Cat · Bondage

This journal is for exploring my interest in bondage. Some things I might like to try some day, others are pure fantasies.

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Two Knotty Boys is a San Francisco based duo of rope bondage instruction, rigging and performance. They have a series of nice of how-to videos up on YouTube. In one video segment, they gave a nice explanation of their bondage philosophy, which I've transcribed as best I can:

A lot of stuff you see online... you'll have this supposition that it's all performance oriented, or it's all about sort of dominance... the truth is it's about sensuality and connection.

What we show in the workshops, we don't teach people how to tie rope, we teach people how to tie people. People have feelings; people have connections; people have boundaries; people have lawyers... *audience laughs*

And so you really want to be in a place that you're connected; that you're actually present to the person... a lot of the ties are pretty inconsequential to the relationships that they create, and the moments that they create. And so having these types of moments, being able to tie someone, slow down the sensual process. Having something that is intimate, detailed, focused is not only hot, but is about just being about who you are.

Doms in fiction are commonly portrayed as commanding. Domineering. Forceful. Pursuing and overpowering their hapless victim. And no doubt many doms are that way in real life too. But, for a contrast, we present to you

The Real-Life Adventures of a Top In Training

Our scene today involves myself and two friends, who for no particular reason I'll call A and B.
 

A: Oooh, I've always wanted to try bondage. Will you tie me up? Please?

Me: Sure.

A: And my friend here, B, wants to watch. Can she watch?

Me: Of course.

A: So what do we do first?

Me: Well, take a look at this book here, and see if there's anything you want to try.

A: *flip* oh, I want to try that. *flip* cool! *flip* *flip* I want to try that one too. *flip* Wow, I want to try everything!

Me: Pick one to start with... we can always do another one afterwards.

A: Um, um, um, how about that arm binding?

Me: OK. *looks at book, finds some rope* This piece of rope here looks it ought to be long enough. So, first step, find the bight... *peers at book, starts wrapping* hmm... it says to go under the loop, but does it mean the first loop or the second loop? *holds book sideways so the picture is oriented in the same direction as the knot*

A: I'm so excited *bounce* *bounce* Squee!

Me: Erp, hold on, you can wiggle as much as you want to when I'm done, but for now hold still... OK, I think it's the second loop, may not matter anyway... *continues wrapping up the arms*

B: Wow, that is so hot.

Me: Almost done now.

A: Squee!

Me: OK, that should do it.

A: Eii! I can't move! Squee!

B: That is so amazing.

Me: The result does look impressive doesn't it? But it's actually quite easy to tie.

B: Wow, oh, will you tie me up too??

Me: Sure. I have more rope around here... somewhere... I have lots of rope, really... er, just need to find it... *rummage* *rummage*

Projects projects. I thought, "hey! If I get a really small laptop, I could carry it around with me and use it anywhere". So I got a cute Sony Vaio Picturebook that measures only 7" by 10". I tend not to spend a lot of money on equipment, because my philosophy is that if I'm using something cheap, I won't mind if I break it or I lose it or it gets stolen. So I bought the Vaio used on Ebay, a quite inexpensive and rather old model running Windows 98.

Now of course I don't want to be using Windows 98 which was a truly terrible operating system, so the thing to do is to install Linux. For various reasons it wasn't convenient to install Linux on the laptop's harddisk using the laptop itself, so the plan was to pull the harddisk out of the laptop, plug the harddisk into my desktop (using a Laptop to IDE adapter), install Linux on the harddisk from my desktop computer, and then put the harddisk back in the laptop.

In regular laptops the harddisk usually sits in a little tray, you take out one screw on the side and pull out the harddisk. This Picturebook model is so small that it's really more like a consumer item, it's not designed to be taken apart. The harddisk is buried inside the case, under the keyboard, and has cables going over it because there isn't room inside the laptop for the cables to go anywhere else. Truly a marvel of Japanese engineering.

The cables inside were of a type I'd never seen before. Regular cables have connectors on the end and you plug the connectors into their respective plugs. The cables inside the Picturebook are flat ribbon cables with no connectors, just bare ends that you stick into these little sockets that have these caps on top.

Well, as it turns out after I had broken one of the "caps" trying to get it off, these sockets are something called "zero insertion force" sockets and the "caps" don't come off, you just pull them up a little to pull the cable out and then you push them down after inserting the cable again. Oh well, no big deal, it was just the on/off switch cable that I broke the "cap" off, and I can stick something in there to hold that cable in. So I finally got the harddisk out, and started installing Linux on it from my desktop.

As I mentioned before I had been having some pleasant dom transformation daydreams, where someone would like me to transform or rebuild them in some way. As I looked down at the laptop, spread out in pieces all over my worktable, my thought was, "Um, so, are you sure you want me to work on you??" LOL

I IM'ed conscious_object and said I'd like to visit Wisconsin and have a chance to meet her. She said well, we certainly could meet for "coffee" (neither of us actually drink coffee, lol), but (and I'm paraphrasing here), she wouldn't want me to make a special trip and be disappointed to discover that she is actually a rather ordinary person.

This is true for most everyone, I think, who accomplish things. There's a curious paradox in that on the one hand we are capable of creating amazing things, and yet we ourselves remain just ordinary people. I experience this myself most strongly when I dance, as many people find the Cat Dance quite amazing, and yet I myself remain an ordinary person.

I'm curious about motivation, so whenever I want to do something, I ask, "hmm, so why do I want to do this?" Accepting the premise that conscious_object is actually fairly ordinary, why would I wish to travel to Wisconsin for no more than the promise of having coffee together?

Certainly a simple explanation could be that conscious_object wants, in her own words, "to find someone who enjoys tying girls up, who loves that I love them tying me up, without the whole giving-commands thing". So, sure, we could meet, and it might turn out that we like each other, and that might turn into a friendship or some kind of relationship.

But that's not a complete explanation. Here, where I live, I'm already surrounded by women who like to be tied up... I certainly don't need to travel to Wisconsin to find a play partner! And while I enjoy being a service top, it's not something I've pursued very vigorously. I'll go to the occasional BDSM class if I have time and if I'm in the mood, if a friend shows up at my place and wants to experience bondage, I'll tie her up and she'll have a wonderful time, but I have (so far) not made an effort to find play partners.

Thinking deeper about my motivation, I realize that in all the things I do, programming, dancing, topping, I put energy and action in: I program, I dance, I tie up. And for me it makes a difference of how much energy and information I get back. For programming, some clients just give me money, but they're not engaged, they're not answering my questions, they're not testing the system. They're not putting any energy in. Other clients are the opposite: they work with me, they answer questions about what they want, they test thoroughly the software I've written for them. In dancing, some people are entirely passive. They say, "when are you going to dance again?", as if I were a television program, on at 7pm, for which they can show up and watch, or not, if they feel like it. Other people are active, they say, "hey, let's get together at 7!", they watch me dance, they pay attention, they are engaged and responsive.

I like information. Someone who consumes plants is an herbivore, someone that eats animals is a carnivore; I am an infovore. conscious_object's journal is rich with information: her exploration of her desires, her musings about the contradictions in her sexuality, links to resources. This I find attractive.

I had the not-unusual bondage fantasies as a teenager, and later a couple of girlfriends who enjoyed being tied up. Then my interest in bondage lay dormant for a while. A few years ago I began to read about BDSM more extensively.

For a while I became quite intrigued by total power exchange: where the submissive gives complete control and authority to his or her master. But what did my interest mean exactly? Would I want to be a master in a total power exchange relationship myself, or, am I more like a mystery writer who is very interested in murder, but doesn't want to actually kill anyone? :) Not to say that there's anything wrong with a consensual total power exchange relationship, but what is right for me?

This spring I was at an introduction to shibari class, and at one point we had tied rope on the front of our partner, and the next step was to tie the rope up their back. In a bit of humor the instructor said, "so if you're a dom top, at this point you tell your submissive to turn around, and if you're a service top, you go around to the other side". And I had a bit of a lightbulb go off, and I thought, "oh, I'm a service top!"

Because I've always been a builder, a doer. I build projects, I write software, I implement. I don't get a thrill myself out of someone being compliant... if I'm going to tie someone up, if they've given me permission to tie them up, I don't care what they do. They can struggle or be resistant or try to escape or beat me off me off or just stand there, it doesn't matter: I am going to tie them up and make them helpless.

(I might have fun forcing someone to do something merely by using the power of my voice, but that would be different :)

Thinking back to what I had read about total power exchange relationships, I realized what intrigued me most was the desire of the submissive to be totally controlled. Here was a practice more extreme than what I had envisioned in my own fantasies, and there were women who desired to be in such a relationship, and in fact went through quite a struggle to first admit and accept their desires and then to find someone that they could submit to. So it wasn't the result that interested me -- the total power exchange relationship itself (yeah, so now I'm a master and my slave does whatever I tell her to. So what? :) -- but the desire that I was responding to.

A month ago I was reading a story over in consciousobject's journal, and at one point the protagonist asked the inventor, "do you think we could use [your invention] to try out some other fantasies of mine?". I commented that when I read that, I thought, "you know, that's what I want. I want to be an implementor of fantasies".

Last night my friend Sarah wanted to be turned into a cat...

First I had her put on a full body black unitard. She said "I think I'm too big for this". I said, "oh, it stretches, it will fit". She said, "um, I think I'm too big". I said, "well, give it a try, and if it doesn't fit, we'll do something else". As it turned out I was right, it fit :)

Then I used a technique I learned at the Fetish Fair Fleamarket to bind each hand so that she couldn't use her fingers. The effect is similar to a bondage mitt, but easier and cheaper, and a bit less bulky. First you put a nylon stocking over the hand, to protect the skin from the duct tape. Then you have them make a fist, and you wrap the hand with duct tape, over the stocking.

At this point they still have complete freedom of movement -- their hands are not bound together, they aren't tied to anything -- but they can't use their hands to do any people-things: change their clothing, turn a doorknob, answer the phone, brush the hair out of their eyes...

The result was quite adorable ^_^