watershed

January 25, 2017January 25, 2017 ~ Zoë K ~ 11 Comments

I started telling the story of this trip (including a rough draft of this post) shortly after I returned home. I got the first two posts out before the writing of it slowed dramatically. Around that time I was starting to find it difficult to write anything; I think this was connected to my deteriorating mood, which culminated in a diagnosis of depression at the very end of 2016.

But on top of that, it’s just been difficult to write about because momentous things happened, and since both Wolf and Gawan have access to my thoughts here, those thoughts needed to be very settled before I’ll share them.

After the lengthy train journey, we arrived in Gawan’s town and drove home. I knew this whole trip was going to be a big deal, filled with one novelty after another. I’d never been to his country, never mind the big city I arrived in, his town, his house. There would be “his people”. Our travels together. And any developments that may happen in our relationship.

I was concerned about being overwhelmed by all the newness. There was little I could do about it beyond “wait and see”, but I asked him to give me a little photo tour of the homestead to help me adjust more quickly when I finally arrived. Between that and having stalked the place on Google Street View, I felt more at home out of the gate than I would have otherwise.

Usually when two people are establishing a new relationship, each knows what he or she wants to happen, but is making educated guesses about what the other person wants and is hoping those wants are complementary. This was different in that I was more sure of Gawan’s desires than my own: Gawan knew he wanted to fuck but he wasn’t sure if I wanted to, and I knew Gawan wanted to fuck but I wasn’t sure if I wanted to.

Before I left on this trip, I had decided — by rationally considering my thoughts and feelings in excruciating detail — that I wanted to have sex with him. But I was well aware that I might not feel it in the moment, or I might have an emotional landmine blow up in my face. This wasn’t a simple matter: I was choosing (ethical) non-monogamy for the first time ever and it remained to be seen whether I could and would act on that decision.

Gawan confided later that the hug at the airport had pleased him. What he’d gotten from my warmth was a certainty that sometime during the trip, and sooner rather than later, we would fuck. I wouldn’t have put it that way. I had a level of comfort with physicality that I hadn’t felt during our first trip together, but it was a sitting-on-his-lap-and-cuddling kind of feeling — intimate but not especially sexual.

Of course, I had imagined what it would be like to have sex with him. I didn’t see BDSM happening the first time. Even though it seemed to be part of our relationship, BDSM was only one (for now, small) aspect. This had to be simple, and it wasn’t going to be a scene. It would be about initiating a connection on a new, physical level. I had discarded the hotel as a possible location, which left his house. The house we were now at.

After supper we got settled, and then played around. We kissed, he gave me oral. He smacked me with the wood-and-leather flyswatter I’d bought for him months earlier, before we had even met. And we fucked.

This is the most highly anticipated fuck I’ve ever had, and the most rationally planned and considered. I had been thinking about, imagining, constructing, and musing on it for months. I’d thought very little about what it would feel like physically (it would feel how it felt and I had no particular expectations), but I imagined how it would feel emotionally from every possible angle. So how was it?

It was affectionate and kind and sweet.

It was warm and connected.

I felt safe and loved.

It was just what I needed it to be.

e[lust] #90

January 24, 2017 ~ Zoë K ~ Leave a comment

Photo courtesy of Rebel’s Notes

Welcome to Elust 90–

The only place where the smartest and hottest sex bloggers are featured under one roof every month. Whether you’re looking for sex journalism, erotic writing, relationship advice or kinky discussions it’ll be here at Elust. Want to be included in Elust #91? Start with the rules, come back February 1st to submit something and subscribe to the RSS feed for updates!

~ This Month’s Top Three Posts ~

Conflicted part 1

Glow

Happy Endings

Sinful Sunday: honor-bound

January 22, 2017 ~ Zoë K ~ 9 Comments

“Stay put, my darling, and wait there. I know I don’t have to tell you twice. Be a good girl for me.”
honor-bound

Boobday: love, kindness, compassion

January 20, 2017 ~ Zoë K ~ 3 Comments

First, the personal. I’ve been on anti-depressants for three weeks now. Three is apparently the magic number, though I’m confident that I’ve already been feeling results.

The most obvious effect is a side one: I’ve been sleeping about an hour more at night. In addition to the sleep aid I’ve been taking, this puts me somewhere around 10 hours, and I’m still not bounding out of bed in the morning.

This week was a little harder for me than last. Part of that is my period, and part is situational. I’ve been feeling off for a couple of days and yesterday was definitely difficult. I was feeling down, but not so low that I couldn’t function. Today has been better, and I’ve also had the satisfaction of being productive at work.

There’s also the political. It has been a difficult day for millions of people, with no respite on the horizon. I don’t talk about politics on this blog and I’m not about to start. There are a number of reasons for this. Disinterest is not one of my reasons; self-care is.

Today I’m thinking about love, kindness and compassion. Also integrity, courage and resistance.

I’m pulling for you – we’re all in this together.

boobday-love-kindness

from on high

January 15, 2017January 16, 2017 ~ Zoë K ~ 5 Comments

I like to be comfortable. I’m flexible and my clothes need to move with me. I prefer to have bare feet indoors and I routinely pick things up off the ground with my toes. I walk a fair amount and insist on wearing sensible shoes. I live in flats. In fact, I don’t generally use the word “flats” because it’s simply my normal, the uninflected category. I’m practical.

Over the years I’d bought some heels in neutral colors: black, gold to go with a particular dress, deep red because I love deep red. (I’ve discovered that in France, deep red is a neutral, just FYI.) But flashy, vertiginous, and/or sexy was something I could never justify buying. Do I need them? No. Where would I possibly wear them? No idea.

But recently, when I became more comfortable with the idea of dressing up to look sexy, at least at home, it occurred to me that I could have a pair of killer heels and they wouldn’t necessarily be wasted just because I never intended to wear them outdoors. When I came across a pair of 4″ stilettos that actually felt comfortable, I allowed myself to buy the ridiculous things.

If I was ever going to wear them standing up, however, I was going to need a lot of practice, so I got in the habit of wearing them around the house. Eventually I got fairly confident in them and they started to seem a little less frivolous than before. I have now worn them outside of the house a few times and impressed friends with how surefooted I was. (In the context, I think that just means that I didn’t visibly teeter.) I’ve since bought a pair of gladiators: same brand, same height.

The main thing I like about my stilettos is that they make just about everything look hotter. I like my older heels less now because they are in fact less comfortable than the stilettos. So comfort is still key but that doesn’t necessarily translate to runners. The stilettos have become my most practical dressy shoes given how much wear they’ve gotten, and the fact that most of that wear is at home is irrelevant.

I never got the handbook on How to Be Girly, and heels don’t make me feel more feminine. But they do make me feel sexy.

from-on-high

Sinful Sunday: striped symmetry 2

January 15, 2017 ~ Zoë K ~ 23 Comments

“Let’s see you in that new bodysuit. Yes. Yes, very nice. You will wear it for me.”

“Yes, sir. Thank you, sir.”

striped-symmetry-2

Boobday: hold tight

January 13, 2017January 16, 2017 ~ Zoë K ~ 6 Comments

I thought I’d be organized, so I yesterday drafted some text and edited a photo for this post. But then I changed my mind about what I wanted for text. And also the photo. Sigh.

Lucas got rather sick shortly after Christmas but has now sent me the first package of photos from our shoot, though I won’t be posting any until I’ve seen them all.

I was diagnosed with depression two weeks ago and ramped up to the full dose of medication a few days ago. Within less than a week, I started feeling more with it, more balanced. But this is odd because I was told I likely wouldn’t feel a difference until about three weeks had passed.

Is this medication having more of an effect than the doctor predicted? Is it the normal effect and am I so sensitive and observant that I can detect the slightest change? Was I so close to a tipping point that just a little boost was enough to help? Is it a placebo effect, perhaps made more effective by the fact that the diagnosis gave me permission to be ill and I stopped blaming myself for it? Or am I in the middle of some unrelated mood cycle that just happens to be in an upswing?

Time will tell, but for now, I’m just enjoying the fact that it doesn’t feel impossible to do things. Which is good, because I’ve got a trip to Europe and visit with Gawan coming up in about a month so I’ve got some travel arrangements to make.

boobday-hold-tight

Sinful Sunday: statuesque

January 8, 2017March 26, 2017 ~ Zoë K ~ 22 Comments

There’s something about my photo this week that reminds me of Aphrodite Anadyomene (rising from the sea), who is often shown with tilted shoulders and hips, usually associated with wringing out her hair.

(Botticelli’s Birth of Venus is a famous depiction of that moment, though it’s a different pose, with one arm vaguely across her breasts and the other hand in front of her groin: in Latin, Venus Pudica or “Modest Venus”. )

statuesque

This is the 300th week of Sinful Sunday. Thanks and congratulations to Molly Moore for creating and running the meme all this time. And thanks to the Sinful Sunday community for your generosity; I look forward to meeting those of you who will be attending Eroticon in March.

I’m delighted to count myself a part of this community: my first SS was week 207 (March 2015), and my participation rate has been about 90% since then.

Edit: Guest judges Rebecca and Andy from A Couple of Kinks chose my photo as part of the Round-up this week:

We love how simple and complex this image is at the same time. The simplicity is due to the straight-shot, solo-body, black and white capture. The complexity comes from the angle of the body and the shadows created with these angles. We love the comparison to Roman statues and how the image cuts just below the head. This shot was perfectly executed – it is smart, sensual and speaks beyond the photo.

Thank you both!

fiction: The New Principal 5: Examination

January 4, 2017February 1, 2017 ~ Zoë K ~ 4 Comments

I closed the classroom door with a click then walked through the deserted halls, canvas sneakers echoing squeakily. I returned to the restroom where I’d freshened up before class, pushed open the heavy wooden door — empty! — and then was serenaded by the groaning hinges. The door clunked closed.

I was alone and unobserved for the first time since the spanking. I bent over slightly to get my hands on the backs of my thighs under the hem of my skirt while I walked. While I was in class I could certainly tell that the skin was tender, but somehow it didn’t seem fully real until I touched the heat with my fingertips, sensitive cool skin against sensitive warm skin.

As before, I went to the very end of the row, but this time I pushed open the stall door and turned to look at myself in the mirror from this makeshift blind. It was unlikely that anyone would come in during class time, but my instinct was to hide and I didn’t want to take even the slight risk of being seen.

I lifted the pleats of my skirt and looked over my shoulder at my reflection. The area from mid-thighs up to — gathering up the pleats with my left arm, I briefly pulled down the waistband of my panties with my right — mid-bum was tender and warm, and the mirror revealed it to be a splotchy pink. Pink? Not red? Hmph. It felt red. I had felt it throbbing distinctly redly.

Craning my neck was awkward. I heard Mr. Martin’s voice in my mind: “Yes it’s awkward — it’s meant to be.” My gut clenched. I tucked the hem of my skirt up into the waistband to free my hands, turned toward the toilet and held my phone up to take an ass-selfie over my shoulder, then examined the photo. Hmm, the panties hid most of the color. I tugged my panties down to mid-thigh, where they’d be out of the way and snapped another photo.

Back down to mid-thigh, rather. That’s where they were less than an hour ago, where Mr. Martin had put them. No, not put. Pulled. Tugged, impatiently. The gusset was now soaked through and I was dripping wet, like syrup. Had I been this wet earlier? Had he seen? Did he know?

I slipped my phone back in the pocket of my blazer, then ran my fingertips in light circles over the warm, abused skin. I touched myself delicately all over, raising goosebumps in places. Then I placed my hands flat on my backside, middle fingers nestled in the creases at the top of my thighs, savoring the throbbing heat against my cool hands.

He had smacked my bum, a lot. And it hurt, a lot. But sometimes he had touched me gently. Fairly often, now that I thought about it. The light squeezes, the caresses, they didn’t feel like punishment at all. And the times when he had stilled, I suppose he was looking, or rather, gazing. I know he had been hard, I hadn’t imagined that. Then afterwards, he had touched my back lightly, and murmured in my ear.

He had suggested that I might come back to him, that I might choose to take more punishment at his hands. I’d have to want it to be able to choose it. But want… what? To earn extra credit? To impress him? To feel his touch, whether gentle or harsh?

I felt that clench again, threatening to overtake me.

I latched the stall door.

Sinful Sunday: cowries

January 1, 2017January 2, 2017 ~ Zoë K ~ 19 Comments

cowrie, n. 1. the highly polished, usually brightly colored shell of a marine gastropod of the genus Cypraea, as that of C. moneta (money cowrie) used as money in certain parts of Asia and Africa, or that of C. tigris, used for ornament.

1655-65; < Hindi kaurī

The most significant use of the cowrie is as currency among many cultures. For example, it was the first currency of ancient China. (Bonus: they can’t be counterfeited.)

cowries-1 — Mild contortions, featuring curves and cowrie cuff, and a cameo by the carpet.

In a number of cultures (though my quick research has been unable to pin down precisely which ones), the cowrie shell is a symbol of womanhood and fertility due to its resemblance to the vulva (i.e. cunt).

cowries-2