The Intimacy in Bondage
Scenology — By Adele on 1 November, 2007 10:41 pmThe Observer Magazine last sunday had a “This much I know” column by Dave Gahan of Depeche Mode. This is a sort of “20 facts about me” blogging meme in magazine form. One of the facts was:
Bondage wasn’t for me. I spent time during my years in Los Angeles at fetish clubs. I’m all for trying things. But when you’ve taken it to a certain level and you’re in some basement tied to an easel, it’s very hard to get back to any kind of normal intimacy.
Well, for what it’s worth, bondage isn’t really for me either, and neither are fetish clubs. (I can’t even make myself brave Night of the Cane.
But dude, no. No, no. Any sexual act is exactly what you bring to it. You can make sitting on somebody’s lap in a public park feel like a sacrament, and you can struggle to find intimacy in a honeymoon suite.
Maybe I just don’t understand what he’s saying?
Obviously, if somebody prefers not to get tied up, trying to lure them into the handcuffs by the power of logic is pointless. All the same, deciding that bondage isn’t for you because dungeons in LA aren’t intimate enough sounds like a weird reason. I mean, you can try moving to the bedroom…
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5 Comments
Well, bondage is VERY much for ME, but I think I understand what he’s saying. If he tried it and didn’t like it, I’m not surprised he felt like an ass in the scenario he describes. There’s a feeling of having sunk to some low level when you’ve done something you later regret.
Someone not into spanking might feel just as ridiculous if they were coaxed into wearing a school uniform and touching their toes for the cane, only to feel silly and humiliated (in the wrong way). Kind of like when you make a fool of yourself in public – like falling UP the stairs out of the Pimlico Tube station on your way to the Tate Gallery. It’s very hard to return to ‘normal’ again without the looming cloud of your recent humiliation hovering overhead.
Maybe he missed a link between what he experienced and something in his life that had given him satisfaction. A to B then D to E. Missing C – perhaps someone whose opinion he respected or affection he desired, or a simple recognizable stepping stone from previous to new experiences was simply missing – leading to his mind/body not being able to latch on to and place what was happening to him. A fear, which in his case that maybe threatened something more primeval within him. A fear which for some of us maybe the very reason to try. Who knows? I do know that some people, who have not been brought up to socialize in unfamiliar surroundings, find the exposure of events, clubs and parties threatening – particularly when certain social groups determine codes of dress and conduct the ‘outsider’ sees no easy route to acquire or slide into.
A couple of years back, I took a friend to the Erotica exhib. in London (not that scintillating I might add.) We’d become friends through a shared interest in a fine art and dance, and unwittingly, she trusted my judgment and had a great time at the show. So I was the link she was able to build from. In my early teens, an aunt provided me with the link to the fascination of power-exchange.
Put a plate of live fruits-de-mer in front of Niki and she’s prob. in seventh heaven. In front of Pointe and she’ll most likely throw up. REAL Cantonese food is unlikely to be appetizing to many westernized palates, in the same way that many of my Chinese friends, cannot stand rotten milk – cheese! So I think part of the answer may be a matter of how we’re led, or lead ourselves, or acquire the taste from one established and sensually/erotically satisfying experience and springboard to the next experimental level.
Perhaps it’s also important to have that missing link as a retreat road to a familiar place just in case the experiment goes wrong – and that maybe be more important for some, than the more venturesome. In the guy’s bondage experiment perhaps that link was missing. Or it may just be LA!
R
Bondage… (Or as Homer Simpson says off-screen: “bonnnnnnnnnnnnnndage”)
You actually love adore and worship bondage. It’s the ropes tied tightly around your mind and heart that get you off. :-)
And I like your style and wit too.
I’ve been into spanking and S&M for about 10 years or more. My problem was that I got so into my kink that vanilla sex didn’t even turn me on anymore. When a girlfriend is up for that sort of thing, it’s all good, but when she’s not, it becomes a real relationship problem. I think that may be what he’s talking about. When it takes an in depth scene like he was describing to really get you going, missionary sex may not cut it for you anymore. As for me, (I say this somewhat sheepishly)i’m on a bit of a self imposed s&m diet. But i just couldn’t stop reading your site, Adele.
“…it’s very hard to get back to any kind of normal intimacy.”
A few years ago I would have agreed with this statement, having jumped from all D/s relationships into a “completely vanilla man’s” monogamous world…failing miserably in the relationship because I needed so badly only what can be had in a rigid D/s moment…
But then I met a guy who completely blew me away and showed me that when I need kink we can do that and we’ll both have an incredible time (and intimate–is there really anything more intimate than that total trust and giving?) but that there is a special quiet intimacy that can be found in plain old missionary…gazing into each other’s eyes, slow-motion joining that becomes as emotional as any intense scene I’ve ever experienced…
I guess the real discovery is that each encounter whether vanilla or kink is as intimate as you make it inside yourself…by giving yourself completely every time.
I feel sorry for the guy if he’s locked himself emotionally because of a “bad” experience…
I’m off to find the entire article…
Hugs
Roxy