I am heading back from Los Angeles, and I wasn’t tied up once. This was remarkable because I spent the whole four days with a number of people who do that to others to create fantasies. This was not my time to be tied, but oh how the dreams rushed back.

Let’s go back to where these dreams started.

As a vulnerable preteen, the sight of leotards and tights and unitards as they were called, always turned me on. From Pat Benatar to Deborah Shelton, Victoria Principal to Erin Gray, I was obsessed with the shine. And even though I had never seen it except on Batman and The Avengers, the sight of someone tied as a damsel in distress made me feel all, well, ‘damselly’ inside.

I wanted to be them, but certainly, I was the strange one. I was the only one who felt these urges. I wasn’t normal.

It wasn’t until I was in college that I went to my first Adult Book Store… and there it was… on the shelf, second row back, on the top rack. It was a picture of my dreams. Maria Tortuga, fiery, determined, in her black rubber catsuit, shiny and sleek, with sky high heels on tied to a cross the likes of which I had never seen. That vision is still imprinted on my mind. That moment will be forever in my memory.

On the seedy street called Harry Hines (I know. We called it Hairy Hiney too) in Dallas. Texas, I discovered I was not alone. 

When talking to legends of the industry this weekend like Lorelei Mission, Jon Woods and Eric Holman, and later Dominic Wolfe, the story was not unfamiliar to them.

So how did I come to be face to face with these incredible people who wrote my dreams? It was an invitation to appear in a video myself as the Shadow Demon in the Ultragirl series from Sam Binder. We had become friends through the podcast, and believe ir or not, after a long convincing of me to do it, I found myself in LA staying with Lorelei, Jon and Eric.

Naturally, I had so many questions for them, but those would be saved for a podcast we would record the second night I was there (and you will hear it soon on Authentically Kinky.)

Instead we talked about the important questions. “Who was the greatest creator?” “Why is Groucho such a genius?” Real talk. Adult talk. Insightful conversation – the kind of conversation that I love to have but is so very rare. 

Later that night, they told me that in the room I was sleeping in were boxes upon boxes of all the issues of the Harmony Magazines… the very same magazines I saw in that shop at age 18. When I asked if I could look through them, the response was as long as I could get to them. You see, the house had been rearranged from storage for our shoot for the Ultragirl series, but luckily many were within reach. 

Leafing through the pages, I saw all the memories. Betsy DuMont, Laurel Blake, Holly Summers, Dottie Von Dryk, Debra Lee, Ashley Renee and the foundation of bondage’s Mount Rushmore, Darla Crane. There were the pictures of the models that I knew only briefly but their helplessness imprinted on my mind. There were the columns from Simone Devon and Jon Woods, and the hundreds of pictures of and by Kristine Imboch, who later became Lorelei.

Hours upon hours of looking at them in the evenings, and not once did my hand go down my pants or over my catsuit as they might have back in my younger days. Instead, my mind went back to the days when I first discovered kink in the form I understand now. I had no idea how revolutionary the publications were.

In their salute to Harmony founder Robert Q Harmon on their site “Bedroom Bondage,” Eric, Jon and Lorelei pointed out that Harmony made the models humans instead of objects and in the treatment of the women to celebrate their love of what they do. In that writing, they said:

In an era when most bondage producers’ content was heavily misogynistic, he coined the term “Love Bondage,” and his “Harmony Philosophy,” which promoted sexual bondage play as a consensual activity between willing partners, appeared in every one of his publications. Since the beginning of his company, he identified the women appearing in his magazines with permanent model names, which was revolutionary at a time when most performers in the genre had no fixed names.

Consensual. Named, and saluting the world of how the ropes and restraints made them feel. I am not Pollyanna enough to say that models all did it because they liked it, it was a modeling gig. But there were those who genuinely would be lost in the moments spent in those ropes. One weekend talking to Lorelei let me know how real that is. She lived for being in the ropes and giving a good moment to those she tied. 

At this weekend’s shoot, there was loads of laughter and joy.

“You’re just so cute,” Lorelei would say as she focused the lens on the bound Ashley Lane and Ophelia Kaan. And from underneath the devilish cleave gags that my character had mystically put on them, there were so many smiles and laughter.

It was not all sunshine and rainbows. Some were having a bad day and doing their best to get through, others were in the pain that age can cause, and even my knees were aching a little more than I was used to, but there we all were, making fantasies come true.

Which takes me back to my own fantasies. Former podcast guest and legendary fetish model Christina Carter said to me, “you really look at what we do in a way I have never thought of.”

Indeed she was right. I am excited not by the vision of a breast or the tantalization of lingerie. I am entranced by the idea of what the model is thinking. I want to feel what the costume feels like on me, stretched over my body. I want to be captured in the ropes so perfectly placed. I want to struggle and wonder if I can get out and if I can’t, who will rescue me, or put me in more peril. I imagined that I was the one in the catsuit like Maria. I imagined I was the one being tantalized by Mistress Stephanie Locke. I wanted to be Pia Sands in the first version of spandex restraint made real by John Floyd and later Noelle Nielson.  

And so I dreamed, with every picture, with every writing, with every memory. It brought forward the realization to me that bondage is an important part of my journey and I want to investigate it more. Public parties don’t usually make for great places for a damsel. However, there are friends who understand what this mindset does for me. In negotiations, I may ask to be put in some damsel tie while awaiting the fate that is in front of me, like a flogging or paddling. I want to live for the tune in tomorrow, same Bat Time, same Bat Channel.

As the William Dozier voice might say, in a remote hideout high in the hills, it was my honor to be the guest of a well known producer.  Joining us were three models and their significant others. and someone who I had not met, but knew of from his Harmony days. While most would have so many questions to ask, I put most of them behind me and just took in the evening. It was a night of amazing food, games (of the board variety) and a movie which I had talked about on the podcast. 

For the second feature, we viewed scenes from another of his movies and there I was sitting next to one of the stars, watching her smile and grimace at how real the situation was, but joyful to see the final product. I loved the scenes and they made me wish I was one of the people in it. 

As I said goodbye to everyone, it was saying goodbye to friends. The models were the ones on the screen. The humans were the people I was hugging… not some fantasy. I’ll give you a little secret identity point. These women are so much better than they are on the screen. They are dreamers, working through life’s challenges, entrepreneurs, and fabulously kind and beautiful from their heart, and not just their looks.  At the same time my fandom went to the backburner. They were just friends and so much better that way. They welcomed me, gave me a hard time. We joked, and we even cried. Wonder Women whose wonder came not from a costume, and the remarkable men who support them every day through the highs and lows.

I got back to Lorelei’s at nearly midnight, knowing I had to be up at 530 for my flight. I packed up, and placed in my bag a few magazines they let me have so my memories would be close by. But the memories in my heart will live on forever. 

I shared this with Lorelei in the Catsuit Notebook I gave her… I hope it speaks to the hope they gave to me and why I am who I am. I am Catsuit, but I am also Jon, there to be a friend and thankful for a lifetime of perspective shared with me.

From a 12 year old who thought he was abnormal, thank you.
From the 18 year old who thought he was alone, thank you.
From the 30 year old who wasn’t sure he could be vanilla, thank you.
From the 50 year old searching for his authenticity, thank you.
From the 60 year old who found their authenticity, thank you.
Lorelei, the work you did to bring bedroom bondage to the world allowed us to know that we had people who loved the same things we did. 
It allowed us to be turned on by the sight of a bound woman with something left to the imagination.
It was not about the sex, it was about the feeling.
It allowed some of us to dream they were those damsels.
You, Eric and Jon all gave me a reason to believe.
You gave me the pathway to dream.
You gave me the chance to be who I knew I could be.
You made a difference, every single day… for me… for others… for the dreamers… and for those who discovered their authentic selves.