Perette's Journal: 2004

1. Mixed feelings about work

2004-01-02 18:56 (Friday) journal

I’m continuing to plug away at the dominatrix & body rub business, although I haven’t renewed any advertising. I’m unsure if I want to continue - I feel myself getting drawn towards some darkness that I’m unsure I want to go into. Actually, it feels like I’m already there, I’m just mixed on staying. It feels like the identity that I’ve had for some years is fading, and being replaced. The idea of lawfulness for its own sake has already been destroyed, and is gone. Despite knowing that being convicted will probably destroy any possibility of touring the world some day, remote as the dream may be anyway, I’m just not caring about the law. The aspect of me that is safety and discipline isn’t working.

Yet, this is what I wanted. I don’t want to be fucked by the laws because I’m one of the few that obey them. I want to be able to ignore them. So now that I can, why do I feel weird about it? Maybe the newfound idea that if I break a law, I can be punished; formerly I tried to comply with the law, this wasn’t a consideration.

I don’t think I should stay the same. Maybe this is how I change, become someone new that can cope with my life, because the me that was me couldn’t. Maybe it’s good that the me that is me isn’t so committed to staying me as the me that was me was, because the me that shall be will have evolved and not be the same incapable critter.

2. Mood oscillation

2004-01-05 14:32 (Monday) journal

I’m reflecting on my mood of late. I’ve been in some kind of oscillation, swinging between okay and a state of paralyzing fear/pain. I get a little bit of stuff done on the upswings, but am completely unable to get motivated in the lows. I assume they’re depression, because I display the symptoms of depression - except I don’t feel sadness. Or maybe the sadness is covered up by the fear/pain. It’s getting worse, too, I think. I was grinding away at the body rub/dominatrix business, even if I was scared of it, and I’m finding myself more and more fearful/paralyzed by the idea of it.

I guess my psychiatrist is doing well: he’s cured me of the depressions in which I’m still capable of basic survival, and now I’m in the normal, unmotivated life-fucking depressions that everyone else has. Of course, this comment is an attempt to shift anger and frustration with myself to him, thus eliminating my feelings of guilt about my incapacity.

I guess it is depression, because in the moments the fear goes away, I just want to cry.

I fear people, I hate people. They harm me, keep me outside. But that’s not true, it’s me that stays outside, because I’m afraid of the challenges inherent in meeting people. I’m afraid of my own incompetence. That’s why I’m fearing the body rub / domination thing - I have no meta-knowledge to assure myself of the skill of what I do. Therefore, I don’t feel good about it, and therefore it has no worth, and therefore I have no worth.

Programming was something I excelled at, and I knew I excelled at it. I saw the others, how poorly they did the craft, and I could see how much better I was. That sense of being better is what has kept me going. But now my mind is in tatters, and I can’t do the one thing that has made others find me worthy.

There are other things I’m good at, or could be, but since I haven’t done them nobody would want to experiment with having me do them, because in this economy they could always find someone more experienced. Someone whose mind isn’t a corrupt piece of shit.

My view of humanity isn’t getting any better either. I still view people as generally self-serving, uncaring critters that would gladly harm me to take what they want - as long as they can somehow deny to themselves that they’ve hurt me, so that they don’t have to feel the guilt. I think a lot of them are good at it. Or maybe I’m exhibiting a symptom of paranoid schizophrenia, thinking they’re all out to get me.

I wonder if I should go for some group therapy, but then I’d have to be in some program which means I wouldn’t be making money. Not that I am anyway, so maybe it makes no difference. Dammit, I’ve paid all that money into taxes all these years, and now I’m fucked and need help, but I can’t get it because I quit my job on my own. I know mom & dad will help me out to some extent, if my money runs out, but I don’t want to be a burden. Isn’t this kind of thing why I’ve been paying a bunch of taxes all these years?

I hate them all. I hate them all. It’s easy to hate when ‘them’ is such a vague term, just hating all the ‘them’ that I don’t know. Just like they hate me, because I’m one of their “them”s. The world is just one big pile of hate, all of us hating our respective “them”s, the people that don’t understand us, that disrespect us, that disagree with us, that are different from us.

3. Mood oscillation

2004-01-07 00:23 (Wednesday) journal

Damn, this high-frequency oscillation thing is weird. I’m used to slow oscillation, usually… Rrrr, I remember frequent oscillation only once before, just before I left Sam Asher Computing. It’s hard to work with, because I’m not adapted to effectively harness the upswings when they’re in little bursts like this.

4. Becoming a dominatrix

2004-01-12 12:11 (Monday) journal

I’ll bet most people don’t write in their journals with vi.

I’m either on an upswing or doing okay. Been feeling okay for several days now. I’ve been starting to feel in touch with my sexuality, like it’s a strong energy source in me. The whole dominatrix things feels like an outlet (or is it a source?) of it, and I’ve been feeling less focused on age play.

Money-wise, I’m actually doing okay. Not huge, but if the last week repeated regularly, I’d have enough to cover all the monthly bills at about break-even point, assuming no splurging like Arisia, which is where a bunch of that’s going to go. But, I’ll learn a lot there which will allow me to become a better / more full-ranged dominatrix. I hope Amanda doesn’t bail out, as 3 of us will be able to keep expenses at a very reasonable per-person level, but 2 will start getting expensive.

I’ve been taking the Red Cross “Responding to Emergencies” class, which involves first aid and CPR. The instructor is passing me so far. There’s a ton of reading for it, and given activities lately it’s hard to keep up. I am capable of reading the book and absorbing data, though not quite in the way I traditionally have.

So right now I’m at the Gates Motel again, waiting for another client who isn’t showing up. This place is cursed. Bastards.

I need to dilate more. I’ve been bad about it. Especially with my sexuality up, I should keep myself ready to be able to screw so I don’t find it frustrating when I’m in the mood. Sigh, not disciplined like I used to be. Sometimes disciplined in a different sense, though, which is an okay thing.

5. Clutter clearing, the value of time, and work-life balance

2004-01-26 16:01 (Monday) journal

I’ve been selling a bunch of stuff on eBay recently, trying to get rid of excess junk around the house. I’ve sold a bunch of Model 100 peripherals and some ethernet cables so far. It’s brought up the issue of what my time is worth. When I was working, my time clearly had a value of about $50 an hour (wages + benefits). Time outside work had value too, and I think that value was higher than time is now - in part because there was a lot less non-work time available.

Now, I have no work time. There is plenty of time to myself. I waste a lot of the time that I now have, in part because there is a lot of it but in part because I don’t have the income to fill it with something more meaningful. And selling this junk on eBay - how much do I need to make to make my time worth it? Is just getting the stuff out of my house worth it? I’m making crap on the ethernet cables, but I’m still selling them because I don’t want to just throw them away. Selling them is only making about $3 / bundle, and requires screwing around mailing stuff. So maybe I’m making $6/hour.

Yet, in dominatrix work I require $50/hour. However, I have to drive to client houses - so now maybe we’re talking $20–40 / hour. If we consider the time invested in set-up and adjusting web pages and stuff, it’s way less - probably $3 / hour, though that will increase over time because I’m having to invest less and less time as those things are in place and require less maintenance.

6. Rejection and Betrayal

2004-02-02 00:59 (Monday) journal

I grew up a part of society. A reject part. I was the one cast out, spat on by my classmates, pushed around because I could be pushed around. I was weak, and I was taken advantage of for it. As I entered adolescence, my intelligence blossomed and although among my peers I was still week, among adults I was respected. I was kept around to be preyed upon.

When I came out, I became an outcast. Though I was still intelligent, the fact that I wasn’t a traditional sexual orientation or gender meant my position had to be reevaluated. I don’t know quite when I became a part of society again, but I did. Maybe it was when people found my intelligence to be useful to them despite my sex/gender issues, or maybe it was that I conformed after my sex change. Though I was never a social maven, I was accepted.

As I’ve gone through this breakdown or whatever it is, I feel betrayed by society. I’ve taken care of a lot of people, and truth be told the friends I have have done a lot of care-taking for me. Despite this, I still feel inadequately supported. Some of it is the financial aspect: over the last 8 years, I’ve paid probably well over $100,000 in taxes, but I don’t understand/can’t figure out how to get help in this area. My friends have been willing to help, and I’ve gotten some, which is nice to receive because I have helped friends and it’s good to see that that is balancing out in my moments of need.

So why do I feel betrayed by society?

Every time I looked for a part-time programming job, I was unable to find one. Asking companies I worked for about it, they were unwilling to allow for me. People said I was lazy because I didn’t want to work 40 hours per week. So am I lazy, or was I trying to correct the situation I knew was happening, little by little? Maybe a little of the first, more of the second.

But lazy isn’t really a good word for what I was. I’ve always been involved in stuff, been doing things. If I didn’t want to be at work it was in part because I wanted to be doing other things, wanted to be able to dabble in enough of my interests to keep me happy.

I feel betrayed because when I finally started looking for help in October, I got the run-around. Every time I encountered somebody brushing me off and sending me elsewhere, it incurred delays because it just seemed too hard. Even now, I’m having a lot of questions about how much this idiot psychiatrist is helping. I keep going to him, is there a plan? When do I get better? Or do I just keep going, giving him money? Oh, wait, he gave me drugs so I’m supposed to be better now, just go back to programming, it’ll be fine, really, I’m just being greedy which is obvious because I’m fucking incapable of reading for understanding and think I shouldn’t be working until I can… But I digress into a sarcastic, bitter rant.

Everyone said they wanted to help. My boss said if there was anything he could do, he’d be there. But when I first started calling and showed up his cube to ask about how to get help through workman’s compensation (where my GP sent me), I was told that would be too hard to work and I should just try to do it on my medical insurance.

When I saw my GP, they said I should see a shrink right away, I was seriously fucked up. A compassionate voice, telling me they cared. But when I tried to schedule, I needed referral numbers and then incurred a 3 week wait.

Yet it’s my choice I quit my job, so no financial help for me.

I am bitter as all hell at the society I live in.

Am I just looking for a scapegoat for my problems? Probably, in the sense that reasons/persons responsible for my problem are irrelevant. This is the state of things, advance from here. I have no motivation though. Motivation in me was based on an idea I could make things better, society could grow and I could evolve and benefit as part of that. Now, though, I perceive no future for me.

I think in part, I don’t see anything interesting occurring in my life. I’ve always had dreams, maybe one day I can go hike some mountains or visit Japan or China or something. Now, I perceive survival indefinitely. I realize that this perception is not necessarily correct, but when I think about what doing any of it would mean it seems pointless anyway. Doing any of these things requires effort to assemble the financial resources, which seems just not worth it.

I think a difference now is that I used to like my work. Doing work I liked to get paid, save up money, then try something new I’m interested in seems like a viable plan. Doing a sucky job for Goddess knows how long to save up and get away for a brief time – not a good cost/benefit ratio for me, I’d rather be dead and just save the effort.

But what about my new job? I do like it sometime, if I like the client. But, I’m not getting rich off it either.

I’m tired, I’m going to sleep.

7. Cost/benefits of head shrinking

2004-02-06 12:05 (Friday) journal

Yesterday’s appointment with the shrink went okay. After the few weeks of considering whether or not he’s been showing any value, he actually did raise a few points that seem valid. Still, I didn’t bother to set up another appointment, as I question if the cost/benefit ratio is good enough to warrant continuing to see him.

It’s interesting that I mention cost/benefit ratios in my last diary entry too. Cost/benefits must be in the forefront of my thoughts. But I digress…

The point he raised is that of the things I find most important to my happiness, I’m not affecting change to try to get to where I want to be. The things that most mattered to me are:

• Having close relationships with my friends, and establishing new ones to replace those who have moved elsewhere. This is a gradual process, and hard to control. I am making new acquaintances, and some of the RKS folks are moving from acquaintances to friends. I’m also meeting people through work, but I wonder how close/intimate the relationships formed this way can be. On the other hand, I’ve established 2 to 3 that show potential.

• Having a open creative outlet. I have this journal, and the web page in general. The work in November- December on web pages and the m4/HTML macro package was definitely a creative outlet, and it felt good. Yet, now I’m idle again. I don’t have a large-scale project in which to pour creativity. There’s a bit of a conflict with close relationships, as focusing on a project takes time away from friends. Often, when I’m focused on a project I become very introverted while I’m working.

• Being able to commune with the Goddess. My feeling is I should be learning disciplined techniques like meditation and energy work, and learning herbs and layouts and stuff to provide a structure for me. However, I think these things are there to help provide a formalized way of communicating - free-form communication has worked well in the past. Or am I just being lazy? Maybe these things would allow me to get closer via the discipline that comes with learning the techniques.

I think the goal is to find a balance between the three points, and establishing a creative outlet is probably the first item that needs to be addressed.

8. Yoga, Progress on work

2004-02-18 15:01 (Wednesday) journal

On Monday while hanging with Anita, she introduced me to Yoga. She got a video at Wal*Mart that she’s been using to learn. I found it relaxing, invigorating. It seems to be effective in focusing on the body as a way to manipulate the mind, and looks like it would be good for the body as well. I intend to grab a copy of the video when I can find one, so I can learn it as well. This would be a good discipline to learn for improving my magickal skills.

Tommy finally got my listing on the DPF site, so I’ve been getting interest calls in AB/DL sitting. I’m thinking that given my nature, this would be a good direction to focus my dominatrix career. Obviously I should try it out for a while, see how I enjoy it as I do it a bunch, but I’ve had the thought that maybe creating an AB/DL retreat / baby-sitting service in the Greene county area might be (a) fun, (b) profitable (not far from NYC, Boston, Montreal, and mildly far from Toronto; (c) a long-term thing I could do - I think being a mommy wouldn’t be as susceptible to aging issues as other dominatrix things; (d) a nice place to be in terms of being close to nature and mountains and places to hike and stuff.

I’ve been realizing that I don’t want to program again. Maybe get into networking, or some other technology that is more tangible than the depths of software.

At the same time, I seem to be looking to the future again in the last 24 hours. At least, the possibility of finding something for a medium- to long-term future, either doing network stuff or finding niche dominatrix work that I’d feel safe doing, seems better and that is a nice feeling.

I still don’t feel attached to Rochester. But the idea of Greene County or Hudson Valley region - it feels like that could be a home in the future.

Progress on the house has been okay. Blue bedroom is repainted, the new foyer ceiling is up. I need to finish patching foyer walls, then repaint - the new color is antique white, which is roughly what it is now I think.

It’s become sunny out, so I’m going to go for a walk in the sun.

9. Mood swings

2004-02-26 00:22 (Thursday) journal

I’ve been mood swinging the last few days, I think from stress of stuff going on. Newton busted and had to go back to Apple for a few days, and generally I feel overwhelmed by obligations and stuff I’m working on. Electrolysis uses up some of my sanity as I try to bear the pain.

10. State dump

2004-04-01 22:38 (Thursday) journal

Tomorrow I’m going to see John Amos, a psychologist. I’m hoping he’ll be able to direct the self-repair progress into a more productive direction than the spin it’s been in for a while.

Memory / intellect performance has been okay lately, although I’m certainly not pushing my brain the way I used to. I’m concerned that much like therapy for a physical injury, we must gradually ramp up brain use and not simply drop me back into an environment like I was in before. I fear that in that scenario, I’d simply tear my mind apart again, and create further damage in the process.

Issues in my life:

• No sense of direction.
• Bored with my life.
• Lack of desire to be productive.
• Sense that being productive doesn’t get me anywhere.
• Not sure what I want to do work-wise. I don’t think I want to do the dominatrix thing long-term, but I can’t figure out what else to do that’s got a flexible enough schedule to give me time to live.
• Not sure how to achieve financial balance given other confusion.
• Not sure how to integrate my magical aspects into my life.
• Friends leaving, inadequate replacements (number and value).
• Not sure how to balance need for sleep and need for sunlight versus need for interesting social stuff which all goes on late at night.
• I have always lived looking toward the future, planning for some time when things will be good and I’ll have enough and I’ll have time. Sense now is that I want to live now, screw the future, carpe diem. I don’t know how to do this, and don’t have the financial resources to do it – unless I start dipping into savings heavily, which is a limited time offer.
• I’m not getting anywhere (or feel like it) in getting my life in good order.
• Midlife crisis?:
• Having trouble making decisions, or feeling like either way I’m leaving something out of my life that I’d like.
• Feeling like I can’t do everything I’d like to do.
• Perception that the things I do in my life get in the way of having “better” fun, which I couldn’t / wouldn’t have anyway because I can’t afford it or don’t have the time or whatever.
• Inability to resolve choices between what I want to do and being responsible / what I think I should do. In part, because I’m not sure what I want to do, but there’s a lot of stuff I want to try.
• Possible chemical issue involving mood swings. Bipolar disorder?
• Weak faith in humanity.
• Not sure how to integrate spiritual issues into my life.
• Not sure how to integrate being universal or Earth balance point thingie into my life, and having trouble dealing with the idea of being whatever it is that I am.
• Not sure how to deal with mental health types when they’ll just say that I only believe I’m some kind of universe balance thing because of chemical imbalances in my head, then try to brainwash it from me.

I should document the catch-22 that occurs in my mind: I want to be happy. I need to achieve balance in my life. I need to develop the spiritual aspect of myself to fulfill my destiny. I need to have friends to support me through this process. Sometimes I need to take time to go off to go and do my own thing. When I’m off on my own I can’t make income, so finances are bad. Eventually I will be bankrupt. So get a job. But if I have a job I won’t have time to develop my spiritual aspect. (Contradiction.) Accept the idea of being destitute. If I’m to fulfill my destiny, I need resources. Something to edit on, and access to the internet. Thus, not destitute. (Contradiction.) Figure out how to live off the government. I’m not sure I find this acceptable, and it’s hard anyway. Start a cult, and collect tithes to support me. That’s not acceptable, and will interfere with my destiny. Don’t fulfill my destiny. Not acceptable. (Contradiction.) Learn to live without balance. Don’t know how. (Contradiction.) Don’t be happy. Present state, but I’d rather be happy.

11. Reflecting, and contemplating leaving Rochester

2004-04-08 22:02 (Thursday) journal

After a few crazy days, I’m having a moment of semi-calm as I munch a Chicago Classic at Pizzeria Uno. Mood swingy action is still in force, and I’ve been noticing it’s the old cycle: Stress -> desire to change, desire to change + no method seen -> trapped, trapped -> fear, fear -> panic, panic -> depression.

I saw Borghi-Sensei today, and she didn’t want to prescribe a mood stabilizer, preferring to defer that responsibility to someone who specializes: a psychiatrist. She did, however, prescribe some stuff that is meant to deal with anxiety, so if I start going into the fear cycle I’m to try this stuff out and see how it works.

I had a nice scene last night with a first-time BDSMer. He enjoyed it, felt safe. I haven’t done any topping quite like that in a while, and it felt really nice to do it.

The next few days are going to be nuts. I’ve got an AB/DL client visiting from NJ, then a body rub when that’s over. Monday I’ve got a forced feminization scene planned, go to Connecticut Monday to dump off Jack and then return to Albany on Tuesday - Wednesday to do another age-play scene. Eeek! Financially it will be a very good thing, if all goes well, but it’s still going to be a lot of stuff in a short duration.

I’ve been thinking about my issues with wanting to bail from Rochester. I think there’s some justification, in that Rochester is really depressing throughout the winter when it’s gray all the time from lake effect clouds. Bad thing for a photosensitive type. However, I think that a lot of my desire also stems from attempting to run away from problems I’ve created around me: I’ve neglected a lot of small maintenance on my house, and it’s building up; I’ve never purged stuff effectively - no, I’ve been a pack-rat so I’ve actively collected crap, and the crap is just getting in the way now; I’ve got some projects that I’ve started and just stalled on for extended periods. The problem is, as individual tasks they are mostly not so bad (restoring woodwork excepted; that’s hard on all scales), but when I look at one I see the whole pile and then I’m overwhelmed and don’t know where to start.

Still, I don’t know how to heal some of the damage that’s been done - both my disconnection with the house, and disconnection with the neighborhood since my bike was swiped last year.

Regardless, whether I decide to sell the house or stay, the shit that’s broken should be fixed. I should start fixing some of the stuff, and maybe see if I start reconnecting to the house. Sue thinks the completion of undo-spell may also help restore connection.

I’ve just noticed that when I’m writing in my diary and I start thinking about what to write next, I brood. I think I brood pretty effectively too. I should have someone watch me sometime and see if I can brood as effectively as Angel. Not as much, certainly, but maybe my brood- quality level is comparable.

12. Anxiety

2004-04-13 13:10 (Tuesday) journal

I’ve arrived in Albany for another scene with a client from Boston. I came up from mom & dad’s, where I dropped off Jack and some of my stuff last night. On the way up, I started doing the my-life-is- screwed panic-trapped-depression thing, so I just took one of the anxiety pills Borghi-Sensei prescribed.

Where the hell is my life going though? I don’t want to do anything within the normal constraints of society. Yet, I’ve got the perception that anything I’m doing I can’t succeed at, especially when I start thinking about the hell that is going to be my taxes. Again, feeling of being overwhelmed and trapped. I don’t want to stay in Rochester, because I should be somewhere with more light, but I don’t have anywhere else to go. And going to a specific place implies some reason for going there and setting up some life there, either buying a house or renting a place which involves a lease - and again, we’re back at the idea that going anyplace else implies a reason for going there, and the stability that comes with being a standard part of society. Being part of the ol' 9–5 grind. And when I see that, I just don’t want to be a part of it.

There should be stuff I’m excited by. I should be interested in possible relationship with Ellen, but that possibility is starting to just blend in with all the other crap that seems like a hassle. And this RKS board stuff, crap, I’m doing a crap-load of the fashion show and the things other people are supposed to be doing they just don’t do without telling me, and when I find out they just expect me to be able to do this even though I haven’t got the resources set up. Arrrrr…

I wish I wasn’t so bull-headed, and that I’d just be able to give up and end it all. But no, I’m stupid and have to believe that things could get better, but I do nothing to make things get better because I don’t know where to begin or what would be right.

13. The pain of communication

2004-04-27 16:27 (Tuesday) journal

This past weekend was Full Circle of Women (east coast). It was good to see people again, it felt good to be cared about. I gave Big Orca to Rica, because I know she’ll take good care of her. Still, it wasn’t like it has been in the past – I feel disconnected, unwilling or unable to reach out to others or let them connect with me.

Part of this, I’ve realized, it just that communicating is a pain in the ass. I appreciate people caring about me and wanting to help… but the current state of problems in my life is the culmination of a few years of shit building up. Relationships gone wrong, becoming more realistic, maybe overshooting realistic in favor of a pessimistic view of life, burn-out at my job, being taken advantage of again and again, and finally abandoning lawfulness in search of a way of coping (which then necessitates grieving about the loss of who I was and a life that was, in some ways, simpler).

However, when people want to help, they want a quick summary and then to be able to provide advice as to how to fix your life. There’s a lot of issues in my life for which I still struggle to describe the nuances here, in my journal, and it’s downright hard. A lot of the stuff is linked, being both caused by some prior events and causing some later ones. But, in the quick “let’s fix your life” conversation, there isn’t time to go over the whole sequence of dependencies and decisions. So the listener starts in with suggestions, which I’ve already considered and tried or thrown out. And after this happens a few times, I’m at the point of frustration with the difficulty in conversing about something that’s hard in the first place, and doing it for the Nth time because I’ve done the conversation several times before. And then I want to talk about it even less the next time, and I want to talk about new progressions less with the few who are in-the-loop.

Which is part of the reason for making most of my diary public (that is this journal). In theory, people can follow what the hell is happening in my life here, and actually read back and have the whole context on what is going on and not have to make me go through the struggle to put it into words again.

In reality, though… Journals have a sort of reverse problem. In theory, for journals to work, everyone needs to publish one and we all need to keep up with everyone else’s journal. However, that would require us to all keep up with the goings on in everybody’s lives constantly, which has the drink-from-the-fire-hose problem. It’s much easier to just bump into someone again, do a quick update-context state transfer, and go from there. This works great when things are simple in someone’s life, but when things get complex then it falls apart.

With the display at just the right angle and the right light conditions, I can use my iBook with the backlight off. I’ll bet I get nearly tolerable battery life this way.

I did a hike from the CT/NY border to Salisbury, CT on the Appalachian Trail, then a second one from Rt. 23 outside Great Barrington to Mt. Everett. Dad wants to do a loop that was published in ATC news which goes from Bear Mountain up to Everett, which should finish off Connecticut for me. Massachusetts will still have the Dalton-Chesire gap to be filled in.

It feels good to sit in the warm sun.

It’s been about 2.5 weeks that I’ve been here at mom & dad’s, and I’ll be heading back to Rochester and regular life tomorrow. It’s been a low-budget trip… well, FCOW was pre-paid… so financially things are looking alright. I got my federal tax refund a few days ago (the miracle of direct deposit - sometimes, technology does rock), so that should allow budget to stretch a few more weeks.

14. Feeling Upbeat

2004-05-22 17:57 (Saturday) journal

I’m hanging out in Shoen Place in Pittsford, relaxing on an overcast but nice-temperature day before dinner & session with a regular client who I really enjoy spending time with. He’s one of the people that makes this job nice to do. Anyway, can’t write much - almost time to meet.

Things seem to be going okay. I’ve been watching Buffy season 6 while scanning / sorting paperwork and junking the crap. Enjoyed Nuts & Bolts comedy show last night, and had some snuggle time with Sue & Amanda afterwards. Generally, things are okay… hopefully they will stay good.

15. Yard sale, work, and my journal

2004-06-06 21:41 (Sunday) journal

I love the smell of glutaraldehyde in the evening… No, wait, the stuff is kinda nasty. And I’m supposed to minimize smelling it, because it’s a nasty chemical. Nasty! Nasty chemical - don’t mean a thing.

It’s been a busy couple of days, having run a tag (aka yard, garage, junk, house, barn, lawn) sale on Friday and Saturday. I didn’t make much, but it covered an advert in the paper – I have my doubts about how effective it was – plus maybe $20. And I got rid of clutter, and it forced me to junk a bunch of stuff I didn’t want back. I still have CoCo stuff to get rid of, as it didn’t sell. I might give some of it to Sam down the street if she shows interest in the CoCo 2 I gave her.

Today was a pretty good day. I had a client out in the country. It was a fun session, we did a friendship bonding thing, ze made a nice dinner and I got to relax in hir hot tub afterwards. The nice little perks like that make being a dominatrix okay sometimes.

Mood has continued to be up lately. I’ve recently started on Lexapro, which is a mild anti-depressant and anti-anxiety drug. There’s a 20% chance of complications due to bipolarity in me, but I figured that ending up on a simpler drug was worth the risk. The simplicity principle.

I spent 3 days last week at Sue and Amanda’s place in Toronto. I got to know my way around Toronto a little better, learned more about navigating the TTC. Amanda and I got to see part of a movie shoot, and the three of us saw part of a TV show shoot one evening.

This week promises to be busy and full of nice weather. I’m hoping to take advantage of it by doing an overnight cycling trip on Thursday.

I’ve been re-reading some of my diary from earlier this year, and I wrote some really interesting stuff. It’s weird now, I feel like I should write in my journal as a matter of course, to keep a record of what’s going on in my head. Yet, when I’m in an upswing there’s not a lot interesting going on in my head. `Everything is okay.' But when something’s wrong, then I start deconstructing my life and reasons for things, and it’s interesting.

I kind of wish I could deconstruct my state now and write it down, so I could use it as a recovery point when I go into a depression. It’s hard to find anything to write down, because nothing seems introspective enough. Not that stuff isn’t worth remembering; it is. It’s more that simply remembering, by memory, seems good enough for most happy memories.

The important bits to write down aren’t what I did. That I can remember. It’s how I felt about it, what things meant to me. Take the derivative (or is it the integral) of my actions, that’s what I want to write down because that’s what’s interesting. Maybe even second or third level derivatives / integrals.

So if I’m not writing stuff down, it’s not a bad thing. It’s probably an indicator that things are easy in my life right then, because I can do 2 + 2 = 4 and happy actions are easy to deal with. It’s when I need to differentiate 3/4 tan (7e^x)y sin(x/pi) that things get hard and I need to work it out on paper. I think that’s the stuff worth reading, too.

16. Sex work is not easy money

2004-06-08 12:12 (Tuesday) journal

I think in part I wanted to try being a dominatrix because I had an illusion that it would be easy. I knew it was illusionary, but knowing something is an illusion and being able to see around the illusion are different things.

Now, I think I can say the illusion is gone. I spend probably an extra hour every week doing laundry created by my business. Another hour or two doing high-level disinfecting and scrubbing gear afterwards to get the disinfectants out. Then there’s dealing with advertising and promoting, purchasing, accounts payable, and research. And of course, all the talking with customers about their fantasies and What I do and What They Want. It all adds up. Even though I’m only actually “performing” - doing billable work - a few hours a week, there’s a lot more going on behind the scenes. It can be tiring.

17. Responsibility and agency

2004-06-13 21:17 (Sunday) journal

At O’Bagelos this week, discussion touched on the idea that people, even in positions of authority, don’t want the responsibility they’ve been given and are happy to have others take action on their behalf. It’s that behavior that find frustrating. One of the most frequent times I see it is when Amanda is driving. She’s an intelligent gal, but put her in the driver seat and tell her ‘go to x’ and she will immediately respond with, “How do I get there?” or “What is the best way to get there?” It doesn’t matter if she knows the way; even though she’s been given then authority to drive, she still seems to want someone else to take the responsibility of routing there.

Furthermore, she wants simple instructions - you can’t just say, “Get on 590 north.” That’s too hard from my house, and causes recursion on “What’s the best way to get there?” You have to say, “Go to Humboldt Street, jog over to Marion, then take Browncroft to 590 and go north.” Otherwise, the myriad of choices is too much - you could take Middlesex to Blossom, or Humboldt to Winton to Browncroft, or Humboldt to Winton to Blossom, or … eeeeeek, hard decision, make it for me! Sometimes I wonder if she was the only one that knew how to get somewhere, if she’d still ask the question.

I do a similar thing under certain conditions: when I’m driving and someone’s directing me to somewhere new. It depends on how they give directions, and I think it’s more a buffer limit of like 3 events that I can queue up. It’s like the manager memory limit proposed by Simon Trafalga in BOFH: if you put in more than 3 items, it trashes the stack. So, I can buffer go to Lake and Ridge, turn right and go to Woodlawn and turn right. Okay, that’s 4 items, so my limit is 4. Put in 5, and suddenly I’ve got go to Lake and Ridge and buy a donut, return Anita’s call and remember to call dad for Father’s Day.

I think that the difference is that once I’ve been somewhere, I can be directed there with a single instruction later. So, “Go to Anita’s” the first time requires someone direct me there, or a map or directions or something. After that, Anita’s is a single item. So then you can say, “It’s the Chinese restaurant one block south of Anita’s”, which makes conveying instructions to me easy. Whereas with Amanda, I think you’d still have to give directions from home, because she wouldn’t want to make a decision as to how to get to Anita’s; thus you can’t get to the Chinese place without specific directions to Anita’s.

Oddly, while there’s a lot of this in industry, there’s another problematic class which I think is a sort of reverse: people with responsibility and no authority. They’re responsible for making schedules, tracking progress, but they don’t have actually authority to make anything get done and aren’t in charge of anyone that gets anything done. These people hold onto their responsibility, seeming to know (without being fully aware) that the illusion of importance is what keeps them in their positions. These people strike me as pompous, touting their importance to insure their perceived importance is high enough to stay employed.

Which, of course, you could accuse me of with this stupid journal.

18. Safewords without debriefings

2004-06-14 21:26 (Monday) journal

As a pro-dom, I find it quite disconcerting when a client abends a scene early. In RKS, there’s the friendship around playing and there’s an opportunity / expectation that we’ll cuddle or otherwise share a moment when a scene is done. If something goes wrong, it might not be cuddling but there is still an opportunity to talk and do care-taking, so I can understand what’s up in the other person and be there for them. With a client, it’s like they return a nondescript error code for which there is no explanation and I just have to let it go. It’s uncomfortable to leave someone without knowing they’re okay.

19. Starwood Festival

2004-07-29 18:20 (Thursday) journal

I had a fun time at Starwood. It seemed smaller, yet more commercialized that prior years. Despite that it was fun - lots of good musicians, some interesting discussions (some sensible, some wacky). I ran into Liz from Monroe Ave and Dave from WITR there, and even happened to be camping near them.

I hung out a little bit with the CAWmunity (Church of All Worlds), which is going through a tiff with the founder, Oberon-Zell.

I’ve been buckling down since I got home and getting some stuff done.

20. Spending more time with Dave

2004-07-29 21:00 (Thursday) journal

I’m hanging out with Dave, and we’re talking about doing the Ren Faire together. It’d be nice to do something more than dinner with him.

21. Spending more time with Dave

2004-07-31 19:38 (Saturday) journal

I went to the Ren Faire with Dave today. I enjoyed myself, though it’s a lot of the same. I did pick up a gorgeous purple leather dress. The top is vibrant purple with like snake-skin black marks through it. The bottom is formed from various leather patches, including some matching purple; it gives a bit of a savage look. I think it’ll be cool for BDSM.

Anyway, I’ve been playing with the violet ray a bit, and learning how it performs and stuff. I think I figured out how it operates safely: P = I * E, so assuming you can shove whatever max P through the wand, and all attachments have a minimum voltage E to work because they all have some sort of spark-gap isolator, then there is a maximum current that results. I can not increase to a dangerous level because I = P/E, P is fixed, and for I to increase E must decrease which means there isn’t enough voltage to jump the spark gap. Hence, anything without the spark gap isolator is an accident waiting to happen. I wonder how many people have created their own attachments without them.

So mood continues to be up, stable. A lot of my friends are physically ill, though; one had muff tumors removed and another one cancerous lymph nodes. I hope everyone heals and recovers well.

22. Paying bills, getting bored

2004-08-05 13:36 (Thursday) journal

So life continues to be okay. I’ve been making enough dosh to pay basic bills, and spending some spare time doing woodworking making a little bondage bench out of spare 2*4s that I got from the RKS demolition. It’s turning out good, though at some point I’ll need to tear it apart and sand it down. I’m going to wait on that until I’ve worked in the kinks, I’m sure I like the attachment points, etc.

Sometimes I get bored, but that might be more the cleaning than the playing. I’m still deciding. Anyway, I guess I’m more finding an interest in having a creative outlet beyond BDSM, but still not certain about the time for it.

I’m going to miss Kage when he leaves.

23. Being stolen from

2004-08-19 19:43 (Thursday) journal

So I think I just got ripped off by a client. I thought I set down the client fees down in one spot, and they aren’t there anymore. It’s possible I misplaced them somewhere else, but I’m pretty sure I put them there. So at the moment, I’m of the belief that the client swiped his own client fees on the way out. I’m kind of stunned by it, disappointed that someone would steal from me. I mean, I try really hard at my job and I invest in all the tools to do it well and I try to care about it - why would someone who knows how hard I work steal from me?

I know the answer, they just steal because they don’t care and can get away with it. They don’t care about other humans, it’s just them that’s important in their eyes.

If the dosh doesn’t turn up, it’ll be interesting to see how I handle the next few months, dealing with the impact of this. The head-crash last year was due in part to my bike being stolen and the fallout from that, but there was stressful job and stuff too. I wonder how the anti-anxiety, anti-depressants will handle me against this. Or if it’ll just help carve the ruts deeper into my mind.

24. Presta valves suck

2004-09-05 11:22 (Sunday) journal

Dad always hated Presta valves. For the unacquainted, Presta valves are French-designed inflation valves that are popular on higher-end bikes. Dad grew up with the English measurement system and so anything he comes across that’s metric is, for him, an irritation. He can’t identify the size by eye, he doesn’t have a comprehensive metric tool set, and he doesn’t have a supply of replacement nuts/bolts around. In addition, I think, it’s just not what he’s used to so he’s prejudiced against it. I figured the same thing applied to Presta valves: his tire pump didn’t fit, you have to screw around to get the adapter to work, and they’re different, therefore they’re bad.

On this one, though, dad was right. Presta valves suck. I got my bike a year or two year ago, and I set up my pump in Presta mode because it was obvious that the valve adapters are a nuisance. Thus, I didn’t need to deal with the adapters.

The first difference with Presta valves is you manually lock them down. Instead of having a spring to keep them shut, you turn a little nut thing to keep the valve shut. This is fine, and I don’t have a problem with it. Except, the little screw in the valve is so small it bends easy, and the first time you don’t take the pump off perfectly straight it catches on the nut and bends the screw. It’ll usually straighten when you tighten the nut, but now it’s suffered from metal fatigue so it bends easier the next time and it’s just a matter of time before it gives up the fight and the valve blows apart to pieces, thus requiring replacement of the whole tube.

The second difference is that the Presta valves don’t lock down in the pump well. Thus, they tend to leak if the pump wiggles while pumping, and tend to push the pump off which leads to the pump coming off unexpectedly and not straight and catching the nut… see problem #1.

The third difference is the valve is screwed to the rim. You put the valve through the rim hole, they screw it down. This is a nuisance when you’re changing the tire or fixing a flat. It’s not so much that you have to loosen the valve to get the tire off, it’s that to get it on the best way seems to be to tighten the valve on, seat the tire on the rest of the rim, loosen the valve and push it in, seat the tire near the valve (which involves pushing the valve in so the tire edges can sneak around the inside valve components) then tighten it all down again.

All that might be fine if you’re a pro-cyclist and don’t get flats because a street-sweeper is run over any roads you’ll race on before you’re on them. If you’re just an average recreational cyclist and just want it to be convenient and easy, then Schrader (American style, like on your car) valves are the way to go. So I’m going to drill out my rim.

Another thing I’ve been thinking about, and I may have mentioned this when I was around Starwood, is the way a lot of people that claim to be Earth-centric spirituality types and who talk about saving the planet don’t really do much about it. They pay lip service to it in a crowd but then go climb into their SUV to return home, where they don’t make any effort to comply with recycling regulations already in place. We whine about how the Christians don’t practice the peace and non-judgment that they preach, but when it comes to us I guess we don’t need to practice what we preach either. Come on guys, stop being a bunch of hypocrites and practice recycling. Breaking down a cardboard box and putting it in the recycling bin takes maybe 15 extra seconds versus stuffing it in in the trash. Putting the grocery sacks in there takes maybe 30 seconds? Get off your lazy asses and show the Goddess you care about her creation, and you’re going to make effort to take care of it.

I forget who I was talking to but we discussed the concept of being nice to each-other as a luxury afforded because we are well-off enough to think about these matters. People who are in a daily struggle for survival don’t think about whether or not their actions hurt someone else, because they’re just concerned with making it to tomorrow. Unless you know you’re going to be okay until tomorrow, and be in good shape then, you don’t really care what happens to anyone else. It gets interesting to look at my mental state over the last year or two as I broke down, and how my attitude towards the value of human life went from sacred to walking meat that can (and should) be destroyed at will to allow me to survive. The odd thing is that, though I’m doing better now, and people aren’t quite walking meat, I don’t see the value of life returning to sacredness. I wonder if this is something that will take more time, of if this is a permanent change to me.

25. Transgender awareness among BDSM clients

2004-09-13 13:17 (Monday) journal

It’s weird dealing with potential clients who aren’t transgender-aware. They don’t seem to grasp anything beyond male, female, and guy in women’s clothing. It’s odd to deal with because I understand that selecting a dominatrix is a bit more intimate or personal than, say, selecting a shoe salesperson. Thus, desires of the heart/soul come into play, so I don’t think it’s fair to expect equality that I would expect at my old job. No, that’s not true - I expect to be be treated fairly, equal to any non-trans dominatrix, but I also realize that some potential clients won’t find me acceptable and I respect this.

On the flip side, I occasionally get asked, ‘Are you male or female?’ or ‘Are you a man or a woman?’ So I explain I’ve had a sex change, long ago, but often they don’t seem to get it. ‘So do you live as a woman?’ Duh! Or just ‘Oh… I was looking for a girl.’ Well, yeah, I am. Maybe I’m expecting too much, but it seems to me if someone had a sex change you’d figure they’re living in their new gender. What’d be the point otherwise, unless they screwed up, but then why would they describe themselves as woman? I realize there’s some she-males and other gender variants working the industry, and especially amongst the sex trades, but if you’ve had surgery then isn’t it readily apparent that it’s not the same as a she-male or drag queen? Apparently not.

26. Consensus bad

2004-09-17 11:20 (Friday) journal

Why you shouldn’t try to arrange social events by consensus:

It doesn’t work. Say, for example, you’re planning a fetish munch. You ask on a newsgroup, “Hey, does anyone want to do a munch?” Everyone says, Yes'. Then you ask, "So when can people make it?" And there is mostly silence, because people don't want to say anything because that implies a commitment and they might have an opportunity to do something else they'd rather do. So you select a day and time and say, "Can people make it Friday?" Several people say,No, I’ve got X going on.' So you ask, “What about Saturday?” Some of the same people, and some different people, say, `No, I’ve got Y going on.' And so it repeats until it’s the weekend, and then it’s too late because everybody’s made other plans because nothing got nailed down, and nothing happens.

Basically, it falls into a few problems:

• A couple of people want to join in whatever activity, but when compared to anything else they’ve got a possibility of doing then they’d rather do the other thing. So, it’s virtually impossible to schedule them in. If you asked them, “Is there anytime you could make a munch that you wouldn’t have something you’d rather be doing?”, and they actually thought about it, then they’d say, `No.'
• In a bunch of people with a variety of schedules, you’ll virtually never get 100% agreement on a time. Give up. Set a time early, so people can set the time aside if the event is important enough to them. The more time wasted in negotiating, the more time for people to make other plans that they then feel committed to.
• Some people think they want to do stuff, but then they’re lazy/ introverted/whatever, so when it comes time to go to whatever event, they find their dishes need washing -oh!- and they’re a Buffy marathon on. So, even though they don’t have anything better to do, to avoid confronting their own fears/introversion/whatever, they make up excuses that there’s something they’d rather do.

So if not a lot of people show up, don’t be upset about it. It’s not the coordinators fault for not trying to time things better or anything. It’s mostly just the way people are unrealistic or dishonest to themselves in saying they want to take part. And if a couple of people get together and get to know each-other or have fun or whatever, then you did good. Even if it’s a small fraction of what it seems like it should be.

27. I'm getting to hate ABs.

2004-09-18 00:10 (Saturday) journal

I want to rant about how much I’m getting to hate ABs.

I like being a dominatrix. It’s interesting, I meet new people. It’s a lot of work, considering advertising and coordinating and maintenance and scheduling and paperwork and prospecting and all that stuff. I’m not getting rich off it, but it’s enough to live off of, or at least will be once I’ve got an established clientele and I’m not reinvesting all the money. In part, because I can live on a small budget… if I had expensive taste, I’d be screwed. I really have to be much more cautious with spending versus when I was a software engineer.

I’m really getting to hate my AB clients. On the good side, I have one regular AB client, and the scenes always seem awkward but he seems happy so I guess it’s okay. I’ve had one other AB client who was really fun to play with, and I enjoyed the time together. I like the DL I play with from Ohio, and I seemed to have an okay scene with the guy who seems to have a vinyl sheet fetish.

There’s one or two in the pipeline who could be fun, if they ever come to fruition. That’s where I’m getting kind of pissed though. Weird calls seem to come with being a dominatrix, and I accept that as the territory, especially as I’m learning to deal with it. However, the sheer number of weird calls for AB stuff seems to be much higher versus any other fetish. In fact, versus all the others combined.

So what’s a weird call for a dominatrix?

The same person calls me several times, asking the same sequence of questions. I ask for an explanation on about the third time. `I’d like to get to know the service before I hire someone.' After about the fifth, I stop answering calls from that number. He starts calling with restricted ID, so I indicate I’m finding the calls creepy and harassing. He stops calling for about 2 weeks, then calls back with a new question sequence, but I can still tell it’s him. I clearly ask that he not call again and hang up a few times. He starts disguising his voice, so I’m not certain it’s him until we get into question sequence. I directly indicate I don’t want his calls, but he calls anyway. I finally bitch him out, he hangs up on me, and I call him back on the number I’ve got from several months ago and continue bitching him out, and hope that I’ve unnerved him enough by calling him back that he won’t call again. It’s yet to be determined if he’ll be calling again.

A similar set of calls from Michigan. Seems normal for a few calls, then gets into self descriptions that set off a detector in my mind - they remind me of George from University Avenue, this guy who I used to ride the bus with occasionally. George was easily identified because he wore a big old 10-gallon hat and talked with a Texan accent. He claimed he owned a ranch and stuff down there, but I think the story may have changed a few times between he used to own and he does own. I think he was going to some kind of therapy, and he just had these perpetual lies, or maybe they were like an alternate invented reality that he lived in to escape the pain of life in the real world, so they seemed real to him. Anyway, this guy from Michigan rubbed me the same way. We talked a while, did a phone trial scene. Eventually, I said I had to get other things done. `Oh, okay, one last thing…' Ten minutes later, I had to explain I really had to go, stuff had to get done that day, we’d talk again tomorrow after I’d had time to think about the scene and come up with some new ideas. An hour later, he calls back and wants to talk more. And, as compensating and a deposit on a session, he’s sending me $100. Well, maybe $300. Make it a nice round $500, money’s no object (see that George thing above). He’ll get a money order and send it today, he’s already pulled my address somehow (probably DPF, because Tommy [an AB] fucked it up when he finally gets to adding me to the babysitter list on about the fourth request, and put in my real name rather than work name, and I’m nervous to try to get him to fix it for fear he fuck it up worse. Fucking incompetent idiot). Eventually, I do a callback to verify his phone number and he’s given me a wrong number. Well… it’s his number, but a woman who doesn’t recognize the name I ask for answers. Hmm, must be the extra servants he’s got, since he’s single and doesn’t have a wife. I eventually declare I don’t feel comfortable with him, and I’m not interested in doing a scene. Incidentally, the dosh he supposedly sent, which I would have returned because of my choice not to do a scene, never shows up. Lying fuck.

He calls back a month and a half later… I suspect it’s him after a bit, but he gives a different phone number when I ask. Researching it, it’s a dead number. Oh, he made a mistake… No, no one knows him at that number either. I eventually demand he give me a number that I can call him at right now, and now it matches up with the prior month’s records. Rrrrrr!

When other folks get told I don’t want a slave, they get it. I beat them, they go away happy. No permanent contract. The ABs, I indicate I’m not interested in being a phone mommy, but they just keep calling back, even though I tell them I’m not interested. I guess part of my frustration is that I don’t want to be part of some codependent relationship, but it’s explicitly what they’re looking for. If they just needed to talk occasionally - a confidential outlet - and they showed some drive/intelligence/problem solving/desire for growth, I probably wouldn’t mind. But they just want me to play mommy, and apparently want/expect me to do it for free.

Incidentally, I’m not entirely alone in my observations – one of the DLs I talk with, who is intelligent and interesting and I like talking with him because it doesn’t seem all codependent and shit, has described similar observations about a lot of ABs who can’t figure out how to relate to the world so they regress into their fetish, which leaves them less configured to cope with the world and so they regress more and more, until they’re lost in some distorted reality where they spend their life looking for the mommy to make them into the baby they want to be to escape the big bad world.

Then I’ve had 2 ABs who just didn’t show up for day-long sessions. Several day periods of my life were arranged around their sessions. There’s a third that’s looking to do the same thing next weekend, based on lack of response to e-mails I sent this week to confirm that we’re on.

I mean, I don’t want to be a money whore. I want to retain my humanity in this venture, to know my clients well and enjoy their friendship or at least acquaintance. The ABs are just pissing me off so much… But besides the above frustrations, the AB jobs pay crap. A typical session is 2 hours between negotiation, scene, and cleanup. $50/hour to make that income (ignoring expenses). Sometimes someone goes off into subspace and needs cuddle time, which is just kinda cool though I don’t get paid for that time… but sometimes clients tip, too, or take me out to dinner. So the experience is usually fun, and the generosity of some makes up for the occasionally cruddy experience. An AB scene: I cover all expenses, so it comes out of my profit; scenes run many hours long, they’re always jawing me down on the price, they want to negotiate details to the Nth degree (taking up hours in the process). I’m making a lot less. Basically, I’m making babysitter wages. Which I might be okay with, if they didn’t treat me so bad the rest of the time.

I’m really tempted to drop the scene. I’ve invested a lot in it, buying gear to support it. If I had it to do over again, knowing what I know now, I wouldn’t have offered service to them. I think for the moment, I’ll wait until the end of year to make a decision, implementing some new deposits to see if that separates wheat from chaff.

Bastards. There, that feels better to get off my chest.

Right now I’m up in Toronto with Sue, my sweetie, who is going to sleep next to me, and I can think of much better things to do than writing in my journal.

28. Adult babies are just too frustrating

2004-10-07 23:32 (Thursday) journal

Toward the end of September, I became adequately frustrated with continued AB/DL aggravations that I’ve decided not to accept new clients, and will probably drop the service entirely next quarter.

I had a good cycling trip with mom last week. We got a ride from Sue & Amanda to Toronto, then spent 2 days cycling around Toronto and 3 days riding back to Rochester via lake-front bike paths, various lakefront-paralleling roadways, and Route 31. We had great weather for the trip; no rain, moderate temperatures, a lot of sun. I liked it.

I’ve re-arranged my living room, and I think I’ve managed to come up with a nicer arrangement. The house is really starting to feel a lot better, having gotten rid of a huge amount of junk that I had pack-ratted over that last several years. I’m still trying to get rid of a few things, but the bulk of the junk is gone.

29. Happiness

2004-10-11 13:54 (Monday) journal

I’ve been noticing something strange about my life recently: happiness. Not just happy-for-the-moment, but a feeling of confident happiness, satisfaction with things. It feels really good.

30. How could this happen?

2004-11-02 22:55 (Tuesday) journal

I’m hanging with some friends watching the elections results come in, and I’m amazed. Amazed that people could be so gullible and continue to support the rabid, hate-mongering bunch of liars that is the current administration. Dislike Kerry all you want, complain he’s a waffler, but that’s better than someone who rushed into a war, allowing weapons that Saddam would have kept safe into terrorist hands, breaking international treaties, refusing to join the ICC? Bush is a whacko, and the election’s going to be close again, we may even be stupid enough to elect him this time!

It scares me that I live in a country where people learn so little from empirical evidence and study, instead preferring to listen to the words or marketing that is espoused. There’s terrible problems with the Democrats too. Even prior Republicans were at least intelligent, or had good teams backing them. This administration… words fail me.

31. Bush, again

2004-11-03 12:14 (Wednesday) journal

I’m ashamed at the country I grew up in. How could we make such a stupid, horrible decision?

I would renounce my citizenship, but then I’d be eligible to be disappeared without due process. Not that I suspect due process will exist much longer anyway…

Maybe it’s time the North East think about seceding. We could form into a province or two and join Canada, maybe. Or just make our own country, free from right-wing religious looneys that are dumb enough to trust Bush after all the lies he’s told. I think the friend I was just talking to is right, Roe v. Wade is toast over the next 4 years.

Five years ago, I couldn’t envision how the prophecies would - or could - come about. Yet, here we are, a rogue nation, re-electing our leadership, pushing farther and farther from any international cares, thinking we’re the big cheese and we can do anything we want – boy, are we in for a realization when the world is fed up with us.

So, all you world leaders who read my journal, I’ll understand when you decide to put sanctions on the US. Don’t worry about us, do what’s right for the world. The people of this country, apparently, don’t understand that we need to play nice with the rest of the y’all, that we’re not the lone superpower that we once were. It’s time for a hands-on lesson.

32. Karma, fishie car, paperwork

2004-11-17 22:03 (Wednesday) journal

Karma is a good thing. Implementing Karma is a satisfying thing. Unfortunately, when one implements something karmic one can’t hang about to see the results take place, you must allow things to happen and just irritate the person needing repayment for their annoyance. Otherwise, there’s the possibility of them finding out where the repayment came from and then attempting to get back, and the whole thing escalates - which isn’t good.

Fishie car needed replacement of tie rods yesterday when I took it in for service, but it wasn’t overly expensive and I’m able to swing the cost. I’ve got to start saving up for the big expenses of December and January, which are combined city taxes, county taxes, and medical insurance. I really need to get off my butt and find out about the government-subsidized insurance for low-income folks, because I understand I can get it cheaper than the COBRA and I think I’m in a low enough wage bracket to be allowed to go on it.

I’ve been scanning more paperwork and going virtual. The crappy free Epson scanner software wouldn’t scan color, so I downloaded some updates from the website and then it didn’t work at all. Well, the old program didn’t - there was a new program (different name and icon) that I either didn’t notice before or that is new, which works more easily and functions for all document types (or at least the ones I’m using), unlike the old one.

The Epson software has the capability of doing multi-page PDF files, but if I scan to a single-page PDF I get a _40KB document, a multi-page PDF comes out to about 4 MB for a 4 page document. You’d think it would be about 4 times the size, but no, their software sucks. So, I’m scanning to single-page files (which is easier in the UI anyway) and I wrote some shell scripts to scan for multi-page documents (by looking for <file>-p001.pdf) and combine them GhostScript. It works pretty good, and the resulting file is about the size of the sum of the individual file sizes. What a concept!

I had a really nice scene this evening. Flogged this guy for a bit, then wrapped him down on my massage table with plastic wrap - with the nipple-clamp-chop-sticks still on, which pushed down and seemed to generate the right kind of pain. Then I was thinking I wanted to pull the nipples, so I hooked up a rope but it didn’t work; the clamps wouldn’t stay on well enough. I moved one set to his genital, and that seemed to work well. Then I did a bit of wax-play, which the plastic wrap worked good with because it didn’t get caught in his hair and I think it buffered the heat a bit. So I did that a bit, and between waiting for wax to melt I whacked on his genital with a flogger a bit, and did some violet wand play. The wax was working so well, I decided to try it on the naughty bits, so I covered the scrotum with a bit of plastic wrap and put a condom on - and gagged him in case he wanted to make a lot of noise with this; and loosened a hand to use finger-snap safeword method - then dribbled wax on. Again, seemed to get him higher into whatever state he was in. So that was about it, I cut off the plastic wrap and let him out, we talked a bit as he came down.

He didn’t go as far into subspace as some others I’ve played with - this one guy a while ago took about 15 minutes to form sentences, and over a half-hour to come mostly back to reality. That was really fun, intense, enjoyable - a feeling of true satisfaction for me.

Today was fun, enjoyable - not as intense, but far from light. Again, satisfying.

So, that’s what I do as a dominatrix, when I’m having fun. Not all scenes are so cool, but it’s nice to do something like this.

33. Where I fit into BDSM

2004-11-18 15:22 (Thursday) journal

I don’t think I’m a good mistress when it comes to mistress/slave play. I think that would qualify as the DS in BDSM. I think I’m pretty good at the BD, and in time I’ll be good at SM, but I just don’t think the DS part works all that great for me, and consequently I don’t embrace it or perform it the way it should be done.

34. Thanksgiving

2004-11-30 18:52 (Tuesday) journal

It’s been a good vacation spending Thanksgiving with mom & dad. Mom made a delicious meal, and I was even able to eat some on Thursday as I seemed to be over the intestinal discomfort which I suspect was a result of food poisoning.

The family all seems to be doing well. Mom just got DSL enabled, and I set up her PC with it but the thing had all sorts of problems that just kept popping up, so we eventually just replaced it with a new cheap Compaq.

I’ve been feeling quite strange, I think a result of coming down off my meds (Lexapro, an SSRI). I was unable to keep anything down Tuesday and Wednesday, then failed to bring enough meds home to last the whole time so I spaced them out to keep me on an even keel. Nevertheless, the changes I feel in my mind make me suspect that the levels in my mind have dropped sufficiently that they’re having little effect (I need to check with my docs on this). It’s strange, though, it feels like the last 5–10% of my mind, which has still kinda felt asleep or in a fog, feels like it’s back. I basically feel like my old self, for the first time in a long while.

The question becomes, do I want to stay this way? There’s a lot of stuff to consider:

• I like being able to sleep reliably.
• I’ll be at risk for depression again if I go off meds permanently.
• I feel alive right now in a way I haven’t in a while.
• How much of what I feel is psychosomatic?
• How much of what I feel is caused simply by not being in a really boring environment? Do I feel alive because I’ve had people to talk to, and different things to do? If this is true, what should I be doing to make my normal life interesting? It’s hard, because I’m good at knowing I’m not certain what is truly affecting my decision.

Anyway, I was thinking about my crash, and the way I always try to elevate myself above the normals. The reality is, though, that I let myself crash just like a normal, and in that respect I am a normal. I am just another person, screwed by the system, whose mind took a dive when it got too hard.

35. Today's surrealist thought

2004-12-01 17:52 (Wednesday) journal

“Hey, this network adapter tastes just like chicken!”

36. Wistful over Jennifer

2004-12-05 13:32 (Sunday) journal

Today I’m scanning photos of my senior prom. I went with Jennifer Boyce, a beautiful gal I met at the Eastern National 4-H Engineering Event in Richmond, VA. We did a long-distance relationship thing for about a year before going separate ways. It’s strange looking at the photos, seeing this ugly, nasty geeky version of me next to this beautiful, happy woman and just wondering how I, in that form, could have ever ended up with her. Even now, from time to time I think about her and how much I cared for her. I hope wherever she’s gotten to, she’s doing well and her dreams have come true.

37. Life lacks adventure

2004-12-13 20:10 (Monday) journal

I think I realize what’s wrong in my life: I want adventure. I want to be interesting, with unknowns that become challenges. I fear that they will be excessive and make me collapse like last year, but the complete lack of adventure makes things boring.

My desire to go to Toronto or somewhere else is the aspect of me that wants adventure trying to find or create that adventure.

I’m reading “A Brief History of Time” by Steven Hawking. I’m up to page 25 and I’m starting to have trouble understanding. This relativity stuff is really strange.

38. When GLBT becomes a market

2004-12-19 23:14 (Sunday) journal

I saw the magazine “Out” today, and I found a lot of mixed feeling about it. Out is a national gay/lesbian magazine with a look that reminds me of Cosmo. “237 items to make gay life great!”, “Todd Fishbah’s latest Home Furnishings” were the kind of things on the front cover. Advertising featured watches, clothing, travel.

This is very different from what I saw in The Advocate 15 years ago. At that time, The Advocate was mostly just a news magazine, with little snippets of the latest gay beatings, legislation updates, and stuff like that. I think most of the advertising was various types of alcohol.

On the one hand, it’s acknowledgment. We are a market. We exist, we have money, and we are large enough to be worth spending attention on us. We are an economic power.

On the other hand, I feel insulted. The content was so trivial: articles with drivel about the difficulties of being a gay Hollywood star, the latest hip slang terms for various classes of gay-bar patrons, and lots of articles about the stuff I need to buy to ensure I’m secure in my gay identity. This is supposed to be important?

I’m disappointed, too. The fact that this exists, I am sure, means that it works. A lot of gay folk must buy in to the crap. Not many years ago, we were struggling with just not being sacked if someone found out we were gay. Now we’re an important market? So we are dumb enough to happily buy what they tell us to? Shouldn’t we be concerned about human rights, gay rights, making the world acceptable? I guess not.

Watching this process, though, it seems to be the evolution of media as a community comes out, establishes itself, then is recognized. Advertising’s evolution from “we make a product that does X” to “our product that does X is the best” to “X will make your life better, period” has been noted before, as it applies to the world at large. It seems the same thing is happening at a smaller scale in the Gay rags. The question becomes, will this happen in other communities?

The BDSM community, with the advent of the internet, has established itself. My gut tells me it’s in the state the gay community was 15 years ago. Companies catering to the community are showing up in larger numbers, and it’s even hitting the edges of mainstream in the Goth type stores. There isn’t a national BDSM magazine that of a well-written caliber that I know of, but there are well-known web sites (maybe a sign of the change of the times).

If this is a trend, then at some point, BDSM will be seen as a market to be taken. A national magazine will be established to cater to us, to help us establish who we are and to share ideas. It’s likely to start with a bit of a political bent, trying to change the perspective of BDSM away from a “perverted” activity. There will be talk about safety, sanity, consensual behavior. As time passes, the magazine will evolve or be replaced by a flashier rag with fancy cover art. “16 Easy Ideas for Improving Your Dungeon”, “Early Images of J.T.’s Spring Furniture Line”, and “Madonna talks about BDSM imagery in her (Her?) latest video” will be featured on the front. How-tos will disappear, replaced by must-haves; how-tos will be relegated to books on the various subjects. Some of us will look at the magazine, wondering how such a piece of crap could sell - but it will, purchased by those in search of their identity, incorrectly searching externally instead of internally.

I think the reason it seems strange to me is that I don’t think I took my imagery from the media, it was from those around me. So for me, the imagery competition was geek-related. I wanted the best server, the coolest technology, and to have the most knowledge and ability. Some of this was genuine technology evolution, but some was driven by competition between friends. I don’t know if I’m immune now, though I’m certainly less susceptible than many.

39. Health insurance

2004-12-29 17:55 (Wednesday) journal

This month, I applied for the Healthy New York insurance plan. It’s an off-the-shelf package set up by the state for sole proprietorships and small businesses, that otherwise couldn’t get insurance. However, Preferred Care promptly lost the paperwork so now I’m screwed out of another $280 month on COBRA instead of $140 Healthy NY.

On the other hand, screwing up the paperwork which gets me to give them money is probably a good indicator of the difference between Preferred Care and Excellus. When I apply again next month, I’ll be applying to the other guys. [Update: On 2005–01–06, the paperwork reappeared from whatever closet it had been stored in. So, since they didn’t lose it, and they’re Making Things Right, I revoke my anger and am going to give Preferred Care a try.]

Over the holidays I went to Connecticut, and I caught this show on Nickelodeon called “LazyTown”. It’s this silly but very fun kid’s show that’s produced in Iceland, with this great bouncy music that sounds reminiscent of Aqua.

The photo album project is going well, and will probably be coming to a close soon.