miscellany

What A Lovely Way to Burn: Spring Fever at Sideshow

It isn’t quite spring here yet, but it’s getting close. The light is changing. The snow has been mostly washed away by the recent rains. I’m hoping by next week the light will be even higher in the sky and full-on spring fever will have sprung, just in time for this month’s Sideshow theme.

The sad news is that Fran Varian can’t make it up from Durham this time, but rest assured! She will be here to perform her kickass work another time. Meanwhile, you can learn more about Lyme disease and help heal Fran over at her website, and you can buy some of her books if you were dying to hear her work (and I know you were).

While Fran is a fan of the Peggy Lee version, I am really into Elvis lately, so here’s a little something to get you in the mood …

Join us at Sideshow on March 8th with readers Arianne Benford, Beth Greenfield, Genne Murphy, and LOVE the Poet.

Sideshow: The Queer Literary Carnival – Spring Fever
Hosted by Cheryl B. & Sinclair Sexsmith
Tuesday, March 8th @ The Phoenix
447 East 13th Street @ Avenue A
Doors, 7:30pm. Reading, 8pm
Free! (We’ll pass the hat for the readers)
RSVP on Facebook
See the bios for the readers.

identity

Still Time to Contribute to Symposium #2

Butch Lab’s Symposium #2 is in progress, and I have some great submissions so far! I’m compiling them this week, so if you can get them to me by Friday you will still be included. I hope you’ll consider contributing!

The topic for the second Butch Lab Symposium is Butch Stereotypes, Cliches, and Misconceptions.

Here’s the writing prompt:

What do people think “butch” means? What are the stereotypes around being butch? What do people assume is true about you [or the masculine of center folks in your life], but actually isn’t? What image or concept do you constantly have to correct or fight against? How do you feel about these misconceptions? How do you deal with them? Do you respond to these stereotypes or cliches? How?

The easiest way to get your post URL to me is by filling out this form on ButchLab.com. You can always email butchlabproject (at) gmail.com if you have problems, but the form is preferable.

identity, Interviews

AT: Mini-Interview

AT, Psychologist, Writer, Jock, Artist, Blues & Swing dancer.

1. What is your relationship with the word or identity “butch?”
Butch says it as no other label can. Butches, for the most part, present tough and perform tender. I love the word Butch as it well characterizes the stuff of Butch.

2. What kind of words and labels, if any, do you use to identify yourself?
Butch guy and Transmasculine.

3. What do you wish you could tell your younger self about sex, sexuality, or gender?
Thanks to me as frequently I give my younger self a big pat on my back for having never once wavered throughout my entire life in my presentation and performance of my identity, sexuality and gender as a Butch guy and Transmasculine. Everywhere I held fort, as a former teacher, getting my graduate degrees and later, in my years of private practice. I strutted my stuff and swaggered and loved special women all as the jock I was, athletic prowess and all taking my space the same as I did as a teenager able to kick a high and distant spiral while barefoot. The same too I did at thirty-something at Jones Beach out in the ocean far from shore, with my swimsuit tied around one ankle and swam naked in the deep ocean. It was my return to shallow waters and the shore fearing each time I would reach down to my ankle and discover my swimsuit no longer there. :-( It takes guts to live Butch!

Bonus: Anything you’d like to add?
Feminism near destroyed Butch and Femme, their attempts to bury us deep in a graveyard and to be forgotten and dismissed. Feminism failed at that, notwithstanding the years of pain and suffering on the part of so many Butches and Femmes forced underground, their presence denied during the many years of Feminism. Remember: only Butch and Femme existed pre feminism! I am deeply appreciative to the Butches today whose persistence of who they are validates our identity, gender and sexuality. It is the zing of the strings in my heart!

identity, Interviews

Jenni Olson: Mini-Interview

Jenni Olson is a writer, director, curator, filmmaker, and co-founder of PlanetOut.com. She is also director of e-commerce at WolfeVideo.com and author of The Queer Movie Poster Book. www.butch.org

Photo by Cheryl Mazak

1. What is your relationship with the word or identity “butch?”

Butch is a word that helps me speak proudly about a very important aspect of myself. I love that it enables me to embrace so many of my unique and special qualities in a celebratory way and to connect with others who are interested in dialogue about gender difference in society (especially other butches, and the girls who “get” me).

Like the word “queer,” the word “butch” has an outsider quality which reflects the reclamation of an identity that our larger society has historically (and currently) held in contempt. Proudly flying this flag is the first step in my personal manifesto of gender integrity in the face of perennial societal disapproval. It is part of a journey towards wholeness, healing and self-esteem — a journey which becomes somewhat easier as I get older, stronger and smarter. Somewhat.

2. Which words and labels, if any, do you use to describe yourself and your identities?

Butch dyke, lesbian, queer. I am not a “gay woman.” I love that my kids call me Mom! I also proudly claim Q. Allan Brocka’s hilariously honest term from his Logo series, Rick & Steve: The Happiest Gay Couple in All The World: “Versatile Top.” I am also a closeted bisexual.

3. What do you wish you could tell your younger self about sex, sexuality, or gender?

I would start with the currently popular phrase: “It gets better.” And then recite what I just wrote above in Question 1.

miscellany

“It’s All Butch” 2011 Calendar

Photographer Debbie Boud has put together a 2011 calendar featuring butch pin-up photos, It’s All Butch.

Says Debbie:

“The It’s all Butch calendar came about from a blog on myspace a friend of mine did about Butch women from the L word and how sexy they were. I thought to myself that most of the women on the L word were not lesbians so I decided to create a venue that showed that Butch Lesbian women could be just as sexy as the femme women. The idea was to create a diverse array of Butch women. In 2010 Maria is 68 yrs old and was a professional roller derby gal in the 70s. In 2011 Torie is 17 yrs old. There are thin Butches, big Daddy Butches, and FTM [folks].”

She sent on some shots to show off here.

More information is available at cabelgalshideout.com, including bios and personal profiles of the models.

dirty stories, fiction

Good Girl, Bad Girl (Part Two)

WARNING: This story contains Daddy/girl play (and dirty talk). Read Part I.

Part II.

She is a bad girl.

There is very specific protocol if she wants me to fuck her. She is supposed to ask for it, nicely. If she’s embarrassed, she is to sit on my lap and tell me she has a secret.

She wants it, all the time. She is the first girl I’ve dated seriously who has a higher sex drive than I do.

I want her to own her desires. To know there’s nothing wrong or shameful about wanting to be fucked, to be opened, to be taken. But sometimes, she can’t. She forgets she’s supposed to ask, and instead drops hints and tries to turn me on, to entice me. Sometimes, this frustrates me. Sometimes, it becomes a game, reminding her she is a bad girl for wanting it and not being able to tell me.

This is what happens.

I sit on the couch reading a book and drinking tea after the dinner she made. For me. She finishes the dishes, brings her book out too, sits next to me. She doesn’t look at me as she finds the place marked by a small piece of paper and starts reading. I’m not paying attention; she’s watching me from the corner of her eye. Her legs stir, she shifts position, pull them underneath her as she inches closer to me.

I turn a page. She turns her eyes to the pages of her book, moves them along the words, not reading. She’s tried to get my attention all through dinner. Touched her foot to my ankle under the table. Gazed at me, lusty and devourous. Touched my hand and forearm, leaned across the table to display her breasts. Kept her thighs apart. Crossed them, rubbed her legs together.

She gets frustrated that I’m not paying attention. Starts pouting a little. She sighs, audibly.

I ignore her.

We read a while. I’m deeply involved in the middle of this book, and besides, didn’t she just get fucked this morning? I am impatient with this seduction routine, it makes me feel anxious, itchy. And simultaneously, something dark in me growls from down low.

I finish my tea, put my book down, and get up to brush my teeth. When I emerge, she watches me from the couch, waiting for some cue from me, and almost rolls her eyes when I give her none. She sets her book down on the coffee table a little harder than necessary and gets up to brush her teeth, wash her face, prepare for bed.

We cross next to each other in the hallway and I slam her up against the wall, face first. She whimpers, gasps. Breathes in.

“Is this what you wanted?” I grip her arm and twist it behind her, my mouth close to her cheek. Continue reading →

miscellany

Boston & Syracuse This Week!

I’m off tomorrow to Boston for two workshops—Cock Confidence and Afternoon Delight—until Wednesday, then Friday I’m heading upstate to Syracuse, New York, to do a Radical Masculinity workshop.

I’ve been updating the details in that “What’s Happening in February” post that’s been at the top of the Sugarbutch feed since earlier this month … Has that been useful for you folks, or do you find it annoying? It’s a new thing I’m trying.

Hope you can join me at one of these workshops! Here’s the details:

Cock Confidence: Strap-On 101 Workshop at Good Vibes in Boston

Tuesday, February 22nd, 8pm
Good Vibrations, 308A Harvard Street in Brookline, MA

Many of us have experience with strapping on, packing, and playing, but there are lots of new products out there on the market that might be exciting and that you haven’t encountered yet. Plus, she’ll delve into some cock confidence, getting into the psychology of penetration, and discussing what it’s like to shoot from the hip.

(Thanks to Syd London for the great photo!)


Cock Confidence at Butch Voices NYC (photo by Syd London)

Afternoon Delight: A workshop on sex toys and getting what you want in bed at Harvard in Boston

Wednesday, February 23nd
8-10pm
Ticknor Lounge in Boylston Hall (right by Mass Ave)
Harvard, Boston, MA

Produced by Girlspot, the queer women’s group at Harvard. We’ll explore how to turn up the heat on our sex lives, what gender expression and performance has to do with sexuality, and all the fun tools we can use in the bedroom—from vibrators to strap ons to butt toys to light bondage and sensation. Includes a sex toy giveaway! Open to the public.

Radical & Responsible Gender Masculinity, Misogyny, and Feminisms at Syracuse, NY

Saturday, February 26th, 1-4pm
Syracuse University
Hall of Languages 102
Syracuse, NY

Academics break down and deconstruct gender. How do we build it back up radically and responsibly? How does one adapt masculinity or femininity “positively?” How do we become responsible about gender? How do we continue to break down the gender role restrictions that are hurtful and traumatizing? How can queer communities and spaces be improved by gender reflection? Open to the public; RSVP to Lauren Hannahs at lbhannah@syr.edu

identity, Interviews

Claudia Rodriguez (aka C-Rod): Mini-Interview

Writer, activist, teacher/student, parent. agentezeroocho.blogspot.com

C-Rod is also part of the performance group Butchlalis de Panochtitlan.

1. What is your relationship with the word or identity “butch?” 

Butch is word that I’ve grown to embrace, I love being butch but sometimes I hate the baggage, mostly expectations and misconceptions others, friends and foes, impose on me because my gender presentation is butch. This is a poem which, I feel, truly encompasses my relationship with the word butch:

To my butch scholar

Butch aesthetic…
what does that mean?
Reflect what you see before you into words.
make sure you address my big boobs
and expand on how my tight ass
makes you salivate at the thought
of your fingers
sliding up and down your keyboard
as you recreate me, separate me, turn me upside down
and label me.
ME-your idea!
For you to relive every time you, she, I read.
Butch aesthetic?
that captured by your eyes
digested by your mind
and ends up on everyone’s tongue.

Reflect what you see before you into words.
Please include the smells-
is that hot wax or the smell of hot skin?
Hear that?
Your heart beating in MHz at the sound
of the whip against my back,
Um, my moans.
Butch mystique?
That surrounding my butch Papi
who stirs fag/boi/tranny fantasies
you fucking me in your mind
as you witness
gender fucker
fucking
gender fucker
performing Butch identity against what is Queer/Butch.
Gender fuckers gender fucking,
performing Butch identity against what it means to be a chicana/butch
butch violating butch…
This is butch to me…

I feel the marks of my identity
I’ve been the butch top in this femme-butch matrix
where my desire IS draped in femme fatigues
where my identity manipulates my desires
Where I’ve enjoyed being somebody’s bitch
Really, I just want to be ok
with wanting to be manipulated by you.
Feeling your cock-hard Domness
Top this sub
makes my cock hard
femme or butch both can top me the same
as long as I get spanked the way I want to be spanked.

The personal is political
but the political is not always written on the skin
I know you see me as a cabron…ladies don’t deny it
But can you tell I like to fuck boys/bois?
Yes
I am
one of those butches that flew over the coo-coo’s nest
the kind that fucks other butchas…
go ahead and say it “where are all the real butches.”
Act surprised that I’m down with getting down butch on butch?

Hola Papi,
I was thinking about you, how the other day you stretched yourself out before me, slid your hand under your boxers and touched yourself. You scooped some of your juice up! I know cause I saw as you first smelled your scent then ate it. As if nothing you slid your hand down there again. You face twisted this way and that with pleasure and lips parted with your moans. You got the legs twitching, chest heaving types of motions. I watched until your eyes rolled to the back of your head with satisfaction and closed with bliss.
Here I go again
Talking all that little boy fetish (gag motion, and bj motion)
I like short hair, ( here voice over comes on, continue bj)
peach fuzzed, tittie tottin’ cara de niño
The prettier the better
I’ll say it
Son mi cochinita pibil
Carne tierna y picosa.
Won’t I ever quit
Shed this skin
Step into the post pony-tail dyke
Post-drag king
Post-andro
Post-trans
Post post
Post Pomo
all I want is to step into my post-heroic masculinity
Stop suppressing mine to uphold others’
Does it make you feel good?
Does it heave your imaginary man pecks
to put me down? To walk around me like everything is cool
even though you didn’t play by the rules,
Then I’m down to let you
If you think you’re Top enough to top this.

Reflect what you see before you into words….

2. What kind of words and labels, if any, do you use to identify yourself?
Lesbian, jota, gender queer, gender fucker, papi, sub/slave, switch, Chicana, lesbiana, sinvergüenza

3. What do you wish you could tell your younger self about sex, sexuality, or gender? 

The void of not having female masculinity role models will haunt you like a missing limb. But don’t worry little one, one day you’ll figure out how to step into your/my post-heroic masculinity stop suppressing your’s/mine to uphold others’. You have to have lots of love and compassion for self and it will be returned ten-fold to you.

reviews

Happy Birthday, Shine! And Recommendations For the Best Queer Porn

Purely for fun, and because a little birdie told me it’s Shine’s birthday today, here’s some of my favorite Crash Pad Series episodes.

I’ve said this before, but I can’t really stress enough that if you aren’t watching the Crash Pad Series you are missing out on the best porn out there, period. Not just in the queer porn category, but in the broader sense of the people-having-sex-on-camera world in general. In fact, I think even calling it “porn” turns some people off to what it is—I mean yes, it is sex on camera, but the word “porn” for most people who aren’t so versed in the huge variety of things that fall into that category calls to mind bleach-blonde silicone-implant girls and bow-chicka-wow-wow soundtrack and awkward movements and no actual plot.

Not that I think you necessarily need a plot, just that some sort of context or reason for these two people to be fucking on camera is kind of important, mostly because otherwise it looks so incredibly awkward to go from sitting next to each other on a couch to screaming orgasms.

And hey, what do you know, Shine took care of that with this simple premise of her series: The “crash pad” is a place where you can go and have sexy escapades with someone who’s already there or with the person you bring. Or, hell, by yourself (there are some solos available in the vast library). Just putting this one thing in place has meant that Shine (from her voyeuristic position of the secretly installed cameras in the crash pad) has completely bypassed the awkwardness of “plot” in 90% of porn.

You could even look at the Crash Pad Series as a cultural artifact: This is how queers are having sex in the 2000s and ’10s. This is authentic and real. This is what we like to do with each other, this is how we like to explore our bodies, our sensualities, our sensations, our energetic meridians, our love, our desires.

To paraphrase some conversations I’ve had with Barbara Carrellas, queers are more deeply in touch with this stuff. I’m not sure why (though I’m sure if Barbara and I sat down we would have some interesting theories to discuss), maybe it’s that we have to un-learn the biggest cultural assumption about sex (that we’ll sleep with the opposite sex) that we can more easily open up and explore other aspects of it, too.

We queers are damn good at fucking.

Maybe you’re one of those people who believes that there’s so much free porn out there, that you can’t afford to pay for it—which I understand, I have made that oath to myself in the past. But as I get older, and as the Internet gets older and as big business owns so much of the art that we all consume, I believe more and more in paying artists and supporting queer community ventures—not just by attending or promoting or sharing the cool things, but also with my dollars. Syd London and I were just talking last night about radical capitalism and how every one of our dollars is a vote, and every one of our votes adds up. It’s part of why I’m a vegetarian, it’s part of why I purchase albums from my favorite indie singer/songwriters (even though it’s inconvenient to sometimes have the iTunes restrictions on them) and go to their concerts.

If we support these artists, then they will be able to continue doing what they (we) do. Not just because we will be able to pay our bills, but also because we will feel like what we’re doing has a valuable place in the world, and specifically in these communities in which we run.

It’s like Jiz Lee has said: “The ONLY time I’ve felt exploited in porn is from people pirating my work.” Or like Tori Amos said (to me, actually, in direct answer to my question) once, “If I taste wine, and I like it, I’m not going to put the bottle in my purse, because I want them to continue making that wine.”

So I know $20 a month for a Crash Pad membership seems like a lot to pay for porn, but how much do you pay for your smart phone? Or your cable? Or the beers you have on the weekends? I’ve come to think it’s pretty important to put my money where my mouth is, as they say, and order artist’s work, to pay good money for art.

And this is really worth it. I promise. Give it a try for just one month and see what you think.

Shine has been documenting, directing, recording, and showing off the many, many ways we fuck and play and explore through the Crash Pad and other projects of hers, and I am ever glad she is part of this world and doing what she does. Happy birthday, Shine. Thank you for sharing your hard work with all of us!

On to some of my personal favorite episodes, the ones I go back to over and over.

Season 1 Episode 1, Starring Dylan Ryan & Trucker Cash: Still my very favorite. I love the fisting and Dylan’s outfit and mm everything. They were a real-life couple so the chemistry and connection is there.

Season 1 Episode 5, Starring Shawn (Syd Blakovich) & Rozen DeBowe: Because Rozen is one of my favorite porn crushes. Doesn’t seem like she’s doing much lately, but I do like going back to this one. Rozen mostly tops Syd in this one, lots of cock sucking and fucking.

Season 1 Episode 6, Starring Princess Donna & Jake: Dirty knife play in a kitchen, with ice and a blindfold. Sexy. Donna’s profile says she’s usually a top, but she does quite a nice job giving in here.

Season 3 Episode 21, Starring Princess Donna, Jake, & Lorelei Lee: Good threesome (and decidedly not awkward! I should take some tips from this one). They are all sexy and lots of hot play.

Season 4 Episode 24, Starring Ex & Muscle Beach: Long-time lovers, which is clear in their joyous smiles and giggling and sweetness toward each other. Lots of pain play, I’m inspired by Ex’s badass toppy-ness.

Season 5 Episode 33, Starring: Carson & Syd: Who are apparently lovers off-screen too. SO much chemistry. And Syd is so fucking badass. I love watching her top.

Season 5 Episode 35, Starring Mickey Mod & Syd: The Crash Pad’s first cis guy, and it is SO so queer. See Micky Mod also in Heavenly Spire.

Season 7 Episode 44, Starring Julie Warren & Kuma: Kuma is a leather daddy, Julie is femme, they’re a real couple and it’s clear. Knife play, stockings, garters, caning, flogging, cocksucking, and it’s SO sweet and tender and hot.

Season 12 Episode 83, Starring Tina Horn and Roger Wood We watched this as part of the Crash Pad Series Twitter #pornparty and it was my favorite of the night. These two are skilled at their play and it shows. Plus, three words: Tina Horn’s ass. Oh my god.

Season 13 Episode 89, Starring Hilt and Rusty Nails: Love the ripped up fishnets on Rusty, and I love the noises she makes. Hilt clearly knows what he’s doing.

Season 13 Episode 91 Starring: Arabelle Raphael and James: Arabelle speaks French and teaches James some naughty phrases. She leaves her stockings, garter, and shoes on. Pretty switchy scene, they go back and forth. Arabelle is so hot, I would watch any of her scenes.

I haven’t kept up with as many of the episodes after Season 8 or so—Clearly I need to catch up! And now that Kristen is working during the days, I’ll have a lot more time to do that. File under: things to do right before she comes home.

So I’ve told you about my favorites … What about you folks out there, do you have favorite episodes? Which have you seen? Do you have the DVDs, are there certain web episodes you go back to? Which ones am I missing? Which from Season 8 onward should I be sure to watch? Who’s your favorite Crash Pad “character”?

And hey, be sure to wish Shine a happy birthday, on Twitter or elsewhere.

journal entries

“I Want To Be Fearless”

Ever since I got Ellis’s newest album Right On Time I’ve had it playing over and over. I like to listen to it at the gym (along with the Bryan Adams anthology) because I can crank it in the headphones and hear every word, every note. Somehow she has captured every emotional state that I’ve been going through lately on that album, and I’m continually surprised by her eloquent writing.

When I ordered Right On Time I got a note back from Ellis thanking me. I kind of assume she does this with everybody, though I can’t guarantee she’ll send you a note too, maybe she just happened to have some extra time on her hands right then. So I emailed her back and we corresponded a little, which is what led to her mini-interview on Butch Lab, which I’m so happy to have there. I’m keeping a watchful eye on her summer tour schedule—I hope she’ll be somewhere in the Northeast that I can easily attend.

I just ordered her Scrapbook 2-disc set which includes a DVD and an mp3 CD with her entire backlist (64 songs for $40!). I used to have a couple of her early albums, but I’m not sure what happened to them, they disappeared in one of my moves. I’m excited to hear the other albums, can’t wait to get to know all of those other songs of hers.

Here’s one from Right On Time that I’ve been obsessing over lately, listening to a lot and trying to keep in mind while things sometimes feel tumultuous.

(She adds another verse in this live version … “Let’s pretend we’re smaller than / the ants under the grass” but these lyrics are for the album version.)

Close to You
Ellis

let’s pretend we’re taller than
the highest part of everest
giants with a lions roar
but lighter than a bird
and we build upon our shoulders
buildings high into the sky
and we look out of our windows
wishing we could fly

I want to be close to you
to know how close we are
I want to be fearless
in the face of love
and not be afraid of falling apart

each day there’s a sunrise
beauty I can barely see
if I saw it all my heart would fill so full
I couldn’t breathe

I want to be close to you
to know how close we are
but I cover up my heart
afraid I am weakening
I have ways to escape when things get hard

here we are
this is
the way it is
the sun, the rain
how things are always
changing

let’s pretend we are at the end of our lives here
all our troubles that seemed so big
have all disappeared
when we are deep in the shadows
bringing light into the dark
I will reach for you till the end of me
when I can’t tell us apart

’cause I want to be close to you
to know how close we are
I want to be fearless
in the face of love
and not be afraid of falling
I’m falling apart

identity, Interviews

Raquel Gutierrez: Mini-Interview

Performer, writer, arts promoter in LA. myspace.com/butchlalis & raquefella.com

1. What is your relationship with the word or identity “butch?”

I love butch; it is onomatopoeic. You have to say it like you really mean it for it to register its true power. Being butch scared me, which obviously means I really wanted it. I’m in my mid-30s and these boots have finally been broken in just right. So, as I age, butch feels richer, more deserved than it did when I was a baby gay colliding blindly into language of identities and anarchy of desires. It was an arduous road getting here and it was worth it.

Is butch an insult? It has never been enough of an insult to warrant my having to comment on the banality of someone’s limited observation.

2. What kind of words and labels, if any, do you use to identify yourself?

Bilingual. Brown. Butch. Los Angeles. Napoleon Complex. Performance Writer. Pretty. Queer.

3. What do you wish you could tell your younger self about sex, sexuality, or gender?

Take it slow; subvert the scarcity model of relationalities; feel emboldened to ask partners a fuck ton of questions before having sex; lovingly challenge mentors out of their uncritical machismo even if it means risking invalidation; find, create and nurture a radical gender genealogy; believe what people tell you about themselves; take extra doses of vitamin Compassion; and to state my truth like my life depended on it.

miscellany

What Workshops Would You Like To See Me Teach?

My spring schedule is coming together, I’ve been talking to maybe a dozen different places and continuing to keep up my contacts as I plan to visit various cities this spring. I’m hoping that even if some of them don’t work out right away, perhaps they’ll work out in the future and I can come visit in the fall or next year.

I’ve got a pretty long workshop list right now, and while my most popular workshops continue to be Fucking With Gender, Radical & Responsible Gender, and Cock Confidence: Strap-On 101, I’m interested in continuing to develop other workshops that will be appealing. Someone just mentioned she’d like to go to a Daddy/girl workshop about the continuum of the dynamic from the bedroom to living that lifestyle 24/7. That’d be fascinating (I’d attend that workshop certainly). And another friend of mine just asked if I do anything for teens, which prompted me to start thinking about a How To Survive High School workshop for Queers, Freaks, and Gender Outlaws. Working on that one, too.

Point is, sometimes other people see workshops that I don’t necessarily see. So while I’m updating my workshop list for 2011 and thinking about other things I could start thinking about and developing, do you have any ideas for me of what workshops I could add to my repertoire? What would you love to see me teach? What do you wish I would come to your town and lead at your local college, community center, or sex toy shop?

I don’t have my spring schedule finalized yet, but I’m keeping it updated at mrsexsmith.com/appearances and in the What’s Happening in February post at the top of Sugarbutch.net (until March 1st, anyway, where I’ll replace it with a What’s Happening in March post instead).

If you’d like to bring me to your town for a workshop, I would love to go! Or perhaps I’m already coming to your town, and can do an add-on workshop with your group? You can email me directly, mrsexsmith(at)gmail.com, or you can contact my booking company PhinLi.

But, in the meantime, I would love to hear any ideas you have about what you’d like to see me teach. And thank you, it is helpful!

identity

Butch Lab Symposium #2, Feb/March 2011

WHAT IS THE BUTCH LAB SYMPOSIUM?

The Symposium is a cross between a blog carnival and a round-up, where participants write about a monthly topic and submit links to Butch Lab which are then recounted. Participants are requested to a) link to the

Butch Lab Symposium in their post, b) reprint the roundup on their own blogs within five days, and c) commenting on the other participants’ entries would be an added bonus (let’s support each other eh?).

You do not need to be butch to participate, anyone is welcome to discuss their opinion.

The topic for the second Butch Lab Symposium is Butch Stereotypes, Cliches, and Misconceptions.

Here’s the writing prompt:

What do people think “butch” means? What are the stereotypes around being butch? What do people assume is true about you [or about your masculine of center friends], but actually isn’t? What image or concept do you constantly have to correct or fight against? How do you feel about these misconceptions? How do you deal with them? Do you respond to these stereotypes or cliches? How?

To participate, write about this topic in some form on your own website and email the link to butchlabproject (at) gmail.com before March 1, 2011. The full roundup will be released mid-March.

miscellany

Butch Lab Symposium #2: Call for Participation

Hey, writers and folks interested in gender!

The next Butch Lab Symposium topic has been decided, after much deliberation, and posted.

WHAT IS THE BUTCH LAB SYMPOSIUM?

The Symposium is a cross between a blog carnival and a round-up, where participants write about a monthly topic and submit links to Butch Lab which are then recounted. Participants are requested to a) link to the Butch Lab Symposium in their post, b) reprint the roundup on their own blogs within five days, and c) commenting on the other participants’ entries would be an added bonus (let’s support each other eh?).

You do not need to be butch to participate, anyone is welcome to discuss their opinion.

The topic for the second Butch Lab Symposium is Butch Stereotypes, Cliches, and Misconceptions.

Here’s the writing prompt:

What do people think “butch” means? What are the stereotypes around being butch? What do people assume is true about you [or the masculine of center folks in your life], but actually isn’t? What image or concept do you constantly have to correct or fight against? How do you feel about these misconceptions? How do you deal with them? Do you respond to these stereotypes or cliches? How?

To participate, write about this topic in some form on your own website and email the link to butchlabproject (at) gmail.com before March 1, 2011. The full roundup will be released mid-March.

journal entries

What Roses on Valentine’s Day Are For

Kristen spent the weekend at a work-related conference, and I spent the weekend watching Pushing Daisies, going to butch burlesque, reading, doing various housekeeping tasks, and gathering a few little things for Valentine’s Day.

I had the dozen long-stem red roses on the table when she got back last night, and I had bought the ingredients and was already preparing dinner: roasted beet, goat cheese, and candied walnut salad, and homemade butternut squash tortellini with a brown butter sauce. Most of the components were about done by the time she arrived home, so we got the wonton wrappers out and folded up the butternut squash puree.

Ravioli, tortellini, and other kinds of stuffed pasta are Kristen’s favorite, so I thought I’d just cook some up, but when I started looking for sauce recipes I found that Giada De Laurentiis recipe and figured it didn’t look too hard—I had no idea you could use wonton wrappers to make tortellini! It had a lot of components, and took a while to roast the squash, but it wasn’t all that difficult and was delicious. And we still have about a dozen tortellini in the freezer, all ready to be cooked.

But enough about the food.

We watched a flick and made out on the couch. Before we went back into the bedroom, I pulled a rose out from the vase.

Which is why there are only eleven in the vase this morning; the 12th was dragged all over her body after I stripped her clothes off, the soft petals tickling her nipples and hips and inner thighs and cunt, then the long stem used as a makeshift cane on her inner thighs.

It didn’t last that long—it broke in two places before I could really get her warmed up and start delivering some harder swats. I don’t think I left any marks from the rose, but some gentle welts on her inner thighs were a bit raised last night. And this morning I noticed a couple handprint-shaped bruises on the backs of her thighs.

Valentine’s Day is off to a good start. Today, after I go to the gym and do some work, I’m going to make some extra-chocolatey brownies. And tonight’s plans are only a simpler dinner; I’ve requested her signature noodles with peanut sauce.

identity, Interviews

Grace Moon: Mini-Interview

Grace Moon, Writer, artist. gracemoon.net | @gracemoon

1. What is your relationship with the word or identity “butch?”
Me and butch go way back. We had a brief falling out in my early 20’s, we rekindled our relationship later that decade. We now enjoy each other immensely, albeit with some disagreements here and there. Relationships are a growing process.

2. What kind of words and labels, if any, do you use to identify yourself?
Queer, lesbian, dyke, butch, trouble, left of center but not centrist.

3. What do you wish you could tell your younger self about sex, sexuality, or gender?
Don’t worry one of these days, one of these pretty girls will want to date you. Come to think of it, the message hasn’t changed…

4. Anything you’d like to add?
“Butch is a noun and a verb.” (c) gracemoon 2011

reviews

Friday Reads: Favorites from 2010

2010 was the first year I was pretty diligent about using GoodReads to record what I’ve been reading, and it tells me I read about 50 books in 2010—I think that’s not quite right, but I’m going to try to be even better about it this year. In fact, I’ve made it a “goal” on GoodReads to read 100 books—given that I’m reviewing lesbian erotica for Lambda Literary Foundation, editing two books, am a judge for a literary contest, and my monthly book group, and just that is more than 50 books, I think I can make it.

2011 Reading Challenge

Sinclair has

read 16 books toward her goal of 100 books.

hide

Looking over the books I have listed on GoodReads as read in 2010, these are the ones that stand out. Not all of these are queer explicitly, though queer novels remain my favorite thing to read. And not all of them were published in 2010.

All are linked to Amazon for research purposes, but please do order and buy them from your local independent bookstore—Support booksellers! Support local culture!

In alphabetical order, because it’s hard to compare:

Aud Torvingen trilogy: The Blue Place, Always, & Stay by Nicola Griffith. I remember when Stay came out while I was working at the bookstore in Seattle (where I worked for almost 5 years as a bookseller), many people recommended it to me, saying I would like it. I think they assumed I would like it because I’m queer and it has a queer protagonist, but whatever. I (mistakingly) thought it was science fiction, and wasn’t so inclined to pick it up, but I finally picked up The Blue Place a few years ago (GoodReads says I read it in June 2009) and I was impressed. Well, first I kind of hated Aud Torvingen, the know-it-all, independently wealthy, accomplished-at-everything ex-cop turned private investigator who was trying to get her life together. But the end of the first book is so heartbreaking and good, I couldn’t just leave the characters suffering, so I had to read the other two in the series. I got hooked. And they just kept getting better. Easy, deep reading that I got lost in. I would read all of these again from the beginning.

Broken Open: How Difficult Times Can Help Us Grow by Elizabeth Lesser. I’ve been a little obsessed with books about healing and trauma the past few years, and I ran into this in a bookstore and picked it up from the library right after. Frequently my favorite books in about this kind of thing take a very Buddhist perspective (like When Things Fall Apart, Radical Acceptance, and When the Past Is Present), and while I love that, I also know that until I had a pretty strong base in Buddhist philosophy, I didn’t quite understand what they were talking about, and I found them difficult to read. Not this one, though. Broken Open talks about trauma, loss, grief, and healing from lots of different perspectives, weaving in stories and techniques from her workshops over the years. Very readable and very inspiring.

Enlightened Sexism: The Seductive Message that Feminism’s Work is Done by Susan J. Douglas. It’s not out in paperback yet, so I’ve still got the hardback copy from the library and have renewed it about 25 times now. I keep thinking I’ll get to a full review of it on Sugarbutch, and so I should go back and look through my notes and dog-ears to figure out exactly what I want to say. So here’s the paragraph version: I have thought about this book often since I read it. The descriptions of the 1990s especially made me realize I grew up in a unique time, full of the closest we’ve gotten to the manifestation of the feminist and gender equality movements, and the 2000s have brought plenty of backlash—but in a more subtle, twisted way than the backlash of the 1980s and early ’90s. Now, the backlash makes feminism look like it is outdated. Feminism? Pshaw, who needs that, women are equal now! But through various examinations of entertainment, celebrity, films, TV, and other pop cultural artifacts, Douglas argues that it’s far from over. It changed the way I am looking at feminism, and gave me some new ways to talk about what’s going on now. Now excuse me, I want to go re-read it.

Lynnee Breedlove’s One Freak Show by Lynn Breedlove (Manic D Press, 2009). Just, awesome. I’m a fan, but I had no idea Breedlove is so funny! And readable, and smart, and clever. I identified with many of the struggles within the queer communities about gender, and loved the bits about cocks and sexuality. It was more than I expected, and made me feel like Lynnee is my buddy. I was able to be there when Lynn won the Lammy for in the Transgender category last year, and it was a thrill to hear a few of the best lines in the book delivered in person. My full review is up on LambdaLiterary.org.

Gender Outlaws: The Next Generation edited by S. Bear Bergman & Kate Bornstein (Seal Press, 2010). Things have changed since Kate Bornstein’s book Gender Outlaw, and this is the updated proof of the celebration and liberation that’s happening within the trans landscape right now, and the proof of how much further we have to go, and what else we need to work on. I would put this on my “required reading” list, and I bet a lot of other people out there would too. It’s a beautiful anthology. I especially love Bear and Kate’s introduction, which is a conversation via internet chat. My review on Sugarbutch and my companion piece, Ten Ways I am a Gender Outlaw.

Manhood for Amateurs: The Pleasures and Regrets of a Husband, Father, and Son by Michael Chabon. A personal account of gender and masculinity insights throughout life, with illustrations of various relationships—friendships, marriage, kids, parents. I really love his writing, he has such a beautiful way of constructing a sentence, and I was really moved by his descriptions of feminism. Though maybe I shouldn’t be, I was surprised to find a straight white cis man writing so eloquently about gender dynamics and providing insight into so many of the difficulties that are imposed upon us in gender roles, and I think his accessibility brought these concerns to a lot of people since this book was published. It’s a great starting place for examining masculinity in more depth (which is one of the things I hope to do this year, and I have about five books waiting for me).

Mating in Captivity: Unlocking Erotic Intelligence by Esther Perel. I didn’t expect to like this one as much as I did—I thought it would be pretty elementary, but it had some great insight into American culture and relationships. Perel is not American, and that outsider perspective was at times really interesting and useful. Of course, it is 99% heterosexual, and when she tries to include queer couples it doesn’t really account for any sort of difference in culture, but glosses over the difference and goes right to “all relationships have their difficulties, doesn’t matter if you’re gay or straight,” which I get, but I think there’s a little more to it than that and it’s a little bit of a privileged position to be able to dismiss the queerness as just a personality trait akin to liking sports or being into cooking. Nevertheless, the tips and consciousness around building a long term relationship that remains sexual are important, and I’m glad I read it. My full review on Sugarbutch.

Missed Her by Ivan Coyote (Arsenal Pulp Press, 2010). It wasn’t until I was telling a friend about the book that I realized that “Missed Her” is often mistaken as “Mister” in speech. What can I say about Ivan? She’s a masterful storyteller. She and I grew up in a similar region, and her tales about her childhood and her extended family feel so familiar and nostalgic and articulate in such a beautiful way. I love the descriptions of her new relationship love. I will continue picking up every book she puts out, and I’ve never been disappointed.

Mr. Benson by John Preston (Cleis Press, 2004). How is it possible that I did not read this book until last year?? I can’t believe I missed it. And now that I’ve read it, any time I mention it to queer folks—especially ones older than me—they all know about it, and know it well. So: It is a gay men SM novel first published as a serial in 1979, and then in full in the early 1980s. It’s from a time before the AIDS crisis. More good stuff on John Preston over at GLBTQ encyclopedia, if you want to know more context. The book is dirty and full of power and strength and dominance. The actual storyline is a little boring (I just wasn’t as invested in the human trafficking/exploitation part as I was in the beautiful D/s scenes), but the book does need something to keep it going. Apparently the book was so popular that there were both “Looking for Mr. Benson” and “Looking for Mr. Benson?” tee shirts all over in the ’80s, though of course they are not around now, at least not that I could find. I handed the book to Kristen as soon as I was done and she zoomed through it, then had a “Looking for Mr. Benson?” tee shirt made for me for winter solstice. It prompted me to think a lot about how I play with dominance, especially in my domestic life with Kristen, and we have talked about it frequently while trying to iron out difficulties between us in that play. And who knew piss play could be so awesome?

Origami Striptease by Peggy Munson (Suspect Thoughts Press, 2006). I’ve had this one on my shelf for a few years, not sure where I picked it up but I didn’t know much about it. I started reading it and was hooked: It is so ethereal, so surreal, at times it reads like poetry. The intention and clarity behind the word choices are so specific. It reminds me of Rebecca Brown or Jeanette Winterson, two of my favorite authors. I love getting lost in words and images like I did while reading this. Looks like it’s a little bit out of print now, which is too bad. Maybe the publisher still has it directly.

The Sealed Letter by Emma Donoghue. Historical fiction that recounts a divorce trial in the 1860s. I’m not so in to historical fiction, though on occasion I find it fascinating—particularly when I find it relevant, which, for the most part, I don’t find the genre, but I have found some of the recent books, like Sarah Waters’s novels, with lesbian content. I read this one for my book group, and I was skeptical—it took a while to really get into it. The first half of the book is elaborate descriptions of the two women’s friendship, and the details that lead up to the divorce, then the divorce trial happens for another 1/3 of the book (which I found terribly dull, though my lawyer friend thought was fascinating)—but the very end made it worth it. Though I was a bit triggered by all the psychological manipulation one of the characters continues to exhibit, I have still been recommending this quite a bit. It’s pretty fascinating to hear about the politics of marriage, family, cheating, and legality from 150 years ago—really not that long ago, but it exposes some of the ways we have directly evolved from those cultural standards.

Sometimes She Lets Me: Best Butch Femme Erotica edited by Tristan Taormino (Cleis Press, 2010). Call me biased if you like, because I have a story in this book, but this is my favorite erotica collection to come out for a long time. Not only because it’s butch/femme, but also because the stories are just good. Editor Taormino had a decade worth of Best Lesbian Erotica collections to pull from, and she picked the best of the best of the best, in my opinion. Plus, there aren’t very many explicitly butch and femme erotica anthologies, so I’m glad we’ve got one more. This one is still on my nightstand. My review on Sugarbutch.

Toybag Guide to the Taboo by Mollena Williams (Greenery Press, 2010). I’m a fan of Mollena‘s work in general, and when I saw her at the Lesbian Sex Mafia for her workshop Taboo Play and Working Through Extremes in early 2010 I admired her even more. This book is kind of the written version of her workshop, with many of the same stories and philosophies about what it’s like to be exploring the “taboo” sides of sexuality, like incest play, bestiality, force, and race play, and it is thoroughly thoughtful. Obviously Mollena has been thinking about these things for a long time, and it shows with her respect, care, and detail.

Follow my author profile over at GoodReads if you’d like to see more of the books I’m reading.

So let’s hear it: What were YOUR favorite books of 2010? What are you reading right now? What else do you recommend that I read?

identity, Interviews

Daddi Dice: Mini-Interview

Dice is a 23 year old lesbian women, who identifies as a stud, and a cool collected Aries. “I have a open mind. When it comes to life, it’s to short to be shy.”
@iStrapStroke & Crashpadseries.com under the character “Dice”

1. What is your relationship with the word or identity “butch?”

When I think of the word “butch,” I picture the old school lesbian with a buzz cut and one dangling earring of a cross on the right ear. When I was a kid, that’s what I heard, that’s what the more masculine lesbians where called. I think of it as a old lesbian term. Also, when I think of butch, I think of the word “dyke”—both to me are old school lesbian terms.

2. What kind of words and labels, if any, do you use to identify yourself?

The term I closely identify with is stud. A stud is my generation’s butch. Some people say that within the LGBT community when they hear “stud” they automatically picture a blk, hispanic, often times Asian aggressive more masculine female, emerged in the hip-hop culture, but when you hear butch more then likely your going to think of an androgynous/masculine white female. A stud/butch to me is a beautiful/handsome women who is masculine. A stud/butch has a style close to a male and when in a relationship we wear the”pants.”

3. What do you wish you could tell your younger self about sex, sexuality, or gender?

If I could tell my younger self about sex, sexuality, or gender I would let myself know that it’s okay to be the way I am. When I grow up there will be others like me if I would just open my eyes.

When I started dressing more tomboyish in elementary I use to have a lot of problems with the girls in school. I always got random questions like, “Why do you dress like a boy?” My answer would be, “It’s comfortable.” I realized in middle school that it was more than “It’s comfortable;” while all the girls in my grade where experimenting with make-up and shorter skirts, I was stealing my mom’s dildos and making panty harnesses for my favorite one. In high school most girls had already had sex with men and was more open to trying something new, so to speak it got easier to get laid, I was a attractive women with a boi swag, girls loved it.

cock confidence, reviews, starred

The Sugarbutch Guide to Cock Confidence: Pack & Play

See also: My Packing Cocks 101 on Sugarbutch

Speaking of pack & play cocks: There just aren’t very many available right now.

The technology that enables cis men’s penises to soften and get hard (which is flesh & blood) is quite difficult to reproduce. You’d think we had better tricks for it, Batman-style tricks like how his cape gets taut to enable him to fly hang-glide. But as far as I know, we really don’t.

Maybe there are things available for thousands of dollars that I don’t know about? But there’s a reason I don’t know about them—that is really not accessible to me. And probably not to most other gender exploring queers, either.

So the problem is, either good soft packing cocks are too soft to play with, or good solid fucking cocks are too hard and big to pack with (and end up giving you a tent pole in the pants rather than a modest bulge).

Here are a few that you can actually do both—pack and play—because they are bendable enough and still hard enough.

Also, before I get to the cocks, here’s an important packing tip: Unless you’re going for the big bulge in the pants—which hey that can be fun, but most of us want it to be more subtle than that—make sure you wear loose, even baggy pants or skirts while packing. Your tightest jeans, though hot, will absolutely show off what you’re packing. Try loosening the harness just enough to tuck the cock under one of the straps, and wear tight undies to keep it in place.

So what’s available out there for packing and playing?

Tantus VIP SuperSoft
VIP SuperSoft by Tantus

The VIP SuperSoft by Tantus, Inc. is the newest pack & play cock that I’ve seen, and it works quite well in my opinion (and experience). I’ve heard that a few toy shops aren’t carrying them because it’s too obvious and not packable enough, and well, yes, it does create quite the bulge in your pants. But if you know how to wear that well, or if you don’t care if it’s obvious, this is a good option. Since it’s silicone, it’s fully sterilizable (top shelf of the dishwasher with no soap, boil it for 5 minutes, or a 10% bleach solution).

What makes this special: The curve is great for g-spot play, and the “SuperSoft” silicone material specific to Tantus is great. Love the shape for both stimulation of the wearer and the receiver.

Drawbacks: It is kind of floppy. Not great for the heavy pound-pound kind of fucking, it will slip out pretty easily, so make sure to stay in communication with each other if (when) it does. It’s not widely available (yet … perhaps it will be, eventually).

Specifications:
6.5″ (5.5″ insertable) long by 1.7″ in diameter
Silicone (sterilizable)
Made by Tantus, Inc
Available in vanilla, caramel, and chocolate colors
Cost: $60
My review on Sugarbutch
Buy it directly from Tantus, Inc.

Goodfella by Vixen

The Goodfella by Vixen Creations is part of their Vixskin line, which is my favorite material for cocks. It’s soft and touchable silicone, so it is fully sterilizable (top shelf of the dishwasher with no soap, boil it for 5 minutes, or a 10% bleach solution), yet it still has a strong inner core that makes it hard enough to fuck with.

What makes this special: The balls go in front of the O-ring! That is quite unique and awesome. Watch the video on how to back it into a harness, since you can’t put it in from behind like most cocks.

Drawbacks: It is slim and pretty short, especially when you take into account that it is really only insertable up to the balls. Pretty good size for ass play and blow jobs, but for folks who like anything sizeable, this one is going to be pretty small.

Because the balls sit outside of the O-ring, it’s pretty hard to pack comfortably. In order to pack it, the cock part needs to be bent under the harness strap to hold it back, which can make the base pinch your sensitive flesh.

Unfortunately, it is also very expensive. But it comes with a lifetime guarantee from Vixen, which means if it gets damaged, if your dog finds it and chews it up, you can replace it easily. Whoops, sorry—I’m wrong here, let me clarify. Or rather, let me quote you what Kitty from Vixen emailed me: “The Goodfella is one of the only products not covered by warranty (another is the Mr. Right) This is mentioned on the commercial packaging. It simply cannot take being bent back-and-forth on a daily basis as the Vixskin is rather delicate. Our warranty actually mentions NOT being able to return things since your pet ate them.”

You can read the full warranty statement, which says: “Vixen Creations, Inc. wants you to be completely satisfied with your silicone dildo, plug or attachment, which is why we offer an unbeatable lifetime replacement guarantee on damaged items. Please note that damage resulting from misuse of our products is not covered by this policy. For example, “My dog or cat ate it,” “I forgot it was on the stove,” “I bit it,” “My girlfriend left me and took the dildo,” do not qualify for product replacement.”

(Thanks for the clarification!)

Specifications:
7″ (5.5″ insertable) long by 1.5″ in diameter
Silicone (sterilizable)
Made by Vixen Creations
Available in vanilla, caramel, or chocolate colors
Cost: $100-120
My review on Sugarbutch
Buy it at Babeland, Eden Fantasys, The Stockroom, or directly from Vixen Creations.

Silky Pack & Play Cock
Silky aka Mr Bendy

The Silky by Vibratex is the first usable pack and play cock I ever found, and I love it. It’s my favorite of these three.

What makes this special: The internal spine means it is flexible enough to completely bend sideways (or down) for packing, but perk right up when it’s time to fuck. Great size, not too big or small, excellent for blow jobs and for fucking. This one is my favorite.

Drawbacks: Not silicone. The elastomer material is phthalate free, but it is not sterilizable. It’s easy to clean with soap & warm water, but do not boil it, and always use a condom since it cannot be sterilized.

Because it has an internal spine, which is bendable, it will probably break. Mine has—in fact, I’ve gone through probably eight or so of these, about one per year. The spine has never broken through the elastomer plastic, and it has never hurt anyone, and in fact I’ve never heard someone say that theirs has broken the skin, either (though many people who I know who have used this have broken the spine at some point). That’s just what happens when you bend a bit of plastic at the same place over and over—it weakens the plastic, and eventually breaks. But like I said, mine lasted about a year, and if I had not packed it in the exact same position every time it might have lasted longer. After breaking two, I decided it was worth it to keep investing in a new one every year or so, that I just had to look at the $40 cost as a temporary investment that would last me a finite amount of time, not forever.

Some folks have said that they keep using theirs, even after the spine breaks, and this works too—it’s just not quite as perky or bendable as it used to be. From my experience, after it breaks it is not dangerous, and the spine part probably wouldn’t poke through the plastic to harm your delicate parts.

Specifications:
7″ (6″ insertable) long by 1 5/8″ in diameter
Elastomer (Phthalates free, Hypo-allergenic, latex free)
Made by Vibratex
Available in pink, purple, blue, and black (the pink and blue seem to be the most commonly available)
Cost: $40-50
My review on Sugarbutch
Buy it at Babeland, Eden Fantasys, The Stockroom, or Good Vibrations.

So, am I missing any particular cocks that you think I should try out, or include here? Have you heard of others that work for packing and playing? Have you used any of these? What did you think? Any other recommendations?

reviews

Extra Sexy Valentine’s Day Gift Guide

So Babeland did this sweet Valentine’s Day gift guide, and it got me thinking about what sexy toys and gifts I would highly, highly recommend, above all others, for you to pick up for your sweetheart (and, uh, yourself) for this Valentine’s Day.

I’ve been reviewing products for more than two years, and these are some of my personal favorites. The queer porn is especially good as a Valentine’s Day gift I think … plus, if you get a year-long membership, or even a month-long, that will be an ongoing present, one you can enjoy together and that might help take your sex life to a new level. It’s much easier to point to some sex act or product on screen and say, “So what do you think of that?” in order to open up conversation than it is to say, “Hey, I want to try …”

Hope you find something you like, and that the day is fun, regardless of how you celebrate.

You can also check out more of my favorite toys over at Good Vibrations, where they have various celebrity picks.

So let’s hear it: what are you getting your sweetheart, or yourself, this year? How, if at all, are you celebrating? What are your very favorite toys that I might have left off this list?

identity, Interviews

Syd London: Mini-Interview

Photographer, sydlondon.com
Photo by Maro

1. What is your relationship with the word or identity “butch?”

When I think of “butch” I think of the women I’m attracted to rather than myself. Butch is beautifully mind blowing to me. It’s the contrasts of masculinity and hardness in a person who still has the soft skin of woman that drives me crazy. It’s the refusal of butches to kowtow to society’s “should’s” that I continually admire. There truly is nothing sexier than butch to me.

2. What kind of words and labels, if any, do you use to identify yourself?

This is a question I’ve yet to truly answer. I think of myself as a proud dyke and many other things but haven’t found a word that truly encompasses all of me. Though my drag name Syditious does contain a bit of me. In the end I’m just me. I love to play with the biggest power tools I can get my mitts on but I also like to make soap and developing fragrances. Go figure.

3. What do you wish you could tell your younger self about sex, sexuality, or gender?

There’s is so much I wish I could tell my younger self. In many ways I try to communicate those things to our queer youth now through my photography. Above all I’d tell myself to hang on. Life isn’t easy, that’s part of the nature of it – BUT things are going to get so much better than I ever dared dream. If you told me ten or fifteen years ago that I’d be a pro photojournalist covering our exquisite community I never, ever would have believed you. I wish I could tell myself about the queer family that I’ve found and am lucky enough to be part of. And I wish I could tell myself that one day not only will women actually cheer for me as a drag king but also there are women out there who will like me for me ( when I came out at 15 I thought no woman would ever like me, let alone kiss me. I wish I could tell myself about a few of the hot make out sessions I’ve had over my life). And I wish I could tell myself about the love and support the community gives me, though I don’t think I could have believed me. Or you. Or anyone.

Bonus: Anything you’d like to add?

As un-butch as it sounds, I wish I could give all the butches who came before me and helped pave the road a big bear hug of gratitude.

reviews

Friday Reads: Gotta Have it: 69 Stories of Sudden Sex

It’s out!

I just received a copy of the newest erotica anthology, Gotta Have It, which includes my work, this time it is The Dirty Things She Says which is a piece in a lot of dirty talking dialogue that’s only about two pages long. All the pieces are extra-short, which is why they’re called “sudden sex” stories in the title—they’re short-short stories, which in my opinion make the erotica extra-condensed and hotter than usual. Not nearly as much wading through character and plot. And personally, I like that kind of thing in erotica.

Well, I mean, I still think the literary elements are important, but generally I think people spend way too much time being sure to establish those things in an erotica story. Most of the time, why are we reading the erotica? To be turned on, to get off. Of course, that’s just my opinion—plenty of other people really want to have context and plot and non-sexual build-up. But have you ever read Micro Fiction, or another short-short anthology? It’s a brilliant example of how literary you can be in very, very few words, embedding plot and character into every phrase, having each sentence hold two or three or four levels of meaning for the story. I still find them fascinating.

And the good stories in this anthology do that, too.

It includes some of my favorite erotica writers, including Cecilia Tan, Kiki DeLovely, Teresa Noelle Roberts, Rachel Kramer Bussel, Kristina Wright, D.L. King, and Maria See, and I’m sure once I read through it I’ll have a few more favorites to add to the list. So, I know what I’ll be doing this weekend.

Rachel Kramer Bussel edited this anthology (I haven’t mentioned that yet), and put together another one of her brilliant and fun book trailers for it, this one including video or audio of many of the contributors reading a piece of their own story.

Lots more information about Gotta Have It is over on Rachel’s Gotta Have It official book website, including a copy of her introduction, the table of contents, the author’s short bios, and announcements about readings.

Cleis Press, who published this anthology (and who publishes all of the best erotica anthologies, in my opinion, and I don’t just say that because they’re putting out my forthcoming lesbian BDSM anthology), has a special going on: “To celebrate this February 14th, receive 14% off all orders! Enter discount code HEARTS14 on your web order to receive your discount.” So pick up Gotta Have It over at www.cleispress.com, or at (or order it from) your local independent bookstore (assuming you want them to be around next year).

identity, Interviews

Ivan E. Coyote: Mini-Interview

Writer & performer. ivanecoyote.com
Photo by Eric Nielson

1. What is your relationship with the word or identity “butch?”

After many years of rambling and banging around in the “identity and labels” aisle of the english language, I have happily settled on butch. It is a big and beautiful enough category for me, and includes enough other folks that I can identify with and see as my family, my blood.

2. What kind of words and labels, if any, do you use to identify yourself?

Butch, queer, writer, artist, storyteller, Yukoner. There are others, but those are the first that spring to mind.

3. What do you wish you could tell your younger self about sex, sexuality, or gender?

Be kind. At least try to be kinder. To yourself, and to others around you, both strangers and intimates. You are just figuring all of this gender stuff out yourself, and things you think are absolutes right now will one day seem a lot more blurry, and complicated. Respect the differences of others, and honour who you know you are in your heart.

miscellany

What’s Happening in February

Events! Here’s what’s going on in February, exciting New York City events that aren’t mine but that I highly recommend and my own events in both New York and elsewhere. Come on out and support queers and sex activists doing exciting, entertaining stuff.

Events with Mr. Sexsmith

Tuesday, February 8th, 8pm Sideshow: The Queer Literary Carnival: Achilles Heel featuring Melissa Gira Grant, Rohin Guha, Aimee Herman, and Christa Orth at The Phoenix, 447 East 13th Street at Avenue A in New York City

Tuesday, February 22nd, 8pm Cock Confidence: Strap-On 101 Workshop: Many of us have experience with strapping on, packing, and playing, but there are lots of new products out there on the market that might be exciting and that you haven’t encountered yet. Plus, she’ll delve into some cock confidence, getting into the psychology of penetration, and discussing what it’s like to shoot from the hip. Good Vibrations, 308A Harvard Street in Brookline, MA

Wednesday, February 23nd
8-10pm
Afternoon Delight: A workshop on sex toys and getting what you want in bed with Girlspot, the queer women’s group at Harvard. We’ll explore how to turn up the heat on our sex lives, what gender expression and performance has to do with sexuality, and all the fun tools we can use in the bedroom—from vibrators to strap ons to butt toys to light bondage and sensation. Includes a sex toy giveaway! Open to the public. Harvard, Boston, MA
Ticknor Lounge in Boylston Hall (right by Mass Ave) for 8-10PM

Saturday, February 26th
1-4pm
Radical & Responsible Gender Masculinity, Misogyny, and Feminisms: Academics break down and deconstruct gender. How do we build it back up radically and responsibly? How does one adapt masculinity or femininity “positively?” How do we become responsible about gender? How do we continue to break down the gender role restrictions that are hurtful and traumatizing? How can queer communities and spaces be improved by gender reflection? Open to the public; RSVP to Lauren Hannahs at lbhannah@syr.edu Syracuse University
Hall of Languages 102 Syracuse, NY

I’m still booking spring events! Would you like to bring me to your college or local queer center or somewhere else? Check out what kind of workshops I offer, and get in touch with me or my booking company, PhinLi.

This post will be updated with any new events added and further details, as I get ’em, and it’ll stay at the top of the blog until the March event schedule is posted. RSS readers probably won’t notice the difference, but if you’re reading here on the site, scroll down for the updates. Continue reading →

journal entries

So, Hi. I’m Back.

January is over, so my official hiatus is through. I had a very particular writing schedule for myself in January (that if I was being really honest I’d tell you I rarely adhered to) and some specific goals, very few of which were met. But it was a start, and I do feel like I have a better idea of how to grow this manuscript that I’m working on and what I need to do. Which is, mostly, work my ass off.

So I wrote some, I went to the writer’s space that I rent out, I worked at home, I focused, I cut out all sorts of unnecessary distractions except for Sideshow and the sacred sex coordinating and the weekly column and the porn party. Which I know sound like a lot but were actually relatively easy to coordinate and still write. Amazing how many of the things I do that fill my days are actually superfluous, extraneous, unnecessary. It’s a good thing to remind myself.

For the last week of January I was on a DIY writing retreat up at a nearby retreat center, which was an interesting experience too. I’ve never done that before, never taken myself somewhere else to just focus on writing. The internet was out for two of the four days I was up there so it was really just me and my words. I would’ve liked to have gotten farther than I did, but I do like what I did do, so that’s good. It wasn’t completely successful but I think it’ll be easier to do next time, and it is something I’d like to do more regularly than I do.

January was not without challenges, though. I wrote about the snowstorm at the very beginning of this writing leave of absence, and the weather has been a factor, since feet (feet!) of snow, ice, and rain are often a good enough reason to stay at my lovely little home office and not trek to the writer’s space. But aside from the weather, Kristen and I have had some kind of awful fights. It seems like January hit and everything changed, though of course it’s not everything, it’s just a couple key things, things to which I’m still adjusting. That was part of the point, and part of the reason I started this month-of-writing leave-of-absence in the first place, that I was getting itchy and dissatisfied and she was going through her own stuff, so we both decided that separately and together we needed to shake things up, make some significant changes in what we do daily and, to a certain extent, our emotional landscapes too.

I don’t want to get too much into that. Partly because some of that belongs to Kristen and partly because I don’t have a good grasp of it in my head yet, so I’m not ready to write through it publicly. But we’ve been fighting. And it has at times completely thrown off my writing.

And then, on top of the weather and the fighting, I’ve been sick. It’s actually kind of rare for me to get sick, I generally take good care of my own health, but somehow this cold has gotten away from me. I’m still sick, actually, and this is the third wave of the sickness, I’ve gotten better twice before and then had some sort of relapse where it seems like it started all over again. I went to the doctor when it started up the second time, which I rarely do, and of course they just told me it was a cold, but I guess it’s good that it wasn’t bronchitis or something. But I thought I was getting better! I even went to the gym! And I went on that retreat! I was okay! But now: sore throat, congested sinuses, which is how it started the other times. This time I’m so congested that I can’t taste anything, or smell anything. Isn’t that weird? I don’t think I’ve ever eaten anything and had absolutely no taste of it before, it is kind of freaky. I’m sure it’s just temporary, and I really should remember that, both about the taste thing and about the sickness, since I can be a kind of lousy patient and just sit around moaning about how sick I am. That’s not very attractive or fun or Daddy-like. Not that I’m saying I should “take it like a man” or anything, just that I could probably have a bit more self-control and that would be fine. It’s just so annoying to be sick, it’s hard not to express that annoyance.

And it really is getting in the way of writing!

I guess this is something I need to learn: how to keep my writing steady even if other shit is going on. How to let writing be my refuge from all the other shit, instead of needing the other shit to be calm and fine and in place in order to do the writing. Problem is, my brain really has not worked for the last four weeks! So of course the writing I’m producing has been pretty, well, thoughtless. And extremely frustrating.

Even if these distractions weren’t going on, this writing project would still be hard. I’m kicking up some memories and trying to wade through them, organize them, and write about them eloquently. I’m not sure if this will end up where I think it’s going, but for now I’m just trying to generate content, and have something to edit and improve.

So, my point is that my hiatus may continue in February—I’m going to keep focusing on this manuscript. But I also hope that I’m going to write here, too, and use this place as my morning pages. And of course I still have some events I’m hosting, and I need to get the manuscript together for the lesbian BDSM erotica anthology, so there is much to work on. Oh yeah, and I have some events too, so I’ll be doing some traveling to Boston and Philadelphia and upstate New York to Syracuse. (More about those soon, I’ll post a full event schedule.) And you’ve probably noticed that I’ve been posting some reviews lately; I still have a few in my back-log but I’m not taking on nearly as many as I used to. It’s great to have access to new products, and I’m enjoying building up my porn collection, but I don’t have the time to review all that I used to, and I have a very specific wishlist of products I’m picking from these days.

It’s a new year, and things are changing. Time to pick up the pace and jump over the hurdles and accomplish some shit. Which for me, first and foremost, means writing a book.

reviews

Review: Aslan Silicone Ball Gag

I’m totally sold on Aslan products in general, so it’s no surprise that I love this Aslan silicone ball gag. Aslan’s leather is beautiful, finely made, soft and buttery, and consistently high quality. Their toys are superb. I don’t really have anything bad to say about the company, or their toys.

Years ago I picked up one of those cheap, typical red ball gags with the single-buckled nylon head straps. It basically did what it was supposed to do, to keep someone’s mouth open and impede their speech, but it wasn’t particularly pretty and it would slip. It felt cheap in my hands.

Which is the complete opposite of this one. It feels high quality. It looks pretty buckled around my girlfriend’s jaw. It is adjustable and it stays in place. The ball is just the right size, maybe even a little bit small.

Though Kristen is very oral, she hasn’t expressed much interest in gags and early on even said that she didn’t like them and didn’t want to play with one. I didn’t expect her to like them—but it turns out that her sexual interest continues to evolve (as does mine, but that’s a slightly different post). I would’ve thought that it’d be too much for her, even a year ago, but she’s more interested in having her body parts restricted and restrained than she used to be, and combined with her continued oral fixation, playing with a gag makes a lot of sense.

Though to be honest, I really like it when she talks, so I don’t get this gag out very often. But I’m happy to report that when the urge strikes, this beautiful gag is right there waiting for us.

I didn’t expect to like it as much as we both do, but upgrading from that former cheap red gag opened up the new possibilities of playing with gags that neither of us expected. I’m even interested in another type of gag, one that has an o-ring instead of a ball gag, so things (fingers, cocks) can be inserted into her mouth while it has to stay open. It’s a bit more intense, and I’ve seen o-ring type gags that are made of metal, too, which I think are called spider gags?, that look even more intense and less attractive, but that might be something worth exploring eventually as well.

I had no idea this would become a thing for us to explore, but I trust Aslan’s products, so it was easy to pick up and try out.

The Aslan silicone ball gag was sent to me from Babeland for review. Pick up other sex toys from Babeland, still my favorite feminist, queer, friendly, educational neighborhood sex shop.

reviews

Review: X-Harness

The first time I tried on a chest harness was at a leather festival. I put it on over my tank top and quickly admired myself in the mirror looking like a gay boy leather daddy top, which is really my only association with those x chest harnesses. As much as it seems like they would be worn by bottoms, and used for restraint, it seems like they are more commonly associated with the tops doing the restraining.

Maybe that’s just me, and I’ve somehow superimposed my own biases on the whatever images I’ve picked up along the way.

I was planning to use this x harness in a photo shoot, but that has yet to happen. I still think it might, someday, and I think these harnesses look particularly bad ass, so it could be a useful prop. I have a particular vision of how I want to be posed when I have this photo taken, but what I visualize and what turns out to be the best shot aren’t always the same, so who knows what’ll happen when I actually get around to capturing some images. That’s partly why I’ve had this harness for such a long time but still haven’t written it up—I thought I’d post a photo, since how much is there to really say about this type of object?

Really I’m not sure what kind of uses this harness has aside from as a prop in a photo. Or maybe as a fetish outfit to a play party, if I remembered it and dressed up ahead of time. I haven’t taken it out during sex, well, ever, and I’m not sure I would. But I still like having it in my toy box, and hopefully I’ll come up with some good uses for it aside from just to look pretty. Any ideas?

The X-Harness was sent to me to review from sextoy.com. Pick up the x-harness or other bondage toys from sextoy.com, or your local queer feminist sex-positive independent shop.

reviews

Friday Reads: Dear John, I Love Jane

Seal Press recently released a much needed addition to queer identity narratives in the anthology Dear John, I Love Jane: Women Write About Leaving Men for Women edited by Candace Walsh and Laura Andre.

What do you think of when you think about a coming out story? Typically in this culture, the main character of a coming out narrative tends to be a teenager, either pre-teen or late teens, someone who either has always been a bit different or is suddenly hit with the sexual revelation that they might be gay. Despite that coming out as a teenager seems, to me, to be actually a somewhat recent phenomenon, and that people coming out even ten or fifteen years ago were more likely to be college-age rather than high school age, which I would largely attribute to the rise of the Internet and the vast amount of information easily accessible by just typing “gay” into a search engine or, at this point, speaking one word into a search program on a smart phone, there is still a significant lack of literature available about people who come out later in life. Though the coming out process continues to happen younger and younger, the dominant stories are still about people in their tumultuous twenties, which is frequently when we formulate and articulate our adult sexual identities, often for the first time.

But what about someone coming out in their late thirties, forties, fifties? What about someone who has spent most of their life heterosexual, married and raising kids? Often, these stories are not reflected in queer literature and culture. We tend to value and legitimize the folks who express that we “always knew” that something was off about us, queer identities that started giving hints in childhood and were full-on signs by our adolescences.

Which is why this anthology is a much needed addition to the body of work on queer identity; we have so few stories about what it’s like to form these identities later in life. In this book, “later in life” is defined quite broadly, as some of the participants are still quite young and have, in my mind, had fairly typical coming out experiences.

While I was reading through these essays, I felt that it was important to keep in mind that they are personal reflections about the authors’ own experiences, and while there is great value in telling those stories, and this book is beginning to fill a neglected gap, they are not necessarily radical or particularly theoretical, and in fact perpetuate many stereotypes about lesbianism and gender in particular. In fact, the consistent commentary on gendered lesbian stereotypes in so many of the essays made me wonder if those stereotypes were a reflection upon the editors’ beliefs. Perhaps the reader was meant to assume that these were former stereotypes that the narrators held, and that their understandings have deepened and become more complex, but none of the essays directly addressed the vast inaccurate outsider observations toward the lesbian communities and none of the essays directly took on any sort of understanding of how complex gender identity and expression is in the queer and lesbian worlds.

I know that a complex understanding of gender is a lot to expect, and that I am particularly critical of representations of gender that are heteronormative and perpetuating stereotypes, but I was disappointed in the consistent portrayal throughout this book. I do think it is an important to add to the dominant paradigm of coming out and coming to queer identities, and certainly it gives a solid base on which others can now build. But I am cautious in recommending it, since I think it perpetuates more stereotypes than it challenges.

identity, Interviews

AJ Stacy: Mini-Interview

Host, Tuna Talk

1. What is your relationship with the word or identity “butch?”

I think of me, by default, or people like me, who have too much style when we walk into the men’s section at the department store. The word “Butch” is sexy, it’s strong.

2. What kind of words and labels, if any, do you use to identify yourself?

I really don’t like to label myself too much, but people always ask if I’m FTM or Butch or if I’m transitioning or whatever so, based on that, occasionally I like to clarify that I’m just BUTCH, I’m just AJ, I like to dress better than a straigt guy.

3. What do you wish you could tell your younger self about sex, sexuality, or gender?

If I could sit my 18 year old, crazy self down, I’d tell myself to go out and have fun, don’t be so shy, speak up for what you want and what you believe in and don’t wait for things to happen, make things happen.

Visit AJ’s online video blog Tuna Talk

identity, Interviews

B. Cole: Mini-Interview

Activist, advocate, teacher, community leader. brownboiproject.org

1. What is your relationship with the word or identity “butch?”
I came of age as butch but it never fully reflected Cole. As I was growing up, butch was much more common in the white queer community. That’s why I came up with the term masculine of center. I wanted to be able to acknowledge my place within this amazing community of womyn, recognizing the diversity and power of defining ourselves across a spectrum.

2. What kind of words and labels, if any, do you use to identify yourself?
I’ve been a stud, a dom, a butch, and a boi across my journey of life. It’s been important to claim my identity as a masculine of center womyn, to make peace with myself. I prefer female pronouns and as long as you don’t call me lady or m’am, we’ll be fine.

3. What do you wish you could tell your younger self about sex, sexuality, or gender?
Spend your time with people who respect and love you for who you are, even if it’s different from them. We live in a society that has a deep aversion to difference. Love it, cultivate it all around you. It is what makes life the most interesting.

miscellany

Heavenly Spire

Yes, this is a bit of an advertisement for queer porn director Shine Louise Houston’s newest project Heavenly Spire, but it’s also a commentary on masculinity in porn.

I’m sure I don’t have to work too hard to convince you that for as many limited, limiting, stereotypical, heterosexist notions in porn that exist for women, there are just as many that exist for men. Men are portrayed as the domineering, dominant, in charge, virile, muscular, top character in virtually every way in the porn industry, a depiction that hurts and polices the vast range of male sexualities—just as depicting women as the receptive, passive counterparts is hurtful to women.

And while there is a huge world of queer porn out there, most of the ethical, thoughtful, gender-aware is trans or female, and there hasn’t been many explorations of masculinity through video and porn.

Until now!

Here’s some wording from the official press release of Houston’s beautiful Heavenly Spire project:

After making a name for herself directing beautifully shot dyke/queer porn, Feminist Porn Awards’ Visionary Director Shine Louise Houston has turned her sharp eye to the gays.

Vivid-Ed director Tristan Taormino touts Houston as “one of the most influential, groundbreaking and talented queer filmmakers of this century.” Advocating that women watch gay porn, Taormino enthusiastically took note of the new site, commenting: “It features a group of ethnically-diverse models and couples, genuine chemistry, and Houston’s signature stunning cinematography.”

By dedicating the site to masculine beauty and sexuality and how it manifests on different bodies, Shine Louise Houston pushes the boundaries of a new visibility in gay porn: HeavenlySpire.com equally casts queer males as it does transsexual men. This inclusion is a rarity in gay male pornography.

Models share an intimate interview where they disclose their personal fantasies, describe their sexuality, turn-ons, and what they physically like about themselves and one another.

While partially inspired by her love for gay male porn, Houston’s vision for HeavenlySpire.com came mainly from within. Says Houston, “Heavenly Spire is a personal project for me. Accepting my own masculinity has really allowed me to feel okay with desire for masculine people. Exploring it on the site really looks at male bodies the way I want to.”

It sounds all smart when described like that, huh? And yes sure, of course it is smart, it is intentional and thoughtful and the filming is just fucking beautiful. But let’s not forget that it’s also way hot.

Sometimes as a dyke I am a little hesitant to recommend porn with cisgender men in it, as I can frequently get the “ick factor” reaction from other dykes: “Ew.” But as someone who is increasingly cock-centric, and, I’ll admit, sometimes a bit fascinated to the point of fetishizing cocks, I have got to say that this site is not just thoughtful and beautiful but also fucking hot.

So thank you, Heavenly Spire, for being a sponsor of Butch Lab, and for bringing new and exciting visions of masculinity and a masculine sexuality into the porn world. I can’t wait for the DVD.

dirty stories, fiction, starred

Good Girl, Bad Girl (Part One)

WARNING: This story contains Daddy/girl play (and dirty talk). Read part two here.

Part I.

Sometimes, I am a Bad Daddy: I hate it.

I hate it and I want it and I crave it and I hate that I want and crave it, this, this girl, this way that I use her, this way she uses me. Sometimes I resent it. Her, me, my own desires. Why do they run this way? Where did these wounds come from, or are they scars now?

I have to remind myself not to ask myself too many of those questions. That it’s okay to want what I want. That after the flash of feminist guilt, as Karlyn Lotney once wrote, it is quite the handy little fetish.

And it is a fetish, or maybe rather it is many fetishes wrapped up and tied with a big pretty satin red bow. Power. Gender. Age.

I hate it, but I have never loved any play more.

This is what happens.

I sit on the couch reading a book and drinking tea after the dinner she made. For me. She finishes the dishes, brings her book out too, sits next to me. I don’t watch her as I take another sip of my tea. This is what I practice: Not paying attention. But in not paying attention I still pay attention, I just don’t let her know that I’m paying attention. When I notice I’m focused on her, I try to turn the focus inward. What do I want right now? And I feel something stir.

She inches closer to me. I turn a page. She sighs inaudibly. I turn my eyes to the pages of my book, move them along the words, not reading.

“Daddy?”

I don’t look up, yet. “Yes?”

“Can I …”

“May I.” I correct.

“May I … sit on your lap please?” It comes out in one quick string.

I pull the bookmark out of the back of the book and slide it in between the pages, close the book, set it on the coffee table, look up at her. Her eyes gleam gently. Hopefully. Like she just asked for candy at the grocery store. Her dress is pushed up from how her legs are crossed on the couch and I can see a hint of her inner thigh, and I want my cheek on it, want to bite it, want to feel her squirm and hold her there between my teeth as I leave marks. I breathe in. Keep it under control.

“Yes, sure darling.” With the Good Daddy voice.

She climbs over, sits sideways on my lap, knees bent over my thighs. Wraps her arms around my shoulders and her face buried into my neck and collarbone. Her hair smells faintly of shampoo, clean and bright with a gently fruit-flavored hint. It’s soft and thin and I bring one hand up to the back of her head, play with the gentle curls there.

She settles in and drops one hand to my chest, resting it on my waist. I shift a little, a growl rising in my belly. My arms fold easily around her. I don’t notice the sigh I let out, a low hum, the precursor to the growl.

“Daddy?”

“Yes, darling.”

“I like to sit on your lap.” She snuggles a little closer. I can feel a tightness spreading in my groin. I don’t say anything. “Do you like it?”

“Yes, darling.”

“Does it feel good?” Her voice drops softer.

“Yes.”

“Does it feel good …” she’s whispering now. “In your pants?”

I stir. My cock stirs, jumps. The growl grows. My arms tingle and tense, a sensation I want to let out with a fist. “Yes.” I whisper too. Our mouths are close.

I am a Bad Daddy. I want my girl to do dirty things; I want to do dirty things to her. I know she’d let me if only I asked, but sometimes the desperation is more fun. The arguing with myself. The attempts at holding myself noble, resisting her sweet girlish body. Feeling dirty for wanting it so much that my palms ache.

“I feel you getting hard, Daddy,” she keeps her head low, shifts her hips to rock against my cock. My eyes roll back, wrists go slack. So soon. Fuck.

“Do you, now.”

“Yes.” She waits. “Can I feel it?”

“You want to?”

“Yes.” Again, a pause. “Please?”


My hands flex. “Please what?”

“Please can—may I touch your cock, Daddy?” She knows how I like to hear it. All the way through, from the ‘please’ to the way she should address me when we play.

I try not to groan audibly. I swallow instead, clear my throat. “Well, since you asked so nice and pretty. Yes, sweet girl, you may.”

She bites her lips and shifts her hips again, reaches down with one hand to grip the hard packer I’d slipped in after dinner. She strokes it through my trousers. She licks her lips unconsciously.

“Daddy,” she presses close to me, hand still stroking, and I feel her small, round breasts against my chest. “It’s too big. It should come out of your pants, Daddy.” Her lips are nearly touching my ear and she knows how I love that. My whole body shudders, relaxes, stomach muscles clench for a moment as I contract and release. I picture her pretty hands with her perfect sparkly red nails wrapped around my cock. I picture her lowering her lipstick-painted mouth toward it. I am a Bad Daddy, and she is so good.

“It’s big and hard in your pants, Daddy. Don’t you want to take it out? It’s too tight under there. Too big. Can I take it out? Daddy, can I?” Her lips are on my neck, earlobe, jaw. I can barely see straight.

I breathe out. “Yes. Yes, you may.”

She slips off my lap and crouches between my knees, staying on her tiptoes on the floor and unbuttons, unzips my pants, pulls the too-big cock from under my briefs and straightens it out, poking from my fly. She wraps one hand around it, then the other. “Mmmm,” she hums a little, smiling, stroking, biting her lower lip then keeping them parted, pressing them together.

Her lips are flushed red.

She watches her fingers stroking my cock for a quick minute, then looks up at me, still crouched. “Daddy …”

I bring one hand down to her jaw line and trace it gently with my thumb. She leans into it a little, eyelids half closed.

“Daddy,” she starts again. “I could put my mouth on it. Don’t you like that? You like it when I do that. And I like to make you feel good. It feels good when I put my mouth on it, Daddy. Can I?”

I stiffen, feel my cock jump. Breathe in. It is so dirty to want this so badly. To hear her beg, to hear her ask over and over at each step of the way. I fight every urge I have to just shove my cock into her mouth, slide it over her tongue, and instead do my best to resist, and the tension keeps my body cocked and loaded.

She flattens her tongue and runs it over the very tip, smiling up at me. “I’m a good girl, Daddy. I know how to make it feel good.”

That breaks me. I breathe out. “Yes, I know you do, sweet girl. Put your mouth on it for me.”

She swallows the spit her mouth is already excessively producing and opens her mouth, and that momentary flash of a pause burns my eyes as if I’d hit pause, her hovering open lips just centimeters away and closing in.

When she drops down, my cock slides in effortlessly, right into the vacant space she’s made for it, and I barely feel it until she’s got the head at the back of her throat and closes her lips around the shaft and pulls up, sucks, lips pushing out as she slides them up and over the ridge, until it pops free.

Mouth open, lips wet, she pauses to say quietly, “I like it in my mouth,” then bends her neck again and takes it deeper, sucking expertly.

I could watch her do this for an hour, two. What is it about this that gets me so hard and hot? I can’t feel it, but I can feel it, every stroke, every graze of her teeth, every swirl of her tongue, as if it was me filling with blood and swelling as she closes her mouth around it, again and again. My hips tighten and knees rotate open, just barely, pushing.

“That feels good,” I manage to mumble, eyes blurry, as I slide my hand into her hair, tangle my fingers into it.

She glows at the slightest praise. “You like that, Daddy? Does it make your cock feel good to be in my mouth?”

“Yes, darling.”

“I like it, Daddy. You can put it in my mouth when it gets big and hard. It feels good. I like to suck on it.”

“You’re getting it all wet.”

“Yes Daddy. My mouth gets wet when I suck on it. Want to see?”

I nod. She swallows a little again, pools the saliva on her tongue, dips her neck down to my cock and slides it deep, far back into her throat. I groan. She leaves it there for as many seconds as she can. When she opens her mouth to slide it out, it glistens slick with the thick spit from her throat. She smiles as it strings from the tip of my cock to her lips. Again, and she leaves even more wet behind. She laps at it with her tongue, moves it around.

I groan again. “Baby, that’s so good, you’re so good at that.”

She rubs her lips together, licks them, swallows. Shifts her legs and raises up to bring her mouth close to mine. I quickly bring my hands to her waist, squeeze the sweet curve of her hips, and bring her body in closer and bring her mouth to mine, kiss her hard. I’m practically panting. She knows it, too.

“I like it. It feels good for me too. See, Daddy?” She raises one knee up next to my thigh on the couch and pulls my hand from her body down between her legs, and I feel her pussy against my hand, swollen and slick, before she slides two of my fingers into her easily.

“Feel that? Sucking on your big cock makes my pussy all wet.” Her mouth is by my ear again. “It’s okay, Daddy. You can put your cock in all my little holes. You like it when we play this game. You can put it in my pussy, too. Want to put it in my pussy now, Daddy? Do you want to?” My fingers go in and out, pausing to rub circles over her clit. “See how wet my pussy is? It’s wet for your cock, Daddy. So it will slide right in and go in and out. It’s just for your cock. Don’t you want it in there? It’s okay, I want you to put it in, I want you to, Daddy …”

She shifts in my lap and knees on either side of my thighs, starts guiding my cock toward her hole. I watch, slip my fingers out, bring my eyes up to her face as she reaches for the shaft to guide it in. “Do it,” I growl low, already thick and pulsing just feeling her slick lips touch the tip. “Slide it in, baby. That’s good. Yeah, like that.” And she does, she slides it right inside, slow, and pushes all the way down until her thighs are pressed against mine.

We both shudder and sigh, and she rests her cheek on my shoulder for a second before clenching her thighs and lifting her body up and off of me until only the tip of my cock is touching her opening, then pressing down and letting her weight rest on me again, clenching, squeezing her thighs together.

My eyes roll back. I breathe in. I can’t stand it.

“I like it, Daddy. I like it going in and out. I like your big cock in my little pussy. Does it feel good, Daddy?”

I move my hands to her hips and hold her steady, start thrusting with my hips. I’m close. She’s got me so close. “So good, you’re such a good girl, baby, my good girl.” My lips can barely form words. She kisses me, sucks my tongue into her mouth, wraps her arms around my neck and squeezes me tight with her thighs and cunt.

“Do it more, Daddy. Do it harder. Please? Please put it in my pussy. Please, harder, Daddy, please, please …” She knows I’m close from the way my hips are shuddering, faster now, more of a shake than a thrust. She keeps her lips next to my ear. “Do it, Daddy, come in my pussy, make your cock come in my pussy Daddy, please, come Daddy, come Daddy …” And I do, I thrust harder up inside her and my groans and grunts turn into yelling, fuck, yeah, fuck, body pulsing, gushing, until I feel every drop squeezed out of me, and I collapse back, head rolling gently, eyes closed, as she kisses my neck and rocks gently against me.

I breathe out. Open my eyes. Smooth her hair, run my hand along the side of her body. “My good girl.”

She grins and brings her mouth down to mine again, sweet soft kisses, and I wrap my arms around her.

Read part two here.

miscellany

Elisha Lim’s Queer Love Cards

Artist Elisha Lim is now also selling Queer Love Cards at their Etsy shop.

Says Elisha: “The cards are about a queer way of being in love, with things like butches saying “Hey Handsome,” transfags saying “Hey Beautiful,” and genderqueers saying “Hayy” and “I Like Your Cardigan.””

Just in time for Valentine’s Day! I’m sure I can think of a few people I could send these lovely cards to … Etsy.com/shop/elishalim

See also: Elisha Lim’s 2011 Illustrated Gentleman calendar and their Mini-Interview with Butch Lab.

They also sent along a couple images to show off here on Butch Lab! Enjoy:

identity, Interviews

Gina Mamone: Mini-Interview

President & CEO, Riot Grrrl Ink. The Largest Queer Record Label in the world.
Photo by Grace Moon

1. What is your relationship with the word or identity “butch”?

My relationship with butch has evolved over my life. From coming out in college in rural West Virginia in the mid 90’s to living in modern day New York City. I have a very broad concept of gender especially in regards to identity and fluidity.

I did not come into my butchness like some, I was born into it – my mother jokes to this day that there was no need for me to “come out”. I grew up in rural Appalachia in the buckle of the bible belt. In the early 80‘s before there were mandatory curriculums of inclusion and tolerance in the public school system. I was bullied and teased constantly at school, it was a hard way to grow up. Butch was full of negative connotation for me in the first part of my life. Then I came out and I learned to find positive images of butch & gender variance in my community and I learned a new definition of the word. The more people I meet, the more art I am exposed to – my definition of butch & gender gets bigger and bigger – it will always be evolving.

2. What kind of words and labels, if any, do you use to identify yourself?

I identify as a Tender Hearted Gender Queer that has a nougaty Deep Lez Center with Hillbilly tendencies.

3. What do you wish you could tell your younger self about sex, sexuality, or gender?

I was bullied and teased constantly about my gender expression in elementary school (see attached elementary school photo). By the time I was in Jr. High & Highschool, I was dressing to fit in and growing my hair long. I had learned to not let anyone know who I really was. I would go back and tell my younger self about Dapper Q, Bromance and the Flatbush Freakshow…. the big beautiful world that awaits out there once all of the queers find each other on the internet… start to mobilize & create. I would also tell myself that American Apparel Manties will change your life, have a wicked respect for your herstory / history, there is truth where you come from and to take better care of my vinyl.

I LOVE what is happening now – the fostering of butch identified community though grassroots organizing. I look at things like Butch Voices & Butch Lab happening all over the country and I see people coming together to create safe space, share resources, organize n’ mobilize, get inspired and most importantly, connect to community and I get hella excited. This generation of butch identified / masculine of center individuals are changing what it means to be butch – making it bigger and more accessible for those to come and it’s all being documented in real time through social media – it’s a very exciting & fascinating time.

identity, Interviews

Rachel Venning: Mini-Interview

Owner, www.babeland.com

1. What is your relationship with the word or identity “butch?”

Being butch has always been part of my queer identity. When I was young my friends and I loved to talk about “what kind of butch are you?” Now that I’m headed into my silver fox years it’s just an identity that has sat well with me for a long time. And I acknowledge other butches out there as much as I can, with the butch nod or a “hi.” I feel a lot of solidarity with other butches. It’s really not easy being butch. Just dealing with people’s reactions and my projections of their gender phobia.

2. What kind of words and labels, if any, do you use to identify yourself?

Butch, dyke, lesbian and queer. Kinky. Some feel more comfortable than others.

3. What do you wish you could tell your younger self about sex, sexuality, or gender?

My younger self thought she knew it all, so cocky! I’d tell her to be more gentle and compassionate- people have a lot of different ways of growing into themselves. Oh and I’d tell my younger self to take more risks, and have sex with more people. I was not enough of a player in my playing years. More of the uhaul type, alas.

giveaways

QueerPorn.TV Porn Party Winner

Winner of the one month membership to QueerPorn.TV is Comment #7, Missy, who says: “I totally want to see the Billy Castro and Johnny Mission scene!”

I think Judy Minx is in that scene too. Then again, I can tell who it is you’re looking forward to watching …

Hope you’ll join us tonight, Missy. There’s still time to pick up a membership to QueerPorn.TV—$5 off if you go through the secret #pornparty sale.

Kristen and I invited a (hot butch top) friend over for dinner before hand, so she’ll be joining us in commenting on the porn viewing. Follow @kitchentop and @mrsexsmith to see what we’ve got to say about the new QueerPorn.TV.

You can also follow @garnetjoyce, my co-host of this Twitter Porn Party, as well as @queerporntv, @courtneytrouble, and @tinahornsass who are the geniuses behind QueerPorn.TV, follow @billycastroxxx, @thedylanryan, @judyminx, @ignacio_rivera, and @jizlee, who are some of the stars we’ll be watching! I’m not sure who will be joining us tonight yet, but keep an eye on their accounts, they might be around and responding to the #pornparty.

giveaways

QueerPorn.TV Porn Party Giveaway

UPDATE! Secret special QueerPorn.TV membership for $5 off, special for Porn Party-goers!

Well hello there! I’m still writing away (or trying to) on my small hiatus, but I’m poking my head up out of Scrivener long enough to co-host a Twitter Porn Party Wednesday night, tomorrow, where we’ll be watching four episodes of QueerPorn.TV.

Want to join us? There’s still time to pick up a membership, and from what little I’ve seen of the site already, it is absolutely worth it if you’re into, well, queer porn. You can rent the videos individually or get a VIP membership for $29.95 a month (and you can cancel at any time), which I’d recommend if you’re going to join us since we’ll be watching four of ’em.

But, if you don’t have that kind of extra cash to spend on queer porn, who can blame you, I mean it’s a recession (aren’t we still in a recession? Or is that over now?) and we’re all underemployed.

So if you promise to come to the porn party, just leave a comment on this post to win a 1-month membership with which episode on QueerPorn.TV you’re most excited to see, or which looks the most hot from the descriptions and photos. Or the porn star you wish would be on QueerPorn.TV. Or something else entirely.

This is a quick giveaway—winner will be announced tomorrow morning so you’ll have time to get the membership all set up for the Porn Party, which is tomorrow, January 19th (6pm PST / 9pm EST), #pornparty on Twitter.

Oh, a quick aside—someone asked me yesterday if they could host their own Porn Party. Of course! We don’t have any claim on it. It’s been a blast so far, the others Garnet and I have hosted have been fun.

identity, Interviews

Adrienne “Aj” Davis: Mini-Interview

Organizer for the Butch Voices conferences, www.dreadedmemes.org

1. What is your relationship with the word or identity “butch?”

I proudly use that word. Although it took me about ten years after I came out before I truly embraced that identity.

2. What kind of words and labels, if any, do you use to identify yourself?

Butch. Geeky butch. Nerdy butch. Nerd. Geek. Geekgirl (or geekgrrl). Academic butch. Scientist. Alpha Geek.

3. What do you wish you could tell your younger self about sex, sexuality, or gender?

I would tell myself, “Self, don’t worry about how others look at you. Don’t worry about how this might play in the black community. Embrace who you are because you ARE sexy, you ARE beautiful, you ARE alluring—but not in the conventional manner that women are seen as expressing those attributes. And yes, Virginia, you can be as academic and urbane as you wish and still be a butch.”

identity

Shelley Stefan: B is for Butch

Artist Shelley Stefan sent on this video from her art show in Harlem in New York City in 2010. I missed this entirely, unfortunately, but I really like the work.

Here’s a description from Shelley, from an interview with CherryGRRL:

“The series “B is for Butch” is an offshoot from the work and research I developed in two prior visual arts projects entitled: “Lesbian Family Heraldry: An Achievement of Arms” (2005-2006) and “The Lesbian Effigies” (2006). These bodies of work, comprising of paintings, drawings, bronzes, and belt buckles, appropriate the art and science of medieval heraldry in order to engage queer subcultural commentary on topics of power, alliance, and family signification, prioritizing what Theorist J. Halberstam cites as the construction of “queer (female) genealogies.”[i] In 2004, I directed my visual arts practice and research into the world of heraldry and armour as an emotive response to real-life experiences of familial trauma, where I felt what it was like to be a person, a family “under siege.” My wife and I lost custody of our happy and healthy daughter due to several breaches of justice and a bigoted and homophobic US legal system. The experience and the loss left me and my lesbian partner feeling broken and beaten. I did what many artists do amidst strife: I turned to my visual arts practice as a method of emancipation, activism, and poetic justice in a world where, unfortunately and sometimes, bad things can happen to good people. Heraldry and this world of armour seemed like a perfect conceptual and aesthetic palette for me to think about notions of power and security from the “underdog” or subculturally liminal perspective, and how traditional visual symbologies (such as heraldry) have a way of legitimizing through the mere history of their visual currency. In these bodies of work, I problematized heraldry’s armigerous exclusivity and its heterosexist male monopoly on the meaning of family, as well as appropriated the heraldic medieval aesthetic to take part in what Third World Feminist Theorist Chela Sandoval calls a “Technology of Crossing” – a method to “identify and describe emotional, psychic, and social technologies that embody and circumscribe identities necessary for recognizing power, and changing its conditions on behalf of equalizing power between socially and psychically differing subjects.”[ii] I began using the power of heraldry and medieval armour as a method to transpose power on behalf of queer liminal subjectivity.

“Through this research process, I encountered many, many images of armour. Some armour just seemed inherently queer-looking to me – very dykey, very butchy, and quite gender-bendy, all of which to me are very good attributes. Some armour also really seemed conceptually loaded for me on topics of security/insecurity and subcultural interiority. I began to think about the dual signification of the term “armour” – like, how armour signifies at once a sense of security and a sense of insecurity – a toughness and a vulnerability. To wear armour is to acknowledge in some way that you are vulnerable, but also and simultaneously that you aim to and claim to feel non-vulnerable, or protected. I started really thinking about subcultural interiority, what’s underneath the rock that’s underneath the rock. Near 2008, I began to imagine how different liminal subjectivities and minorities might relate to this notion of armour and how I might be able to manipulate these visualizations to open up conceptual doors. Butch subjectivity came to the forefront, partially because I live as a butch lesbian and my art is strongly tied to self-portraiture, but also because I like to do research in queer subcultural theory and this was a topic I was interested in investigating. So, I was inspired to create this collection of works entitled “B is for Butch.””

Here’s one example of a pieces from “B is for Butch:”

Shelley Stefan, Primary Cock, Oil, 2010

Shelley Stefan – B is for Butch from Roger Kisby on Vimeo.

identity, Interviews

Kyle Jones: Mini-Interview

Writer, parent, lover, perpetual student. www.butchtastic.net

1. What is your relationship with the word or identity “butch?”
‘Butch’ is one of the words I use to describe myself. I’ve experimented with different identity terms over the years, and ‘butch’ is one that I come back to over and over again. I currently use butch to describe my presentation, as an adjective more often than as a noun. When I describe myself as butch, I mean to say that I am masculine in appearance and mannerisms. I wear clothing from the men’s department, cut my hair short and don’t mind when someone refers to me as ‘Sir’.

2. What kind of words and labels, if any, do you use to identify yourself?
When I talk about my identity, I say that my sexuality is queer, my gender is genderqueer and my presentation is butch. I also use the words transgender and trans-masculine to identify myself, as a female-born person who’s gender identity does not always line up squarely with my body.

3. What do you wish you could tell your younger self about sex, sexuality, or gender?
I would try to explain how fluid and changing identity is, that what we see as a rock solid personal identity can change over the years, as we grow and experience more in life. I would encourage myself to explore sex more, to experiment and play, to see the fun and playfulness of sex and not be hung up on judgements about what should, or should not, turn me on. I would try to explain some of what I know about gender now, which is much less rigid than my viewpoint when I was younger. Back then, I was very much trying to find the one gender that worked for me and that kept me bouncing back and forth until recently, when I finally realized that I didn’t have to choose. Gender is not only fluid and unfixed, we can experience multiple genders concurrently, or even feel a lack of gender identity. Gender is much more fascinating than I imagined 20 years ago.

miscellany

Porn Party with QueerPorn.TV

The next porn party is coming up on January 19th (6pm PST / 9pm EST), and we’re watching QueerPorn.TV, a beautiful new queer porn site (what, like the name didn’t give it away?) by Courtney Trouble and Tina Horn.

What is a “porn party”, you ask? Well, it’s a little virtual gathering on Twitter where we watch porn and comment on it, “live-tweeting” the event. We’ll tag our posts with the hashtag #pornparty. (I recommend tuning in the day of on Tweetchat, since it’s a bit easier to follow hashtags there than on Twitter.)

How do you join us? Easy! All you need is a Twitter account and a membership to QueerPorn.TV.

1. Make sure you’ve got a membership to QueerPorn.TV. Dig up your password and have it on hand so you don’t have to scramble for it later.

2. Log on to Twitter and follow the hashtag #pornparty. You can also do this through TweetChat, which is a great way to follow conversations happening on Twitter.

3. At the specified time, in your time zone (6pm PST / 9pm EST), Wednesday January 19th, start up Courtney Trouble & Scout’s episode on QueerPorn.TV, and start up Twitter. Watch the scene, and post your thoughts. You can follow what we’re chatting about even without having a Twitter account, but it’d be more fun if you post your thoughts too (and include the hastag #pornparty so we see it!).

4. Bonus: follow @mrsexsmith and @garnetjoyce, the hosts of this Twitter Porn Party, and follow @queerporntv, @courtneytrouble, and @tinahornsass who are the geniuses behind QueerPorn.TV, follow @billycastroxxx, @thedylanryan, @judyminx, @ignacio_rivera, and @jizlee, who are some of the stars we’ll be watching!

You can always surf around QTube while we countdown to the porn party, if you need something to keep you busy.

Here’s the scenes we’ll be enjoying:

When Courtney Trouble cast Toronto native Scout in a porn scene, she never guessed that Scout – a youthful, creative, genderqueer creature – would follow her all the way back to San Francisco just to fuck the director. But that’s what happened, and with the windows open for all of downtown to see, this switchy pair, shall we say, hit it off. In fact, they had already started by the time I showed up to their hotel room; I followed them around with my camera for hours while they completely ignored me, engrossed in rough passionate queer sex. Scout is a tireless top, but also a masochist, and Trouble slaps them around even as she chokes on their sparkly unicorn cock. Scout strap-on fucks Trouble doggy style, piledrives her, and gives head to an NJoy Eleven in Trouble’s cunt. Trouble, a vicious and vivacious little tart, bosses Scout around and cums over and over again. Trouble loves to get her ass spanked and pussy punched and luckily Scout loves to follow orders! Run Time: 25.19

Blurring the line between classic nude art and raunchy queer porn, genderqueer legends Jiz Lee and Papi Coxxx pose for Suzanne Forbes‘ pen. It’s only a matter of time, of course, before they can’t hold their pose any longer. Sweet nipple teasing dissolves into passionate fucking and buckets of cum; it’s all Forbes can do to keep up! Jiz and Papi both love to switch, and they each penetrate the other with their realistic strap-on cocks and skilled hands. These two performers, who are known for ejaculating, deliver gushing orgasms that will take your breath away. Run Time: 14.35

Dylan Ryan was ravenous for a truly submissive pain slut like Tina Horn. In her super-cool masculine persona Butch Friday she gives Tina a taste of what it would be like to be her total slave. In full masochistic faggot mode (complete with superhero panties) Tina soaks up a prolonged heavy spanking, flogging, verbal degradation, dominant-submissive play, deep-throating, fisting, and deep strap on plowing in a leather sling – all to earn the right to worship Butch/Dylan’s magnificent cock. This gender-fucking BDSM scene between two cisgendered ladies who enjoy playing with their male personas is intensely kinky, highly verbal, and disarmingly sweet. Run Time: 26.38

This scene involves a fantasy of non-consensual acts that was designed and negotiated by all three performers. The World’s Next FTM Porn Star Billy Castro and porn newbie, the insatiably hot and smart intersexed Johnny Mission, gang up on sweet “sleeping” little Judy Minx, restraining her with a belt, humiliating her and forcing her to beg for sex, then for harder, and then for more. They double-team their willing victim, slapping her around, invading her pussy with their huge cocks and her mouth with their inexhaustible hands, making her come long and hard. Inspired by a real-life hot and heavy flirtation between the three stars, this spur-of-the-moment shoot of a home invasion fantasy fuck is quite possibly QPTV’s most realistically raw scene yet. Run Time: 14.56

Descriptions from QueerPorn.TV, thanks!

identity, Interviews

Joe LeBlanc: Mini-Interview

President and Conference Chair for Butch Voices. butchvoices.com | @BUTCHVoices

Photo by Kristin Kurzawa

1. What is your relationship with the word or identity “butch?”

My relationship with the word and identity of butch has been a complex one. I hesitated using it at first as a descriptor for myself since I did not “fit” the stereotype for a number of reasons. So much was wrapped up for me upon first glance in the identity of butch – hair style, clothing, class, age, race, sexual preferences, boundaries, underwear, shoes, etc… in order to use the identity for myself. Or so I thought. I thought that I had to already have it all figured out, and have it all in place in order for me to identify as a butch. Not knowing any other butches impeded this process, because I only knew what little I saw about butches. The disassociation the lesbian community was having at the time over anyone who looked butch, much less identified as butch, didn’t really help matters either.

Over time for me, it became less about my needing to fit a specific equation of x + y + z = butch. I began to see that it was more about how I felt inside. I did a lot of internal work around the various facets of myself in regards to my preferences. When I gave myself the permission to get beyond the stereotypes, I could relax and start to become at home with the word. For me, butch is an identity that is personal, as well as sexual and political, too.

With doing community organizing with BUTCH Voices, I have seen ‘butch’ as a polarizing word. For some it has become more of an umbrella term that continues to bring folks together both online and in person, who in the past would not have been in the same room. For others it is a word that gives them the idea that they can ape the worst traits in men. Being a misogynistic asshole does not make someone butch. I enjoy when people can use their preferred identities to start conversations, find commonalities, but not dismiss the differences, or abuse privileges sometimes afforded to us for presenting masculine. Finding strength in the diversity of what butch means is key for us as a segmented community. The identity we choose for ourselves is not the end all, be all about us. It’s only the tip of the iceberg. We can stay divided over semantics and assumptions, or we can find common ground and actually work together to combat the many issues that we all face no matter the language we choose for ourselves.

2. What kind of words and labels, if any, do you use to identify yourself?

I am a lover of language, so I do have some strong personal relationships with certain words around my identity such as: butch, genderqueer, transgender, masculine of center (from B Cole and the Brown Boi Project), dyke, feminist, activist, queer, and gender non-conforming to name a few.

3. What do you wish you could tell your younger self about sex, sexuality, or gender?

I would tell my younger self to not to be so in a rush with the need to figure it all out. But I’m not sure that my younger self would listen. My life’s lessons had and continue to have to be experienced first-hand, which isn’t good or bad – it just is. I am constantly learning more about myself and adding this knowledge and reforming opinions I have along the way. Such is life, and it’s more about the journey than the destination.

Anything you’d like to add?

Butch is what you make of it, and there is no one way to be butch.