and the editor of the local pervy newsletter asked me to contribute a few articles. I understand that they are basically always desperate for content. I tried to refine some of the stuff I have been thinking about lately. I haven’t edited this yet.

Identity is a concept that I spend a great deal of time thinking about. I ponder the relations between being heterosexual or bisexual, and monogamous or polyamorous, and I certainly wonder about what it really means to be “in the scene.” To clarify: by the standards I see demonstrated at munches I have been in the scene for five years now. My issue is that this is the standard I have learned at munches and I have no idea if it is the proper standard whatsoever. Let me explain.
My discovery of the scene was rather smooth and easy. One night in May or June of 2000 I was hanging out in some random chatroom, I believe it was on match.com, and the room was engaging in that particular bit of idiocy that only people with no life can engage in. We were playing truth or dare. Can anyone explain the logic of this to me? Even at the time I was shaking my head at the stupidity of playing it online where really the only option was truth because no one would be able to see or prove that you had completed a dare. Anyway, someone asked me what my deepest, darkest fantasy was and I told them some lovely little story about being kidnapped and single tailed until blood ran down my back and then being brutally raped. This is still one of my favorite wank fantasies. One fellow in the room private messaged me and told me to go find the book SM101. Yes, Jay Wiseman provided my early education in the scene; it is funny that I now know him. This fellow became my sort of “on-line master” and to this day I cringe to admit that I went through such an idiotic experience. He had me do tasks for him (he lived in Southern California) such as going to PE, and buying clothespins and I ran up one hell of a phone bill that month. He drove up here and we spent an afternoon talking. Two weeks later I drove down there and we were supposed to spend the evening playing. Instead I absolutely freaked out and immediately drove home after the bath he gave me. This was far too Daddy/daughter for me. (He was in his late forties and I was a whopping eighteen.) I have never heard from him again, but I will always be grateful that he told me about this book and that I went on to find munches, classes, and the scene at large.
I showed up at munches all over the bay area in late July/early August and I went back to PE on my own after hastily purchasing my first attempt at fetish wear from that beacon of teen rebellion, Hot Topic. I experienced my first beating from a wonderful girl at PE the night before Dore Alley; I still run into her from time to time and she does not remember me. I was invited to a private party at my second munch. I was also invited to join Frenzi. I picked up a boy at that munch and we spent the next few days playing and getting to know one another. He escorted me to that private play party. At that play party the lot of us were cavorting and enjoying the lovely pool and in walked one of the cutest boys I have ever seen. He had one nipple piercing which was totally at odds with his otherwise sweet and demure presentation. He was hotness personified and I instantly knew that I wanted him. During the course of this party I essentially ditched my date and the hot boy ended up pulling my hair while I moaned on the floor between his legs. I had no idea that he was a rope god or that I was in fact going to spend the next four years of my life so in love with him that it hurts to think about.
With the boy I went to munches and parties and national conferences. He taught classes, and I learned how to teach classes. I learned how to top from him and with him and I ended up topping him more than anyone else. (This was a big difference from my initial refusal to top at all.) We explored M/s and I was under contract as his slave for two years. The relationship had amazing high points and very sad low points. Ultimately we discovered that it didn’t matter how much we loved one another, sometimes people just aren’t a match.
As we moved towards breaking up and after we eventually went through with it I pretty much disappeared from the scene. I maintained friendships with a few people but I stopped going to munches and I didn’t go to a play party for a long time. I dated people who were more or less vanilla and tried to convert them. I tried playing privately with newbies and discovered my complete and utter frustration in having to teach someone how to top and be dominant when they refused to go to classes or associate with people in the scene. After quite a bit of time went by I started going to sex parties with a bdsm flavor again. Then I even ventured to a play party. I have gone to a handful of munches again. I went to Debaucherama on New Years Even and saw a very hot boy and totally mocked his outfit. Weeks later he started flirting with me on tribe.net. (I suppose I am a true example of my generation; all good things from the internet come.) And now months later I am happily living with a pervert again and seeing if maybe this time we might be a better fit. I am hopeful.
So that is my story. I fit the definition of being in the scene as per the definitions I have always heard at munches and I very much did my scene growing up in the munch culture. I went to Castlebar and the Scenery and now I like the Citadel. I missed Differences and the old Castlebar though—I was too young. I went to Fandango’s and Dark Knights and other occasional parties. I did not go to BaGG or any of the other clubs. I learned to scorn those people who mixed drinking and play. I am the first to admit that I have been a rather atrocious snob about people who do not fit into the generic category of being in the scene the same way I have been. In addition to what does it mean to be in the scene I have also wondered what it really means to be a pervert. See, I have spent a lot of time in the past almost two years getting to know people who play exclusively privately. They may take the occasional class, but most of them have zero interest in munches or in playing publicly. In my arrogance and condescension I have told people that they aren’t really in the scene if they have never been to a munch or a play party—they might be kinky, but they aren’t “in the scene.”
Then one of them asked me if since I haven’t really gone to scene events in a long time, does that mean I am no longer in the scene? Stop. Wait… I don’t know. No way! I could never lose my status of being in the scene! Big names in the scene all across the country know me; I have even played with many of them. I have had people 3,000 miles away talk about scenes I have done at con’s. I am asked to teach classes. There is no way that I can ever lose my status in the scene… can I? But lately when I show up at munches and events there are a few people who remember me, but mostly… I don’t know people. I once again have to deal with the new het male doms who want to lecture me on my behavior and have not yet experienced the wondrous sweetness that is my response to being told that I am not behaving like a true submissive. So maybe I am not really in the scene anymore. Or maybe I have Another Fucking Opportunity For Growth and I need to stop being a condescending bitch. I am really upset about this possibility.
So think about it—what does being “in the scene” mean to you?

My audience is obviously a bunch of self-identified perverts.