Spanking is a big part of my sexual repertoire. There is a lot to be said for using your bare hands but sometimes you need something that packs a bit more sting. The Rainbow Nights paddle is an elegant answer to that problem.

The first thing you’ll notice about this paddle is the elegant embroidery and beading. While the adornment is pretty, the workmanship on it was not very high quality. Even directly out the packaging, I found that some of the beads and sequins were already loose. However, it is still a lovely embellishment. The embroidered side also presents some nice opportunities for sensation play as it can be used to caress the skin of your partner and provides some delicious scratchy sensations.

The most important thing to evaluate with an impact implement is how it sits in your hand. The Rainbow Nights paddle is compact and lightweight but it has enough heft to it to feel substantial. It felt comfortable in my hand and was easy to swing.

So how did it feel on the receiving end? Stingy! If you’ve never spanked with a paddle before, you are in for a whole other sensation. Without the feedback of the sting on your own hand, you can hit much harder and the leather backing delivers a great smacking sound. Despite the scratchy beading, turning the paddle over to the velvet decorative side allows for a softer spank.

Overall, I felt that this paddle was made out of sturdy material and that it would hold up through many spankings. It has gotten a regular workout at my house this week and doesn’t show any signs of slowing down. This will be a welcome part of my toy bag for a long time.

I met Hania at the beginning of the summer. She burst into my dry and repressive summer class with so much energy and enthusiasm that it was hard not to be a bit annoyed at 8:30 in the morning. When we got assigned to do a group project together, I didn’t know what to expect.

Sometime during a procrastination break, I find myself telling her about my sexual proclivities and my phone sex work. She smiles and asks a lot of questions. Then sho bowls me over by revealing that she used to do phone sex work while she lived in London. Here I thought that Hania, a Syrian, might be free-spirited but was another oppressed middle eastern woman. My prejudices were obvious to me almost immediately.

The next week, she came over to our house for a potluck. When the rest of the guests left, she didn’t and the three of us talked late into the night.

I can break the nearly 24 hours we spent together into distinct moments, all of them characterized by arousal and many of them by a distinct longing.

***
She is on my couch and we are discussing sex (what else?) and it is 4am. I am falling asleep and I also desperately want to reach out and touch her. Her breasts are over-spilling her shirt and I think she knows this and doesn’t fix it on purpose. I can even see the top of one dark areola and I try not to stare too much.

***
After a conversation on rope bondage, she agrees to be tied up. The morning sunlight is streaming into the guest room and her hair is wet from the shower. I nervously apply the katana over her clothes. Her chest is still heaving in the shirt she was wearing the night before. Despite the intimacy I nervously apologize each time I brush against her but she looks at me angelically.

In a bold moment, I show her what the Japanese refer to as dishevelment and pull the top of her tank top down to reveal her pink bra.

***

I am in her kitchen and she thrusts a porcelain dish under my nose, “Smell!”

“Za’atar?”

“Yes, you know it? My mother sends it to me”

Three days later I find myself in my own kitchen, mixing a batch of the pungent spice blend. Sumac, paprika, cumin, and thyme. I inhale it deeply and remember her.

***

I am sitting on her couch and and she is reading my fortune from the grounds in my Turkish coffee. We are leaning our heads together and I can smell her and I want to cry because I want her so badly.

***

Last weekend we saw Hania again. She had spent a month out of town and was emailing me and calling me several times a week just to talk. I knew she wanted us but I was so nervous. For now, I’m treasuring that night and keeping it to myself. You, dear reader, can enjoy the same anticipation that I did. Hopefully by the time I write the rest of the story, she will have given me permission to publish the picture of her in my ropes.

Want to know what Jay was thinking through all of this? His version was posted this week.

Download Episode #19 of Bedroom Radio (15MB, 33minutes)

In this episode, I read a great piece of erotic fiction from Jack of Writing Dirty. Additionally, Jay and I demonstrate the Door Jam Cuffs from Vibe Review and test out the Snugglepuss vibrator.

Right now, enjoy 10% off any purchase at Vibe Review by shopping through this link!

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Jack and I go way back, he has commented on this blog under more names than I can count. I was thrilled when he started his own sex blog recently because I always knew he had this sort of thing in him. I was even more thrilled when he wanted to answer my questions on masculinity because I knew his responses would be insightful.

Like others, Jack cites male family members as clear role models but I was also interested in the images of masculinity he drew from popular culture. This is an aspect of masculinity that is discussed infrequently and deserves attention. His influences, in particular, are eclectic and not the first things that many people would associate with the word “masculine”.

When was the first time you remember being aware of masculinity? How old were you? What was the cultural climate or influence?

I guess like a lot of men my image of masculinity is very much rooted in my father. I actually grew up in a house full of women. I was raised by my mother and I had an aunt and two female cousins in the same house as us for most of my childhood.

I think playing sports with my father was when I realized “hey, this what men are supposed to be like.” My was (and still is) a brilliant man who is also athletic and very emotionally detached. I remember playing catch with him, I must have been about nine, and he threw the ball to me and he would throw these pop ups that would basically disappear into the sky and then come down like a meteor.

At home the women were emotional, moody, scattered. When I visited my father I saw someone rational, cold and very disciplined. Masculinity comes with an air of being in control. Being in control of yourself and being in control of others.

It was the mid eighties, New York, upper middle class. I also very much associated wealth and financial security with masculinity I think. My father was a business man, he wore a suit everyday and
carried a brief case and made a lot of money. He drove a BMW and owned two houses and made a point of telling me how he put himself through college.

In my late 20′s, when I finally had some financial freedom and security I remember feeling like a man more than any other time in my life.

Do you think of yourself as masculine? Why or why not?

I think of myself as pretty masculine. I’ve actually grown into masculinity. I was a lot less masculine as a kid. Or at least I felt less masculine. I was a nerd, reading too many books, fascinated by
everything. I wasn’t good at sports, I was soft. I was emotional, I cried, I lashed out, I built up all kinds of defenses. If masculinity meant being in control, I was out of control most of my life.

How does your masculinity relate to your sexuality (be it your orientation, preferences, or expressions)?

My sexual tastes are not that focused, but I would certainly say I am mostly straight. I like girls, though I occasionally am intrigued by men it is usually not a sexual kind of feeling. That being said I have been very attracted to women who dress like men and act like men in the past. Thus my old habit of falling for lesbians. Drag kings are hot, but it’s not the masculinity that turns me on as much as the masculine front with the feminine peeking out. A chubby girl in a suit and tie with a drawn on mustache is only hot if the curve of her breasts is still unable to be hidden and the smoothness of her cheeks too perfect.

That being said I am mostly attracted to feminine girls. Curves and pouting lips, large breasts and asses. My tastes shift and grow as I get older and more than anything physical intelligence and creativity are my main attractors and those things are not inherently masculine or feminine to me.

As for me I think I put off a pretty manly vibe. I certainly look and dress like a man. I am often obsessed by women and femininity. A lot of my idols are women, though. Anais Nin being the person I have read most about in life and have drawn so much from.

My idea of masculinity is rooted in my father, Indiana Jones, Batman, Dr Peter Venkman and Henry Miller. Smart, strong, creative, bawdy, hairy and dominant.

Some people have asked me if they can answer the questions. Absolutely! I look forward to hearing from as many people about this as possible. You can answer the questions and email your response to lumpesse AT gmail DOT com or you can post them on your own weblog. There is no need to link back to me (although I certainly don’t mind) but I would love if you sent me a link so that I could link to your responses here. The only thing I ask is that the comments of each post be left to discuss that particular post, so don’t post your answers in the comments.

I have a pretty personal investment in this next set of responses because they come from Jay, my amazing lover, best-friend, and companion. There are a lot of people that blog in isolation from their romantic partners and that makes me sad. I deeply treasure the honesty we share and the fact that he loves all of me, unconditionally. I am lucky for that.

Jay is an incredibly special person and his answers here were not news to me. But reading them has made me feel closer to him. His memories and recollections are, like many of the men I have featured, heart-breaking, thought-provoking, and raw.

When was the first time you remember being aware of masculinity? How old were you? What was the cultural climate or influence?

My earliest childhood memories (ages 2-3) are of my father physically abusing my mother. The ensuing conversations that transpired between my mother and I told me in no uncertain terms all of the negative traits that made a man.

Growing up with a single mother and 2 sisters I never really trusted any men enough to let them have a positive effect on my view of masculinity. As a child I was more submissive and feminine than most of my peers and certainly less masculine than my tom-boy sister.

Do you think of yourself as masculine? Why or why not?

Now I feel a lot more masculine than I did as a child, but I’m still a very passive person in general.

I know that many people have read about my sexual experiences online and have commented to the effect of “You’re such a man, you know what you want and you go after it.” Of course they don’t know me and the fact that I am a kind, shy, passive, gentle person (or at least they look over those facts as I do try to write about them).

How does your masculinity relate to your sexuality (be it your orientation, preferences, or expressions)?

I’m the quiet, shy, rebellious type (wait, is there a type like that?). I look for any way I can to play with people’s traditional concepts whether it is family values, religion, or sexuality/gender. My orientation is bisexual, although right now I’m swinging back toward heteroflexible.

In kink play, BDSM, and parties I prefer to dress up as a woman and take a dominant role (which is a lot of fun since I have a very full beard). At a recent party I was dressed as Jackie O and spent most of my “play time” whipping the bejesus out of a tiny little woman in front of a rather large audience… if that gives you any idea ;)

This is the back of the harness that Artemis put on me. She did beautiful weaving on the back so that I would be able to lay down on it and not have any knots digging in.

After getting the harness in place I was molested. Significantly. Implements used included a violet wand, an e-stim kit, a Hitachi, and wax that was melted using a blow torch.

After 3 hours had passed, she set me free. The rope marks were beautiful.

I have a lot of things to say about what happened last weekend. I had a play date with Artemis Hunter and a wicked sadist that involved upwards of 4 cases of sex toys and kink props. I was a demo bottom for Artemis during her class on predicament bondage. We ended the weekend by attending an amazing play party where Jay cross-dressed and was molested by half a dozen pretty girls while I got to try my first full suspension. This post is just the first think I felt like writing about. The picture is what I wore under my clothes at the demo and what I was stripped down to.

We arrived early and were waiting patiently for things to begin when Artemis walked up to me with a red collar in her hand.

“I was wondering if you wanted to wear this play collar for today?”

I didn’t think much about it and agreed readily. She fastened it on me and went back to preparing her things.

The collar felt a bit tight but it wasn’t choking me. I don’t normally wear things on my neck so I was just aware of it all the time.

It seemed that other people were aware too. I was sitting with Jay and as we met people or talked to friends they all did something peculiar. They looked at him for approval before speaking to me. One woman that I had talked to online and was looking forward to meeting shook my hand and started to hug me before stepping back and asking his permission.

We must have looked confused and stunned and then I put it together. The collar.

I’ve never been in any sort of master and slave relationship and I don’t particularly intend to. The collar was just for show, a costume. And if it bound me to anyone (for the next few hours at least) it was Artemis. I quickly explained all of this. She hugged me.

I respect the decision that people make to live in 24/7 dynamics but it isn’t one I can fathom. Additionally, anyone that knows me, knows that I bristle at protocol. I respect it and keep quiet at appropriate moments but it isn’t something that I choose to practice.

So, other kinky folks, share your experiences of this with me. Do you wear a collar? Maybe just for play? Have you run into unexpected assumptions of protocol from friends and acquiantances in the scene?

We met for drinks a few months ago and then schedules got tight and new jobs were started and we lost touch. Carmine found me again a few weeks ago, telling me that he wanted to see me.

So we met for drinks and talked about school and teaching and the law. We also talked about lubes and blogging and the joys of rope and electro-sex. I’m attracted to Carmine but the conversation wasn’t sexy, it wasn’t flirtatious, it just was.

He asked me back to his place so I texted Jay to make sure it was alright. It was. I knew that something might happen but I wasn’t expecting it. Carmine is sweet and self-effacing. He has a slight Boston accent that makes my pussy twinge when he says words like “car”. I couldn’t, for the life of me see him making the first move.

He did. Standing in his living room he grabs me and kisses me. He leads me to the bedroom and begins taking off my clothes. We tumbled around on the bed for awhile kissing and groping. At one point he paused, excusing himself to go to the bathroom. I posed myself so that I would look effortlessly sexy when he came back in the room. On my stomach, legs bent and crossed at the ankles with feet in the air. He came back in the room and slid on top of me, caressing my back with his body and kissing the top of my head. I felt his cock pressing against my ass and I wiggled a bit as I looked over my shoulder at him.

“You have a baseball bat next to your bed.”

“Yeah.”

“Are you afraid of intruders?”

“No, it helps me think.”

I look at him quizzically.

“It is a guy thing,” he explains, “it is phallic.”

I smirk and decide to give him the benefit of the doubt. He is grinding against me and kissing my shoulders. He asks me what I want and I shoot the question back at him. So, he tells me he wants to fuck me and spanks my ass. Too softly.

I tell him I want to fuck him too but he’s going to have to hit harder. He does.

So we fuck.

Yeah, I know, I always skip that part. Here, let me give you some highlights. He slides into me and his cock is thick and hard and I squeeze him. His eyes widen a bit and so do mine. He pins my hands beside my head. He squeezes my wrists hard and it hurts and I really love it. I scream, a lot. Obscenities, sacrilegious prayers, and incomprehensible things. Throughout it all, Carmine retains a placid and contemplative look on his face. I smile and he smiles back but he is already smiling. I wonder if there is some joke that I am missing. And as his cock slams me, sometimes too hard and too deep. So aggressively that I have to remind him that my cervix is there, he still smiles. I wonder if this has something to do with the baseball bat.

So, we finish and I bite my lip and steal a quick glance at him. I giggle a bit. I’m not being myself so much as an approximation of myself. It is okay, he might know this or it might be too complex for the moment or he might not even care. I ask him to explain the baseball bat again. He picks it up and shows me. He is laying on his back next to a puddle of ejaculate with a baseball bat in his hands and my naked body slung partially over his. He looks a bit like he owns the world. He holds the bat like he is expecting a pitch and moves it back and forth a bit. I duck and giggle. He explains that he’s never even played baseball on a team and he isn’t that big of a fan. It just works. He tousles my hair and asks if I want a cigarette.

I tell him that I’ve never had a cigarette after sex before. Maybe it is too much of a cliche. He gives me an incredulous look. Law students are apt to smoking and Carmine knows that when I’m having a drink, I’m prone to a cigarette or two. I tell him that I’ve probably fucked smokers before but the cigarette never came up. He tells me it can’t be beat.

We slide back into our clothes and walk out on the porch and talk about evolutionary biology and have a smoke. He isn’t lying, it is a really good cigarette. The night is hot and exceedingly Southern he tells me that he hopes that now that we’ve gotten the preliminaries out of the way, we can get more adventurous next time.

Oh, thats right I left out some details. I met Carmine because he likes cross dressing and taking it in the ass from girls with strap-ons. He is also perfectly capable of spanking me and pinning me to the bed while he fucks me hard. Interesting how people and their sexualities aren’t just one thing. My life and relationships would be much too boring if that were true.