La Phalene

Christmas is rapidly approaching- hard to believe it’s the 13th already, with a scant few more days to ship gifts. I’ve sent of Christmas cards, to various people, including my Swedish friend (two US stamps = international mail, according to Canada post), and figured out what to send to my mother and to one of my sisters. That leaves three siblings, mothboy, mothboy’s mother, Charisma and probably someone else who’ll occur to me at the last minute.

I’ve taken some anti-biotics for my sinusitis, and it’s hard to tell if they’re working. My cough is less intense, but the other symptoms continue, leaving me all miserable and bubbly in the head. On the plus side, I got mothboy to go over the organization of my paper of doom, so it’s more swollen in length now. AND the prof says my sick note is acceptable. So high spirits and a stack of books from a lovely little secondhand bookstore make me a very happy moth.

So Mothboy and I got back together, and we’ve been co-habiting more or less accidentaly in a 1.5. To deal with the awkwardness of living together, he pays for groceries while I maintain my single tenant status. If we continue in this fashion any longer it’s going to involve getting a larger place.

Yesterday, chronic sinusitis made me miss my exam. Today I have colliwobbles from the anti-biotics, but I’m less stuffy and I can breathe again. Actually I was having ’splah!’ style panic on top of my bacterial infection, which was compounding the problem. So Dr. T let me out of my exam (which I didn’t want to miss, but I was wheezing like it was going out of style), and now I need to talk to Dr. S about this, sort out my defered/supplemental exam, figure out what to do about the major paper fail, and study for the next exam tomorrow.

Did I mention that there’s a lovely snowfall blanketing the city and I’m wearing my boyfriend’s thermal wool socks while her writes his thesis in bed?

Somehow I can’t muster the energy to freak out anymore.

My tuition bill came the other day and I can either pay for rent or school unless the gods provide, I’m nowhere near done my essay that’s due on Monday, I have a social obligation in a few hours it’s too late to flake on and I have two exams breathing down my neck. YOW!

Nobody told me that I’d reach 23 with very little in the way of marketable skills, no direction in life and complete disgust and despair about my planned degree. It all seemed to simple as a ten year old. I would be a scientist in a lab coat studying fish. These days, 4 years into poli sci/psych, loathing both, unemployed and living on the charity of others, I haven’t the foggiest notion how I’ll handle next term. Hell, next week is such a bloody debacle that I’m tempted just to curse the skies and quit, so I can go down in flames instead of ignomy.

I’m trying to write an essay on the role of external influences on Kuwait’s willingness to democratize at a faster rate than Saudi Arabia. I have a mountain of sources to support my claim and about 1K out of 4K words written. It’s due on Monday, with my soft deadline tonight, so I can free the weekend up for my exam studies and a holiday tea with LittleNell

Instead I’m going to procrastinate in the fine old tradition of not being able to focus, so applying my attentions elsewhere. Actually I think I need to get suited up against the winter cold and shlep out to the library to find a reliable source book on the history of Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, but I’m going to talk about the issue of being outed.

Not everyone in the world is inclined to agree with my orientation, but I’m blessed with an understanding (kinked) family. I’m sure my blisteringly normal grandparents would be horrified, and my psychiatrist is making little notes that I’m not to be trusted with children or sharp objects, but at this point in my life I’ve reached the sad realization that I’m never going to hold serious political office, which somewhat liberates my writing.

I have some core beliefs about being out- violent S&M should not take place in any old public place, but be reserved for the sort of enviroments where other sexual activities are acceptable, leading folks around on a leash in the park is borderline and probably in bad taste, and if an employer descriminates against you for kink, they should be sued into the ground under the same protection the charter currently grants to homosexuals.

On the other hand, my partner does not want to be ‘out’. I always use psudeonyms in my blog or forums, but I ramble on and on about the mundane in betwixt talking about kink, so a reasonably savy detective could link up my various online identities with me, and probably dig out a face picture to boot. In my case, I’m not exactly sure what use that information would be, except maybe if you were a psychotic stabby stalker, in which case I’m probably doomed anyway.

But to Mothboy, this is inclined to make him twitch because he doesn’t want it known that he’s involved with the kink scene because the place is full of prostitutes. I already mentioned how upsetting it was that I was rubbing elbows with a lifestyle choice I didn’t agree with, but employers tend to look down on things of borderline legality. Frankly pro-dommes seem like one of the less exploitive ways that one can trade in flesh, since the ones I know are all self managing freelancers, and the exploitive flesh peddlers tend to be mandoms pimping their subs as strippers. However, in his line of work he’s likely to never get the chance to explain.

But with an online persona that already makes it clear I’m pretty freaky, even before I met him (which he is aware of), I’m not sure to what extent I’m ethically required to tone down that I’m involved with making nice men cry. Should I create an alternative persona purely to publish my naughty stories under, for example? It’s a bit like locking the stable door after the horse has not only fled, but been resold, died of old age and the resulting pot of glue used up.