Is everybody okay?

Right now, over 200 wildfires are burning out of control in British Columbia and California. Many of my readers live on the west coast of Canada and the USA, and on behalf of all my readers, I hope that you are safe and out of harm's way. Our thoughts and prayers are with all of you.

Let us know if you are safe.

The Same, Only Different

I grew up in a city that was sharply and clearly divided into separate groups that tolerated and accommodated one another, interacted out of necessity, but usually avoided one another. Some of the factors at work in determining the makeup of these divisions included socioeconomic level, race, language and, not surprisingly, religion.

Where schoolchildren were concerned, it was easy to tell who belonged to what group, because uniforms were mandatory at both the Protestant and the Catholic schools. During the school year, a quick glance told you who was an ally and who was someone to steer clear of, as well as which language to use to address that young person.

Younger girls wore tunics very similar to the ones in this picture I found on the internet.



Older students wore uniforms similar to these. The colours were different at each school.




An incident from my childhood comes to mind. I was ten years old, and my friend and I went to the park on a summer afternoon to spend a few carefree hours on the swings. Uniforms had been put away for two months, and the park was full of anonymous children dressed in t-shirts and shorts.

We approached the playground apparatus and saw two girls, roughly our age, climbing the jungle gym. We paused and listened, and were pleased to hear that they spoke English. So we joined them, and although we didn't know one another, somehow we quickly discovered that we all loved Barbie dolls. For the next half hour we chatted happily about Barbie, Ken, Midge and all the details of life with fashion model dolls. We eventually got around to exchanging names, but then someone asked the inevitable question.

"What school do you go to?"

"Wellington School." That was the Protestant school two blocks away. "How about you?"

"St. Martha's." That was the English Catholic girls' school.

"Oh."

"Well, we gotta go now."

"Us too. See ya."

"See ya."

And that was that. We never saw them again. That was just the way it was back then.

The reason I mentioned this incident at all was because in some way it's similar to the distinctions that sometimes arise among us. Those of us who enjoy reading these blogs are all spanking enthusiasts of one sort or another, but it's easy to apply labels that lead to judgements and misunderstandings. DD, D/s, TPE, TTWD, S&M, BDSM, erotic spanking, disciplinary spanking, playful spanking - yes, they're all different from one another in significant ways, but the similarities are what bring us all together as a spanking community.

I hope we can all play nicely together in the same sandbox.

You Said What?

Last week Ron had lunch with a good friend. That evening he brought me up to date on the latest news about Greg, his married son and his unmarried daughter. I listened with interest, but noticed that he hadn't mentioned Greg's wife. Finally, with a frown, Ron said, "So I asked Greg about Penny."

"And?"

Ron looked concerned. "He said she didn't want to be spanked."

"Oh! What? You asked him about--? You told him--?" I saw the corners of his mouth twitch. "No you didn't!" Ron laughed, delighted that he had fooled me.

I giggled and asked, "What about him? Maybe he would like to be spanked. Some men do, you know."

Ron agreed. "Okay, next time I'll ask him. 'Greg, do you want to be spanked?'"

"Not like that," I laughed. "He'll think you're offering to spank him." I got a swat on the bottom for saying that.

I wonder what those two had for lunch.

Friends Award

Angelbrat gave me this award:

“These blogs are exceedingly charming. These kind bloggers aim to find and be friends. They are not interested in self-aggrandizement. Our hope is that when the ribbons of these prizes are cut, even more friendships are propagated. Please give more attention to these writers.”

The Rules to accepting this award: “Deliver this award to eight bloggers who must choose eight more and include this cleverly-written text in the body of their award.

Limiting my choice to eight was almost impossible, because I would like to send this award to all my friends. But I chose eight blogs who haven't already received the award (yet). I'm happy to pass this on to some of our newer bloggers as well as a few old friends! Please visit them all and tell them Hermione sent you. I'm sure you'll enjoy your time with each and every one of them.

Ms. Betty
Lil Sam
Devlin
Ronnie
Abby
Spanky
Cigi
Recidavist