Blog

journal entries

further workshop revelations

Posted on by Sinclair Sexsmith

I brought my butchness to this workshop in a way I never have before. On Saturday, I wore a button-down and tie in the morning. It has never even occured to me in the past to wear a tie (in fact, in one of the workshops, five years ago now, I felt inspired to bring my only pair of high-heel shoes for one of the rituals, although I never wore them) but this time it did, and it was lovely. I got a few compliments and I felt like myself, not like dressing up.The thing is, this workshop is very goddess-yoni-vulva-womyn. In a wonderful way, really; the rituals and energy ground me in my body, often purge some major things I’ve been holding onto. Hard to describe. But it has meant that it’s hard to bring the butch/masculine energy into that space for me sometimes, because it doesn’t exactly fit in. It stands out, sometimes dramatically. I also think it might put off some of the participants who are very suspicious of masculine energy, and who need the circle to be an especially safe space, which, for many women, means completely free of that masculine energy.

There were a few differences in recent years – I am different, of course, my butch identity has grown and solidified over the past year in a very new way. Also, the instructor is genderqueer – she even referred to herself as trans-gender, at some point, not in a ‘transitioning from one to the other’ kind of way but in a ‘occupying both, transferring between genders’ kind of way. She made me feel particularly empowered to bring the butchness.

What is also interesting about that is the ways that some attendees seem suspicious of me – likely because of my butchness – but by the end of the weekend treat me a little differently, since they’ve seen me warm & open.

I packed on Sunday. I’d brought my (pink bendy) cock & harness for the altar, but during a morning meditation I had some revelations about the ways that I identify with my genitals outside my body, and the ways that that means for me that I have worked really hard to take a good look at what’s going on for me “down there,” my history and relationship and connectiont to my cunt. It’s also about how cock-centric I – and my sex life – currently is, and after that revelation, I really wanted it on. I took it from the altar during lunch and didn’t take it off the rest of the day, wore it under boxers.

It wasn’t obvious, I don’t think – the few people I revealed it to were surprised – and I felt a little embarrassed or even guilty about wanting to wear it. As though I should be complete without it. As though I shouldn’t want and need this extra thing that is me but isn’t me, that is more me than anything else but is not a part of me, that comes to life when I am and it is touched, but has no nerve endings, no real sensation. Wanting it so badly is also a recognition of that which I do not have, of my defiency, and when my cock is acknowledged as me and touched as part of me, I am seen as whole, and I am recognized as having that cock, in all its reality – as a separate-but-connected extraneous and integral piece of me.

If I summed up this workshop in two words, they would be cock and heart.

Aside from the revelations on butchness and my cock-identification, I was consistently reminded of how closed down my heart is (was?). One of my intentions for the workshop was to connect my cunt and my head, which are working quite well, really, via my heart, which is not working so well.

My heart feels like a nest of needles. Tied tight with thick scratchy ropes like a boat moored. (What is tied to it? Can I let that drift out to sea?) Tethered like a hot-air balloon held to earth when it’s impulse is to float and lift.

Another intention was the small mantra, “I already have my wings,” which spoke to not only the ways that I needed to remind myself to open my chest, open my chest, open my chest, but also the idea that I am already complete, that I don’t have to look outside myself (Callie) for answers and validation.

My heart is not healed yet. That’s okay. I kept making the gesture when talking about the workshop of my hands over my chest, peeling back my ribcage – and that feels lovely, vulnerable, tender. I’m sore, yes – but keeping my heart wrapped up tight like this is a bit suffocating, and just makes the soreness worse.

There’s more, there’s so much more about this workshop. But this is a start.

journal entries

workshop revelations

Posted on by Sinclair Sexsmith

The workshop this weekend was phenomenal, as this workshop always is. This is my seventh time at a workshop through this same school, my third time as an assistant. It’s different every time, though the structure is very similar, mostly because I’m different I suppose – it brings up and heals and expells and calms different things in me depending on what is happening in my life.I had a lot of revelations this weekend. It’s different to be back in the “real” world now.

Let’s start with Friday.

I realized how little I breathe, and how much I’d like to do some serious study of breath on my own, not just in workshop. We did some tantric breathing, including a “pelvic lock” which seriously rocked my world, and after being blown away I swore to myself I’d look for some lesbian tantric resources. I also very much remember thinking the same thing last year, as I went to this same workshop almost exactly a year ago, and I started wondering why it was that I didn’t follow through on that.

Which is when a list of things fell into place. (I’ll give a little recap.) I split with my girlfriend of four years over the summer, in July, after I met Callie and went on a date with her. I have often described Callie as a “defribrulator for my heart,” as she jolted me awake in a huge new way – I hadn’t even realized how numb and hiding I was in my relationship with my girlfriend (at the time, often referred to as “the girlfriend” or “the ex-girlfriend” in the archives). Callie made me feel desire, lust – made me feel interesting, fascinating. I fell in love with her that first date. But, I had a girlfriend, and Callie found out, and refused to date me until I figured it out, said she wouldn’t wait for me, etc. Which, you know, makes sense. I spent the next three months getting my life in order – leaving my girlfriend, moving into my own apartment, fucking around – mostly so I wouldn’t be completely lost in my lust for Callie if/when we started dating.

And then, in October, on a Wednesday, I put up a person ad – the same one she had put up, to which I had responded, only in reverse – and then sent her flowers on a Friday. She called, almost immediately.

And that was the weekend of the workshop last year – so I couldn’t meet her that weekend. We had lunch on Monday, the day after the workshop.

I barely remember anything about the workshop last year. I remember lunch at the South Street Seaport, talking about Callie. I remember having a hard time focusing, because I really just wanted to be with Callie. I spent three months dreaming and preparing and wishing Callie back into my life, and there she was, ready for me, too – so I skated through the workshop and probably even used it to fall deeper in love with her. On my own, without her even there, without knowing her.

Dangerous, dangerous.

So, on Friday, I was remembering the feeling of wanting to study breathwork and tantra last year, and wondered where that energy and inspiration went, then realizing it was all focused into that relationship. Sex always worked with Callie (see: all of October to May, explorations from desire and role play and force, to lingerie and topping and ten times in twenty-four hours) and I always assumed that because it worked so well, better than I’d ever had in my life! Which was a combination of Callie being a femme bottom (finally, finally) and coming out of a sexless four-year relationship with a girl who didn’t really like sex, among other things. Because things worked so well between us, sexually, I quickly took that to a spiritual level – of course I did, coming out of this workshop the day before our relationship began! – and thought that that meant something much, much more than it did.

It didn’t mean that much. It wasn’t a spiritual connection, it wasn’t a “meeting of the souls.” Or, I don’t know, maybe it was a little bit, but that doesn’t mean that she wasn’t also unstable, seductive, and manipulative.

I’ve said this about Callie before, too, but it rings particularly true: she is beautiful for the same reason that puppies and babies are adorible – because if they aren’t, you would murder them for their horrible, life-shattering annoyances.

So. That was Friday, and throughout-the-weekend revelations about Callie. Things I took away: I want to make a serious study of some tantra and breathwork; and I feel like this relationship with Callie is further coming into focus.

(Saturday & Sunday revelations to come.)

miscellany

fisting in time out

Posted on by Sinclair Sexsmith

Sinclair Sexsmith – ahem, that would be me – has been quoted in this week’s Time Out New York magazine (thanks to Viviane) about fisting.It’s under the Pick-a-fetish megachart, the penultimate of the list, almost at the end.

Not a bad quote, entirely:

“Go slow, slow, slow and use lots of lube,” says Sinclair Sexsmith, a Bed-Stuy-based sex blogger and femme fister with seven years’ experience. “It’s gonna be messy. Just put a towel down and get over it.”

It’s kinda hard to give someone beginning fisting advice without getting too much into the down-and-dirty. It’s so hard to be quoted, I would’ve chosen other things to highlight. And while I did say water-based lube is often slicker, in my opinion, it implies that the lube should be thin rather than gel-like, which is backward: I find the gel-like lube often stays wetter longer, though I do like how I can kinda pour the liquidy lube into my cupped hand and get things all nice & slick without pulling my hand out entirely. That’s helpful.

miscellany

PSA on being GGG

Posted on by Sinclair Sexsmith
Alright, folks, let’s have a little chat, shall we?

It has come to my attention through a series of conversations with friends and lovers recently that, very often, we are not getting what we want in bed – but not for lack of trying. Many people I’ve talked to lately are saying that they are explicitly asking for what it is they want in bed, sometimes in the heat of the moment, sometimes beforehand, and their lovers aren’t doing it.

And, I mean, their lovers aren’t doing it out of lack of interest, or lack of being GGG (as far as I know). They are simply being non-responsive.

I have a motto for those of you who are this type of lover. Memorize it. Repeat it to yourself. Live it: you don’t have to tell me twice.

Come on! If a lover is bold enough to ask for something, which is no small feat – it takes guts! courage! lots of practice! to be able to ask for something that you want in bed. If they are bold enough to ask for it, you better well do it (unless you have an actual objection to the act).

When the Southern Belle said “harder, fuck me harder,” do you think I paused, thought about it, considered it? Uh, no. When Callie said “pull my hair,” did I decide to do it another day, later? No. And I’m not trying to say this to further prove that I am good in bed, all I’m saying is, it is a good thing when a lover requests you to do something. It means they’re comfortable enough with you to empower you to do more of what they like, which will make them all the more grateful to your fabulous skills.

So, people, repeat after me: you don’t have to tell me twice.

Seriously.

This has been a public service announcement for better sex. You will now be returned to your regularly scheduled Sugarbutch Chronicles.

miscellany

sugasm 97

Posted on by Sinclair Sexsmith

The best of this week’s blogs by the bloggers who blog them. Highlighting the top 3 posts as chosen by Sugasm participants. Want in Sugasm #98? Submit a link to your best post of the week using this form. Participants, repost the link list within a week and you’re all set.

This Week’s Picks
The Manifesto of the Cuntcentric Hedonist “I’m not being selfish, I’m being altruistic when I open my legs and offer my body up.”

No reservations, part 4 “By this time, said balls felt twice their normal size and very full.”

Sex Work And Religion: The Violent Priest “We were to seduce one of the young ladies in the church’s choir.”

Mr. Sugasm Himself JBS Underwear
Editor’s Choice The Top 10 Reasons to avoid “Pregnancy & Sex” bulletin boards

More Sugasm Join the Sugasm See also: Fleshbot’s Sex Blog Roundup each Tuesday and Friday.

See the rest of the posts in Sugasm 97 …

reviews

review: the Crash Pad DVD

Posted on by Sinclair Sexsmith

The Crash Pad
2005, Directed by Shiner Louise HoustonThis is, hands-down, my favorite dyke porn film that I have ever seen. And while I don’t tend to talk a lot about watching porn, I actually do, fairly often in fact. There is a lot of bad lesbian porn out there, most of which I would lump into the category of “porn made for straight men” rather than porn made by dykes for dykes.

This is definitely in the latter category.

The plot (hah) of The Crash Pad is set in an apartment in San Francisco, to which if you have the key, you can go there and have wild, fabulous sex. Many of the scenes feature real-life couples and their chemistry is through-the-roof gorgeous. I am particularly fond of the opening scene, where a couple is fucking and doesn’t answer the phone, which is a check to see whether or not the Crash Pad is occupied. Another couple enters, and a threesome ensues, complete with fabulous fucking.

Also incredibly noteworthy is the butch-femme couple scene, where the femme actually cries out “oh I love you! I love you!” in ecstacy. So sexy! And, later, a boi-boi scene where there is some wrestling, ejaculation, and batman socks, which seems to be a favorite among my friends.

Some have criticised this video because the sex is too “heterosexually reproductive” – meaning, there are a lot of strap-ons in this one. If that’s not your thing, it may not be for you. But considering you’re reading Sugarbutch, I suspect you might actually like that kind of thing.

Watch the trailer here, order it from (the distributor) Blowfish or (my personal favorite dyke-owned & operated, sex & gender positive sex toy store) Babeland.

identity politics

More on Butch Identity, Mine

Posted on by Sinclair Sexsmith

An old friend of mine sent me an email recently, and said I could post it & my responses.

So I’ve been following your Sugarbutch blog for quite some time now and the whole Gender Identity thing certainly confuses me. I mean, some of it I get, ok, a fair bit of it I think I get. I mean, for instance in life [my wife] is a goodly deal more masculine than I am and I’m a deal more feminine than she is.

I think you’re speaking of these terms differently than I would. By “more masculine/more feminine” you mean she takes charge, does the outward, social, money things, and you are more domestic, yes? You don’t mean that you bat your eyelashes and coo and wear skirts? She’s in charge, perhaps, yes, but that is not the same thing as masculine. That’s sexist, in fact; aligning all things in control with masculinity.

Do correct me if I’m wrong, but these are different things in my head.

When we’re in the bedroom we reverse that dynamic. I dom and she subs and we wouldn’t have it any other way.

Those things are separate from gender to me, too. That’s power, rather than gender. And really that all sounds very similar to my own makeup – I want a femme girl who is extremely powerful, especially socially, partly because I prefer to be the observer, to fall back and watch. But I want to take her down in the bedroom.

However…..the extent that you discuss it…it sounds like a LOT of work. I mean really. a LOT. I guess for me I figured out who I was and my wife figured out who she was, we figured out who we were together and we have this sort of…be-ing. We just are. I mean…am I missing something?

It is a lot of work. You’re right. And here’s why, and why it’s okay: for one, the work is fun. I so get off on this. The work is not necessary – at least, it is not consistently necessary, there is a degree to which I’d say it is necessary – for just going about my day. But I enjoy this kind of exploration of sex, gender, kink, and sexual dynamics, and I’ve made a formal hobby of it, you could say.

I understand what you’re saying about how you “just are” and I think that’s great. Me, however … I have been doing a bit of a life overhaul, what with the two major breakups in the last year, and I need to make a study of myself, the way I function in relationships, and the things I want, because I was with the wrong girls. Now this is not to set up a hierarchy and say that you are where I wish I was, that your place in this is better than or superior to mine. It is only different, we have our own paths.

One of the reasons our paths are different, I’d bet, has to do with the ways that our genders are so different because I’m queer/butch and you’re hetero/male. It took me a long time to figure out who I was – and while I’m sure it took you a long time, too, I still bet you knew all about your gender in high school, or earlier. And after I came to my own gender, it took me a while to learn that I wanted to be with a femme – a femme bottom, no less. My particular flavor/brand of desire took me 25-27 years to come to full fruition.

And because I am in a marginalized place, with few real mentors, all of my moves and identities and gender development took longer, and was more complex and tumultuous than a more mainstream, less oppressed or marginalized identity.

ALso, re: this is my hobby: this is also my passion. Sugarbutch is a culmination of what I studied in college: social change, gender, writing – all wrapped into one.

One of the things that kind of threw me for a loop in reading was the comment you made that part of your inspiration was when you asked “what do I need to do to get a hot girl like that?”. To me that just smacked of what most boys go through in high school. Most boys change radically who they to get the hot girls. My friend Dustin for example. He told me once, while extremely drunk, that he used to be nice, sensitive, blah blah blah just like I was but he wanted to get laid and so he changed everything about himself. And then I read about how you want to up the notches on your bedpost. …

Here’s the thing. I changed, yes, but I did not become an asshole who no longer respects myself or the people I’m with. I became more myself than I’d ever been. My butch identity development – as related to wanting to be with femmes – was less like your high school friend and more like me finding my ideal perfect job I wanted to have the rest of my life, then researching where it was that the people who got that job came from, how they got there. I am still nice and sensitive. I will not – I refuse to – sacrifice my personality on the basis of any gender. I separate those things, actively, intentionally, in my approaches to gender.

When someone first said to me, “I think you’re butch,” I nearly fell over. I wanted to be, so badly. I wished and wished and then worked my ass off when I got more confident, more capable. And I spent years feeling “not butch enough” – and I got increasingly interested in the social policing of gender, and identity construction, and the places gender & sexuality intersect, all of that.

Re: “notches in my bedpost”: it’s true, I do want this. But it is about gaining experience and knowing myself better, not about some macho conquest thing. I tend to fall for girls I sleep with, at least a little, but I want to learn to have casual sex. I want to find out what I really want and like so I won’t get stuck in another awful soul-crushing relationship. I want to know what’s out there. I don’t want to settle.

I know that you must get extremely tired of “expalining yourself”, so I apologize. And really you probably don’t HAVE to explain. I love you anyway and that goes beyond any lack of understanding, at least by my reckoning. So this is just an “I’m slightly lost” kind of thing.

I will always gladly answer any questions, and I am flattered you feel comfortable enough to ask. I hope this explains a little better, and I hope it doesn’t feel like any sort of attack against you or your identity. This is really hard for me to articulate, I’m just trying to work through it.

dirty stories, real life

broken, breaking

Posted on by Sinclair Sexsmith

I walked home with my thumb slung in my blazer jacket pocket, fingering the tip of my favorite pink packing cock, the ridges on the head, mostly to keep it from poking out of my pocket. Its spine is now broken at the base but I think I could still fuck with it.But, if it’s broken, well, what a way to go.

And really, opening this story with discussion of my cock is very self-centered. The night wasn’t about me at all. Once the boundary was broken, once the floodgates were open, the last six hours of foreplay and teasing rushed to the palms of my hands, and the only thing I could do was take her down.

–

“You’re going to come for us, aren’t you. Aren’t you, pretty girl.”

She moaned and writhed and melted. I held her down by her wrists and shoulders and whispered in her ear. “You like the way she’s sucking your clit?”

“Yes,” she whispered.

“Yeah? I like the way you say yes. Say it again.”

She paused, swallowed. “Yes.”

“Say it louder.”

She resisted me a little. “Yes.” Told me later that she had to add her own twist to what I told her to say. I liked the way she took direction.

She wriggled her way from one end of the couch to the other, head eventually pressed against the arm, the living room a mess of clothes and blankets and pillows thrown everywhere. Gasping and twisting.

“Oh my god, oh, my god. No one has ever – fucked me – like this before. No one has ever – I mean ever – ohh, my god.”

She was stripped bare, skin flushed and freckled, mouth red and open, lord, she has the most gorgeous mouth I’ve ever seen.

“I like the way you suck my fingers,” I said, working two fingers in and out, pressing a little on her tongue, holding her jaw with my thumb under her chin. She bit down on the nail of my fingertip. More than once. Hard. Ow. Oh I loved it.

Those were my favorite sounds she made. The way she moaned through whatever was in her mouth. Fingers. Especially my cock.

I worked her mouth and my aural skills while her friend worked her clit and gspot for an hour, almost two. Hips slung over shoulders, arms underneath, wrapped around to her hipbones. Sounds from her throat, mumbles, delicious little noises, mouth full, eyes open.

Two butches and a femme. I was not in charge, did not orchestrate the evening. In fact, it never occurred to me that we would actually return to her house and fuck. I spent the six hours – six! – at the second bar resisting their advances, allowing them both to play with my packed cock, her butch friend grabbing my cunt, working her fingers under my harness, and later biting my neck; and then there was that moment where my hipbone place just below my waistline was exposed and the femme licked and sprinkled salt for a body shot. Her mouth so close to my cock. That pretty, pretty mouth.

Later she took it in her mouth. Not properly, on her knees in front of me, but me above her, sliding it in.

It happened the third or fourth time she was oh so close to coming. I kept whispering things like let go and come for us, pretty girl and I want to hear you scream. There was (forgive me) something happening energetically, and I moved down behind her butch friend and grabbed her short hair, ran my hands over her back and ass, still covered by her cute boxer briefs.

And oh the view from below her. Getting fucked on her back on the couch, body all smooth and soft, curves and I could see the muscles rippling under her skin when she contracted, when her butch friend thrust harder, when she found the good spots and didn’t let up.

“Is that it?” I’d ask as the femme writhed more, reacted, moaned. “Did she find the right spot?”

“Oh she’s got it, she’s got the right spot, she’s had it all along. Ohh, my god. Seriously. God, oh god.”

I liked her hips all splayed open, thighs exposed and pressing her pelvis deeper into her mouth, stomach doing that crunching-contraction thing, shoulders off the couch, arms reaching gripping pressing into anything around her, head and neck hitting against the edge of the couch.

“Move back,” I told her friend, pulling on her thighs. She slid backward a foot or so. “Slide her down, too.”

They gave me just enough room to come back up to the head of the couch. I took the femme’s wrists in my hands again and pressed them over her head. She opened her mouth, closed her eyes.

“I want to fuck you,” I told her. She opened her eyes, looked at me clearly. “I am grinding my hips into the couch right now, I want you so bad.”

She reached for my cock and gripped it, milked it with her fingers. “Ohh, that’s good,” I said. “I like your fingers around my hard cock. I like the way you touch me.”

“You could put that in my mouth again. That would not be a bad idea. Seriously, you could put that cock in my mouth, right now.”

I did. Of course I did.

I don’t prefer blow jobs from above because I like her to control how deep to take it (despite my occasional fantasy otherwise – it’d need to be layed out, consentual. I digress; more on that another time).

But. She took it. Impressively.

“Ohh I like watching my cock slide down your throat,” I said. “So beautiful, watching you suck my cock, oh god, yes, suck it, suck my cock, fuck, fuck.”

I locked eyes with her butch friend, mouth still full on her cunt, watching us. Can you fucken believe how hot she is? we asked each other with glances.

“She is hotter than the center of the goddamn sun,” her friend told me later.

She was a defiant, wily bottom, but good, so good, at submitting, at taking what we gave her. Later, when I told her I liked how she took direction, liked telling her what to say, and she told us both that she had to make it her own, I had the urge to break her of that. I want to direct her, I want her body to be my tool, my instrument to play. I want her to feel the consequences of stringing me along at a bar for six hours, of her tongue on my hipbone.

She is powerful, so commanding and present, in charge, all heart and command, that I want to take her down, I want to break her in.

miscellany

put your money where your mouth is

Posted on by Sinclair Sexsmith

This is a call for donations for Scarleteen.

If your values align with Scarleteen’s, and if you are willing and able to keep this necessary resource afloat, please consider helping any way you can.

Here’s the link: Donate to Scarleteen and win tickets to “My First Time” … read on if you’d like more information about what Scarleteen does.

Scarleteen is a labor of love: a site dedicated to providing teens with accurate, supportive information about all aspects of sex and sexuality. As all of you know, I bet, because you have al searched for sex ed info online (what is the first thing for which new technology is used, for example? porn), it is actually quite difficult to find accurate and supportive information on sex, especially for teens. Scarleteen is a major resource, and so important.

And they are struggling immensely.

Heather Corrina, the founder, editor, & designer, works immeasurable hours on this labor of love, and it shows. Her heart & soul are in this project. Hell, I might go so far as to say she was born to do this. She is not exactly a close friend of mine – in fact, I’ve never met her – but I have followed her work online for many years: her writing, her photography, her activism. I have such admiration for her work and dedication, and for this project.

If this doesn’t appeal to the do-gooder in you, perhaps I can use sex appeal?

Or perhaps the promotion Scarleteen is currently running – “The first 18 donors who give the largest donations to Scarleteen from September 1st through September 16th, will not only help us provide sex education and information for teens and young adults worldwide — which is reward enough! — but will also receive a voucher for two tickets to My First Time to be used between now and the end of October. Valued at just under $120.” – will entice you?

Any way you can, Scarleteen needs support. Please help keep this invaluable educational hub thriving, and help support healthy, consciencious sex & sexuality information for teens & young adults.

There is also a Scarleteen book s.e.x.: The All-You-Need-To-Know Progressive Sexuality Guide to Get You Through High School and College. Buy it for the kids in your life. better yet, buy signed copies of the book direct from Scarleteen, by either “making a donation of over $75 to help sustain Scarleteen, or purchasing a signed copy for $22.”

blurb:

Get your hands on S.E.X.: the in-depth and inclusive young adult sexuality guide by Heather Corinna! Covering everything from STIs to sexual orientation, body image to birth control, masturbation to misogyny, the anatomy of the clitoris to considering cohabitation, and written for you whether you’re male, female or genderqueer; straight, gay or somewhere in between, this is THE everything-you-need, comprehensive, progressive sexuality handbook to get you through high school and college.

This ends your public service announcement; we now return you to your regularly scheduled Sugarbutch Chronicles.

identity politics, Interviews

Butch & Trans In Conversation: Interview with Cody

Posted on by Sinclair Sexsmith

When I went on that gender tirade back in August, Cody & I talked a bit about the butch/femme identities, and I was really curious about the ways that my arguments translated into arguments for why trans identities are subversive genders as well. He was graceous enough to agree to be interviewed about his gender opinions. Here’s the transcript.

Sinclair: I’m looking over the transcript of the chat we had a few weeks ago about butch/trans identity…

Cody: Okay. Are we beginning the interview? Should I put on my game face? Not that gender is a game or a construct. I wouldn’t want anyone to think that Id joke about something so serious.

Sinclair: That’s a great place to start. If gender is not a game or a construct, or a “role,” what is it?

Cody: Well, Actually, I was kidding. I think it’s all of those things, and none of them really. Gender is whatever you make of it. I also think (and I’m going to get a little woo woo here so bare with me) that gender is also this internal thing something you feel, some, internal energy that informs you about yourself. This is obviously informed by outside forces etc. But not completely. Does that make sense?

Sinclair: That absolutely makes sense. I’ve been writing a lot on Sugarbutch about the ways that butch/femme are not reproductions of some sort of heteronormativity, and I came up with a couple of major arguments about why those genders, though appearing to be hetero, are actually subversive of the whole sex/gender binary, and compulsory gender as a whole. And while I was writing this stuff out I kept thinking, you know, I bet these same arguments apply to the trans identity as well. It’s frustrating – I still hear so much transphobia kicked around in the queer/dyke communities.

Cody: Yeah, there’s a lot of that. But watch out, we all THINK about kicking back now and again.

Sinclair: Oh yes. I kick back, that’s for damn sure. So my question is, how do you think those arguments translate? More specifically, how is the trans identity subversive? Because it appears to be a heteronormative reproduction, especially (obviously) when the trans man is straight, or dating femmes or straight girls.

Cody: Well, the simple answer is that simply by the nature of my physical body [my trans identity] is subversive. And when I am dating femmes, the identity is subversive for a lot of reasons, but if we want to get down to bones here, I’d say the ways in which we have sex are subversive. Also, here’s something I realized the other day that made me laugh: I can never ever have straight by the book hetero-sex. It is physically impossible for me to do so. If that doesn’t make me fucking goddamn subversive I don’t know what does!

Sinclair: I love it! Hell yeah!

Cody: To get back to the question: what I mean about the nature of my physical body, is actually something I’ve been having a weirdly large amount of dialogue with folks about lately. This discussion of my junk (and by junk I mean my genitals) because that’s really what it comes down to in most discussions about trans shit: “What have you got between your legs?” Which has, frankly been making me very angry lately. Because, hell, I’m not a shy dude, but when people (even people in my queer community) are asking me about my dick (or my cunt) I feel kind of well, a little put out. But then again, this is how we end up understanding each other. By our genitals and how we use them to fuck, and how all of this informs who we are presenting to the world (meaning our gender).

Sinclair: Interesting – so that equation is, genitals plus fucking equals gender presentation. That seems accurate, although I would say that’s not everything that goes into gender.

Cody: No, of course not. But for the purposes of this particular vein, yes.

Sinclair: Would you tell me more about what you said about the nature of your physical body? I’m not sure I understand what you mean by that yet. By the nature of a trans body? Born into one sex, but altering it physically?

Cody: Yes. I mean, the fact that I’ve altered or am merely presenting my body in a different way from which I was told upon birth it was, makes the mere nature of it subversive. I mean, it’s a small part. But it’s an argument I like to use, because it’s easy to understand, and If people make you feel uncomfortable (which you totally aren’t, just an example) it’s a good shut down.

Sinclair: Ah I see. And it’s subversive because our sex/gender binary paradigm says that your body informs your nature? Or – your biology informs your self, perhaps is a better way to put it? I don’t want to put words in your mouth here.

Cody: Exactly! No you’ve got it. The binary says that my body should inform everything, right? So if I change my body, I’m fucking with the entire paradigm!

Sinclair: I like that. I know what you mean, I feel that way about the butch identity, too. And that’s one piece of that “butch/femme are not reproductions” argument, definitely. That it fucks with the sex/gender paradigm, by its very nature.

Cody: Definitely. The fact that it is NOT what it seems on the surface makes it so subversive.

Sinclair: Are there places that you feel the trans identity does become reproductive, perhaps sometimes in a negative way?

Cody: There are all kinds of ways that the transmale identity can become negatively heteronormative.

Sinclair: You mentioned before that you have noticed trans men rejecting the butch identity when they transition, perhaps because butch never fit them, and yet that’s something that you have held onto.

Cody: Yes! [I did not] reject the butch identity in favor of my trans identity. It’s more about embracing it because it INFORMS my trans identity. I figured about butch stuff (re: myself) around a similar time in my life that I was discovering trans stuff.

Sinclair: The identities seem closely aligned – or can be. Some of my best trans guy friends have explored so much about butchness with me.

Cody: Its funny, my best friend and I would sit down, and he would tell me about butch stuff, and it was SO HARD for me to understand it (because I was scared I think) and I would explain Trans-ness to him and he would balk. Now, well, now we are both butch trans men.

Sinclair: What changed? Was there a moment when butchness “clicked” with you?

Cody: Well, I think we were both scared, of all of it, of identity politics. Of talking about all of this. I don’t even think we knew at the time, that what we were talking about was so huge. We were just trying to work things out with ourselves and the people we cared about. God, saying that makes me feel like it used to be so much easier before we had to worry about a whole community, too! I mean, it wasn’t suddenly I passed the butch test with myself, but over a period of time, things started happening that helped me to nurture that part of myself, and understand that’s what I was doing. The other thing [that happened was] that I started meeting femmes. Something that I had never really experienced before. Where I grew up there was an incredibly small pool of queers.

Sinclair: How did that start altering your identity?

Cody: While now my butch identity is strong enough to stand alone, in the beginning [of its development], in order to build yourself up, let’s be honest, we need femmes. Let’s be really honest and say, butches need femmes all of the time. [What changed was that] I stopped feeling so ashamed of the ways in which I was masculine, and the ways I wasn’t. I worked out how to feel less shame about being a butch, and about being a man. The man part took way longer.

Sinclair: What was different about the man part & the butch part?

Cody: The butch part I think was easier, because honestly I had more support from those around me about it. The man part, well, I got a lot of shit about. The man part made me into a patriarch. Dykes, butch dykes, femme dykes, lesbians, straight feminists… In the small community I was working shit out in, the backlash was INCREDIBLE. I didn’t call myself a ‘man’ until I had been out as trans for years, partly because of that. I identified almost exclusively as a Butch-Trans-Boy

Sinclair: That [backlash] is so sad. We need to be allies!

Cody: It is [sad]! I had this idea, that if I didn’t align myself with the identity of being a man, I didn’t have to take responsibility for any misogyny.

Sinclair: Yes! I think that’s the same reason it took me so long to come to a butch identity, because I was picking and choosing very carefully what traits of masculinity I wanted to adopt, and I was scared as hell about betraying my feminist politics and enlightenment.

Cody: Funny, when you are trans, when your gender is male, no matter your history, you’ve got to ‘step up to the plate’ about it. It was like, white guilt. Plus, being a boy is all about fun and flirting and whatever. It’s easy!

Sinclair: That’s a huge concept. So, dare I ask? How does one do that? Step up to the plate about it?

Cody: Take fucking responsibility for yourself! Stop forgetting about your feminism because you have passing privilege. I think it’s almost more subversive to be butch, or to be a man, and be a feminist, if you are stepping up to it.

Sinclair: I like that. Is this why we have a serious lack of butches (and/or trans feminists) but we have this new fad of “boi” and “bro”? So many dykes I meet who I would perhaps label as butch tell me they don’t identify as such, but sometimes do identify as boi.

Cody: I think so. I think that’s a big fucking part of it. It’s fear. It’s [seen as] not hot to be a butch, or a man. Because you have to work for it.

Sinclair: It amazed me how much I felt socially policed while I was still coming to this butch identity. All those comments from other butches about toughness, competition, objectifying women. I still get those comments – they just don’t effect me as they used to. One comment would throw me for a loop for days.

Cody: Every time someone put down my butchness, or my male-ness, I regressed like YEARS in my discovery and comfortability with it.

Sinclair: [Masculine identities are] so sensitive! I wonder if this is also what teenage boys go through, all that fag/pussy-bashing stuff.

Cody: Homophobia: the deconstruction of masculinity. Homophobia is all about the construction of masculinity. It’s more about gender than sexuality – sexuality is a part of it, but its more about gender. It’s all about ‘othering’

Sinclair: And [it’s about] misogyny. I would say that’s perhaps because masculinity has historically been defined as not-woman, not-female, not-feminine, and as the gender revolution opens up more and more places for women to occupy, and expands the definition of feminity, that the space that masculinity can occupy becomes smaller and smaller.

Cody: Instead of cutting out any way that it’s okay to be masculine, why can’t we just look at better ways to be masculine?

Sinclair: Which is why I still think we need a masculine-gender revolution. It’s brewing, I think, and trans guys are at the forefront.

Cody: I think you are so right! But we aren’t alone, I think butches are up there on the line with transdudes about this masculine gender revolution. I think we have to hold each other up. This may all sound very idealistic, and utopian, but you’ve got to dream right?

Sinclair: Absolutely. This is what I aim for, even if I feel that it’s going to be a hard bumpy road to get there.

Cody: Oh, man, is it EVER.

Sinclair: So how do we encourage the butches & trans men to be aligned? For some reason, we are often so threatened of each other.

Cody: I think by doing what you and I are doing right now: by fucking talking to each other. By realizing that we’ve got a lot in common, even if it’s scary. By being okay with the fact that this doesn’t mean either one of us is presenting ourselves wrongly. Trans men aren’t ‘abandoning’ the community, and butch women aren’t too scared to ‘man up.’

Sinclair: Well said – that neither of us are presenting ourselves wrongly. That’s a big part of the intimidation factor, isn’t it? That these identities are so fragile, so hard to grow and to maintain, but then when we see someone with something so close to us but very different it becomes a worry that somewhere I’ve made a mistake.

Cody: Exactly. Also, we’ve got to keep in mind, that for some trans men, the ‘trans’ part of our identity fades once we have passing privilege and we’ve all got to respect that. I think that the queer community has a serious peter pan complex going on. Butch ‘bois’ and tranny ‘bois.’

Sinclair: So, you’re talking about respect a seeming rejection of queerness?

Cody: To be honest, there isn’t a cut and dry answer to it (which I think you know and is why its so hard). Every single trans man is different. Sometimes, it IS about rejecting queerness.

Sinclair: Of course. I definitely agree with you about the Peter Pan complex – especially when it comes to the butch/male/boi/tranny boy identities. It’s safer to stay young, perhaps? Not as much examination of identity is required?

Cody: Exactly, and its CUTE, right?! It’s so cute to never grow up.

Sinclair: It’s safer, too. And cute means not threatening. Because when women move into a masculine identity, they are moving UP in the hierarchy, which is threatening.

Cody: Uh huh. Not threatening means no need to examine masculinity means no responsibility. “Oh! Isn’t it cute that that little butch boi just called his partner a bitch?” Gross.

Sinclair: That’s an aspect of masculinity that I don’t want to take on, that I have worked SO HARD to reject. This is why we need a masculine manifesto and revolution!

Cody: You are very right! Also, the word revolution gives me such a hard-on for change!

Sinclair: Oh, that is seriously hot.

Cody: Of course! T-shirts anyone? Also, I really appreciate you even asking these questions about how to not hate on the trans. :)

Sinclair: Thanks! And likewise I really appreciate you answering my questions! I suppose the last thing I want to ask you is something I hesitate to bring up, which is that idea about trans-ness as a fad. it is definitely becoming more prevalent, and it does make me sad to loose the butches, and I am concerned about it as a ‘trend’.

Cody: Mm…Okay. Well, I want to tell you first that I’m glad you brought it up. It’s a hard question to answer/dialogue about.

Sinclair: It is hard to talk about. ‘Cause, you know, I don’t want to invalidate anyone’s identity. But it definitely comes up in conversation; at least, it does with the dykes. Not so much when I’m talking to trans guys.

Cody: Because I think this is why butches and transmen have a lot of disconnect sometimes, this issue puts us all on the defensive.

Sinclair: But at the same time, I know people who have transitioned and then transitioned BACK, I know people who have ALMOST transitioned and then at the last minute decided not to. It makes me nervous that younger and younger kids are doing this seemingly on a whim.

Cody: Here’s the thing. I think that in some ways it is becoming a fad. Just like when all the girls in high school I knew were bi. Yes, I’m comparing the two. This is VERY controversial of me to say and if a lot of dudes read this they might vote me off the island. But sometimes I feel like my personal struggle is getting fucked with and devalued because dudes are making this whole trans thing into a big goddamn joke. Like its something fun. Here’s the secret: Being trans ain’t fun most of the time. It’s not fun to realize that you feel fucking uncomfortable in your skin, or uncomfortable with the way your gender is in the world. It SUCKS. It ain’t fun to get your shit cut open and cut out and stick yourself with a needles every two weeks for the rest of your life. But, young (and by young I mean, new to transition) dudes are making it all into this GAME. It makes me very …well, it makes me very angry. My fucking life and experience isn’t a game, and it ain’t fun. It wasn’t EASY for me to, figure shit out, to be alone, to find a doctor who would give me T, to pay for surgery, etc. Also, I think its GREAT when people fuck with gender for themselves, when they work out how they feel most comfortable, I think that’s AWESOME ‘cause that’s what I did, am doing. But don’t make me feel like shit ‘cause my struggle doesn’t align with your PARTY.

Sinclair: So what is that other part for you – you don’t align with the party?

Cody: I just got so hot under the collar. Okay, I guess what I’m saying is, when people turn all of this gender business into a big game, it’s a way in which they aren’t willing to examine their privilege. Because that’s hard, right? My struggle don’t play. My life is hard, and I’m down for it. I’m down to work on it.

Sinclair: Ah, so it’s about privilege and examination? That makes sense. That’s exactly the places where gender is the most frustrating for me, skating by on some sort of butch/masculine privilege without even realizing that’s what it is, no examination, no understanding of what you’ve taken on.

Cody: It’s like walking around with a bandana tied over your eyes, and putting your nasty little fingers everywhere.

Sinclair: I don’t know, maybe for some people this identity comes more “naturally”? I just feel like I really really had to WORK at mine.

Cody: I mean, its all ‘natural’ in a way, cause it ends up making sense and feeling like you are at home when you work it out. It takes a much stronger person to realize something about their identity, feel comfy in it, finally! After all of this time! And then KEEP working on it, to keep improving upon what is there and makes you feel good.

Sinclair: Yeah, it really does take constant work, I definitely agree. Everything can be refined, everything is a process, all that. And gender is so complicated! We live within this huge gender system, and it is the source of major agony/pain for pretty much everyone involved, in my opinion. Those places where gender is liberational, and subversive, and fabulous, they are worth navigating the fucked up system for. But man that takes a lot of work.

Cody: Very, very true! All of it. Why can’t we take the shit we need to work on, plop it right down into a comfy space, get out the glue sticks and go at it?

Sinclair: Glue sticks! I love it. I guess first we have to MAKE a comfy space, for everybody involved, right? A forum in which to discuss these things, for as many people as possible. Which is definitely one of the goals of Sugarbutch — to bring this stuff TO LIGHT so that people feel more comfortable exploring, sharing, and articulating to begin with.

Cody: Which is hard, cause we are an exclusive goddamned bunch, aren’t we? Our communities are so INTENTIONAL, that I’m not willing to compromise. But, if we keep creating dialogue and space for those we WANT to work on this with, it will bow out. Get bigger. We are talking grass roots here. But that’s where I operate best. With my hard-knuckled fists working the wood of the problem. Yo! That’s why we butch! That’s why femmes are femme! Because we WORK.

Sinclair: It’s that old quote from Airen Lydick: “Femme is knowing what you’re doing.” As in, being aware and conscious of the identity you are developing and presenting and taking on. And maybe that comes back to other gender questions I have, too, about how to view these roles as celebratory rather than confining, as liberational rather than limiting — by creating dialogue and space to explore all aspects of these complicated identities.

Any closing thoughts?

Cody: Just that this is the beginning of the conversation. Include my email address (codycoquet@gmail.com) and my blog address (codycoquet.blogspot.com), and encourage people to write if they want to discuss/ask anything of me.

Sinclair: Thank you, so much, for the conversation.

dirty stories, fiction

The Hitchhiker

Posted on by Sinclair Sexsmith

Thanks to bird for this Sugarbutch Star scenario submission. I’ve been working on this for a few weeks now, it proved harder than I expected because I was determined to not ever use gendered pronouns for the driver. Worth a try, though now I know better than to do that again.This story was featured on Fleshbot‘s sex blog roundup. Thanks Jefferson!

The Hitchhiker

“Get in,” the driver said, after flipping the dial on the stereo of the small blue pickup truck, quieting Big Black’s “He’s a Whore.”

Alice leaned her elbows on the window, made her legs into an A frame, tipped her ass to one side, and flipped her wheat-colored hair over her shoulder. She took a long look at the driver, the blond fauxhawk, messy overalls, lean defined arms in a life-partner beater, dark tribal tattoos peeking out from the collarbone. A dark, worn-in cowboy hat sat on the passenger’s seat. The driver flashed a nice smile. Simple, a little mischievous.

The scent of grass and sod wafted from the back of the truck. Alice spied power tools, a lawnmower, some rakes and shovels secured to the racks in the back. She gripped the handle, opened the door, and slid onto the vinyl bench seat, taking the cowboy hat into one hand and easily sliding it over the crown of her head.

“My friends call me Jack.”

“I’m Alice.” She slid her eyes sideways to watch Jack maneuver the stick shift as the pickup pulled back onto the Pacific Coast Highway.

“Where you heading?” Alice asked.

Jack watched as she adjusted her long legs and ran one ankle against the opposite calf. “Wherever.” South on the PCH was good enough for now. Alice wanted to end up in the city somewhere, it didn’t matter where. Cliffs and beach rolled by their windows. This was as good of a direction as any.

The cab smelled like grass, too. Grass and dirt, but in a clean, organic earthy kind of way. “You been working in the sun all day?” Alice asked, tossing the hat onto the dash, then flipping her hair again and strategically placing her elbow over the back of the bench seat between them. Her fingers were dangerously close to the overall buckles. The skin beneath was tan, a little pinkish.

“Yep.”

“It was nice today. Not too hot for August.”

“Yeah.”

“So you’re a gardener?”

Jack downshifted through a tight curve and held the clutch in a moment too long. “Landscape architect.” Pressure on the engine.

“Of course. You enjoy that?”

“Yeah, I do.”

Alice let her fingers drift onto the muscles of Jack’s upper arm. Soft skin. “You look like you’re good at it.” She let herself picture Jack shoveling, digging, big bags of fertilizer slung over these broad shoulders, squinting in the sun.

Jack didn’t answer, just smiled softly, looking out at the road. The silence was comfortable. Alice lifted her small satchel bag from her shoulder. “Do you smoke?” she asked.

“No.”

“Mind if I do?”

“Go right ahead.” Such a gentleman. She rolled the window down a crack, lit an unfiltered Lucky Strike from a soft pack. Only a few more left. The small cylinder felt good between her fingers, on her lips. She slipped her slender tan feet out of her white beach sandals and brought them up onto the seat, exposing her creamy caramel inner thighs. They rode in silence as Alice smoked, Big Black still soft on the stereo. Jack watched her from a sideways glance, one hand on the stick shift, palm starting to sweat. Alice’s tank top exposed her toned navel and hip bones peeking out from the top of her tiny jean shorts. She brought the cigarette to her lips deliberately.

Jack took a breath, still not looking at her. “I like the way you do that.”

“Yeah?” Alice leaned against the door, moved one leg further up onto the seat between them. “I like the way you drive.”

The corners of Jack’s mouth curled. “Thanks, darlin’.” Her toes shuffled toward the exposed side of the overalls, the thin, thin fabric of the undershirt. Jack shifted in place, thighs adjusting.

Alice watched, considering Jack’s hard body, the sweet smell of sweat and physicality. She flicked her cigarette out the truck window and rolled the window back up, pulled her knees up underneath her, leaned in close to Jack’s ear.

“Any interest in a fuck?”

“Uh,” Jack’s eyes flashed. Alice already had her hand on the bulge in the crotch of Jack’s overalls.

“I’d like to see what you’ve got under there.” Jack unsnapped the shoulder buckles. Alice pulled a thick, marble-blue colored strap-on from soft gray Calvin Klein briefs. Bigger around than her hand would fit. She milked it with her fingers. Jack’s eyes never left the road.

“Looks good,” said Alice. “Big and hard already.”

“Gave me quite the boner, you on side of the road like that.”

“Oh yeah? Little ol’ me?”

“Soon as I saw those legs, I wanted them wrapped around me.” Alice bobbed her hand in Jack’s lap, dipping her face nearer to the cock. Small murmurs coming from her mouth. Jack left one hand on the wheel and didn’t slow down, hugging the curves of the road with precision. Her lips grazed the head. Licked it like an ice cream cone with her long tongue. Sucked it into her mouth while she left her hand pushing into the base of the silicone.

Jack groaned. “Damn, you’re good at that.”

Alice smiled and sucked. Swirled her tongue. Worked the head against the ridge at the back of her mouth. Applied pressure.

Jack moaned again, deep, from the gut, hips thrusting a little. Heavy foot on the gas pedal, not slowing, eyes on the road. Jack took a blind curve around a cliff, suddenly swerved into the dirt pull-off overlooking the beach, and cut the engine. Alice didn’t stop, head bobbing on the blue cock. Jack leaned back, feet on the floor, hips lifting, hands gripping the steering wheel and then the ceiling of the cab. Pressing against the truck at every angle to get the cock farther down Alice’s throat.

“Fuck.” Jack shuddered, bringing a hand to Alice’s long hair and pulling her off of the cock. She wiped saliva off her mouth with the back of her hand, eyes wide, lips swollen.

“Come with me.” Jack threw open the door to the cab and half-guided, half-dragged Alice out of the driver’s side door. The sun hit them both, insistent and thick on its fall into the ocean. Jack pulled the tailgate down and hopped into the back of the truck with one quick leap, then leaned and offered a hand to Alice. Barefoot, she climbed in.

Not much room with all the tools. The lawnmower was covered in flecks of grass and a dark petroleum lubricant for its rusty engine, and sat next to a red gas can, a strong pungent smell. Dirt under Alice’s bare feet. She made her way up to the cab of the truck and pressed her stomach to it, lifted one leg at the knee and stared out into the beach and setting sun. Waves lapping. Pretty much deserted this far out of the city. A sporty two-door car zipped past, then it was quiet again.

Jack let go of the overalls and they fell. Alice had her hands on the waist of her shorts, twisted around to face Jack. “You’re gonna fuck me with that big thing of yours, aren’t you?”

Jack’s mouth watered. “Yes.”

“Do it then.” She bent over the cab of the truck, slithered the shorts down over her ass and left them at her knees, creamy tan beach skin exposed, cunt exposed, neck twisted to watch Jack approaching.

Jack slid the cock into her in a swift gasp, stretching her taut. Alice lifted onto her tiptoes to tilt her pelvis, curve her back. Jack took hold of her hips and thrust, hard, and again, and again, thick inside her.

“Tight little pussy,” Jack murmured, one hand on her ass, spreading her cheeks. “Feels so good to open you with my big cock.”

Jack thrust harder, grunting. “Aw yeah, aw god yeah.” Alice gasped with each hard thrust, impaled, in a bit of pain but also exquisite sensation, hips pressing apart, back arching deeper, mouth open and gasping. She lifted one foot up onto the three piled bags of garden dirt in the corner of the truck and spread her legs for Jack.

“You like that, don’t you. Dirty girl. You’ve been waiting for someone like me to come along and fuck you right, haven’t you. Haven’t you.” Jack thrust harder, slower, then sharp.

“Yes, oh god, Jack, fuck me,” Alice moaned. Jack slid one arm around her waist and twisted, pulled out and shoved her onto the fertilizer, dropping her on her ass harshly and she reached down to catch herself with her hands, her legs slightly tangled in the fabric of her tiny shorts.

Alice reached up and gripped the bar of the lawnmower next to her, lifting her feet off the ground, legs together, balancing on her ass. Jack slid the shorts down her tanned, slender legs and stepped between them, squatting, pushing her knees back against her chest, their faces inches apart.

Her big blue eyes were wide open.

Jack slid the cock insider her eager cunt again and tried to keep looking at Alice, tried not to miss a minute of this, sun and surf behind Alice’s head, California traffic zooming by on the PCH, Alice’s face flushed, neck arched, hands gripping, pulling, steadying. The lawnmower shook as Jack thrust and thrust, harder, gaining speed, getting faster.

“Your pussy feels so good,” Jack mumbled. “So tight around my cock. Squeeze me, oh god yeah just like that, feels so good, feels so fucken good.”

“Oh yeah, fuck me,” Alice breathed. “Come inside me, oh yeah, you can do that, can’t you, big boy? Fuck me hard until you come inside. I’ll pump that come from your cock with my tight pussy. You like that? You can feel that, can’t you, Jack?”

Jack bucked against Alice, tight and hard, shoving into her over and over until Jack came, swearing, and softened, slowed. Alice caressed the back of Jack’s head, the short short hairs and longer ‘hawk in the middle, until tentatively Jack met her eyes and stood.

“Strip.”

Alice’s eyes narrowed. “What?”

“We’re going in.” Jack nodded toward the beach and lifted the A-shirt up and off, revealing toned chest muscles, the swirls of dark tribal tattoos, California brown skin. Hopping out of the truck, Jack jogged toward the cliff’s edge and found a path down, through the beach grass and lines of rocks against the road. Another car zipped past, an old sedan, then the sound faded around the corner of the PCH.

Alice followed reluctantly, watching as Jack awkwardly stripped off the CK briefs while attempting to run in the sand toward the water. Alice nearly laughed. She let her body pick up speed while gravity pulled her down the path of the cliff’s edge and broke into a run when she hit the sand. Her shorts were still in the back of the pickup somewhere, legs bare, feet bare, only her cut off tank top remained, and she pulled it over her head, dropped it near an obvious large boulder.

Jack splashed into the water, tossed the words over his shoulder: “Come on!”

Alice hovered near the edge of the surf, ankle deep in lolling waves and wet sand, kicking at the water. She watched Jack immerse and surface, strapped blue cock and leather harness wet and becoming looser around Jack’s hips, hands running through the wet ‘hawk falling in both eyes, and Alice dove into the surf, slid through the water, cool and soothing against the heat of the day. She surfaced and couldn’t see Jack, then let her body float, weightless, on the rolling waves, until something abruptly pulled her under.

She opened her mouth with a startled “oh!” and then it was full of salt water. Her arms and legs flailed as she struggled back to the surface, gasping at the air.

Jack was smiling, stifling laughter, next to her.

“Oh, you think that’s funny, do you?”

Jack’s laughter stopped suddenly and changed to a falsely serious playful face. Alice closed the distance between them quickly and, smirking, grabbed for the strapon, pulled hard, forced Jack under the water, both of them struggling, Jack grabbing onto Alice for support as they were both pulled deeper under the water.

They detangled, emerged, gasping and laughing. Jack lunged for Alice in a taildive, took hold of her waist, lifted her legs. She leaned back into the water as Jack found her clit, slid fingers inside, held her hips up.

“Ohh, that’s good,” she crooned. “Oh god. Damn. That’s perfect … oh fuck, your fingers inside me feels so good. I can’t – I want –” she had no leverage. She could feel the sandy ocean floor with her toes, but wanted her ankles up on Jack’s broad shoulders.

Jack pulled-pushed her further toward shore, half walking, half swimming, bodies touching everywhere, Alice being pushed backward as Jack walked along the sand, holding each other’s eyes and bodies up in the water, Jack’s cock bobbing against her leg. She bit her lip to keep from sucking her tongue in her mouth, remembering how that blue cock tasted and felt.

The ocean rocked around them, then she hit sand with her butt first, soft, sand, ground, then Alice was laid out as the wave receded, kissing, nude, Jack’s hands between her legs, greedy, pushing her thighs apart, thick fingers entering her and she gasped.

“I think it’s time you came for me,” Jack whispered gruffly, mouth rough on her cheek, pressing Alice against the sand, pushing her legs apart. “Come on, pretty girl, open up that cunt for me, squeeze my fingers. You feel me deep inside you?”

Alice gasped, body balanced on every sensation. Heels in the air, thighs pressed back against the wet sand. Jack worked her clit with expert precision, slow circles, a slick thrumming, and another wave broke at their feet.

“I’m gonna make you come so hard,” Jack breathed into her neck, fingers moving harder, faster, between her legs, pulsing over her clit. “You’re going to come just for me, just for me, pretty girl. Feel my fingers workin’ your pussy? You’re gonna do it for me, aren’t you? Let go, pretty girl, just let it all go, and come for me, come on girl, fuck yeah, do it.”

Alice, gasping, toes curling, swollen cunt pressed hard against Jack’s hand, felt her muscles tighten and vibrate, swell and then explode, thick and fast and deep, Jack’s fingers thrusting, pressing hard against her hard clit, as her stomach contracted and body shook. She screamed a string of profanities and gripped Jack’s wrists, clawed at the muscles of Jack’s shoulders. She moaned and yelled, eyes open and suddenly aware of the darkening sky, the bright stars beginning to be visible outside of the city, twilight fading fast to blackness.

Jack touched her thighs and stomach for a minute as her body calmed. Alice became suddenly aware of her wet feet, bare body, cool breeze coming from over the ocean, the sound of the water, waves still tickling her calves and knees, cooler than the air and soothing.

“I, uh,” Jack stammered, suddenly shy again. “Guess we should get back on the road.”

Alice nodded. She wanted another Lucky Strike, was beginning to feel chilly. And she wanted to blow Jack behind the wheel again.

Jack offered her a hand up and they both brushed sand from their bare skin. Alice watched the toned muscles of Jack’s chest and arms, the dark curly tattoos. Jack began making his way in the sand, and Alice stood for a moment, watching the shimmering reflection of the rising new moon in the surface of the water, listening to the crash and rush and whoosh of the waves, when she saw something break the surface, a fin, and another, then a tail, the dramatic swoop of the back arch of a dolphin.

“Jack!” Alice called. “Did you see those dolphins?”

Jack turned and looked, then laughed. “That’s so gay.”

Alice smiled, then couldn’t help but giggle. She turned away from the water and watched Jack’s firm ass and thighs moving along the path ahead of her, wondering how long Jack would resist before she could get fucked again.

dirty stories, real life

ask for what you want

Posted on by Sinclair Sexsmith

I want you to only address me as Sir.

I want you to start playing with your clit ten minutes before I arrive, but under no circumstances are you allowed to come.

I want you wearing high heels and a short skirt with nothing underneath.

I want your safeword to be carnation, which means, you can yell no all you like, but I will not stop.

I want you ready to bend over my lap struggling as I spank you. Lift your dress up and turn your ass-cheeks red until my hand hurts. And then you’ll kiss it, suck my fingers, make it better. I’ll scold you for making me all hard and wanting, and you’ll straddle me and ride.

I want your explicit consent. I want your permission and submission.

I want you to know how to draw it from me. I am afraid of my own power. I want you to pull these cruelties from me, to beg for them. I want to take your energy and mine into one huge fireball that I will weild and you will receive. I want your surrender. I want you to make me feel like the biggest, baddest top in the room, even if I’m not.

Can you do that for me?

dirty stories, real life

I top on the third date

Posted on by Sinclair Sexsmith

Oh, yeah, I had a date last Tuesday. A week ago now.I showed up, six-pack in hand, at her apartment on Tuesday night. She answered the door in a black tanktop and tiny skirt, very short, kind of an army-green color, which was quite lovely for her light blonde hair and fair skin. Bare legs, bare feet. Have I mentioned this girl is beautiful? Fantastic legs. Wonderfully curvy body, still toned and slender but not very angular. Soft, still strong.

She made chili, and cornbread, which was more savory than sweet, and delicious. We ate, chatted on the couch about our days, drank a few beers. I said a few stupid things and noticed myself getting more & more flustered and un-suave. She tucked her feet up onto the couch and fingered the hair on her neck. Sexy.

We were talking about our days at work, and I said a couple things (that I won’t relay here) that made me sound kinda like an idiot, which I immediately regretted. I attempted to shift the conversation to something better, namely, sex, dating, and being picked up by her.

She said something about being silly or bold or drunk enough to pick someone (me) up in a bar and make them take her home with them, at which point I said, “well, clearly, I wasn’t going to do it,” which … uh, oops … as soon as it came out of my mouth, I realized it sounds not at all as I meant. What I meant was, I didn’t have the guts to attempt to fuck her. It barely even occurred to me that it was a possibility, she seems out of my league.

And it was supposed to be funny, like, god, it was so clear and exasperating to her that I wasn’t going to be The Butch in the situation and make a move toward the physical, so she had to do it, but that’s not at all how it sounded. It sounded like, pshaw, I wasn’t going to pick you up, so you were gonna have to throw yourself at me. Guh.

But in this moment, my head just prickled and tied itself in knots and I realized what I’d said and tried to cover my face and my embarrassment with my hand while grinning like an idiot, stupid me, god, what the fuck. She says, “Oh, yeah, well, that cute smile is buying you some time, but you better come up with somethin’ good to say,” at which point I stumbled, said something about her being out of my league, until she was nodding, saying “uh-huh, sure,” and I gave up trying to explain and shifted my body wait above her, and said, “Alright, shit. I’m going to kiss you now.”

“About time,” she muttered, and we kissed. She is a good at kissing. Soft, smooth, slow, sensual. Simple, even, though not in a way where anything’s missing. Just – clear.

It didn’t take long for us to both realize it was clear we wanted to, and were going to, fuck. We moved to the bed. She altered the lighting and the music to set the mood. I tore her shirt off. Tore her skirt off to find a dark pink satin thong.

She doesn’t let me stay clothed. As soon as her clothes start coming off, she starts on mine. It’s okay, but I’m not used to it. With previous lovers, unless I took my clothes off, often they didn’t even come off. (This is, perhaps, an indication of topping tendencies?) I don’t mind being naked, really, though, so it’s not a big deal. It just puts me in a slightly more vulnerable position than I am used to, from the beginning.

Clothes get strewn. I’m touching her, fingers inside her, kissing, holding her down on the bed, taking more control than I have in our past encounters. Perhaps I need a lot of explicit permission to let my toppiness come out. “Don’t hold my wrists,” she whispers. “Hold my hands instead.” No problem.

Eventually, we break apart, she goes to the bathroom, I get up to get my cock out of my bag. “The good news is,” I say when she gets back, “I brought my bigger cock. The bad news is, I brought the wrong harness, so I can’t strap it on.”

She shrugs, eyes my cock, slides her slender fingers around it. “I have a harness.”

She opens the bottom drawer of her bureau and rustles around. Toys and equipment go flying as she searches for her harness: vibrators, attachments, little bundles of rope, cocks, feather ticklers.

I laugh. “I guess that answers the kink question.”

“What kink question?”

“You know. The Kink Question.”

“Ah. Yes.”

She found the harness. I strapped on. It’s still a little uncomfortable to have something that large dangling from my clit & hips. I get shy, embarrassed at the way I love its weight between my legs.

Lube and fingers and she was wanting, took that big cock all the way. I loved the way she gasped under me, the way her legs gripped my waist. Scratched at my shoulder blades and gasped in my ear.

I fucked her, hard, like this, for a while. Quite close to coming, myself, when we paused again, caught our breath, heads together on the pillow.

I said, “So tell me about sex, Joy,” and we talked. I asked her about kink. Likes, dislikes? At the top of my list, which I relayed, are spanking, rope bondage, and flogging. She got shy.

I said, “My sister would laugh so hard at me right now. Look, I’ve got this gorgeous girl, in bed, naked, next to me, and I’m saying ‘let’s talk.’ Sometimes I am such a capital-L Lesbian.”

She got more comfortable. Said she has four hard no’s: bestiality, children, human waste, and extreme pain/humiliation. She’s willing to explore most everything else. I am pretty much with her there, although there is a bit of a blurry line there for me with some age role-play (dangerous, to me, but can be cathartic and hot), and pain. I like pain. I would like to play with that more. So, we talked about that a bit.

Later, we talked about kink again. What’s the difference between kink and preference? I’m not sure I have an answer to that, I’m still kicking that idea around.

She brought up topping & bottoming, or maybe I did, to say I was sorry to have decided she was a top so vehemently. “It bugged me for a couple days,” she admitted, “but then I realized that I didn’t really even know what you meant, and if I didn’t really know what it was, but somebody else recognized me as such, that meant I could be doing it wrong.”

Ahh yes, I do understand that feeling. But certainly I shouldn’t impose my judgments about identity on anyone else, & I said so. I tried my best to describe what I mean using the terms “topping” and “bottoming,” but they’re really hard to define. (Post on that to come.)

These conversations interspersed in our sex play were quite short, really, generally during which I would keep my hand on her body somewhere, or she would keep her hand on mine, and when she gave me a bit more of a reaction with her body I would increase pressure, frequency, and build the energy again until starting to fuck her again.

I like the way she comes. On her back, fingers flicking over her clit for a while, swirling, she likes the figure 8s, increasing pressure, until she gasps, eyes roll back, hands grip my arm and her body contracts and releases until she opens her eyes and demands fuck me, now, hard and I do, fingers inside her, more, more fingers, two, three, harder, and that ring of PC muscles grip my fingers hard and she groans, cries out, whimpers into quietness. After, I hold her. Sometimes we find I’ve opened something gaping in her and she gets tender, sore, exposed, and I cover her body with mine, sew it up with my fingers on her skin, until she’s contained again.

I like her in these moments. This is perhaps why I am a top. I adore seeing women – especially powerful, put-together, coiffed, impenetratable femmes – in this state. I love creating it, causing it, contributing to it, holding her through it. I love the breakdown behind her eyes, the way her voice changes, softens. I love when she cries after she comes.

I cut her off twice after that, times when she began touching my hips or stomach, making moves to get me off again. I was satisfied. I didn’t want more. It was hard to ask her not to, but it’s what I wanted. I could’ve kept fucking her, though; that, I am not tired of.

Joy asked me to stay the night, I declined. She walked me to the subway, said it was hard to see me go. It was sweet, but I was – and am – worried that she wants more than sex from me. We haven’t quite had that conversation yet, it is definitely on the agenda for our date on Saturday.

miscellany

if that’s what you’re into

Posted on by Sinclair Sexsmith

I’m exploring this conversation about GGG – good, giving, and game. Dan Savage describes it this way:

Dan Savage and his readers often use the abbreviation GGG. This stands for “good, giving and game”, and generally refers to Mr. Savage’s ideal for healthy human sexuality: that a partner should be “good, giving and game” when presented with a person’s fantasy, however kinky or unusual. In his March 1, 2007 column, Savage summarized “GGG stands for ‘good, giving, and game,’ which is what we should all strive to be for our sex partners. Think ‘good in bed,’ ‘giving equal time and equal pleasure,’ and ‘game for anything—within reason.'”

And so I’m taking a lesson from Flight of the Conchords:

journal entries

a couple things to clarify

Posted on by Sinclair Sexsmith

Re: why we need to examine our lives:I do not think that heterosexual relationships are bad. All I’m trying to get at is that in this culture, in this time and geographic location, we have culturally dictated gender roles for men and women, males and females, masculine-types and feminine-types. And any or all of us can buy into these gender roles, reproduce them, and limit ourselves and our loved ones by forcing us all into positions of responsibility that detract from our Selves, our unique beings, our authenticity, our integrity. This happens for everyone, because of the ways that gender is so extraordinarily prevalent in every single aspect of our culture.

In that examination of gender dynamics in the queer (specifically, lesbian) communities as a reproduction of male/female gender roles, the point I’m trying to make is that just because one is butch or femme doesn’t mean that one is not reproducing these roles. Sometimes we are. There is a lot of nasty garbage that comes along with compulsory gender, for heteros or queers or anyone in between, and if we don’t examine how gender works and functions and interacts, I don’t believe we will get to the place where gender is liberatory, as opposed to limiting.

Re: top 10 things I love about femmes:

One of the things I wrote is: “The struggles with not being visibly out, which also brings the privilege of hearing what people say when they don’t know someone queer is listening.”

Here’s what I am getting at: the bottom line is, as a butch, as a visible queer, I don’t have this ability. I don’t hear what people say when they don’t know somebody gay is listening to them, and that has made for some fascinating conversations with my (femme & passing) lovers & friends. I find it interesting. It’s a place where butches and femmes differ greatly, and that’s all I was trying to acknowledge – unique pieces of a femme identity. By writing that post, I tried to say, hey, I see you, I notice you doing this, I actively witness you: I validate your identity.

I got a bit of grief for this statement. I used words like envy and privilege, which I definitely understand are loaded. I do not want to glamorize this aspect of femme identity, which I do absolutely understand is very complicated, and which is the source of pain and sorrow and frustration.

Okay, that’s all for now. Just a few clarifications. I hate being misunderstood. It is one of the biggest reasons I am a writer: to make myself clear.

miscellany

susie’s survey

Posted on by Sinclair Sexsmith

Susie Bright posted the Bathroom Sex Suvey over on her ever-entertaining blog. Here’s my answers.

What is your gender, at least at the moment? kinky queer butch top. they all greatly influence my gender.

Have you ever had sex in a public bathroom? What did you do? (Define “sex” as you like). yes. strapped on with a girl sucking my cock, fingering a girl till she came, on my knees eating her out

More than once, several times, every day? several dozen times, though it was years ago now

Did you have your t-room sex with a man or woman? women

Did you know them, or were they a stranger to you? I knew them

Have you ever had sex in a “private” bathroom— but one which wasn’t at your house? hmm … I don’t think so

Have you ever had sex in your own darn bathroom? absolutely. showering together is fun

Have you had bathroom sex fantasies, never acted upon? can’t say I really have that many bathroom fantasies, aside from sex in public bathrooms, which I have done a fair amount of.

Have you ever run into anyone having bathroom sex, while you were just “doing your business?” Have you ever been propositioned and turned someone down? Was it hard to say, “No, thank you?” no! but that’d be hot.

Have you ever run into a high level Republican pol having bathroom sex? not that I know of …

Are you gay? (Just kidding). sure – gay, lesbian, dyke, queer, I use ’em all.

essays

Why we need to examine our lives

Posted on by Sinclair Sexsmith

I went back and re-read the article Lina posted, and I’m pleased to say, it didn’t frustrate me nearly as much as it did the first time I read it. I have various responses at the ready and I feel like I could easily defend my position & claim.

During this gender discussion we’ve been having, I was reminded of this quote:

Nothing can be so amusingly arrogant as a young man who has just discovered an old idea and thinks it is his own.
– Sidney J. Harris

… and I think it is fitting in this situation for various reasons. This argument of “butch/femme as reproductions of the patriarchal compulsory gender roles” et cetera is old, nearly forty years old at least. It strikes me as ignorant and arrogant and young to go around spouting opinions about things which one knows very little. These are old ideas, they are not radical, they are recycled, get your facts straight.On the other hand: there is much value in observation. And there are many, many butches and femmes who – I believe – to fully pass judgement here – are NOT using these identities as subversive tools, but rather ARE reproducing the heteronormative paradigm (gasp! I said it!).

Mostly, I feel like I have no ability or right to draw conclusions about how other people occupy and use their gender. However, occasionally I get the chance to actually converse with someone about it, and I am often shocked at the ignorance and thoughtlessness.

So, here’s what I haven’t said during this gender rant exploration yet:

Sometimes, butch/femme is a reproduction, a mimicry. And honestly, I disapprove of that. I believe that because of the grand amount of gender injustice that happens, because of the prevalence and acceptance of misogyn, because of the objectification and damage done by compulsory gender rules, we must – MUST – do some deep searching and analysis as to how institutionalized oppressive structures function and effect our lives. Especially the big ones: race, class, gender, sexuality. It is life-altering to understand how they work. I honestly think feminism and women studies played a huge role in my dealing with my depression, and the shock of becoming an adult woman in this culture.

But I digress.

This help that gender analysis and theory offers is where feminism comes in. And 1907s US lesbian-feminism – also closely related to what I tend to call “white western feminism,” WWF – was limited in its view at times, dismissing all butch/femme representations as hetero or all hetero sex as rape (coughDworkincough). Obviously there are some issues with these limitations.

BUT!

Though this may be a mainstream understanding of What Feminists Think, it is not the only understandings of sex that feminists hold. And to dismiss feminism as only viewing things this way is also limiting.

So. In summary: sometimes butch/femme is a reproduction of the compulsory misogynistic heteronormative gender roles. This is why we must examine the hierarchical structures in which we operate and make conscious choices about how we participate or resist.

And, not everyone’s participation or resistance looks the same. That’s why I try to talk to people about this stuff. Ask questions, listen, be aware. I feel like that’s all I can do, is attempt to understand the wild and precious ways we all live our lives.

identity politics

Top 10 things I love about femmes

Posted on by Sinclair Sexsmith

  1. Strappy sandals, roman sandals laced up the ankle, legwarmers, flowery skirts – the legs, the legs, the legs

  2. The moments of subversion when I expect gender to be aligned with compulsory femininity, and I am surprised

  3. Delicate jewelry, fingernail polish, pierced ears, garter belts, purses, glasses

  4. The way she walks in high heels

  5. The under-the-eyelashes fuck-me look

  6. The feminine curves of cleavage and the clavicle

  7. The struggles with not being visibly out, which also brings the privilege of hearing what people say when they don’t know someone queer is listening

  8. Holding the door open, holding your umbrella, ordering for you, pulling out your chair, that moment when you take my arm, carrying your heavy burdons, cradling your delicacy …

  9. The examination, overhaul, and eventual reclamation or rejection of “traditional femme hobbies”

  10. When a boy actually turns you off … but I turn you on

miscellany

thank you ladies. you didn’t have to say that*

Posted on by Sinclair Sexsmith


Team Gina, Butch/Femme

I like butch girls and I cannot lie
you other femmes can’t deny
when a butch walks in, all the femmes wanna fuss
’cause there’s like one of them and thirty of us …

Brilliant! I don’t usually post media here, but this is oh so relevant to the current topics of conversation.I really wonder what kind of conversation happened on the set here. Where’d they find all these butches? Do they identify as butch? Were they hesitant to be involved in this video because they didn’t identify as butch?

And how about that part at the end, when the butch is “flaggin’ a bottom” – she vehemently denies it: “I’m a top, I swear!” – I like the subversiveness of the lyrics there, the femmes singing “I ain’t trying to be predictable, but you’re gonna have to pin me against this wall” (I would like that), but it is a tiny moment where I wonder about the reinforcement of the butch/top femme/bottom dynamics.

Really though, this shit is fucken brilliant.

* Flight of the Conchords

journal entries

don’t you know it

Posted on by Sinclair Sexsmith

“Oh fuck –
God – yes – fucking hell –
holy shit – oh god – god –
oh fuck – oh god – oh – yes –
fuck –
oh fuck –
god –
holy shit … “

“You’ve got quite a mouth on you, Mr. Sexsmith.”

journal entries

things I’ve never done, but would like to try

Posted on by Sinclair Sexsmith

  1. Fuck a girl’s ass with a strapon (is it still called pegging if it’s two women, or is pegging unique to a woman strapped on fucking a guy?). I’ve done plenty of ass-play, but somehow the women I’ve been with have never actually been comfortable enough with it for me to be strapped on. I have, however, fucked a guy this way, once upon a time.

  2. Stingy toys, like a cane. I’d like to leave some marks. I’ve used a cane before, actually, but I don’t own one, and I’d like to experiment to feel more comfortable with it

  3. Receive – and give – a cutting

  4. Role-play out in a bar, pretend we don’t know each other and pick each other up. I suppose that has a lot of variations (resistance, convincing).

  5. Sex in central park, sex in every girl club in new york city (the bathroom, the back room, the alley, the deserted dancefloor, wherever), sex at work. After hours, in an empty office, wherever. I’ve done that, actually, though not at my current job.

  6. Play with knives. And yes, I think I’d like to be the one holding the knife, although that could be negotiable.

  7. And, last but not least, recent events have told me that I need to practice my flogging & rope bondage.

journal entries

this is my life

Posted on by Sinclair Sexsmith

Lately it seems I have had a lot of these moments when I get a screenshot of what I’m doing loaded in my head, and I think, holy shit. This is my life.Thursday night, it was that gorgeous blonde, on top of me, straddling my cock, grinding against me, hands in her hair, head turned to one side mouth open eyes shut, moaning, my hands on her hips – and I nearly laughed.

“You better not be laughing with a naked lady in the room,” she gave me a look like she was going to smack me, but her eyes were playful.

I tried to explain. This is my life, I said. I think she got it.

Friday, it was out with an amazing group of new friends, at a vegan cafe with prosecco, at a stunning concert with New York’s skyline in the background, then at the local watering hole (aka dyke bar) where I actually ran into people I know – that doesn’t ever happen to me! I was out on the town with (dare I name it) my community, sitting around a picnic table with cider and beer and bourbon, talking about sex and strapons and relationships and how to invite what you want into your life and topping and bottoming and delivering and love and romance and doting upon and, of course, gender …

It is the first time in a long time, probably many years, that I have heard last call at a bar. We were all so excited to be connecting, communicating friends that we didn’t want to leave.

Lucky for us, there is a rooftop barbecue already planned for this afternoon.

I gotta say, it is really fucken great to be me right now. And I am so, so grateful.

journal entries

there’s a reason some things are cliche

Posted on by Sinclair Sexsmith
Email to Joy:

Subject: hi, this is me emailing you

day after. my impulse is to be poetic and make reference to the willow tree while walking home, the curve of your hip, the way our bodies fit against each other in quiet moments, the way you move, smell, taste.

but then that sounds all dramatic.

so I’ll just say, I had a great night with you. there is still more I want to know. let’s do it again.

identity politics

Top 10 things I love about being butch

Posted on by Sinclair Sexsmith

  1. I am visibly queer

  2. I give visibility to femmes, which make both of our identities more subversive

  3. It challenges the sex/gender assumption

  4. Belts, suspenders, wingtip shoes, vests, motorcycle boots, leather bracelets, briefs, boxers, fedoras, ties

  5. My cock collection

  6. Moments of being “in” with the straight boys when they are able to have an open discussion with me about sex & gender

  7. The way me and my gender make so much more sense when up against a femme and her gender

  8. Re-inventing masculinity

  9. When gay boys or straight girls think I’m hot

  10. The awkward greeting of “yes, sir?” at a restaurant/deli/library, only to be followed with “Uh, ma’am, uh, sorry, uh…”

  11. [And one bonus reason:] Following in my mother’s footsteps and rejecting femininity, but for completely different reasons

identity politics

Top 10 things I love about being gay

Posted on by Sinclair Sexsmith

  1. There’s that whole fucking women thing. Yeah, I like that.

  2. It challenges all sorts of compulsory hegemonic systems and encourages new ways of acceptance, tolerance, living, and loving

  3. The community! We have such fighters, artists, activists, lovers – I love our arts and culture, our philosophies, our theories

  4. Drag kings, drag queens, and queer burlesque

  5. That we are a lineage of kisses; because we do not inheret our legacies through our blood-related families, we must claim our heritage through our desire, love, play, and kisses

  6. Getting over the “ick factor” – which is what I’d call a lesbian’s aversion to men (and masculinity) or a gay boy’s aversion to women (and femininity) – and creating alignments with all sorts of genders within the queer spectrum

  7. The synthesis of feminism, gender, and sexual revolution

  8. The brilliance and hilarity of our (mainstream) queer celebrities – Ellen, k.d., Harvey Feirstein, John Waters, George Michael, Jenny Shimitzu, Rosie – and our media – Better than Chocolate, But I’m a Cheerleader, Bound, Queer as Folk, Brokeback Mountain, Will & Grace … and dozens more. They really are forging through.

  9. The Pride Parade & Dyke March. Stonewall. Knowing where I come from. Honoring traditions, and making new ones

  10. I do have a great toaster oven from all those young’uns I’ve converted …

dirty stories, fiction

The Popsicle in the Library

Posted on by Sinclair Sexsmith

Sugarbutch Star honorable mention submission from Jennifer

Popsicle in the Library

“You know there’s no food allowed in the library,” I growl in her ear, pressing her stomach against the concrete stairwell wall. I’m speaking quietly but it still echoes.

“Unh,” she groans, not able to form words, mouth open.

“Not very polite of you, breaking the rules like that.” I lift her dress and shove my hands under the edge of her panties. She’s wet.

“Oh, you like this, do you? You’re enjoying this?” I flick my fingers over her cunt, then pull my hand away. She wimpers, echoing in the stairwell.

“You want something to suck on, girl, you take this,” and I let up on the pressure against her. She peels her cheek away from the concrete. I take my hand from her hair and unzip my fly, pull out my packing cock, bend it straight. “Go on, suck it.”

She drops to her knees, lips red from the cherry popsicle she’d been sucking lewdly when I walked up to her. And here I’d thought we’d had a study date. Her legs were all long in the windowsill, summery dress light and airy and when she moved her knees I could see the thin cream fabric covering her pussy, the outline of her lips, plump, thick.

She offered the sweet, bright red popsicle to me. “Want some?” Eyes all sly and sparkly, playful smile on her mouth.

I shook my head no. Crossed my arms over my chest. Raised one eybrow and nod for her to continue.

She does. Slides the whole thing into her mouth and cherry juice gets on her chin.

And now she sucks me just like she was working that sticky treat, sucking it like she could pull the juice from me too, like she could use the muscles in her cheeks to draw the cum from me and swallow it all.

Fuck. I want her to make me shoot in her mouth like that. Oh I wish I could.

I groan. “Enough.” I say and pull her to her feet. I don’t take her panties off, just lift her dress and finger the fleshy parts of her ass with my hand, then give it a good smack.

Not too hard. I cup my palm a little bit and it echoes perfectly, which makes the slight sting more impressive because it sounds so loud. I smack again. She cries out a little. Again, harder, and she yelps, I hear it floors away. My cock is still out and I shove it into her. Hard. Slide it in all the way. She whimpers, presses her hands into the concrete, the side of her face, presses her ass into me, spreads her legs.

She actually shouts, my thrusts pounding the noise out of her.

“Quiet.” I say, harsh, in her ear.

She is still wimpering. Trying to be quiet and she whispers, “I’m gonna spew if you keep fucking me like that.”

“Oh yeah? You’re a messy one, eh? Bring it on, bitch. Come on, come for me.” My mouth at her ear and my hands on her hips, head of my cock hitting her g-spot, I can feel it, and she comes hard, wet, dripping, soaking my cock, her thighs, the floor, my shoes. Her body shudders but that’s not all I can get out of her and I pull out and twist her around before she’s regained her composure, slide my fingers in, slide my hand in, reach up and inside her and I can feel the spots to press and I do.

I growl, “Do it again,” and she shakes her head no but she’s gasping, legs wide and on her tiptoes on the wet floor. She grabs for my wrist to pull me back, embarrasment in her eyes and she can feel her own cum dripping down her legs, but I don’t let up.

I take hold of her hair with my other hand and pull her head back, press my mouth to her jaw saying, “Come on, I’m gonna make you. You’re going to come just for me. Fuck yeah, do it. I’m gonna make you, fuck yeah, fuck yeah.”

And she wraps her arms around my neck and comes, and comes, and comes.

identity politics

What Gender Is

Posted on by Sinclair Sexsmith

… and the beginnings (continuings) of My Gender Manifesto.A little bit of conversation about femme (specificially) and gender (in general) is happening over in this last post, and I have some things to add, especially about a comment on “butch in the streets, femme in the sheets.”

Essin’ Em said: “I hate the phrase “a butch in the streets, femme in the sheets” because it places value on each…is there something wrong with being a Femme in the sheets?”

And, duh, you probably already know my response, at least to begin with. Of course there’s nothing wrong with being a femme in the sheets, let’s just make that clear.

I love femmes in my sheets. My favorite. Rawr.

But.

That’s not quite what this phrase is saying, or means, in my opinion. The implication that a “butch in the streets” would be a femme in bed is implying – and correct me if I’m wrong here! – that the butch was a bottom. Someone who didn’t have the gruff masculine throw-down take-charge style that is assumed to come with the butch gender identity.

Which comes from the assumption that all butches are tops.

Which comes from the heterosexual gender hierarchy, which tells us that men are the agressors, women are submissive. Men are in charge, women are passive. Men take, women receive. Et cetera, et cetera, ad infinitum.

But, see, these things are actually different. Being butch is a gender, and being a bottom is sexuality (a sexual orientation? What is that category?). And to assume that all butches are tops or all femmes are bottoms is to buy into That Infamous Heteronormative (and misogynist!) Paradigm.

With me so far?

And, it’s just not true! Femmes are tops AND bottoms AND switches! Butches are tops AND bottoms AND switches! And, there are tops and bottoms and switches who do not consider themselves either butch, or femme. One thing does not necessarily constitute the other.

This is absolutely one of those places where butch and femme should – and MUST, in my opinion – deviate from heteronormativity. Come on, we’ve gone through the sexual revolution and the gender revolution, for pussy’s sake. We can differentiate between biological sex, between-the-sheets sex, and gender.

I’m not sure “butch in the streets, femme in the sheets” would EVER be an accurate description of anyone, unless their gender actually changed while “in the sheets.” And I’m not sure how that would happen … would they put on lingerie? A dress? Heels? I might prostelitize that that person had a cross-dressing fetish, rather than becoming femme in the sheets – but perhaps that’s the same thing? I’m not sure about that.

And this leads me to another interesting point. What is gender, anyway? What is butch, what is femme? How to define these ever-elusive, ever-complex terms? And, as bird and I were saying just last night, how do we make these terms expansive, rather than limiting?

Here’s what I think.

Gender is about my physical body: how I appear, the clothes I wear, the accessories I choose. And, it’s part of the way that I communicate physically, and thus becomes a big part of my sexual life, which is all about my body communicating with another’s body.

My hobbies, interests, values, activities, and personality are not dictated by my gender. I refuse to let them be. Those are dictated by ME. My unique spirit, whatever hippie shit you want to use to describe my “essence.”

This was one of the hardest, hardest things for me, in coming out as butch, after I came out as queer. Because I’d grown up in a very feminist household that devalued gender, wrote it off as compulsory and constrictive. And, yes, absolutely, it has been that – women forced to wear skirts, men forced to keep their hair short, etc. But this is not where we are anymore.

There is still work to be done, don’t get me wrong – and, in fact, for me, this is the work, right here.

I can pick and choose what aspects of gender that I want to adopt. Some of them work; some of them do not.

I, for example, am really interested in processing, emotional intelligence, gender theory, feminism, psychology, sociology, how people relate to other people, group dynamics … and those have, at times, been interpreted to being “feminine” traits, yes? And reading, cooking, preparing nutritous meals, home decorating/interior design, organizing, collecting.

And when I came out as butch (which was a long process for me, it took about 4 years, much longer than it took me to come out as queer), I went through a long time period where I was really struggling with what it meant to adopt a butchness, to be butch at all. I loved the suave masculinity of collared button-down shirts, boy jeans, polos, tee shirts with cigarette packs rolled into the sleeve, vests, fedoras, pinstripe suits, wing-tip shoes, motorcycle boots … and I wanted it. I wanted to BE that. But I didn’t know how to BE that without being the rest of masculinity, too – the “tough guise” of machismo, of violence, of emotional miscommunication, of misogyny.

I guess I figured it out: I separated gender from personality.

Butch is a masculine presentation of the body.

Just as femme is a feminine presentation of the body.

And there is a whoooooole lot of room there, within “presentation,” in my opinion. I know butches who wear lacy thongs, I know femmes who have short hair. I know butches who wear heels and skirtsuits, I know femmes who rarely wear much more than sweatpants or jeans.

My test, then, I suppose, for the butch/femme sphere, is the Dress-Up Test. If I am getting fancied up, do I put on a suit and tie, or a dress? And some of us, of course, would say “it depends” — well sure, that’s a gender too. I guess that’s what I might call genderqueer, though we don’t really have much of a label for it. Somebody should create one. Hint, hint.

There are certain things that gender does dictate when it comes to action or personality, but that seems to be primarily set around chivalry, which is really that physical communication aspect of sex and relationships.

Ahem. For example:

I hold my hand out for a femme who is walking in heels next to me when we go down stairs, because I want her to have something solid to hold onto in those high heels. I switch sides of the sidewalk when I notice a grate or something she can’t walk over. I open the door for her because I don’t want her to ding up her fingernails that she spent two hours perfecting. I take her coat because her dress is tight and if she lifts her arms up above her shoulders it could actually damage the dress.

I am aware of the ways that her gender – her physical body – interacts with the world, and I want to enhance that presentation, cradle her, protect her, celebrate her ways of showing off her beautiful, sexual, powerful self.

Just like she does for me.

dirty stories, real life

Gender Is A Sex Toy

Posted on by Sinclair Sexsmith

My favorite part of last night was the way she said please. Please, please, like a whisper, or a prayer. At the bar, she told me was disappointed I hadn’t emailed her back.

“Ah,” I said. I didn’t have a good excuse. But when I discovered she’d be at this party I made note, and made sure to be there.

“I kind of want to go talk to her,” I told my friend, who I’d arrived with.

“Do it, chickenshit,” she said, “just go do it, no big deal … ” and proceeded to say something else supportive, made to boost me up, but I got distracted: she walked up to me, put her hand on my arm, and said, “Sorry to interrupt …” Oh no, no problem. We were only talking about how I should go talk to you, anyway.

I told her I’d Googled her after we met. She was embarrassed. She had Googled me as well, made a reference to the video of my spoken word she’d found.

I told her I’d been up to my knees in gender theory this week, trying to uncover and then articulate the reasons why butch and femme were subversive. I asked if she identified as femme – I would put her in that vague category, red strappy sandals, silver hoop earrings, but I know some people hate being categorized.

“I suppose I look femme,” she said, “but I don’t think I really act femme, and I certainly don’t fuck like a femme.”

We got interrupted, but I wanted to ask her what she meant. Or rather, I didn’t want her to tell me, I wanted to find out. I took it to mean that she’s not a “pillow queen,” which most would say derogatorily when referencing a femme in the bedroom. And that is a moment where butch/femme is operating under the assumption as a reproduction of the heteronormative paradigm, and not necessarily a re-visioning of the compulsory gender hierarchy.

And this also reminds me of another point I haven’t yet discussed during this gender conversation – what I believe gender is and what kind of role it should play in my life. (More on both of these soon. There’s so much to say and explore about gender.)

Another friend of hers said she wasn’t so into gender. “I hate it when it takes girls like three hours to get ready,” she said. “I’d rather spend two and a half hours enjoying your company, and half an hour getting ready.”

“I can get that,” I said, “but I also want to acknowledge how much fucking effort it takes to be femme. It isn’t just roll-outta-bed, tussle-the-hair-with-product like it is for us” – I indicated myself and the friend – “it takes a lot more work. And I gatta say, I love what that work creates. It’s an art form, a creative expression. And, not to sound egotistical, but I also kind of see it as for me, something to get my attention, get me going, and I love that – love that I’m worth that effort.”

“Plus,” I added, “I can enjoy her company while she’s getting ready, can’t I?”

Clearly, this was the foreplay.

“So,” she said later, after we’d been sharing life stories, still drinking pints at the bar, “when are you going to kiss me?”

Then my hand on her cheek. Soft lips, and oh she tasted fantastic.

I felt oh so rude, having pretty much completely ditched my very good friend and a gaggle of other queer girls (some of whom I knew, and others of which seemed fantastic! I wanted to meet them, hand out, socialize! So easily distracted by the hot girl … ), but I didn’t let that stop me, and we took a cab to my house.

We were both tipsy. She looked at my bookcases, went through my iTunes (Animaniacs, Gretchen Wilson, Dolly Parton, Garrison Starr … and I discovered that my sexmix is seriously outdated. Seriously. I should’ve just put on Morphine. It was laughable, honestly). And then we were naked, in my bed.

“Lube?” she asked.

“I’ll get it … ”

“No, let me. Where?”

“In the toolbox, under the bed.”

“The toolbox. Of course.”

I leaned over to pull it out. She fisted me easily, though it was too much to sustain for very long. But oh it is sometimes so lovely to be filled, stretched.

Later, fingers not enough, I said: “Can I get my cock out yet?”

“Oh god yes. Please.” That please again. The way she whispers it. Makes my stomach contract as if punched.

I like the way she moved. The way her body curved, the way she wasn’t shy but would put herself where she wanted to be. I would probably call her more of a top, though we didn’t discuss those identities. And it made me realize – or perhaps remember – that I don’t really surrender well. My impulse is to take, to overpower, to do the throw-down. I have a harder time as the one being thrown down. Not sure why. There are certainly times that I can let go, give in, get fucked – but honestly, if I hadn’t made her come yet, I feel distracted by the want of that, the desire to do so.

Given the option of me getting off and not her, or her getting off and not me, I would be much more satisfied with the latter. I get such satisfaction out of making girls come.

It was hard to get her off. “We’ve learned a valuable lesson about alcohol,” she said. “Four beers is too many?” I asked. “Four beers was what it took for me to ask you to take me home,” she answered, “so it was necessary.”

[Another tangent: I actually find that I rarely get off – or get her off – the first time I’m with a girl. There’s a learning curve to discovering her body and what she likes. Which is yet another reason why I’m not so good at one-night stands, I like to build that understanding, that communication, between our bodies.]

Pillow talk consisted of our favorite books. The Sparrow by Mary Doria Russel, Time Traveler’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger, and Crush by Richard Siken, I said. I talked about sci-fi and fantasy, her genres. What I liked and disliked. She said she had one in particular I needed to read. This means I just may see her again.

I walked her to the subway at two am to wait with her because I knew it’d be a while before the train came. As we walked, I switched sides with her so her heels wouldn’t get caught in the sidewalk subway grate, and it was a beautiful little gender dance, gender connection, my brief protection of the ways she presents her sexuality and desire through her gender.

I really love those moments. Gender is such a sex toy.

identity politics

This week’s gender discussion: roundup

Posted on by Sinclair Sexsmith

What’s been going on with this huge ol’ gender conversation, you ask? Well, here’s the roundup.This particular conversation this week was sparked by an anonymous comment on Bottoming is topping and vice versa, where the commentor asked, “why do lesbians hold true the male ideal of duality?” (and etc.)

I then wrote a post on the outdate questions on binaries where I wanted to address precisely why butch and femme are not inherently reproductions of the heteronormative paradigm (seems like folks kinda liked that phrase, it got picked up a lot).

Around the same time, Miss Lina posted A Gay Shame, a reproduction of an article in her local gay rag about the butch/femme dynamic and how outdated/heteronormative/etc that it is, and I nearly fell outta my chair with frustration.

I realized that it was actually incredibly difficult to explain precisely why I thought that butch and femme weren’t simply imitations of the straight world, even though I believed firmly that that was true. So I quoted from the GLBTQ dictionary and listed some further resources, brought it up to some of my butch & femme buddies, and cracked open my ol’ gender theory books to see what I could find.

I got a lot of comments, some of them extremely wonderful and helpful as I was attempting to sort out my own ideas on the subjects. And other writers began posting their own thoughts on these complex subjects.

Dylan wrote about checks and balances: “For me, a constant system of checks and balances keeps everything aligned and when it is not I am the first to make myself accountable. Examining where stray thoughts, decisions or actions might have originated from, I am able to not only challenge if my own beliefs are ones I want to continue to uphold, but more so, why I hold them to begin with.”

Bird on the Wire wrote on queer politics, and the places that she overlaps with the queer community, and places where they have been exclusionary and offensive “i identify as queer or gay, but in reality i am bisexual. granted, all but one of my relationships was with a woman. i find both men and women interesting and attractive and would hate to close myself off to any potential amazing experiences just because society prefers me to date men exclusively and the gay community prefers me to date women exclusively. i find it offensive to suggest that i am “straddling a fence” as if this is a choice i consciously make any more than anyone else. i find it offensive to suggest that i am any less gay than a lesbian who would never consider the possibility of sleeping with a man. i came out at 15, i suffered the same hardships, the same ostracizing, the same heartbreak, the same political battles.”

Miss Avarice, in continuing to work through her femme identity, wrote about femme-ism: “Here’s the riddle: I embrace my femininity when it attracts women, and I reject my femininity when it attracts men.”

I started compiling my ideas and posted further points on gender, then on the places where butch & femme are incredibly subversive, and why.

Just for fun, I published something I’d written weeks ago, but that seemed relevant, which was a little list on the care and feeding of a butch (ahem, that would be me), and a little gender play on the ever-so-popular lolcats format.

I still have a lot to say about gender, resistance, social change, the heteronormative paradigm, subversion, butch/femme identities and (so-called) “role playing” … and I’ll do my best to type up more of that today.

It’s been a hellova week here in sexblog world … I am really loving being part of this. I’ve spent more time on Sugarbutch, writing things for Sugarbutch (you should see how many draft posts I have right now), writing in the margins of my books and printouts of various articles on gender, and journalling about my own personal beliefs. It’s one of the reasons I put up those ads in the sidebar – I’m torn about it, but as I’m spending more & more time keeping up with this website, I want to encourage, and even request, some compensation for my time. If only I could just sit around and have these discussions on sex, gender, sexuality, and relationships all day every day. I’d have revolutionary theories in no time. Hmmm, I should find out who would pay me to do that kind of thing.

(If I missed your post on gender, sorry about that – let me know & I’ll gladly add it.)

dirty stories, fiction

Her Mouth on My Cock

Posted on by Sinclair Sexsmith

This is an honorable mention Sugarbutch Star submission from the femme top. And yes I know I never posted about our second date … consider it on the way.

I can feel everything. Every breath every movement every inch where my skin is bound with leather. Wrists, ankles. I can hear my heart beat. Can see my chest moving up and down, the skin thin and flushed. I swallow. Focus on the ceiling; you are kneeling, strapping on. Hand on the thick of it, slick with lube. I am exposed. Open to you and you want me here, this way.

My hips are cramping, pulled back like this. Even my underarms are exposed. I don’t want to struggle but my body can’t stop. A twist of my wrist and my ankle is pulled up further, I feel it in my thigh. Everything is connected.

I don’t want to want it like I do. Don’t want to need, to crave to be filled when I’m like this. To be reduced to something empty, inadequate, unwhole.

Make me whole.

Make me scream.

You have your eyes on me and I blink back tears. You slap my cunt. I cringe, cry out. I don’t want to say please. I don’t want to need the sting of your fingers which are wet now, from me. I don’t want you to know how much I crave: touch me again. Twist the bar so I can’t keep struggling, and make me feel. Make me feel even the places I refuse to let you in. Make me.

Your eyes are shining wet like your cock. Your hand is on it. I want to be closed to you but you have me open, unlocked already and spilling my secrets. I need to hide my every imperfection. Need to hide my want. You can have me. My body is all nerve endings and convulses at every touch: your hands on the backs of my thighs. No need to open me further, this is all there is, this is all there is. Take me so I can only ever be taken by you. Take me so I wake inside myself screaming your name. Take me to where I feel again, where I feel anything, all of it, open, receptive, receiving, submitting.

You can have me. I give in, I give in.

It is agonizingly slow, a steady slide, all the way in, tip to base, and I can feel it, feel it, feel it, all the way up to the back of my throat, and I loosen, lose my grip, lose myself, but you keep hold of me, and I am only a vessel, something to hold you, cradle you, something to take it in, to receive, and I become only energy, light, lightning, and I am made whole.

miscellany

lolgender

Posted on by Sinclair Sexsmith

All this gender analysis & discourse lately made this pop into my head on my commute this morning … I’d prefer it to be a photo of me, but since I’m still attempting to maintain a shred of anonymity, Marlena Dietrich will have to do. She kind of makes it a little more playful, actually, less like an identity and more like a costume, which I actually like, although it has a slightly different meaning this way.PS: I know lolcats usually use a much less gramatically correct syntax, but I think the point still comes across. kthxbye.

miscellany

sugasm #92

Posted on by Sinclair Sexsmith

The best of this week’s blogs by the bloggers who blog them. Highlighting the top 3 posts as chosen by Sugasm participants. This Week’s Picks …

do one thing every day that scares you
Interview With Deborah Jeane Palfrey, AKA The DC Madam
Rough Sex – with pictures
Mr. Sugasm Himself: Keep Britain Tidy, Gimp
Editor’s Choice: In Her Mind, the Pigeons Were Always Fucking

More Sugasm Join the Sugasm See also: Fleshbot’s Sex Blog Roundup each Tuesday and Friday.

more sugasm …

identity politics

Gender Dynamics in the Sexblog Community

Posted on by Sinclair Sexsmith

Welcome to the community, Colleen and Jake. Even just a few months ago the dyke-run sexblogs were few and far between, but this little empire (car tires & chicken wires) of ours is growing. Have you seen my “Playin’ for My Team” sidebar list recently? Not all of those are exclusively sexblogs, but most of them are. But here’s a funny thing … almost all of these dyke-run sexblogs, though, are from self-defined femmes. Hey, all the better for me, really, but where are the butches?Similarly, I was at the Pervert’s Saloon Tea Party this past Sunday, and it was me, Jefferson, and six other women – Tess, Viviane, Calico, Selina, Rachel, and Lolita. (I missed Madeline, who has been there every other time I’ve been to a tea party, and I’m sure I wasn’t the only one.) We were interviewed by Craig Collinson of Nobles Gate for his documentary “A Sex Bloggesy” about, um, sexbloggers.

That’s us. Anonymized in the interviewer’s monitor. Photo borrowed from Viviane.There was a question at some point about the imbalance of genders in the room – At one point, Jefferson said (about me), “Well hey, you’re the only man in the room …” This imbalance is in the sexblog community in general, too. We did some speculation as to why this is. The interviewer even brought up the idea that women are not as sexual creatures as men. I think, honestly, he was playing TO the stereotypes intentionally, though he was also asking us to defend/discuss it. I spent much of the interview biting my fist to keep from jumping up on the table and start proselytizing.

And, what is that about, anyway? That it is primarily women who are running sexblogs? Oh, I have some ideas.

  1. The mainstream audience for porn is, of course, men, so women are better able to get a handle or corner on the potential marketability of a sexblog.

  2. Because of the way patriarchy works (gasp, the P word), men don’t have to examine or question or explore sex in order to figure out how to get pleasure, how to get validation, and how to reconcile their identity as a sexual person, because it’s socially acceptable and, in fact, encouraged, for a man to be sexually explorative. This is still not true for women.

  3. Women, as a whole, do tend to be more verbal (whether it’s nature or nurture, we can have that argument another time), and also attach more emotion to sex, probably for biological purposes (and this has been proven by sociobiological scientists, not just stereotypes). Therefore the act of sex is potentially more complicated and problematic for women (?? … I’m brainstorming here, don’t mind my generalities).

  4. There has been a lot of work done by women on the gender of femininity in the last forty years (holy smokes, second-wave feminism was forty years ago?) because of the sexual and gender revolutions of the 1960s and 70s. Therefore, many many many of the limitations and constrictions that were previously placed upon women and femininity have been deconstructed and revalued, and, generally, quite successfully I think. This is NOT to say that I think feminism is over, or that we are now in a post-feminist state – only that women and the feminist movement have done a lot of work on the feminine gender, which may actually be leading to how women are able to take control of and elaborate upon their various sexualities via writing on the Internet. However, that work has not been done in the same way by/for masculinity and men. I would argue, in fact, that that is where the next gender revolution needs to come: from and for men, revaluing and deconstructing masculinity and the mandatory tough guise. However, because we are STILL in a patriarchy, and STILL value maleness more than femaleness, men haven’t been forced to do this – yet. I don’t know how I can help fuel this revolution-to-come, but I sure would like to.

  5. Hmmm … anything else? (I’m digging this list format. Feels like my ideas are more organized this way.) I’ll keep thinking about this question. So, riddle me this, folks: Why is the sexblog community dominated by women? And why are the queer women sexblogs primarily femme? Where are the gayboy sexblogs, anyway?

So, after the interviewers left, we went back to our regular fabulous Tea Party, catching up with each other, discussing and processing and catching up.Viviane, always the amazing host, made strawberry shortcake and mint juleps, along with watercress & goat cheese tea sandwiches. And delicious tea, of course, both iced and hot. Selina brought beautiful cups & saucers for our tea, Rachel ran out to get the proper milk, and looked gorgeous in her summery dress. Selina had some pretty fantastic heels on that she’d discovered in London, and Tess … well, Tess had heels on too. (Oh I’m such a sucker for stilettos.) Lolita had a beautiful new cutting by Jefferson Sharrin Spector (who wasn’t there, but Lolita gave me her link so I figured I’d include it. I’m kinda jealous, I want a cutting). Calico I met for the first time, who is a newcomer to this scene but is already making quite the impression. And Jefferson, of course, infamous Jefferson, was showing off his rubber ducky boxers by the end of the night.

What else happened at this tea party, you ask?

Well … After the girls said they’d gotten pedicures just so they could wear their fancy shoes, I mentioned that I cut my fingernails just for the party … to which of course Jefferson retorted, “What, did you think you were going to get laid?” … which was the beginning of the shenanigans.

Jefferson told me “what gender is” while we were in the kitchen devilling eggs. To be fair, I thought he was saying “ginger,” because of his cute little southern accent, which prompted me to ask what the hell he was talking about. Although ginger wasn’t actually that out of context considering we’d been discussing ginger butt fucking (apparently called figging?) just shortly before.

It’s true what they’re saying, I did get a little lesson in flogging from Lolita, as did Tess and Selina. I felt out of practice and incredibly embarrassed, actually. Because I am good at flogging. Actually, quite good. And I hated being seen, in front of a roomful of experienced people, of whom I was one of the youngest, as not experienced in something I am good at. It was very frustrating. Really, it made me draw the conclusion that I need to flog more, to be sure to keep my skills fresh. … perhaps I should seek volunteers.

Viviane did a bit of a roundup, Tess wrote about it, and Lolita did too.

One last thing: I really have NO idea what I said on camera, what quotes of mine (if any) will be used. The one thing I did really want to press was how much I believe that our discussions of sex, relationships, and gender in these online communities is actually an act of social change and revolution. That it helps and encourages open communication about pleasure, identity, and of course sex, all of which are still taboo. We’re makin’ history here, we’re paving the way for a more sophisticated, more particular, safer, happier, much improved cultural dealings with sex. And I am oh so grateful to be a part of that, even in the smallest way.

dirty stories, fiction

Charcoal Portrait in the Art Studio

Posted on by Sinclair Sexsmith

This is an honorable mention from the Sugarbutch Star contest, from Grey. Written from her perspective. I plan to post a few more honorable mentions as well – I am attempting to keep them short, little snippets of a scene rather than the entire build-up and tear-down that I usually include in my stories. I’m doing this to challenge myself and my writing, but it’s also because there were so many great submissions, but I don’t have time to write them all for the contest, unfortunately.

Charcoal Portrait in the Art Studio

There is only the light scratching of my charcoal on paper. Thick and cream, deckled edges on plyboard. Held in my lap. An indication of shadow here. Of hip, of thigh.

She’s posing for me, only a black tie around her neck, black leather harness around her hips, black strap-on eagerly poised. She’s draped on the white studio couch. She’s calm and steady. She’s watching me.

A flick of my wrist and a line for her jaw, her left breast. The angles of her come to life. I recreate her. She lets me.

I fill in details. Impressions of her, sultry, on paper, fall around me like winter is coming. I tear off another sheet and she is moving toward me, all eyes and hips, that cocky swagger.

I drop my charcoal. My fingers are blackened with it. Her lips are at my ear: “Which curves are you still missing?” She takes my hand, sets it on her hip. “This one?” On her stomach. “This?” On her thigh. “Here?”

I swallow the hesitation in my throat.

“Come on,” she says. “You can do better than that.” And I can.

She shows me. Her tongue sketches curves and I am recreated by her from the inside when she slides.

Her lips are charcoal, and my skin is perfect paper.

identity politics

The care & feeding of a butch

Posted on by Sinclair Sexsmith

  1. When I look handsome, tell me so. That look of appreciation in your eyes for my masculinity makes me melt.

  2. Let me open doors for you, hold your umbrella, carry your bags, pull our your chair, refill your drink. These are the ways I call you precious.

  3. When I am moody, let me have space. I will come back to you for help when I am ready.

  4. Take my left elbow while we are walking. It makes me feel like I am promenading you, and plus our bodies can be closer that way than with handholding.

  5. Don’t make a big deal out of it if I cook, clean, or cry. These may be “women’s things” (socialized or by nature, that’s a debate for another time) but I like to do them, I like my subversive gender, I was raised female too.

  6. Buy me boy presents like cuff links, ties, a flask, suspenders, a watch caddy, a shoe-shine kit. These are tokens that show how you celebrate my gender expression, just like when I buy you lingerie, flowers, perfume, jewelry.

  7. Watch (or read) porn with me sometimes. Then tell me how you’d do it better …

  8. Don’t assume I’m stone just cause I’m (a top, and) butch. I like sex – and getting off.

  9. Tell me when I fuck up, and let me fix it. I usually can. I’m handy that way.

identity politics

Butch/femme as a Disruption of the Heteronormative Paradigm

Posted on by Sinclair Sexsmith

This whole sex/gender conversation has had me skipping around today & yesterday with the singsong voice, saying, my readers are smarter than yours.Seriously though … I love love love that I am part of this conversation. Thanks for contributing, bouncing ideas off of me, bringing your thoughts.

Talk nerdy to me, baby.

I fucken love gender theory. This is reminding me of just how much. I did some reading yesterday and today, reminded myself of some of the other arguments in the dialogue on the butch/femme disruption of the heteronormative paradigm.

  1. The butch identity, particularly, though both the butch and femme genders, can be argued as an illustration for the deconstruction of the sex/gender alignment – that is, the assumption that gender and sex are the same thing, that gender comes from some sort of “essential” place based in biological sex – because if the codes and symbols of masculinity can be adopted by women (who, it could be argued, in some cases, can perform gender “better” than biological men), then gender is therefore something learned, not something innate. And thus butch/femme is a disruption and subversion of the hegemonic paradigm
  2. The femme identity particularly, but both the butch and femme genders, also draw attention to the performatibility of gender and how the symbols and codes can be adopted and learned. Specifically, since femme is a verison of femininity and is used not for the attraction of men but for the attraction of other women, femme challenges the very basic function of the feminine gender (attraction/pleasing of men), which, we are taught, is the sole purpose for these essentialized characteristics of the sex/gender binary.
  3. As much as the butch/femme dynamic is subversive to the dominant sex/gender system, I actually believe that it is also an imitation, at times. It must must must be extensively analyzed and carefully adopted because of the ways that the gender hierarchy can infiltrate our own sexual and relationship dynamics, and honestly, I might be more second wave about this than others, but I do strive for equality, I do strive for equal value in a relationship. I want to play with the power and gender and submission and control in sex, sure – but when it comes to value within the relationship, I do think it’s important to be on equal ground.

Okay, this concludes my gender rant for today. I have more to say – much more – and will write more on this as my thoughts get clearer. Thanks again, though, to those who have contributed to this conversation. Let’s keep it going, eh?

dirty stories, fiction

Threesome & A Purple Tie

Posted on by Sinclair Sexsmith

Thanks to Lady Brett Ashley for this submission, the second of the five finalists in the Sugarbtuch Star contest.

Threesome and a Purple Tie

Brett reaches up with one hand and peels off my purple tie, her blindfold, sticky against her forehead. Her mouth is full of her girlfriend’s cock. I watch her hesitate momentarily until she wiggles her hips a little, which is my acknowledgement. If her girlfriend is in her mouth, I must be the one fucking her from behind.

I hadn’t expected the evening to go this way. I had hoped to take Brett back to my place, sure, but as soon as her handsome and clearly doting soft butch girlfriend showed up as I easily fingered Brett’s jean-clad knee, I altered my evening expectations.

“Oh, you’re … spoken for,” I said, frowning, exaggerating my disappointment in order to hide it. “Too bad. Unless … I don’t suppose you’d want to share?” I look to the girlfriend. Eli. She sizes me up, then looks at Brett. Brett’s eyes sparkle and she gets this cheeky half-smile. I think Eli’s about to punch me, and they’ll have a fun night of what-if sex, then I think Brett might ditch Eli by the way she’s already devouring me with these smoldering looks, then I think Eli left Brett alone for just this reason: to find a third. I consider making a joke to Brett about feeling used, how I’d been on my very best charming pick-up behavior, but decide against it.

“Yeah, alright,” Eli shifts her weight, digs her hands into her pockets, also with a slight half-smile. She has nice arms: strong, defined muscles under her white tee shirt. She’s more girly than I am, but still more boyish than Brett, who is what I’d call subtle femme. May take a second glance, but it’s there.

Brett caught my eye as soon as I walked into the club. Nice ass, graceful legs. Pretty eyes behind her thick, long curly hair. Cute glasses that enhance the curves of her jaw and cheeks. I took the barstool next to hers and watched her laugh before I said hello.

I drain what’s left of my melted ice and Jameson. Their hotel is on the corner.

I untie my purple silk tie in the elevator. “Kiss her,” I say to Eli. She’s not sure she wants to take orders from me, but she wants to kiss Brett and she’s glad I didn’t move in to kiss her myself. Brett is curled against the corner of the elevator, watching us both interacting. She sometimes raises a finger to her mouth as if to bite her nail.

Eli carefully places each hand on the elevator wall behind Brett and leans in to kiss her. Brett watches me, still unslipping my tie, carefully undoing the knots, mouth moving against Eli, eyes open. I undo the top button of my silver shirt and hold one side of the tie in each hand.

And so it began.

The elevator doors open, I step through and wait for them to lead the way. A cute couple, attractive. Brett has a great ass.

Eli slides her keycard in and the trio of us enters the bland hotel room. Two beds, small table with an ice bucket and glasses, a chair that is a cheap knock-off of something comfortable. Their suitcases are on one bed. The other is perfectly made.

I toss the tie to Eli. “Care to blindfold her?” Brett turns to me, eyes wide, still quiet. Eli smiles and tosses it back to me. “You do it,” she says, crossing her arms over her chest. She’s smiling but also challenging me. I don’t understand this game yet.

I take two steps to Brett, who has saught protection from a wall again. I take her glasses and set them on the bed with the open suitcases. Her hair falls in her face, chin tipped down. Curls everywhere. I want handfuls of it. Fistfuls and to use it as rope, as something by which to pull her. It is long, past her shoulders. It would splay out everywhere. I finger her jaw, her cheekbone.

We have a moment. Eye contact, connecting. “Can I kiss you?” I ask. I’m asking her if she’s okay with this. She’s stealing sipping glances at me, looking down at my hands on her waist, looking back up, body language telling me she loves it, is just a little shy, but she likes to be told what to do.

She nods. Murmurs please or yes or okay or maybe just mmm. Her body goes soft against me and her hands find my waist, then lower back, then fingers dig into my shoulders as I kiss her. I like the way Brett lets go, trusts, lets me push her by my energy and intention. She picks up on the subtleties fast.

I draw her thin tee shirt over her head, a mess of dark curls spilling out. Eli Is at her back now, unhooking her bra, hands on her skin, her stomach, her shoulders, kissing her neck, rolling her nipples between her fingers and Brett leans back into her, one arm up, hand in Eli’s short cropped hair.

Topless, I slide my wide purple tie over Brett’s eyes, tie it behind her head.

Eli has her strapon in one fist and the vinyl harness dangles from her hand.

“You may not be able to tell who is doing what,” Eli says, still at Brett’s neck, watching me as I unbutton the rest of my silver shirt, slipping it off of my shoulders. “But I’ll be here the whole time,” she promises, still holding Brett close. I’m already strapped, she needs a minute to prep. I take Eli’s hand from Brett’s shoulder and we both step back, stand and watch Brett reaching for us by listening to where we are moving. I keep Eli’s hand a moment and kiss her fingers, suck her first finger onto my tongue, flick it with my tongue ring.

“Butch on butch,” she says, laughing, her eyes soft, “that’s practically faggotry.”

“Best kind of faggotry, in my opinion,” I say, and lightly wap the ass of her jeans as I step back to Brett.

“Tell her to get on her knees,” I say to Eli.

“Get on your knees,” Eli says, unbuttoning and sliding her jeans off, pulling the harness on.

Brett sinks. She brings her hands behind her back and I put my hands in her hair, then move one to my fly and cock. I finger her lips, pretty mouth, and she takes two of my fingers between her teeth, sucks them onto her tongue. Soft.

Actions become blurred. My cock. Brett’s jeans pulled off and on the ground. Eli fingering Brett while she sucks me, the lovely noises from her throat as she tries not to come, not yet. Eli clearly knows what to do and doesn’t let up, Brett arches her back like a cat and nearly hangs from my legs, gripping my thighs with her hands as she sucks my cock, pulling on my jeans until they come down with my briefs and she slides two fingers under my favorite harness to find my clit. She works it like a cock, strokes it and rolls it gently between her fingers. I groan, hips buck. Lord.

Eli’s got one hand on her left hip, still working her right hand between Brett’s legs.

Brett starts shuddering and panting and she’s going to come, I don’t know if I should pull out of her mouth or stay. She stops sucking but keeps leaning forward into my cock, breathing heavy around it, big gasps of air mouth open and I let her work herself against it, and she does, god she does, until she’s writhing and rocking against me, my hips and cock, against Eli and her hands, shuddering, convulsing at the stomach in small pulses of muscle and breath and she groans, hard, gasps for air, whimpers a little, and is still.

Eli holds her hips for a minute, letting her rest in her crumpled state on the beige hotel carpet, then twirls her finger at me, meaning time to switch.

My mouth waters.

Eli still doesn’t have her cock on. Her harness is loose but won’t fall off her hips; she’s stripped her white tee shirt and jeans. I remove my jeans and watch as Eli guides Brett from the floor onto the bed, onto her back, Brett’s knees hanging off the end, legs parted but together, thighs pressing.

Kneeling on the bed, Eli slowly draws one knee to either side of Brett’s shoulders, then lowers her cunt gently down over Brett’s mouth. I realize my jeans are stuck at my ankles and try to tear my eyes away long enough to pull them all the way off.

Eli has hold of the wall-mounted headboard and her head is thrown back a little, spine already arching, body moving eagerly. Brett’s knees are contracting off the bed and she runs one foot over the other, up her calf. She has hold of Eli’s thigh and her body is curling off the bed like a wet piece of paper.

I leave my a-shirt on and move to the foot of the bed, touch Brett’s knees, caress her thighs, her calves as much as I can reach, her hipbones, the gentle hair over her pussy, her labia, swollen and sensitive. I ease her left knee off the bed into the grip of my elbow and step closer, use my right knee to press her legs open. She’s slick, wet and supple, muscles pliable, she lets me move her where I want her. Her hands reach for me a second then back to Eli’s lower back and thighs. Eli is quietly moaning.

I feel her cunt with two fingers and slide in slow to get the angle, feel how deep she is. My packing cock isn’t huge but it is enough. She is slick and smooth and she parts her thighs a little farther, offering herself a little more.

I let my fingers wander over her labia and clit as the head of my dick finds her opening and slides in. A little too fast and she gasps. Her whole body responds, she groans, a sound that starts deep in her belly, somewhere my cock is hitting. Her sounds are muffled vibrations against Eli’s cunt.

Eli is working harder against Brett, increasingly faster, pressing her hips down into Brett’s face, balancing herself against the headboard and wall. She is practically on all fours, kneeling, working her clit in Brett’s mouth.

I match Eli’s rhythm and pace and speed. Slow strokes in and out, then faster, shallow. Sometimes a little rotation, a side-to-side motion. I copy her precisely.

They are both moaning. I tighten my grip on Brett’s hips and find a sweet spot, start thrusting harder. I hear Eli’s orgasm building, she’s gasping now and moaning in longer drawn-out sounds. Eli’s whole body begins to shiver and I barely notice, I am occupied, Brett has her legs wrapped around my waist and she’s puling me in, hard and deep.

Eli swings one leg over and half slides off the bed. Her legs are a little weak.

“Turn,” Eli says, pushing at Brett from the side. Brett turns to her stomach. Eli grabs her cock from the foot of the other bed as I don’t wait, but slide right back in, tip to balls, and begin fucking Brett again like I never stopped. She has one knee on the bed, one leg over the edge, toes on the floor, pelvis tilted up and back to take me in. Her hands are grabbing fistfuls of blankets and peeling the sheets from the bed. Her hair falls in a mess of curls around her head, only slightly restrained by my purple tie still around her forehead.

My head leans back, shoulders back, holding onto Brett’s hips, sometimes the flesh of her ass, round and a nice handful. Eli slides back onto the bed, sits with her back against the headboard and pulls Brett to her, sliding her cock Brett’s mouth.

I’m close to coming and feel pressure building, the muscles contracting with new force and urgency, when Brett lifts her hand off the bed and removes the blindfold. I see Eli smile at her, hands in her hair, then look at me. We lock eyes for just a moment, until Brett presses her hips back and wiggles against me, and the sensation is overwhelming, throwing me off balance and sounds escape my throat with every exhale until I’m pounding, pumping hard against her and Brett is gasping into Eli’s cock, muffled, and it all builds, hard, until I swear I can feel her cunt contracting around my cock, squeezing, and I explode inside her, coming hard, rocking against her, shaking.

My lower back is wet with sweat and I stagger a little, knees weak, joints not holding me up, and both Brett and Eli are looking at me, biting back grins, giggling, ecstatic. I swallow embarrassment and clear my throat, which makes them laugh more. I laugh too. We’re all a bit high. I lay myself down next to Brett, awkwardly, not able to quite be all the way on the bed but the support feels good, and I’m breathing hard, still catching my breath.

Eli laces her fingers through Brett’s and kisses her. “That was fun,” she says between kisses. “Sharing you. So … when is it not rude to kick her out?”

I laugh, ruffle Brett’s hair, kiss her, kiss Eli gently on the lips, cupping her chin, then pull on my jeans. I can take a hint.

identity politics

Further Points on Gender

Posted on by Sinclair Sexsmith

  • When myself and my partner are both women, we are inherently breaking from heteronormativity just by the fact that we are both women.

  • Arguing that butch/femme reproduces compulsory heterosexual gender roles assumes that heterosexual gender roles ARE the source, and the norm, from whence butch/femme came. What if all of these gender roles are pulling from a different force – say, some sort of universal life-force, uniquely expressed in a wide variety of ways?

  • Sometimes butch/femme roles ARE a reproduction of heterosexuality, and that is where trouble comes into my paradise. If only they never were. That is absolutely one of the reasons why it was extremely difficult for me to come to a butch identity – because I’d grown up believing that gender roles were confining, and limiting. But they don’t have to be. I’m working on the details of that argument, but – for now – it’s similar to how a poetic form can actually liberate a poem, or an idea, rather than limit the expression of it.

  • I don’t like the argument that we should be “beyond roles” or beyond definition. Defining ourselves gives us power, and language, to articulate who we are. The problems arise when we are confined to the definitions, when we can no longer re-make or re-claim the words to accurately describe ourselves, or when we grow and move and change and are holding on to something that is no longer true. Categories should never be so rigid that there is not room to manouver inside of them.

  • Claiming a particular label or gender identity or expression also situates me within a particular history. There is a heritage of women who refused to be confined to femininity, many of them butches in the queer community. And I come from them. They are my heritage, I am part of that lineage, I want to claim and celebrate and align myself with what they did, because I am so fucken lucky to be sitting in a corporate office in midtown Manhattan, with my boycut #4 and my polo shirt, black boy slacks and loafers, Hanes briefs and a pocketwatch, wearing Old Spice and American Crew pomade, and my coworkers don’t care. I claim that heritage by claiming my identity to be butch. I stand on their shoulders. I am not alone here.

  • Gender, for me, is an expression of my sense of self as played onto my body, but it is also a sex toy. It is a way that I play and have fun and enhance the friction and traction between myself and my lover. It’s about contrast, holding myself up against someone else to see where we overlap, where we divide, where we collide.

miscellany

someone slightly more articulate

Posted on by Sinclair Sexsmith

[O]ral histories have demonstrated that butch-femme couples were seen in America as far back as the turn of the twentieth century [… But] the lesbian feminist movement beginning in the early 1970s, dismissed butch-femme culture as politically incorrect. […]

Criticism of butch-femme was usually based on the claim that these identifications are an attempt to replicate heterosexuality by designating one member of a couple as male (the butch) and the other as female (the femme). Even today this argument is frequently aired. However, it is highly problematic because of its own underlying assumption of heteronormativity–that is, the tenet that heterosexuality is normal, and that all other forms of sexuality are only weak imitations of it. Butch-femme need not be an imitation of anything; it is a unique way of living and loving.

from the entry for Butch/femme in the GLBTQ encyclopedia

See also:

Brazen Femme: Queering Femininity by Chloe Brushwood
Butch Is a Noun by S. Bear Bergman
Dagger: On Butch Women edited by Lily Burana, Roxxie, and Linnea Due
Femme/Butch: New Considerations of the Way We Want to Go by Michelle Gibson and Deborah T. Meem
The Persistent Desire: A Femme-Butch Reader edited by Joan Nestle
… and don’t forget the upcoming Visible: A Femmethology edited by Maria Angeline

miscellany

more gender frustration

Posted on by Sinclair Sexsmith

Did you see the post about gender binaries over at My Name is Lina?I’ve got all sorts of reactions. Mostly frustration. I feel inarticulate, like I can’t possibly explain this such that others will understand. I’m going to re-read some gender theory and butch/femme celebration books and see what I can come up with.

I like what Joy just said in a comment on my last post, how these dualisms/binaries are also about archetypes and patterns and mythology, about interesting ways to interpret and understand our lives.

Is that not enough?

identity politics

Ranting about Gender Binaries & Stereotypes

Posted on by Sinclair Sexsmith

I should be sleeping. And I have too many things to be writing about to be flying off the handle at some random thing, but I just ran across something that has me all … hot under the collar.The lovely Miss Avarice made some comments on my post about active surrender where I wrote about topping & bottoming, and who really has control. Fine, good. Sweet of her to link to me, actually, and I should’ve said that in my comments, but I got distracted, because someone commented by saying: why do lesbians hold true the male ideal of duality? male vs. female…masculine vs. feminine…i mean it is still a ridiculous battle and fight over nothing. still a struggle that is ultimately useless.

And oh my god I don’t even know where to start. Go read my very sloppy comments on the subject if you’d like.

You’re not going to go read the comments, are you? Okay, here’s what I wrote:

The dualisms absolutely can be confining, if you let what they’re “supposed” to be dictate who you are. But many people, and I include myself in this description absolutely, find categories and dualisms also extremely liberating, and celebratory. there is infinity inside of these dualisms, if one wishes to embody them that way.

Also: “the male ideal of duality”? Why would duality that be a male ideal? That makes no sense. Humans categorize, male and female and beyond and in-between.

But – I believe Miss Avarice was discussing topping & bottoming here in this post, which is not male vs female or masculine vs feminine. Which is also, perhaps, a duality, but you missed the point of the post: even when someone is bottoming, they are still in charge. so who is really bottoming? who is really in charge? who is really in control? who is really submitting? those lines are extremely blurry, and difficult to categorize, when you actually examine them.

I have two hundred more words I could say about this “struggle that is ultimately useless” and what is problematic about generalizing all lesbians as holding to dualisms. Makes me want to shake my fist and spit at the ground a little bit.

I have books and books to say about how, to start, the gender expressions of butch and femme are not reproductions of the heteronormative paradigm.Can everybody please just say that five times, out loud, right now? Butch and femme are not reproductions of the heteronormative paradigm. Butch and femme are not reproductions of the heteronormative paradigm. Butch and femme are not reproductions of the heteronormative paradigm. Butch and femme are not reproductions of the heteronormative paradigm. Butch and femme are not reproductions of the heteronormative paradigm.

But beyond actually even addressing this misconception, and further perpetuating this argument about how lesbians are reproducing heterosexual gender roles, there’s another issue here which is really the one irking me: are we really still asking these questions? I mean, really? Have we not addressed this, over and over and OVER?

And maybe that’s just me. Maybe I’m just fucken lucky that I’ve been examining gender expression and dynamics and paradigms, and the history of feminism and women’s liberation and sexual liberation, and kink and play and sacred sexuality, and so I take it for granted that I have done this work, and others still haven’t.

But goddammit, why why why haven’t these ideas prevailed? Why haven’t they permeated the general public’s consciousness, just a little more? What a fucken battle we’ve been fighting.

And! – I was at a round-table interview today with seven of the smartest sexbloggers I know (more about that later) and one of the things the interviewer postited was about how a woman’s sex drive is still (perceived) to be lower than a man’s.

I just had to bite my tongue. I mean, really? Are we seriously still believing that in this culture? In 2007? Women still aren’t sexual beings, when compared to men?

What. The. Fuck.

This is why we still need social change, and why writing about sex IS an act of social change and liberation, subversion and joy.

I have so much more to express about this, about my own personal story of coming to and coming to terms with my own gender identity, about my attraction to femmes and to the so-called “gender binary,” about why dualisms are fascinating and important and celebratory instead of limiting.

But.

Two things.

  1. If it doesn’t work for you, fine! If you don’t find a particular binary useful, don’t use it. But do try to understand it before you go around discounting and patronizing other people’s values and choices. (Or maybe that was the anonymous commentor being authentically curious about the reasons behind “the lesbians” supporting as-a-whole these dualisms? To me, it just came across as holier-than-thou aren’t-you-unenlightened belittling.

  2. … And this is a new thing, something I’m trying to remind myself of, and remember. I am under no obligation to educate any random person who comes along and challenges my beliefs. For some reason, I have kind of been operating under the assumption that I should, actually, engage with these questions, and attempt dialogue. I don’t actually have to do that. That feels like a weird thing to be realizing – and it lifts a sort of weight, whereas seeing a random post, on a friend’s blog which discusses some ideas that originated from me, makes me feel very much obligated to discuss and engage and argue and support and defend.And you know what, anonymous? You didn’t even leave your name, blog profile, ID, or email. Why would I discuss this with you when you clearly didn’t really want to engage in a conversation anyway? Why waste my time defending and defining parts of my fundamental identity to someone I don’t even know?

This is the difficulty, that I sometimes very much forget, of occupying space within these binaries. It’s somehow unlesbian, and therefore unfeminist, to be inside of those dualisms because they are supposedly originated from the heteronormative gender roles.Before I go to bed (because it is one am and I had just a weeeee bit too much bourbon tonight), I do want to say briefly (ha!) why it is that butch and femme are not reproductions of the heteronormative paradigm. And that is because of exactly the reason our anonymous misinformed friend over at Avarice’s place was saying that lesbians shouldn’t be adopting these “dualisms”: there is a wide, wide range of human gender expression. And these roles are taking certain organized human traits and playing with them, enhancing them, celebrating them.

This is such a huge topic, I could write (and have written) for hours on it. What is butch, what is femme, anyway? I would probably have to define those things before really examining their liberatory function. Honestly, the closest I’ve come to actually defining them really has to do with formal wear, and underwear: when I dress up, I wear a suit. It is how I feel most comfortable. When I wear briefs, I feel sexy. And that physical gender expression actually makes my actions, hobbies, and interests all the more interesting – I think – because they are not necessarily in conjunction with your perceived idea of who I will be, because of my gender expression. And that, right there, is an act of subversion.

Those are the moments in the binaries and dualities that are the whole purpose, to me. When two seemingly mutually exclusive things occupy the same space: boy and girl. Love and violence. Power and surrender. That is how things feel made whole, balanced, right.

miscellany

active surrender

Posted on by Sinclair Sexsmith

I spent much of yesterday going over the Sugarbutch Star entires (again & again, some of them) and I am still just overwhelmed, in awe, in amazement at how revealing, detailed, and fucken hot they are. I’m humbled and surprised at how much perfect strangers would share and reveal and ask for and exchange.Years ago, around 1998, I met a girl through the anonymous journal I was keeping, and she used to photocopy parts of her journal and mail them to me when she found our writings matched up – she felt like what I was revealing was so intimate that she wanted to reciprocate.

And I think this contest opened up that exchange for many of the folks who read this place. I put a lot of personal, emotional, complex details about my life up here, not just the sex but the emotions, my psyche, my very makeup, which is partly why readers do feel safe and comfortable revealing things to me. You all know more about me than most of my friends, you have an understanding of how my mind and inner world works in ways that nearly no one in my “real world” life does.

But. Even still. I am a little shocked and definitely humbled. Thank you, for all you’ve revealed. Thank you for trusting me with your stories. Thank you for writing them.

Many of the stories I received are from very submissive girls, wanting to be taken in various ways, and I am continually surprised at how much some people (women especially) want to play with the line between submission and degredation. I can play with it, I have and probably will again – but it makes me nervous, and cautious. I worry about the emotional and psychological effects, especially on impressionable young women. Maybe this is my feminist-hippie background coming through, believing that every person is valuable, good, whole, worthy.

It got me thinking, though, about submission. I think there is a big difference between submission/surrender and degredation. I think there are ways – hundreds of ways – to be submissive, to surrender in a scene, without fundamentally losing your own value.

I was taught, by the D/s BDSM community that raised my kinkster self, that the bottom is always the one in real control. That the top may be inflicting the pain or sensation, may be the one holding the knife or the flogger or the end of the rope, but the bottom is who is dictating the next move, the depth of the cut, the strength of the paddle, the moment of release.

Honestly, I wouldn’t want it any other way. I wouldn’t want to top someone I didn’t think was on equal grounds, I wouldn’t want to top someone who couldn’t hold their own up against me in just about every way. I need active bottoming, active submission, active surrender.

If you want to know more about this stuff, I suggest reading The Topping Book and The Bottoming Book. Go to the Body Electric workshop Power, Surrender & Intimacy.

I guess I’m trying to encourage lots of examination here. I want to know the whys behind the degredation, the whys behind the unworthiness. When I witness it, on other sex blogs or in erotica or writings or submissions or comments or lovers or friends or porn or anywhere, I feel skeptical, and sad. Sex and BDSM and D/s and power and surrender can be tools to discover and rebuild and enhance and create a better self, a stronger self, a more open and loving and conscious self. But they can also follow unhealthy, dangerous old pre-determined pathways.

Don’t get me wrong, please – there were lots of submissive/bottom submissions to the Sugarbutch Star contest and most of them seemed fucken solid. Just a few in particular felt dangerously degrading, perhaps only because I didn’t have the backstory, didn’t have the context. But it made me wonder all the same. Made me want to cradle and protect, to hold and comfort, before I would bust out my cock and paddle and fist and fuck into the night.