Ten was born prior to my first Playa del Fuego. Since it’s also a Playa name, that is kind of cheating… you’re supposed to get your Playa name –ON- the Playa. But meh, petty details.

 I had a very different life then—collar and ownership and all. I literally belonged to someone else. So yes, it was true, those who said it was a phase.

The man who owned me named me. Slave 10. The number. Not just because that was all I was. But because I was his perfect 10.

We’re different people now. But I’m still Ten. I’m not a number, and not just someone’s Perfect 10. The word is now personified into the person you see before you today. The person who came to Playa del Fuego and left a changed woman. Who took the collar off, but still remains active in the BDSM community. Because that’s who I am now.

You ask about BDSM? As a “community”? Those who aren’t a part of it will never know how strong we really are. A BDSM “community”—it’s a hard concept for those who think it’s all about beating the snot out of people for sexual gratification. But I assure you, I’ve never felt more a part of something, more supported, and more self-aware before I found my kinky chosen family.

I never fit in anywhere. I never belonged. High school, college, even with those of similar age in the workplace… I was always different. I mean, I got along well enough, I had my fun. But never fit in. Never got let in.

Now. I know what community is. My first chosen “home” where I could be me (Ten) was Dressing for Pleasure’s The Crawlspace. Master Ed and Karen took us in and accepted us as family that very first night. I learned so much there, about different fetishes and people and statuses--- and about uniting under one flag.

It was there that I met Firefly who would take me to my first “big event”: Black Phoenix’s Winter Solstice. It was a sleep-away event where I stayed in a hotel and attended classes during the day. I met soooo many people. And it became apparent that people accepted me, as Ten. The person who I had to hide from others. That I wasn’t strange, crazy, or a burden.

Since then, Ten has attended many events. And Ten has spilled over to daily life. I introduce myself as Ten to most anyone new I meet. I am called “Ten” by both of my roommates, the kinkster and the ‘nilla both. Few people know me by my old name anymore. Those I still talk to from my old life (not the ones that simply keep tabs through Myspace and Facebook status updates), know about my lifestyle… and while they may not want to know details, they accept me as Ten as well, even if they call me by my given name.

OK, I can make this vewwwwy easy on you. Skip to the bottom, to the "Quick and Easy Version" if ya just wanna read some fortune cookie type advice.

Otherwise... have fun readin' wha' goes on in mai head!*

I thought the day was going pretty shitty. Things had been kinda-- less colorful-- since Monday and my experience with my ex (aka the General Manager of the NJ branch of ****ers Inc.-- the company I work for) which led to my resignation. I mean, having to go in for these last 2 weeks (ok, actually twelve days as I don't work Sundays)... it's killing me. It's been two days and I'm getting more and more depressed. I love my fucking job. I mean, I maintain the structural and financial center of an entire company, I work with truckers all day, I can wear pajamas to work, and I can fuck around on Fet all day without fear of reproach. This is a gig to kill for. And yet, one person, who happens to be my boss, who I happened to be VERY in love with at one point, sullied it so much that I need to leave because I feel as though I am mentally and physically in danger.

Today sucks worse than Monday... I have to get all of my stuff out of the warehouse, where I'd been storing it since, what, July? I mean, me and P had been going around these last two days faking it until we made it. As if I wasn't leaving. It seems like it's the way everyone feels like dealing with my exodus...

Except Alv**.

"Naw girl, don' tell me dat. Naw, you playin'. Stop playin." I get a huge hug as the man wrestles with emotions ranging from anger, anxiety, and sadness

Ohhhh Alv--. Alv-- the skinny African American from North Carolina who repeats the same thing over and over, who got real excited over the "crystal clear" picture of a T.V. a customer had given him (I mean REAL excited), and who thinks won-ton soup is some kind of strange, foreign delicacy. He's so special. But he's the only one who showed emotion when I said I was leaving. who was the only one out of all the members of ****vers Inc. to willingly enter the Delancey Street Foundation where all of the workers of this company met.

Oh yeah, I probably forgot to mention that, not only do I work with truck drivers all day, but I work with reformed (reformed with the exception of my ex) drug addicts and ex-cons. The stories you hear, the things you learn when you work in an environment like that... well it should probably be considered a part of your benefits package

OK BACK TO THE POINT

So moving out kinda sucke. It was another blow of reality that I really wanted to ignore. Thank goodness I had the help of Christian Davids and ElisabethDavids (who will always be "Ismene" in my heart). They kept me in good spirits and that they drove 2 hours to help me means the world to me. These kind of friends are VERY few and far between.

I took them and Master_Tombstone out to dinner and we were shootin' the shit and then I got kind of bothered. My mom had called me earlier and said something about a house fire but that everyone was ok and she'd call me later. It didn't really sound all that bad, something like a cooking accident that destroyed a cabinet or something. But at dinner with these fond friends, something hit me, in the gut. A feeling. An "ohmigod". I suddenly felt the need to get in touch with someone, anyone who could explain to me what the fuck happened.

I called my mom, my granddmother, my stepfather, my brother, and my sister. None picked up. They complain that I distanced myself from the family-- argh. Finally get my brother. While I thought his voice was the least likely I'd hear, it was a pleasant surprise to talk to him. Still, he's also the most likely to know nothing beyond the pot smoke within his college dorm room.

Then my mom called back. Actually my stepfather did, from her phone. I used to hate the man. 8 years ago, before they got sober, him and my mother, he used to terrorize the household with empty-- and full for the matter-- threats of bodily harm and anguish. But tonight, I was never more relieved to hear his voice.

He started to tell me what had happened but he was slurring a bit- while he'd given up the sauce, I know he was probably on his second dose of Percocet, whether or not his back really hurt. So I was really happy when he put my mom on the phone. I may think she's an ever-loving cunt and a "douche-cannon" (thanks Eric) but she's still my mom and at that point I was ready to start taking laps around the parking lot, I was so nervous.

I started going into shock when she recounted the events of the previous night. As an empath I could feel how it felt when C**, my 7 year old brother came in to tell her the TV stopped working and how terrified she was when she walked in to see gray smoke pouring out of the outlet. I felt what it was like to grab the kid- to scour the immediate surroundings for what you should be taking in case the place goes completely up in flames. I felt what it was like to have your husband of five years (although she has shitty taste, it is love after all, and love-- I understand-- see excerpt above about loving a toxic asshole) battling the blaze for 25 minutes while you impatiently wait for the FRIGGEN firemen to arrive to save the day. I felt the terror as the firemen went to leave and my fairly high husband asks if they checked the basement and as they open up the crawl space (no, NOT DFP's) and watch as smoke BILLOWS* out. The anguish as the hoses the inept firemen used only pushed the fire farther into the house and destroyed more of the precious irreplaceable stuff that one stores in the basement...

And what's the kicker of it all? My mom, the person who, in my angry adolescent angst years used to positively hate, the woman who beat several HEAVY addictions and continues to fight against rampant co-dependency (AKA wiping my douchebag stepfather's ass all the damn timer-- ok well he's not so much of a douchebag now either)... the woman who sold herself and her kids for drugs, who very nearly lost her identity as a human being... she said that we (meaning her, my stepfather and my little half [whole in my heart) brother] were blessed.

No one got hurt, not even Lucky, the dumbass chocolate lab. And within 24 hours, her connections within Alcoholic's Anonymous found them a "home". Not a hotel. 2 bedrooms, every amenity you could imagine. And the insurance company is paying for it. A home. Within 24 hours A place to stay until the damage was repaired. And this ex Meth head, who has no other faux "silver linings" was able to see the positive.

I tell ya. If ya met me a year ago you'd know I fucking HATED her. So to admit that I love this woman and that she taught me a lesson today is rough... I'm so happy for them and the energy they give me over the phone. Even if it took her other 3 grown kids from previous exploits and her making a new life with the ex-psycho, now somewhat reformed husband and the kid they made.

The only thing that is still making me feel these intense JABS-- yeah, they're fucking jabs... and they need to stop-- of depression is that she made me give her a bin I had taken mistakenly when I moved the fuck out. It had all of my dad's stuff in it and my old report cards, art from art shows I did (holy SHIT, I used to do art shows. And poetry contests. And speech and debate and fiction writing... wow I am a person. And not just someone who likes to be tied up... Sorry just need to remind myself sometimes because I really do love to be tied up) in it. She made me give it back. Luckily, I planned to do a scrapbook for my siblings (the one that share the same Daddy) and I had swiped a lot of his pictures, his wallet, his school term papers... and other random things. So something was working with me there.

But still. My past. A lot of it. Is gone. While it's not my dream home, like that house was to my mother... my past, the happy parts I like to hold onto... are gone.

shakes head vigorously

This blog was SUPPOSED to be about perspective. But yeah, if ya haven't figured it out yet, skip to the Quick 'n Easy Version at the bottom:

Quick 'n Easy Version My parent's house burned down. My past is missing. They don't have their dream house anymore but still feel blessed. So... yeah... how the fuck are you blessed?

After months of physical abuse, it was just a 15 minute verbally abusive tirade that made me quit my job.

I'm terrified.

And relieved.

But now what?
 

But alas, he was already laying in bed, having to be up at 5 a.m.

So I went to the house. (I live in Wayne now). Vera wasn't home, was working a 24hr shift. Ari was there, a few words were exchanged but we each plopped down on our computers like any other night. I tried not to let it get me down. Hell, I finished college!!!... but there was no amount of self-help tactics that would alleviate this feeling of emptiness.

It was a random IM from someone I'd asked information from that made my night really. An unexpected source of intellectual debate--from someone who I've been around about half a dozen times and spoke the same amount of words to.
 

I feel like we can communicate

On an alternate plane.

But we’ve hardly ever uttered a word.

Between us twice.

• He suggested counseling. I wanted to do that at one point. Why did it change? I think I was put off by the amount of schooling I'd have to do to get anywhere. I probably was smoking alot of pot at the time and had the motivation of a stoner because I'll take a little challenge to a jaded daily quotidien any day.

• I have the materials to learn to be a personal trainer. I dig exercise and people come to me for exercise advice all the time. (and they make big bucks). Not exactly a career, but a supplement to my income involving something of interest to me.

• Graduate school? For what exactly? I have a BA in History. I don't want to be a Historian/Archivist/etc. History was really a piss-poor decision. If I followed through with the teaching thing it would've been worthwhile but just the History isn't going to do much for me.

• I could go for law. I know I'd be really good at it, but it's not something I really want to do.

Problem is, there's no single thing I truly have a passion for, I just have a passion for excelling. So how can I aggressively pursue something if I have no idea what direction it's in? Travel blindly and make the most of it? That'd be easy if I was a free-style living type of person but I get anxious if I can't see ten steps ahead.  I need to know what the future holds so I can be prepared. It probably stems from a childhood of itinerancy and not-so-pleasant surprises.

(My favorite was the time when my mom came home from a long weekend away somewhere and informed us that she had married the sociopath she'd been dating. Fun stuff.)

So Mr. Misanthropic Philosopher who engaged in a lengthy conversation with me last night tells me that I should do what makes me happy.

I don't know what makes me happy. Besides ice cream. And snuggling. Stupid little things like that, none of them life-defining. And I seek a niche, a purpose, a reason for being, a sense of self. Ice cream, while amazing, cannot provide these things.

He tells me to choose, that the first step is hardest, but not to look back.

I have no idea which way to step. 
I don't like taking risks.

I find myself telling him things like:
Comfortable is safe, but comfortable isn't necessarily fulfilling.
Being comfortable is not a reason to continue on your current path.
If you're unhappy with the present situation, it requires risk to change it.

Mr. Misanthropic Philosopher (who shall now be known as Mr. MP)-- I'll take my own advice if you do the same.

The pervasive question that haunts me now is... what's next?






 

They tell me to listen to the "little voice". It will tell me the right thing to do.

Doesn't really help if you're ScHiZOPhrEniC! -snarfs

Ok, I'm not really schizo (but I didn't say I wasn't crazy!). But I do have a battle raging in my head as to what the hell I should be doing. Which option is best for me? What are the pros and cons of each situation? Which one stands out? Blah blah, blah blah, blah-- BLAH.

Truth is, I change my resolve with a change in the wind. I don't know what the fuck I'm doing. It's slightly terrifying. (I say "slightly" so I don't look like a chicken) I ain't skerrrrred -puffs out chest-

-deflates- But I am. Of tangible and intangible things, of 'sure things' and 'just in cases', of feeling like I'm in a bit of a limbo at the moment.

At least I have the love of a wonderful woman smothering me. Otherwise I'm not sure how this dazed and confused mentality would be affecting my sanity.

That's it I guess. Just how I'm feeling at the moment.

-shrugs-