saturday

There are 15 glass pebbles in the vase in our living room – representing the 15 swats I owe Ma’am for minor transgressions and lapses. It’s my responsibility to ask permission to trade in the pebbles and receive the punishment I’ve earned…but in the 3 months since the system went into effect I have yet to ask Ma’am for her discipline. I’ve been saving my pebbles. I go through periods where I crave more discipline and experience has shown that in those times I have a tendency to be more lax in my behavior and service. It seemed a good idea to save the pebbles for those times rather than risk acting up with Ma’am.

This past Saturday I had planned to finally kneel before Ma’am and ask her permission to redeem a number of the pebbles I’d earned. Since I hadn’t done this before, I wanted to be sure that I knew the ritual aspects of the asking and the proper protocol for accepting the punishment. I didn’t know if Ma’am would ask if I remembered the reasons I’d earned each of the pebbles and so I decided that I’d better memorize them as well. My memory is not always the best under pressure so I reviewed everything again and again. I kept coming back to it throughout the day to be sure I remembered – the result of which was that my craving for discipline and ritual had grown throughout the day. It sounds weird to say but I was looking forward to the opportunity to ask to redeem my pebbles.

I didn’t have anything special planned for dinner - I’d arranged for food to be delivered about half an hour after Eve was due home. I’d decided to wait a short while after we’d had dinner before going to Eve for 2 reasons – to allow her to rest and relax a bit and also to ensure that she didn’t have any plans for service that I didn’t yet know about.

While we waited for the delivery person to arrive, Eve came across a movie that she wanted to watch. It didn’t end very late so I decided I could wait until after the movie was over. The movie wasn’t bad but I couldn’t help being distracted as we watched. My mind continued to review process, protocol, and transgressions – and I slipped into my submissive headspace before I knew it. As the movie came to an end, I fell prey to a small bout of nerves and left the room to use the washroom. I'd thought that I would assume the proper position and make my request when I came back into the room…

This, of course, is where everything started to go wrong. Eve had found another movie to watch while I was out of the room. She seemed pretty eager to watch it – it was one she’d wanted to see for a long time. When I learned what time the movie ended I saw my hopes for the evening vanish. I wasn’t going to take Eve away from something she clearly wanted to enjoy. We have neighbors and it would be too late to make such noise after this new movie ended. The pebbles would stay in the vase tonight.

Eve turned off the TV and directed her attention to me as two things had perked her interest. I don’t usually ask her what time something ends when she sits down to watch TV and my disappointment at the ending time had been obvious. She thought I wanted to talk about something and wanted to know what it was. The TV was going to remain off until I came out with it.

It bears mentioning that in that moment Eve was my partner, not my Ma’am, and she was speaking to me as such. She didn’t know where my head was, didn’t realize that I was seeing both my Ma’am and my partner sitting before me wanting an answer that I didn’t know how to give. I hadn’t wanted to take her away from what she wanted to do to ask her for something that I wanted. It seemed selfish and inappropriate behavior. Besides, there is a ritual to asking for discipline - I’m not to just blurt it out. I was confused and conflicted – I couldn’t tell her what I was thinking and couldn’t not answer my Ma’am. So I kept trying to tell her that there was nothing I needed to talk about, trying to convince her to turn the TV back on…

For a while Eve’s attitude and queries seemed to indicate that she had a fair idea of what was on my mind. She seemed to be playing with me, taunting me, and a part of me was taking pleasure in it. I’d thought she was too - but then her attitude seemed to suddenly change leaving me feeling confused and rejected. I’m not sure either one of us knew what was going on at that point and things quickly began to spiral out of control.

Eve ended up angry which I couldn’t help emotionally reacting to more as her submissive than her partner. As she took the time she needed to calm down, the quiet had the opposite effect on me. My mind was in turmoil…the emotional responses fueled by my submission prodded me to a place where all I could see was rejection and responsibility for Ma’am’s anger and displeasure…

Sigh...not exactly the Saturday night I’d had in mind.