A Place To Draw Blood Laughing

Oh my god, with the thing, and the funny of doom.

What the hell was I going to write about? Oh yea, not being a scatterbrained hysterical whatserface. Also, laughter.

Laughter is the saving grace of every successful relationship I have in the scene. (Curiously not every successful relationship I have ever, but then the word “relationship” covers all manner of sins. I did just quote Hugh Grant. Shut up. I drank regular soda and I’m punchy as hell.)

So. Picture this. I’ve got Maymay, in all his wriggly red-headed glory, tied down to to a bondage bed with a metal frame, and we’re playing with my friend’s violet wand and a knife. I’m using the knife to channel the electricity, running it up and down his chest and thighs, pressing the tip into one hip or the other to force his body to flatten out when he tries to curl up like a little June bug. And he’s never felt electricity like this before, because this is ages ago and we’ve only just started playing together and I’m still in the phase where I practically stole this violet wand from my friend because it was just so fucking cool. I take the point of the knife and I run it down the center of his chest, and little sparks jump off the tip bright enough that we both can see them. May says “it’s like little mini lightning bolts!” except he’s in sub space and feeling small and when he says it the words come out like he’s a six year old playing with a super awesome science experiment. We look each other in the eyes, and a tremor starts in his jaw and travels up my arm to my face, and suddenly we’re giggling like there’s no tomorrow, and we don’t stop until the scene ends an hour later.

Or picture this. I’m having my boots shined as part of a demonstration for a class. My friend Blaise is doing the shining, something he’s done for me a dozen times before, except that this time there are 20 people watching us and I keep trying to not open my legs in such a way that the audience members on the side of the room can see up my skirt. Blaise is lying on the ground, licking the top of the right boot’s toe, when I feel this little noise come through the leather from his mouth. He looks up at me with eyes like he’s Peter Pan fighting pirates, and grins, and suddenly the ironies of this private thing in public space hit us both between the eyes, we’re both laughing so hard we can’t stop, and I almost fall out of my chair in front of 20 people.

Or hell, picture this. I’m eight years old, swimming in a pool, beating my brother’s friend up with one of those ridiculous water noodles. There is no situation in which those water noodles are not hilarious.

Laughter seeps into my life from all directions, and invades scenes insistently and without remorse. I am freaked out by people who never laugh when they play. How is it possible to not see how sex is funny? The squeaks, the squelches, the weird belly sweat, the noises. Dear god, the noises. How is it possible to not see how kink is funny? The outfits, the pomp and circumstances, the noises all over again.

And isn’t there something funny about a big hulking man twice the size of everyone in the room wearing a frilly, pretty shirt and a skirt with his knees poking out? I don’t mean something meanly funny, something to promote humiliation or ridicule. I mean something amusingly, preciously funny. Affectionately funny. I love seeing men in girls clothing. I love seeing gay couples with their hands in each others pockets. I love seeing women comparing nipple sizes in bathrooms. These things make me laugh.

Is it really all that fun to play with a top who never laughs? I don’t mean a top who never laughs at you. I’m not talking about the kind of laughter born of cruelty, although I get how that’s sexy as hell sometimes. I mean a top who never laughs with you. Who’s never human for an instant, fallible for an instant. Who’s never joyful. I don’t want to go near someone who behaves as though they’re infallible, or inhuman; the instant you start thinking you’re infallible in the scene is the instant reality sits up and smacks you in the face for your insolence, probably injuring your loved ones in the process.

I’m not saying that people who never laugh necessarily think they’re infallible. But I do think that a lack of laughter in a top points to a distinct issue of taking oneself too seriously.

And then, on the other side of the equation, I don’t want to play with bottoms who never laugh. A bottom who never laughs is indicating to me not that they are taking themselves too seriously, but me. Taking me seriously is, of course, an earmark of a wise bottom. Taking me too seriously means there has been a breakdown of communication. We are coming to the scene for different reasons, and two people with two different goals rarely manage to mesh together. And hell, it’s not like I’ve put out a copyright on laughter. I’m laughing! You can laugh too! Just try and tell me having someone play tic-tac-toe on your skin with a knife isn’t funny.

I think that the lack of laughter within the scene may be the single most obvious indicator that we are still dealing with the influence of sex-negative cultures, even in supposedly sex-positive communities. Conveying the idea that sex or BDSM is no laughing matter is a direct carry-over from the straight-laced morality-focused mindset in which sex may or may not be a sin, but should absolutely be treated seriously and as a serious pursuit for serious aims and goals, like procreation or the consummation of love. Which I personally think is bullshit, by the way, because whether you believe that sex is goal-focused or recreational, the reality is that sex (as well as kink) is humanizing, and humans are funny beings. And also, even your goals should be treated with humor.

I encourage laughter over the specific quirks of BDSM not only because these things are genuinely funny, but because laughter over specifics keeps the mind open for laughter in general, and general laughter paves the way for positive influences.

Even the kinky people who never laugh are always up about taking pride in the scene. Be proud! Stand tall! To hell with that. Take joy in the scene. Be happy. Find humor, because with humor comes affection and connection, and the very essence of pride is born out of affection and connection. Laugh because you love what you do, love life, love your partner. Laugh for the hell of it, laugh because your leather’s sticky, laugh with delight, laugh like an eight year old with a water noodle.