The Stone Shelter

(Originally posted on another site in answer to the question about did body image play a role in the development of our kinks.  Pasted here as it seems to fit the "shape of you" challenge.)

For me as someone is Male and became a Dominant, I think maybe body image did play a part.

Not all of it, no, as I never did have a whole lot of submit to my personality even when I was still in diapers. Oh, I might do what the adults said... but, I would do it my way. And don't even get me started on the number of times that my alligator mouth overloaded my canary ass with my peers.

During my early developmental years, I was a short and scrawny little thing due to some health issues. I can actually remember my pediatrician giving Mom some guff about how underfed I was. The thing was, she was feeding me all I would eat. I just couldn't (or wouldn't) eat much.

I don't know how it might have been where you matriculated from, but at only five and a half feet tall, I was the shortest guy in the class. Shorter than most of the females.

Also, in that time and place, height mattered a whole damn lot! No gal wanted to go to the dance with the guy who would be laying his head on her tits when the slow numbers came up.

I also was THE natural prey of the cornfed schoolyard bullies, with an I.Q. equal to their bench press. And, unfortunately, not the common sense to refrain from sharpening my wits on their frail egos when they would begin their verbal sparring. Which would naturally escalate to the physical. Which I couldn't even come near competing in.

I couldn't do anything about my height. But, I could do something about being a "pencil-neck." At least I could once I grew out of the ailments that plagued my childhood. And took to an exercise regimen that was considered insane by all save Olympic hopefuls.

Which was, perhaps, ill advised. Since those layers of muscle on my short frame caused me to look like a fireplug.

Even more unfortunate, when puberty hit, hair began sprouting. The full mustache by age twelve was... ok, pretty cool. Having to shave twice per day (once before I left the house in the morning and once in the Principal's Office at lunch) when I was fourteen... not so much. And then there was the fact that I had more hair on my shoulders than... ***sigh***

This was right about the time those male models segued from open shirts with hairy chests to smooth and hairless. And it didn't help any to have a sister that would scream and run whenever I was unwise enough to come out of my room without a shirt on.

And then, there was the locker room, since I was in the process of transitioning from nerd to jock. At the time, I didn't have the first concept of "grower" versus "shower." And if some of those guys had grown proportionately...

That was exacerbated by being the time frame of Long Dong Silver in porn. 24" of swinging meat that could tie it in a knot for a photo stunt. And, of course, the stories (that I was really probably too young and impressionable to be exposed to) made it very clear that nine inches was the minimum acceptable standard. That anything shorter would never be able to satisfy a woman. Naturally, being the quintessential nerd I was, I sneaked into the hall closet, into Mom's sewing kit, late one night and got her cloth tape measure. And considered suicide seriously for the first time when I fell an inch and a half short of that mark because I knew that I was doomed to lose whatever ephemeral woman I eventually was able to lure into my bed.

Whether fortunately or unfortunately, I turned my inquisitive mind to if there was anything I could do to offset my disadvantages. And in the meantime covered up as much of my thick pelt as I could (not to mention hiding my bulge [or lack thereof]). I took the knowledge that I gleaned and came up with an exercise regimen designed around making me a better lover. When, that is, I got around to actually doing anything about it. Since, after all, that would mean getting naked. Exposing my "gorilla body" and "small dick."

However!

However, I didn't delve too deeply into BDSM at that stage. I wasn't very comfortable with... ah... things that were percolating in my brain at that stage. And very firmly steered away from what, on the surface, seemed to me to be more violent than people who were supposed to love each other should be.

I had an eighteen inch neck, forty-two inch chest, a thirty inch waist, and twenty-eight inch thighs, stood five and a half feet tall, covered in thick hair that looked more like an animal pelt and hid the definition in my musculature (our family doc [and our team doc] chewed my ass more than once to put on some fat if I wanted to stay healthy), and the less said about what I was hiding behind my books, the better. (And, no. I didn't 'roid.)

When I did actually have sex (yes, I really was over eighteen), I considered myself lucky that I'd found someone willing to have me! Someone that didn't point and laugh the moment they saw me without my shirt, much less my pants.

It was an unmitigated disaster.

But, not for the reasons that one might think.

I had put in so much time and effort into learning about sex and then developing an exercise regimen to increase my endurance for the aspects, that when I unleashed... er... most of what I knew, and what I'd practiced for, I was way too much. Some shit went on that isn't really germane to the specific topic at hand. But, when she broke up with me for the final time, she told me it was because all I wanted was sex and she didn't feel she could keep up, that she felt inadequate.

I knew... didn't just think, but knew... that she was lying. That she was just trying to spare my feelings so that she wouldn't be the bad guy. I was oh-so-certain that it was really that my dick was too small, that I was too hairy, that I was too short. That my heavy musculature combined with my short stature and simian appearance made me grotesque.

I was done with college before I was brave enough to let another in that deep.

Oh, I did have sexual encounters. But, none of them saw me with my shirt off, much less my dick out.

The thing is... after that second fiancee dumped me, I moved my major from the engineering key to the "softer sciences" and studied sex.

Okay, technically, I was studying towards being a Marriage and Family Therapist specializing in Sex Therapy. But, still. I studied sex the way most college students study English or Math or Economics or whatever they majored (and minored) in.

However, I still wasn't ready to... be fully myself. I still shied away from the majority of what is covered under the BDSM umbrella. I look like an animal. I actually bore the nickname "animal" for awhile. I couldn't... let myself act like an animal. Couldn't let them be right about me.

Meanwhile, intellectually I learned that my dick wasn't actually small, but slightly more than average. That did not, however, get understood in my heart, in my gut, in my soul.

Intellectually, I learned that being hirsute is actually a mark of higher testosterone production which is tied to libido. However, learning something in the conscious brain has very little impact on the subconscious body image developed as the brunt of what passes for schoolyard wit.

And none of it mattered when right there in the pornography of the time, the well-endowed, hairless, cocksmiths towered over the women that were opening themselves to them.

***sigh*** And, yeah. I learned that there actually are people (both men and women) shorter than my five and a half feet in the world. But, that didn't really help any as the women (sorry, guys, but only women) who were actually shorter than me... I was afraid I going to fucking break them! Literally!

Seriously, the last time I was tested, I'd been able to apply enough psi with my grip that I could crack bones. And delivered seven hundred and twenty pounds of explosive thrust. (I don't know how much of that would have been lost just thrusting with my hips rather than from a three-point stance to my full body extension measured at my shoulders, but it still scared me.)

My third ex-fiancee didn't get all of me either. That took the woman I would eventually marry. And it took her rather a lot to convince me that it was alright. That she wasn't made of crystal. That she actually like it rough. No, rougher than that. No. Rougher still. Ok, that might be just a little too much. Perfect.

However, she never did convince me that she really did like my body hair, despite gentle pressure for me not to depilate it. It's not that I didn't... that I don't... believe her, really. It's just that... well, how often do women accept something that really isn't all that great because they love the person?

I didn't actually believe that my dick was big enough until a couple of decades later during a follow-up appointment for her full hysterectomy, a very attractive (and prim) doctor peered over her glasses right at me as she talked about uterine bruising they had found. I made a comment about "it must have been her ex-husband" and she just about fell off her chair laughing.

I know that the disparity in our heights bothered her as she could look down at the top of my head and was always telling me to "stand up straight!" Usually hissed under her breath when she couldn't avoid being seen standing at the same time as me. (Perhaps naturally causing me to bend my knees and slouch more so that the top of my head only reached her shoulder.)

But, hey! I could reach all sorts of interesting things all at the same time while we were in bed. So, there was that.

On the flip side of the coin, I'm forced to concede that I am a shallow son-of-a-bitch. I categorically require that my partner be sexually attractive to me.

The thing is, I could give a shit whether anyone else (themselves included) see it or not. There is not a specific weight limit, height requirement, breast size requirement, face shape, or anything else. But, when I look at her, I have to be turned on. And, more, I have to be proud to be seen out and about on the town with her. And anyone (herself included) would be decidedly unwise to disagree with my assessment of her attractiveness in my hearing.

But, it's my understanding that the question was about my own perceptions of my body and how they color my sexuality.

Up to this point, I was talking about my early years and how they colored my perceptions.

Enter aging.

For a long time, I was physically active. And in my thirties maintained nearly the same dimensions that I listed from earlier. Just a little... softer as I finally started putting on some of that fat doctors had been trying to get me to.

However, in addition to still having the hairy, short body (and "little" dick), I started losing my hair and my teeth. "Shocked and amazed" is a good descriptor for the sensations when an eighteen-year-old beauty queen (ok, technically runner up) expressed an interest in me. I don't know how true it might be, but I've always felt more than a little like I was a check-box she ticked off during her college experimentation.

Then my (often misspent) checkered past caught up with me in the form of Parkinson's that they believe was the result from too many closed head injuries. Some jackass threw the emergency brake as I was doing top speed along the highway and I went from seventy to flat zero in a hurry.

Couch potato? I was a couch worm for a time as they tried (and failed) to figure out what was wrong with me, and then (once they did grasp a clue) tried to figure out a drug regimen that would get me back to some semblance of life.

The thing is... I'd always had a problem putting fat on. But, not because I didn't eat. No, I ate enough for three men. I just burned it off as fast as I could shovel the reactor mass in.

As a result, I positively ballooned. From a thirty inch waist as a snot nose to thirty-two inches for most of my adult life, I swelled to a forty-six inch waist. I shot from 120 pounds when I graduated high-school to 150 through my professional years up to 225.

And keep in mind, I am only five and a half feet tall.

It would have been easier to jump over me than walk around me.

"Men age more gracefully" my hairy ass. Maybe some do. My Dad definitely did, still looking good right up until he started going in and out of the hospital after he hit 80.

Then again, he was six-three, weighed a hundred and eighty pounds, had a head full of salt and pepper (and teeth!), no hair where a Homo sapiens shouldn't, and I have it on good authority hated having to sit on the toilet to pee when he got too unsteady because that damn water was cold!

I, on the other hand... forget second childhood. All I would have needed was a pacifier and a pampers and I would have looked like a (only slightly) larger version of myself as an infant.

My wife and I were both disabled and our life expectancies weren't great. I don't know what possessed her... probably that she was over a decade older... but, she wanted to have the conversation that goes "after I'm gone, I don't want you to be alone." I think I probably hurt her feelings a little bit when she wouldn't back off about it, so I pointed out that no one was going to want me. That I knew damn well I'd been playing above my league when I caught her. And that was when I had a modicum of desirability (all I'd ever possessed) in my youthfulness. No one was going to want me now short of paid, and I couldn't afford the prices they would command once they got a load of me.

Even before my wife died, I was on Lit. (As a matter of fact, I was on Lit when she died. But, I've told that story elsewhere.) And I continued to Lit after her death, but I wasn't all that serious about it.

Yes, I was a listless Litster.

Nay. A lackadaisical Litster.

I didn't believe that anyone could want me.

And then I met someone who gave me some small hope.

***sigh***

Actually, she was just an exceptionally kind woman who saw me as something on the order of "a project." It isn't her fault that I blew the little that she gave out of all proportion until, finally, she had to be blunt that she didn't think of me that way. Which shouldn't have been a surprise, I suppose. After all, she was just telling me what I'd known for the entirety of my life. But, her gentle handling, that I now see for the compassion and not wanting to hurt me that it was, confused me enough that...

Well, long story short, there was never a "little one" that I talked of in some of my posts. There was just a kind, considerate, compassionate woman that I built a fantasy around. I would apologize to her if I could. But, the closest I can come is these words here and the hope that she might someday drop by and see them.

I can also see that I didn't handle my disappointment well.

But, again, I've discussed that ad nauseum elsewhere.

What is germane to the discussion at hand... I loathe pictures of myself. My face alone is bad enough. (Yes, in fact, I have scared women and small children.) But, my simian torso, much less my dick? Ugh.

However...

However, I took pictures of myself specifically to send to her. She never so much as thanked me for any of them, much less gave me any compliment. Hard to blame her, really. I don't want to see that myself. Couldn't say just when the last time I looked in a mirror was. And I wouldn't have believed any compliment if she had given them.

What she did do was, in some ways, worse. She encouraged me to post them in the forums.

I was hurt. I had taken them for her. Had reached past my old scars and hurts to expose myself to her, just hoping and praying that I wasn't too distasteful and she would stop speaking to me altogether.

But, I did as she asked and posted a few of the pictures that were meant to be a gift of my soul to her.

I didn't really believe the positive comments that were made. Not in my heart and soul. But, I typed all the correct responses.

After she sat me down and explained that she just didn't think of me that way, that the few times she had indulged my fantasies, she'd been drunk, horny, and desperate or she never would have and regretted it, I... didn't exactly move on. But, I did open myself up to others who approached me.

***sigh***

And once they saw me, once they saw a picture, somehow we almost invariably explored Werewolf fantasies.

Or Gorilla fantasies.

Or Grandfather and baby girl.

I tried to tell myself that it didn't matter. That at least they wanted the Beast I am. Or saw something in my bestial appearance (and animalistic mannerisms) they could work with.

But, almost invariably, when I stepped outside of the narrow scope of the fantasy they concocted, they would object.

Again, a whole bunch of shit went on that I've not only gone over ad nauseum elsewhere, but isn't really germane to the discussion at hand.

What is germane is that at the end of "The Trail of Tears," I challenged a little sub to put her body where her mouth (and fingers) was and deliver her body into my literal, physical hands.

And she took me up on it.

And again, I've said most of it elsewhere. And it isn't really germane to this discussion.

What is germane... and something I haven't mentioned prior... is her verbal response once I broke our first kiss when I molested her mouth with mine (and between her thighs with my hand) before she could so much as get her seatbelt off.

"You're cute!"

Uhhhh.... no, I'm not. I'm a whole lot of things. But, cute ain't one. Neither is "sweet."

I was still rather bitter and challenged her on it.

"But, you are!" She insisted. "I was expecting Quasimodo. You aren't near as bad you described yourself. And that one picture you sent me didn't do you justice! I spent the whole drive here convincing myself that it didn't matter what you look like because I love you. And, yeah, I really, really need to get fucked. So, whatever I found, I could put up with. But,... damn. Just damn. You are cute! And fucking sexy as Hell!"

There is, I suppose, no accounting for taste.

I had purposefully gone out to meet her wearing nothing but a pair of cotton shorts, showing my fat, hairy body, figuring that it would be easier (on both of us) for her to leave from there, before she even got out of the car, than for us to be inside and completely naked and then have her change her mind.

No. I didn't believe that she was all that enamored of what she saw. But, she didn't lay rubber backing out. It was enough.

She did not, however, get to see my cock until she had been inside, with the door locked, for five minutes and I'd peeled every stitch of clothing off her, bent over the dishwasher, as I used my hands to drive her through two orgasms and then my mouth for a third.

Then and only then did I take that final step, guide her out of my kitchen and to my dining table, where I pulled off my shorts, allowing her to see all of me.

Allowing her?

Actually, I forced her to her knees in front of my chair as I sank into it, and held her there to take a long look at just what... how little... I had to offer.

One last time, I told that tale elsewhere. And I'm reasonably certain that any who read my post about Forced Orgasms probably decided that the reason my eyes are blue is because I was spewing it all rather than being full of it. I'm reasonably certain that no one that read it believed that I worked her over for over forty hours.

Not really their fault as I'm well aware that I'm far outside anything that might be considered "normal."

And... Well, in all fairness, I didn't fill in all the details.

The overwhelming majority of that time, I was not using my cock on her at all. Wasn't even hard, actually.

I used my hands.

I used my mouth.

I used a wide variety of toys and tools. Sometimes sitting in my chair and burning a smoke as I watched her, bound and blindfolded on my bed, writhing under the tools I'd applied to strategic places and tied into place before retiring to my observations.

Oh, don't get me wrong. I fucked her with my cock plenty enough during that forty-some-odd hours to satisfy even the most ardent Satyr (and I should know). Usually pulling out and letting myself go soft again, eschewing my cock for my hands, mouth, or toys. I only gifted her with my cum five times total that trip, while I reft from her every single one that she could manage, more than she thought she could, and then a few more for good measure.

Enough that I recognized that she was going to need more anal training to stretch her wide enough for me to even attempt to fit there.

Enough that she gagged and retched and I understood that she was going to need more oral training as well to be able to take me in her throat easily.

I took a picture for her that she is absolutely enamored with. I gave up trying to explain that it is a trick of the angle. That my cock isn't really wide enough to stretch from pupil to pupil in her eyes.

But, the truth is nothing measured against perception. She believes that my cock is as wide as she wants to try to take (and "can't believe I took that monster in my mouth, my kitty, and my tight little tushy [on another trip]!") I believe that only slightly larger than two D-Cell batteries is small.

She did, however, (despite claiming to be enamored of my hair) ask me to "trim back the underbrush."

Which I mentally kicked myself for not doing prior to her arrival, and promptly went her one better, peeling everything back down to the skin.

Which she objected to. Until I "teabagged" her, filling her mouth with my balls like a chipmunk storing nuts for the winter as I stroked my cock over her, and reached down her bound body to drive her through another series of orgasms using first my hands and then a Hitachi wand.

***shrug***

I'm sure by this point, those that haven't rolled their eyes and stopped reading are thinking I am just engaging in braggadocio. But, I believe I was answering the question with all the relevant aspects.

I loathe my body. I know... not just "think" or "believe," but know beyond a shadow of a doubt... that there is nothing aesthetically pleasing about it. I've known it for a long, long time. Even prior to becoming sexually active.

But, where did I get that perception? From mass media. From interactions with peers and then lovers (and rejection from those I wanted to be lovers). And, yes, from Porn with their oversized dicks, hairless hard bodies and handsome faces (Ron Jeremy notwithstanding), and towering height.

My inception into the world of kink and fetish was born from that feeling of inadequacy. I can do what I can now, what most believe hyperbole until they experience it first hand, because I was driven by those fears and perceived inadequacies to train for sex like an Olympic Decathalete.

Yes. I am a Dominant.

Yes. I am not confident of my appearance. Of my appeal. Of my ability to lure desired lovers.

However, yes. I am well aware that when little red riding whore enters my den, and the door is locked behind her, that she will most likely find that this Old Wolf's teeth are more than she can endure. That's what we have "safewords" for.

"I searched inside of me, where everything was numb and empty and tired. Magic comes from the heart, from your feelings, from your deepest expressions of desire. That's why black magic is so easy- it comes from lust, from fear and anger, from things that are easy to feed and make grow. The sort I do is harder. It comes from deeper than that, a truer and purer source- harder to tap, harder to keep, but ultimately more elegant, more powerful.

"My magic. That was at the heart of me. It was a manifestation of what I believed, of what I lived. It came from my desire to see to it that someone stood between the darkness and the people it would devour. It came from my love of a good steak, from the way I would sometimes cry at a good movie or a moving symphony. From my life. From my hope that I could make things better for someone else, if not always for me." ~ Jim Butcher

 

 

You can do magic.

 

Sometimes all it takes is a caress.

 

Maybe a hug.

 

A touch.

 

Something as simple as a kind word.

 

Perhaps nothing more than a smile that reaches from your lips to light your eyes.

 

Each and every moment, you have it in your power to be either a blessing or a curse to someone.

 

Choose wisely.

 

Then choose again.

 

And again.

 

Thank you to those who have chosen to be a blessing to me.

May peace, prosperity, and pleasure be yours in three-fold of threes measure.

 

 

 

 

Edit:  I got an email wondering if my sweet little spice and I had ended things.  Nope, nope, nope.  We are still going strong.  I posted this wish (or possibly Samhain blessing) for YOU, if you are reading it.  Releasing as much positivity as I can into the aether, not because I want or even need anything in return.  Not even Karma.  But, because I care that you have as much peace, prosperity, and pleasure as you can stand, my friends.

... sand gets fucking EVERYWHERE!

 

I have been moved to collect some tales of wagging tails that I shared (and perhaps overshared) elsewhere prior to being dragged from my den where I was licking my wounds and (snapping and snarling the entire way) into The Cage.

I would caution anyone reading that (even more than usual) some of what I chose to share in these collected tales may be... difficult for some of more tender emotional dispositions to handle. As always, I am sharing here what I shared there in an attempt to help rather than hinder, much less harm. So, I do ask that if a) you don't like dogs or b) you are emotionally wrought already, then please hit your back button on your browser and give this one a pass.

 

*****

Way, way back when I first got my little sister, Mom being the genius she was also got me a puppy. A little black cocker spaniel that for reasons that completely escape me I named "Sugar." (Gimme a break. I was four.) Well, for reasons already discussed elsewhere (as much as I'm gonna in open forum), for a long time I was only allowed to go out in the backyard and play with Sugar. In every way that counted, she was my only real friend for years.

Along the way, Sugar had her share of problems and more. Cancer. Heartworms. She even had a wound on her back at one point that flies had laid maggots in that had to be surgically fixed. Mom had her put to sleep when I was... I don't remember for sure exactly what age. But, I know I was already wrestling with death between losing my first grandfather and the old couple that I stayed with before I started to school (pretty sure I mentioned the one-legged carpenter somewhere around here) all within about three months. I don't know that it was the best idea, but Mom decided to bury Sugar beneath my bedroom window and plant... honeysuckle, I think. I couldn't take part. I just couldn't. I sat in my bedroom and cried while I listened to her digging right outside my window. But, it ever after meant something to me to know that my first best friend was right outside my window. And I always thought the plant was the most beautiful I'd ever seen.

Yeah, there is more than one reason "Where the Red Fern Grows" still makes me tear up.

Even before Sugar was put to sleep, Rowdy had come into our lives.

Rowdy was... I've never been really clear. But, I'm pretty sure Mom knew Sugar wasn't going to be around much longer, so she made arrangements with my best friend's Dad... the ex-marine DI turned Baptist Minister (and we did NOT see the same side of him on Saturday night he displayed on Sunday morning, let me tell you!)... to gift me with one of the puppies their dog was always having.

Looking back, I feel sorry for Rowdy. He came along at really the worst time in my life that a puppy could have. My adolescence. To a large extent, other than making sure he had food and water, he was pretty much all but forgotten out in the backyard while I was hustling around doing my school and church stuff and was hardly ever home except to try to get a little sleep and shower, much too busy playing Big Man on the Campus, hanging with my friends and chasing the elusive "split-tails." Then college happened, not one but two jobs, I managed to actually catch one of those "split-tails" (or was caught by her) and Mom had to take over even his feeding since I was, quite literally, never home.

He formed a tumor on the back of his neck and shoulder that was really more of a fluid cyst that just got bigger and bigger over the years until it was about half the size of his head. And despite always having only the best food, he would not eat and was little more than skin over bones his entire life. Don't even get me started on his teeth that were snaggled and would get caught in his fur. Those friends tried to say their dog, and Rowdy, were Pomeranians. But, the thing is, I know dogs. I mean, I was seriously a dog nerd. And I even took my dog encyclopedia to them and showed them the picture of a Tibetan Spaniel and dared them to tell me Rowdy couldn't have posed for it.

When I moved off to chase a career, I don't really remember whose idea it was. Mom was working on what would become her second failed marriage and asswipe had a whole pack of Shelties. Any road, I took Rowdy back to live with me. Which was a mistake since he'd only ever been an outside dog for about a decade and I was living in a little back house with no yard and working two jobs. If there was a single place in that house he didn't hike his leg, I don't know where it would have been.

But, sadly, Rowdy and I just never had the same connection that I'd had with Sugar. Which was my fault because I just never spent the time with him that I did with her except for those months he lived inside with me at that little house. I loved him and he loved me. But, we just didn't have that same... magical connection. So, when I moved back (and basically ended Mom's second marriage because I wasn't going to put up with dickweed being a lazy motherfucker and not working and then abusing Mom emotionally on top of it), when Love followed me, and I moved in with her, I left Rowdy with Mom.

I don't really remember just where she came from (I think from dickweed who was trying to worm his way back in with me no longer actually living IN the house), but, a Spitz showed up from somewhere. A female Spitz. With rather obvious results.

And, yes, I laughed my ass off when I saw them at it and she was having to lie on her belly for him to reach high enough to get the job done.

Well, Love and I were living together. But, I was working and working on my Master's. She was working on her Bachelor's and not working. And pretty much was alone in that little apartment most of the time and when I was home, I was typically sleeping off my 250mg of Elavil. So, Mom gave her one of the puppies which was marked just like Rowdy but built like a miniature version of Sheba.

Now the thing is, in addition to being a bit of a dog nerd, I've always had something of an affinity for dogs. Dogs that no one else can seem to get along with will take a shine to me more often than not for some reason.

But, I was bound and determined that Little Bit was going to be Love's dog. Not mine.

And I was mostly successful.

For the most part, if Love was home, Little Bit was going to be her shadow. And she very rarely had anything to do with me. Very rarely. Unless she was hurt or sick or frightened. Then she would come straight to me and want me to hold her about like a toddler, with her paws around my neck and her head tucked under my chin. I should probably mention here that Little Bit and her littermates were born in a pile of my laundry in the garage one cold night.

And then, shit got real!

As I said, I had left Rowdy with Mom. Well, when she moved to join me, Love had left behind an Apricot Pekapoo, Precious. And somehow, and I'm really not sure how, both of 'em ended up coming to live with us within the same month!

Holy shit!

Literally!

Taking them out to do their business was a chore as whichever one of us was on puppy poopy patrol had to juggle three leashes, a pooper scooper, and a baggie.

I can remember one particular day, I was the lucky one. (I usually was.) And a pickup rolled by with a German Shephard in the back and he barked. And each of our three reacted according to their natures.

Rowdy, thinking his tiny little ass (no bigger than one of my shoes) was Alpha, bowed up and came trotting from the other side of me to let the interloper know this was his yard.

Little Bit, being definitely Beta, tried to run behind me and hide.

I did mention retractable leashes, right? Hold that thought.

Precious had finally set aside her copy of Dog World and found the perfect blade of grass and was in mid-release of something that should have required Class III hazmat if we were technical about it.

Well, the leashes had somehow managed to get wrapped around my legs, as well as around Precious' leash, and tugged at both of us. Just as I was bending down to scoop up a deposit either the coward or the bully had left while the little old lady was finding her perfect blade of grass. I was already off balance and trying to pull my left leg up out of the leash web when Precious yanked like the sour dispositioned old lady she was.

And down I went.

I'll leave your imagination to fill in the rest since I think I just threw up in my mouth a little bit.

Any road, Rowdy didn't stay with us all the time. As I say, he was really an outside dog for 90% of his life and just didn't transition well inside. So, he was with Mom when I got a call one day that it was time. And gave the go-ahead to have little man set out of his misery.

Precious, we reached that point before Rowdy, I think. I want to say she was already sixteen and only had two teeth in her head (and those didn't meet) when she and I were introduced. And she lived with us for a few years before I had to make the call. The funny thing was, that she was Love's dog for a decade and a half before I ever entered the picture. But, I was the one that when I was picking up the food and water dish ended up sitting on my ass with my back against the wall, bawling my eyes out.

We should have put Little Bit to sleep. I can see that now. Her mind was gone and she was in a lot of pain. But... well, it was after we'd both become disabled and money was tight. Actually non-existent. We didn't have food, much less money for a vet. And we'd just pawned our wedding rings for me to buy a bus ticket to see my mother in the hospital for what turned out to be the last time.

Mom died in the hospital from Lymphoma. And I was told her organs had started shutting down, but that was all. So, I had a very vivid imagining of what that must have been like. And a week after Mom died, Little Bit started shutting down. Until the day I die, I will remember holding that little puppy that was born in my clothes, surrounded by my scent, puking up bile in my arms as her heart and lungs labored. And thinking that this is what it must have been like for Mom.

Despite already struggling to get the trash to the dumpster, that night I went out into the backyard and dug a hole for that pretty little puppy with tears and snot running down my face.

About a week later, a friend found us burrowed under blankets with no heat, no light, no food, a big foreclosure notice on the front door... And took us back to stay with them.

One month after Mom died, three weeks after I held Little Bit in her death throes, that friend opened the front door and said, "Look what I found."

And a little puppy that I could tell at a glance wasn't ready to be off the tit came limping inside, straight over to me, and couldn't have said any louder if she'd been able to speak, "this is who I came for."

 

*****

When my sister was born, Mom, being the genius she was, decided I really needed a dog to help me deal with the usual bullshit a kid goes through when they aren't the only one anymore. Of course, three years later I was evaluated for allergies and found to be allergic to dogs (as well as just about everything else except myself). But, by then, it was too late. They could have my dog when I was dead and cold.

"Where the Red Fern Grows" still makes me tear up.

Any road, about a week after Mom died, so did the last dog she ever gave me.

The wife and I were in a bad way. Out of work due to a disability, but hadn't been able to qualify for disability yet. Savings were eaten up by medical bills and all the usual bullshit. Some friends came by to check on us and found us huddled under a blanket with no electricity, no heat, and no food and took us home with them.

Two weeks after rescuing us (three weeks after Little Bit died in our arms and a month after Mom died), Tom opens the door and calls out, "Hey, guys! Look what I found!"

Now Tom is infamous for an uncanny knack for being in the right place at the right time (or "wrong" if you ask his wife) to rescue animals. Seriously ridiculous stuff that could only happen to him or in the cheesiest plot you've ever heard of. Like seeing Mama Cat get hit while trying to get her kittens across a busy road while he is out riding his motorcycle. Pulls over and finds one baby kitten alive. Puts it in his jacket and brings it home. Like that, but consistently. Like at least once every four months or so, he will rescue a kitten or a puppy.

Mostly they had placed them, but two dogs and four cats stuck. Yet, still, he was consistently bringing home more rescued animals to tend, resocialize, and place.

Now, at the time, I was actually going through a rougher time even than my wife who was still able to get up and move around a little. I was mostly a couch worm, riddled with pain and muscle spasms until it was just safer for me to lay there, or to crawl on the floor if I had to go to the bathroom rather than walk.

And in walks this puppy like she knew just what the hell she was looking for and made a beeline straight for me, jumped up, and curled up next to my head.

In my misspent youth, I'd done my fair share of animal rescues too. At one point, our backyard looked like the overflow from a vets office with animals Mom and I were tending for farmers or whomever that didn't have the time to fool with it. Baby calves, baby pigs, baby sheep. Of course pups and kittens. Probably the strangest was a brown bat with a torn wing who had a baby until they could be nursed to health and returned to the bat colony at Carlsbad. Well, you get the picture. But, what I knew most about, what I was most attached to, was dogs.

And I knew dogs.

I knew dogs well enough to know THIS mutt was only about four weeks old and not ready to be away from Mama. And a pretty fair idea of just how huge this tiny little puppy that could already struggle just to get her face in a boot was going to get.

However, I was not, not, not going to get sucked into a) the shitstorm when his wife came home and found out he'd brought another animal home or b) get suckered into becoming this dog's person.

I don't know just how hard Tom looked, but he claimed the hour he was gone, he was looking for where it came from. When his wife came home, she was every bit as pissed as I'd known she would be, and I think she really did look.

Now, as I say, the wife and I were in pretty bad shape. We'd both been told they couldn't do anything for us and our life expectancy wasn't great. And we were so broke we had to rely on those friends to feed us and our four cats or we wouldn't have eaten. Besides still hurting from holding Little Bit as she died, no way, no how was I going to take another mouth to feed.

And I tried to have as little to do with the thing as I could. Which should have been easy since his wife borrowed a crate from their neighbors who kept Great Danes.

But, every single fucking time I would doze off (which was pretty frequent), one or the other of those three would let that damn pup out of its crate. And it would come to squirm up on my pillow and curl up next to my head.

And, since they were both working, I somehow got to be the one who would feed it and make sure it ate and took it outside to potty. (Although I categorically refused to play with it or encourage it in any way.)

Since their efforts for finding where it came from in the first place fell flat, and since I was adamant that I did not want it, they started trying to find someone who did (they claim).

I got shouted down in a hurry for my first offering as a name, "Shit for Brains." And they didn't like my fallback, "Knucklehead," much either. One of the gals that worked with his wife came up with "Daisy," and his wife came home with a pink collar with flowers on it and that name.

I was not, however, going to fall for that shit. And I told them so. Which they found just hilarious for some reason.

I knew I was fucked, however, when I was getting onto her for something and, without thinking, tacked on a middle name. "Daisy Mae"

Realizing just what I had done, I ripped open their back door and found his wife lying on the floor, holding her stomach, with tears streaming down her face, cackling like a mad woman. At least Tom and my wife had the decency to keep it to a smile, although their faces were awful red and shiny. I flipped them all the bird and slammed the door and left them to their hilarity.

And went back to the little idiot that was grinning just as big as she could and wagging that tail, happy I'd finally figured it out.

The next day, a tag with "Daddy's Girl" on the front and "Daisy Mae" on the back "miraculously" appeared dangling from that stupid pink collar.

Here's where things get weird.

I have always been infamous for being a heavy sleeper. Seriously. My sister once banged pots and pans above my head for five minutes and I didn't respond. Never heard her. I've had marbles straight out of the freezer dumped in bed (a waterbed) with me and just kept snoring.

The only thing that ever worked was Mom pulling the blankets off me and spritzing me in the face with a water bottle over and over.

That damn dog decided I should be awake one day when I wasn't. Got up from being curled next to my head. Peeled the covers off me by grabbing the edge under my chin and peeling them back over themselves.

Then she went to her water dish. Got a mouthful of water. Came back to jump up on my chest.

And let that mouthful of water go right in my face.

Any road. I could keep going, but I figure everyone is probably tired of this crap.

I'll just say my pretty little girl turned nine this last March. And that cute little puppy who would curl up on my pillow next to my head now stretches out on the queen-sized bed next to me with her front paws on the headboard and her rear paws hanging off the foot while she stretches.

Of course, these days, she doesn't bother with the water trick. She just jumps up and sits on my chest and I usually get the hint immediately.

And the white-jacketed assholes with stethoscopes around their necks like rap star wannabes pretty well agree that she did more for me than the fistfuls of pills they had me swallowing three times a day. My "discount therapy puppy."

And yeah, her halter and the chain around her neck, her leash, and her food bowls and just about all of her toys are still pink.

And more of my neighbors know her name than know mine. Like her more too. Those that don't run screaming "Dogzilla" anyway.

 

*****

And I should probably stop there. But, there is a story that needs to come out of me, I think. One I have only shared once before.

You see, my pretty girl is only nine years old this past March. And that doesn't seem very old. But, it so happens that I know quite a bit about dogs. And I know that we will be extremely lucky if that is only the halfway point since she is a large breed. And, from time to time, especially since October 2017, it hits me that someday, sooner than I want to, I will be holding her head in my lap as she breathes her last breath. I know it's ridiculous to go mourning something that hasn't happened yet. But, I think, too, in a way it's a good thing. Because it keeps me from taking her for granted in the meantime.

But, the thing is... Well, in a way, my life is bound up with hers. I've shared and perhaps overshared in places, that Daisy Mae is pretty much the reason I didn't turn my face to the wall and wait for death from October 2017 when Love died until February 2018. And I've hinted elsewhere that Daisy Mae was much more responsible for me coming back from being diagnosed with Parkinson's.

What I haven't shared before now, not with anyone anywhere, is that Daisy also stopped me from committing suicide, quite literally, before she was even a year old.

I won't go into why I had gone down that dark path. Nor will I discuss the reasons behind why I went to such an elaborate plan versus something simpler and much surer such as a bullet in the brain. Much less why I didn't discuss what I was feeling with anyone that led me there.

But, it was a cold night in the tail end of winter. I remember that much because it was part of my elaborate plan. I already wasn't feeling hungry or thirsty any more. I hadn't eaten any food in over a week, closer to two. And I had not allowed any liquid to touch my lips for at least three days. Perhaps longer.

It was the deep of the night, the wee hours of the morning, and it was cold. Very cold. The coldest moment of the night in the coldest month of the year that I could manage without a crystal ball. I took Daisy outside. Ostensibly so that she could use the bathroom.

And I sat down in my chair that I always sat in while we were out there.

Nothing could look odd, you see.

I closed my eyes. And I guess I must have drifted off to sleep, just like I'd planned.

Because the next thing I knew there was a sharp pain in my hand and that damn dog was doing her best to try to drag me out of my chair with her teeth clamped on my hand.

I didn't want to. I really just couldn't even express how very much I didn't want to. But, I allowed her to half drag, half coax me up out of that chair and back inside.

I don't know how much of it was real and how much imagined, but I sort of have fuzzy memories (all puns intended) of her curled around my head for the rest of the night as I slept on the couch. And occasionally nipping my nose and licking my face.

The next morning, I woke to find the sun shining cheerily, and my wife thumping around in the kitchen, making an unholy racket as she made her coffee.

I took Daisy Mae outside.

Love stuck her head out and chewed my ass for being outside with snow on the ground in nothing but a pair of boxer briefs.

I never did tell her why I broke down in hard tears and sobs later that same day.

Daisy Mae, of course, licked away my tears.

The running joke for several years was that Love believed that I fought my way back for that damn dog more than for her.

I never revealed to anyone why that joke made me so uncomfortable. Until now.

 

*****

Any road, my long-winded (as usual) point (as much as I ever have one) is that dogs are something special.

Our condolences, and much love and warm furry hugs, from our house to any that have lost such an amazing part of their life.

 

 

Fear is not an option.  Luck is not a factor.  The only question in this life is whether you will knuckle up or knuckle under.  Failure lies not in getting knocked on your ass, but in not ever getting back up.  No matter what you've been told, it's not what, or even who you know (or blow) but how hard you are willing to grow.

 

And always remember to be good to you, to take care of you.  You are the only you those fortunate enough to know you have in their worlds.  And even if you don't see them yet, someone, somewhere, is relying on you to take care of you and stick around to be there for them when they finally find their way home to you.  And if you haven't been good to you, then you won't be able to be good to them when they need you to.

 

 

I ordered a surprise for my girl for her next visit from a distributor that typically encloses free gifts with each order. Gifts that I strongly suspect are shit no one would buy, and so they give it away in order to empty warehouse space. In this order, for a free gift, they gave me... I don't even know what they are actually called. I've always called them "pocket pussy." A silicone sheath supposed to be a masturbatory aid for men. Sort of the flip side of the coin from a dildo, I suppose.

Only,... Apparently, they sent me one for a leprechaun. My dick is bigger than the entire thing. And the hole that I'm somehow supposed to get my dick in is no bigger than the hole in my dick! What the fuck?

Amused as hell (and confused only slightly less), I decided to try it anyway, just for shits and giggles. I mean, it was free. And there was no sending it back. And it wasn't like I was going to bother trying to figure out something else to do with this lump of silicone. So, I wouldn't be out anything when I tore it up and reduced it to trash.

Only, apparently, I used a little too much lube. So, my hand slipped as I was trying to slip this thing on my cock (which is bigger than the whole thing, much less the hole) and it shot out of my hand and across the bed. Fuck!

It's a little hard for me to maintain an erection when I'm laughing hysterically. So, it took a minute for me to (once I'd retrieved it) get myself back into condition, and back in position. Only to have it slingshot across the room again! Fuck!

Now, conventional wisdom would dictate that I might as well give it up. Particularly since, while I was still bent over the arm of my chair gasping for breath from laughing so hard, my dog had snagged it up and taken off to the other room with it (fuck!) But, I can be a mite stubborn. And I am a firm believer in giving something three tries before I admit it just ain't gonna happen. So, after retrieving it from the dog (in exchange for a soup bone), and washing it, I gave it one more try.

And, to my amazement, actually managed to penetrate the thing. Granted, it was virtually turned inside out. And it looked something like a chest burster from Alien, the way it was bulging. But, I was in. Sort of. So, I set about trying to figure out just what the appeal might be. Trying to slide it up and down my shaft as best I could. (Although, it was a little more like rolling a sock up and down.)

It took a little while. Longer than if I'd just used my hand. And, possibly longer than if I'd used a sock, rolling it up and down. (I still don't get the appeal.) But, the moment finally arrived. I blasted a load of cum in this sleeve, which I had come to the conclusion was just supposed to be a cum catcher to save on tissues or something.

And felt something on the backs of my fingers. I'd blown out the other end of the damn thing when I'd cum! Fuck!

When my girl got back from her parents and contacted me, I told her about it. And she laughed. As I'd intended.

And told me, "I told you, you were big! Did you think I was just saying it to appease your ego when I told you that you were so wide it felt like you were going to split me in two? Or that my mouth... I can't take you comfortably sideways because you are too wide? I still want you to take my ass. But, I don't know how we are going to get me big enough to take you."

Fu-u-uck. So much for dumping hormones, since I was right back to square one. (Although, yeah. I had actually thought she was just saying it to be nice or whatever.)

"So, what were you thinking about while you were fucking your new toy? Were you thinking about fucking me, your tight little fucktoy?"

Oops. Fuck. I hadn't been but had been trying to find something in porn sexy enough that it might offset the hilarity. (Although in retrospect, maybe I should have been cruising blooper reels.)

But, now I was. Remembering her riding me, with my hands on her waist, guiding her movements as I fucked up into her. And imagining her flying off across the bed when my hands slipped... Bwahahahaha! F-f-f-fu-u-uck!

Me being me, I shared with her the mental image. Which made her laugh too. And then reassure me.

"Well, when I come to see you again in a few days, just hold onto my hair and the ropes you have me bound in, while you take me from behind, and it should be no problem. And, fuck! Now, I'm fucking horny. What are you going to do about it, my Lord and Master? Are you up to training your slave tonight?"

MMmmmmm. Fuck.

Sadly, she fell asleep after only four orgasms. With the vibrators still in her pussy and ass. Fuck.

So, I'm sitting here listening to her snore and typing up this fucking story that nobody is going to give a fuck about. Or fucking believe anyway. Fuck.

Water from my shower still beaded in my body hair as I knelt on the towel in the front room with my old battle-scarred wooden sword breaker across my knees. A simple roll of my shoulders showed the holder of the sword breaker to be just as battle-scarred as the weapon itself amidst several crackling pops from shoulders and spine. I focused on my breathing. Seven in through the nose, bringing in peace and serenity. Eleven out through the mouth, exhaling pain (emotional and physical).

And no little worry.

We had "met," if that is the word, on The Cage. A flurry of messages through the private messaging system there led to an exchange of email addresses and then phone numbers. Almost without me realizing it, we were soon spending more time on the phone with each other than off. Talking about what we were doing in the moment. Talking about the past, our histories. Talking about how we were feeling, what we were thinking.

And, yes. We spent more than a few hours engaging with each other sexually. Masturbating for, with, and to each other as I drew her through her every sexual fantasy and into mine between the power of my voice and my determined focus of will.

We even slept with the phone line open between us! Who the fuck does that silly shit?!

And, yet... And yet, it felt right. I slept better than I had in almost two years listening to her snore. Her one complaint was that I didn't snore enough, although I did wake enough every time she made a noise to whisper, "I'm right here. I've got you."

But, then...

Then, she started talking about coming to meet me. No, she started talking about coming to me "for you to fuck me, to use me any way that you want."

Which was a dash of cold water in my face. The truth was that while I had very carefully addressed all of her fantasies with things that I had done, had a proven capability with... I hadn't done them for several years. Some, in over a decade or more.

I spoke seriously with her at that point. I explained that I was no longer what I once was. That I wasn't sure that I could do some of the... more acrobatic stunt fucking anymore. Hell, I wasn't even sure my hands could still manage hemp rope since I struggled with buttons and zippers now.

It didn't matter. She still wanted to try. She wanted to find out what I could still do. If it would be enough.

Would it be? I wasn't sure. And often when we weren't on the phone, weren't speaking, I had moments where I wondered if I actually could do what I once had. What I described to her in loving detail through typed text or my spoken words.

The day had come. She was on the road. Soon, I would be standing in front of her. No computer screen between us. No miles of telephone line. Just she and me. Face to face. Breathing the same air.

Fuck! What was the matter with me?! I'd outgrown this sort of adolescent angst way back when I was fucking fourteen! And now, at fucking fifty, or damn close enough, it was back?

Fuck that! I was... No, I AM a Dominant. From balls to bone and back there is not submissive give to me. So what if she didn't feel I was enough for her? What difference did that make in who and what I am? Fifty fucking years... or at least thirty-six... I had done what I damn well pleased and fuck anyone who didn't agree so long as what I was doing didn't impinge on their consent or safety. If I wasn't enough for her, then that just meant that she wasn't right for me. Pure and simple.

A knock at the door caused my heart to give a cold spasm in my chest as if a fist of ice were wrapped around my heart, squeezing.

I rolled from my knees to my feet, ignoring the pops of ankles, knees, and hips, whipped the towel from the floor to wrap around my waist and strode to the door. Opening it... It would, perhaps, have served me right if it had been some unsuspecting delivery person or proselytizer. Or perhaps that would have served them right?

It was her.

She was here.

Her pictures hadn't done her justice.

Her wide eyes met mine for maybe two seconds before dropping to my damp chest and lower. Her lower lip caught between her teeth.

Something...

Something that had lain dormant in me for so long. Something I'd thought dead within my breast until I felt it stirring and stretching, taking a lazy interest once I began interacting with her. Something came howling awake from the recesses of my mind... my soul... to reclaim every inch of me inside my skin.

A firm hand on her wrist pulled her inexorably inside my dwelling, into my arms, nestled against my chest... where she fucking well belonged!

I felt the towel slip as the arm not busy holding her to my chest slammed the door behind her. I ignored it as I pressed her back against the door, felt it slide completely to the floor at my feet, leaving me clad only in a sardonic, hungry smile as I stepped closer to her, pinning her body between mine and the door as I crossed her wrists above her head.

"Tell me to stop," I growled, "and I will."

Her pulse pounded in her throat as her wide eyes studied mine. Her mouth opened, then closed. Her throat worked and she tried again.

"No," she whispered.

I almost pulled back. Consent is everything to me. But, I realized that she was saying that she wasn't going to tell me to stop.

A rumbling growl of contentment rattled my chest and seemed to reverberate with her as she shivered.

Her wrists crossed in an X over her head, I slipped my left thumb under and my fingers over, to hold her in place with a grip that had once tested as sixty-three pounds per pressure per square inch. I knew in my bones that she would not be getting away unless I allowed her to. But, also that she wouldn't even try to get away.

My mouth found hers and ate the moan which escaped her as my right hand trailed from her shoulder to her breast and beyond, fetching up between her thighs.

A squeak from her tasted like sweetest cinnamon on my tongue. Her squirms sent my blood racing to fill my exposed cock.

I regretfully peeled my mouth from hers and locked eyes with her.

"Tell me to stop and I will," I growled again.

It would be hard... Rather, it would be difficult. But, I could stop if she said she didn't consent to this. Consent to me.

"P-please d-don't. Please, M-master. Please don't ever stop!"

"Mine!" I half-growled, half-roared as my fingers touched my goal.

Her body jerked and spasmed, though whether from my victorious growled roar or from my fingers reaching my target.

"Y-yours," she whispered as her body sagged and shivered in my grip.

 

 

A few days ago, on another site, I read over a forum post that was a sub basically bashing a Dom for saying he loved him.  My first thought was, "Look here, littlebitch... (Don't look at me like that.  That was his screenname.)... "No one gets to tell me how I feel, or what to think.  And before you go getting all salty, just think about this.  Maybe he could have loved you.  But, love is a rose, and roses don't typically grow well in salty sand."  My second thought was, "oh, fuck it.  Why bother saying anything to an obvious douche-nozzle?"

 

This kind of dovetailed with something a pretty sharp young woman penned on these boards about a week or so ago having to do with the spirituality of submission.  I thought at the time, but didn't say anything, that it's a two way street.  At least for me it is.  As something on the other side of the coin from submission, I have to have that connection before I can try to be...whatever.  I mean, if I didn't have a connection with her (sorry fellas), then why would I care to try?  The opposite of love isn't hate, it's apathy.

 

However...

 

However, I will be the first to admit that I have made more than my fair share of mistakes thinking that I felt a connection with someone, some form of love, when that spiritual connection was only with a mirage that I thought they were rather than who they really were.

 

 

But, either way... whether the connection was to the real person or who they presented themselves as... it still felt real to me.  And severing it did hurt.  In more than a few cases, badly.  While there might have been one or two that were actually a relief, most of them weren't.

 

Actually, in only one case out of all of my experiences was I the one to sever the connection.  Every single other one, she did.  That's just... who I am.  What I was built, bred, and born.  I don't chase, but neither do I leave.  I am a stone shelter that remains for she who finds me, makes me her home for awhile, and then moves on.  It's what I am.  What I've always been.

 

***shrug***

 

And maybe that doesn't seem very D-type (much less Alpha), but I can't say as I've ever really cared too much.  No one gets to tell me how to be, think, or feel.  My lovers and/or submissives (platonic or otherwise) have always been welcome to ask for what they want, or think they do.  And, if it suits me, then I will grant it.  But, no one gets to tell me what I am beyond what I am to them.  And trying to tell me what I think or feel will earn them the back of my head.

 

So, yeah.  I'm a D-type.  And have even been accused of being an Alpha type. (Although I hope like hell I'm not as bad as some of the pricks that claim that for themselves!)  And, yes.  I also have feelings and a spiritual side.  Crave a connection be there if I'm going to even attempt to be anything more than a Top for the night.

 

And, yeah.  When that connection is threatened, even severed, it hurts.

 

And when the pain is bad enough, I have been known to shed a tear or two.  Very rarely ever in front of them.  I learned that lesson when I was not quite five and broke my collar bone, that crying about shit doesn't help a damn thing, and only makes people feel like shit.  So, "suck it up, buttercup."  At least 'til I'm alone.  Usually.  Only twice that I can remember had I trusted the person who was hurting me enough, was open enough to them, when that hurt came at me in a moment that I wasn't expecting it that they actually got to see (or, rather, hear) it.

Generally, though, I wave bon voyage and wish them well on their journey.  And wait until they are out of sight to lick my wounds.

 

The danger, for me, is that takotsubo cardiomyopathy is a thing, as we discovered when Love died.  While I'm (demonstrably!) not female (and in fact have been accused of having no feminine side to get in touch with), I was close enough to fifty that my Parkinson's pushed me over the edge on risk factors.  The only way I know to describe it was as if a hand of ice was inside my chest alternately squeezing and shredding my heart.  And, of course, I couldn't catch my breath.

Well, that was actually pretty understandable.  I mean, I had just woken up to find my wife of two and a half decades gone, leaving behind her empty chrysallis!  And, while I have limped around for thirteen hours on a re-broken fibula (and with three broken ribs) teaching my classes after a motorcycle wreck on my way to work, this was a different kind of pain.

But, I was beyond startled when a woman coming clean to me that she had lied to me for six months and she belonged to a Dominant that was not me kicked off a similar bout (if not worse).  (I've typically told people that was a bout of pneumonia or bronchitis since the pulmonary edema complications were severe enough that I would have been diagnosed.)  Well, I mean, I was and I wasn't.  I'd always found it beyond odd that people could not be hurt, or at least claimed they weren't, when a lover or even a friend abused their trust.  And I had known I was deep, deep, deeply invested.  But,... Well, anyway.

 

I've since learned that it doesn't have to be a heart-break.  It can be when my temper escapes my usually decent control.  It can be something positive that kicks it off.  Hell, I had a slight case when the damn cable company finally sent me the damn paper bill in the mail for those that read my diatribe that passes for a blog about a month ago!

Over the last several months, I've narrowed down and learned to identify when that now familiar feeling is starting to kick in.  And I know what to do rather than hie my sorry hide to some white coated menace that should fly south for the winter.  I disengage, go off-line, take the phone off the hook, whatever I feel is necessary so that I can meditate, ground and center myself, in as quiet, calm, and stress-free environment as I can manage.  Generally, after a day or two, my heart and breathing will steady down (except for a bit of a cough if I didn't catch it soon enough), and I'm ready to step back in the square.

 

Any road, a special thank you to those who reached out, wondering where I've been, and if I was alright.  I wasn't.  But, I was doing what I could do to be good to me.  And I am in a much better place today.

 

Any row you have to hoe, always be good to you first.  'Cause if ya don't take care of you, you won't be able to for anyone else that needs you to.