Dan Savage on Masturbation

I Know The Way You Can Get

I Know The Way You Can Get

From: 'I Heard God Laughing - Renderings of Hafiz'

I know the way you can get
When you have not had a drink of Love:

Your face hardens,
Your sweet muscles cramp.
Children become concerned
About a strange look that appears in your eyes
Which even begins to worry your own mirror
And nose.

Squirrels and birds sense your sadness
And call an important conference in a tall tree.
They decide which secret code to chant
To help your mind and soul.

Even angels fear that brand of madness
That arrays itself against the world
And throws sharp stones and spears into
The innocent
And into one's self.

O I know the way you can get
If you have not been drinking Love:

You might rip apart
Every sentence your friends and teachers say,
Looking for hidden clauses.

You might weigh every word on a scale
Like a dead fish.

You might pull out a ruler to measure
From every angle in your darkness
The beautiful dimensions of a heart you once
Trusted.

I know the way you can get
If you have not had a drink from Love's
Hands.

That is why all the Great Ones speak of
The vital need
To keep remembering God,
So you will come to know and see Him
As being so Playful
And Wanting,
Just Wanting to help.

That is why Hafiz says:
Bring your cup near me.
For all I care about
Is quenching your thirst for freedom!

All a Sane man can ever care about
Is giving Love!

Margaret Cho - Eat Me Out - Atlanta, GA - June 7, 2008

It Takes A Village

"The secret to a happy marriage is that you have to fuck a lot of other people. It takes a village."

Margaret Cho: Beautiful

Talking Equality

Wet and Juicy

Met with my juicy women last night.

Lena is still healing her heart over her young boy toy lover who turned out to be more trouble than he was worth (plus he cost her a lot of money.) He was extremely high maintenance, drank too much and didn't fuck her enough. She has also sent her potential internet lover down the highway after he moved across the country due to his on-line infatuation with her that didn't pan out to her liking. He was totally gaga over her, had money he was willing to spend on pleasing her, but reminded her too much of her "suffocating" mother. She is now heading off on a little vacation to be with one of her lovers and his wife for week and then is off to another city to visit with another lover.

Molly is feeling pretty settled down with her husband once again. Things have calmed down for them a lot. She continues to support him financially while he carries out his househusband duties. She swims in the pool after a long day at work while he serves her wine and cooks her dinner. They've been enjoying their sex life again.

Pema says she is actually feeling mostly good and balanced in regards to her relationship with her lover who is back living with his wife for the time being due to financial necessity. At the same time, talking about her situation brought on tears. She's reached her limit on giving (with her adult children as well as her lover) and is needing to be on the receiving end for awhile. While she is still unsatisfied with the dynamics of their sex life, she has established some new personal boundaries within their relationship to take better care of herself. Plus, she is back to whoring again so she has some income that is making it much easier to cope with her life as it now stands.

Randi is back with her married lover. They broke up and had spent 3 weeks apart when the universe threw them back into each others arms. He missed her dreadfully. She was miserable without him. They are seeing each other everyday and fucking like bunnies. She is having the the most incredible orgasms that she's ever experienced in her life. He had originally planned on leaving his wife (who he hasn't had sex with in over 20 years) fairly quickly but when it came right down to it, the fear of dealing with his social network and the supposed reaction of his grown daughter got him very confused and procastinating. Randi is putting thoughts of all this on hold for awhile and is choosing to simply focus on her love for him and the great orgasms she is having.

Rosemary's adventures continue with her husband and her lover although there has been some fall out with her lover from her sharing some of her truth and emotional turmoil. He in turn shared his own emotional turmoil about some things that weren't working for him and they have been trying to sort it out. They are still seeing each other but at his suggestion, not as often. The love is there but some of their wants and needs aren't currently matching up in the way she would prefer. Time will tell how their relationship will evolve. Rosemary feels pretty accepting and willing to find a way that works best for both of them.

Ana is grieving the supposed loss a man she connected with on such a deep level that she had opened to the possibility of combining her life with his and living monogamously. Needless to say, that didn't pan out and the difficulties of their union seem to be insurmountable. With her traveling a lot and him tied up with business and traveling out of the country, he hadn't contacted her for a couple of weeks. She sent him a "pathetic" text. He called her. He loves her. She loves him. It's just not gonna work. In the meantime she had a date with a professional athletic. They had an awesome time but he had the smallest cock she's ever fucked and she realized that size definitely matters to her. Also, Randi hooked her up with a new fuck buddy, a married man with a great body and beautiful cock whose wife hasn't had sex with him in 2 years. She's been enjoying this experience and is looking forward to more.

Is-ness

Last night I went to bed contemplating Is-ness. Thank you Pema for inspiring this. My contemplation continues this morning--the is-ness of my life in general and the is-ness of my intimate relationship dynamics in particular.

I live with the intention of being aware. I strive to be conscious of the stories my ego is telling me--stories about my relationships that create emotions that I must deal with on a daily basis. A good part of my days focus on, and circle around, my connection with others--family, friends, lovers, clients... And then there is my relationship with self and the intricate connection between how my relationship with self affects my relationship with others and vice versa, how my connection with others affects my sense of self. My relationship with others serves as a mirror as I gaze into it to see what's going on inside myself.

So I have all these stories about my relationships, about others, about myself, and I'm constantly letting go of the stories and attempting to just be with what actually is. Being with the is-ness, the actual day to day reality of these relationships, others, self. So I assertain what is real and then make choices to deal with this reality to the best of my ability. Being with the is-ness and not attaching a story to it is quite challenging because there are many layers to the stories and they are quite insidious. It's kinda like not throwing the baby out with the bath water.

Is-ness lies behind the stories. I can make all sorts of feel good/feel bad meaning from my stories. There are so many different perspectives to buy into and I'm quite good at that. In my open-mindedness I sometimes try on all the different perspectives (stories) and find something worthwhile in each and every one of them. But what lies behind the stories, the actuality of what is, is what I'm attempting to zone in on and then base my choices from this place.

So what is for me right now? I'm noticing that many of my choices in life are interconnected to the choices of others. I'm looking at another's choices and pondering how their choices affect me. These choices may work well for me, or not, but seeing that they are another's choices there isn't much, if anything, I can do about that. What I'm left with is being with what is. Being with the is-ness of another's choices and dealing with the consequences in the best way possible to create my own happiness. Sometimes this process is like making lemonade from lemons. Sorry for the cliche but ¿dónde está el azúcar?!!! Whether it's another person and the way their choices affect me, or just life circumstances in general, what else is there to be done?

Recently I told my truth. I told it without blame, and even though I was upset and wanted things to be different, I made no request to effect that. My motive was simply the intimacy of sharing my truth and exposing my vulnerability to another. I just spilled out my truth of the moment (which isn't necessarily the absolute truth but rather the truth of my thoughts and feelings at that moment in time.) While I am a big advocate of the truth, I realize that speaking it doesn't always get us what we want. That's not what speaking the truth is about anyway. It has other advantages which often do lead to getting what we want in the ultimate, if not immediate sense. This time around, speaking my truth served to get me less of what I wanted rather than more. My intention with speaking my truth, as is always my intention, was to create more intimacy and understanding in my relationship with another. Did it work? I don't know. The jury is still out. I hope so. I wouldn't say that I'm experiencing more intimacy just yet but I do think there is more understanding. And my past experience in life and truth telling is that intimacy grows from understanding. I'm hoping that another's response to my truth has put their actions into more alignment with their own truth. We will see how things evolve from here. In the meantime I will deal with the is-ness of it all.

Sometimes people don't respond "well" (in the way we would like them to) to our truth. The consequences of truthtelling are not always the results we would hope for. One of the things I'm noticing is that perhaps I've fallen as a bit of a victim to a common phenomenom in the truthtelling of intimate relationships--which is wanting the other person to tell the truth, but only if the truth is something I want to hear! The thing is, truthtelling often opens the flood gates so we better be ready to get wet. I wasn't really ready for the response I received to my truth and I didn't want it. I lost my equlibrium a bit for sure. I think I have it back again now. The truth, be one the giver or the receiver of it, often brings up much trepidation and fear, especially when we are dealing with heart stuff. Others don't always take care of our heart in the way we need our heart to be cared for and in the preoccupation of figuring out how to best care for our own hearts, we sometimes neglect another's.

This Rumi poem comes to mind:

There is field beyond right and wrong, I'll meet you there.

All the stories, besides being quite entertaining, are often for the purpose of making someone, or something, right or wrong. I'm not much into playing the blame game so I practice letting so of my stories and playing beyond judgment in my relationships (I don't always succeed)--meeting the other in this field of is-ness. But the is-ness must be dealt with! This keeps me from living in denial, losing myself, and dishonoring my experience. Forget the story. Forget the meaning I make of the story. But don't ignore what is! Another's actions (choices) are simply that. Right/wrong, mean-spirited/kind-hearted, sensitive/insensitive, mindful/clueless, doesn't really matter so much when you get right down to it. This stuff simply is and what I do with it, how I be with it, the choices I make in the face of this is-ness is what matters.

One thing I will do is to keep speaking my truth because utimately, even though I know (fear) that revelation of my truth may be the catalyst that takes all I perceive I want away from me, I know that ultimately what leaves me, wasn't mine to begin with. And I'm not going to withhold the truth to protect an illusion.

Episode #15 (new episodes twice monthly)

Birthday Lovers

Some current pictures surrounding my 55th birthday celebration--

My 54th year was interesting to say the least.
I've moved into my 55th with lots of love and acknowledgment from my friends. Also with some emotional trepidation. This is the year of the Lovers--#6 for me. A friend offered me this reading:

Starting with a poem by Anais Nin

The value of the personal relationship to all things is that it creates intimacy and intimacy creates understanding and understanding creates love.

Yes, understanding is what I'm going for. Understanding of self. Understanding of another.

The Tarot Lovers is about the Art and Craft of relationship. I just set up my arts and crafts room...hummm.

The Lovers journey is about the journey of the twins. This represents whoever I'm in relationship with and what those relationships require:

A child like innocence. Now that's sometimes hard to come by. I feel a bit tainted and cynical--but not totally. Just somewhat glib now and again as I move throughout my days.

Curiosity and playfulness. Yes, I have that--sometimes. I'm also tired. Tired of the struggle. Wanting things to be easier.
Loyalty and commitment. This I have and it seems very natural and easy for me. Once I love you, I love you. I don't tend to give up on relationships.

The gift of spaciousness--the allowing of space for contemplation, introspection, and the need for being alone.

The lover's need for not being limited, restricted, barred or restrained in their relationship. This feels like a huge challenge for me. Very BIG.

Another quote from the I Ching--Book of Changes:

But when two people are one in their inmost hearts, they shatter even the strength of iron or bronze; and when two people understand each other in their inmost hearts, their words are sweet and strong like the fragrance of orchids.

The Lovers represents two kinds of love. Love as passion and love as compassion. This archetype reminds us that whatever type of love relationship we enter into, sincerity is the only proper basis for forming relationships of any kind.

The lovers is the most peopled card in the entire Tarot. This year is about establishing relationships and perceiving what's working and what's not working. It's about using my people skills and choice making. This is a powerful period for making choices about improtant relationships in my life, especially those I would like to deepen and expand. My desire to not be barred or limited in my relationships is strong. This is related to family and friends as well as lovers.


Pictures:

1. My solstice freedom ritual which was the start of my birthday celebration.
2. A Rumi poem--Fish don't hold the sacred liquid in cups! They swim the huge fluid freedom. I'm swimming.
3. My new haircut
4. My hair burning in fire sacrifice.
5. Sunflowers growing in my friend's garden.
6. More Sunflowers.
7. I've been enjoying lots of margaritas. This was dinner the night we saw the Neville brothers in Tahoe.
8. A wish.
9. Charles Neville. I love a man playing the sax. It is so fucking sexy. And Charles always gives me lots of eye contact at their shows. Such a treat.
10. Aaron Neville singing his heart out.
11. Papa Funk--Art Neville.
12. Concow Lake.
13. One of my grand babies asking lots of questions about angels.
14. I am not a well behaved woman by society's standards. Thank God.
15. Lake Alamanor.
16. The steps I must take to be a lover?
17. July 6th birthday rose.
18. July 6th Feather River
19. July 6th on my friend's property.
20. July 6th...my friend's property.
21. My birthday prayer--Keep me wild lord, keep me wild.
22. My birthday skirts. High Sierra Music Festival.
23. Beauty. Prayer flags. Always prayer.
24. Grace Heart.

Passionate Kisses!!!

Is it too much to ask?
I want a comfortable bed that won't hurt my back
Food to fill me up
And warm clothes and all that stuff

Shouldn't I have this,
Shouldn't I have this?
Shouldn't I have all of this, and

Passionate kisses
Passionate kisses, whoa ohh oh
Passionate kisses from
you

Is it much to demand
I want a full house and a rock and roll band
Pens that won't run out of ink
And cool quiet and time to think

Shouldn't I have this,
Shouldn't I have this?
Shouldn't I have all of this, and
Passionate kisses
Passionate kisses, whoa ohh oh
Passionate kisses from
you

Do I want too much?
Am I going overboard to want that touch?
I shouted out to the night:
"Give me what I deserve, 'cause it's my right"

Shouldn't I have this,
Shouldn't I have this?
Shouldn't I have all of this, and
Passionate kisses
Passionate kisses, whoa ohh oh
Passionate kisses from you

Passionate kisses
Passionate kisses, whoa ohh oh
Passionate kisses from
you

Drunk More With Love Than With Wine

From the last chapter of Outlander by Diana Gabaldon

The intrusion was startling. Hot and slippery as our skins were, we drifted over each other with barely a sensation of touching or pressure, but his presence within me was solid and intimate, a fixed point in a watery world, like an umbilical cord in the random driftings of the womb. I made a brief sound of surprise at the small inrush of hot water that accompanied his entrance, then settled firmly onto my fixed point of reference with a little sigh of pleasure...

"Not yet. We've time. And I mean to hear ye groan like that again. And to moan and sob, even though you dinna wish to, for ye canna help it. I mean to make you sigh as though your heart would break, and scream with the wanting, and at last to cry out in my arms, and I shall know that I've served ye well."...

The rush began between my thighs, shooting like a dart into the depths of my belly, loosening my joints so that my hands slipped limp and helpless off his shoulders. My back arched and the slippery, firm roundness of my breasts pressed flat against his chest. I shuddered in hot darkness, Jamie's steadying hands all that kept me from drowning...

"No," I said. "Jamie, no. I can' bear it like that again." The blood was still pounding in my fingertips and his movement within me was an exquisite torture.
"You can, for I love ye." His voice was half-muffled in my soaking hair. "And you will, for I want ye. But this time, I go wi' you."
He held my hips firm against him, carryng me beyond myself with the force of an undertow. I crashed formless against him, like breakers on a rock, and he met me with the brutal force of granite, my anchor in the pounding chaos.
Boneless and liquid as the water around us, contained only by the frame of his hands, I cried out, the soft, bubbling half-chocked cry of a sailor sucked beneath the waves. And heard his own cry, helpless in return, and knew I had served him well...

...giggling helplessly, drunk more with love than with wine, we made our way side by side, on hands and knees up the second flight of steps, hindering each other more than helping, jostling and caroming softly off each other in the narrow space, until we collapsed at last in each other's arms on the second landing.

Being Here

I woke up so sad this morning. My heart hurts. I'm depressed. Didn't want to get out of bed so I just pulled the cover up over my head and cried. There is nothing for me to do. It's not about doing. It's just about being. Being here with these feelings.

Matisse and Monk

Mistress Matisse has a link to a new podcast up today. She and Monk talk about Polyamory, BDSM, and the "not-so-good idea of comparing your partners." They also talk a little about Monks wife, Tambo.

Making Love

How she likes to make love.
A piece by Mistress Matisse.