Putting on my collar

This week I went in for a mammogram… just one of those pesky routine diagnostics that they start prescribing as I get older and older.  I don’t love it, but I don’t hate it either… it is not painful, just a bit awkward and uncomfortable.  The lady was nice, quick, efficient… nice in a professionally detached kind of way that I really appreciate.  I don’t find overly chatty, friendly x-ray technicians help me relax… I am all about getting in, getting squished and getting out in the shortest amount of time possible.

But this is not about x-ray technicians or squishing boobs… it is about my collar.  I wasn’t sure if they would want me to take off my collar and it does take a tiny little Allen wrench to turn the hidden little set screw.  I can do this by myself.  I have complete permission to take off my collar for medical and other type things… in fact I carry a spare little Allen wrench in my purse if there is any kind of emergency.

It was funny… I chose to take my collar off before I left the house and I teasingly asked Master, “Do you notice anything different about me?”  He stared at me for a long time before he noticed it was gone and then his eyes narrowed in a very strange way.  It was hard to tell if he was angry or shocked or hurt.  But all humor had instantly evaporated.  I was instantly babbling… explaining… reminding him of my mammogram… and he quickly relaxed. 

And I thought about that moment in the car as I drove to the doctor’s office and then as I drove off to work afterward.  I can take if off… I can put it on… it does not really change anything about me… not really… not inside.  But symbols are important… that and the fact that Master has found all he has to do to shut me up… turn me instantly still, pliant, silent is to slip his fingers inside the rigid ring of steel and tug.  (He very much likes that part… and um… so do I?)

I thought about the fact that I can be the one that puts it on… what that symbolizes.  In fact while having Master’s fingers on my neck, his hands carefully turning the Allen wrench can turn my insides to mush, the basic truth is that I am the one that must assume this role… that must internalize being his… being collared. 

When I finished my appointment and pulled that cool ring of metal out of my purse and slipped it around my neck.  When I carefully got out the Allen wrench and meticulously turned the screw.  I thought about how I was not doing this casually… that the very act made me pause and think… I choose to wear this collar… I choose to be his… I choose to be enslaved. 

Sometimes, late in the night, as I lay snuggled down, warm in safe in the night next to my Master I find my fingers looped around my collar, holding tight… somehow safer and more secure with the rigidity… the strength… the inflexibility… it feels warm to my fingers…