You Will Never Believe What I Just Saw and How Normal and Boring It Became (Part One)

          The Eulenspiegel Society (TES) is a non-profit corporation of and for people interested in leather, sadism, masochism, and other sexual minorities started in 1971 by Pat Bond. The stated aims of TES are “gaining acceptance for alternative lifestyles, education, and promoting social contact.” TES is names after Till Eulenspiegel, “a figure in German folklore whose practical jokes amused and attracted the women but angered the men.” Till Eulenspiegel is extended as a symbol for how actions and behaviors that amuse some anger other outside of that population. The exploration of sexual scripts and cultures has always interested me and the ability to observe an S&M community in a semi-natural environment excited me.

            In a conversation with my mother, I mentioned my upcoming trip to TES. To my surprise, she not only knew what TES was but had been there about 30 years ago. Her best friend at the time (now my brother’s godmother) was a seminary student interested in TES in relation to the boundaries imposed by the Catholic Church. I called her up to ask about her impressions of TES 30 years ago and she recalled people in a place that had a lot of “negative energy.” Warning me to be careful and to not go alone, I headed down to the TES meeting on sounds with Alessandra.

            Having preconceived notions about what I was about to walk into seems normal. Guessing about the unknown enables me to both calm and excite myself as I sit on the subway. Where I’m headed is filled with seemingly oxymoronic situations. At the same time, the venue is going to be dark, cold, and damp but also medically sterile; there will be chains hanging on the walls, ready to hold subjects up but also metal medical trays holding sterile instruments; people are dressed in leather and black gloves but also wearing nurses’ outfits. Strangely, the images going through my mind did somehow come together, just never in a way I would have imagined.

            The waiting room outside the door of TES was actually the seating area of an acting studio. At 7:30pm, we were allowed to enter the room that had been set-up beforehand. I first saw about five rows of chairs that were separated into two five-seat per row sections making about 50 seats all together for the audience. On the back wall was a table with information about TES as well as flyers for events, business cards for different places, and a card on how to deal with law enforcement. In front of the information table was the set up: a table that looked like a portable massage table, another table next to that with an array of gadgets, gloves, alcohol, Betadine, cotton swabs, sterilized gauze, wee-wee pads, towels, a syringe filled with KY jelly, a tube of KY jelly, and two chairs. On the right side of the room was the table I paid at and was given a packet with information about sounds. All of the tables were lines with thick black fabric covering mattresses to absorb the noise (the meeting was inside one of the acting studios). The black curtains made me a little uneasy. Back in the waiting area, Alessandra and I had nudged each other and commented on how surprised we were that no one was wearing leather and leashes.

            After a few minutes, the room was packed with mostly white men and women who were from the greater New York area. Alessandra and I had secured seats in the second row—just far enough from the action to feel separate from it, just close enough to be able to see well. To me, there was a clear divide between audience and demonstrators/performers but there were also about six people sitting closer who seemed to be there as authority figured or the heads of the board. One woman was seated very close to the demonstrators and acted as the assistant. Everyone seemed to know each other and was very willing to talk to Alessandra and me. One of the people who sat in from of us, John*, introduced himself and had a small conversation with us about being submissive versus dominant and how there really is a spectrum of preference. As a submissive male, he introduced us to his partner who would be assisting the demonstrators, Lady Velvet Eagle and Thrash. John was a submissive partner as a lifestyle and explained that Thrash was a slave to Lady Velvet Eagle as a lifestyle. John saw this as going overboard but was quick shrug and note that different lifestyles work for different people and that the demonstrators were very happy together. Interestingly, a lot, if not all, of the members of TES had different names such as Lady Velvet Eagle and Snake Eyes that they referred to each other by. In the opening statement, the person made sure to be inclusive in her words of the transgender and queer communities. Being inclusive of sexual minorities of any type is in no way strange for TES, but since they are specifically geared toward the transgender or queer communities, it seemed noteworthy that they make a point to be inclusive.