The Culture that has been here all the time

Hello Friends, There was an encounter in front of my house today. A man and a woman were walking their dogs and stopped to talk.

The man said, "Hey, I would like to get to know you."

The Woman replied, " I never talk to men I don't know."

They shrugged their shoulders and continued walking their dogs.

Hello Friends,

Let's Take a Look at what WebMD has to Say About Masturbation. First, it is an inescapable fact of life that humans masturbate, Men and Women. Religious Views are:

"Today, Roman Catholic (including Eastern Catholic), Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox and some Protestant Christians consider masturbation to be a sin. Many Protestant churches in Northern and Western Europe and some Protestant churches in Northern America and in Australia/New Zealand see masturbation as not a sin." ¹

^{"Leviticus 15:16–18 states that any male who emits semen is considered ritually impure - whether the emission came through masturbation, nocturnal emission, or sex between married heterosexual partners."2}

^{Islam see}

^{Masturbation Myths 3}  

1Myth: It’s not normal to masturbate.

2Myth: If you masturbate while you’re in a relationship, something is wrong with your relationship.

Myth: Masturbation is bad for you.

Myth: Masturbation is not a normal part of healthy sexual development.

Back to what WebMD has to Say About Masturbation:⁴

Medically Reviewed by Melinda Ratini, DO on December 19, 2023
 Written by R. Morgan Griffin

1. Masturbation doesn't have the health benefits that sex does.

2. Masturbation is not risk-free.

3. There's no "normal" amount of masturbation.

4. Masturbating doesn't reflect on your relationship. 

1 Religious views on masturbation - Wikipedia 
Wikipediahttps://en.wikipedia.org › wiki › Religious_views_on_...

2

³

⁴

Hello Friends,

The term "Switch" is pretty self-explanatory, but I have a number of questions about how "switch" people function in practice.

Does switching from dom to sub happen during a sexual encounter? Or do two switches take different roles at the start of each new sexual encounter? Does a switch need to pair up with another switch?

Thank You for your help

Hello Friends,

As an Artist, Writer, and performer, you may think I hate critics. I do not. They are an essential part of the creative process. Can they abuse their privileged position? Sure. Everyone can harm others in some way: bullies, authority run amock, unfair assessments, and unrevealed biases.

Art critics keep us on our toes and help us evade mediocracy. I had two projects reflecting times in local history, and one critic seemed to complain about my use of treble when mastering. He was right. I was unaware of how much my hearing was affected by my military experience, and I was able to make adjustments in the recording process to compensate. If he had not written that, I would have continued mastering with that flaw.

Writing about sensitive topics? I have often stumbled into the china closet and broken a few dishes. I had to develop tact to convey the truth without offending someone who did not deserve to be offended.

The most challenging criticism to deal with comes from peers. They can be motivated by envy or have a valid point mixed in with overzealous expressiveness.

I forgive them; why? They may alert me to a valid truth, but my audience is the ones who count the most. 

AFTER I WROTE THIS, AN ANECDOTE CAME TO MIND: I was one of several regular performers in a coffee house, and we knew each other as rivals and friends. I arrived early for my performance time and walked in on peers mocking my songs and imitating me. I accepted the criticism graciously and then explained that the simplicity of the songs they seemed to mock was intended for children. Easy to sing simple words and simple melodies. Also, a novice guitarist quickly accomplished the guitar level in the songs.

Hello Friends,

The original people (first immigrants, if you prefer) who settled in North America had some interesting spiritual views, and one, in particular, I found profound: how honesty was established among the people. The version I like best is Honesty, which arrived or was introduced and monitored by Kitch-Sabe, a now-extinct giant.¹ I have been converted to the spiritual beliefs of many people in North America because of very disappointing results with the religion I grew up with.

Seven sacred teachings, gifted by the grandfather spirits, are in one reference. At this time in my social Isolation, I am in communion with the Grandfather Spirits: I speak to them, and I am learning how to read the messages given to me by nature. Perhaps one day, I will meet an elder from a tribe who can be my mentor and teacher. I believe I have already successfully interpreted some signs, but I am a very long way from claiming I am a Shaman.

I have striven to be honest all my life, and there are costs for this, but the stories for this are for another time.

¹

²

³

^{4 My older friend may recall the TV program "The Lone Ranger" and his sidekick Tonto called him "Ke-mo sah-bee"  SEE:}

Hello Friends,

Wow, isn't this a great country? We have so many freedoms. In theory, we have freedom of speech, but I have discovered that most people want others to be like them, think like them, and speak like them. Even write only what they agree with. So, are we free to speak our minds and voice our opinions? Or must it pass the censorship panel first?

Well, I'll be damned! I have to conform to the nonconformist view or I am not going to be accepted.

Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm> Let me see.

Back in the 60's, the people I met people yelling prejudice and bigotry but what they really wanted was their versions agreed with, not a true objective view but a tained view by the rose-colored glasses they were wearing and handing out for free. 

Bobby Said it Best:  Bob Dylan All I Really Want to Do lyrics

"I don't want to fake you out
Take or shake or forsake you out
I ain't lookin' for you to feel like me
See like me or be like me
All I really want to do
Is, baby, be friends with you"

Hello Friends,

If you fall off a cliff or into a deep well, chances are there is nothing that you can do about it (it's too late). This analogy applies in many obvious situations; fortunately, this is not the only possible outcome for many other situations. 

When you discover a product you purchased is defective, return it, have it replaced, or at least have it repaired. If you enter into a business agreement that has been misrepresented, seek professional assistance to exit it with a minimum loss. Now, what about matters of the heart?

It would be much better to disengage from a significant other before it costs you so much material and emotional damage.  I had been married three times, and though, in retrospect, I can make sense of the first and understand what happened in the second case, we still experienced negative consequences. In my opinion, joining two humans on so intimate a level (official or within a "friendly agreement" ) is complicated to disengage without some negative emotional consequences. There are three standard options.

1) Official dissolving of a marriage (divorce)

2) Unofficial parting from each other

3) Modify the relationship so both parties are in agreement and satisfied with the outcome.

Since we do not have a clear sense of possible futures, we should be cautious before entering a serious relationship. Unfortunately, emotions can blind us as they often did with me: I was always unrealistically optimistic and made too many assumptions about how things could be worked out. The best thing would be to cover important issues, not assume, and try hard not to make decisions based on pure emotion (if possible).

When you find that you may have made too many assumptions after a while, go forward and try to make the relationship work from that point on.

Hello Friends,

Thanks for the comments on my last post. I have been candid to a fault, which has not worked well for me.  My new perspective is neither adventurous nor bold and not proactive.

I do want friends, and I do want like-minded friends within the BDSM social order. I am not going out of my way to precipitate this; my focus is on running my home and caring for my family. You may recall we came here invited, and did that not work out well. I now live with it. It has left me not knowing people where I live and with little opportunity to change that.

It is more akin to me being an alien whose UFO crash-landed and does not have much to go on about how to adapt. Yes, I have a place to live, food, and healthcare. My primary VA counselor reminds me that I am a social creature and need to relate to sentient beings like myself. The one window brought me to financial disaster because I was too trusting and too magnanimous: The Internet. I should have known better and should have responded to the "Red Flags" I encountered. I am over all that and adapted better to my current life. Our oldest grandson is making a difference.

Our oldest grandson, who is 30 years old, criticizes the family for their lack of positive action and has stepped in to fill big shoes to help me. He has enabled me to have appointments without added expenses, and in turn, I am helping him with his guitar lessons. I have also gifted him several guitars I will no longer require. 

Hello Friends,

I mentioned before that my wife was a sub, but I did not understand the concept until recently. According to one book I keep handy, she was a classic sub. She has fleeting moments of her old self on rare occasions, and I relish those few moments. This post is about how she and several other women addressed me.

The most common was for decades, "Daddy," but I have had women call me Boss or "You're in charge." Strange to me, as I recollect, this happened during closeness and allusions of intimacy, which were not necessarily at the level my wife expressed. I took them as simply addressing me with respect. 

I see now that each woman made this choice regarding how our relationship was or was to be defined or hoped to be defined. In cases when I interacted with women on a friendly level but the relationship was kept a little more distant, these terms were not used. During several incidents, I saw what may have been overtures at me, which I missed when a woman addressed me in a tone similar to my wife's and with a demeanor—resembling a flirt. I did not seek nor act on that because our marriage was monogamous, and neither one of us strayed; therefore, I did not pursue or encourage this. 

I am thinking out loud here because though I am new to BDSM M/S, I now think these events and situations can be seen in a new light and could have become overt if I had encouraged them.

Does, by definition, a "submissive" person wait for a "dominant" person to make a first move? Or can either a Dom or Sub initiate interest in someone.? Is there a protocol for this?

Hello Friends,

Back with a quick note or two. Our grandson has become a help. I have some new health challenges not fully understood yet. I feel ok and function ok but I inherited a condition that needs further medical investigation. It isn't major at this point my Mom lived to 92 with it.

Best to all of you all

Andron