Most people that read this blog know that I have an intense relationship with music. My podcast started out being about sex and music and the level to which I sexualize music is pretty clear if you listen to episodes of it. But, I’ve never really written about the stumbling blocks I’ve had with music through the years.

When I met C in 2002 he was my destined to be my first for a lot of things. One of the fundamental pieces of our early romance was music. It was a love affair conducted via file transfer and mixtape. His excitement for me was carried with outpourings of new sounds and arrangements I’d never imagined before. I learned to use music to love and to share music as an act of devotion.

When C and I broke up, this left me in a peculiar place. Plenty of couples have a few songs that they consider “theirs” and of course those songs can, in turn, bring back either wistfulness or painful memories. The problem with my relationship with C is that music was such a big part of it (he a record label owner and club DJ and me being a radio DJ) that it wasn’t particular songs that reminded me of him or even particular artists, it was music itself.

Melody and lyric had been the language that we loved each other in and thus they were too painful to hear when I lost him. This might sound dramatic and silly but it was a reality for me. I was ruined on music for awhile. When Jay and I fell deeper in love I wanted to share it with him but painstakingly picking through my music collection was still too raw. Instead I brought an external hard-drive to his house and dumped a few gig of my library onto his computer and let him sort it out for himself. It was heartless and impersonal.

Finally, years out from my breakup with C, I am falling in love again. This time it isn’t bittersweet because Jay and I cling together, steadfast in our dedication to each other and our life together. He is my cheerleader in my new, fragile loves with Michael and Ariel. And I am, in turn, his. The greatest revelation has been that music has come back to me.

Driving home from visits to see Michael and Ariel, Jay and I found ourselves singing silly love songs at full volume. As I opened my heart to many loves, it opened to old and new melodies to express them in. Every song was about me and I’ve never been so grateful for being a trite cliche.

So, here is a mix CD that they got in the mail from me yesterday (a few tracks are missing because they weren’t on Grooveshark). It is a lot of silly love songs, inside jokes, swelling melodies, and love.

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?