Delineation

I used to be a stickler for defining things.

I wanted boundaries of relationships outlined, I wanted to give people specific lines and know what their lines were. In between M and C (before C and I got married), when I was ‘dating’ dominants, I’d make sure they knew what I would and wouldn’t do for/with them before it went very far. I made some kind of weird huge deal about telling them that unless I had formally submitted to them, their dominance of me was limited to the bits and pieces I willingly gave them, not what they felt they could take from me.

Maybe it was just that particular time in my life – after an intense 4-year relationship, in which I played with all kinds of fiery things I’d never been interested in touching before – and it was out of fear that I made those rules.

Because while I do have lines and boundaries now, I find them to be much less strict, and I’m not so much ‘in need’ of having things defined to the nth degree before I’ll take a small step toward something.

Over the last year or so, since I truly opened myself up to the possibility of a new relationship, I’ve tentatively given up a little piece of my will here or there to someone I was conversing with and trusted. Not often. And not a huge piece. But small pieces here or there, like dipping my toe into the ice-cold creek.

It’s not like there are a huge number of dominants I’ve corresponded with that have held my attention (or, to be fair, having held theirs) for long periods of time. I do have standards and I do have criteria that pretty much must be met before I’ll even agree to meet someone offline. So far, the list of people I’ve met offline is less than the number of fingers on one hand.

(If that makes me picky, good. It’s about time I was.)

But in relation to what I wrote yesterday, about subtlety and the art of being clear without being blunt, perhaps my ‘little pieces’ go unnoticed because I’m not as formal about things anymore.

A friend of mine and I had a discussion the other day about a behavior of mine that I think drives him a little bit nuts. I basically told him that if it bothered him that much, to tell me to stop doing it. I’d listen. I’d stop doing it. I can’t judge his reaction to that; I can’t guess how he took it, unless he either does it, or tells me he won’t do it, or doesn’t do it *chuckle – but I gave up a little piece because I felt safe in doing that. Did I make it clear enough? I don’t know. Time will tell I guess.

The difference between the time between M and C, and now - is that I do not require any formal declaration of *dun dun dun D/s! dun dun dun!* to open that door a little. Good, bad or indifferent, it’s just how I seem to be working these days. We’ll see how it works out for me in the long run.