive study in such a relationship, both relaxed and studious in protocol, skilled in play and knowledgeable in the psychodynamics of M/s, and sensitive to both the spirituality and the science involved in absolute mastery and total submission.
As a result mitda was nervous, emmie less so although her general shyness kept her very quiet for much of the evening. E. was very well mannered, as is his wont, and did a lot to smooth the flow of conversation in a situation where he was, although married to emmie, the only person not involved in TPE at the table. He showed his interest in the subject and his respect for the other gentleman's experience and knowledge of these matters.
It was a real relief for me to spend time with them. Even in the bdsm scene TPE is an oddity, and it's not unusual to hear, for instance as emmie and mitda did at a submissive's meeting, that "TPE is a fantasy". mitda of course countered with a solid argument, but one that was probably understandable to less than half of those present at that meeting, and to a degree if one hasn't experienced the absolute as it manifests one can find it impossible to relate to. Speaking with this couple, discussing similar experiences and our reactions to them, and discussing experiences they have had throughout an extensive history that are new and unknown to me, but from a perspective I relate to, was both satisfying and refreshing. I feel that much more confident in my mastery, and find that much more enjoyment in my slaves' submission, in sharing it with people who understand that mastery is not just being a 2 year old and having one's every want and desire met (although that is a nice bonus :) ), and that "exquisite enslavement" is not just a masochistic need to be used, but a path of self development within the encircling comfort of the Master's world and the unlimited responsibility he takes on.
Recent posts by mitda and emmie have had me thinking about jumping-ahead, or projecting-open, not in the general sense but particularly in their lives. How does one jump ahead in order to give someone their concern? In a sense I do so, have done so, and without it I wouldn't be their Master. But it's an effort that has to be renewed every day, every hour, and preoccupations get in the way.
Luckily I don't think the new job will be altogether that stressful. The code that needs to be tested, and the new code that needs to be written, are not particularly complex. Which should give me a bit more time and energy to focus on the girls than I have had recently. Well, specifically I have had time but stress from the other place has overburdened things and the energy and focus hasn't been there.
I thought I would post some thoughts on the subject, since although the girls have been collared for some time, mitda for a fair length of time, last weekend we did a collaring ceremony for them together, and as a result it is closer to top of mind than it has been for a while.
Firstly, I love that they are collared. Their beauty seems that much more radiant wearing their collars, and now that they can both wear their collars 24/7 they are a constant reminder to me of my luck and joy at mastering them. They are also a constant reminder of my responsibilities in mastering them, and the standard which I have to try to live to. I am currently studying the concept of unlimited responsibility, something that I think is particularly apropos and necessary in a TPE relationship.
Not that things are always perfect at House Daedalus. The fact that the collars are identical reminds me of the occasional rivalry between slaves, the envy or jealousy that can poison any poly household. And treating two very different people differently, as they require, but still equally, as they desire, is a difficult balancing act at times, and one I don't always succeed at.
mitda and I, as a former vanilla married couple, had the easiest transition to a TPE lifestyle. emmie and I have a few more hurdles to climb. We are in a poly married situation as far as our vanilla sex lives go, but it is new and like any newlyweds we are still learning each other's tastes, wants and predilections. And we have our pre-existing, comfortable relationships with our legal spouses to fall back on when things become tense for any reason. That my spouse is also her sister slave makes her feel insecure. That her spouse is a "top" sexually, and beginning to dominate in a bedroom bdsm sense, is an additional element and tension for me. Don't get me wrong - I wouldn't trade any aspect of my family for any other in the world, but it's only by being honest about the tensions that they will be resolved, as I always trust that they will. The love I have for emmie, Jubal and mitda, and the love between all of us, makes all the tensions worth it, all the difficulties a temporary thing, and my overall life satisfying and full of joy.
mitda, commenting on jubal's next-to-inaugural blog post, makes a few comments that make her worldview precariously relativistic. Here is an adjustment I would make to correct her, since her ideas are my responsibility : ).
"we live in our own worlds- and for the 4 of us, and the kinky people
with whom we associate, those worlds sometimes overlap, creating our
own society with its own norms."
Worlds are shared phenomena, Being-in-the-World is a simple, single structure, not a relation between independent phenomena the way it appears in English. Even between radically different cultures there is a shared set of meanings that constitute a common world, and allow other structures of human being such as discourse and understanding to occur coterminous. It's not so much that worlds sometimes overlap. Rather the result of World+understanding (among other existentials), things that always already have occurred in human being, and are therefore a priori to willed cognition, are unique, and huge contributors to what is variously, and loosely, called character, personality or self consciousness.
To quote Medard Boss, a Swiss psychiatrist who was very involved with Heidegger's ideas of human being, "We are not individuals locked up inside our bodies; We live rather in a
shared world, and we illuminate each other. Human existence is
shared
existence."
Today the family hasn't been up to much at all, me especially. The girls and I went for coffee and laptopping for a little while, and then mitda did the market run while we were out, but emmie and I pretty much sat and vegetated. Well I did some writing about TPE which will likely find its way onto this blog later in the week. But nothing really useful. emmie's and mitda's posts today made me feel very good ...
This is a needed change after yesterday, which was wonderful in many ways but extremely tiring to me at least. We prepared for and performed the collaring ceremony for both girls, with E assisting me in actually locking the new collars in place. It was fun and we all felt a little special I think, hopefully not in a short bus sense. Afterwards we went to the local play party and after a rather interminable "discussion period" and an equally lengthy set of personal introductions finally resulted in us watching some interesting rope work and having some reasonable conversation with others into related kinks.
So today, as I said, is relaxation time.
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