I popped my con cherry

So Jay and I have been traveling this past week, and part of the itinerary included Providence, RI, home to a few good friends of ours from college who we haven't seen for a while. It happened to be my friend Elaina's birthday this past weekend as well, which neatly coincided with the New England Leather Alliance's Fetish Fair Fleamarket. In conversations with Elaina prior to the weekend, it was decided that we should spend the day on Saturday at the Flea, you know, since we were in the neighborhood and all.

Now, my initial reaction, after I agreed to this idea of hers, because of course I agreed to this because I am cool and cosmopolitan, was, HOMIGOD, I am going to be out in public at a kinky event and I am not sure this was a good idea. You see, for all of my sophistication, I don't do the whole "no, really, I'm kinky" thing. You know, there's a reason that this blog is anonymous, okay? I am not okay with being "out there", at least with kink.

So I sucked it up and went anyway. There were a half a dozen of us who went, and while I thought it would be really weird to be at a kinky convention with friends who don't know that I'm kinky it... well, wasn't. The nice thing about these friends is that they're all adults and really couldn't care less.

Now, when we first got there, I was kind of freaking out a little bit. I wasn't exactly sure how I was supposed to handle the whole "convention" thing. So, I treated it like I was at an event back in the days when I worked in the queer community - just relax, don't stare, take it all in stride. And, it worked. True, I saw some really odd things there, and I did repeat "your kink is not my kink, but your kink is okay" a LOT, but, honestly, I had a pretty good time.

There were a couple of, well, moments. First was one of those "holy shit, people from the internets are REAL" moments, when I got to meet Monk and alex and bought rope from them. I like to think I was a cool customer. I probably wasn't. I was thisclose to saying "teehee I read your blog" and introducing myself. That was a little too gutsy for me, however, so I settled for buying lots of rope, and being disappointed that there was no Bavarian Blonde.

The second was when I guess I gave away a little too much, because Elaina totally gave me a look, like, "how do you know this?" One of her other friends was going to a class, and she was trying to figure out which one. She mentioned that it was being given by Midori, and I said, without thinking, "Oh, probably something about rope bondage then". She Looks at me. I shrug it off and say "I am the queen of knowledge on the internet, dude." I think she suspects that is not so much the case.

Finally, Jay bought me a corset. It is delicious and wonderful and I loves it SO MUCH.

But yes, a good time was had by all. I may even be persuaded to attend another public kinky event at some point. Maybe.