Invisibility

When things start to spin out of control as they have been, i lose all perspective on things and a part of that is not knowing that i have lost all perspective.  Master tried to tell me and i couldn't hear Him, couldn't believe Him.  Even as He was telling me i knew ---KNEW--- that He was right and that i was falling back into that abyss but it was almost as if i was watching it happen.  It didn't feel like anything i could have an effect on.  

i've been feeling this way since yesterday, as if i'm free-falling and nothing i do is going to have any effect on any of it.  i cry so much it seems like i never stop.  i've been screaming at everybody at home.  i was so frustrated at one point that i grabbed a pair of needle-nose tweezers that are on my computer table, a watchmaking tool, and scratched my arm with them.  It didn't bleed but there's a tiny pink line there and it makes me feel better.  i punched a file cabinet but that just annoyed me more.  i want to REALLY cut, to bleed, to feel like i am alert and alive.  

i cursed at Master on Yahoo.  i was in my own head so much so that i didn't even feel as if i'd done anything horrible.  It really was as if i was a spectator at a distance.  There's line in The Goo Goo Dolls' Iris that says "When everything feels like a movie, yeah, you bleed just to know you're alive".  That's how i feel.  i know i can't damage Master's property like that.  i also know i have to.  i'm fighting myself inside my own head.  i'm insane.  i'm so crazy.  i hate being crazy.

Master has been amazingly lenient with me lately.  He has had tons of reason to punish me and hasn't or to do so more harshly than He has chosen to.  And i find myself on familiar ground.  Even the whip tonight didn't shake me from this funk and i'm remembering a time a while back when i told Master to go ahead and whip me because i was so numb i wouldn't feel it anyhow.

Every time i get to this point, i know it.  i know where i've been, where i am, and where i'm headed but it's like watching a train wreck with no ability to stop it.  the only thing that ever stops it is Master and His whip.  It's as if i have to reach some absolute low before i can start to recover and move in the right direction again.

The times Master has whipped me... REALLY whipped me and coupled it with redefining my world in the terms i need to see it by being amazingly harsh... i have snapped out of this.  It's as if He has had to make me feel so small that i was about to disappear and cease to exist.  Only then have i actually felt any motivation to continue existing and been able to focus and work my way back.

But there's a HUGE cost to this.  It's been devastating to me to keep regressing to that place of virtual nothingness.  When i'm there, i hate myself for mistreating Master and for His needing to keep dealing with my bullshit.  i hate losing privileges and whatever niche they might have made me feel was mine, even if it wasn't.  

i could care less if i ever wear clothes on the sims, seldom venture off anymore, and am glad v is first girl.  Still, when i don't have something i used to, i feel like i'm worth less than i was.  i don't want first back.  i just want to stop feeling as if i'll never get back to being wherever i was in Master's mind before He took it.

And now i'm crying again!  Kleenex is at no risk of going bankrupt any time in the immediate future.  i'm seeing to that.  But that's the cost of needing to be treated that way by Master to get my act together.  He tries to go easy on me and be nice but i can never manage to get back on track until He totally beats me down in every sense of the word.  i am utterly clueless as to how to change this.

That also begs the question of how this will play out in real life where i can't put on a meter and get beaten to 5% and then just turn it around from there.  What will happen when i'm this much of a mess?  What will Master do and how will i respond?  How much will i hurt Him?  How much will i make Him hurt me?  How do i get out of this without going down that same horrible road every time?

Whipping Posts

It's been a long and trying day and i imagine that's why i got as upset as i did so quickly.  When Master said to follow Him outside because He had to rez the whipping posts, i started to panic. i got a knot in the pit of my stomach.   My god, i hate those things!   Logically i knew that i wasn't in any kind of trouble and wouldn't be whipped this time.  It didn't matter.  

i thought He might whip kalli and i didn't want to see that.  i couldn't bear the thought of watching.  When He rezzed the whipping posts, i started to feel even more out of control.  i started crying.  All i do lately is cry.  But i couldn't even look at them... nor could i take my eyes off of them.

i wanted to ask Master if i could go back inside the club or to my spot but i was afraid he would ask why.  i was afraid that if he knew i didn't want to see the posts that He would say i needed to see them and remember it could be me up there.  But i could never forget that.  They terrify me.  i don't even know why but they truly do.

Honestly, if i was kalli, i'd rather have gotten the whipping over with than having it hanging over my head until tomorrow.  i'd never sleep knowing it was coming.  Waiting for a punishment is horrible.  i don't know how kalli feels about it but i could feel it on her behalf.

The only whipping i've ever witnessed other than my own was v's and it was mercifully brief.  It was excruciating to watch her up there and almost feel as if i was there in her stead.  Every time Master asked her something, i willed her to answer Him quickly and respectfully so that nothing would get any worse and it could hopefully end.  

i felt exactly the same way about kalli tonight. Every time she answered in a way that wasn't what might have been ideal like "okay" instead of "yes, Master", i cringed and willed her to correct herself, hoping Master would let it go.  Thank god He did.

When she was finally off the posts and hadn't been punished, i got up the nerve to ask to go to my spot and Master allowed it.  i haven't been using my spot nearly as much as i used to and i hadn't realized that until i asked Master to go there.  i don't want to be anywhere nearby if Master whips kalli tomorrow and, if i'm on SL, will ask Master if i can go there again.

What constitutes abuse of a consenting adult?

Today started off horribly and has not taken any turns for the better.  i was sound asleep with a loud fan on its highest speed and earplugs with the highest commercially available decibel blockage in my ears.  i was awoken by the sound of e having a tantrum over s not getting punished, by his estimation, as severely for stealing from me and he had gotten for stealing from j.  Life is just full of what he considers these gross inequities.

i got up and immediately turned on the computer, my security blanket and link to those who accept, understand, and can even relate to me.  i started crying and rau, who has been a godsend this past week, listened to me whine and cry on voice for a while and talk about wanting to be dead.  i actually pulled out the Hiding the Bodies chore notecard that i hadn't viewed in months and read it over.  Living to fail, failing to live.  That line had always stood out in my mind and it did again today.

rau asked if i had told j that i couldn't go on living like this any longer.  i had.  she asked what j said.  He said he wouldn't let it continue.  He has said that a million times in a million ways for what feels like a million years.  And i keep telling him honestly, just as i did this morning, that it's not within his control.  It's not a matter of a lack of effort on his part.  Living like this is killing me and i need out.  One way or another, i need out.

When j had then left to drop the boys at the bowling alley, i had sobbed to rau on voice and indulged myself in a bit of a nou pity party.  j returned home alone and said that he would take me out to breakfast.  He was going out of his way to be nice.  In the car on the way to the diner i told him that nothing is going to change.  he said that he thinks we need to spend time together and things like that.  i was very clear about it being over and me being done and my not being interested in making  any efforts to the contrary.

we ate lunch at the diner and returned home.  my printer needed ink so when i walked out of the bathroom and saw j standing by my makeshift room, i thought he had probably just gone in to check what type of ink it took.  But he was looking at me funny.  He came over and cornered me by my chair.  He said that i'd told him yesterday that i had said i would allow him sex if he wanted it and that he wanted it now.

Sex with j in the past couple of years has been rare, mundane, and not remotely satisfying.  i thought this would be the same.  Wow, was i wrong!  First j tapped the computer table behind which he still had me cornered and told me to put my glasses there.  i knew that meant it would be rough but even j's version of rough has never been much in my eyes.  

i purposely put my glasses in a spot other than the one in which he had tapped, just to see what he would do.  he accepted that and i could immediately hear Master in my mind handling it differently.  j's voice was totally calm.  It was confident and had an icy edge.  It wasn't the j i knew or expected and i wasn't sure what to think.

Next he simply said "strip".  He has never ordered me to strip before, never even used that word with me.  i did, removing my t-shirt, shorts, and panties.  He ordered me to turn around and i did, with a helpful shove and yank of my hair from him.  i thought he'd smack my ass but i heard him removing his belt.

i held my breath and held still, knowing what was coming.  He whipped my hips and ass and thighs HARD.  i have no idea how many times but the spots where the belt landed repeatedly hurt.  He grabbed my ponytail and dragged me to the bed which was easier said than done since getting to the bed as he ordered required me to turn around and he had me by the hair.

He threw me on the bed and continued with the belt, even on my back.  i guess his being right handed made my right hip an easy target and more lashes landed there than anywhere.  It really HURT, so much so that i even risked  scooted up on the bed a bit, hoping that the belt would at least land in a different spot.  

He said that he knew nothing was going to change between us and that this wasn't going to make him think otherwise.  He said that he didn't care if i enjoyed the sex because he would.  i had offered it and he was taking it.  It was as simple as that.

So he did take it, violently.  He never put the belt down for more than a moment if he had me on my stomach and never let me forget its feel.  He rolled me to my back and my head was jammed against the door that is the wall of our makeshift bedroom, my neck at an awkward angle.  i was scared to protest.

He grabbed my breasts very harshly, something he knows i hate, and bit one.  i have marks all over both of them still.  He told me to say i was beautiful, something i would have protested doing in the past, but i readily complied.  He told me to repeat the words and slapped me when i did.  Again, he made me repeat "i'm beautiful" and slapped me.  Some of it's a blur but i know he slapped me a lot of times on both cheeks with his palm and backhand.  For a split second, i flashed black in my head.

He put my legs as he wanted them, jammed his cock inside me, and fucked me hard.  If i made any sound, he slapped me hard but it was almost impossible to be silent unless i held my breath entirely.  i was hurting and scared and being ridden and just trying to give him what he wanted.  He came in side me, grabbing my breasts viciously as he did, then shoved me aside and said again that he knew nothing had changed just because of that.

i just rolled onto my stomach and buried my face in the pillow, crying hysterically.  He had never acted like that before in so decisive and confident and serious a way and with as much pain and damage to me.  i knew before i even looked that i would be welted and bruised.  i was just hoping that my face wouldn't show any marks but it doesn't.

He reached over and tried to scratch my back but i pulled away in the tiny bit of room i had to do so.  i couldn't stop crying.  i kept telling him that i was sorry... sorry for not being a good enough wife and mother, sorry that doing when i need means hurting him too, sorry about not knowing in time to keep us from being obligated to the house.  i asked him if he felt better.  

i had hoped he might be less angry and i might feel less guilty.  He said he hadn't been angry, that he thought i'd like it too.  He started to realize how freaked out i actually was and saw that my tears wouldn't stop, he started to apologize.  He kept apologizing until i told him to stop.

i lay there, frozen in place as my tears finally subsided, but didn't move until he left the house to go get the boys from bowling.  i was sore could feel his cum inside me.  i just wanted to disappear.  we had to meet the contractor at Home Depot as soon as he got back with the boys so i didn't even have time to clean up fully.  i did what i could and dressed.  i signed online quickly and IMed Master on Yahoo.  He wasn't at His computer but i told Him i loved Him.  i needed to.

Going to Home Depot was like being in shock.  i could barely speak or focus for a while, until i started to feel less numb and more like myself again.  we managed to get through the shopping trip, a stop at Staples for ink, and home.  But j was not himself on the outing.  He insisted on holding my hand, something he hasn't done in years.  He tried to pull my shirt up in the parking lot.  That is NOT him.  It's as if he figures he has nothing to lose anymore.

j took a nap when we got home and i signed on to have Master scream in accidental caps "WELCOME BACK PRECIOUS".  It felt so nice!  Not that Master needs my permission because He can obviously say or shout whatever He pleases to me, but i told Him He can scream things like that at me as much as He likes.

i told Master about growing close with rau which led to my mentioning crying to rau in the morning and then sex with j in the afternoon.  Master was not happy.  He growled, and definitely not in a cute way.  He says it's abuse.  But i agreed to it, went along with it, even offered it.  How can you abuse a consenting adult?

Now Master says i am not to let j slap or hit me including with the belt.  It's hard to envision myself enforcing that.  i can't disobey Master but disobeying j when he is like that and standing right in front of me, cornering me... i don't know how that will play out.  

As odd as it is though, i'm really not scared of j.  i think i could get him to stop if i had to.  i know what to say and how to get to him.  i'm far more afraid of Master.  i even pointed out to rau that getting whipped by Master will be worse than this was.  And, after this, i am NOT looking forward to the initiatory whipping.  

My fear of Master is far more than of His physical punishment though.  Master knows who i am and who i should be and strives to make them one and the same.  It's challenging when He pushes me and scary too.  i don't ever want to disappoint or fail Him.

i guess i hate that i am disappointing and failing j by leaving.  i expect his anger and feel that he is entitled to it.  It seems the natural complement to my guilt.  i guess i need to find a way to resolve that without tolerating what Master considers abuse.  i wish i could just make clean break once and for all.

The beginning of the end...

Doing what is right does not necessarily feel good.  i spoke with j tonight about my leaving.  i didn't mention anything about what i am going to do but, for the first time, was absolutely clear that i fully intend to leave and that things are over between us.  i guess a small part of me feels good to finally have the truth on the table but, overwhelmingly, i feel like shit.

Watching the realization dawn on j's face, seeing the hurt in his eyes, hearing the anguish in his voice, and seeing him snap into the mode of protector and advocate for his sons... it was all but unbearable.  i think i expressed myself as well as i could have.  i was calm and quiet and made my points clearly.  i was as complimentary and appreciative of j as possible but i didn't backslide on any of my convictions to ease the tension between us.

He said that what i'm doing is cruel and i conceded that point.  i agree.  i have from the start.  i have old notecards of conversations with Master that demonstrate this.  But then he called me sadistic and i told him i am not.  i said that sadism implies malice and i have absolutely none.  

i recognize his gamut of emotions, not the least of which is very legitimate anger, but i'm not going to be portrayed as acting with the intent to screw over anyone.  That is the last thing i want and the reason i have stayed so long and have been taking so long to tell him about the fact that i am going to leave.  i threw out the idea of leaving at the end of the school year but that seems impossibly soon for logistical reasons.

we are not even sure what our legal obligation to remain in possession of the house is in terms of a timeframe.  our particular type of loan may mandate a certain period of residence.  i told him that i would try to be flexible but i left no room for misunderstanding.  It's over.  i'm leaving.  

i suggested he take the big check i get in June and use that to pay the mortgage for the next couple of months when i go but he said that will hardly do anything.  i suggested we sell when we can but he wants to hang on to the house for the boys' sake.  i suggested he take on a tenant that he knows and let the rent cover a chunk of the mortgage.  i finally realized that he needed to think it through on his own, to wrap his head around the newness of it all and process it further in his mind.

i told him it's not about him, that it's not a matter of his doing anything wrong or failing to do something right.  i told him that i love him and that he deserves someone who will regard him and treat him as i can't or don't.  i told him i harbor absolutely no animosity toward him.

But i held my ground too.  He said that the new house was supposed to be a fresh start for us and i said that that was HIS dream, never ours.  His wishful thinking had just projected it onto me over and over again despite my giving him evidence to the contrary.

He was mad that i had left him financially committed to the house and i reminded him of all the times i had told him i didn't want the house, including one very serious talk prior to the closing.  i took responsibility for not knowing what i wanted until it was very late in the process and also in my cowardice in not communicating with him in a way that left no room for doubt.  i explained to him what my thinking had been to close on the house and leave us with equity rather than fail to close when we were already financially obligated and leave us in debt with nothing to show for it.

When we got home he sat in the car for a bit without coming in.  When he did come inside, he looked as if he'd been beaten down and likely shed some tears.  i want so badly to ease his pain, to hold him, to reassure him that i will stay.  i hate to be the one who is hurting him, even if only by the results of my finally advocating for myself.  i wish he wanted me gone, that he was in love with someone else, that he was relieved by my news.  But he was devastated. 

He asked me to stay until he can get his doctorate and promised to do that as quickly as possible.  He is hoping that, in doing so, he will have the earning capacity to maintain the house on his own.  He said it would probably take two years when i pushed him for a specific timeframe.  i told him only that i would try.

If i remain that long, we will need to work out certain conditions.  i would never disrespect him by flaunting my new life and would not allow the boys to feel as if i was taking advantage of him either.  But i will insist on certain freedoms that i don't have now.  i'm not going to sneak around to use voice or to visit Master.  

i'm a homebody.  It's not as if i'll be out partying every night.  But i'm also not going to start lying to cover for myself.  And he can and should seek out female company if he wants to, also in subtle ways for the benefit of the boys.  i guess it would be like being separated while living together.  

i told him he can have custody of the boys, that i don't want it.  Honestly, e will be 15 in July and s will be 16 in June.  By the time i am actually fully out, custody will be all but a moot issue because the boys will be close to eighteen.  It is hard to hear myself say that i don't want my kids.  It is hard to see it written here in black and white.  But it is the truth.  i am totally unable to deal with them in any functional way and maintain any sanity.

All through dinner i thought of Master.  At first j and i sat in awkward silence and i was thinking of how Master had said i could write out DJ's apology but had to deliver it in person.  i had decided that i would write out the things i wanted to say to j.  There had been so many times that i thought them in my head and willed myself to say them aloud to him, at the beginning of this meal included, but just couldn't force out the words.  With a letter in my hand, i thought i could probably make myself read it to him.

But them we started discussing the stupid tile and things that need to be chosen for the house.  This was before we got into how our futures would be apart.  i was willing to select the materials but, in response to j's comments about being excited, said that i didn't care about the house.  He offered to go alone for the time and i unthinkingly blurted out "i want to have a say 

in it if i'm going to be living there for a time and also because it will affect the resale value".

i could all but watch the words sink into j's mind and the underlying meaning dawn on him.  Part of me wished i had kept my mouth shut and not tipped him off, sparing him the pain.  But there was a part of me that hoped he would get it this time so i could stop worrying about how to broach the subject with him and what would happen when i finally did.

i guess i should feel glad that that particular worry is behind me but this is going to really suck in so many ways for a very long time and i am NOT looking forward to that!  He asked in the car on the way home if he could just ask me one question.  i said yes, sure he was going to ask if i was leaving him for someone else.  

Instead he asked about a recent large ATM withdrawal i had made.  It was kind of strange, almost comically so.  i answered him honestly but asked if he was thinking i was supporting a drug habit or something.  He said that he hadn't thought it went to drugs but had wondered about it and hadn't wanted to ask for fear of angering me.  

This kind of put things back into perspective for me to some extent.  Master has said that i should treat j with respect and remember he is a Free.  i tried to do that in talking to him tonight and have been trying to do it as much as possible lately, with a fair amount of success.  

However, i'm damn sure that Master is never going to avoid asking me about expenditures, if i have any dealings with them, for fear of angering me.  i need Master whom i cannot intimidate or manipulate.  As hard as tonight is and as the coming months and maybe even years will be, i know i'm moving in the right direction.

kajira versus slave

i really feel like giving up right now.  i don't feel it in a desperate sort of way as i have so many times before.  It's not a response to any big emotional crisis or a reaction to an especially intense punishment.  i actually feel very calm which leads me to conclude that my current take on things is valid.

For a long time i was thinking of the terms "kajira" and "slave" synonymously because they were, in effect, interchangeable in light of the role i had been trying to fill.  i think that was a mistake now.  i was looking back through some of my old blog posts and saw this illustrated in last month's "Responding to Master's observations..." entry.  That i am slave is clear enough.

But slave can mean many things and kajira is merely one very specific depiction of slave.  Never in my life have i fit neatly into any package.  It has never been accurate to use a single word to describe a group en masse and include me in it without a string of caveats to explain the exception i represented.  The other day Master used the phrase "ragtag group of misfits" and that seemed fitting in its encompassing those who otherwise defied categorization.

Likewise, the term "slave" is something of an umbrella category.  It describes me.  The rigidly defined subdivision of kajira does not and i have concluded that it never will.  Serving Master is a gift.  i love Him.  Living to please and obey Him is the most exciting and palatable of possibilities of which i can possibly conceive.

In contrast, living in deference to ALL Free is incredibly distasteful a concept. Most Free are assholes.  i hate them.  They are not worthy of even the generic respect of a slave.  To show such regard to specific Free, as per Master's orders, makes sense to me.  He has dealings with them in whatever capacity and wants them treated well by His property.  i understand that and, despite my overwhelming difficulties in this area, could probably learn to do this.

But to show uniform and absolute subservience to all Free without exception ever is another story.  It makes no sense to me.  i realize i don't have to like or understand it, only to do it, but at some level i need to feel as if it is a reasonable thing to do.  And i don't.  Not even close.

i keep running into this brick wall because i really don't comprehend the concept in any real way.  Yesterday DJ kissed kalli.  kalli is restricted white silk yet her response was accepting and flirtatious.  she even giggled.  i went off on DJ for doing as he had, thinking he knew gor since his close friend is of gor.  It turned out he didn't know gor so i apologized and set things right with him.

So... who is in trouble here?  kalli for not only accepting the physical affection of another Master but doing so eagerly?  Nope!  Who the fuck cares what her profile said?  she damn well knew her own restrictions and, even if she was obliged to tolerate the kiss, she had no need to encourage it with her response.  Is DJ in trouble for having handled Master's property such?  No, he didn't know any better.

That leaves me.  i was supposed to watch a Free touch my slut of a sister and keep my mouth shut because, after all, i'm kajira and shouldn't be thinking critically.  So i'm in trouble, as usual, for forgetting my place... my place, apparently, not being that of one who intervenes when Master's property is mistreated and welcomes it.  i was careful not to accuse kalli of any wrongdoing because i didn't want it to either reflect badly on Master by association or get her punished.

Instead i'm punished for rudely telling a Free that she is off limits.  That makes absolutely no sense to me.  It's just the way it is in gor.  i know that.  i can't apply any sort of reasoning to it and have it become any more logical.  That is simply the role of kajira.  Period.

Well fuck that!  How can i internalize rules that defy all reason?  How can i live out an existence of blanket acceptance of the screwed up actions of others, regarding them as somehow right because that's what a kajira does?  i can't.  Maybe if i had found gor when i was much younger, this would be easier.  Maybe you can't teach an old dog new tricks even if you are Master.  But i'm NEVER going to get this part.  i'm never going to be kajira!

i want to be clear here.  i am in no way upset about Master's punishing me.  Honestly, i think He went easy on me.  i had been thinking the whip was a sure thing.  And i know, even if i don't agree with it, that i did wrong as kajira.  Master was right to punish me and, though it was the last thing i intended, my actions reflected badly upon Him.  This isn't about the punishment.

i just don't view things as kajira and i don't think i will or can.  It is too foreign to my mindset and too vast a concept to internalize.  Actually, it is incongruous to my thinking, essentially the polar opposite.  It is beyond me.

Master needs a kajira, not just a slave.  i have no doubt that i could serve Him as slave and learn to fill the role in a way that ultimately became worthy of Him as i grew in my servitude.  But that will never be adequate.  He wants and deserves a kajira, not merely a slave who will fail Him time and time again, bringing Him stress, making Him look bad, and requiring His punishment.  i am not kajira.

i'm not sure where that leaves me.  i'm incapable of being kajira and that means i cannot serve Master.  Leaving His collar would at least end the vicious cycle of my fucking up in the same way over and over again, like a stuck needle on a record player.  He deserves better than a basket case who's never going to get it anyway.  

That would leave me as slave with no Master and there is no other Master i would ever wish to serve.  In my eyes He is the ONLY Master.  He thinks i am brown-nosing when i express that sentiment but it is absolutely heartfelt.  i cannot imagine ever regarding another as i do Master and i don't want to.  

Staying with j isn't even a consideration any longer.  So that leaves me alone.  This is a viable option if not an appealing one.  i SHOULD beg release but i don't want to leave Master.  That i selfish, i realize, but how do i ask to walk away from the Master i love and who wants me?  i'm not kajira and can't be what He wants yet i can't bring myself to beg to go.  i guess that only affirms that i am truly not kajira.  A kajira would offer her throat to her Master's blade if He wished it.  i won't even cast myself aside to rid my Master of a parasitic wannabe kajira.

Pleasing Master

i just asked v if i could blog rather than going to SL.  i was about to blog about kalli.  Before i got more than a title and opening sentence written, kalli asked me to read her blog.  It was about me.  i told kalli that i was going to write it anyway because i know i'll express myself more cogently if i'm not anticipating anyone's immediate reaction or limited to the space in a buffer.  Writing also clarifies my own thoughts for me.  i promised i'd be willing to discuss it with her afterwards.

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This morning Master told me to apologize to kalli.  my very first thought was to say "yes, my Master" and i was pleased with that.  i very seldom even stop to consider a serious order any longer.  i am but to obey.  i know that most of the time lately.  It is reassuring.  He commands.  i obey.  Period.  

Despite the fact that i had every intention of obeying, it wasn't long before i started to feel annoyed and having to issue an apology i didn't feel i owed.  i immediately started tossing around phrasing in my mind which would pass muster as an acceptable apology to Master but still convey the reality that it was forced and not genuine to kalli.  

Yeah, i am but to obey... in my own damn way with my own bitchy twist when i feel like it.  This needs work.  Instead of arguing with Master, i try to manipulate conditions in more subtle ways to better fit my liking.  Normally this is where it ends.  i do this and either i get away with it or i don't.

Today was different.  Today i said to myself that i would just go ahead and issue the apology because it would please Master.  It was like a lightbulb went on.  i don't have to like it or agree with it in order to do it without an attitude.  All i have to do is remind myself why i am doing it.  i want Master to be pleased and my obedience will please Him.  This isn't new information but this morning it clicked in a new way.  It wasn't enough before to get me to set aside my own irrelevant thoughts but, in this moment of clarity, it became enough.

Unfortunately, my serenity of surrender to pleasing Master turned out to be short-lived.  It should be enough motivation.  i know that.  i want it to be.  And when i reread old blog entries, i am always disgusted with how much they are about what i want and how little they are about serving Master.  i keep telling myself "Do not ask what your Master can do for you but what you can do for your Master".  i'm trying to make it my new mantra.  

i don't want to be so self-centered when it comes to Him.  i don't want to be needy.  As upset as i was last night, as much as i cried, i was angry with myself for adding stress on Him and taking Him away from either other things that needed to be dealt with or from leisure time.  i want to be an asset to Him not a liability.  i want to give more than i take and i haven't been lately.  i don't quite know how to do that with the club yet.

In any case, i started thinking about kalli during the day and getting mad at her.  i was annoyed that she had gone to Master before talking to me directly.  she had every right to though, i know, and i was a wreck last night and signed off SL early so she didn't even have a good opportunity.  i wouldn't have answered her on Yahoo even if she had tried.  i was too freaked out in my panic attack.

Then i was mad that she had seemingly lied to Him.  Master was under the impression that i had told her to return from the mall which i never did.  i never told her to do ANYTHING, or rau either for that matter.  i never gave anyone any orders.  While i was inclined to feel as if her giving Him that mis-impression was malicious, i had to admit that there was a lot of confusion during the time of that conversation and also that i was out of it enough to have possibly missed or misheard things that were said.  Today kalli said that she hadn't been able to convey her message clearly to Master last night and has since clarified it with Him.

Beyond that, i was mad about kalli's seeming betrayal because i had defended her to someone in IM just yesterday.  i had explained in ambiguous enough terms so as not to share any private information that she has been through a great deal both financially and personally of late and really is a good person who has been there for me in the past.  i had explained to this someone that i felt bad because she and i had been fairly close before she lost internet access and that i felt like she came back expecting nothing to have changed but that things HAD changed.  Things moved forward as they inevitably do and dynamics and relationships and people themselves evolved.  Not only did i change, but she has too.  Nevertheless, i had chided myself to this someone for not being more patient with her and not making more of an effort.  And, though it had become my tendency to remain off SL if she was the only other one on the sims, i had purposely spent some time there with her yesterday making what i thought was an effort to be nicer.  In light of all that, her going to Master with untruths about me was all the more upsetting.

i spent a good deal of time today considering the apology.  i didn't want to deal with her directly because i didn't trust myself not to get into a conflict with her.  i was afraid that if i was in text and she was on voice that she would manipulate the conversation to appear as if i had been out of line in some way.  i decided that if i owed her an apology then i must owe one to rau too since the one statement i had made had been addressed to both of them.  

i wrote an apology that explained things honestly and gave her the benefit of the doubt.  Master believed that i hadn't acted wrongly but still said i needed to apologize for making her feel bad.  i included that along with some things that i truly did feel i should say.  i offer praise which was legitimately due her and rau too.  i apologized for the state of mind i was in yesterday, for which i feel genuinely disappointed in myself for being unable to keep in perspective and function in spite of.

i'm not sure exactly what to say as a more direct response to kalli's blog.  i'm not likely to ever be that person who gives off warm fuzzies.  It's not me.  i guess we need to meet somewhere in the middle.  There's got to be a middle ground between the person who has been telling Master for the past couple of days what a great job kalli is doing as well as defending her privately and the bitch she is usually confronted with on SL.  

The flip side of that is that she needs to make an effort too.  she has absolutely no idea as to most of what i'm dealing with and i feel no need to make her aware.  But she needs to realize that she doesn't have the monopoly on tribulations.  Also, a lot of what she takes as personal attack is probably just my personality and largely the way i treat everyone.  While i need to work on taking the edge off of it in her case, she needs to make an effort to be less sensitive.  My sarcasm is rarely personal.

i don't harbor any grudges or bad feelings toward kalli and hope that things can move forward certainly peacefully and ideally in friendship.

Confusion

It is one of those days when my mind is racing with a million half-formed thoughts and i'm constantly on the verge of tears.  Every thought i have gives way to more confusion.

-Why is Master THIS mad at me?

-Should i have a better idea of why but i'm just in denial?

-Will He still be mad tonight?

-How long will He stay mad?

-Can i handle it this time?

-How do i avoid it next time if i don't even fully understand it?

-What if He doesn't believe i don't understand?

-Will He punish me and how?

-Why didn't He believe i expected Him to punish me last night?

i checked my phone every ten seconds today hoping for a text that never came, except ones from my former friend-turned-judge.  It has been excruciating.  There was a faculty meeting at work so i had to stay an extra hour totally unable to focus on a typically useless meeting.  i cancelled plans after work to go straight home, in the futile expectation that there might be an online message from Master.  There was nothing.

It's not that Master hasn't been furious with me before.  He has.  But i've usually had a much clearer idea of why and He hasn't left things on SUCH a bad note and then had no communication for twenty-four hours.  As much as i fear and loathe the whip, i'd rather He had whipped me mercilessly a million times over and then told me He loved me.  i keep seeing the words from His yahoo message in front of my eyes.  i saw them all day, everywhere i looked.

kennel

I am going to bed

And that was it.  Nothing else.  No "goodnight".  No "mine".  No "sleep well".  No "I love you".  Not even "I love you but I'm disappointed in you."   All there was to taper the signs of His anger was the fact that all His screaming had finally reduced itself lowercase letters.   

So i spent today cranky and upset and teary and having only some idea why Master is mad and not knowing how mad He will be when i see Him next.  i don't even know if i have a word to give how i am feeling.  i guess empty describes it best.  And i feel lost.  i feel as if my foundation was kicked out from under me.  

i was starting to get angry which was probably more of a defense mechanism than anything else.  When i finally got home from work i reread the slave creed.  i knew i needed to.  What i came away with is that Master usually treats me so well that when He doesn't, whether intentionally or inadvertently, i feel a loss.  i'm not entitled to hear that i am loved but i do, nearly every day.  i hope today turns out to be one of those days.

Perspectives

It's amazing to me how different people can have such different perspectives on the same things.  All through my life others have tried to push me in the direction of making the decisions they thought best for me.  When i was small it was family members and sometimes teachers.  As i grew it became friends and colleagues.  Yet two things have held true over the years.  

The first is that i ultimately tend to do what i believe i should.  i do consider advice and input and pertinent information but there's usually a part of my gut that relentlessly steers me where i am to go.  It doesn't necessarily steer me down the easiest path or the most mainstream one but i do believe it's the one meant for me, the one on which i belong.  It's not as much a matter of weighing evidence as knowing which way i feel i should be headed.

The second is that i surround myself with the people who are going to support my choices.  For better or worse they are mine to make and i'm not going to waste effort in justifying or explaining myself to people over and over again.  There are very few people in my life i believe are even entitled to such explanation and, of those, most either don't need one or don't feel any better having received one anyhow.  

i said goodbye to a friend today because he refuses to support the path i am following.  i have explained it to him and tolerated more intrusion on his part that i would have from most people, recognizing that his intentions are to help me.  i have also told him point blank several times that i heard his protests and don't welcome more.  i thought he had understood and agreed to try to be a friend and not inflict his ideas upon me any longer.

Today at work, i was intermittently in tears.  i was so upset about Master being mad at me and confused about exactly what happened last night.  The ironic thing is that, had my friend actually stopped being so damn judgmental, i probably would have felt safe enough to share some of my fears with him.

Instead he texted me repeatedly about what he considers acceptable options of life changes i can make with his approval.  Who the hell does he think he is?  i'd have a hard time naming a handful of people who express more dissatisfaction with their own lives than he does with his.  He even said recently that his reticence at my new path was in part due to his own jealousy.  Why should what he thinks i should do outweigh what i think?  Why should i give more credence to his opinions than my own?  

i'm hurt and frustrated by his actions.  i'd never treat him or another friend with such pompous disregard for their own choices.  i can't count the number of times i've offered a friend input then backed off to support what i expected to be a disastrous decision.  Often it was and i was there to pick up the pieces.  Sometimes i was wrong and didn't realize it until afterwards.  Either way, my role as friend was not to dictate action but to support it.  i am disappointed that he can't or won't or doesn't see things this way.  

i don't know when he and i became friends but it has to have been at least eight or nine years ago.  This is the first time i really feel disappointed in him.  i'm not angry at him, just sad that he's not letting there be a role for him in the path my life is going to follow.  That he can't see i have every right to make my own mistakes, even if that is what i am doing, is so much less than i would have expected of him and so much less than i feel i have given of myself to him.  

i know that moving to Master will result in the severing of some ties and the erecting of some boundaries i likely wouldn't have had to deal with otherwise.  i'm prepared for that.  i just hadn't expected this particular friendship to be one of them and maybe that's why i'm finding it as painful as i am.  It hurts that his agenda for me trumps my own and, in his mind, gives him grounds to act as he has been.  There was no choice to make.  It was a no brainer.  i told him that i don't want to hear from him and to leave me alone.  

To end on a positive note, i've connected with many new people lately and they do accept me.  They don't all share gor or slavery or any one commonality necessarily but my support system is expanding and there are people in my life who will hear me and know where it is coming from.  They will tell me when i'm full of shit but they will let me be so if that's the direction i need to take.  They will support my victories or pick me up if i get knocked on my ass.  

Thanks to Master, i've gotten better at letting the newest of them in.  i still have a long way to go but i am grateful for the progress.  i have more people i would call true friends today than i have in a long time, maybe ever.  i know i have a long way to go in terms of letting them get close and reciprocate the caring i give them but i also know that no friendship is ever going to involve anyone undermining my own decisions in favor of theirs.  So it is with sorrow but not regret that i leave behind someone i used to call my friend.

Patterns

The thing about patterns is that i can't always see them until either someone points them out to me or they are so far extended that i am feeling like crap and in deep trouble already.  My patterns of response to many situations have changed so much lately that i am amazed.  But then other patterns linger and those need work.

Master is right about Him not needing to know every good thing i do.  i haven't felt a need to point them out to Him so much lately either.  But He said that i should be doing them because they are the right thing.  i have to admit that i don't care in the least what the right thing is.  i do them because it is what Master wants and it would please Him.  

That's true on SL especially because i wear His collar there.  In rl i don't, not yet anyhow.  my job and home require a huge degree of aggression and dominance on my part and i don't know how to filter that out at certain times but not others.  i'm scared to.  i'm scared to have the vulnerability of forfeiting that aggression without the security of Master's rl collar to back it up.  my personality has long been a defense mechanism and i know that shield needs to be let down.  i just don't know how to do it in rl, away from Master, and i don't feel safe trying.

Master said that i know He wouldn't talk about punishing me if He was going to and that He would just do it.  That's not a pattern i've noticed though, now that He has pointed it out, it is the case.  Still, Master's talking about punishing me is frightening.  i always wish He would just do it instead of leaving me to wait and wonder.  i didn't take it lightly that He was just talking about it and therefore wouldn't really punish me and i don't think that's a bad thing.  i have no doubt that the second i get a cavalier attitude about being punished, i'm headed for a BIG punishment.

The other major pattern i see here is that the further i get from a punishment, the less fine-tuned my behavior gets.  i am highly aware of this pattern and i see it coming and do everything i think i can to prevent it from repeating but it inevitably does.  It's been a week since i've been punished in any way.  

Some part of me gets anxious and insecure.  i live for the moments when Master scolds or warns me and then says "good girl" when i respond "yes, Master".  And some piece of me wants and needs to feel the safely of being knocked on my ass and reminded in no uncertain terms that i am slave and Master's.  i know this but i need it demonstrated.  

That's not a good thing.  It makes Master's life more arduous.  i know how much stress He is under and i don't want to add to it.  i thought i'd been very careful this time to be conscious of this pattern and not allow myself to do things to provoke Him.  i've thought that before.  i always screw it up.  

At the risk of whining, i'm also under a lot of stress and am feeling it acutely right now.  i think Master knows this and i think His desire to be sensitive to it is actually what makes it harder for me.  Right before i asked again to kennel, i had returned to the SL window and He said it was my choice whether Sonya showed the pictures in public.  i just COULDN'T make a decision at that moment.  i have no doubt that it was Master's intent to be sensitive to me but all i wanted was for Him to tell me what to do.  And i was too frazzled to say that just then.  So i asked to kennel.  

i guess if i'm to put a positive spin on this blog it would be that all the things i want and need and fear, and all the patterns i see, build a picture of kajira.  It's hard to reread that and doubt that i am slave.  They also bring to mind another pattern, one on which i do feel i've made significant progress.  It used to be that when Master got angry, so did i.  And any time i got angry, i was egregiously disrespectful to Master.  

i'm definitely not perfect on this front but i've reread old notecards and i can't ever imagine speaking to Master as i had.  Even angry or upset today, i think i stay on the right side of the line in terms of how i speak to Him.  It took the whip to drive that home home but i got the point, finally.  It wasn't easy to get but at least i've retained it and, staying conscious of it, hope to continue to do so.

My List of "What Ifs"

What if...

-Master hates me

-i can't handle being kajira

-Master hates me

-i regret leaving j

-Master hates me

-i regret leaving my job

-Master hates me

-my depression gets worse

-Master hates me

-i do something really stupid and Master uncollars me

-Master hates me

-there's not enough money to live on

-i get jealous of v

-Master hates me

-we never have sex

-Master hates me

-i freak out entirely

-Master hates me

-we have sex but it's terrible

-Master hates me

-i get claustrophobic in a cell

-Master hates me

-there's only ramen noodles and microwave burritos

-Master hates me

-i want to leave and have nowhere to go

-Master hates me

-v and i don't get along irl

-Master hates me

-i can't be what Master wants and needs and deserves

-Master hates me

-i find hard limits i hadn't anticipated

-Master hates me

-there's not enough of Master to go around

-Master hates me

-i can't get my medications

-Master hates me

-i'm allergic to something Master or v wear

-Master hates me

-v hates me

-Master hates me

-i can't handle their smoking

-Master hates me

-eve comes back

-Master hates me

-i hate the physical aspect of wearing a collar

-Master hates me

-i can't handle the initiatory whipping

-Master hates me

-my crappy housekeeping skills are inadequate

-Master hates me

-i can't control my sarcastic mouth

-Master hates me

-i don't get enough intellectual stimulation and my brain shrivels

-Master hates me

-i can't handle the hot weather

-Master hates me

-there's only spicy food

-Master hates me

-i can't ever nadu for long

-Master hates me

-Master collars more girls irl

-Master hates me

-Master won't accept a hard limit

-Master hates me

-Master decides He isn't Master

-Master hates me

-i find it unbearably boring

-Master hates me

-i am mean to Master

-Master hates me

-i am mean to v

-Master hates me

-i am mean to Free

-Master hates me

-i can't handle Master's traveling

-Master hates me

-i disappoint Master

-Master hates me

-i'm too self-centered

-Master hates me

-Master dies

-Master hates me

Or what if:

Many of my worries don't come to fruition and those that do i cope with as they arise.  i actually allow myself to be loved and come to believe myself worthy of it.  i find the happiness that has always been so elusive and depression finally ceases to cripple me.  

Suicide

Master wants me to write about nailah and i do NOT want to nor do i have a choice.  So here i am writing.  As much as i do not want to write, the assignment weighed on my mind all day and i'd as soon put it behind me as spend a second day dwelling on it.  Master says i have a need to write on this even though i don't think i do.  Maybe so.  Or maybe He believes i'll conclude that suicide sucks and i'll have an epiphany as to the error of my ways.  Not fucking likely!  Master says that His only demand is my honesty and that i am not writing this for Him to like or dislike what i say.  So be it.

Master asked how i felt in dealing with nailah the other night.  There's not one simple answer to that.  A big part of me was on auto-pilot and just going through the motions and doing what needed to be done.  i've always been good in crises, level headed and able to exercise sound judgment rather than panicking.  So, i simply responded instinctively.  i kept nailah talking, fished for information which might be helpful when emergency help was contacted, and did my best to reassure her.  At that level, there wasn't much feeling at all other than a bit of an adrenaline rush.

Another part of me was numb.  It was surreal.  It felt like the situation couldn't possibly be happening.  The last time i remember feeling that way to that degree was when i received word that my brother had died.  It was almost as if i was outside myself watching what was happening, what i was doing, as if i was watching another person.  It wasn't quite to that extent with nailah, but it certainly brought back that general feeling. 

A part of me was also skeptical.  Right down to my core,  i am loathe to believe anything is actually what it seems or that anyone is genuine.  i considered that nailah was faking it, that she and eve had concocted some elaborate scheme to fake her death and not have to deal with Master.  When her husband came on i was even more dubious.  Would he really react that way?  Would 911 not have kept him on the line?  The cop served only to increase my lack of trust with his not offering his last name and some of how he conducted himself.  When Master told me nailah had already been released from the hospital i was even more doubtful.  It seemed too quick.  i'm not entirely convinced even now that the experience was real but i think it was.

Then there was the part of me that was increasingly terrified.  What if it was real?  What if nailah died?  What if i was the last one to communicate with her and i screwed up my end of things, resulting in her death?  There were definite parallels to my feelings about my father's death.  i felt responsible for nailah's fate, guilty without being able to pinpoint any wrongdoing on my part.  i felt utterly helpless.

And there was another part of me as well, the one that felt jealous of nailah.  She had the guts to do it.  She didn't chicken out like i always have.  Her problems were over.  Everyone would contemplate how wonderful she had been, how much she had been loved, and she would be blissfully ignorant of it all.  The world would go on without her and all her tribulations would either cease or continue in her absence.  She was living my dream!

But i immediately recognized that her methodology was lacking.  It was unfair to leave people wondering as to her fate.  If i was going to kill myself, i'd make damn sure i maximized the likelihood of my death and also that no one knew about it until i was fully dead.  None of this waiting around for news and praying crap.  nou's dead?  Oh well.  Let's move on.

That plan does have it's loopholes though.  There's no guarantee of death and being left alive and in some state of impairment is a gruesome thought.  The options would either be to do it at home and, unless the plan was unrealistically elaborate, to be found by a family member or, as Master pointed out, to do it elsewhere and have a family member have to come identify my body.  Either way, that's a REALLY crappy thing to put on them.

Master wanted me to write about how i think others would feel if i killed myself.  At first i guess they'd be surprised, some more than others.  They'd probably go through all the usual cliches of my being so young and having so much to live for and all that other bullshit.  As i had with nailah, they would probably feel responsible and guilty even though they would NOT be.  i would at least leave a note telling them they were not and that there was nothing they could have done and that they were the reason i stuck it out for as long as i did.  Who knows?  Maybe some of them would be jealous just as i was.

But time would pass and, for them, life would go on.  Master once said that the reason He said what He did after He first whipped me with the slave whip was so i would realize i was expendable.  His words didn't bother me because they catapulted me into this new realization.  i know damn well every second of every day that i am expendable and i've known it all my life.  It was the fact that Master knew it which upset me so much.  If He knows then He can release me.  If He knows, then others know.  It made my downfall feel all the more imminent.

i think that's also what made losing first girl status so hard to take.  It took away my niche.  It made whatever purpose i may serve... or at least appear to serve... all the more elusive.  It made me all the more expendable and blatantly so.  At other times, aside from when i was new, i always had some sort of foothold.  Well, i thought i did anyhow.  When amina was first and i was second, she was never there and i was needed.  When kimmy was kennel mistress and i was first, we each had our jurisdiction of sorts.  

No matter how the roles played out, mine always seemed to matter enough to make it more perspicacious for Master to keep me than not.  It's not that i thought He couldn't or wouldn't uncollar me with good reason but i invariably thought He would need substantial cause to do it.  That feeling has changed with me as second again.

i shouldn't even say again.  In effect, i was never second before.  When i was second to amina she literally was never there at all.  Without a first, i really wasn't in the role of second.  Now i am for the first time.  It's actually a better fit in most ways, despite Master's prediction to the contrary.  i never felt worthy of respect as first and never demanded it be given to me except by the noobs who were obnoxious idiots.  With v as first, i make sure everyone shows her appropriate respect.  i'm comfortable deferring to her and i love and trust her.  she doesn't have a fraction of my moodiness.  And she is proving to be a strong first which i never doubted she could be.  

The only downfall of that from my point of view, and it's selfish to view it as one, is that it makes me feel not only expendable but absolutely useless and somewhat superfluous.  There was a time when the functioning of the sims would have had to adjust quite a bit if i had suddenly vanished or, to keep to the topic, died.  Master probably would have had to adjust as well.  

That is not so now.  v is totally capable and doing a great job.  If i killed myself, others would go through all the standard phases of response but then everyone's lives could go on without any substantive changes.  Both the sims and Master Himself would be fine.  How would everyone feel?  i don't know.  There are things about me they might miss and things they'd likely be glad to be rid of.  Someone else would come along with different qualities and everything would find a new balance.  Life for those remaining would carry on just fine.

i'm not suicidal right now and i don't know that i could bring myself to kill myself.  i do realize that doing so would cause pain to the people i would least want to hurt.  i'm sure that's what Master wanted me to get at.  But i'm also realistic enough to know that, except for my mother, they would go on leading essentially unchanged lives.  i don't know that i ever mattered enough for that not to be so but i certainly don't now.

The Missing Assignment

i still don't want to write this which probably means i really need to.  It usually works that way.  i hadn't realized how much i had wanted to dodge this assignment.  That is further proof that Master knows what i need better than i do.  What i want and what i need are two entirely different things.  Master can tell which is which far better than i can.

Okay...

Other than all the usual things that have me perpetually upset, which may be encapsulated as feeling trapped in a life i hate, i was upset about an incident with my son.  He was angry that, in his opinion, there was nothing to eat for dinner and, still more so, that i refused to give him money for take-out.  That there were tons of dinner options was irrelevant.  That our budget is especially tight with the new mortgage payments on the house was of equally little interest to him.  

When s was small, he experienced deprivation in Ethiopia.  He came to us as a hoarder.  His tiny backpack, sent by us to him in Africa, was his only possession.  He arrived with it stuffed with everything he had been able to get his hands on in his travels to America.  It was packed with a variety or airline items, everything from magazines to a somehow purloined single shot sized bottle of vodka.  It contained hotel items from his journey including toilet paper.  

For weeks after he arrived, scared and skinny and without a word of English, he took that backpack and all he could fit in it everywhere he went.  If we left the house, that bag went with him stuffed with whatever he valued most at that moment.  He slept beside it.  It was his link to never again being without.  

He had learned in the children's center just how survival of the fittest works.  Those who were bigger and stronger took what they wanted from the little ones.  At six, he was one of the little ones still.  His first full day in America, we went to the park.  He marched up to a toddler, yanked a lollypop from the toddler's hand, and popped it into his own mouth entirely unaware he had done anything wrong.  He was simply behaving in the only way he knew, using the skills to survive that he had honed back in Africa.

For years and even still today at times, he has hoarded food.  At first we would find any food items at all in and under his bed, stolen and hidden in case he was ever left orphaned and starving again.  Over time, he became more selective in what he hoarded but the underlying emotion was always the same.  Now fifteen and with more of his life spent here in the United States than in his home country, some part of him still can not believe that food truly will be available to him always.

The rational and empathetic part of me knows all these things and aches for what s endured.  i love him and wish i could heal him.  i wish even more that i could have spared him the many traumas he endured, deprivation being only one of them.  i despise myself to the core for overestimating myself and my own abilities to cope.  

i am a horrible parent, one that doesn't deserve children and should never have adopted them.  My intentions were good.  i never set out to hurt them.  But i have.  And i hate myself for it daily.  i took two children who had been traumatized and added to their trauma.  In my inability to parent, i victimized them all over again.  The inward directed anger i feel settles here.  There's a place for me in hell that awaits, a place for those who mean well but act out evil.  After all, Hitler believed he was helping too.

It is with that background that i move forward in explaining my anger on the night Master wanted me to write about.  S was angry and his slightest irritation terrifies and, yes, infuriates me.  In his nine years in the Unites States, he has destroyed any semblance of sanity i had and any possible normalcy in my life.  i have spent so many hours, sometimes days on end, planning my own demise and, though fleetingly, envisioning his as well.  Evil.

i can't rationalize my adult experiences in comparison to those of a child, orphaned in a third world country, one who watched his father gunned down in cold blood in the streets, one who hid with his little brother under a bed in fear for his own life, one who was abandoned by other relatives and believes it was because he was bad, one who suffered atrocities that i am only now coming to know and many that i will likely never know.  What he experienced is beyond my imaginings.  His suffering as a small boy, while i understand it intellectually, will embed itself in my soul as it has in his.  i can hurt for him, and i do, but i can never fully comprehend the magnitude of his wounds.

So it is with great guilt that i go about describing my own wounds, seemingly inconsequential pittances next to his.  Since s has been my son, he has stripped a lamp of its shade and burned me with the bare light bulb.  He has lunged at my husband behind the wheel of our car and run us off the road, grabbing the wheel and gaining temporary control of the vehicle.  He has held a knife in his hand and threatened to kill me in my sleep.  He has hit and punched and kicked and bitten me.  One of his punches to j, ruptured j's eardrum.  He has grown from tiny and easily restrained to far larger and stronger than i am.  He has hurt people and destroyed property.

Today, when s gets angry, i don't think about that terrified little boy hiding his little brother under a bed, hungry and confused.  My own body reacts with automaticity.  My muscles tense and the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end.  i tremble and play out scenarios in my head, sure that this will be the time it escalates too quickly for help to arrive, that this will be the day i die at his hands.  i grab a phone in my shaking hand, sometimes dialing the nine and the first one and waiting, just waiting for ample cause to finish the emergency call.

i hide in my room, not even a room for it has no actual walls or door.  i don't leave because leaving would mean crossing his path and i don't dare risk it.  i may need to use the bathroom.  i don't.  i may be hungry.  i stay where i am.  i just wait for the storm to pass or to escalate, wondering if this will be the final one, the one that kills me.

And no one understands this.  j says afterward that s stayed in physical control, shouting and cursing but doing little more than that.  This time.  It makes no difference to me any longer.  Any time s gets angry ---ANY time--- i am absolutely petrified of what route his anger will take and what will happen before it either subsides or he is again dragged off me, handcuffed, and taken to the hospital.  What state will i be in if he does get his hands on me again, now stronger than the last time?  Instead of just bruises, will i have broken bones?  Will i even be alive?

But no one wants to hear that i can't live with s.  They tell me how well he is doing.  How can we have him removed from the house for getting angry.  Everyone gets angry, don't they?  And they do.  i know this.  It's normal.  Yet very little about s or my learned response to him is normal.  

i made a promise to be his mother, to care for him, to love him unconditionally and always... i broke it.  i can't do any more.  i resent that he has taken nearly a decade of my life.  i hate him as much as i love him and sometimes more.  i fail to see that tiny traumatized child and see only the monstrous side of him.  And i hate myself for being able to do not better.

THAT is why i was angry the other night.

Why i was angry...

Master told me to write in this about why i was angry the other night but i didn't.  i tried a few times and just couldn't get anything into words that made any sense.  So i deleted what i wrote and never made the blog entry.  What was worse is that i never even gave it another thought.  i disobeyed Master without even feeling guilty or worried about His response.  i guess i just took it upon myself to decide that my efforts were good enough but that wasn't my decision to make.  

The fact that i was so totally surprised by Master's confronting me about it made it all the more upsetting.  i was actually in tears which usually only happens when He is angry.  He wasn't really angry as much as just correcting my error and teaching me.  But i still got mad and filtered through the usual range of emotions i experience when that happens.  

my first is to be mad at Master.  i guess that His being the one to call me to task is enough to direct my anger toward Him.  This has changed over time though.  i used to be very mad at Him and even become adversarial.  i would argue and blame Him and it took a while for me to calm down.  Even after i was calm, respectful, and compliant again i would sometimes still think He was wrong.  

The idea that He is right simply by virtue of being my Master was so foreign to me.  i knew the concept intellectually but definitely hadn't even begun to internalize it.  Being socialized that things should be fair always played against my ideas of slavery long after such an incident.  That i have only those considerations which Master chooses to give me is a hard concept to fully submit to.

Still, i can see movement on my part in the right direction.  my anger at Master is a fleeting thought and one i have grown accustomed to readily dismissing without bothering to think it through.  i know it's unjustified and i don't allow it of myself.  It doesn't linger or keep resurfacing in my mind.  

The next victim of my upset is inevitably myself though how that plays out has also changed over time.  i used to get so down on myself that i thought every mistake i made, once i actually let myself take responsibility for them, meant i should not be kajira.  i would get so black and white about it as i tend to do with everything.  i felt as if a mistake meant i was a failure and should just give up and leave.  i would conclude that i was more of a burden than an asset and couldn't stand the idea of being such.

Again, i can see forward movement in my responses today.  i still get very mad at myself and run through all those things in my mind... failure, burden, run run run!  But, as with my anger toward Master, the most extreme thoughts are fleeting today.  i dismiss them without giving them credence and without voicing them.  It's not that i am denying my feelings or repressing them.  i just know that they are not worthy of sharing.  i understand them now as i didn't before and sharing them today would just be acting the martyr in a play for attention.  i don't allow that of myself.

The other difference today is that i can wait out the discomfort a bit better.  i don't get as frenzied as easily and don't need to do something ---anything--- to make it stop.  i don't feel as strong a need to either lash out or strike inward.  i feel more secure in knowing i will be okay eventually.  

i guess this blog entry turned out not to be about why i was angry the other day but i think it was worth the writing.  i hope Master agrees.  He is not on to ask so i will allow myself a MUCH needed nap and then do the blog entry that Master originally ordered.

Mood

Paper won't harbor my feelings tonight.

Ink won't convey what my heart yearns to write.

This blog won't shelter emotions that rage.

i ache from within yet blank is my page.

Slave Creed

He is Master; i am slave.

He is owner; i am owned.

He commands; i obey.

He is to be pleased; i am to please.

Why is this?

Because He is Master; i am slave.

i live for my Master.  His word is law.

i am for His pleasure always.

i am slave.

i am but to obey.

Master said to break it down line by line but it really doesn't lend itself well to that because its beauty is in the fact that it is so straightforward and simple.  But Master said to do it and when He commands, i obey.  Um...

He is Master; i am slave.

Well DUH!  What can be added to that?  

I went to the dictionary for input.  The noun form of Master has several definitions including:

-one that conquers or masters

-one having control

-an owner, especially of a slave or animal

The definition about one having control and the one about the owner both fit in blatant ways but it is the first one which most speaks to me.  A Master always has control.  A Master is always the owner.  But He does NOT always conquer.  Often there is no need.  Some people are slave and they always know it.  They may have meek or subservient personalities that just lend themselves well to the lifestyle.  

In my case there was a need to conquer, something i think has only begun to truly happen, and i think that's why i gravitate toward the first definition.  Master is conquering me in little ways all the time, little ways that are quickly adding up to transform me into someone more submissive than i can believe.  Before Master, i was totally untamed and seemingly untamable in many respects. The idea of Gor and slavery had some appeal but only as small doses of fantasy.  The fact that i am being conquered in real ways makes the distinction all the more pronounced.  In that vain, He is truly Master and i truly am slave.

The dictionary defines slave, in its noun form as:

-a person in servitude as the chattel of another

-one that is completely subservient to a dominating influence

Well, the obvious response is to point out that Gorean slaves are not people but rightless animals.  i do like the term chattel though.  Master never calls us chattel, i don't think.  Hmmm.  

As to the second definition, i definitely do not meet the standard of complete subservience. Increasing subservience, certainly, but far from complete.  i used to think that made me either a bad slave or a poor choice as kajira.  It just makes me at a certain point on a path though.  It's more a matter of what i aspire to and the effort i make than having reached perfection, an impossibility anyhow.  It took a long time before i understood that and there are still times when i need to be reminded of it.  

Besides, i take exception to this definition.  There have been slaves throughout world history who rebelled.  i hardly think they were not slaves despite their failing to be entirely subservient.  LOL, i'll even argue with a dictionary!  Thank God complete subservience is not required from the start.

He is owner; i am owned.

This makes the clear distinction that i am property and therefore, to my thinking, less than human.  It also establishes that i am Master's as opposed to some stray wandering around aimlessly.  Without Master as my owner, being slave would be an impossibility for me and, at best, tedious and without meaning.  i cannot imagine wearing the collar of another.  i think that's why i was not in the lifestyle sooner.  The right Master hadn't yet found me.  Or was it i who found Him?  Not just any man can be Master and i was never willing to do more than dabble in play with those who are anything less.  Master is the real thing and deserving of the label "owner".

He commands; i obey.

Okay, this has been a challenging one for me but i feel as if i have made real strides lately.  The slave creed doesn't say anything about exceptions and while the complete subservience referred to above might be an attitudinal impossibility, obeying absolutely is not a physical one.  Master does not command me to do that which i cannot.  That leaves it as a matter of choice whether i obey.  More and more i have been obedient.  It has not been a matter of doing so to avoid punishment or even doing it for the right reasons but having to force and fight myself.  Being obedient has just gotten to be what feels right.  It is FINALLY more comfortable to obey Master than to resist or defy Him.  This is not to say that my comfort is a consideration because it obviously should not be.  It's just so much nicer not to feel as if i'm always swimming upstream against the current.

He is to be pleased; i am to please.

This speaks again to the fact that my comfort is irrelevant.  i am tired right now, don't especially like this topic for writing, and want to abandon the blog to go to bed.  But Master wishes me to write this.  i do it not simply to obey but because, in giving Him obedience, i please Him.  i am not simply here to carry out actions but to provide an emotional component, that of pleasure.  

The truth of it is that in pleasing Master, i find pleasure myself.  In fulfilling all the parts of the slave creed, i not only please Master but i find a deep and otherwise elusive contentment.  i learn about myself and better understand who i am and why.  i become who i am supposed to be and live a life of honesty instead of hiding.  In displeasing Master, i find misery.  

The creed is not just an arbitrary depictions of how things SHOULD be but an outline of what WORKS.  It is the map to success for both Masters and slaves.  Though i write this as the slave i am, it occurs to me that it is as important for Masters to know the creed as it is slaves.  Master wanted me to include why every kajira should learn the creed.  Well i'll be so bold as to say every Master should too.  Neither can fulfill His/her role without the other.  A Master who fails to own and command cannot maintain a slave who behaves as obedient property.  The roles complement one another and are interdependent.

Why is this?

Because He is Master; i am slave.

i think that in its simplicity this simply illustrates that it is not to be questioned, perhaps not even analyzed as i am doing in this blog entry.  It is the way of things.  The roles are what they are.  They have no need for so much scrutiny and over-interpretation that they become biased and tainted by either personal or societal factors.  He is Master.  That's it.  i am slave.  There need be no more reason than that.

i live for my Master; His word is law.

This rings true more and more for me lately, not just in action but in my thinking.  Master is never far from my thoughts, waking or sleeping.  i am consumed with wanting to be with Him, even if silently and without interaction.  His commands seldom leave me rankled any longer, obeying only after fighting down the urge to argue or refuse.  They are law.  When He says something, i usually respond now without first running it through my own filter of opinions and tastes.  That is because i see Him foremost.  He is my reason.

i am for His pleasure always.

Okay, this is getting redundant here and i am getting even more tired.  i discussed the idea of pleasure already though this line specifies "always"... That means even when what brings Master pleasure is something i DO need to fight down the urge to argue or refuse... It means that when my opinions and tastes rebelliously surface, they are irrelevant.  Just as obedience must be absolute, my goal of His pleasure must be as well.

i am slave.

Okay, i got that.  slave.  i'm it.  Not much more i can say on that front just now.

i am but to obey.

i'm pretty sure i covered this as well.  Maybe it's a little reminder on the end for forgetful kajirae like i can be.  The fact that it ends with this line, the black and white of the period at the end of the line, give it a finality which i often need.  Left to my own devices, i would probably add on exceptions...

i am but to obey EXCEPT when:

-i don't like the command

-i don't feel like it

-it's too much trouble

-Master won't find out anyhow

The slave creed ends with none of these exceptions, however.  i guess that is intended to drive the point home so that it does not need to be done with a whip.  Recalling this will serve me well so that i may serve Master well.

Anger

Master told me to write about why i was so angry yesterday,  i think there were probably a lot of underlying emotions that surfaced as anger.  Fear and stress and guilt are the first three which spring to mind.  The day had a clear progression so describing it chronologically lends itself to the most insightful revelations, i would think.  

At about 11:00 am, i asked j if he wanted to go out to lunch, just the two of us.  i hadn't eaten anything yet, was getting hungry, and was already majorly stressed over Master's order to report back to Him everything i ate and at what time.  j, after making it into a whole big production whether to go and where to go, said yes.  His inability to ever just make a decision gets on my nerves and yesterday was no exception.

Seeing j and i were going to be leaving, the boys decided they wanted us to drop them places on our way.  Of course neither of them knew where they wanted to go and had to make phone calls and arrange things.  j's patience with this is endless.  Mine is not.  So we spent about an hour with the boys making plans and all three of them doing things around the house that j suddenly decided needed to happen before we left.  Having to wait with no definite time frame in mind and for things that are totally irrelevant to our departure infuriates me.  Being hungry, unmedicated, and stressed didn't help any.

Finally we left and s was being obnoxious as usual.  Any time the four of us are in a car together, it is all but guaranteed that there will be problems.  Usually i refuse to go in the car with everyone or blast my ipod through earbuds to drown out all else.  my ipod wasn't charged, though, so i wound up in the car dealing with our foursome.  It drives me nuts.  The boys are whiny and demanding and ornery.  j is indecisive and overly lenient and i just can't handle how much he tolerates from the boys... from me either, for that matter.

After two stops and meeting my friend's son unexpectedly and a bunch of other nonsense, we finally dropped s off at the skate park and were going to drop e off at his friend's which is the total opposite direction from where j wanted to eat.  i realized i had forgotten to bring my medication and it wasn't even set up in the daily containers so i would have to take still more time to sort through the bottles and prepare it.  

i was frazzled at this point already and had a headache.  The thought of riding all over the place, with j's crappy driving and me getting lightheaded, was beyond me.  It was a recipe for getting carsick.  Plus, i was already cranky and bitchy for all of the above reasons and having gotten almost no sleep.  i just told j to drop me at home and refused to get lunch.  

i went inside and started setting up the pill containers, a chore i HATE.  i had planned on blogging about how much everybody was pissing me off but i realized no one had really done anything.  my teenagers were being teenagers, nothing more.  The chores j wanted done before leaving needed doing because i never do them.  And the medication being unprepared and left at home was entirely my own fault.  Not being justified in complaining about everyone else just pissed me off further.

Then i found Master's message about the kennel.  My first thought was relief.  Master had taken the struggle off of me and just made a decision.  i was glad that He would and could do that and felt a bit of the security i always feel when i am reminded that He is in control.  That soon was replaced with renewed anger though.  Anger at myself for fucking up.  Anger at Master for letting me and for punishing me.  Just anger at things not going the way i wanted them to.

i finally finished setting up the pills and got into nadu.  i was totally annoyed at having to nadu but, when j got home just seconds later, i was totally annoyed at not being able to.  It was one of those no win moods i get into.  Absolutely nothing is going to do anything but irritate me.  i want what i can't have, hate what i do have, and feel that way no matter what changes.

So i finished the blog, having taken no medication and had nothing to eat, and went to sleep.  i slept on and off waking intermittently to hallucinate in bed.  It was pleasant and i wasn't really in a state of mind to feel concerned.  In retrospect, it was probably due to medication withdrawal and low blood sugar.  But at the time it felt nice and i just kept dozing off again each time i awoke.

Eventually, i was awakened by s on my bed screaming that the friend of a boy in his and e's circle of friends was going to press assault charges against him.  It took me a moment to gain full alertness and realize that j was outside talking to the boy's father who was in a mini-van with a bunch if the kids involved in the day's incident.  That left me needing to keep s as calm as i could and indoors.

j came back inside and, as best he can tell, some boys again whom s has been an aggressor in the past, have teamed up to get him in trouble now.  They are brighter than he is and the fact that every local police officer knows s' violent psychiatric history makes him look guilty from the start.  That leaves us wondering how to protect s from getting jumped if he goes out and from getting intentionally provoked into violence or accused of it anyhow.  It's impossible to keep him locked up at home 24/7.

Totally stressed about what this group of kids was going to do to s, what they might do to my car or the house, dealing with e who always sides with the other kids and would fight s on it every second he could, and dealing with s being at home more often?  i felt ready to explode!  i wasn't even thinking about not eating or medicating at that point.  And waking up to find myself in the middle of a conflict always leaves me 

 i'd been texting back and forth all day with a friend from work and her next text invited me to drive out to her sister's where she was going for dinner.  i'm so reclusive but i was really feeling desperate and really wanted to talk to her.  i actually agreed to go and she told me to hurry because the beginnings of dinner were already getting started.  It was almost 7:00 pm by then.

i considered for a second that i should tell Master.  But i fought it.  i didn't want to tell Him in that moment, didn't want to be answerable to Him.  And a part of me wanted to punish Him, to make Him worry about me, to test Him to see if THIS would be the incident that put Him over the edge and finally provoked Him to kick me to the curb.  i used to have a habit of testing the  people i let get close until i finally succeeded in pushing them away.  i hadn't realize that tendency was rearing its ugly head again.  But i knew i was doing wrong.

i drove out to my friend's sister's house and had some soup there at about 8:00 pm.  i have no idea what kind of soup it was but it was homemade and very good.  It was the first thing i ate all day.  i had brought my medication but didn't want to take it because my friend and i had decided that we would leave her sister's house and get a bottle afterward.  i didn't want to mix the pills with alcohol.  i really needed to talk to her and didn't think i'd be able to sober.  

we left her sisters's and went back to her apartment and then went out to but some Absolut.  We also arranged for her son to get us some weed.  The liquor stores were closed and she didn't want to go to a bar so we went to 7-11 to see what we could get there.  When we were outside 7-11, her boyfriend who is enormous and totally abusive called her on the phone again.  He calls constantly and never believes she is where she says she is or with whom.  He stalks her.

He flew into the 7-11 parking lot and nearly knocked me on my ass, jumping back to avoid his mini-van as it swung into the handicapped parking spot i was standing in.  He started screaming at my friend and i started screaming at him, urging him to go after me so i could press charges.  i had him absolutely enraged but he wasn't dumb enough to voice a concrete enough threat or raise a hand to me despite my provocation.  He wouldn't leave.

my friend wanted to go to a bar for drinks so we could stay out in public and calm him down so we went to a bar and began drinking there.  i think i had a total of two shots of Absolut and maybe three strong Absolut and 7-Up drinks there.  Having eaten almost nothing except the soup and some potato chips outside 7-11, and having not drank in years, i was strongly buzzed.  i wasn't fall-down black-out drunk but i was in a pleasant state.  

It turned out one of our coworkers was also at the bar so she joined up with us and we got some kind of fried appetizer sampler platter until the friend we met there was basically unable to stand.  we took her back to her fiance's apartment, once we figured out where it was since she couldn't remember, and then went back to my friend's apartment with her idiot boyfriend still following us.  

my friend got him to leave for a little while so she and i could talk.  She rolled joint and we smoked and i actually managed to tell her about the major details of what is going on.  i told her about my plans and Gor and Master and v and a few other details.  i knew she'd be skeptical but i also knew she'd try not to judge.  i know some serious things about her and she knows i'd never judge her either.  

Eventually she made what i think is an excellent analogy.  She said that my life, as i was describing it to her, sounded like a gay person who marries someone of the opposite gender in an attempt to live a mainstream life even though it is never going to make them happy, and eventually leaves to be with a partner of the same gender.  i thought that was a really good comparison.  she is still skeptical but i also know she "got it" and that i can talk to her about it in the future.  That is a big relief, to at least have someone i can speak to about this in person.

Her idiot boyfriend came back but by then it was after 3:00 am and we were all tired and mellow.  i took my medication and my friend gave me an Ambien so i would get a bit more buzzed and hopefully sleep for a change.  It worked.  i had an interesting chat with a lamp and eventually dozed off for a while.  The three of us talked for a little while in the morning and then i headed home.  

i had been thinking about Master all through the night, what He would think, if He was wondering about me, if i would be in trouble.  When i signed on, i was surprised to see Him.  The 3:30 am yahoo messages about Him being worried made me feel bad and amazingly immature.  It would have taken a few seconds to let Him know of my plans and prevent His worry.  Not doing so was selfish, not service.  What i said about not being able to contact Him during the night was true but before i left i could have and should have.  

Part of the reason i was annoyed with Him was about the kennel, just one more offshoot of not being first girl.  i wanted it back, felt like i deserved it back, was mad He continued to deny it to me.  i still have that attitude, despite all this effort, that it SHOULD be mine.  The first thing that actually made me realize it shouldn't be, that it might be gone for good and rightly so, was Master's asking me to look after v before he signed off sl today.  That is something He might have said to His first girl but, instead of being enthused by the thought He might be viewing me that way again at some level, it only made me feel horrible.  

i knowingly took off without word leaving Him to worry.  i knew that wasn't the act of a first girl when i did it and i did it anyway.  v deserves the title and the kennel and everything else.  If Master gives her the chance, i know she can step up to it as i haven't.  i'm done focusing on what i thought should have been mine and feeling as if i can't settle down until i get it back.  Despite all my screw-ups, i AM learning and moving forward in ways.  If i'm in Master's collar in ANY capacity, that is enough.  It is a gift i will not take for granted.