Oxygen is for losers

I had an amazing few hours with Lady Lydia earlier this evening. I spent most of it floating around in subspace, just a big puddle of relaxed submission. She used a variety of tools to get me there, including a leather straightjacket, needles, a ball clamp, a crop and a pair of chopsticks. However, the most devilish tool of all was a simple piece of plastic wrap. Draped over my face it slowly got warmer and stickier, dragged closer with each intake of breath. Careful regulation of breathing helped prevent it closing off the air supply entirely, but it’s tough to breath slowly when somebody is trying to pull your nipple off with a pair of chopsticks. Or slapping a crop across a few carefully positioned needles. The natural tendency is to moan and suck in a big lungful of air. At which point the plastic does its best impression of an alien facehugger, and suddenly oxygen has become a scarce commodity.

We were far too involved in the unfolding scene to snap photographs. Which may come as a relief to those of you out there with a low tolerance for skinny naked British guys in your daily blog material. However, as an alternative I found this infinitely more visually appealing shot of Lydia from her visit to OWK. In this case the plastic wrap is being used for bondage rather than breathplay purposes, but the limited availability of oxygen is a common theme.

Lady Lydia at OWKI found the image in this free gallery on the OWK cinema site. You can also buy the DVD of the entire session from Lydia herself.

A handful

Here’s a mistress with a very satisfied expression on her face. I like to imagine that as she tightens her grip, her smile is only going to get wider.

The pegs on his nipples are kind of cute. Although the last time someone tried these kind of pegs on me, I was surprised at how mild they were. These look dramatic, but it’s the little sharp clips that hurt way more.

Handful I found this on the Femdom Style Counsel tumblr site. I don’t see an original attribution anywhere, but I’m going to guess it’s from one of the kink.com sites.

Inching to the edge

Mistress Rex isn’t the most prolific of writers on my blogroll, but when she does post it’s always interesting, thought provoking and highly literate. Her most recent post helped crystallize a number of thoughts I’d been mulling over recently. I suggest reading the whole thing, but I’ll just quote the section I particularly want to talk about.

I’d be bored out of my mind if I stayed within the parameters of what clients (or lovers) told me they think they want. It’s domination. It’s the thrill of control and power. It requires a degree of force and discomfort, a shifting of will. How do you know how much you can take if you’re not challenged? How do you know how much you can give if you’re unwilling to offer it?

Brock Lesner is an idiot, but he happened to deliver a beautiful concept (wherever he got it from) on national TV when he said that, “fights are won by inches.” Technique and skill can take you a long way, but it’s intensity that fills those inches – it’s knowing to keep going when you have your opponent hurt. It’s holding someone’s head under water despite their thrashing, because you know that panic is a moment too soon.

Mistress Rex from her post titled ‘Give Her an Inch and She’ll Walk All Over You‘

I’ve observed that being stressed and forced close to their thresholds of tolerance is a common desire amongst submissives. It’s certainly a desire I have in any session I do. No matter what the activity, I like to feel I’m being pushed and stretched in new ways. That I’m going to go further than I have in the past. I hate to stop an activity because it’s too intense for me (and I almost never do), but at the same time it’s never a completely satisfying session if we don’t briefly flirt with that possibility. It’s a very tricky line to walk.

The need to push for this intensity, to inch forward towards that threshold, is one that has bothered me a little. Am I just doing it for stupid macho-sub reasons? To prove that I can do it? And am I going to run out of inches one day? Find out that there is nowhere left to go and I’ve burnt out. Most other activities in life don’t require this kind of dynamic. I love fine dining and nice wine, but I don’t have a constant need to push my boundaries every time I eat in a restaurant. Why is my masochism and submission different?

I think Mistress Rex has helped me answer these questions. It’s about the shifting of will, the relinquishing of power. It’s only in those last few inches that dominance and control is absolutely demonstrated. What happens up to that point is just sensation. It might be interesting or pleasurable (in the masochistic sense) sensation, but it doesn’t cost the submissive anything until it approaches the edge. It’s the extraction of that payment where both the dominant and the submissive find the real satisfaction.

Breathplay with water immersionMistress Rex’s comment about holding someone’s head under water made me initially think of this image, but I posted it because it represents a type of play that quickly pushes me close to some of my personal edges. I struggle with anything that closely covers my face, whether it’s a leather hood or a tub of water, so using this apparatus would be to extract a very high price from me.

The dominant is Isis Love in a Divine Bitches shoot.

Nervous Anticipation

This image caught my eye for the way it so beautifully switches the traditional roles around. His body language and expression suggest nervous excitement, a naked virgin awaiting his new experience. In contrast she’s controlling, predatory, seductive. Gently pressing him down as she kisses and licks his neck, sliding the tip of her tool along his back and into his crease. I hope she’s gentle with him on his first time.

Strap-onI found this on the Am Bi Guosity tumblr site. There’s not a lot of femdom material there, but it might be interesting if you’re looking for ts girl, bisexual and ambiguous glamor shots.

The most controversial activity?

If I had to choose the most controversial and debate provoking femdom activity, I think it would come down to a run-off between scat play and forced bisexuality. I’ve posted about the former in the past and, after stumbling across the picture below, I thought it might now be time for a post on the latter.

I should be clear that the majority of my comments here relate to forced-bi in the context of pro-dommes, or casual play, rather than lifestyle relationships. I think the lifestyle dynamics are so complex and unique to each circumstance that it’s impossible to make the kind of sweeping generalities that I’m about to.

The first issue that arises for pro-dommes in this context is a legal one. If money is being exchanged for a man to be part of a scene and perform a sexual act then the domme opens herself up to prosecution under pimping and pandering laws. Those are charges that can carry very significant penalties.

Outside of the practical legal issues, I’ve also observed that some dommes have a more philosophical problem with this activity. The idea behind a forced-bi scene is that the submissive shouldn’t really enjoy it at the primary sexual level. He might get off on the idea pleasing his mistress, or with the power exchange involved, or the humiliation, but sexy fun isn’t supposed to be part of the plan. However, I’ve heard numerous dommes report that men use these kind of scenes as an excuse for doing something they secretly really want to do anyway. Five minutes into the scene and the domme is suddenly taking a backseat to the two guys getting it on. This not only undercuts the femdom ethos, it’s also manipulative and hypocritical, forcing a woman into a fake role because a man can’t admit his real desires. In fact it puts the domme firmly into the role of the pimp that the law would allege she is.

On the submissive side of the coin, forced-bi is one of the most polarizing activities in terms of the reaction it provokes. Typically when confronted with the idea of an undesirable activity, the standard male submissive response seems to be “Not really my thing, but whatever….” However, suggest forced-bi as the activity, and you’re likely to get a much more visceral and violent reaction from those not into it. For many men it is a fundamental hard limit that they dislike even talking about, let alone one that they are open to negotiating.

Personally, the idea forced-bi as it’s commonly portrayed (like the image below) doesn’t do a lot for me. This is not because I’m fundamentally opposed to the idea of another man in a scene with me. I think cuckolding scenarios can be hot, as can sissy play and gender switching. Even being topped by a dominant couple might be an interesting thing to try. But forced-bi as a kind of humiliation or punishment activity with another submissive somehow doesn’t really click with me as a femdom dynamic.

Forced-BiI’m afraid I don’t have an original source for this image. I found it on domme pics.

Please stand by…we’re experiencing technical difficulties…

The more eagle eyed of my regular readers may have spotted a lack of blogroll to the right. Unfortunately, after many months of successful and trouble free web serving, my hosting company appears to have encountered some gremlins. And then fed them after dark. And got them wet. I can only hope their data center isn’t currently hosting an extravagant musical number as I type.

To populate the blogroll I need to be able to pull in RSS feeds to read their latest posts. And right now the hosting service won’t let me make any outgoing connections. Hence, no blogroll. It’ll return just as soon as we figure out what’s going on.

In the meantime here’s a little glimpse of heaven by way of apology. It’s the very beautiful Justine Joli, photographed by Steve Diet Goedde.

Updated : Looks like the gremlins have been zapped and the service has returned to life. Normal blogroll service has been resumed and we apologize for the interruption.

Justine Joli, Los Angeles 2006

Old School

This is a pretty traditional piece of dominatrix artwork. Tight leather, bulging breasts, a piercing stare and a riding crop. Normally I try and avoid the femdom cliches, but something about this image appealed to me. Maybe it’s her calm and very matter of fact expression. The composition is clever as well. It’s incredibly simple, but the black and white background gives the impression of a doorway or opening, which adds a nice sense of depth to the figure.

Domatrix by Michael BairThe artist is Michael Bair. I came across this on the femdom artist site.

New blogs

I’ve added four new blogs to my blogroll over on the right.

Mrs Kelly’s Playhouse is written by Scott and Emma, and describes their female led marriage. It covers a wide variety of kinky topics, including BDSM, cuckolding, chastity and the all issues that come with integrating them into a full time lifestyle relationship.

The Glow Inside has been created by Steve Mayhew and contains an eclectic mix of artwork, fiction, links and his musings on kinky activities and relationship issues. He also described this blog as ‘looks the goods’, which I’m not completely clear on, but I’m going to take as complimentary.

From Mundane to Mistress is written from the perspective of Mistress L, who has transitioned from being a BDSM photographer to an active participant in the kink scene. I found her posts on her hunt for a new submissive to be particularly interesting. From my perspective as a submissive/masochistic single male it often feels like there are a hundred submissive men for every dominant woman, and that a mistress shouldn’t be able to swing a whip without hitting a dozen eligible slaves. It’s therefore illuminating to see some of the issues from the other end of the leash (so to speak).

Finally, last but definitely not least is A Life as Her ‘Wife’. This is a relatively new blog describing the lifestyle relationship of Paul and Carol, and is heavy on themes of cuckolding, cross-dressing, chastity and service submission.

Niagra Detroit ImageThis funky piece of pop art comes from Niagra Detroit. I discovered it via The Glow Inside blog.

Quirky

My recent posts on authenticity and smiling dommes seemed to attract a fair amount of positive feedback. This wasn’t really a surprise to me, as I’ve repeatedly seen a lot of negative comments from multiple sources on the snarling domme stereotype. That kind of classic shot still has its place, but it’s clearly no longer enough to simply curl a lip and wave a crop at the camera.

The image below was one I originally considered including as an example of a smiling mistress, but I decided in the end it was worth a separate post, as it’s more of an amused expression than an outright smile.

I think there’s a great dynamic here between the three people. The woman on the left appears to be giving directions. I can just image her saying “Go on, grind your heel hard into his nipple. Let’s see if you can make it bleed” The man appears to be a little perturbed by what he’s hearing, and is sitting up to plead his case. And the blonde with the quirky smile looks to be both amused and pleased with the suggestions. I expect her next words to be “You are evil! I love that idea. That’ll be horribly painful.”

Quirky SmileI found this originally on Awesome Femdom, but it’s clearly originally from Strapon-Hell.