Old Longings
“Old longings nomadic leap, chafing at custom’s chain, again from its brutal sleep Wakens the feral strain”
Jack London, Call of the Wild
The thing about leather is it becomes protective for a human only after the animal is dead. There is an element of sacrifice there. Flesh on an animal is as vulnerable as on a human. But killed, the skinned hide becomes a shield against the elements. So when I think about growing a “thicker skin” there’s that idea that it is somebody else’s skin that’s becoming thicker, more to protect my own. There’s sacrifice. Mine won’t grow callous until I’ve bled enough, been impacted enough times and only then my own skin can become leather. Until then, I wear another’s.
It started with watching West World. It immediately hit, conceptually. The notion of a Western adult theme park. Because the west has always been a myth. When my family came to America the only notion my father had of Seattle was reading the stories of Jack London. I researched London and learned that he was an adamant socialist, possible fascist and definite bigot. But that was London the person not the persona on the pages of his stories, and I’ve learned in my own work to distinguish between the two.
The fox coat lived in closet for years, hiding under a polyester Macy’s garment bag. Marti gave it to me before moving back to Texas and her initials were monogrammed inside the lining under the left pocket. I’d put it on several times but only left the house once wearing it the night we watched the feral puppeteers in the 2nd Avenue subway station. It was warm and disgusting and mostly I had fear of being accosted by animal rights activists. I loved the way the fur felt on my body but the cut was so archaic I felt like a 1970’s hooker, which I secretly loved and it made me uneasy as if I was “outting” myself just through wearing this coat. It oozed a vulgar sexuality that I embraced and was petrified of and so if I could wear it, I could say it without saying it. There’s something about fur that spills out like liquid gold onto the fingers. When you cut it, the hairs just fall apart, but still attached to the interior hide it moves like a living thing. People are disgusted by the deadness of fur and I know that is what Julia Kristeva touches on when she describes abjection. I find that the animal is still with me when I wear it, in power and in spirit.
There is an immediacy in fur’s proximity to both luxury and death. One thing not existing without another. Luxury not being just about the mechanisms of decadence, but about unapologetic announcement that life doesn’t happen without death.
What went underneath the fur was another kind of veneer. The layers of stockings I had worn in session and then discarded due to their obvious retirement found in tears, rips and elastic malfunctions. These thin silky things had been my own second skin, operating as the barrier between me and another’s hand, mouth, or eye. Being transparent, they couldn’t prevent the gaze. As thin as they were, they couldn’t defend against touch or the tongue. But fur could, leather would.
this wild fur, draping over my thin veneers, under which there is more fur, more wildness. me. the down between my legs. men. their skin spills out. their secrets spill out. they cannot contain it and I don’t make them.
I get nude sometimes, or I just wear the stockings. It’s a gesture. It’s symbolic. I’ve had one pair of stockings since I bought them in Paris 15 years ago. I’ve saved them because they’ve never ripped. They’ve never failed me as a tool to protect me guide me. Totemic, stockings are. I can see through them, but they are like an airbrush, they smooth, the democratize. They make blurry stretch marks or cellulite. They contain the flesh. They ensure I don’t fall out, fall off.
There’s that frame, its perfect underneath, perfectly proportionate, with right angles that a woman never has. The fur hides the rigidity that I wish I had. But it can never be rigid, and I can never be contained. I am both dead and alive when I wear these things. I’m in between. I’m in that liminal state. I’m protected.
The blue trimming is a simple bind to articulate the bind. An extra precaution. A decorative touch. A bit of pageantry. Working class. Utliitarian. The underpinning, the trim underneath, the non decorative used as decorative. Using the fur out here makes me think of being a pioneer and the fantasy of it. Of going out west. West as a notion of the wild, of the far and away America that represents the unknown. To hunt, but also to be hunted.
Old Longings
“Old longings nomadic leap, chafing at custom’s chain, again from its brutal sleep Wakens the feral strain”
Jack London, Call of the Wild
The thing about leather is it becomes protective for a human only after the animal is dead. There is an element of sacrifice there. Flesh on an animal is as vulnerable as on a human. But killed, the skinned hide becomes a shield against the elements. So when I think about growing a “thicker skin” there’s that idea that it is somebody else’s skin that’s becoming thicker, more to protect my own. There’s sacrifice. Mine won’t grow callous until I’ve bled enough, been impacted enough times and only then my own skin can become leather. Until then, I wear another’s.
It started with watching West World. It immediately hit, conceptually. The notion of a Western adult theme park. Because the west has always been a myth. When my family came to America the only notion my father had of Seattle was reading the stories of Jack London. I researched London and learned that he was an adamant socialist, possible fascist and definite bigot. But that was London the person not the persona on the pages of his stories, and I’ve learned in my own work to distinguish between the two.
The fox coat lived in closet for years, hiding under a polyester Macy’s garment bag. Marti gave it to me before moving back to Texas and her initials were monogrammed inside the lining under the left pocket. I’d put it on several times but only left the house once wearing it the night we watched the feral puppeteers in the 2nd Avenue subway station. It was warm and disgusting and mostly I had fear of being accosted by animal rights activists. I loved the way the fur felt on my body but the cut was so archaic I felt like a 1970’s hooker, which I secretly loved and it made me uneasy as if I was “outting” myself just through wearing this coat. It oozed a vulgar sexuality that I embraced and was petrified of and so if I could wear it, I could say it without saying it. There’s something about fur that spills out like liquid gold onto the fingers. When you cut it, the hairs just fall apart, but still attached to the interior hide it moves like a living thing. People are disgusted by the deadness of fur and I know that is what Julia Kristeva touches on when she describes abjection. I find that the animal is still with me when I wear it, in power and in spirit.
There is an immediacy in fur’s proximity to both luxury and death. One thing not existing without another. Luxury not being just about the mechanisms of decadence, but about unapologetic announcement that life doesn’t happen without death.
What went underneath the fur was another kind of veneer. The layers of stockings I had worn in session and then discarded due to their obvious retirement found in tears, rips and elastic malfunctions. These thin silky things had been my own second skin, operating as the barrier between me and another’s hand, mouth, or eye. Being transparent, they couldn’t prevent the gaze. As thin as they were, they couldn’t defend against touch or the tongue. But fur could, leather would.
this wild fur, draping over my thin veneers, under which there is more fur, more wildness. me. the down between my legs. men. their skin spills out. their secrets spill out. they cannot contain it and I don’t make them.
I get nude sometimes, or I just wear the stockings. It’s a gesture. It’s symbolic. I’ve had one pair of stockings since I bought them in Paris 15 years ago. I’ve saved them because they’ve never ripped. They’ve never failed me as a tool to protect me guide me. Totemic, stockings are. I can see through them, but they are like an airbrush, they smooth, the democratize. They make blurry stretch marks or cellulite. They contain the flesh. They ensure I don’t fall out, fall off.
There’s that frame, its perfect underneath, perfectly proportionate, with right angles that a woman never has. The fur hides the rigidity that I wish I had. But it can never be rigid, and I can never be contained. I am both dead and alive when I wear these things. I’m in between. I’m in that liminal state. I’m protected.
The blue trimming is a simple bind to articulate the bind. An extra precaution. A decorative touch. A bit of pageantry. Working class. Utliitarian. The underpinning, the trim underneath, the non decorative used as decorative. Using the fur out here makes me think of being a pioneer and the fantasy of it. Of going out west. West as a notion of the wild, of the far and away America that represents the unknown. To hunt, but also to be hunted.
Nadia
Originally from the former Soviet Union, Mistress Nadia is a professional Dominant based in New York City. She is turned on by space between sadism and semantics. She holds strong opinions about topics like ideology and immigration and contributes to the literotica found on this site.