This morning seems to be going much better than yesterday in regards to my son. He is alot calmer today. I don't know why he was so hyper yesterday. Sometimes he gets like that when he isn't feeling well. But I can't be sure because usually when it's illness caused hyperactivity, he doesn't eat either, but he ate alot yesterday. I guess it could just have been a 4 yr old's "bad hair day" type of thing.

Interesting and exasperating conversation in channel last night on whether or not a submissive can submit without a counter balancing dominant. I tried so hard not to get frustrated and/or exasperated when the conversation started going in circles and pulling in three or four different topics, and then had my original opinion agreed with from the get go, after 30 minutes of having it picked apart. I did not succeed in keeping my cool. That bothers me. I try so hard to keep my cool, and I still lose it more often than I want to. I did not scream and yell, call anyone names or anything else, but I did get upset. One good thing, however, is I did not stay upset for long. Maybe 20 minutes and mostly because I couldn't understand why the discussion became an argument when the opinions were actually agreeing with one another. Why purposely disagree with someone's opinion when you hold the same opinion? It's like starting a fight for the hell of it, something that I've never really understood, though i do realize that people do this anyway. I can't exclude myself either, I've been known to start a fight with someone just because i was in a bad mood or what have you. Though, that is something I don't do as often as I used to 5 or so years ago. So I went and read the person's blogs. Now I at least understand where the topic came from. I wasn't really angry with the person who started the discussion, more with the way the discussion went. Plus, I got angry with myself for becoming frustrated so I got offline before I could lost complete self control and do/say something I would severely regret later. This person is someone I have not known for very long, but so far I have found the person to be interesting, intelligent, capable of in depth conversation, and respectful, in short, I like the person. When I realized I had reached my personal limits of frustration, I left. I do however feel that I should apologize to this person for losing control to frustration and will do so as soon as I see that person again, hopefully tonight.


I tend to define submission as including both mental/emotional aspects and physical aspects. To me, even if a person bottoms (which is engaging in pain play for the physical sensations) that person is still submitting physically. They may or may not have the mental and emotional submission going on, nor is it complete submission, but they do still submit their body to the whipping (caning, spanking, whatever) that the Top wishes to impart on them. Because of that, I think it is a form of submission, but not complete submission. Complete submission is more than just giving someone the right to order your physical actions, but it also contains bending your will to theirs. Doing what they want you to do, or letting them do what they wish to do to you whether itis something you enjoy or not. For example a non masochist submitting to pain play is indeed submitting their will to someone else. It is very hard for me to explain this and I've been thinking about it since the conversation occured in channel last night. I also include service as part of submission because for a service sub, there are times when they do the service orientated actions even when they don't want to, simply because the dominant wishes them to do those things.

I can understand and accept (as well as agree) with the statement that a bottom is not a submissive because they do not submit outside of a scene, and they are not submitting to something they do not enjoy, instead they are only submitting to themselves (mainly) by giving in to their own desires for physical sensations. however, there is also a lower intensity of physical submission involved simply by bending over to take the pain from someone else. There are of course some bottoms who do not set the entire scene up, and basically submit to whatever the Top wishes to do within pre-arranged limits such as no blood, but these limits leave lots of possible types of play open and available, and thus up to the Top's decision of what type of play to engage in. In this scenario, there is some submission beyond physical because the bottom did not say "OK you can spank me with a paddle, but not use the flogger today" Instead the bottom effectively said "These are the types of play you can do, but the specifics for each scene are up to you". Thus, if the Top wishes to flog, the bottom accepts it even if they aren't exactly in the mood for a flogging at that moment. Wouldn't that be more of "submission" on the mental (will) level than just physically submitting one's body? I tend to think so.

I spent alot of time this morning reading other people's blogs. Very interesting reading. Some of it kind of bothered me. A couple of them seemed to be nothing more than hate messages and daily listings of things that the poster doesn't like, people the poster didn't like, or other negative angry things. Made me wonder how some people can live with so much anger/hate/resentment inside themselves? Sure, I get angry. Sure there are people I do not neccessarily like. But I try very hard not to focus on those people all the time, and follow their every word just so I can fight with them, and then vent at length about what rotten/stupid/idiotic people they are. Most of the other blogs, I found extremely interesting and enlightening into the posters view points, lifestyle choices, and the person themselves. With a couple of them, I am now able to see the posters in a different light, more human. I think that is a good thing. It of course, made me think of how often people just see one side of a person and think that's all there is. Usually ending up with a mistaken opinion or view of that person in the process. I know I've done it, so in some ways, these blogs are a way of getting to see the sides of others that we wouldnt' normally see on chat rooms or mailing lists. The more "human" side. I think this is a good thing and could go a long way towards misunderstandings based on the pigeon holing people tend to do when forming their opinions of someone else. Though, that could just be an idealistic statement as well. But these blogs are supposed to be my thoughts, as they come to me, and thus that is how I enter them. I think it, I type it. The blogs could also be nothing more than a waste of time. Or, could be some way of patting ourselves on the back and saying "see I'm good! I blog!" or somehoe reinforcing our own views of ourselves. I guess what one gets out of a blog will depend on what one puts into it, and for the reader, it wil depend on the view point from which one reads the words posted by another, plus their reason for reading them. If the reason is to learn more about that particular poster, then the blog could be a good way to do so. If the reason is to somehow use what is posted against the poster, then the reader will find that too I suppose. It is interesting to think of why someone would post in a blog. For me, I am doing it because I often get asked just what goes through my mind during a given day, and how does living a 24/7 d/s relationship differ from a vanilla one. People seem to think that there is some big difference between living in a power exchange relationship than in a "vanilla" one. Some even think that I spend all day walking around naked with a collar and cuffs on, kneeling all the time, or playing every night. That just isn't true. Like everyone else, I have responsibilities I need to take care of. The same stuff everyone else has to deal with, bills, laundry, dishes, cleaning, cooking, etc etc. Those things don't just disappear in a d/s relationship and of course must be dealt with. Some people deal with them outside of the power exchange, and others deal with them by saying the sub must "serve" the dom by doing all the housework related stuff themselves, to make the dom's home more "homey". I deal with it by doing what I can (with arella's help, THANK YOU gf!!!!) and master helps out on the weekends. Because I can't work, I feel my job is the home. Not because master ordered it, but because that's how i view it. house hold chores tend to be done by whoever gets their first, be it me, arella or master...or we delegate things to the kids. I don't think that takes away from the power exchange in the relationship, instead it just deals with the realities of day to day living. Well time to go. Kidling causing trouble.