SIR | object

During this Holiday season I have had little to give the boys in an emotional sense. In spite of Leather Family, friends, and a supportive partner, I have felt alone. I have been focused on how to survive the end of December, a period usually filled with the joy of Yuletide.

My partner observed my struggle this season and admonished me last week to focus on myself. This is challenging when others look to me for mentorship and service in the form of guidance. I have little to give to them. And the boys, concerned about SIR, want to help but there is nothing that they can do. Surviving the first Holiday without my mother has been one of the most painful times of my life.

My struggle to survive has has caused me to think about the question I usually ask SIR contestants in interviews, “What makes you a SIR?” I have yet to hear the answer that I want to hear, a comment pointing to the fact that a SIR is defined by the role he plays in a boy's life. Given that I have offered little to the boys during this Holiday season, I question if I am indeed a SIR.

A SIR should always strong for his boys. A SIR should not vulnerable to depression and despair. Leather textbooks say nothing about those moments when a SIR feels vulnerable to his own emotions. Images do not exist showing SIRs in contemplation and grief. Indeed, the palette of emotions that a SIR should show seems to be limited. A butch man castrated by a fantasy self.

The roles that have historically emerged in our Community are idealized portraits. The praxis of SIR/boy has been modified by fiction, porn, and the fantastical images of visual artists. They exist solely as models, sexual paradigms. Images that fuel our fantasies during masturbation.

As I look in the mirror each morning, I do not actually see myself. Rather, I see a self through the filter of my experience and my desire. An idea that I use as a measure. To see myself honestly and outside of this measure is also an idea, an impossibility. I submit that there is no escape other than to recognize this process, especially in times of crisis. In short, the understanding of myself as SIR must always be approximate.

Recognizing this process is an honest act. An act of integrity and strength. As counsel to boys, I invoke the wise words of a foolish man. “To thine own self be true.”

Removing the collar

Last week I removed the collar from one of the boys in my family prior to receiving medical treatment. As I turned the key to the lock and slid it from around his neck, I said, “Remember that the collar is still there, even if the chain is not.”

The collar was simply the outward sign of the bond between us, Sir and boy The remnant of continuing negotiations.

Physical attraction plays an integral role in identifying a potential boy. After acknowledging this attraction through sexual play, I allow the relationship to gestate for a period of months in order to learn what role I might occupy in the boy's life. I allow the relationship to grow naturally. The boy receives a collar when we both understand what role I will have in his life.

Even before a collar, the boy needs to show that he is committed to the Leather Family and to his Mentor. He must understand the boundaries for proper behavior, the protocols that define the relationship between himself and his Sir. And he must understand that this bond is not easily broken. The collar is simply the vestigial manifestation of the familial bond.

As I remind my boys often, “you are extensions of Myself.”