We travel a great deal right now. We spend a good amount of time in our car between our present home and our future home and the ride is a good six hours. One essential for travel is a good audio book and I’m the librarian who gets to find suitable reads.
Norseman has specific tastes in literature. There is violence and plenty of shooting for sure, but swords and shields are satisfactory should the era be pre-gunpowder. Explosions are a plus. A good torture scene is always appreciated.
My tastes will never mesh with His therefore I find myself “zoning out” often during a ‘listen’. Sir loves historical yarns and sometimes these can have some interesting references.
The book we are listening to currently keeps referring to a practice called ‘birching’. It’s some historical novel I think from the first millennium and it goes on FOREVER. I got hung up on the way they kept referring to ‘birching’. Birch is a noun as in the tree but also a verb and historically it was used for punishments in schools, penal institutions and wherever else. The last official “birching” in a penal setting was in 1956 on youthful offenders on the Isle of Mann. Wikipedia has a very descriptive article complete with etchings. The writer specifically states the punishment is to be given on the bare buttocks. I was fascinated.
Since my Master is a ‘mountain man’ we spend a great deal of time outdoors, on trails and in the forest. I have received many a spontaneous whipping outdoors when Master found a good switch or stick that made his palm itch. When my Sir has a spanking up his sleeve his environment provides him with many opportunities. I thought, therefore, ‘my Master is going to like this’ and I opened the discussion on one of our trips.
“Do you know how they talk about ‘birching’ in this book? Do you know what that means? I looked it up.” I said. He answered, “It’s caning, right?” I then explained what my research turned up and caning wasn’t exactly synonymous. “It’s a bunch of twigs” I explained. This opened a dialogue on the type of twigs which lasted quite awhile, because my Master is nothing if not thorough. He argued that ‘birch’ wouldn’t be effective. (Norseman is all about his punishments being ‘effective). I researched further and found out ‘birch’ is just another word for ‘branches’ with reference to the bundle that was used and willow and hazel were particularly good because of the ‘whipiness’. As I read on, I found out the branches were bundled and bound then soaked in brine (I think the brine softened them and also worked as a disinfectant since they knew skin would be broken).
It was a fun discussion, and I loved the fantasies in my head that came as a result. I had no idea if my Norseman would even recollect the subject, since we talk about all sorts of things when we are together. We did touch on the subject of the various types of benches and birching ‘horses’ used, the latter getting stuck in my ‘kink’ vault in the ‘gotta have’ drawer. That passed and we went on to another book and it was forgotten. Or so I thought.
Not long after I broke one of Sir’s ‘rules’, I can’t remember what rule it was, but we were on our new property where we are installing the infrastructure for a future build. All that exists there now is an RV camper and I get flustered and disorganized when I am there. I kept losing the keys and after my swearing to the almighty that HE had them I found them in my pocket. At that point he ordered me to ‘Bend Over’ which I did laughingly. “Drop them” he commanded which I did reluctantly. Even though we are in the middle of 14 acres it felt like every neighbor for miles around might see.
Master said, “You’ve been asking about this” as he cut several branches, and I felt ‘the birch’. When I fantasize about something and fixate on it by reading, collecting pictures and data, then share it with my Sir, I naturally imagine a certain type of result. I never get what I imagine because Master never tells me beforehand what is going to happen. It’s always a surprise and it really feeds my submissive mindset. I must accept and be grateful for anything my Master gives. It’s the part of the M/s that really makes me work. Trust me-if I could I would have a lot more input on the ‘what’s going to happen’ I would but that’s never going to happen.
This was my first experience with ‘the Birch’ and it was effective (My Sir’s punishments must be ‘effective’). I thanked him for the ‘loving’ correction and humbly said I would try to be more cognizant of keys in the future then enjoyed a lengthy lecture on my lack of focus (or something like that. I don’t remember because I was lost in reliving the experience of my first ‘Birching’!)