The Hammock of Aftercare

Time spent at J2D is time well spent: so much is achieved before I've even poured my first cup of tea.  Before lunch, I accomplished two successful, impromptu photoshoots with some truly beautiful couples (inside and out), and secured a future as a photographer for the sim.  (I'm sure there will be more of us, in time, who love to take pictures and who will donate their gifts to the very worthy J2D.)

Sometimes it's hard for me to say in words what I can say with a picture.  Articulating what I mean to say, verbally, is good training.  If we cannot articulate with words, we're trapped.  Words are, after all, our only reality... unless we can show some other way.  During one conversation today, I wanted to answer a question that was posed to me: "What does aftercare mean to you?"  It's one of those questions that continues to pop up (like "topping from the bottom" and "switch") regardless of where I go and with whom I speak.  But I suppose the best way that I know how to answer that question about what it means to me (as opposed to what it means in general)  is, "It means neither of you will exhaust your loving selves."

I realize, now, that a very long time ago, when I was privileged to be in a relationship with an excellent roleplay-Master (no longer in the game) that I was exposed to fine, fine aftercare.  I miss it now, keenly.  I have not forgotten the grooming of my tastes.  But I digress...  What does it mean to me?  Aftercare will restore the heartbeat to normal; will gentle the senses back to normal; will still the blood and cool the flush.  It will preserve the sanity.  It will taste like a chocolate mint after a salty supper.  And the mint will linger and freshen, cleanly, watery and soft.  On this little archipelago, for example, a solitary tree, some rocks, vast ocean, and a wooden shack.  The wind moves my hair as I stand innocently at the door to that little shack, shivering from a sudden chill and the absence of birds, thunder rolling in from the north, and then footsteps crunching the sand behind me.  The force-fantasy inside the little shack ends after several hours of intense, disciplined creativity and mood-refining, and then nearby there is The Hammock of Aftercare.

I just named this hammock now, at this moment.  I hope Wendy Xeno doesn't mind (all these pictures are from her sim Humanoid, a lovely place to imagine yourself in).  Thinking symbolically, the little table is to intimacy what the hammock is to aftercare.  The hammock for two is the place where both of you are suspended in the caring arms of each other.  The Dom and the sub both get to enjoy the aftermath of satisfied exhaustion and the aftercare of re-building.  The Hammock  is not an established D/s ritual... it's just something I invented (and maybe others invented also, in other places and other times).   For a long time, I have passed by hammocks and thought them cozy; but now that I immerse myself into Our Lifestyle I understand The Hammock of Aftercare  to be a sacred place, just like Intimacy is a Small Table.

But how can I describe the hammock other than to show it?  It looks flimsy; it's easily overlooked, in fact.  But to those who know what it means, to those who know how valuable it is (how life-saving, relationship-saving, and pretty damned important all around) they can recognize The Hammock of Aftercare no matter what sim they are standing in.  It is a net, with pillows.  It is the safety net.  It is the cradle we all require when we've just finished something dangerous.  You'll see The Hammock situated in so many places you visit, in Second Life.  The fantasy is in the familiar:  The Hammock of Aftercare is as much a requirement of the fantasy as the seduction, the ropes, the sweat, and the cries of ecstasy.