Well, the Man About Town was downgraded this week from
hapless to creepy—in his last (or what I hope was his last) correspondence to
me he insinuated that I was somehow being dishonest because I needed some space
to process things without his input. He said he just didn’t take my boundary
seriously—what girl doesn’t loooove hearing that her “no” meant nothing, huh?
He’s all blocked/unfriended/marked as spam now, but I’m still kind of waiting
for the other shoe to drop.
(Note to self—I believe in magic just enough that I should
never mess around with someone who is in a coven—I keep imagining him sending
me gross condescending healing vibes or something.)
What I realized was, I acted in bad faith. I didn’t like
him. I was ambivalent after our first date, but I thought that might’ve been
because I was all swirly about Mister Hazel eyes. On the second date, I was
sure that I wasn’t attracted to him—his kisses just tasted wrong, the chemistry
was off.
Yet I thought I should go forward with him because he looked
good on paper—he had these nice, sensible girlfriends, he seemed stable and
smart, he treated me very well. I thought that I should like him. So I
asked to go forward as nonromantic play partners, just to see how that went.
In retrospect, it was a cynical move trying to make myself
like someone just because he was appropriate. I had this idea in my head that I
had to move on from the single boys, the bad boys, the inexperienced,
unavailable boys to someone who was more suitable. I was trying to grow up,
yes, but going about it in such a coldhearted way.
Being experienced at poly doesn’t make someone a mensch, and
I should have followed my instincts—they obviously picked up something that I
didn’t. So the fairly obvious lesson is: don’t play with people I am not
attracted to. My body knows what it is doing and I need to listen to it.
Otherwise, naked pictures of me will keep ending up in the hands of people I
actively dislike—that is just not good.
There have been a few times that I’ve wondered if I have to
make a choice between the adventures and the blog, but the main characters, the
people in the story who mean the most to me, have never given me even a little
bit of shit about it. The two guys who have caused me trouble about my writing
were people I had reservations about anyway, and next time, I will listen to
those reservations.
The holidays are a great time to put my quest for another
partner on the back burner and turn my focus wholeheartedly to Sweetie and the
rest of my family, to appreciating all of my friends, and to celebrating the
fact that I am about to complete my student teaching. There is so much richness
that I already have, and it needs my attention. When I return to dating, I will
do my best to believe in attraction, in my body, maybe even in love. Just like
I did a year ago!
A few weeks ago, two events conspired to make it really hard
to have any faith in this process. I wrote a little bit about it here but I
find myself needing to return to the topic. Part of what inspired the sadness
of this post was HempRopes, the talented top who suspended me last month.
After we played together, he sent me the picture and let me
know that I’d been a vey good bottom and that he’d play again any time, so I
asked if we could make some plans. He responded enthusiastically, telling me it
was time to meet his wife so that I could be vetted to come over and play at
their house. I let him know that I was a ways away from private play but that
it was a possibility for the future. The exchange was punctuated with more than
a few smiley emoticons on my part.
He said that his November schedule was up in the air but
that he’d let me know. I saw his RSVP on a mid-month event but hadn’t heard
from him so I planned to go and play with Sweetie.
I should have had a blindfold on. We were at a very sociable
venue and I was distracted from our scene. People kept coming over to say hi
and for the most part I didn’t mind it until my friend Bubbly Sub came over and
gave me a happy naked rope hug, glowing and bragging about how much fun she’d
just had with HempRopes. She was all buzzy and glittery with happiness, and it
should have just made me happy, but it didn’t. I don’t know why their having
played bothered me so much, except that I couldn’t shake the feeling that he’d
chosen her first because she is 24, more pliable, more agreeable than I am.
There was no way I could ever get chosen if those were the desired traits.
The hurt brought me completely out of my scene with
Sweetie—I was struck by the sheer empty futility of standing there naked trying
to attract the attention of men, and most of the time failing, at least in the
long term. I know much more happy and healthy uses for my nakedness, but in
that moment of despair there were none to be had. I felt guilty for
interrupting our fun, but I had to get some care and go home.
There was no offer from HempRopes to really decline, since
he’d clearly forgotten that I’d asked for plans, but simply to hold myself to
my decision, I sent him a note with the heading “Not Cut Out for Bunnying.” He
responded that he certainly had had no intention to hurt me, but that he’d put
out a call (on FL) and she’d responded. He said “I tend to get myself a queue
when I put the call out, so I go in a “first come, first served” order.”
So BS was chosen not for her youth or cheer, but simply for
her ability to sit on FetLife and wait for someone to offer to play. So in a
way I guess it was her youth—no adult, professional woman would have time for
that nonsense. She was, in the truest sense of the word, easy—a thing I will
never be.
I didn’t say any of that, of course, I just sent a polite
note that a queue wouldn’t feel right to me. He wished me luck and I crossed off
another possibility, stunned by the callousness involved in thinking that he
saw both me and BS as nothing but a take-a-number bodies waiting to entertain
him.
The second blow to my sense of hope came a few days later,
after I’d already posted about my general worries and emptiness. I’d had a good
playnight with the Man About Town, and in my post-scene glow, I’d accidentally
sent a tweet about it to him instead of Twitter. It was a silly mistake and
since it had a hashtag in it, he took it as an invitation to look up this blog,
even though I’d made it clear that that was considered 29th base—I
wanted us to get to know each other better before I trusted him to read it
without trying to control it.
After ONE scene, either he thought we’d achieved that level
of intimacy or he didn’t care.
I felt trapped. I found myself workshopping emotions I
hadn’t had enough time to even think about yet, things it would seem INSANE to
share with someone new, especially someone I was casually playing with. He
apologized for “leaving marks that scared (Sweetie)” and it felt like this
awful, creepy, invasion into my married life. I would have expressed concerns
eventually, on my own terms, but having those insights taken from me felt
awful.
Still, it was a mistake from a silly mistweet and the whole
sex-blogger thing IS a tricky situation. If he would have apologized, I still
wouldn’t have played with him again, but I wouldn’t have been quite so bitter.
Instead, he was self-righteous, saying “I’m not going to apologize for reading
something that is basically public property, that anyone could just stumble
upon.”
Which would be a fair point if I hadn’t ASKED HIM NOT TO. I
keep coming back to that:
I asked him not to and he did it anyway.
After one scene, he felt entitled to renegotiate our terms
without me, to take what he thought he was entitled to, whether I agreed or
not.
It is supremely disheartening, that even the most new-agey,
married-to-a-high-priestess, referring-to-the-moon-as-She guy would still feel
entitled to my inner life after such a tiny amount of time.
It’s enough to make me rethink my attraction to D/s
situations. While I do of course physically enjoy being dominated, I think I’ve
emotionally used dominance as a place-holder for things I’m not sure I can find
or deserve, traits I believed in a year ago—ideals of masculinity that I see in
friends and the husbands of friends but not in the men who are interested in
me—courage, chivalry, integrity, emotional honesty and strength.
So far, my experience of dominant men has been one of cold
cowardice—from Bill wishing simply for a chokeable fuck doll, to Fireguy
thinking that my expressing a point of view about my own experience was going
to wreck his entire existence, to HempRopes and his “First come, first served.”
I started with a fear that that I could never be what men want, that a man
could never be interested in my whole self, and I have found character after
character to confirm those fears.
I worry a lot about being perceived as a man-hating harpy,
and I’m sure that M.A.T. can commiserate with Fireguy to that effect, but I am
really, really trying to be flexible and kind. I don’t want to have such a
stunted view of men. I want to let someone real into my life; I’m just totally
at a loss about how to get there.
Sorry I didn’t get to finish the Old Timey guy story—it’s a
hot story but it just isn’t inspiring me. I just ended up feeling sort of empty
about it.
Empty is unfortunately the theme this week. Last Thursday
night I had a perfectly fun evening in Man About Town’s basement. He’s a little
sloppy with the knots, but he has other qualities, especially in the
holding-me-down department. He did a great job and was the first guy I’d
trusted with aftercare in a while, but I think I pushed myself too far. He left
ass bruises that scared Sweetie, and I ended up in a dark place and sobbing as
I was falling asleep that night.
Then, last night, I was at a party, in perfectly-knotted
ropes, alternately tickling a topless Sweetie and drawing pretty doodles on her
back, and I somehow felt invisible and abstracted from her. I felt so far away
from the warm, loving times that we have at home.
I stopped the scene even though she was enjoying herself.
The lonely-for-Sweetie part is easy to remedy—a
snuggling-and-hiking Sunday starts as soon as I’m done typing this—but what
about the missing man-affection? I like all of the guys that I have played with
recently, but only in a really superficial way. I don’t feel a real connection
and that feels like it is eroding something in me.
So what do I do? Declare a moratorium on playing with guys
until I find the man of my dreams or a time machine back to last year? Maybe.
I’ve been looking for guy-connection at kink events, which seems reasonable, but
maybe I need a good break from looking, some time to do other fun things and
see if I can reconnect with myself and stop feeling so empty.
My Man About Town is a catch in a million ways—he’s warm,
sweet, excited to learn knots, excellent with logistics and making me feel
cared for. I’ve been to his house and I like both his wife and his girlfriend.
After our hike last
night, he sent me a Google Earth map of the route! Romantic, right?
But I just feel like the chemistry is off. I love talking to
him but I just don’t feel quite right about kissing him.
If this were a romantic comedy, this would be a part where I
realize that I’ve moved past the bad boys and I’m ready for some genuine
affection, and choose the Nice Guy. And I really want to do that, but it just
feels like we’re more a friend match than anything else. I DO want to be
treated well, but a spark is important, too.
The week before my birthday, I kissed four people, which is
maybe too many. The only one of those that you haven’t heard about yet is the
Man About Town.
I’m calling him that because he’s got a lot of community
stuff going on—his art is in local galleries, he’s in the pagan community, and
he’s a leader of the local poly meetup, which is how I got to know him. I’d
seen him around for about a year, but one night a few months ago during a poly
book club meeting I noticed that he’s my type--big and bearish, warm, fond of
easygoing public nudity. So I sent him a friend request on Fet Life and I guess
my pictures did the trick. We exchanged emails all summer. He’s looking for a
new play partner, so we made plans.
Our first date, during that week-of-kissing-four-people, was
a hiking date on my favorite leisurely trail. We talked and talked and talked. Then sometimes we talked ABOUT
the talking. I felt really comfortable with him and was as confessional as I
would’ve been if I’d had two glasses of wine. I told him SO MUCH STUFF and he
told me a lot too. It was like a miracle of yammering, I loved it.
I was trying to remember the name of a butterfly* that was
helpfully splaying out its wings for us to study when I felt him move in for
the kiss. He was gentle, a little tentative, technically proficient, but I’m
not sure what I felt, emotionally. Still, I was impressed, and I couldn’t
resist high-fiving him and saying “Good job!”
Then I was like “Wait, is that okay to say? good job?”
“Of course!” he said, “Feedback is always welcome.”
Man About Town is close with Fireguy’s crowd, so I talked to
him a lot about that situation, which is good because it means that some
disclosures are out of the way. It was a relief to talk about that stuff, I’d
been afraid to for a while.
The Man About Town is just that, a man. So far, he makes me feel valued, understood, and oriented. My
first date with him was a pretty island in the sea of insecurity that was the
end of Mister Hazel Eyes. I got home that day feeling comfy in my own skin,
pleased to have the rest of the day alone with a good book, not needy or clingy
but self-contained.
He asked me out right away, but I was feeling really
overwhelmed about everything else that was going on. I told him I needed a
month or so to get back on my feet before any more non-Sweetie dates. Then, a
few days later, I asked if I could put him on the calendar for the end of
September so I’d have him to look forward to. He had absolutely no problem with
planning things three weeks in advance, and that is so dreamy. I’m not sure how I feel about him, but I am so proud to
have made plans with a grown ass man. Go me.
