Another week has passed.

I didn't mean to alarm any of you reading this by not being online much last week. Of course, there aren't many people reading this. I didn't add a hit counter or anything, but I suspect the readership is about four.

Four people, not four years old.

Anyway. With Boy backing out last week, and another friend-who-is-sometimes-boy-and-sometimes-just-so-filled-with-angst-you-can't-stand it also deciding that he's "not in the mood" lately, there wasn't a lot of reason for me to be online. Plus, I had a lot of other things to do, and I usually keep a spare machine online on gay.com or AIM or whatever.

So, last Saturday, I shut it down. I started doing other stuff. I moved a different computer into the same place that didn't have the chat stuff set up on it, so it wasn't too easy to chat anyway.

It was kind of nice. I'm poking my head online a bit more now, but still not staying on there like before. No one seems to have noticed much, save for my best friend, but I stayed in touch with him through other means, so my absence doesn't seem to be denting the universe.

From the short chats, I think Boy thinks I'm mad at him for backing out. This is not exactly true. I'm sad and disappointed that he did, because the main reason he got through the door was that he was so sure of what he wanted. If I'd detected that kind of uncertainty in his wants, I wouldn't have invited him out here. I talk to lots of boys online who never get through the door; he would have fit in well in that group. (Most of them think they can come through anytime they want, but that's an earlier post.)

I don't feel like he used me or anything, though I did question that at first. I think anyone would. For that lovely feeling, at the same time, let's talk about another boy whom I've talked to online for about three years. When I first started taking to him, he was just a club kid, with a latent interest in leather but not at all ready for it or what it meant. Over a 3-year online friendship, he learned more and more. He asked for lots of advice, and I always tried to stop and give it. I even designed business cards for him once.

I did invite him out here on several occasions, but he didn't start getting close until last year. I stopped inviting him after offering him dinner and a movie on his birthday and getting back, in words not much different than this, "let me see if anyone better is around first."

But still we talked. He asked more about BDSM and I told him, about toys and what being a master or slave is like, and how to play safely, and whatever else crossed his mind. He always said he wasn't quite ready to try it. Then, after I didn't hear from him for a week or two, he popped up again, and said, "You know all that stuff you wanted me to try? Well, I found a guy in another city and tried it all!"

That really wasn't what I'd had in mind.

Still, I wanted to be supportive, so I talked him through problems and misconceptions. Late in the year, he realized it was finally time to get his head shaved and get collared, and I'd promised him a collar as a no-strings-attached gift more than 2 years earlier. So he came out here and took care of all that, and borrowed a few simple toys to help his new proto-master bind him, etc.

Since then, he's had difficulties a few more times, thinking that his master isn't taking his service as seriously as he is, wondering about how to get things done. One Wednesday night, he msg'd me almost in tears, not even sure if he was going to stay with his master that week because he was so disappointed. I stopped my work and sat down with that computer and talked him through it for an hour before he left, abruptly, because his master was home.

I have, in general, attempted to have the patience of Job with the boy, even once it became clear that he was not interested in me as more than mentoring and advice.

So, this month, I realized I hadn't heard from him in a while. I found him on one of the IM services and said hi, and asked how the slavery was going.

He said, in essence, that it made his new master uncomfortable for him to talk to anyone about BDSM problems, so he wasn't going to talk to me about BDSM anymore, and didn't want me to talk to him about it. He asked for my address so he could mail back the toys he borrowed, which was always the plan of last resort anyway.

After three years of schooling him on BDSM (and everything from how not to panic to how not to commit suicide with club drugs), now I'm very politely told to censor myself, and not to talk to him about the major topic of three years' worth of conversations. (He has plenty of work-related question for me, though, and seems annoyed when I don't stop my tasks to provide free work-related consultation to him.)

That, my four readers, is what being used feels like - and why I don't miss being online as much as I was. Like I said, I'm poking my head up every now and then, and checking mail (sorry about no replies, Paul), and all that. And who knows - someone else may come along, unexpectedly, like Boy did. I may write a couple of stories, or tell some more stories here. Maybe happier ones!

So drop me a line if you want to say hi, or speak up when you see me poke my head up, since I'm not staying online for long, and may not be online for several days at a time again. But I'm here. You need kryptonite to get rid of me.

I suspected as much.

Boy has decided not to continue training or sessions. I can't say I'm surprised, but given how I never expected to find a boy at this time anyway, I am surprised at how sad it makes me.

Happy Valentine's Day

Boy cancelled for the second time in a row, although this time he told me about 12 hours in advance that he had a "date," rather than telling me 3 hours after he was supposed to arrive that he had a social commitment he didn't know about on time. He remains uncollared, and while he says he has been celibate while unlocked, I have not seen him in close to three weeks, with no meeting currently scheduled.

I am a big fan of the "three strikes" rule for BDSM relationships, but I don't advertise it because then it's a threat, not a policy. He's now cancelled two scheduled visits in a row, so I'm not scheduling a third - that's up to him, both to find a date and to clear it with me. If he does, and he cancels that one too, he won't get another opportunity.

Better to face reality than pretend something is there that's not. I see more and more why one my best (non-BDSM) friend calls today "Black Heart of Darkness Day."

Boy, boys, no boys, some boys, who knows

No updates for two weeks, bad on me. Haven't had a lot of recreational writing time, for better or (mostly) for worse.

So, as of this moment, Boy is not collared. We knew from the start that he had a medical appointment sometime this month or next that would require removing the collar and other marks of submission, at least for that day and probably for a little longer, since he lives more than half an hour from me and can't get out here more than about once per week. That was planned. I expected that.

I did not expect that I would have to have a proxy remove the collar and other devices on my behalf.

Because he's younger, Boy does not always understand that actions speak louder than words. (Again, for those just surfing the web: in BDSM, boy refers to a BDSM submissive man, whether he's 18 or 65, in the same way that Sir refers to a dominant whether he's 18 or 65. It's about role, not about age. All "boy" and "Sir" references are to consenting adults in all such contexts.) At times, Boy thinks he is supposed to say what I want to hear, and not what is more accurate or more true.

This always leads to problems, and it's been no exception for us. Boy asked for things he wanted to try, but implied that he was sure he wanted them for longer than a trial period. Boy said that certain BDSM events were not that big a deal to him when, in fact, they really were a big deal to him. He's now understanding that if he feeds me bad information, I make bad decisions. When a Sir asks a boy if he can take anymore, the boy had better not turn a true answer like "I want to be able to take more" into "I can take more" if the latter is not true as well. A boy who says he can take more when he can't is going to get hurt. Bad information creates bad decisions.

In this case, Boy wants to be collared, and has said so - but he's also self-conscious about his collar in some settings. He's aware that not being able to remove it has been good for him, but now that it's come off, he's not sure he wants it back on. He's starting to understand more that submission is not just the exciting parts that they write the porn stories about, but remembering those choices daily, accepting that you're not in control of everything, and seeing where that leads you, both physically and emotionally.

Combined with other basic honesty problems, Boy and I are not as close as I want. Boy is a smoker, and I hate tobacco smoke. He's not my 24/7 boy, so I didn't tell him to quit smoking, but I did tell him with crystal clarity never to let me smell it on him. For his second visit, he showed up reeking of smoke - and then lied to me about the cause. (It was not someone else smoking in his vehicle - it was him smoking in his vehicle, and I knew it.)

That was on top of a visit that had been shortened to just a few hours due to his schedule. His next visit after that was to have been last weekend, for most of Saturday, but he elected to go see his family instead. That reduced his potential time here from most of the weekend to just a few hours on either Friday or Sunday. He chose Sunday - and then, when he was supposed to be here, he didn't arrive. I only heard from him hours later. He had an organizational commitment where he lived, and didn't know about it until so late that he couldn't even get there for the start of it.

But for whatever reason, he didn't call and report the problem to me - I just sat here, wondering not only why the visits were getting shorter, but now seemed to be vanishing altogether. I knew the collar had to come off for his medical appointment, but this week, he apparently contracted a contagious illness that, due to family history, I must avoid at nearly all costs, so he couldn't come here to get it removed and I couldn't go to him, either. Another boy and his companion (who wants to be a boy) who live near Boy were gracious enough to come here and get the tools to remove the collar and other devices, and used them to unlock him on Thursday.

The boy and his companion who performed this favor for me were close to being collared as well, just two weeks ago, but backed out at the last minute. They say it wasn't fear, and at times I think they really believe that, but I don't. My canonical example for this is still a boy having his head shaved (and yes, I think boys have to be prepared for that). It's not about the moment in bondage when the master has the boy's hair removed as a sign of his service - it's about the next days and weeks when the boy remains shaved and has to deal with it. It's about realizing that things for you are different now, and taking the difference one day at a time. Collars can come off, piercings can be removed, but hair doesn't grow back instantly. You can't undo it, and you can't pretend it didn't happen. The boy knows some of this; his companion much less so. Yet this is where they need to go next, because it's exactly when the excitement of the session wears off that they start questioning their commitment. It's time for them to find out what that's like.

However, while that's my experienced opinion, it's not my problem. I like them both, but have already told them, "The collar will not be offered again this semester." They may know what that means already, I guess I'll see. This boy, while a great friend and a wonderful boy, has always had difficulty with decisions - not that he doesn't have choices he likes, but that choosing one of them locks out other choices he might like. He's the proverbial kid in the candy store with only $1 - he knows that once he spends it, he can't have anything else, so he stands there all day just staring at the sweets, unable to choose one to the exclusion of others.

He's been talking with Boy for a couple of weeks now, and I start to see some of the same indecision in Boy that this other boy has had for his adult life. One reason I collared Boy, even though he's slightly younger than my preferred age range for a boy, is that he was able to make decisions and commit to them quickly. He was unafraid to go for what he wanted. After a few weeks of talking with the other boy, though, now he's not so sure what he wants. Instead of Boy being a decisive influence on the other boy, the other boy may be an indecisive influence on Boy.

I don't know that's what's happening, but I wonder.

I sincerely hope that Boy wants to be collared again ASAP, but not if it makes him unhappy. I want him to be collared and happy, but if that becomes an either-or question, he has to pick "happy." I believe that taking things one day at a time because of his ownership is very good for Boy. He enjoys being taken to new levels of himself, and even when he doesn't quite know what being owned means, I believe he can feel his collar and know that he's secure and cared for. I believe that the control he cedes to me will reward him in ways that stubborn self-determination - which he's already mastered - cannot.

We'll see in the next few days if Boy is comfortable with both the freedom and limitations of being owned, and how the other boy and his companion manage their ongoing journey. I won't shrivel up and die if I don't own any of them, but they're all fine boys, and I especially have enjoyed owning Boy, except for the miscommunication and the shrinking amount of time I see him. I hope it continues.