Books

https://a.co/d/6V4QCQqWelcome to Full Cow, a podcast about leather and kink where your host, Edge (he/him), shares his 30+ years of experience in the community. In this episode we look at Leather / Kink / BDSM books—both fiction and nonfiction. There’s also an Ask Edge segment about monogamy.

Here are some links from this episode:

• Carney, William. The Real Thing. 1968.
• Townsend, Larry. The Leatherman’s Handbook II. 1995.
• Preston, John. Mr. Benson. 1980.
• Mains, Geoff. Urban Aboriginals. 1984.
• Califia, Patrick. Macho Sluts. 1988.
• Thompson, Mark.

Chapters

• 0:30 Exploring Leather and BDSM Books
• 15:13 Exploring Erotic Fiction and Polyamory
• 29:09 Navigating Monogamy in Leather Community

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:30

Let's talk about books that you are an adult. Welcome to Full Cow, a podcast about leather, kink and BDSM. My name is Edge, my pronouns are he, him, and I am your host. In this episode we're thinking about books about leather and BDSM, with a focus on gay leather BDSM, primarily because that's where my experience and my reading has been. You know, before we had podcasts and blogs and YouTube videos and TikTok videos and all of that. The community transmitted a lot of knowledge through writing, through books, and we're going to think about some of the most important books about this topic, things that you may want to read and explore, or at least things you may want to have heard of, so that you can fill out your knowledge of the history of our community as a way of deepening your presence in it. We're also going to have a question for the Ask Edge segment and I'm kind of excited about this episode, so let's give it a go. Some of the books I'm going to be discussing I have read, some I have not, but I know and trust and I'm hoping that some of you will consider reading some of these. I know actually people who listen to podcasts or people who also listen to audiobooks in some of these. In fact, some of these are only available as audiobooks. I think one of the takeaways from today's episode is how much of our written history is going out of print. Some of these books you can't find anymore, and that's pretty sad right, but some of them you can. So let's start at the very beginning. Very good place to start.

Speaker 1: 2:26

The first book I would recommend is called the Real Thing by William Carney. This is a novel, but it is an epistolary novel, and what's really special about it is that it was published in 1968. 1968. That means before the Stonewall Riots, before the gay rights movement, back at a time when there would have been serious repercussions for being gay, let alone kinky. This is also an interesting novel because it's an epistolary novel, which means it is a series of letters where you kind of piece together what the other person wrote back, based on what the letter is saying. It's about a kinky leather man who is sort of educating his nephew, I believe. Don't quote me on that. Everyone is always wanting to know about the old guard. Well, guess what? If we're talking about the 1960s, we are still talking about the old guard, and what's really interesting about this novel are the parts that you recognize and that resonate and that are still present in the community, as well as the parts that seem different and foreign and are no longer part of the community and foreign and are no longer part of the community. The history of the novel, the history in the novel, is really actually more interesting than the novel itself.

Speaker 1: 3:51

This is really hard to find. It's mostly out of print. If you search used book sites, you're still going to be paying hundreds of dollars for this novel. But should you ever run across it, I recommend grabbing it because it is hard to find, and voraciously consuming it. I don't know if any libraries would have it. That's a good question. We should think about that. Check your local library, see if they can get a copy.

Speaker 1: 4:17

The second book is the first book I read that was connected to Leather, kink and BDSM. That is the Leatherman's Handbook. I read the Leatherman's Handbook 2, which was published in 1995, but the original was published in 1972 by Larry Townsend. This for me, the second edition, 1995,. It was this miraculous oasis of a resource, because at that point I was very, very early in my leather journey and I knew nothing. I knew nothing but suddenly I had this resource that included really practical sort of knowledge but also these sort of pornographic interludes. So it was a source of learning and a source of masturbatory pleasure to find the copy of the Leatherman's Handbook 2 listed on Amazon. It is listed at $2,640.56. If you go searching some of the used book websites you can find it a little cheaper, but I don't have my copy anymore. I deeply regret that I no longer have my copy. I have heard of a couple people who have copies. If you can find this, you absolutely must grab it as a beautiful historical document and as something both practical and deeply erotic. Ps, if you haven't noticed yet and you will pick up on this, I'm just sort of going in chronological order so that we'll get a sense of what books came out and what they meant to us.

Speaker 1: 6:05

Speaking of books that mean something to us, the next one we're going to talk about is Mr Benson, which is a novel by John Preston. It is a romance novel of a slave finding his perfect master. Actually, it ends up being the perfect slave finding the perfect master and it follows the classic marriage plot. So in the 19th century, like great big Victorian novels, the marriage plot is man finds woman, man loses woman, man gets woman, or woman finds man, woman loses man, woman gets man. So not to give away the ending, but slave finds master, slave loses master, slave gets master.

Speaker 1: 6:57

What's interesting about this is the extraordinary popularity it had at the time. It was originally serialized in Drummer magazine, which was one of the core magazines of our community, and the story goes that men would be lining up at the newsstand to get the new issue of Drummer so they could read the next installment of the novel. It creates a kind of pattern that infiltrated our understanding of what kinky relationships should be in ways that are both good and bad. It's also so fascinating. You know, when I was coming out into leather in the 90s, I don't remember there being pups Like in my historical sense of my lived experience, pups were recently new phenomenon. Well, no, there's a pup in Mr Benson and that's from the very early 80s and you have to actually imagine he's writing it in the late 70s if it gets published in whole in 1980. Parts of it are just absolutely ludicrous because you know it's porn essentially. But the story was so compelling that I think in fact one of the books we're going to talk about later has a whole essay about how we're looking for Mr Benson.

Speaker 1: 8:17

The next book is a work of nonfiction and it's one of the first books to really philosophize or bring a thoughtful aspect to the community, and that is Jeff Mainz's book, urban Aboriginals. Now, this was published in 1984, and part of what it does is connects the leather community to tribal practices. Now, looking at this decades later, that's not entirely unproblematic if you think about the very white male nature of this community and the very colonialist impulse to appropriate tribal practices, tribal tropes. But it's important in its place in our history as an attempt, a published attempt, to help understand who we are, what we do, why we do what we do. So I recommend reading it. In fact I think it's still in print. I think it's pretty sure it's still in print. Oh, and I'm going to have links to Amazon for all of these books that at least give you a starting point. If you want to get the full title publication information, go digging for cheaper copies. You have a starting point. It's worth reading. I feel like if you really want to understand the history of our community, I mean definitely you've got to read Mr Benson, which is available as an audiobook, and definitely you have to read Urban Aboriginals.

Speaker 1: 9:42

The next book is a little unusual because it is Macho Sluts by Patrick Califia, who at the time was Pat Califia, and this is essentially a collection of lesbian SM fiction. However, there are two stories in it. One is called the Surprise Party and the other is called the Spoiler. The Spoiler is one of the best pieces of gay male erotic fiction I've ever read and it inspired a lot of my erotic fiction writing. The Surprise Party is hot period, the surprise party is hot period, h-o-t hot period and Califia is really able to tap into our psyche much. But there was this notion that SM was violence against women. It was a reinstantiation of patriarchy. We must reject all pornography. We must reject all SM practices and this is really speaking back to that in powerful ways and representing lesbian SM practices. So it's both important historically and important for our community in those two stories. I've read this book. I love this book. I've read the whole book. The stories are a little uneven, some of them are better than others, but the two stories the spoiler and surprise party are exquisite. It is a little hard to find but I do think you can find a used copy.

Speaker 1: 11:26

The next book is another nonfiction book and it is Leather Folk, radical Sex People, politics and Practice, and it's edited by Mark Thompson. It is an. This came out. I was super excited for this because of its visibility and its representational status. You're just existing as this scared little leather boy in New Orleans and then suddenly you go to the bookstore and there's a whole book that taps into this larger community that you don't currently have access to.

Speaker 1: 12:06

The essays are also a little uneven, but the one I recommend most is by Tom Magister and I forget the title of it. But the whole collection is broken down into sections, so there's one that sort of looks at spirituality, there's one that looks at politics, but there's one that looks at history. And the Tom Magister piece he is writing his experience of initiation into the old guard. Now again, everyone's like oh, old guard, this old guard that we love, the old guard. I want to know about the old guard. This is an actual chance to learn about the old guard and we don't have a lot of written records of the old guard. William Carney, the Real Thing out of print. Good luck. Tom Magister's essay in Leatherfolk in print. Give it a read.

Speaker 1: 13:00

The next book is from 1992. It's also a nonfiction book and it is SM 101, a Realistic Introduction by Jay Wiseman. I have never read this one but I certainly heard about it a lot and I would recommend it because I know Jay Wiseman is a reputable name and I know the book is reputable. Similarly, the next book from 1993, ties that Bind SM Leather, fetish, erotic Style Issues, commentaries and Advice. That's quite a title. We just call it Ties that Bind, 1993, guy Baldwin. I've not read this. However, guy Baldwin is an important leader At the time. Guy Baldwin was a very important leader in the community and he had really a lot of good things to say. So even though I haven't read this one, I know it's by someone reputable, someone important historically, and that I suspect it's a really good read.

Speaker 1: 13:56

I have read the next book, which is Leather Sex by Joseph Bean, published in 1994. Full title is Leather Sex A Guide for the Curious Outsider and the Serious Player. Joseph was also an important leader at that time in our community and this is the book I recommend as the introduction. So when I run across people and they're like, oh, I want to get into leather, oh, I recommend as the introduction. So when I run across people and they're like oh, I want to get into leather. Oh, I'm really curious. Oh, I need some resources If I find out that they're capable of reading, because not everyone has the sustained attention to read anymore. If they're capable of reading. I always, always, always recommend Leathersex. It is an excellent resource, still some 30 years later. It covers some really practical aspects of the scenes, but also a lot of information on the dynamics of a scene, and I probably say things all the time about dominance and submission that probably originally came from this book. That's how deeply it is embedded in my psyche. That probably originally came from this book. That's how deeply it is embedded in my psyche. Curiously, I don't think I read it in 1994, but I have read it since and I do recommend it all the time.

Speaker 1: 15:13

Now we're back to fiction with Carried Away, an SM romance by David Stein. This was originally published in 2002, and I think there's a second edition or a second printing. I should say that's a little more available, but the original is really hard to find. The first printing is really hard to find. I knew David Stein. He was part of my world when I lived in New Jersey. I was actually in a writing group with him. I spent a lot of time with him and his ex, who was my mentor. I built a website for David. He gave me a really exquisite piece of art. I was there when he was writing this and it took him so long to write this. Part of his goal was to correct Mr Benson this sort of fantasy notion of what an SM relationship would be, and he wanted to really work out what it would look like in real terms, while still being an erotic novel. It is big, it is thick and you don't even know he did so much revision on it that it was as though he had written the book eight times over. But you recommend it. If you're into erotic fiction, if you want a novel that really reflects us as a community and reflects a sense of what's possible, then I recommend that.

Speaker 1: 16:42

The next book again I haven't read, but is again by someone important, and actually I recommend this book a lot and that is called Slavecraft Roadmaps for Erotic Servitude. I'm pretty sure you know one of the things I tell the men, submissive men in my orbit all the time is that self-care is service, that when you are taking good care of your health, when you are sleeping enough, when you are eating enough, when you are putting your health mental, physical, spiritual health before me. That's a way of service. It is a service to me, because then you come to me to serve me as a more healthy whole person. I'm pretty sure this is a derivation of something that I think is in this book, slavecraft, and that is that rule number one is protect the property. So for Baldwin, the first rule of slavery is protect yourself as a slave, and that means taking care of yourself. That means knowing what your boundaries are, and all of that. I may be making all that up. I don't think I am. So you're more than welcome to check that out and to read Slavecraft the next book I haven't read, but I know people who have read it, and the reason I haven't read it is it came out in 2008. By then I kind of knew everything I needed to know, and it is the Leather Boy Handbook. This is the third edition is out now and it's by Vincent Andrews. I don't know a lot about this except to say that I've heard it enough to believe it is reputable and worth reading, so I would recommend it.

Speaker 1: 18:21

You know I did a lot of writing myself. If you've listened to the podcast extensively, then you've probably run across a couple of readings of some of my stories. I have collected all of those stories into an anthology that is published through Amazon in electronic format only. It's called the Stories of Edge. It's actually really hard to find if you just go searching by the title, so I'm going to include a link to that in the show notes, just if you're curious.

Speaker 1: 18:53

When I write I haven't written in a long time because I ended up getting a life and a job and a career and relationships but when I was writing erotic fiction, oftentimes I was trying to work out a problem in my head around dominant submission, kink relationships, and always I was embedding historical and cultural information and knowledge. So if you read my stories and cultural information and knowledge, so if you read my stories, there's very specific references to certain bars or to certain events and there are very specific references not just to boots but to Huesca boots, not just to gloves but to Damascus gloves, so that they provide a kind of living history of experiences at that time, both the places I'd go and the gear I was wearing. Living history of experiences at that time, both the places I'd go and the gear I was wearing. So it's an interesting historical document, like many of these, in that it really encodes both cultural knowledge and historical geographical knowledge. Now, the last two I'll talk about aren't really about kink per se. They are both about polyamory. However, there's a lot of overlap between polyamory and our community and I suspect that these days a lot of people just sort of jump into polyamory. They wake up one day and they decide to be polyamorous without doing a lot of thoughtful, intentional work around polyamory, and I believe that for me it has worked better when I have done the thoughtful, intentional work around polyamory.

Speaker 1: 20:36

And there are two books I recommend for that. The first is sort of the classic, it's the Bible in some ways of polyamory. It came out a while ago. I don't have publication dates on these because they're outside my SM timeline. The first book is the Ethical Slut by Janet Easton. No, janet Hardy and Dossie Easton, it's not hard to find, just look for the Ethical Slut. There are no other books called the Ethical Slut. It's not hard to find, just look for the Ethical Slut. There are no other books called the Ethical Slut.

Speaker 1: 21:05

And I remember when I read it I was like, okay, well, a lot of this, if you're gay is just sort of automatic knowledge because so much of our community is really about sexual experiences. We are a sexual minority, so I didn't find it super revelatory. I did find some of the chapters. There's a part on jealousy which is really useful and it's sort of, again, you're building foundational knowledge, you're kind of going back into history to build that historical knowledge. And the second book I would recommend is, I think, even better, and that is polysecure. That is one word by Eve Rickert and Nora Samaran and this is sort of the updated version, updated approach to the ethical slut.

Speaker 1: 21:51

Polysecure. I think I mean all the great, all the A-list polyamorous are reading Polysecure. What Polysecure does is looks at polyamory through attachment theory which comes out of therapy, and in that I think it's super duper useful. It also provides a lot of useful vocabulary. It moves away from a hierarchical nature of polyamory, where you have a primary relationship and then secondary, and really embraces this notion of polycule, where there's a constellation of relationships. It also gives you good terminology, like solo, poly and metamor, and I've had a couple people read it who found it useful, not just because of the workaround attachment theory but because they've discovered oh wait, hey, as it turns out I'm solo poly. I'm not going to want that nesting partner, and that's been a revelation for them. So there's also a workbook.

Speaker 1: 22:51

I don't think the workbook is quite as useful. I started it and I'm like, oh, this is just not helping me. Maybe that had to do with my current experience with polyamory or how far I've made the journey, but if you're new to polyamory, if you're thinking about polyamory, if you've decided you're polyamorous, or if you're polyamorous but you've never really kind of figured out what exactly that means, I recommend those two books. As I'm recording this, I also realized there's a book that I forgot, so I'm going to take a short break and go find that book and then come back, so I'll be right back. Oh hey, I'm back. I finally found the book.

Speaker 1: 23:32

The book that I realized while I was talking about David Stein is that he did an edited collection called Ask the man who Owns Him the Real Lives of Gay Masters and Slaves, published in 2009 with David Stein and David Schachter. This is unfortunately out of print, at least on Amazon, but perhaps if you scour some of the used book websites, you will find it. The remarkable thing about this you know we carry all these fantasies of master-slave. This is a book that is a collection of interviews with actual masters and slaves and you get to see what it's like to live that, how do people who live that do it, and you get to see the sort of spectrum of dynamics involved for all these people who are masters and slaves in the real world 24-7. So if you can find that book, if that's a kind of, if you want a real 24-7 kink dynamic, I recommend reading that as well, and I don't have that on my bookshelf either, so I might have to hunt down a used copy myself.

Speaker 1: 24:41

This list is not at all exhaustive. What I did was went through my bookshelf first, thought about books I had read growing up into leather second, and did a little bit of searching on Amazon to make sure I wasn't missing anything. There are a lot of other books that you might look at, including books specifically about bondage. There's a book by Naughty Boys. There's Midori's Seductive Art of Japanese Bondage. The problem is bondage in particular is something better learned through video where you can see what they're doing. I learned shibari through Midori's book, and having to translate the written word into three-dimensional space was really really, really hard. So there are specific books about that. Josephine also has a book about flogging, if you wanted to read about that.

Speaker 1: 25:32

So there are a lot of other how-tos, but these are the ones I've encountered on my path. These are the ones I've heard of. These are the ones I feel are historically important. These are the ones I feel are historically important. These are the ones I feel are historically important. I'm going to end this segment by emphasizing that there is no book available that accurately looks at old guard protocols. So you may want to be wary of books about protocol, because I can actually guarantee you that available books on protocol are not historically accurate. They can be read as interesting pieces, but they are not historically accurate. That's all I'm going to say. I think you'll find that useful advice as you go book shopping.

Speaker 1: 26:38

If there are books you know of or you want to recommend, you're more than welcome to email them to me through ask at fullcowshow and I can share them in an interlude or a future segment as an update to this segment, and I hope you will consider reading some of these. Some of these will be hard to read because they're out of print. Some of these are not. Some of these are available as audiobooks. Some of them are not. I think if you're passionate about this community and its history, then you might also enjoy hunting down copies or trying to see if there are bootleg PDFs out there on the web, so that could be an interesting journey as well, and along the way, you might find websites that discuss other books that you might find useful in your journey.

Speaker 1: 27:23

For me, books were the thing. Books were what I had. I had books, I had magazines and I had the people around me, and they all served me very well. And even though we've moved into this digital era where more information is available in more ways in more places at any time, even though we live in that digital era, I think it's worth picking up a book sometime if you really want to ground yourself in this community. Not a requirement. You can be a leather person, whether or not you've read any of this, without a doubt, but I think it adds something when you know who came before you and what they did to get here and what they've contributed and how. That is your inheritance and how things you do, places you go, are reflecting practices that took place sometimes decades ago. But yeah, that's me. I hope you enjoyed the book discussion at least. And yeah, thanks.

Speaker 1: 28:33

And now we have Ask Edge, the segment where I answer questions from all of you. If you have a question, you can send it to me at ask at full cow dot show. That's ask at full cow dot show. Or, even better, you can leave me a voicemail at speakpipecom slash leather edge. L-t-h-r-e-d-g-e. That's speakpipecom slash leatheredge. L-t-h-r-e-d-g-e. That's speakpipecom slash leatheredge. Those links are available in the show notes. And for this episode we have one question from Leonard Hi Edge.

Speaker 1: 29:09

I was wondering if you have any tips or practices to get into the leather slash kink scene. My partner and I would like to get more into the local scene but are finding it difficult. We are a monogamous couple and it seems that all events and spaces are more welcoming to poly people. What are some ways we can get involved and participate while still keeping the integrity of our relationship? What an excellent question, and let me start by saying that monogamy is a valid relationship choice, as is polyamory, that one does not take away from the other, and I think you're absolutely right that as a community we are far more inclined to polyamory, to creating spaces for polyamorous people and for being poly ourselves.

Speaker 1: 29:57

There is a sense, particularly in bar spaces and some event spaces, where everyone's available. Any man you look at, any person you look at, is available for your sexual desires. You just need to seduce them, right? Not true? Not true? The answer to your dilemma depends, in part, on where you're located. Some local scenes have more depth and more possibilities than others. However, here are and this is obviously a problem because we are a sexual community and that means we have a blurred line between the community aspect and the sexual aspect. And being able to move yourself more firmly into community and away from the sexual aspect while still being leather people can be a little challenging. I'll also say, before I get into the answer you're not alone. I had a question from someone in the Atlanta area a while ago, but they were also monogamous, so you're not alone.

Speaker 1: 31:09

The trick is going to be finding others like you. So the first tip I would give you, based on your local scene, is to move away from sexual spaces to social spaces. So here in Fort Lauderdale, for example, we have a lot of sex clubs, we have a couple of sex parties and we have two leather bars. All of those are going to be sexual spaces, but we also have something called the leather family social dinner, which is purely a social space. We have classes taught by Leatherworks, which is purely a social space. We have a leather cocktail party that rotates around couples and their houses. That is purely a social space. So you want to be able to look for places where the sexual is not foregrounded, so places where there's likely to be less cruising. The second tip is related to that, and that is, if those spaces don't exist, you can create them. You can host a leather dinner party for local couples who you identify are monogamous or likely to respect your monogamy. That's what I will say and then that can become something that grows and creates this sort of community around you that creates connection for you and around you. So the first tip is look for social spaces, not sexual spaces. The second tip is, if there are no social spaces, make them. And then the third tip is events. Now you said that the local events are more welcoming to poly people.

Speaker 1: 32:51

I would recommend some of the national events, which I think for me are less sexual. If you think about something like IML, I've always said IML is what you make it. So if you go to IML looking for sex, you can have all the sex you want. If you go there looking to dance, you can have all the dancing you want. If you go there looking for social connection, that's what you can have. I rarely, if ever, function that's what you can have. I rarely, if ever, play at events. But what I do is make intentional plans with people I want to meet and spend time with, and that's dinners, lunches, breakfast, coffee. Let's go shopping together so you can control what the event is for you. And these are national events and that means broader base of possibilities because so many people are attending.

Speaker 1: 33:40

As a corollary to that, one event that I might recommend is Claw. Claw has two flavors. There's the classic Claw, which is in April in Cleveland, and then there's the new Claw, which has so many different names Leather Getaway, I think they're calling it Leather Thanksgiving right now. We still just call it LA Claw. It's in Los Angeles and it's over Thanksgiving.

Speaker 1: 34:07

The thing about the claws is that they are heavily focused on education. That means two things. First of all, it means that you can go to these classes that are not even if they're about sexual topics they're not actually about having sex in the class right, they are more social educational spaces versus in LA, the giant 3000 square foot dark room, which is clearly a sexual space. The other thing is Claw's always looking for educators and all you need to do is email them and say, hey, I would like to do a class on monogamy and kink, and they'd probably be really eager for that, because they're usually looking for presenters. It's probably a topic no one has ever presented and if you present, you get a free registration. Now you may not feel like you're qualified to teach, but if you think of it more as a panel discussion or around the room discussion or presenting your experiences, what you're going to do is you're going to draw people who are dealing with monogamy and kink, and that means you're going to draw friends to you. They will come to you, and maybe it's only one person whose husband is at home, maybe it's a couple of couples, but that becomes the start of creating social networks that are not sexual.

Speaker 1: 35:26

The only other general piece of advice and I'm sure you've already tried this is to be explicit about the boundaries of your relationship and ask people to respect them. Again, I've said that if we're in sexual spaces, we tend to assume every person there is available to us if we have the right goods, and sometimes we need to be told that, no, some people are not available to us, and there are analogs to this in master-slave. There's no expectation that if someone is locked in a collar with someone on a leash, there's no expectation that they are sexually available to you. So as part of that, you may also consider, depending on the specific dynamics of your relationship, if there's a way for one of you to wear the other person's collar. That is a way of broadly signaling no, do not touch. Now, that requires a certain kind of literacy in the community. I don't know if that's available by you.

Speaker 1: 36:26

Certainly, collars and their meanings have been diversified lately, shall we say. Some people just wear a collar because they want to wear a collar. Diversified lately, shall we say, Some people just wear a collar because they want to wear a collar. But classically I think it would have been a way of saying do not touch. And in certain spaces it will remain a way of saying do not touch, which is a way of setting boundaries from the outset, and I feel like a collar is like a wedding ring. I don't just go around throwing collars on people. Okay, yeah, I do some play collars, but I'm not collaring someone unless that's the equivalent to marriage for me. That's the level of commitment and therefore it might be a way of signaling. Now, it may not actually reflect the dynamics of your relationship and therefore it may feel a little dishonest, so you may not want to do it. However, it is another option for you.

Speaker 1: 37:27

Ultimately, I think that as a community, we have so much we need to look at so often Our acceptance of trans people, issues of equity and inclusion of BIPOC people and part of that which is probably going to be a little far down the line, frankly, because it's a minority, minority Part of it is. We need to look at the kind of bias we have against monogamy, and you are in a position to start creating that conversation by being who you are in spaces. Oh goodness. Another idea you know I don't know if you know about FetLife, f-e-t-l-i-f-ecom. I think of it as sort of like kinky Facebook. It is filled with all sexualities, which means you'll find a lot of heterosexuals there. You'll find some homosexuals there, you'll find pansexuals. You'll find a little bit of everything on FetLife.

Speaker 1: 38:19

That might be another place where you can begin to look for community, because it's very sort of discussion board paced and you could probably find some discussion of monogamy or start a discussion of monogamy, because it's great to say, be at the local leather bar and have people not be hitting on you. That is ideal. But I think what's more important is to locate sources of connection that make you feel seen and valued as members of the community and that are places of support and comfort as you face challenges to your monogamy from the community. And so a lot of times that can happen more virtually through things like FetLife, or it can happen more irregularly through things like going to an event once a year. Of all those options, I mean, the one I really want to promote for you is proposing a class on monogamy and kink at CLAW. I think it would be fantastic and it'd be really interesting to see who showed up and also what kind of response you got. I don't think you'd get people who were hostile, but that would be curious. I don't know if that makes it sound like a horrible experience for you, but I think it'd be good class. I think it'd be really important and educational. So please consider it. And then the other thing I'd really think about is really starting your own damn community and having people over for dinner in gear, or over for drinks in gear, or over to watch TV in gear People who you think already know and respect the boundaries of your relationship as a way of starting an alternate sub-community that is strongly separated from sexual spaces with a focus on the social.

Speaker 1: 40:07

Thank you for the question. I want to encourage everyone to please, please, please, send questions. They help me really make this podcast better on so many dimensions. And that's it for this episode. I'm so grateful that all of you have given me some 40-odd minutes of your time out of your day and I hope your journey is going really well Because, lord knows, it can be tough. That's what this question is about. Right, this journey is tough. It is tough and I know that, and it pains me because my journey's been pretty easy. So I'm hoping your journey, even if it's challenging, is really really good. And that's it for this episode. Thank you so much for joining me. Please consider subscribing or you can send feedback to edge at full cow dot show, as always. May your leather journey be blessed.