Well here it is, the Monday after camp ended. Sigh. I kept thinking, "I left my...(insert sunglasses, water bottle, etc)., back at the cabin," and wondered what everybody else was doing THERE, while I was stuck here. Of course I know there are no people at the camp anymore, they are all home and going through "camp drop" just like me....but still, it lingers in my mind as being a live entity of sorts, that is always happening, and I'm just here missing it. Yeah, camp drop is a real thing, actually, and it's like coming down from this huge and awesome 9-day-long high, so it's quite a bummer to say the least.
Before I go into detail about camp stuff, here's something I thought you might like...
A small group of women and I were sitting back stage in a room after a concert that you performed. Some look-alike guy walks in, and tells us that he is YOU, and all the OTHER women went ga-ga-ape-shit, when I stood back with a quizzical look on my face, skeptical and feeling like something wasn't quite right. That wasn't YOU, and I knew it, but I couldn't PROVE it to anyone else, they wouldn't believe me. So then I start seeing these little blips of you here and there, like a CAMEO shot or something, somebody walking by the doorway---wait a minute, that was REALLY YOU---so I'd run to the doorway and look out, only to see nothing and no one around. So then I'd go sit down and watch the other ladies chit-chatting and giggling with this look-alike guy, and suddenly in a mirror I'd see the REAL you walk by again!! So then I'd go check that out too, only to find nothing again. GRRRRRR.
You're killin' me.
So, after a few times of this annoying game of yours, I got disgusted. Needless to say, I left the room. Then I walked outside, and THERE YOU WERE, standing about 20 feet away, and you looked RIGHT AT ME, but suddenly you ducked back inside when I yelled, "HEY STEVE! WAIT!" And I stood there, feeling flabbergasted and flummoxed, and finally decided, "to hell with it. He can come find ME." And then I woke up.
Dammit to hell, you bug me. Why even bother to show up at all?! You really are a pain in the patoot.
Well anyway, here is what I wrote on Facebook the other day, while I was at camp. I wrote it in response to my best friend's reaction to the photo that I posted (below)....
To anyone who thinks I am a "freak," for being at an adult camp for vacation, please let me know who you are so that I can censor myself and talk only about the weather with you from now on. Skim on the surface of things, how about those Steelers? If that makes you feel less "scared" of me, I can do that. If you would prefer that I keep my fun side hidden and only discuss Holocaust subjects, or world peace issues and be serious all the time, I can do that too. But if you openly and emphatically and repeatedly reject the open minded adventurous and fun part of ME, then the word "friend" really doesn't quite have the deeper meaning or level of acceptance and love that I always assumed it should. Just unfriend me. And please, if you ASK for pictures and details of my time at camp, be sure you can actually handle them first. It's not my problem or concern if you can't deal with my fun side. This is just me, so take it or leave it. Your decision. Thanks.
Ohhhhhh boy, did THIS spark quite a discussion. Here is the photo that I probably SHOULDN'T have posted, but I really had no clue that it would be met with so much negativity from the one person I have been friends with since the age of 15, who KNOWS I'm a silly goof, who KNOWS that I'm a loon, who KNOWS I like naughty humor, and who KNOWS that I'm a whole helluva lotta FUN too.
See, the thing is, I really don't see anything wrong with it.
It's a silly PLASTIC HAND BRA, a bikini top, a JOKE item that I bought at a local Adam & Eve store. It's a VANILLA BACHELORETTE ITEM, for cripes' sake. I thought it was funny, so I bought the damned thing, and what better place to WEAR IT than at an adult camp?! My nipples are completely covered, I'm wearing clothing with it, so what the hell is the big deal?!
The big deal was, apparently her 16 year old son saw the photo, and was "creeped out," because I am his "aunt," (not a blood relation, but almost his mom's sister, since we've been best friends for so long). And his AUNT, for goodness sake, shouldn't have BOOBS like that!! The poor boy was traumatized, even though he's got girly magazines under his mattress, and works at a water park watching young girls in bikini's walk by all day long. GIMME A FRIGGIN' BREAK. If he were 10, I would have been MORTIFIED if he had seen this. But he's not 10. He's 16, he's seen boobs before, so get over it. I told my best friend that I am not the one who taught him to be embarrassed about his body, or the female body either, because that wasn't my job. I think that statement pissed her off a little, but it's TRUE, so what the hell?! I speak the truth even if it stings a little bit, because that makes life SO much easier than trying to remember all the BS and fibs and lies that might be told to various people, I mean why bother with that stupid shit??? Life's too short. So, I just say it like it is.
Anyway, she's still miffed, but she's pretending to "let it drop" because now she's being too NICE to me, (I know her very well, and that's what she does)....so she writes to me today to ask if I'm still going to pitch in money to buy her daughter a baby crib set. Sigh. This woman, my best friend, never went to college. She never got out of my hometown. She just got married right out of high school and had kids. So, she's really not quite on the same level as I am, in a lot of ways---and I don't mean that to sound conceited, that's not my intent at all. My intent is to explain that we are very different in our thinking, and sometimes our values are different too. If she had been WITH ME in that Adam & Eve store, for example, and saw that hand bra WITH ME, she would have laughed her head off about it. She might have even shown it to her kid!! So, it just seemed very hypocritical to me, to ASK ME FOR DETAILS WHILE I WAS AT CAMP, but then when I PROVIDE those details, I get attacked for it.
I also pointed out to her that (when she wrote to her ex-boyfriend to warn me that I'm a freak doing strange and dangerous and crazy stuff with weird freaky people at this camp), it's interesting how she demands respect for her gay sister, and defends gay marriage with a passion----but MY lifestyle choice is apparently something she does NOT approve of, and will criticize and condemn every chance she gets. I just don't understand that.
Here's what I have surmised since all this hit the fan.....apparently, she sort of lives vicariously through me when I go do things like this, and feels some resentment towards me for having the freedom to do it. That is really the bottom line of the whole issue, in my opinion. The problem is hers, not mine. But, ya know, this is what drives me absolutely bonkers about myself....I STILL CARE ABOUT HOW SHE PERCEIVES ME, and how her KIDS perceive me, so I still feel BADLY that I upset her. I never meant to upset anybody. I was just being silly.
Everybody at camp, by the way, laughed their heads off at it. I showed up at the mess hall for dinner wearing this outfit, and oh my GAWD, it was a HOOT!!! Sure, the plastic hands were a bit.....smallish....so maybe it wasn't exactly as TASTEFUL a photo as I had hoped it would be, some would call it crass and low-class, sure, white trash even. Whatever. I just thought it was friggin' funny. I thought about buying 3 pairs----to make myself a bikini, with 2 on the butt cheeks and 1 in front, and Pete wearing one over his naughty bits too!! But, then I figured one pair should suffice, and it was a big hit with all the kinky perverts that I hang out with, so fuck it, the whole thing was WORTH the $15 bucks. I'll wear it again next year too. Anyone who doesn't approve, can bite my ass. It's not like I wear it out in public to the local Red Lobster or anything, for cripes' sake. Gimme a break.
So then I add a photo of the mess hall....it's nothing fancy, but it's decent. Nobody commented at all. Ya know why?? Because it's a BORING PICTURE, that's why. I'm not even supposed to TAKE pictures while I'm at camp, and if I had been CAUGHT, I would have been KICKED OUT. So, I was taking this huge risk, because SHE ASKED ME TO, and yet I got all beat up by HER for doing it. And now I'm supposed to go to Michigan and spend time with her, giving her daughter a baby shower, in 10 days. And I know she's still miffed. And frankly, I'm still a little bit annoyed too.
I hope YOU have a naughty sense of humor, too, because I'm going to show you more pictures that MIGHT be somewhat questionable, or risque, so if that BOTHERS YOU, don't read anymore!!! Just click outta here, log off, whatever, and DON'T READ ANY FURTHER. If you choose to continue on, just be aware that the photos below are somewhat "naughty," and might even be offensive to some.
AND DON'T BUST MY BALLS ABOUT IT EITHER, YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!!!!!!!
So yeah, I put THIS photo on Facebook too, and she was "appalled" by it. There's a black inflatable sheep on the top of my golf cart "taxi," and Pete got this magnet that says "I heart ass raping sheep!" because it was a JOKE based on the hilarious SKIT that he and I performed last year at camp. I got so many laughs as I drove around with this "pimped out cab," and I played music (Bob Rivers "Dirty Deeds Done With Sheep," which was the song we used during our skit). It was a friggin' laugh riot!
But ohhhhh, my best friend's comment was, "You hang out with some very....UNIQUE....people at that camp." Does that seem to be a rather negative comment to you? It did to me. If she had simply omitted the ......'s in between the word "unique," (which was in all caps and came across as being very sarcastic), there would have been no question that she meant it in a positive way. But she constantly refers to these people, my camp FAMILY, as being a bunch of freaks, and it bugs the hell outta me, because WHAT DOES THAT MAKE ME THEN?!! Frankly I don't like being labeled as a freak.
She and my other friend from high school sat with me for nearly 2 hours last summer at my nephew's graduation party, lecturing me about how I must be a freak, I must have some mental issues, I must not be quite RIGHT in the head, to be doing this naughty stuff. They ganged up on me, and made me feel like total shit. I decided right after that, (after crying for awhile), that they can both fuck off. Neither of them seem capable of understanding me at all, and that hurts my feelings a lot.
The common denominator of the 2......church. They both have gone to church most of their lives. They both have a background of being conservative, and even repressed in a lot of ways. I don't. I was raised in a non-denominational church, and I've hung around mostly Jewish people most of my life, I've tried many different types of churches too. I just never really "picked" a religion. I went to vacation bible school as a kid, I studied various verses from the bible, the Talmud, etc., and I've thought about a lot of the religions over the years, but I've never been pigeon-holed into sticking with just one.
So I guess I'm just a little "too wild" for the churchy chicks I knew in high school. I'll get over it. They, however, probably won't.
Now........this photo seemed absolutely innocent to me, when I took it. I just wanted a close-up shot of one of the popsicles I made....(I used a dowel, cardboard & plastic bags as filler, wrapped in fleece, with a balsa wood stick). But, I did NOT realize that, over to the RIGHT of my felt popsicle with lips and a tongue---I made everything you see---there were actually other people in the photo.....one man laying naked on the ground....one with his back towards me, and one on the left of him, naked. I know these men, and I feel HORRIBLE about it, but I did NOT have any CLUE that this was in the photo when I took it. I didn't realize it until AFTER I posted it on Facebook, and THIS caused a WHOLE LOTTA GRIEF to my best friend and a few others who were shocked by it.
The guy on the ground....well....he was participating in the carnival after the parade....and yeah, ok, so while I DO NOT LIKE that he was the human toilet, (he enjoys golden showers), and I SWEAR that I would never USE HIM as such----that simply was his KINK, and that's what he LIKES, and there's nothing I can do to change that, nor would I even bother to try. I don't judge it either. He can do whatever he wants to do, and it doesn't harm anyone.
Personally, I think golden showers are kinda icky, gross, even kinda nasty, and I wouldn't go near him with a 50 foot pole. But okay, this is a BDSM camp, an adult kinky camp full of adult kinky people, and he was doing what he enjoyed. I didn't even bother to explain any of this to the people who complained about seeing a naked man tied to the ground...(it was my best friend who voiced the complaint, but SHE is the one who ENLARGED THE GODDAMNED PHOTO TO LOOK AT THEM, but instead of privately TELLING me that there were people in the photo, she had to broadcast it to everybody else on Facebook).....therefore I knew that if I even TRIED to explain what he was doing, it would have only made matters worse.
This is our float from camp....the "ice cream float." I made felt popsicles, we dressed up inflatable dolls, we named our company "Scream N Cream," I added silly signage, and TAH DAH, we won the competition....of course, handing out real ice cream helped to win the judge's approval!!
Funny, though, right?! It was simply made to be FUNNY. The man doll on the left held a sign that said, "I Scream," the female doll on the right held a sign that said "You Scream" and on the sides were the signs "We all Scream." Yes, I found a light blue balloon sword that somebody made, and put it in between the male doll's legs....(someone else added the white fuzz to the end of it).....and yes, I taped wooden painted cherries onto the female doll's boobs....but it's not PORNOGRAPHIC, it's not DIRTY, it's not HORRIBLE....it's meant to be FUNNY!!! A little naughty maybe, sure, but FUNNY!
NOTE: Pete's t-shirt says, "BAAAA MEANS NOOOO," again referring to the funny skit we performed at camp last year, which AGAIN made everybody laugh a lot! I guess you just have to have an open mind, and a naughty sense of humor, to appreciate camp. Everybody I know who was there, loved everything we did. So, to me, that's all that really matters.
Anyway, here's another photo of Pete at the Oasis that we helped create the first day we arrived:
We are on the Ambiance Committee with our Leather family, so we helped buy all the supplies, and we helped put everything together. These tents sit to the right of the huge pool, and we fill the area with furniture to lounge on. We make them look like living rooms, very comfortable, with carpeting too. We had a ton of bamboo poles, and straw hats, and I bought the curtains, the white screen in the back to the left of Pete is mine too, brought from home. It took us 14 hours to put all of this up that day. When the tornado warnings came, twice, we had to tear it all down so it wouldn't blow away. But we managed to put it all back together each time again, in a shorter time span, so it worked out fine.
Anyway, so that's most of the photos I snuck while at camp. Here's another one, of me this time....
It was 90 degrees most of the time, I had a slight sunburn, and wore my hair up most every day. Didn't wear any makeup either, but this is a leopard lingerie nightie, that I wore with a leopard bra and panties underneath it, so it was TASTEFUL and LIGHTWEIGHT, and felt PRETTY to walk around in all day. Some people just walk around naked all day, but I choose to wear pretty lingerie instead. I do swim naked in the pool, though, but anyway, this is a tiny idea of what camp is like, and why I love it.
I'm exhausted now though. Haven't even attempted to unpack anything yet either.
Just so you know, we actually do OTHER stuff at camp, like attend classes, too. This class was taught by Barbara Carellas, who comes every year to camp, and teaches some really great stuff. This class was entitled "Ecstasy Is Necessary," (based on her new book with the same title), and it was EXCELLENT. This white board was what we all contributed as "what we experience when we are in an ecstatic moment." NOT JUST SEXUALLY ECSTATIC EITHER. There are many many other types of ecstasy that you can achieve in this life, and we discussed how some people who are NOT in the lifestyle don't really ever GET to that point, and never really understand those of us who DO.
And that is what spoke to me the most at camp.
Those people, like my best friend, who are "vanilla," (which is NOT a label, or a derogatory term, it simply means anyone who is NOT in the lifestyle), seem to be curious about getting to something more in life, they know deep down that there is much more to life and to spirituality than what they see in the "normal" world, but yet, they don't know how to GET to the ecstasy that exists on a different level. Everybody at camp that I know, absolutely DOES know that it exists, has experienced it in many ways, many times, and are OPEN to that experience, and so it seems that we are resented a lot for it. One example that came up was the passionate people at the "Occupy" movements all across the country. They were experiencing a type of ecstasy, and those around them who observed this, denounced them, protested THEM for being there, questioned their motives, attacked them, and made them out to be FREAKS and LOSERS, rather than trying to gain a better understanding of them.
That was exactly what I was dealing with, and it made me feel validated to know that everyone around me had also been through the same attacks, the same resentment, the same negativity...doesn't make the hurt feelings fade quicker, but it does help me to understand HER better, which is helpful.
Now I know that I need to just censor that part of me, which is a very sad thing. Maybe I should censor that part of me here too, because who the hell knows who reads it. But ya know what, I support and respect anyone who has the COURAGE to stand up and VOICE who they are, no matter WHAT they do, even if other people just don't get it. It takes GUTS to do this, people. It's not easy. Gay men in the 1950's had to HIDE IT from everyone, they got married to women, they even had kids. And they were miserable. Why spend your life like that?? Does that make any sense?? Is it just so that YOU don't feel awkward and embarrassed by it? If that's the reason, that's pathetic and unfair.
Those of you out there who read this, who are ALSO in some way "freaky," or "kinky" or otherwise "abnormal," in the eyes of the people around you who AREN'T those things, take note that it is most definitely WORTH IT to stand up for what you feel is right for YOU, and it gets easier as time goes on. It doesn't go away. It doesn't hurt any less when it comes around each time. But it does validate who you are, it FREES you from the constraints that everyone seems to want you to live in all the time, and it's the ONLY REALLY IMPORTANT THING GOD REALLY GIVES YOU---the ability to be TRUE TO YOURSELF.
You get one body. You are allowed to make that body feel good, even if it's not in the same way that someone else makes THEIR body feel good. It's not a sin. It's not evil. It's not taboo. It's not a bad thing to be true to yourself, and do what you need to do, sexually or not.....as long as it doesn't hurt anyone else in any way. Respect yourself and stand up for your kinks, fetishes, etc., because if you don't, believe me, nobody else will. All they will try to do is condemn you for it.
Don't let 'em.
Now I have to start getting ready for my trip to Michigan, dealing with my best friend's disapproval.
Coming back to the real world after camp is a MAJOR DRAG.
Bye for now.
Love, Rebecca
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