Militant Homosexual Dress

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Militant homosexual dress: made for the Portland, Oregon Dyke March, summer 2005, bias cut, floor length, one shoulder, camouflage print dress (held up with a bra and extra elastic from left armpit, around the back to right shoulder replacing the missing bra strap). Mixed media (printed cotton canvas, safety pins, green bra, extra elastic).

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Dyke marches are about lesbian visibility, about showing that we actually exist (and there are enough of us to stop traffic), that we vary greatly, and that we’re a community. But dyke marches don’t actually seem to vary that much. Even in Chicago, they are mostly white, and every one I have been to has been mostly young; they are often not so much about community as cliquey-ness. That is, there is a group of organizers and a lot of their friends and the rest are on the periphery. It seems that most of the non-white lesbians show up for the main event, Pride, rather than the small, day-before side show that is the dyke march. Part of that is that pride parades have an older organizational strategy (developed over many years to accommodate increasingly diverse notions of queerness) where in order to insure that people from various communities show up, they invite representatives from those communities to be on the organizational committee. Dyke marches seem to rely on the organizational structure of new media. Namely, put an idea out there on the internet and it will spread on its own (though it is a distinct possibility that the information IS spreading to everyone the organizers have envisioned it spreading to already).

Overall verdict from the dyke march: this dress didn’t work. It’s unclear whether it just didn’t read, was too femmy, not punk rock enough, etc. The net effect was no one talked to us the whole afternoon, which felt odd. It’s highly anomalous for me to walk around wearing something I’ve made and not receive comments from strangers — in any city, on any day, let alone when marching alongside folks, when people usually want to talk. At the Portland Dyke March, the connected dykes in dresses wore cocktail dresses and combat boots, something I’ve worn since — yes — some of them were in baby shoes.

One day in Chicago, on the #55 through the south side (I was on my way to Noah’s house!) I sat behind a pair of U of C babydykes, who were talking in code about one of them going on testostorone (as an early stage of a f to m gender transition) — and they were probably using needles that a friend of mine supplied. Yet there was no nod in my direction, as would have been subculturally …. had they recognized me as anything other than het (or perhaps, other than femme). The person who did talk to me was an older African-American gentleman wearing a very nice fedora who complimented me on my hat (a grey fur-felt trilby). We all miss and catch opportunities to create minor, temporary super-communities via such conversational practices for using clothing (and other corporeal media – hair, piercings, etc.) to simultaneously acknowledge and yet work across difference.

Dyke marches bill themselves as a new lesbian consciousness, a deliberate attempt to get away from Michigan Women’s Music Festival style, folk rock scenes which (in addition to bad taste in music) purposefully excluded/exclude transgendered lesbians. This transformation is laudable (and I’m often both on its side and included by it). What’s going on is not a case of people simply wanting to hang out with their friends: it’s something broader, a political vision. Yet the actual effect is to represent a gay sub-utopia that (unlike hip-hop, for example) doesn’t acknowledge its basis in specific social circles.

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This is part of the Gay Utopia project, originally published in 2007. A map of the Gay Utopia is here.

Do Tibetans Think Iran Is In the Middle East?: Or, From What Direction Is This Utopia Gay?

This is part of the Gay Utopia project, originally published in 2007. A map of the Gay Utopia is here.
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Hey Noah. Your symposium’s topic is timely and intriguing. But one thing troubles me: why the heck is it called gay utopia? Since it doesn’t belong as a utopian project to gay men, nor is same-sex orientation, male or female, what’s at the center of its content. Rather, the title’s resonance depends on the recent schoolboy sense of “gay” as embarrassing, not-quite-right, etc., and more generally on how gayness functions as a put-down in milieux in which you and Bert enjoy playing and ventriloquizing.

If I choose not to enter this frame, your gayness reads not as self-mocking utopian aspiration but as misguided minstrelsy, a
topsy-turvy misunderstanding of a world actual people are building. Let me illustrate.Last Thursday, Rebecca and I went to see Dan Savage speak at Reed. He talked for a while about how gay folks need to have less sex than they can (because 1970s-level germ-swapping isn’t “biologically sustainable”), how he doesn’t go down on men in airport bathrooms (other than his boyfriend) because he has too much self-respect, and how he’d like to instill in his fellow gay men a healthy sense of cooties. And in this regard he positions himself as a reformer, I’ll grant you, rather than as speaking for his fellow gay men. But he also talked about how when he first moved to Seattle he had 5 lesbian friends, of whom 3 are now married to men, and 2 are men; and how this simply doesn’t happen to his gay male friends.

(He then went on to say that he thinks this is a result of human genetic evolution –- you may be able to get Rebecca to write down for your blog a rant (with many chunks of anthropology) about why this is a dumb theory, if that’s something you’re interested in.)

Anyway, the point is, calling what you’re talking about “gay utopia” rather than “bi-trans-androgynous free-love utopia” (or just “bi utopia”, if it’s brevity you’re after) comes off as rather naively bigoted, because it suggests that the only way to have a gay utopia is for people to have more hip, postmodern flexibility & freedom in their sexuality — as if there weren’t folks whose set-in-stone identity is gay, or stone butch, or what have you.

And that’s surely not what you meant, nor want to promote more of in the blogosphere.

A minor note: in your message you use as examples of “gay utopia” Susie Bright and The Left Hand of Darkness. Whereas plenty of Bright’s buy-more-vibrators cheerleading encourages us to think of ourselves as living in a pomo consumer paradise, Ursula K. Le Guin’s The Left Hand of Darkness is not a sexuality-is-freedom utopia, nor a gay utopia (hello, all the sex is het sex!), nor the sort of utopia that exists only as a hermetically sealed elsewhere, rather than being imbricated in explicit, politically problematic links to the author’s society. I actually found the book really confusing and disconcerting the first time I read it, because of how much it violated my philistine genre expectations. What made the book make sense to me was M. Suzanne Menair explaining it’s a tragic love story. And the tragic androgynous hero certainly isn’t shown experiencing sexuality as freedom when he gets trapped during his change with a manipulative politician, nor for that matter with the human explorer. Your invitation mentions you “find any utopian project a little ridiculous”; but I reckon utopian projects are truly ridiculous insofar as they seek to hop into an elsewhere and pull up the rabbithole behind them, or think change will bring us into a socially unmediated world, where good intentions map transparently into good results, etc. — and am glad to know Kroeber’s daughter was smarter than that.

Cheers,
Anne

PS: Yes, actually, Tibetan monks who find themselves living in exile in northern India do speak of “the Middle East”. The sun never sets on the British Empire!

Friendly Advice

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This is part of the Gay Utopia project, originally published in 2007. It is reprinted by permission of EyeofSerpent, and may not be reproduced. A map of the Gay Utopia is here.

This is erotic fiction and NSFW in any way, so be warned.
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Corelle D’Amber walked into my office without fanfare and I returned her firm handshake. Quick observations; she was average height with auburn hair that saw more sunshine than I expected, she seemed mid-thirties, but I knew she was ten years older than that, and she really knew how to dress. Suede pumps, silver bracelets that matched the design of her earrings, and a white carnation in her lapel. She was sporting a very nice charcoal suit with a tiny pearlescent pinstripe. The patch over her eye was exactly the same material as her suit, even to the extent that the pinstripe was neatly aligned with her jacket.

I put aside the instant recognition of a personality obsessed with detail. I was hoping for Ms. D’Amber’s help with this case. I just wouldn’t have time to get to know the woman that Forbes magazine called “the most successful entrepreneur since Edison.” She was a millionaire by thirty, a billionaire now. She could afford to indulge her own tastes.

I gestured, “Please take a seat, Ms. D’Amber. I’m so glad you could fit me into your schedule.”

“Thank you, doctor. When we spoke on the phone, you suggested that Mrs. Roth would sincerely benefit from my meeting with you to discuss her case.” She eased herself into the maroon leather chair.

To put her at ease, I sat in the twin to it rather than behind my desk. This was a woman who knew most business interaction from every angle. I didn’t make the mistake of thinking that establishing trust with her would be a matter of quickly pushing the right buttons. Just getting her here was a plus. “Ms. D’Amber, how much do you know about Alice’s situation?”

She didn’t bat an eye, “I’ve worked with her husband, Bill for nearly six months. I’ve met Alice many times on my trips into town. We’ve even gone to dinner together. I don’t know anything about why she’s seeing a psychiatrist. I’d be surprised if you were going to tell me. Client privacy and all that?”

Sharp. “Yes,” I smiled, “but Alice has also been to see two other psychiatrists by court order. I’m not sure what the court will do if a third one throws up their hands on her case. I’m hoping for some good news.”

That got her attention. I could see natural curiosity working away beneath her surprise; “No one has said anything to me. Bill never mentioned this. What crime has she committed?”

“Public indecency. Multiple counts. It’s not a serious crime, but the judge asked for a psychiatric review.” I watched her for a reaction. Most women were actually very conservative about things like this. Women who ‘broke the rules’ were first scorned by other women.

“Alice? Hard to believe. There must be some mistake.” She shook her head.

Good. At least she wasn’t blaming Alice. Now for the hard part. “No. There is no mistake. Alice even admits to flashing in situations where she hasn’t been caught. Ms. D’Amber, I asked you here to help because I’m sure Alice wants to stop. I’ve gotten her interested in changing her behavior. Part of that change involves asking for you to help her.”

Now she did look wary, “Why me? Why not you, you obviously don’t approve of this behavior?”

I laughed gently, “No. Of course I don’t approve. This sort of degrading attention-driven behavior is a cry for help. Even Alice is very embarrassed by how far she has taken this. Her family and friends are aware there is a problem, if not how serious it is. Her husband is nearly beside himself with the stress. Alice has chosen you, I think, because you are a role model, someone of impeccable taste. Someone who is used to making decisions. Someone she knows is a respected woman.”

“I still don’t understand what help I could be.” She didn’t look pleased. Her face was showing all the signs of ‘discussion closed’. She had a nice straightforward face, not pretty, but she could afford to take care of herself and she obviously had a sense for what worked for her. Simple. Almost an inner elegance. Just this short meeting and I could see why Alice had fixed on Corelle D’Amber as the matriarchal figure who’s permission and forgiveness she needed in order to stop her increasingly degrading activities.

D’Amber was the closest thing I had found in Alice’s mental landscape to an icon of authority. I was getting nowhere by myself.

That still made it awkward to discuss with a stranger. My planned response to Alice’s need was unconventional and my credibility was in jeopardy if it became known that I was trying to get at Alice’s fixation by exposing her case to an outsider. After months, of treating her, it seemed to me that I could crack her resistance to taking my help if I could enlist D’Amber on my side.

Alice always spoke of the woman with intense admiration.

I tried to complete the picture for the financier, “You really have to do very little. For instance, if you could meet Alice here during one of our sessions and tell her that you and I have talked things over and that we are in agreement as to how to proceed. That would leave you out of any of the treatment and give me the mandate in her mind to allow access to her motivation. Of course, none of this would ever be discussed outside this office. Your part would be simply validating my expertise with Alice.” I crossed my fingers. Cracking Alice Roth’s case after two specialists had failed would be quite a coup.

“I don’t think so, Dr. Rand.” She shook her head.

Damn. What else could I say to get her to see this? I had tried to make it as easy as possible. “Alice will be disappointed.” I put plenty of emotion in my voice.

Suddenly, her chin came up. “I doubt that. To summarize what you are proposing; you’re acting for the court to try and normalize Alice’s behavior so that her husband and society can respect her once more. Yet her only crime is transforming her sexual privacy into public record. You want to do this by having me lie to her about my faith in your judgment. You don’t know me or my character, yet you’re willing to have me act as your leverage against your patient. You’ve hit an obstacle and rather than hard work, you’re looking for an easy answer and a quick fix from a complete stranger. Having tricked Alice into believing that I agree with the court, you’ll ‘take over’ and make her behave like a good girl. I must say I’m insulted you would propose such a thing.” She gave me an edgy look. “You must be quite the stuck-up elitist prig.”

I gaped at her. The calm and articulate delivery belied the venom of the words. She was like a restrained viper. Dangerous. She kept going on.

“A woman wants to show her breasts and paternal law says she’s mentally deranged? What about freedom of expression? What about art? A husband ignores his wife’s sexual tension for years and a woman psychiatrist rewards that by proposing theatrical therapy that will deceive the patient? Where is your feeling for Alice, doctor? I can no more validate your expertise than you can understand what dark things Alice has dared to look at in herself. Alice is a level beyond you that you do not understand. You are a child by comparison. My advice is loosen up, Dr. Rand.”

That was more than enough, I stood up. D’Amber was a nut case and this was a mistake. Worse. She was making me angry. “I feel we don’t have anything else to talk about then Ms. D’Amber. I will cure Alice without your help. I’m sorry your own problems have never been addressed in therapy. I won’t see you out or thank you for your time. Good day.” I went behind my desk without looking at her.

“Wrong again, Dr. Rand. You and I aren’t done.” There was humor in her voice, I glanced at her.

She sat there like a queen, staring right at me. There was something in her good eye that looked disturbingly like clinical detachment. I used to practice that in my mirror when I was in college. Fine. I’d just handle her with something she could understand. “We’re more than done, Ms. D’Amber. If you don’t leave my office immediately I’ll call for building security. I’m sure you don’t want that.” My ground and my rules bitch.

She studied me as if I was an interesting case. “You’ll find that the phone is temporarily out of order.” She casually laced her fingers on the leather arm of the chair.

Oh my god. She really was a nut. I picked up the phone, “Sorry. I’m not bluffing.” I didn’t even call my receptionist, I dialed 911 directly. Then I realized the phone was dead. Sweat beaded on the back of my neck. How could that be?

I tried to get a dial tone once more. I didn’t want to lose any momentum, I hung up and walked around her to the door.

She was still looking at the diplomas behind my desk. “The door mechanism is jammed. It won’t turn. You’ll also find that Della has gone to the ladies room, so even if you screamed at the soundproof door, there isn’t anyone on the other side to hear you.”

I froze with my hand near the door lever. Megalomania? If I grabbed it and it didn’t turn, she wouldn’t be a nut. I was very afraid of what that meant. If it did turn, I’d run down the hall until I found someone. It wasn’t safe here at all. I was scared to do either. I surprised myself by calling for my secretary without looking away from the handle that was two inches from my fingers, “Della!”

No answer. Ohmygod.

I tried the lever. Jammed. It didn’t turn at all. Cold sweat broke out along my back. I shivered and pushed the fear down and away, turned around and put the door to my back. I swallowed to steady my voice, assume the worst, assume she was psychotic, manipulate that aspect, stroke her, “I think we have misunderstood each other. Let’s start over.”

She turned around in the seat, smiling. Her hand went up, lifted her eye patch, ohmygod! there was———–.

—-Sex. Slutty outrageous sex. Making a public scene. Wearing slutty strap CFM heels to work. I never imagined how hot it might be. How I could ache for sex. You have to flaunt it when you want it that bad. Hot. Sweating. My crotch was getting soaked. Uncomfortable. I flushed with embarrassment. Corelle was going to make me over and display me like a prize cow. Bell collar. Brand on my ass. Black finger nail polish. Fingers playing with my pussy. I felt powerless. Malleable. So weak. So hot. The only things I could think about were my nipples and twat. Ugh, that word. Slutty. Twat. Hated that word. The sweat trickled down under my breasts. Tits. Boobs. If I took a step, I’d orgasm and never stop. Submissive. She had ruined me. A beast. A smart woman reduced to a fuck machine. I would look like a whore. Hot. So hard to fight. Hypnosis can not make you do anything you would not do while—–

An hour later, I was sitting on my desk edge when Della walked in. She gasped and put both her hands over her eyes. “Dr. Rand, I’m so sorry. I should have knocked. I didn’t—-” She turned around and rushed out.

So damn hot. Strange. It was quite a rush. Silly girl should have knocked. I pulled my hand out of my pantyhose and licked my fingers. The smell was so strong. I didn’t care for the taste. Was I actually hotter because she had seen me? I pushed my skirt back down and stood up. The slick sensation made me feel strange. Why had she thought she could just waltz in here? This was embarrassing.

How was I going to explain this? Should I try? Damn. She had interrupted before I could get myself off. I was still horny as a—. Well. No matter.

I went and sat down and pulled out the file on Alice Roth. Just thinking about Alice suddenly made me hotter than before. That was strange.

I pulled my skirt up and pushed my hand down into my pantyhose and started fingering myself. I’d have to convince Alice she was sick without D’Amber’s help.

* * *

A week later, the day’s case load was finished and Della came in and told me Ms. D’Amber was in the waiting room. My feet were hurting from the white strap sandal heels I had been wearing and I wasn’t in the best mood. “She has a lot of nerve not calling after ignoring our appointment last week. I suppose you should send her in, Della.”

“Doctor?” Della looked baffled. “But she did—”

“Did what?” I looked at her raising my eyebrows. “Tell her to come in. You can go. I’ll lock up.”

“Yes, Dr. Rand.” She went back through the door. She certainly looked confused about something.

Corelle D’Amber walked into my office without fanfare and I returned her firm handshake. Quick observations; she was average height with auburn hair, she seemed mid-thirties, but I knew she was ten years older than that. I had done extensive research on her in my plan to get her to help me crack the Roth case. She knew how to dress. Black leather pumps, no jewelry of any kind, and a black silk dress. The patch over her eye was exactly the same material as her dress, it gleamed from the soft light outside the windows.

I put aside the odd reaction that I didn’t want to talk to her. For some reason, it really bothered me that she had skipped our earlier meeting. I really needed her help to make Alice’s case another feather in my cap. Alice. Damn, why did I think of sex every time that woman came to mind?

I gestured, “Please take a seat, Ms. D’Amber. I’m so glad you could fit me into your schedule.” Hmm. That was a little too cold.

“Thank you, doctor. When we spoke on the phone, you sounded a bit desperate.” She eased herself into the maroon leather chair.

I had started to sit across from her, but her calm description of me as ‘desperate’ floored me. What in the world was she talking about? Desperate? “I assure you, my concerns are for a friend of yours. Someone I hope you are interested in helping.” I sat on the edge of the desk instead, letting my superior height give me an edge in the conversation. D’Amber was watching me closely.

Sitting there. I realized I was wet. I was aroused, but something felt wrong.

She pointed at my feet with her chin. “Nice shoes. Quite daring to wear white after Halloween. Don’t they hurt your feet? They look so high.” She looked up at me. I shivered. Why did this seem dangerous? Why did I buy these shoes? They hurt. They looked like shoes a hooker would wear. I looked down at them. Dark red nail polish, white hose, white straps pinching my toes and four inch heels. Tramp. My pussy was even hotter.

I had to say something. “Thank you. I like to surprise people.” I didn’t want to talk about my slutty shoes. It was too damn embarrassing to trade fashion tips with a self-made millionaire. “They don’t hurt at all. Latest thing.” God. That sounded lame. What a bitch she was. Why was I on the defensive?

The embarrassment ran through me like a river of fire. My underarms were suddenly soaked. I was flushed. Impossibly, I was very aroused. Today was not the day to talk to a stranger about Alice’s degrading sexual kinks. “I’m sorry you didn’t call last week to let me know you wouldn’t be coming. I’m afraid that I wasn’t expecting you at all. It just seemed you had changed your mind about coming. Maybe we should do this another day.” There, that should get her out of here.

“About coming? But I did come.” She smiled. Sweat broke out on my thighs. Something was terribly wrong. I squeezed my legs together. I was wet. Horny. I realized I was rubbing my backside on the desk edge and stopped. I stared at her. She was doing something. Had done something to me. She was here to do it again. I reached around for the phone.

When I picked it up, there was no dial tone. Then I remembered Della coming in the office last week after Corelle had left and finding me with my hand buried in my twat. Oh, that word was vulgar. I groaned and my pussy gushed thinking about Della’s expression. She saw me masturbating.

“Why don’t you turn around, Dr. Rand? Or should I call you Bess? The phone isn’t working.”

I put it down. My heart was pounding. I looked for anything heavy on the desk that I could use as a weapon. With a start, I remembered the small revolver in the bottom desk drawer. I had to get around the other side of the desk, keep her talking. “What have you done to me? What are you?” I did manage to get around to the side of the desk.

“Well, I don’t think you could understand what I really am. All I’ve done to you is give you some friendly advice. You didn’t have any respect for the dark things we all carry around with us, Bess. You were using Alice to make your own career. I decided to let you look at your own darkness. Loosen up.”

Loosen up? I was halfway around the desk. Loosen? Loose. Tramp. Whore. I didn’t want to turn around. If I did something terrible would happen. I couldn’t remember what but I knew not to look at her. No one can hypnotize you to do things that you wouldn’t do while conscious. Horribly, I turned to stare at her against my will. She stood up and smiled. Her hand went up, lifted her eye patch, ohmygod! there was—–

—-ohmygod. I was such a two-faced prig. I loved my wet pussy. I could admit that. Slutty sex. Public sex. Dark sex. All those true confessions. All those exciting clinical examples. Wearing Come Fuck Me heels all day. Staring men. Staring women. Dressing cheap. So hot. Aching. Wet. Horny. I got down on my knees before her. I knew I shouldn’t. I wasn’t a cow. Licking pussy on command. I didn’t want to be milked. Hot. Sweating. My crotch was so slick. Can’t stop. Mistress was going to make me over and display me like a prize cow. Bell collar. Black brand on my ass. Black finger nail polish like hooves. Fingers pulling my nipples, my pussy. Milk me. Malleable. So very hot. I realized I was licking her feet. God, it was so hot. So embarrassing. How could I be so slutty? My breasts hung down like small udders. The sweat trickled down my breasts. Tits. Jugs. I came when she tugged my nipples. I was like an animal. I was a—–

A nice morning. Della stopped when she walked in the office. “Dr. Rand?”

I looked up from sorting the mail. “Yes?” She had a half-smile on her face. It wasn’t flattering on her.

“Nothing,” she shook her head, still smiling, “there was a special delivery waiting for you in the mail this morning. Marked personal.” She set it down and went back to her desk.

Why did Della smiling at me make me so horny? That didn’t make sense. I picked up the package. Return address was my own street address. That made no sense at all. So disturbing. I didn’t remember sending myself a package. I opened it up.

Oh. I took the bottle out of the plastic bubble wrap. Black pearl nail polish. The color was so awful. Mindless Goth girls swam into my mind’s eye, all copying each other’s look. I opened it and painted over one finger nail with four strokes. My nipples ached. The color was really quite awful. I did another nail to see if it would look better. I couldn’t stop there. It was so stark. I was getting hot, just thinking about how noticeable it would be. People would stare.

Later, I took off my black fishnets so I could do my toes. When I was done, I couldn’t imagine why Della hadn’t chanced to interrupt me. I felt disappointed. I started playing with myself.

Oh. That was good. Visions of swollen tits and nipples spraying milk came to mind.

* * *

A week later, Della came in and told me Ms. D’Amber was in the waiting room. I flushed and my nipples started aching. “Tell her I’m not here. She can’t make appointments that we agree to, I don’t have to see her whenever she chooses to appear. Send her away, Della.”

“Doctor?” Della looked at me like I was speaking Swahili, “She’s been here twice before. You’ve been acting strangely, too. Are the two things connected?”

“I have?” I looked at her raising my eyebrows. “Such as?”

“Dr. Rand.” She hesitated, “You’re dressing oddly.”

I felt my pussy steam and instantly become slick. Della was insulting me? Criticizing me? God, that turned me on. “What do you mean, oddly,” I husked. Why hadn’t I worn panties this morning? My crotch was soaked.

“You’re wearing black polish and fishnet body stockings. A lot of your new blouses are really sheer. Your skirts are shorter than mine and you used to tell me to watch that. You said I looked unprofessional when I wore short skirts.” She paused, then rushed ahead, “Doctor, you’re dressing like a—.”

I bit my lip and came. The orgasm was horribly intense. She was telling me I was dressing like a young slut.

Corelle D’Amber walked into my office without fanfare and stopped. I came again when I saw her. She was breathtaking. Commanding. Della started to say something else, D’Amber looked at her and she stopped trying.

I put aside the instant reaction that I wanted to rub my crotch on D’Amber’s toes. I wanted to lie down on the floor and have D’Amber work her high-heeled toe between my legs. I was having some kind of breakdown. For some reason, this woman was a dream of realized domination and I wanted her to own me. Preferably right in front of Della. I was so hot now, that I could feel my thighs getting wet.

I whispered, “I’m so glad you could fit me into your schedule, Ms. D’Amber.” Hmm. What would she do to me now? “Don’t go, Della.” I was of two minds, one wanted sex and the other couldn’t think.

D’Amber looked at me, then back to Della, “How do you like the new Dr. Rand?”

“Just fine, ma’am,” Della lied with a false smile on her face. I came again. Oh, the hot shame. I wanted it again and again.

D’Amber walked over to me. She gave me a wolf’s smile. Hungry. She wasn’t human, I realized. How had I ever thought she was a human being? She was something older and more terrible. “Bessy, I don’t think you could stand another treatment. You’re ready now. She reached into her purse and pulled out a collar with a heavy bell on it. She started putting it around my neck.

The orgasms ran up and down my legs, my back, my nipples were so hot, I started pulling on them myself. “Moo,” I whispered.

Mistress D’Amber stepped away. Della stared at me in shock, her mouth an open oval. That was too much, I came again. “Moooooooooo.” I groaned.

“Della?” asked the Mistress. Della tore her eyes from me and looked at her. I could have told her not to.

Well. If I had really wanted to. I’m sure I could have.

Della and I spent the afternoon in intensely heated sex. She punished me. She milked me and told me what a little cow I was. She worked my pussy and ass with a strap-on I had bought some days before. She suggested I get a boob job so my udders would have some real heft. Of course, I agreed.

Of course, I would pay for it. Yes, I loved being banged by my secretary. Oh yes, I’d love to do housework. Yes, I was such a stuck up bitch. Oh, god. Everything was layers of heat and shame.

I came and came and came. It was so awful it was glorious.

Afterwards, I gave her a big raise.

* * *

Corelle D’Amber walked into her office and placed her purse on the mahogany desktop. The phone rang then, as if it knew when its mistress had returned and it could now deliver up its function and help her conduct business.

She eased it up to her ear, “Corelle here,” direct and to the point.

“Alice,” she smiled broadly, “how good to hear from you. Did you get the release from Dr. Rand? Everything signed and sealed? Good. No. That’s great, sweetheart. Glad to do it.”

She listened for a long time. “I’m afraid that’s true, Alice. None of this would have been a problem if Bill had stuck by you. I’m glad you realize that. He hasn’t been fair. He’s put you through a lot of hell.”

She nodded.

“Yes. Of course. You name the time and I’ll be there.” She lowered her voice, “Alice, you’re making the right decision. See you soon, sweetheart.”

Corelle put the phone down gently. She reached to her cheek and adjusted her eyepatch.

Then she smiled.

On The Left Hand of Darkness

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Noah, I’m guessing your mixed feelings on your first read of Left Hand of Darkness had something to do with the fact that the male protagonist and his androgynous companion never consummate their relationship. Setting aside the fact that the book was written in 1968, I think it would have been weaker if they had “done the deed” and possibly lived happily ever after. The fact that the protagonist is left to live with his regrets makes it all the more realistic, and, for me anyway, that much more powerful.
 
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This is part of the Gay Utopia project, originally published in 2007. A map of the Gay Utopia is here.
 

Ask the Giant Squid: My Time in the Gay Utopia

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Dear Giant Squid,
What do you think of the Gay Utopia?
Signed,
Noah Berlatsky

 
Dearest Noah,
Great and Terrible Gods, it has been ages uncounted since I last thought upon the Gay Utopia, my time in it, and my subsequent reflections as to why the Gay Utopia was not long for this world — and, just to forfend the all-too-common assumptions, it was none of the maws of the triple-headed hydra of disease, drugs, and dilettantish dandyism that ultimately devoured the pure and vital guts of the Gay Utopia, leaving the husk that so besmirches today’s cultural landscape.

Let it suffice to say — despite having the sounding of the besouréd grapes — I like not the Gay Utopia at present.

To explain: The year was ninety-seventy and five, and I found myself in a rented panel truck, touring the small musical venues of the American Middle West in the company of Lütz Günther, Brad Zywicki, and Kirk Dindorf — each natives of Milwaukee — as drummer and road manager to our glamorous disco rock quartet, the Gay Utopia. (The name taken, I presumed, from Sir Francis Bacon’s lesser known alchemical sequel to Novus Atlantis, Utopia Hilaris.)

We three were, afore the formation of the Gay Utopia, perfect strangers.  Brad was a student of the Milwaukee Institute of Art and Design, whilst Kirk found employ changing of the oils automotive. I had, just prior, gone to the crossroads at midnight, had met with the Devil, John Bonham, and three engineers from Pearl Drums, had signed papers in triplicate, and the final result had been metronomic-steady timing, a preternatural “feel for the groove”, and a lead-crystal bell of enormous girth, beneath which were shrouded from the water’s smothering embrace a perfectly balanced, self-tuning, birch-and-maple shelled drum kit with three snares, six tomtoms, double bass drums with double pedals each, 14 variegated cymbals, a gong, and 18 independent microphones, each with the finest Mogami electronics throughout. The effect was really quite stunning.

We happy few were among the three-quarter dozen respondents to a classified advertisement placed by Lütz Günther, seeking a backing band to aid in the performance of his powerful, histrionic ballads.

Nightly we made our camp in the parking lots of Fond du Lac, Green Bay, Appleton, and similar environs, extended the riser from the back of our truck, then strutted and fretted our hour upon the stage, full of sound and fury, bespangled and glittered, sheathed in lamé, lycra, and leather.  As I riffled and rolled across my skins, Kirk and Brad wove powerful, ascendant, interlocking melodies and harmonies upon the bass-guitar and guitar-guitar, respectively, whilst Lütz thrust, gyrated, moaned and ecstatically cried out, thews a-rippling, his beribbonéd tambourine gripped in his muscular human-paw.

In the twilight of early morn, after the final pink and slick guppies had retreated to their parental domiciles, I meditated long upon the alchemical progress of your forefathers, whilst Lütz, Kirk, and Brad retired to their motel’s room, presumably to further discuss the writings of Sir Francis Bacon and his cohort.

It was but a few weeks afore we were playing large shows of the stadium, our adoring fans batting at beach balls, igniting lighters, donning facial makeup, and consuming vast bong hits and mountainous drifts of cocaine within vans that were a-rocking, thus precluding the knocking.  It was a glorious time, and our messages — including “Mr. Sparks and his Rusty Trombone,” “A-Tisket, A-Tasket, A Chicken for Me Basket” and “Frottage in the Cottage” — were broadcast far and wide across the land.

Many suffer under delusions as to what it was to be in the Gay Utopia.  Did we rock and roll all night and party every day?  No.  We rocked or rolled Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, discoed Saturday and Tuesday, rested beneath Thursday, and played a series of unsuccessful tent revivals on Sunday, until late 1977, when we simply gave Sunday over to additional light instrumental discoing, to permit Lütz to nurse his hangovers in the solitude of his enormous, spherical, catamite-choked satin bed.  These Sundays, in most regards, were the worst of days:  Both Kirk and Brad sorely missed their families, and also, lacking the unifying distraction of Lütz instruction and pompery, were at each others throats, bickering with equal vitriol over matters philosophical, political, and musical.

There was, for example, much haranguing and consternation about whether Christian Rozenkreutz was in fact an actual gentleman of history, or merely a metaphor for half an alchemical equation. There was also much dispute on the lineage of Mr. Francis Bacon and his descent or lack thereof from the great Roger.

Did you practice of the free love, irregardless of the gender or identity of the anatomy to which  — or via which — that love was applied?  Hardly; this was the Gay Utopia, I remind you, and not the Rolling Stones or Simon’s Gar Funkel.  We were, first and foremost, consummate professionals concerned primarily with the quality and duration of our craft, and its intersection both philosophical and historical with the great Magico-Religious currents of Western Religious and Political Thought.  Almost every waking moment not spent performing or consuming comestibles was dedicated to practice, honing skills upon our instruments of choice, and the invention and refinement of new compositions — there was hardly world enough and time for sexual gratification at all, let alone sufficient masses of such acts to allow it to become both impersonally casual and take hold as our defining feature.  As I recall, when love was to be had, it was priced reasonably, and at a per-project rate.  Such appointments were largely kept by Lütz, who had a certain passion for public service.  As I recall, gratuities were also accepted.

Do you guys do it in, like, public bathrooms and locker rooms and shit?  No.  It is rare indeed to find a public bathroom or athletic changing room that is, first, private, and second, possessed of suitable electrical wiring to support the load created by our sound board, amplification systems, foggers, and colored lights.  Additionally, it is beyond conception that such a public rest facility exists with enough unoccupied space to accommodate my salt-water tank and drum kit.  Finally, Lütz complained that the acoustics of most bathrooms were “confusing”, making it devilish to attempt to stay upon the key.

Ultimately, the Gay Utopia dissolved along lines almost stereotypical:  There was a falling out over several inconsequential matters — my desire to explore non-integer time signatures compliant with the higher principles of John Dee’s treatise upon the cosmological and alchemical monad, Lütz’ desire that I return the $370,000 embezzled from the band’s coffers (“borrowed” as I have stressed, with the intent of immediate restoration, had not my studies on the transmutation of base matter gone tragically awry), and Brad’s and Kirk’s need to leave the limelight — disputes destructive to the bands’ ongoing cohesiveness.  Also, Brad was always somewhat of the chubby, on which point Lütz often harangued, as it was deleterious to the band’s “fuck appeal, ’cause no kid is gonna cream his jeans watching Brad’s fucking titties flop around while he noodles over flatted-fucking fifths!”

Some say the diabolus in musica is the diminished fifth tritone, but I know that it is truly Lütz Günther.

Subsequent to the pecuniary dispute, I was asked to leave the Gay Utopia, and Brad and Kirk soon followed, choosing instead to raise alpacas in rural Wisconsin.  Perhaps they there formed their own gay utopia; we drifted out-of-the-touch, and I never thought to ask if the alpacas were of mixed gender afore our drift became so wide as to span a breadth incommunicable.

Ghoulishly, despite having aborted its melodic soul and discarded its own percussive heart, the Gay Utopia lived on, undying.  Lütz held of the auditions, and restocked his stage, manning his guitar-guitar and bass guitars with a revolving cast of pouting, tin-eared young miscreants.  The drums were first quasi-competently staffed by an octopus, then later — and in a degraded performance — by three marmots in diminutive self-contained underwater breathing apparati, then by two-dozen oysters, and finally a series of interchangeable boys in eye-liner, each more insouciant than the last.

These words, too, are nought of the soured grapes, but rather simple observations, searingly accurate, of the tight-bunnéd, six-packéd, tone-deaf man-children Lütz favored over legitimate musicians and managerial staff.

In the interregnum Lütz partnered and disenpartnered — saved the indignity of serial marriage and divorce by local statute — at least a half-dozen times, reconstituting the Gay Utopia at least as often.  Despite the limping, carnival freakshow still performing under that name on the many, disused third-stages scattered across the great and undifferentiated middle of this nation, in most any sense of the notion, the Gay Utopia exists no more.

Lütz, it should suffice to say, is something of a crippled man — first, in that he has a dearth of sustainable emotional depth, and second, in that his lower extremities were crushed during a partial stage collapse in a shopping mall in 1992 (see “Gay Utopia Rocks Cleveland— Larger Tragedy Averted” in the Cleveland Plaincothes Dealings).  And I, while clearly a great and terrible success story in this day, had many rags leading to these current riches, and more than a few of them torn asunder by the ignominy I inherited from my quick exeunt from the Gay Utopia.  In truth, it is only Brad and Kirk who have unquestionably thrived not simply despite the Gay Utopia, but owing to it.

I see them often in my day-the-dreams: embracing each other, wrapped in supple blankets of the finest alpaca wool, their cheeks and shoulders pink against the golden fleece that surrounds them and keeps them enwarmed against the winter’s icy wrath. Love of that sort is the true transmutation from material to numinous; had Sir Francis known of such a gay utopia, he would have quit his philtres and phials and lived a ripe age. Of that last, one can be certain.

In conclusion, we see that, even when a question seems simple and its answer direct, within is oft enshrouded a most attractive mystery.

Still I Remain,
Your Giant Squid
Semper Fidelis Utopia Hilaris

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This is part of the Gay Utopia project, originally published in 2007. A map of the Gay Utopia is here.