Compliance

"Ami!" The voice has an edge to it.  He raises an eyebrow and indicates for me to precede him into the kitchen.

From across the room I narrow my eyes at him and lift my chin, but I stop mid sentence.  

He briefly narrows his eyes in response, then glares at me, nodding discretely at the kitchen doorway and moving his wineglass ever so slightly to the left.

I drop my eyes, excuse myself from the couple I am chatting with and make my way around the dining table towards him.

As I pass him on my way into the kitchen I notice the steely glint in his eyes, and I bite down on the few choice words that, a second ago, I was prepared to mutter under my breath.  

He follows me, and putting one hand on the kitchen island and the other hand on the work surface near the cooker, he neatly corals me in a corner.

I open my mouth ready to defend myself, but he forestalls me, placing a finger across my lips and giving his head a tiny shake.  He hardly needs words. 

"Do you understand me?"  He lifts his eyebrow slightly.

For an instant in time I set my jaw and stare back. Then I drop my eyes and nod.

"Ami, I am waiting for a reply."

I study the travertine flooring.

"Yes.  I'm sorry.  My mouth was running away with me there. I don't know what came over me."

"So long as we understand each other." He drops his hand and turns surveying the kitchen.

He picks up a plate of smoked salmon and asparagus, and hands me a dish of olives stuffed with garlic, and another containing small red peppers stuffed with cream cheese.

"Let's get this party started," he indicates the dishes and the people through the doorway.

My shoulders relax.  That was a near thing, I think to myself.

*******

I'm not particularly submissive.  I'm not certain that I want to be, not really.  Not if that submission means I am always being told what to do, how to behave, what to wear, what to watch on TV, what I can spend. I like to think of myself as being co-operative; of being in agreement with Dan and able to comply with his requests.  To know what he is going to request - and get in first before he has to put his requests into words. I've always been this way.

My first job, way back when, was as PA to the Chairman of a very large international company. I just loved being able to predict what he wanted, before he even knew himself that he wanted it - be it end of year results from a rival company, a meeting setting up with the other members of the Board, tickets on the next Concorde flight to New York, or even just a cup of freshly brewed coffee. 

In fact, I remember kneeling at a low-level coffee table in the corner of his huge office, serving freshly brewed Arabica, whilst he and several other high-powered businessmen from the States stood towering over me and watching me.  One even had the temerity to stroke my hair.  It makes me gasp to think I was so naive that I thought it was quite normal for a young woman hardly out of college to serve coffee to a group of men in that way.

For roughly the first third of our marriage Dan made all the important decisions and I was happy to comply with his wishes.  We even used to boast that we never rowed or had arguments, and that we had ironed out all our differences during the years of our engagement.  (5 years!  Long huh?!)  

But then something changed.  Dan's hard work and determination paid off and I rarely saw him without a business suit and briefcase.  He mostly worked with upper management and directors of large blue-chip companies, and was sometimes away for weeks and once lived away from us for three years just coming home at weekends, and one weekday night if he could manage it.

I stayed at home and worked part-time juggling teaching, studying for various degrees, looking after the kids and sorting out their schooling, running the household and riding my horses (mainly eventing). Somewhere along the line we came unstuck.  We nearly came completely off the rails, although I wasn't aware of it at the time.  In essence, I took over.  I did it because Dan just wasn't around.  

Okay, so if he was around I still had his gin and tonic ready for him as he came up the drive on a Friday night - but mostly I steered the ship.

Imagine wearing Wellington boots two sizes too large for you,

and then wading through a sea of ankle deep mud. 

That's how it felt to begin with.  

But then after a while those Wellingtons seemed to shrink and the mud dried out. 

We no longer bothered to kiss each other goodbye when he left for a business trip.  At one time I chaired about six different committees, and some evenings I would be out till after midnight. I remember once getting a puncture. It was before mobile phones. When I eventually rolled into the yard it was after eleven at night and Dan never turned a hair. Didn't even wonder why I was so late.

I was the good little corporate wife.  I knew how to dress and I knew how to act when rubbing shoulders with the "big bosses".  I could be relied on to ask the right questions and engage in intelligent conversation. I gained a reputation for my strength of character, and Dan once bought, whilst on holiday, a silly sign that read "Forget the dog, Beware of the owner." He never knew how much it smarted.

Sex was uninspiring when we had it; I can remember quite clearly that once every three weeks was not unusual, and it was more often than not of the "Wham, bam, thank you mam" variety. If I didn't feel like it I would even slap his hand away if it ventured in my direction. 

This turbulent third of our life came to a close one Friday when Dan arrived at work to be asked for his car keys.  He'd became a necessary cut. The entire company he worked for became a necessary cut.  I collected him from the station that evening.  He was very quiet.  His face was grey.

We lay in bed that night and he broke down.  He asked me if I was going to leave him.  He didn't think I would want to be with a man who had just lost his job.  We made love tenderly and with more regard to each other's feelings than we had in years.

Life deals you blows and you pick yourself up and get on with it.  It takes time and you follow a rocky road, but then, life ain't easy. 

Sometimes just putting one foot in front of another is hard, yet at other times you find yourself running up the hills.

Dan's made of some pretty strong stuff.  He started to network, and before long he set up his own company, and he never looked back.  It's being cut adrift that's the most difficult thing; once you start to tread water it's only one step on and you're swimming with sharks.  Once again I found myself steering that darn ship!  But this time as a mere sub-lieutenant.

  
I mostly deferred to him; the household resumed its well-oiled status; life settled down. It wasn't exactly super-exciting, but it was good, and predictable, and I discovered that Dan was much better at navigation than I was.

Then out of the blue came my heart attack.  It's funny how these things toss you about a bit and make you think.  I did a lot of thinking back then.  I decided I didn't want to do any more boring or predictable.  I sorted out my shoe collection, and my underwear, and started to read some erotic literature hoping to spice up our sex life a little. And of course, it lead me to that book and to my first ever visit to a sex shop, and the rest is, as they say, history.  

Let's just say I became compliant.  

What a pivotal moment that was.  We both had so much to learn, so much to experiment with.  I had kept such a firm lid on my own nature, that it came as quite a shock, especially to Dan, to discover just how wanton I could be.  

The spanking is really the icing on the cake. 

Sometimes it's hard,

sometimes it's soft,

and sometimes it's unbearably sweet.  

I love it and I hate it, and I find myself completely addicted.

But me submit?  Never.  Ha!

???????????

Wait a cotton-picking minute.  Did I say that at the start of our marriage I was happy to comply with Dan's wishes?  Did I end by stating that I became compliant?  Hmmmm...

submit:  to surrender oneself to another; to yield; to be obedient to another

comply:  to act in accordance with the wishes of another; to yield; to submit

So why is it that I am happy to comply but not happy to submit?  Believe me, whilst I am quite happy to surrender, I am not happy to yield. I am sparky and feisty and I wade happily into a dispute like a Spanish galleon in full sail with all her gun ports open and ready to do battle.  Yet at the same time I am like a fruit sweet with a hard exterior and and a soft interior. A very soft interior.

Not just a pickle but a puzzle!

  
dominant:  prevailing; predominant; overtopping others; occupying a conspicuous position; the fifth note above the tonic

subdominant:  the note next to or immediately below the dominant

Ahhhhh?  Maybe that is what I am?  I am a musical note.  I am a little softer and not quite as loud, but a sympathetic vibration resonating off my dominant. Dan provides the tune, and I provide the harmony.

*******

He leans in, stroking my blush-pink cheeks and tracing the fine lines that define my sit-spots.  I clutch my pillow and my breathing becomes deeper and hitches with anticipation.

I sense, rather than hear, the displacement of air as the bathbrush arcs down full across my bottom, temporarily flattening and pressing into the flesh. Although I have expected it, I gasp with the pain and fist the cotton of the pillowcase.  

"But I did understand you, Dan" I squeak.

The bathbrush lands a second time, then twice more on my left buttock before repeating its action on my right.  It hurts a lot and my eyes are watering.

"All things considered, you did very well", Dan informs me.  "This is just to ensure you keep up the good work, and that you continue to understand."

The bathbrush rises and falls three times each on my sit-spots.  I am sobbing quietly into my pillow and I want to be able to lie still and endure, but it hurts too much so I scissor my legs for all I am worth.  Dan waits a moment, and when I have settled he rains down three more swats across both cheeks.  Then I hear him throw down the bathbrush and he is rubbing my smarting backside.  

I crawl up off his lap and snuggle into his chest, burrowing under his right armpit, and he is hugging me to him.  I cry for a bit, and then he hands me a tissue to blow my nose.

"Time for you to cook my breakfast, old girl," he says, and grins.

I clamber down off the bed and shrug on my robe, then I twist my hair and clip it up on top of my head. I smile back at him.  It feels so good to understand. 

"Aye aye, Sir!" Still grinning, I give him a mock salute.

Saturday Snippets (13)

One of life's simple pleasures is surely making preserves.  To take fresh ingredients, add salt or sugar and capture the resulting mix in a jar or bottle for future use, engenders pleasing feelings of comfort and thrift.  At this time of year it is the transformation of Seville oranges into marmalade that occupies me. The smell of zest and juice is intoxicating, whilst the glorious clarity of jelly with suspended shreds of orange rind, become a visual delight.  

Then when you break the seal months later, the perfume hits you and takes you back to that gloomy winter day when you pottered in your kitchen and felt no guilt whatsoever that you ought to be doing something else.

This is my recipe for Three Fruit Marmalade.  It is one of the easiest recipes for marmalade I possess; it looks good and it tastes good. 

Ingredients:  4 lemons, 2 juicy sweet oranges, 2 grapefruit (total weight 3 lbs), 6 pints of water, 2 lbs sugar. 

Method:

1  Wash the lemons and oranges, halve them and squeeze out the juice and pips.  Slice the peel thinly.

2  Wash the grapefruit, pare of the rind thickly with a knife or vegetable peeler and slice it thinly.  Remove any thick white pith and membrane from the fruit and chop the flesh roughly.

3  Put the fruit juice and flesh, sliced peel and water in a preserving pan.  Tie up the pith, membrane and pips in a piece of muslin and add to the pan.  Simmer gently for about one to one and a half hours, or until the peel is really soft and the liquid is reduced by about half.  Remove the muslin bag and squeeze any juice back into the saucepan.

4  Add the sugar, stirring until it has dissolved.  Bring to the boil and boil rapidly until setting point in reached, stirring frequently to prevent sticking.  Leave the marmalade to cool for about 15 minutes, then put into warmed jars and cover in the usual way. 

Seville Orange Marmalade

Ingredients:  3 lbs Seville oranges, washed, Juice of 2 lemons, 6 pints of water, 6 lbs sugar

Method:  

1  Halve the oranges and squeeze out the juice.  Collect the pips and pulp in a piece of muslin and tie into a bag.

2  Slice the peel thinly with a sharp knife or vegetable slicer.  Put the fruit juices and water in a preserving pan and tie the bag to the handle.

3  Add the peel and simmer for about two hours, until the peel is soft and the liquid reduced by about half.

4  Remove the muslin bag, squeezing it well between two plates to extract all the juice (this improves the pectin content).

5  Add the sugar and stir until it has dissolved.  Bring to the boil and boil rapidly for 15 minutes.

6  Test setting point, then leave to cool for 15 minutes. Stir, pot and cover in the usual way.

Things you could do in January:

• Build a bird box
• Go on a beer safari
• Ice-skate in a woodland
• Explore some well-known "gardens" near where you live
• Ensure you have a bright and welcoming winter front doorstep

My garden in January never ceases to amaze me with early spring flowers.  So far we have snowdrops beginning to poke through the ground.  When they are out they will look like this

We also have aconites that grow closely with the snowdrops

and already there are lots of Hazel catkins that dance in the wind along our driveway.

Weather here in the UK has been atrocious.  A series of gales accompanied by horizontal rainfall continue to rip their way across the country, coming in off the Atlantic.  So far we have been spared the worst of the flooding. Others haven't been so lucky.  

All we can do is sit it out.  

They're a tough lot those Canadians!

Finally a bit more humour to end with. I couldn't help but laugh at this one

  

And as for my computer playing up constantly!

Why didn't I think of that?  And finally...

Don't you just love cats?!

The Proof of the Pudding

I was doing some thinking the other day.

Quite often I do my best thinking when staring at the floor boards.  (Funny that.)

I'd been reading a short 'spanky' book on my Kindle about some poor lil ole girl in the Old West, who met some man and ended up married to him within six hours, and being spanked by him within seven hours.

It was a very enjoyable romp.  He used every implement known to man, spanked long and hard, lectured like a pro, and stood her in the corner at the beginning, middle and end.  Whew!

She was beautiful, young, slim and feisty.  She got up at 6.30am, baked biscuits, cooked an enormous breakfast, had lunch waiting and dinner planned and prepared to perfection for when he arrived home weary and saddlesore.  She washed his shirts in a tub outside (carrying water by the pail) and kept the house clean, tidy and well polished, whilst managing to feed hens, collect eggs, milk the cow and feed the pigs.  Yet she still had time to ride off for miles on jaunts, swim in secluded ponds, spend money they didn't have on things they didn't need, be rude and abrupt with their family and neighbours, swear like a trooper and be disrespectful with her new husband - and yet behave like a sex goddess at the drop of a hat both day and night.  Oh, and when she got spanked it was upwards of a hundred times and she screamed and yelled, had to be held down, had her hands restrained behind her back, struggled so much she nearly threw herself off the aforesaid husband's knees, couldn't sit down for the next several days and had to eat standing up, and immediately told him how sorry she was and how much she loved and adored him.  Whew!!

So there I was thinking.

I was thinking about Consistency and I was thinking about all my mates in Blogland, and in particular I was thinking about Dan.

Now Dan isn't particularly consistent.  He would perhaps like to think he is, but he isn't.  It used to bother me a lot.  But now I just go with the flow most of the time, and the other bit of time I muddle my way through as best I can.  But why does he have a problem with consistency, and why do I think he isn't consistent?  After all, he might be.  My perception of him might be wrong.

It seems to me that there are three main types of people who do DD or TTWD.

There are those people who started because they had very real problems with their marriages.  They heard/read/happened upon blogs/found out from friends/had family members who were/are involved in it, and having talked things through they decided (for whatever reason) to give it a shot, in the hope that it would stop the rot, fix their rocky marriage/relationship, put an end to arguments and constant disagreements, and draw them closer together and reaffirm their love for one another.

Then there are those people where the husband, either because he has been brought up in a DD family, or because he has a naturally dominant personality knows deep within himself that there can only be one head of his household - and he is it, and therefore he brings DD to his wife and expects/convinces her, to become his TIH.

Finally, there are those people where the woman brings DD to her husband.  She does it for a variety of reasons.  She may feel their marriage is stagnating or becoming unbearably boring.  She may feel divorce is looming ever closer on the horizon.  She may be wondering why they live like ships passing in the night. She may think their sex life is non existent. She may have had a light bulb moment and realised that she was nagging and hounding her poor spouse into an early grave.  Or whatever.  But she came upon the word 'spanking', read about it, researched it, was perhaps initially horrified by it, grew intrigued with it, perhaps discovered some blogs about others who practised it, and finally decided it was what was going to save her marriage/relationship, so she eventually gets up the courage to do something about it, and she brings DD to her husband.

Whew!

I love reading blog posts.  Just at present I have very little time to do them justice.  I try to comment whenever I can.  I've made many really good friends here, and the advice and support I've received is second to none and if anyone from the outside world tried to upset anyone - well, just call me and see my kevlar body armour!  Blogger is leading me a dance and not letting me add all the blogs I follow to my list, so I apologise and believe me, I try my best and I am sorry if I haven't been on your blog lately.  Whew!

Where was I?

Oh yes, consistency.  

So what I perceive is this.  Group number one don't seem to have any real issues with consistency.  It's a given.  They have talked about and studied the dynamic together, they have practised everything they should have practised, they have (in many cases) their rules in place, their implements in a drawer/box/cupboard, the rituals of once, twice, three times a week, plus disciplinary spankings, plus punishment spankings, and off they go.  They have their ups and downs, as normal people would, but there never seem to be any real issues with consistency, because they both wanted this, and they both worked hard to put it in place in their marriages/relationships.

Group number two sometimes gets off to a bit of a rocky start, but once the couple gets going, they go great guns.  The husband has introduced the dynamic, he more or less knows what is expected, he sorts out their rituals, rules, spankings and implements, and despite various little snarls and hitches, and a bit of back-tracking from time to time, they seem to do pretty well for themselves as the husbands do their best to be consistent.  The only slight snag I can deduce, is that there are a few wives who actively dislike being spanked and are not really what one would call spankos.  Perhaps this is mostly because they mainly see the maintenance/reaffirmation/disciplinary/punishment side of a spanking, and they weren't the ones who wanted to do it in the first place - just the ones who agreed it was necessary in their marriages/relationships.

Then we have the final group.  This is the group where the wives brought this to their husbands. Ha!  You just cannot imagine how long it took me to open my mouth and whisper the little words "I want you to spank me!" to Dan.  He nearly had apoplexy on the spot.  He still has to pinch himself in order to convince himself that he is actually laying into my bottom in order to fulfil my request and that our marriage is not only doing well, but flourishing beyond anything ever hoped for.  But consistency?  Oh brother!  

Some couples are lucky enough to fall into consistency within the first three to four months. Some within six to eight months.  Usually by a year most couples have developed certain rituals, a few rules may have been set up, implements and spanking positions organised and daily, weekly or even monthly discussions have made communication easier and more carefree. Ha!

Then there are The Starsongs.

Half the time I swear the left hand doesn't know what the right had is doing.  But this is someone who mentioned "not being serious" the other week and ended up having a nude discussion for the best part of an hour before being back to the starting blocks to be spanked all over again.

So we had a discussion about consistency.  It wasn't a brilliant, earth-shattering discussion.  It did have Dan telling me that he thought I had somehow "out-manoeuvred" him, and my poor bottom bears the brunt of what he thought of that. But I did manage to explain that whilst I thought we had started off brilliantly right back at the start, we seem to have gone somewhat "off piste" as far as consistency is concerned, and that much of our spanking these days is of the type that could well become the new Olympic sport!  eg I have developed the most imaginative front crawl you ever saw! 

Really I sometimes feel it is like the blind leading the blind.  We just go around in circles.  Dan thinks these circles are consistent, but I am not so sure.  The most consistent bit as far as he is concerned is that Thursday has become known as Spanky Doodle Day. His words - not read off Ana's blog - and he even whistles the tune and plays it on my butt nearly every week as a warm up!  

We also have top-up days, and very often the odd "Get over here, I'm going to warm your bottom for you" days.  But nothing is terribly consistent, and as I say, if I remind him too often, I certainly feel his annoyance and irritation the next time I am spanked for "whatever", be it for pleasure or reprimand.

This morning should've been more in the line of a stressbuster. We got into the consistency debate because Dan noticed the scales on the floor of our bedroom.  They were there because I have put on so much weight over Christmas that I feel like a fat pig and I now have to not only lose that extra weight, but also keep to my goal of losing another fourteen pounds before the end of June when we have a wedding to go to. So I took the opportunity of leaping on to the scales before I leapt over Dan's lap.

  

I shrieked with horror, and very foolishly, EXTREMELY, STUPIDLY FOOLISHLY when asked to fetch an implement, handed Dan the wooden salad server for my spanking. (We hadn't used it for some time as I favour our leather paddle, and Dan favours the bathbrush.) 

"You are going to have to help me with this!" I instructed him, my eyes glued to the scales whilst handing him the salad server. I then moaned and groaned to emphasise my discomfiture. 

"But I like you like this.  Okay, so your legs now look a bit on the thin side.  But your bottom isn't fat, and I certainly wouldn't want you to lose any weight off your boobs. (He used another word entirely.) It's just your stomach is a bit round.  Well, a lot round." He pinched a good deal more than an inch!  More like several inches!  

"I hate it.  I've got to lose it.  I can't go shopping for a new dress looking like this.  I can't believe I've put so much on in such a short time.  I was doing so well."

"Hmmm.  I did notice your jumpers or shirts tend to stand out a bit from the rest of you.  Like the overhang on a cliff."

I froze.

"What did you say?!"

"Well you know.  Nothing fits snugly around your waist any more.  Why don't you tuck your shirts in? Maybe it would help."

I snorted.  "So you think I am fat?  You are saying my clothes don't fit?"

"No I never said that.  Don't put words into my mouth.  I told you, I like you the way you are."

I drew myself up and glared at him.

"All right.  The weight comes off.  You can bloody well help me to lose it.  I will try to lose some each week, and you can spank me so many times for each pound I have to lose, and if I don't lose any weight one week, or put it on, you can spank me more.  Maybe that way I will lose the blessed weight."

So okay, I did have Dan's arm up his back a little bit, but I informed him that I thought it would be within his role to look after me and keep me safe.  (Snigger )

There followed an extremely intense ten minutes of discussion whilst Dan did mental calculations and came to various conclusions about how many spanks per pound he should give me.  It was further agreed that the spanks would be hard and given with the salad server in order that the weight be lost as quickly as possible.  (This is where I have to admit to the world that I need to lose a total of eighteen pounds!  I know - horrible!)  First he decided on ten pounds per pound of weight, but decided that 180 spanks with the salad server would do me in.  (He was right!)  So he went down to seven.  126 also seemed rather excessive.  So we ended up at four spanks per pound and that still worked out at 72.  Horrors!  Suddenly the idea didn't seem so wonderful, and why oh why the salad server?!  

He brandished it triumphantly whilst I got into position.  I took rather more time than usual, and strangely didn't regard my stress release spanking with the enthusiasm I had earlier on.  When he put his right leg over mine I knew he meant business.

He gave me my anti-stress spanking entirely with his hand.  It was harder than usual and not quite as I had envisaged.  After fifty or so he remarked that his hand hurt, but I wasn't prepared for the explosion of pain that crashed over my poor bottom as he replaced his hand with the salad server.  And the blessed man chose this time to discuss my weight loss solution with me and to explain exactly how this was all going to work!

This is a note to all "newbies" or ones among you unsure about the sagacity of using a less-frequented implement, known to impart extreme pain and discomfort, simply as a reminder not to eat so much and to eat more healthily, in other words, as a weight loss tool.  DON'T UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES!

It was unbearable.  I was held in a clamp.  I thought at one stage I would either throw myself on the floor in a heap, or punch poor Dan in the nose.  Way before 72 spanks I was promising the Earth and all that is in it if he would stop.  Dan not only kept going, but he told me it was for my own good and that he was going to not only ensure I lost the weight, but that the salad server was used every week to strengthen my resolve.  He asked me questions.  He made me promise to give up chocolates, cake, pastries and buns.  He felt that alcohol should be limited to one glass only - with my Sunday lunch - and that I should up my intake of mineral water, and eat more fresh fruit and vegetables.  

To think that it was only in my last post I discussed "lecturing".  I can hardly wait to see what he does with "consistency"!

It is evening and I am still sore. I have spoon-shaped bruises on my SIT SPOTS!

This never happens to me.  I boast about it.  This is me with the "rhino hide"!  I have a smooth bottom and I never bruise!

When I eventually levered my poor, hot, well-peppered bottom up from my husband's lap, I threw that f-----g salad server the length of our bedroom. 

Dan was shocked.  "Did you just throw that?" he asked.  

"Yes I did," I snarled.  "I hate it.  I had forgotten entirely how lethal it could be.  I aim to lose this weight very quickly and keep it off!"

"Ha!" he replied.

The Art of Conversation

I don't make New Year Resolutions.  I stopped making them years ago because I always end up breaking them.

This is really meant to be a post about Being Lectured, and how it has led to another bend in this road of ours. But I warn you, once I start to think about things, they have a tendency to get complicated.

Like many others around here, I started my New Year with a well-earned spanking.

I thought I had done really well up until Christmas.

Dan pulled me over his lap Christmas Eve for a top-up spanking, which seems to work well for us, and reminded me of what he expected, mostly in terms of behaviour, but with one or two points regarding my safety and well-being thrown in - which is quite a new thing, and mostly involves going up high step-ladders, lifting heavy weights, and getting enough sleep.

We had had a large entertaining event the Sunday before Christmas, and I had worked extremely hard to ensure that there was a good selection of festive food, and that everyone's glasses were kept filled with either Mulled Cider or Mulled Apple Juice (I challenge anyone to tell the difference!) and that they had a good time.  By Christmas Eve that top-up spanking was like manna from heaven!  I floated around all day with a smug smile on my face and a wonderfully glowing bottom.

Christmas Day itself was quiet with just the four of us - Dan and I, and our son and his girl friend.  We all ate far too much!  We went for a long blustery walk around the water-logged meadows, arm in arm, and watched some silly, romantic movie in the evening, curled up on the sofa in front of a blazing log fire.

Boxing Day there were ten of us around the dining table.  It was a delight to play with my nearly-six year old grandson, and listen to my grandbaby babble away as he tried to watch us.  The wind was howling outside, and the rain pouring down, but we had a lovely family day.

In between then, and New Year, we were busy.  There were people coming and going all the time.  I was rushing around with three friends getting organised for our annual, joint New Year's Eve dinner celebration, and we fell straight asleep the minute we got to bed and rose early to yet another day galloping around.

I think that's where the rot set in. 

Dan said that had the opportunity presented itself, he would have taken me to one side and sorted me out there and then.  But there just wasn't an appropriate opportunity.

He said he could see his happy compliant wife disappear in front of his eyes, and witness bitch/troll claw her way out of the pit and go on the rampage, but felt powerless to do anything about it, except issue warnings, which I blatantly ignored.

During the day of New Year's Eve I knew I was behaving like the thing from the depths.  I'd had a very bad night due to the whole barn rocking in the gales and driving rain, and I was feeling exhausted before I even began the day.  I had a long list of things I needed to accomplish before the evening's festivities, and had only ticked off a couple when the phone rang and it was our daughter, who'd had a terrible argument with her ex, and who is still trying to control her seven years later, despite having his own family, and she wanted us to call round and maybe go out for a walk around the little town where she lives.

Of course, we immediately set off, and I decided to take my list with me and try to get my bits of shopping done whilst we were out.

Sadly, bitch/troll ensured that I remained a horrible person the whole time.  I was my usual grandmotherly self with my adorable grandbaby, (my older one was with his father), and helpful, supportive and fiercely loving, (like a mother bear) towards my daughter.  But poor Dan took a lot of flack, of the nagging wife variety. I just couldn't seem to ease out of it.  I think I disagreed with just about everything he did or said that day - and for no real reason that I can think of. My feathers weren't just ruffled, they were completely bent back the wrong way. 

By evening he was issuing me with muttered sotto voce warnings and assurances of how he would love to warm my tail.  Ha! I just snarled at him and changed my outfit three times! 

Yet despite all this we had a lovely evening.  We provided the cheese board, and took celery and grapes, and a wonderful Sauternes. Believe me, if you've never tried "Stinking Bishop", you don't know what you are missing!

I sat at the opposite end of the table to Dan. (We were all positioned away from our spouses, and there were two male friends present, one of whom had lost his wife just three weeks previously, and one who, having lost his wife four years ago, had just lost his eldest son at the age of 33 - and all to cancer!) 

Each time I refilled my glass Dan frowned, which made me nervous, so I did it rather more regularly than I knew I should. In the end I tried to avoid looking him in the eye.  I don't think his eyebrow could go any higher than it did!

We all sat chatting after dinner in my friend's living room waiting for midnight to strike.  We had the TV on and were watching the crowds along the Thames with the London Eye in the background. We were all on to liqueurs by that time, and conversation was animated.

At last Big Ben appeared on the screen and we hurriedly poured the champagne and got our party poppers ready to pull.  New Year arrived with a welter of fireworks along the Thames and everyone sought out their partners to kiss and wish Happy New Year to, before kissing and hugging each other. 

I stood and waited expectantly for Dan to make his way across the room towards me.  But he didn't.  He stopped off and kissed first one friend, and then another, and left me till last.  I felt awful.  I knew exactly why he was doing it.

At last he took me in his arms and wished me a Happy New Year, and then with his right hand he gave me an enormous, and loud, swat across my behind. Then he kissed me to muffle my exclamation, which would've been something unprintable and probably louder than the swat!  

Our friends have known us for donkey's years and just assumed he was being amusing and possessive. Ha!  They didn't hear what he whispered in my ear!

New Year's Day we ended up rushing in order to go to my SIL's for an early lunch.  I had a headache from hell, and we were both very tired, and then I had to get Dan to the station to meet up with his soccer buddies to watch our local team.

It was late when he got home, and we were both zonked, plus we both felt bloated from all the eating, and frankly, we just wanted to get to bed and sleep.

But I woke up quite early.  I just lay there and thought about things.  I think I actually squirmed a couple of times.  It's not pleasant waiting for an event. Especially when you know you've earned your come-uppance. You go over and over things in your head a hundred times.  My main question to myself was why had I acted the way I had? This didn't feel like groundhog day, but something else.  It was like having an itch that I couldn't scratch that just got worse and worse.  Like being in such need that I was almost shaking from withdrawal symptoms. Like being addicted and not able to feed the addiction.

I can tell you that Dan didn't beat about the bush. He sent me downstairs to get our morning drinks. Sent not asked. As soon as I had finished my coffee he requested the leather paddle and the wooden salad server.  I should have been glad the bathbrush had slipped his mind, I suppose.

He started out with his hand, which surprised me, as I honestly thought he would start right in zinging away with the paddle the way he usually does when I am being a pig and extra irritating.  But he didn't.  Instead he chose to "talk" to me.

I am always interested when people blog about being "lectured".  It's not a word I am fond of, but I do understand.  Dan doesn't lecture - he converses. He points out every little detail of my behaviour and expresses his disappointment and how it has hurt his feelings, and he does like me to answer him, which can, of course, become a bit difficult when you are chewing the duvet.  This time he spanked and conversed until I was gritting my teeth, and he suddenly shook his hand and said it hurt too much to continue.

Now, normally one would assume that would be the end of the performance.  Wrong.  The salad server made its appearance.  Bugger that thing!  It really hurts!  Especially when Dan does his skin stretching thing, and hammers away on the same spot for six or seven spanks.  

I was getting watery-eyed and just beginning to cry and let go - and then I was suddenly paying attention to what he was talking about.  (Sorry Dan.  Everyone else:  This is one of my main faults - I just drift off into my own headspace and don't listen.)  

The words taking, you aren't, seriously and me suddenly rearranged themselves in my head, followed by You're awfully red, I think you've had enough, haven't you? Shall I stop?

Dan stopped spanking and I held my breath for a moment, and then launched myself up off his lap.

"What do you mean I'm not taking this seriously?!!! All you do, half the time, is mess around and be funny!"

The air was electric and now I had Dan's complete attention.

"Mess around?!  No, I don't.  How?"

"Yes you do.  You play the tom-toms.  Then you play Guess the nursery rhyme. Then you brush me with the bathbrush."  I stood by the foot of the bed, glaring at him, tears streaming down my cheeks.

"And to accuse me of not taking it seriously!" I drew myself up to my full and naked height.  "We've been doing this for over a year now.  I thought you understood it.  I thought you agreed with me that we have come a long way and that we are closer than we have ever been. I thought you had gotten used to spanking me and it no longer bothered you. Yet apart from three or four times, you have never just spanked me until you have decided to stop!  You always ask me!  Or you stop before I've had a chance to off-load all this stress! Surely you know by now that I trust you to give me what you think is enough, both in terms of length and severity, but you always stop!"

Maybe this sounds a bit controlling but I was shaking with anger.  My heart was hurting more than my bottom.

I won't go into it all, because it would take hours, and I can't remember everything. Dan said I had totally misheard what he had said, and that he didn't know where I had got the words from - I must've been dreaming them.  

But I held my ground and continued to stand at the bottom of the bed, and we had a very long discussion. It wasn't heated (I was very chilly by the time we'd finished it) and I was able to discuss my feelings without turning into a rabid dog, and he was able to discuss how he felt without being controlling or condescending.

A bit reluctantly I have to admit that Dan was 99% right in everything he said.  It seems to be the way of the man.  

• Somehow I had misheard the taking it seriously words and twisted them then accused him.
• He had felt very angry with my behaviour, but felt unable, due to lack of privacy and feeling very tired himself, to act spontaneously.
• He can now see a pattern in my moods when I need a spanking, and acknowledges the change in me a spanking brings about.
• He is in full agreement about how very much closer we have become over the past year.
• He feels very protective towards me, much more so than he has ever told me.
• He enjoys spanking me for fun.
• He is still getting his head around this dynamic - even after a year - and still admits to it initially being a hell of a shock to him.
• He positively and completely hates it when I cry.

It's the last one that we discussed the most.  It's the stumbling block.

We talked for ages.  He told me that when I went over his lap I had seemed fine - he talked and I not only listened but despite the occasional "Ow!" and "Ouch!", I had talked with him. We had even joked a bit, and he thought everything was okay.  But he said that when he stopped and asked me if I had had enough, my demeanour seemed to change.  Then the misunderstanding about not acting seriously, and then suddenly I had shot up and stood at the end of the bed.

So I did my best to explain that he often stopped too soon, and that I felt because he nearly always asked me if I was okay, and if I had had enough, it felt like I was the one in control, and that if it was a serious spanking, and not a fun spanking, it left me unsatisfied and grumpy.  All I did then was to stuff my feelings back down, hope for the best, and carry on until the next session.  Why, I wondered, didn't he just carry on, let me scream and wail, if necessary, and get it all out of my system!!!

My poor, dear, gentle and loving husband looked at me and said "I'd defend you against all odds if I had to. I can cope with your stress-induced tantrums and haul you back, forcibly, into line and I can cope with you having a bit of a cry. But when you start to sob as if you heart is breaking, I feel as if someone is reaching inside me and twisting my gut.  I just can't hurt you like that, Ami, it's just something I am not able to do."

By this time I was sobbing quietly, and his eyes were full of tears.

"But you see, I trust you.  I trust you to take care of me and to spank me as you see fit.  You don't need to ask.  You can just make the decision."

"I know all that.  But you seem to be needing it more and more.  And harder and harder.  Do you realise I spanked you over a hundred times just with my hand? It's hurting me, so your bottom must be hurting you!"

I had never realised he ever counted.

"That's the main reason why I ask you if you've had enough.  I can feel the heat coming off your bottom enough to fry eggs. I just can't do this every day, or every other day.  It's just too much.  Please don't ask that of me."

"I wouldn't.  But sometimes I need it more than others.  We were doing so well before Christmas. The stress of everything, including you not yet having your biopsy results, just got to me and made me spiral."

"Then you should've explained.  You accuse me of not talking to you, but half the time you don't explain things to me."

"You don't have to give me long sessions you know.  Five minutes would be fine."

"Ami, five minutes, at a spank a second would be 300 spanks.  That's just crazy."

"Well, a minute and a half then.  Or even just 20 or 30 good ones."

I broke into a grin.  I began to see the funny side and Dan chuckled. "Your bottom feels so much softer and smoother than it used to, but I think it is turning into rhino hide!  I don't think you feel it half of the time. Not any more."

(Rhino hide!!!!!!)

"I do feel it!" How to explain? "But mostly I seem to enjoy it. And even if I don't enjoy it at the time, like the pain when you really lay them on, I enjoy it afterwards."

"Oh."

I frowned. "I think I must be getting addicted. I just can't go back.  I feel such a closeness.  Just look at us.  At how we have changed, especially towards each other.  I don't even bruise any more," I added shyly.

"So what do we do?" I asked him. "If I tell you to stop, it doesn't necessarily mean I want you to stop. Even if I was shrieking stop, I might only be thinking it and not really wanting it."

"But I can't always work out when you've had enough. I can't always read the signs. You say that you relax and let go, but how can I be sure of knowing that?  I need you to tell me things.  I need you to tell me if I am stopping too soon.  I need you to tell me if I have gone on too long."

"Now,"he pointed to his lap, "Come back here."

So I went and crawled back over his lap.  He rubbed my bottom, and then he started over, this time with the leather paddle.

I relaxed into it straight away, and as he spanked the tears came.  I told him how sorry I was for everything, and dissolved into sobs.  I felt him slow, and the spanks grew lighter, but this time he didn't stop.  He was waiting for me.  I didn't have the heart to let him keep going.  "Stop" I told him.  And he did at once.

I crawled up and buried my head under his chin and let myself cry for a bit.

"You know.  We could have had this discussion a bit earlier and avoided all the dramatics," he told me.

"I thought we had had this discussion lots of times. I always ask you to talk to me when you are spanking."

"I know.  But I find it very difficult, especially to concentrate."  He was thinking, then he said "You asked me to do this, you know.  It wasn't as if I was looking for faults in my wife."

There was lots more discussion.  We didn't make love. It was so late we had to get up. But I was back in my happy place once more.

We had a wonderful day, and even snuggled up together on the sofa yet again, much to our son's apparent embarrassment.  As Dan says, whilst our daughter is modern-minded, our son still believes in immaculate conception.

Myself?  I am glad this happened. Perhaps it's not quite like I would've wished it to be, but maybe we can work on it. After all, it has to be for him, not just for me. I need to concentrate more on we instead of I.

I know it all sounds convoluted and mixed up. But it's sometimes very hard to open yourself up to your real feelings. And still harder to share.

I hope that when the next spanking comes along we will be able to continue with our conversation. This is not some elaborate game, we are not playing at scenes, this is our real life, and another bend has been negotiated and another layer of the onion peeled way.

Sometimes when you open up to each other, you discover that you both need to make adjustments, that you can't just expect complete compliance.  You need to be flexible, to be prepared to make small changes to the prototype.  

Yet then you discover you are more malleable than you had realised, and you become like the pieces of a jigsaw, fitting together where you had not at first thought possible.

All this does not, of course, mean that all the lumps and bumps are ironed out and the road is straight, smooth and uninterrupted right to the horizon.  I dare say I shall continue have lesser moments and Dan will continue to address them.

So, tell me, what types of conversations do you have whilst negotiating a spanking?  Are they useful?  Do you profit by them? Are they of the one-sided, "I expect you to do this and if you don't I shall paddle your ass even harder next time." variety? Or are they "This is how I see the situation, so what can we do to avoid its recurrence?" type of conversation?  Or do you feel your husband, having the upper hand at the time, just drones on and on and you eventually lose all feeling not just in your butt but in your brain as well?  Be honest.  It's a difficult thing to admit to if him talking isn't doing anything for you.  I just hope our conversations are going to be rather different in the future.