Identity Crisis, Quandary, Predicament, Impasse, Puzzle, Episode...
I was at my last party for a while on Saturday. It was an event at the Kinky Farm and it was disappointing compared to previous parties there.
I spent a fair amount of time waiting for Kinkycatlady and Impuresoul to arrive. A number of people had come down from Sydney, but they were delayed by a series of unfortunate incidents and didn't arrive until about midnight, so I didn't get to spend much time around them.
There were other people I knew, including Berenice and Dog Boy who put on an impressive display of needlework. Like 280 needles worth of impressive, including a couple of wide gauge needles (14 I think) that went in and out of his back. Warm and cold water was then injected through the needle, never entering his body, but still getting under his skin. I watched with an amused grin on my face.
Overall, I didn't feel as calm as I normally would at a party. The thought crossed my mind that I just didn't have the bandwidth to deal with everyone there. I couldn't take an interest in some of the people there, particularly the people who were petty or critical or who had a predatory attitude.
It probably didn't help that I've been hitting a point of fatigue with some aspects of kink.
I have made a number of friends from many different parts of the kink spectrum, and I have been exposed to many different flavours of kink and many different dynamics. Recently, some things have been getting under my skin (or I've been letting them under my skin.)
The snivelling subs phenomenon is one of the most notable. I know a number of Dommes for whom I have a great deal of respect, but the way some subs deal with dommes is something that for some reason I find distressing. Whether in a blog post or in conversation or in Fetlife profiles, hearing other subs talk about how "Mistress X is the centre of my being and the reason for my existence" (not an actual quote but I think this expresses a bit of the tone) is something that fails to resonate with me. It's not that I haven't experienced a real submissive headspace. I have, and I know it can be a wonderful place, but if this feeling is expressed in terms that are the least bit snivelly, it will put me off.
I can also recall being at a subbies munch and when a bottle of wine was opened, more than one subbie rang to ask for permission. The same happened when someone's birthday cake was passed around. Now I know that some people enjoy having power exchange embedded in the minutae of daily life. Furthermore, some people can use some guidance in various aspects of their lives and if they can get this in a kinky context, then fine. But the repeated deferral to others in this context seemed to suggest to me not submission, but helplessness.
Yes, yes, I know that this might work for them. But it seems that more and more of the currency of submission is foreign to me. Looking around and seeing subbies acting in ways that are alien to me has been happening more and more. It may have something to do with the recent dissatisfaction I've had with the label "sub".
I've thought about changing my orientation on Fetlife to "Kinkster" or something along those lines. There may be nothing to it and I may be overreacting, but I feel sometimes that people make assumuptions about you when they see your label. (Or maybe I encourage them to make assumptions through my actions. If someone only ever sees me in kinky situations in a subbie context, will they (not unreasonably) come to assume that I want or need that kind of feeling constantly?) This goes deeper than that though. Changing my profile orientation or even my name is a simple process. But it doesn't tell me what I am.
In a number of areas of my life I've been having a minor identity crisis (quick, what's a word for a crisis that is not really a crisis?) The labels that I used to apply to myself don't seem to fit. Is this a facet of my identity quandary?
I can take the word "sub" off my profiles easily enough, but how do I deal with the prospect that maybe I'm not really a sub after all?
I'm taking some time off from playing to think about this.