I've just written a piece about how I met my Cariad as my entry for this call for submissions. The project sounds interesting, if any other woman fancies a go:

SHE SAID, SHE SAID: Selected Essays from Enlightened Eves to Clueless Adams
(What Women Really Talk About Behind Closed Doors)

Coming in the Fall of 2008, women around the world speak out in the controversial and eye-opening anthology,
SHE SAID, SHE SAID. Tired of volume after volume on what men absolutely have to have to be satisfied with the women in their lives, we decided it was time to flip the script. Since men selectively listen, we've selected essay prompts designed to push the envelope and help them find their way inside from the dog house. Now all they have to do is roll over, sit up and pay attention...just like Spot.

Ladies, bring it and your essay could be chosen for SHE SAID, SHE SAID.

In 2000-3000 words, respond to the essay prompt that speaks to you. What we'd especially like to see is a well
written narrative account of your experience, along with commentary on how you overcame your dilemma and
the positive lesson(s) you learned because of it. Try to refrain from male-bashing, please. We want our audience to personally connect with you and the message you're conveying. Of course, an epiphany or two would be nice, as well. Write to answer the question, "What do women really want?" Be as witty, satirical and/or humorous as you dare!

Second round of submissions accepted January 15, 2008 - May 15, 2008. Email submission(s), including a
brief bio and contact information to editors@brownreclusebooks.com. Please note: essay text must be
pasted into the body of the email, as attachments will not be opened. All (female) Writers Welcome!

http://www.brownreclusebooks.com/CallForSubmissions.html

...and no prizes for guessing the 'inspiration'!

Celia was also aware that Gareth Pritchard, (Sociology lecturer and voluntary youth worker) had his interest in Ursula triggered by her victimisation by those awful anti-English idiots but thoughts of Ursula could still reduce Celia to alternative hot flushes of shame and the cold sweat of fear that anyone should know of her appalling betrayal of a woman who had seen her only as a friend.

Ursula and William had trusted them and Gareth and Celia had actually had sex in the church hall! If it had been just the once it would be easier to dismiss as an aberration but it was more than that – Why, they’d even considered running away together although thankfully Celia was often to recall, she’d pulled them back from that brink of madness. The sex was good but that wasn’t it…

Perhaps it came back to the princess thing… It was obvious that William loved her but Gareth had had the knack of making her feel like a princess.

She would not have admitted it to anyone but the ‘rescue’ of Sally in all her finery in the Sealed Knot re-enactment had stirred something romantic and sexual in Celia. As a child she would often imagine herself as a princess on horseback and as she got older the idea of being rescued by a prince became more appealing… Of course she wasn’t jealous of the younger Sally’s looks and romantic ‘rescue’ but she could imagine it happening with her as the damsel thrown from her horse… Celia saw no connection between this repressed fantasy and her ‘falling’ for the man who was so central to ‘rescuing’ her as the distraught mother of an unhappy teenager. Celia was never very hot on insight – at least not about herself. Now the motivations of family, friends and of course her big sister – no problem! When it came to more personal insight Celia could be just a touch myopic.

When I write spanking stuff it's fun to think of character types who may be drawn to such impulses. my very first spanking story was inspired by an 'Archers' character and started with a monologue rant:

People say I’m old-fashioned, and in a way they’re right, and I’m proud of it. I like things just so. A man needs to know where he stands – Ah, I know what you’re thinking – Not supposed to say that anymore – it's all this inclusive language nonsense. Oh, surprised I speak the lingo, are you? I can move with the times despite what my daughters think. I just don’t have to like it. And believe me I most certainly don’t. As I was saying I like things just so and I need to know exactly where I stand. I don’t want things to stand still. I am, after all, a successful entrepreneur. Take this European Market - I don’t particularly like this nonsense but I was quick enough to find out how to get it to work for me. Of course set-aside is madness (and the woolly liberals go on about famine and starvation!) – it’s simply a way to support idle foreign peasants but of course, we’re not supposed to say things like that, either. It’s true though. I made sure Maes Gwyn used the system to full advantage – Well, you’d be a fool not to, wouldn’t you?
Of course change is necessary but I miss old-fashioned standards. The old Tory party and the church got it right in my opinion. Nothing wrong with power and money as long as you accept responsibility as well. That’s the trouble with Pont Llaw Land – They want the profit and they want to play the country squire idyll but they don’t understand country folk - or the Welsh! It’s not in the blood. Breeding – another thing we’re not supposed to acknowledge - but like truth it will always out. These Johnny-come-lateleys don’t know the first thing about real country life. What’s really galling, though, is that the locals and bleeding hearts like my brother-in-law Sam can’t tell the difference.

As discussed with melinda, I think the trappings of historical dress easier to 'dress up'. Harder to get tone right with modern setting. I also have problems with language - I hate words like tits and dick, but can do if I change my frame of reference. So sometimes I reflect language of protagonist, even when writing third person, rather than first.

With a casual tone belying his pulsing heart and dick he asked Christine to lock the door of the outer office and she got up, wiping her tears and did so. Jonah gazed at that swaying rump. Christine looked very professional today; she was obviously trying to impress him. That tight pencil skirt ended a few discreet inches above her knee and was both business-like and sexy. She was also wearing heels – a nice change from her bloody Doc Marten’s he thought. It was amazing the footwear some of these young women wore! She’d already taken off her smart jacket so he had an unhampered view of that curvy arse as her top was tucked in showing her neat waist.
As she walked back he noticed her nicely rounded tits discreetly covered in one of those stretchy little tops she usually wore under her jacket. He suddenly realised he’d better get his act together in time with her return to his office. He refined his desk slouch by quickly clearing an edge and continuing to lean so he was half leaning and half sitting. He casually eased back so his left thigh was also on the desk with his right foot firmly on the carpet. As he thought that his raised left leg was the knee over which the delectable young Miss Miller would be bent Jonah felt another twitch in the trouser department. It was a good job he was too much of a gentleman to take advantage of the situation, he thought rather pompously as he nervously and excitedly fantasised about the secrets under Christine’s proper but sexy pinstriped skirt.
As Christine re-entered the office now less brisk than she left, Jonah found an insouciance he hadn’t known he possessed. He leaned back with folded arms and raised an eyebrow (he was proud of his ability to raise just the one but though it best not to dwell on raisings – her skirt, his dick…).
With a casualness that belied the screaming, warring feelings in his mind, heart and trousers he looked at the now stationery vision that was young Christine, unfolded his arms, gestured at his left thigh and said:
“Time for your lesson young lady. Bend over.”

I was also thinking about difference in their frames of reference and language

As the slip slowly rode up the nylon clad legs (of course stockings were impossible, he realised wistfully) he took in the delights of Christine’s shapely and rounded young thighs. He knew she was always trying to lose weight but he liked their touch of plumpness. To his delight her plumply rounded bottom seemed encase only in the sheer nylon of her pale flesh-coloured tights. He then realised she was wearing a g-string.
Once again Christine was overcome with mortification at the thought of the old scroat seeing her designer thong revealed in such humiliating circumstances.

Let's just say I share some history with 'Sarah'!

Despite her fascination with the spiritual Sarah was frustrated that somehow she never seemed to quite 'get it'. She's tried aura reading, astral projection, telepathy and spiritualism albeit half-heartedly. She would read the book; talk to the expert; watch the video but somehow get distracted when supposedly doing the exercises. Simple useful techniques like relaxation strategies, yoga and positive visualisation made perfect sense to Sarah but somehow she never actually did them. She was, however, quick to recommend such ideas to friends and customers. She knew she lacked what her mother called 'stickability'. Her ambitions to develop psychically languished alongside the unfinished jigsaws, tapestries and painting-by-number projects of her youth. She wouldn't even think of the bread maker, steamer, electric wok, exercise bike and decoupage kit - follies of more recent times hidden safely in the attic.

This is story I am currently working on - Should finish it soon. This is an early part of the story.

Terror at the thought of her unpunished flesh being beaten meant the lecture was received in a daze. Suzannah, once again pacing furiously, recalled some comments on duty, discipline and justice and she remembered how she had found herself focussed on the horror of his decree. She had found herself blushing as he had told the maid she would place herself in front of her master and have her flesh bared for a spanking.

At his command, the girl had silently turned a chair towards her master and bent with back to him, displaying her modestly covered back and now readily-curved bottom, as she held onto the sides to the chair. Suzannah had realised the girl’s practiced acquiesce revealed a history of such spankings at her husband’s hand, but her thoughts had been interrupted by the repetition of her name on his lips, once more:

‘My Lady. Please prepare the girl for her chastisement. I want her skirts raised. Her carelessness and thoughtlessness does not, however, merit less than punishment on her bare flesh. You will also lower her undergarments.’

As Suzannah recalled the shameful incident of her first experience of aiding another woman with her clothing the pacing once again faltered. Her ladyship was also remembering that further flicker of awe and horrified excitement she felt as she clumsily, and with unpractised hand raised the girl’s skirts. Once again, her kindly husband and guardian became the powerful authoritarian she had seen on that fateful day she had first witnessed him chastising the maid. She had struggled with the weight and volume of the girl’s skirts and petticoats and pushed them up and over her back, leaving the long, thin drawers as the girl’s only covering and realised that this was a temporary protection only.

‘Now, Suzannah, I require the girl’s drawers to be lowered’

The sound of such vulgarity on her husband’s lips was as shocking to Suzannah as the act she was required to perform – never had her very proper husband ever named a female undergarment, let alone issue orders around it. Despite her shock, fear and hesitation, she felt a strange mixture of gratitude and revulsion as her husband guided her through her task. The less delicate language remained shocking as were his expectations, but somehow, the explicit instructions allowed the modest young wife to comply:
‘You will unbutton her drawers and loosen the drawstring’

Suzannah had only later realised her husband’s detailed knowledge and familiarity with such garments. He had, after all, never loosened her garments – a task for her maid or occasionally, herself only. She had realised with further blushes that his passion for a disciplined household had provided him with an unusual knowledge of his serving maids’ underpinnings.
As Lady Suzannah’s nervous and unpractised fingers struggled with the buttons and strings, she heard her next set of instructions, once more shocked at Lord strap’s earthy and shocking vocabulary:

‘The drawers must be lowered to reveal the whole of her naughty, disobedient bottom. I particularly require access to her lower regions, where I intend to make her flesh sing. By pulling the drawstring, Suzannah, you may tie off her drawers below this area to leave her bottom bare for my attentions, but provide her with some undeserved modesty as I do not intend slapping her thighs for this particular infringement….That’s right…Just there…Just pull the strings, Suzannah and tie them together.’

As she had complied in a shocked daze, worse was to follow:

I haven't! Not really and not for ages anyway. I've written lots in the past, but being mostly unpublished is frustrating. I am going to self-publish a book of spanking stories soon and done the editing and prep.

I thought it would be a good idea to write some stuff, just to get my hand back in (so to speak!) I have several stories on the go that have not been touched in so long, I forgot where I was with them. I used to write one story at a time, (did two books' worth this way)but then started writing down stuff so I wouldn't forget. Some are just titles to act as triggers. Some are a few paras and some half-written. I checked on one and it was merely a title (I said it's been a while!), another I knew I'd started was actually nearly 9,000 words.

It's vaguely Victorian, but underwear is based on fond memories of Western saloon girls in films seen on TV and my fantasy of Victorian dress. All very corny - She is about to be punished by her husband for risking her safety and is thinking back over recent limited experience of corporal punishment of the maid and herself by him. I loved rereading it and wrote a few hundred words - I'd left it mid-caning! Caning is now over and she's distraught, but he is having lascivious thoughts and I'm not sure whether she's going to get a cuddle before she gets the Victorian equivalent of a good bonking which they will both enjoy

I shall post an extract...

There was an interesting piece in Observer magazine about a murder with what is called in article 'S&M' connection:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/theobserver/2008/apr/13/1

There is clear implication that the masochist was an unlikely one because he was squeamish and that it was about self hatred.

Without Stuart or Charlotte's knowledge, Rod had for some time been advertising on an S&M website that he was looking to be someone's 'slave'. If they had known what he was doing, they would both have been surprised. Rod had been mildly curious about S&M when he was with Stuart - nothing more than what Stuart called 'schoolboy stuff' - but Stuart wasn't interested and Rod hadn't pressed it. Not even after they split up did Stuart ever see marks or bruises on Rod's body.

Rod was an unlikely devotee of S&M. He was squeamish. The sight of blood made him queasy. He couldn't even look at a broken fingernail, and Stuart was later convinced that Rod's attraction towards masochism was rooted in self-hatred. He was sure that Rod saw his separation from Stuart as a deep rejection. Rod had been abandoned and he was lonely and now he was punishing himself. The self-hatred, thought Stuart, was all mixed up with Rod's upbringing, in particular his relationship with his father. He had constantly sought approbation from his father, but he felt that he never received it.

It is possible he did hate himself, but from my reading, he was more like a sexualised kid in a sweetie shop who'd been interested in BDSM, but not had desire filled before. His interest in young men and BDSM may have been self-loathing, pleasurable fun or anything between if not a mix of both ends of the spectrum.
Whatever the trigger, he had a curiosity and interest. And people into BDSM are as mixed a bag as any. While not squeamish, I am a bit of a coward about pain avoiding dentists and injections where possible. I suspect I'm not alone in having masochistic/submissive fantasies and desires but being wary of pain. My fear of pain was a barrier to exploration (among other barriers!)but fascination and curiosity got the better of me and reality is rather wonderful.
Sadly for Rod Hall, he became the victim of a most violent and horrific murder. he absolutely did not deserve to die, but he took enormous risks with somebody who showed signs of being seriously unsafe. It is very sad, but is not typical of those who choose to explore BDSM fantasies.

I've been neglecting my blog. I think it is because I'm not feeling very inspired at the moment. I have been quite active on various message boards and wondered why. I suspect it's because MBs are reactive and here I have to be proactive. I like the fact that a blog is one's own, but perhaps it's lack of inspiration that has led to this inactivity.

I have been doing something though. I've put together a collection of spanking stories for self-publishing, so been quite busy with editing, sorting etc.

Meanwhile, here's a distraction:
http://www.talisman.org/quizzes/robin-hood-morality.shtml

...ad by now! It's just always there nowadays. It's miles better than the explicit porn, but just seems..I don't know... Of course the ads I see and my visitors see are not always the same. I really have no desire to find myself a slave or master, so wasted on me, I'm afraid.