family

I wrecked the family car this week.

It was unarguably my fault. I was preoccupied with my own thoughts and drove right through a red light. Lemme tell ya, I felt awful for the poor tourist who hit me.

As for myself...well, I am physically uninjured. And the damage to the car doesn't actually seem that bad; a smooshed rear passenger door and side panel. But the car is so old that it seems likely our insurance company will opt to pay us the blue book value rather than shell out to repair it.

This wouldn't be such a bad thing IF we had the funds to buy a replacement. The car has the automotive version of leprosy anyway. Plastic bits you'd never think were important - like door handles and dashboard knobs - have disintegrated in the hot Florida sun. There's a fossilized mass of gunk that used to be a vanilla milkshake welded to one floorboard, and dents on the hood and roof from where our son (the autistic one) thought it would be fun to play atop the car with a brick. The trunk won't latch and is held shut with a bungee cord. The cheap self-tint film some previous owner applied to the windows is peeling off and starting to affect visibility. If we had the money to replace it with something in better shape I'd be shrugging the whole incident off with a "c'est la vie" and being grateful that nobody was injured.

But we don't. All we have is the pittance the insurance company will pay us for the car.

And the thing is, it's worth a lot more than book value to us. Despite its issues this car is THE reliable transportation not just for Izzy, myself and the kids but also for my mother, tia and his roommate. There's little chance of finding an equally reliable replacement for what the insurance company will pay us. So what should be a minor crisis, easily remedied, becomes a potentially major catastrophe. (And this is what the alleged "recovery" looks like to those of us who are clinging desperately to the lower edge of middle-class.)

It's ironic because I am one of those people who's a fanatic about obeying traffic laws. I'm the sort who will sit through a red light at 3am when there's obviously no traffic for miles because IT'S THE RIGHT THING TO DO. So naturally the one time I fail to pay adequate attention results in a collision.

But the biggest irony? The thoughts which occupied my mind so much that I failed to mind the road were worries about money.

Being both chronically ill & sexually adventurous means having to have conversations like this with your healthcare providers:

Doctor S: "Do you have any problems with your bowels, like cramping or diarrhea?"

Mistress: "You know, the last time you asked me that question I said no. And I have been thinking about it ever since. Because, um, and here comes the embarassing confession...I am very fond of anal sex. And so I do things to facilitate that, like enemas a couple of times a week. And so, um, that could be masking some irritation in that department."

{further very personal conversation involving blood and mucous ensues}

The person I expected to be embarassed by my confession was the doctor. But to her credit my rheumatologist did not bat an eyelash at my anal revelation.

She will either soon look forward to my visits as being VERY entertaining...or I will have to find another doctor. ;-P

I thought some of you might be interested in hearing details of tia's current sissy training protocol. Bear in mind that this is an evolving thing!

Currently tia is "studying" two subjects: Cooking 103 and Essentials of Feminine Style.

For the first subject, Cooking 103, she is focusing on salads. Mistress is trying to eat better, and tia has been charged with helping in that by keeping her supplied with gourmet salads. She is to make a large salad (enough to feed Mistress' entire family) every couple of days. She has to shop for fresh ingredients and research new recipies so Mistress doesn't get bored. Sometimes Mistress wishes a specific sort of salad and tia has to satisfy her request.

Tia is graded on each salad, and will receive a report card at the end of the term. Mistress is generous and does not mark off if the dish is less than tasty, but tia is expected to show decided improvment in her cooking skills each term OR ELSE.

(And yes, there was a Cooking 101 and 102!)

The second subject covers everything a girl needs to know to be ~girly~ , from how to pluck her eyebrows & paint her nails to choosing clothes that are flattering.

She's graded on individual assignments as with the salads but her assignments are much more varied. And while the fetish appeal is obvious, these assignments also have the ulterior purpose of training her to be more useful to me as a lady's maid. For instance, her past few assignments have been to choose, from my crossdressing closet, outfits that meet a particular set of requirements.

This not only saves me time and effort as her Mistress (a self-dressing sissy is a labor saving device!); it acquaints her with the contents of my closet and with unfamiliar fashion terminology at the same time. So that sometime down the road I will be able to say "slut, go fetch me my pink silk chemise with the frogs on the sides, and some stockings to go with it" and she will know what the hell I am talking about, and be able to obey without fuss!

There are other expectations tia is also expected to meet - like keeping her house/my studio clean, and writing worshipful emails to me - but she's not graded on them the way she is on her "sissy academics". Her punishments for not performing well in these areas can be much more intense and personal.

As I said this system is still evolving. Its present form is basically a response to two things. First, tia came into my service completely clueless about things like cooking, cleaning, and fashion. So it's pretty important to me to teach her what she needs to learn to be really USEFUL to me.

But my current method has also evolved in response to conflicts tia and I have had over these things. I need to feel that she's making sincere efforts to improve in these skills. And she needs to feel like her efforts are being noticed & appreciated, that she's getting credit for the work she does. Having clearly defined & graded courses of study works for both of us.

And it has some value in inspiring naughty Headmistress/student fantasies too. ;D

Ok, so clearly I stink at keeping post-every-day blogging resolutions.

But I feel my real error was in foolishly thinking it was realistic for me to post every day during the last few weeks of the school year. This time is always super busy, between end-of-the-year school events and me trying to get adult shit done before I go on 24/7 mommy duty.

(For the next three months I will be super busy being ON mommy duty.)

We did manage to take some more pictures on Monday though. (Cue party music!) And I tell you it feels SO good to be doing some modeling again. It's extremely motivational, for me. I do extra stretching so I can contort myself into interestingly sexy positions, I get better sleep so there won't be shadows under my eyes, I take better care of my skin and hair...I just overall take better care of myself when I know I'm gonna be in pictures.

Nowadays that "extra stretching" means a LOT more exercise, of several varieties. And I'm pleased to report that it's really helping with the painful joints & muscles.

It remains to be seen if it will help me make hotter femdom porn. But I'm willing to try! **grin**

A couple more shots from Sunday's set...

Sometimes, shit happens.

Life has a way of just not taking us where we planned on going. Five years ago, when I finally grew up and realized that I'd always wanted a career in the sex industry, I had all sorts of ambitions. Since then I've discovered that one of my kids is autistic, and that my husband of 12 years was born with a very serious heart defect. The former we learned to deal with; the latter was fixed with surgery. And after meeting my beloved sissy slave tia in December of 2008 I thought I was poised to finally achieve the kind of career success I'd worked so hard for.

You see, I'm a professional dominatrix...but only in the sense that I take money for what I do, and try to go about it in a professional manner. I'm a long, long way from the sort of material success enjoyed by more famous Ladies. Although I am quite good at what I do, to be perfectly frank I started trying to make a go of this long past the usual "sell-by" date. I am too old and too fat to be an easily marketable product in a looks-based industry.

The aforementioned family issues have also kept me from doing some of the things (like traveling to conventions) that other women in this field do to promote themselves. But those were choices and committments that I made long before I ever decided to become a professional sexpot, and my family - by my choice - remains my top priority. On the plus side of this equation is the fact that I've never needed to actually pay the bills with what I do; I can afford the luxury of neglecting business for months at a time to tend to a sick spouse or whatever.

But still. I always meant to persist until I got to a point where I could support myself as a dominatrix, if I wanted to. And once again it seems life has other plans.

My doctors don't know what's wrong with me yet (Haha! If only they knew the half of it...) It might be rheumatoid arthritis. It might be lupus. It might be some other damn thing with a fancy-ass latin name. But it's looking like some kind of autoimmune disorder. And I have MOST reluctantly started to face up to the idea that the nasty pains & loss of energy I've been fighting against these past months are not going to magically go away. That this too is something I'm going to have to learn to live with.

So.

Here I am, changing direction again. If I have to. I guess.

But ya know, it's not like they've taken my birthday away. My fingers may have difficulty tying knots in rope, and my arms may sometimes ache too much to swing a flogger, but I was never really about all that whips-and-chains stuff anyway. My style of domination is about CONTROL, reaching into the mind & heart of my submissive, learning to play them like an instrument until I can turn them into a quivering mass of worshipful desire with naught but a few words.

I've been away for a while, away from this blog and - as much as possible - away from the whole human world. Just taking some time to come to terms with this and figure out HOW to deal with it...where to go next...how to get there.

I absolutely LOVE writing my erotic accounts of our real-life naughtiness. It's so much fun to tease tia with the exposure, and so...well, so fucking HOT to re-live the experiences afterward through my writing. But if I don't get the words down right away I lose the inspiration, the passion that makes the writing so hot. And the awful truth is that, much of the time lately, I'm too tired after play to be able to write about it. I love the writing but I'd much rather spend my time actually playing! So that choice is kind of a no-brainer.

I'm thinking I will start writing more fiction, and how-to essays, and porn site reviews, and maybe even more of the mundane personal stuff like this. I'm thinking of studying hypnosis. My joints may be getting iffy but my voice still works just fine. And I'm thinking a lot of other things too. I can't help it; I'm just one of those people who must be always striving for something.

The most important thing is...I'm back. Didja miss me? *grin*

I don't much care to write about the negative stuff in our lives, although there is certainly plenty of it. We're all zooming into middle age, and have collected our share of dents and dings. We are, not to put too fine a point on it, dirt poor. And Izzy and I have two pre-adolescent kids to care for. That all by itself precludes our living a porn-fantasy life.

But this weekend was above and beyond normal c'est la vie.

You see, my extremely Christian sister showed up on our doorstep on January 1st, having brought her entire family (huband and 3 children) for a visit. Surprise!

Did I mention the extremely Christian part? As in prays to Jesus for driving directions, not having an xmas tree, and being against Harry Potter kind of Christian. She does not know I am a dominatrix who specializes in feminizing males, that I've made amateur porn, that I live a polyamorous lifestyle having significant sexual relationships with people other than my spouse. Even if she could, intellectually, comprehend these things I'm pretty sure she would find them morally repugnant.

I'm not the sort of person to be secretive about anything. It's difficult for me to keep from talking about my work or my kinky, lust-filled life. In the interests of family harmony therefore I have been keeping my distance from her for years. I really don't feel that longing for "sisterhood" that the stereotype of womanhood demands so this hasn't been difficult at all. It's been a simple matter of avoiding someone I have vast areas of disagreement with, who really plays no part in my life.

Like most families we've had some drama in our past. The canyon that lies between my sister and I now began as a smaller rift some years ago. And I realized this weekend that she thinks I am still angry with her for those events.

I owe it to her to tell her that I bear her no ill will for those things. I have so much more important stuff to be concerned about now - Izzy's heart condition, son's autism, even my struggling business. What would be the point in clinging to anger over things that have long since ceased to matter? But I will also be telling her WHY I maintain this distance between us. (Part of it anyway...enough to illustrate the vastness of the gulf between us, and not enough for her to actually FIND any of my websites. I hope. :-p)

Just have to wait and see if the revelation starts a whole new family conflict.

I would be fibbing if I said Christmas was my favorite holiday. That would have to be Easter. (A holiday largely based on pagan fertility rituals? I am so there! It also doesn't hurt that my birthday coincides with Easter every so often.

But the holiday season is a very special time for my family, for multiple reasons.

Izzy and I met at Thanksgiving in 1991, and got involved (i.e. started fucking) at Christmas of that year. (We met when his roommate, with whom I was having a holiday fling, brought me home...but that's a story for another time.)

He proposed to me at Christmas time the year I moved in with him, in 1996. And we were married a year later on the day of the winter solstice, December 21st 1997.

I was not thinking of any of this last year, when on December 6th I invited a certain smart-assed submissive I had met on Alt.com to write to me at my regular email address. I certainly wasn't thinking of it when I invited him to lunch the day after Christmas. Or the day after, when we made the drive together to Orlando to a friend's holiday play party.

I began to have an inkling on that drive, when I found him so very comfortable to be with. But it took a few more months before I was truly conscious that this might be The Real Thing.

Now of course I can look back and see that I've gained another set of precious anniversaries to celebrate along with the winter holidays. To the men I love so much - what can I say? You are the best Christmas presents ever, and I've been doubly blessed to have found both of you.

---

Remember those old home movies I found a few weeks ago? Got another one of them to share with y'all today. I've been sitting on this one, saving it for the holiday it was obviously meant for. I'm not sure what I had in mind when I started; what I ultimately ended up publishing on my (vanilla) smut site was a simple masturbation video. But the toy itself was purchased with the intention of using it in my harness on some slutty sissy. And it has become tia's favorite dildo, nicknamed "fairy".

Anyway, this clip is goofy as hell. But has sentimental value which I know at least one sissy slut will appreciate. *smiles*