Carrots

Throughout their childhood, Daddy and his brothers took sailing courses with Glenans. Sailing is extremely popular here, no doubt because there is such easy access to water no matter where you are! He's very good at sailing and he's been promising to take me out and teach me for a long time. (Strangely enough, having grown up myself in both Vancouver and Seattle, I'd never been sailing at all.)

Today was the day.

We rented a tiny sailboat early in the morning and spent most of the day on the water. The wind was light and the weather was pleasant for February. He was a good teacher too. Very patient when I pulled the ropes the wrong way and also when I lost my balance and crashed into him, nearly knocking him off the boat!

What I learned today is that sailing is hard work and takes a lot of skill to do it well. I have always imagined that sailing involved a lot more sitting around enjoying the beautiful view, but in fact there is a lot more work than it would seem! I also learned that I love it. Love it love it love it! During the drifting parts we did get a little time to relax but quickly Daddy found other ways to keep us getting exercise and enjoying ourselves that involved some other skills I have had a little more practice with. :)

I'm exasperated that we forgot the camera in the boot of the car and missed the opportunity to take a million beautiful pictures of the day, but it does give us another excuse to go back, as if we needed one. I can't wait.

Quoth Ice...

Ice_Princess said...

... I think that you are experiencing a duality :) Magdalena and I were discussing duality so it's on my mind. You want to be independent and capable but also taken care of, and frankly who doesn't? Isn't that what we all want, someone to take care of us once in a while and whom we can take care of....

I don't think I could possibly agree with you more! Duality is a perfect word to describe how I feel, and I read your post on it just to make sure I understood what you meant. I think many people, perhaps women in particular, feel that tug in two different directions. My ambitious and adventurous side urges me to be independant and to be completely in control of my own life.

In this way, sometimes, I simply find it nearly impossible to believe that I have chosen to allow my husband to make rules for me, like a child, and have so much control over so many aspects of my life.

Simultaneously, as much as I crave my independance and freedom, I am happily overwhelmed by the care he takes in attending to me. I have never in my life, prior to knowing Gaelin, had another person on whom I could totally depend for everything, both physical and emotional.

Being controlled makes me feel two things at once. The first feeling reminds me of my own childhood, feeling outraged by having no control over my own life. Feeling angry at having someone else's will imposed over my own. That is my gut reaction.

My second reaction is a healing reaction because my relationship with G is nothing like my real childhood was. Although he is strict, his rules truly are for my own good. He is consistent, reasonable, and predictable. Unlike my childhood experience, these rules make sense, they apply at all times, and breaking them always has the same result. Unlike my childhood, I feel safe within these rules. Though I am disciplined, I am never yelled at, never cursed at, and never left feeling unloved. This difference makes all the difference in the world. It heals my inner child.

That is my duality. On one hand, my first reaction to my childhood is that I want to be completely 100% free as an adult to do everything my way. The other reaction is that I want a chance to do childhood over again, better. Choosing to give someone control over you is just not the same as having someone take it without your consent. I have consented and I don't regret it even when it presents me with some real emotional challenges.

...I am curious though after reading his post, do either sets of parents know about this side of your relationship or other members of the family? If so how does that work out? ...

My own family knows nothing of the personal aspects of our relationship. I am not especially close with my family and so these kinds of conversations just don't come up. As for Gaelin's family, he is one of four boys who are all quite close, and I believe that his brothers are aware that things are different with us. Though I doubt they realise the extent of our lifestyle, they seem aware of the fact that he is wearing the figurative pants on the relationship. Even his parents seem to understand this intuitively.

Perhaps this is a result of knowing him all his life. People always seem to defer to him. When we go out with friends, people always seem to turn to him to make decisions about where we should go, what we will do, what time we will meet and where. He is decisive and sure of himself, and he is charismatic. A natural leader! When his family calls me to set up dinner visits with us, they will say things like, "Check with Gaelin and get back to us." . It seems clear to me that they know he makes our decisions. Everyone who knows him seems to depend on him for guidance and leadership to some extent and in this way I think of him as being a Daddy to the world! Hah!

But as for the intimate details, they are between us. We do have a few very close friends with whom he has shared some minor details (much to my mortification!) but we both realise that most people don't understand or appreciate the kind of life we have chosen and so we don't open ourselves up for criticism in that way.

Oh and your comment reminds me, I have a vice that occurs when I don't take care of myself, a few actually. I am in trouble with a friend of mine over that, but I think I'm safe because he too would have a long trip.

This sounds intriguing. Share if you want to, but don't give G any further evil ideas if you please! :)

Sassy girl

Note to self: Never ever ever ever be sassy to Daddy. (or "saucy" as he likes to say)

Further note to self: Never ever EVER EVER try to bite Daddy's hand when he's washing your mouth out with soap.


These behaviours can only result in trouble. They will only ever result in things that are highly unpleasant for me and my backside.

Valentine's Day

Last night I got into some trouble to crown off our perfect Valentine's Day.

He sent me flowers at work. There's something about flowers at work that is a million times more exciting than flowers at home. I suppose it must be the exhibitionist in me that enjoys the people I work with seeing what a wonderful husband I have.

He made dinner. He really is the best cook ever, and he made all my favourite things.

We had champagne. We don't have champagne very often. It's a lovely treat!

All these things were so sweet and special, and yet there has been something on my mind for a few weeks now. I had agreed, at work, to do some editing for a series of scripts that was recently turned in for proofreading, and after agreeing to do it, I realised it was really more than I could reasonably manage to do.

I wasn't working on it. The playbooks were sitting beside my computer for days and days, unopened. And then, beside the stairs so I would remember to bring them back to work. Like a teenager in high school, I was carrying my homework back and forth, to and from work, but never actually doing it. And it was worrying me. There wasn't time to do it all, and time was passing.

Last night I was feeling tense about the work, and I think I was a bit snappish with Daddy as a result. He can always tell when I'm tense.

After my shower, he was sitting on the bed waiting for me. Uh oh. He asked me to come and talk to him about what was happening. I told him all of it and had to agree with him that I wasn't taking very good care of myself by agreeing to do more work than I was really able to do. He punished me. Not severely.... but firmly. He gave me a spanking, with his hand, on my bare bottom. And then he made me promise that I would talk to my boss today about sharing the editing job with another one of the actors so that it would be so overwhelming.

I did this and now I feel about a million times better to feel like my free time is more my own again, and not drowning in unfinished work. I even got some of it done, now that I feel so much better about it!

Sometimes it's true that a spanking is exactly what I need.