A Celebratory Caning

At 4pm yesterday afternoon I submitted my PhD thesis. At 4pm today I was setting out plates for celebratory dinner, anticipating the caning I was going to get to mark my last evening as a student.

Two of our friends were coming over, one of whom happened to be the first person to cane me after I arrived in England for grad school. Abel thought it was fitting that should also deliver the last strokes of my student life. At first I was appalled by this idea: Mr Friend canes hard, and this dinner was supposed to be a *celebration*, for God’s sake. However, as I cleared piles of my papers off every surface in the house, and set out place mats and shiny cutlery, I gradually began to see the ultimate fairness of this suggestion. I believe in marking milestones in an appropriate way.* A caning to round off fifteen years of full-time education (and I do count the primary school) would give me the sense of closure. I still dreaded it, but I was beginning to accept it.

Abel cooked a beautiful dinner; the four of us polished off two bottles of wine and got started on champaign and cherry liquors, and I started to think that maybe the caning wouldn’t happen today after all – nobody mentioned it, and we were sitting on the sofa, chatting about pervy things (to come in future blog posts, I’m sure) when Mr Friend’s wife (who has expressed a wish to be known as K.) leaned close and whispered: “I want to cane you.” If either of the men initiated it, I might make a great show of protest and fear, but here I was disarmed: she wasn’t suggesting that I somehow deserved it – just that she want to cane me, and who would refuse a beautiful girl who wants to paint tramlines on your bottom? I didn’t.

I went upstairs and fetched a cane. Abel and Mr Friend were happy to wait for their turn. K squeezed my shoulder in encouragement, and guided me over the arm of the sofa, where Abel could hold my hands and stroke my hair to help me get through it.

K is excellent in warming you up with the cane: sharp taps over my jeans which bit, but didn’t burn me. An occasional harder slash made me kick up my foot, but I tried to be stoic. Something about being caned by people who are nice to me throughout, brings out in me a need to be brave for them.** The strength of the cuts grew; even my jeans were beginning to heat up. K pressed her hands against my bottom, and only then did I feel the ridges rising on my flesh; she ran her nails across them, and I felt like screaming. But I wanted to be brave, too. Abel stroked the side of my face, and K said she wanted to see how much damage she was doing. I pushed down my jeans and settled down over the arm of the couch again.

K leaned to me, put her lips against my ear and whispered: “Can you take 6 hard ones?”

I wanted to take six hard strokes from her, even though I knew that when she was finished, Abel would take up the cane, and after him Mr Friend would step up to deliver his share. I braced myself, digging my nails into the upholstery.

They hurt, every one of them, and I couldn’t keep count for anything, though I could probably tell you where each stroke landed. Yet, every rush of pain made me stronger. By the time those six were over, I knew I could take my licks from the men.

It was Abel’s turn. K took his place on the sofa, holding my hands. I don’t think there was an unmarked spot on my bottom by this time, so every time the cane touched my skin – even when Abel was addressing it with light taps – I felt it as a separate, stingy stroke. Again, I lost count. And again, I tried my best to be brave. I failed only once, when instead of delivering the stroke he slashed the cane through the air; if K wasn’t holding my hands, I would have leapt up halfway to the ceiling. Abel gave me his six, alternating reassurance with painful squeezes of my bottom. K offered me my glass of champaign while the cane changed hands.*** “You’re such a good girl,” she whispered. I squeezed her hands in gratitude.

Finally, Mr Friend came to deliver his strokes. I’m sure he would have liked me to be apprehensive, but I was flying. Despite struggling to cope with each stroke – I couldn’t help kicking out and yelping any more – I needed this last caning of my student life to be hard. I had been 21 when I started grad school; I had been frightened and often sad, and, because people often told me that I was wise for my age, I had thought I was done growing up. At 26, I know better.**** I often wish I had a way to tell that sad girl far away from home that it would all turn out well; that at the end of that rainbow there were rewards she couldn’t imagine. Tonight we had the pain in common. There’s no going back to the girl I used to be (and thank God for that), but there was closure for me, which meant more than I could have imagined when I was setting out the dinner plates a few hours before.

When it was done, I had a hug and a kiss from all three, and I pulled my jeans back on. I couldn’t – and still can’t – comprehend not being a student any more. It’s true, though: it’s done, I’m done. There is still a defense to go through before I’m allowed to graduate, but in about ten minutes I forever lose my claim to discounted movie tickets, and that means it’s real: it’s finished.

I mean, the tax man says I’m an adult. The tax man and about 35 cane strokes make for a very convincing argument whenever I’m tempted to think otherwise.

——————————–
* You should see what a big deal I make out of my birthday
** Whereas if a top shows a tiniest bit of meanness, I kick and thrash around, and generally show zero intent to cooperate.
*** It was my first sip of alcohol while bending over. I should do it again; it’s quite nice.
**** Not being a virgin any more also helps.

15 thoughts on “A Celebratory Caning

  • 30 September, 2006 at 12:36 am
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    What a wonderful, beautiful post, thank you for sharing such a massive milestone with us :)Well done on submitting your PhD Thesis (with time to spare!)and on taking your caning so well. Shame about the discounted movie tickets though! x x

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  • 30 September, 2006 at 12:39 am
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    Woo hoo! Congratulations on finishing your thesis, Haron! That’s great news. Definitely an achievement to be proud of.

    And it sounds like the celebration was the perfect way to mark the event. No pun intended, of course. No, of course not. 😉

    Again, congrats.

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  • 30 September, 2006 at 1:47 am
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    CONGRATULATIONS!

    I can understand that weird transition in identity from being a student to not-a-student, but still, you’re DONE. :-)

    Way to go. With the thesis, the school stuff, the caning, and all of it.

    Brava!

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  • 30 September, 2006 at 2:53 am
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    Many many congratulations indeed. And you see? Back when you started I told you you’d probably finish first!

    This was such a sexy entry btw. And a wonderful marking of a great milestone!

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  • 30 September, 2006 at 4:42 am
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    Absolutely fantastic, Haron! Congratulations.

    So what can Abel spank you for next? Do you have a novel in the offing?

    (Clearly, I’m interested in my own prospects for voyeurism here.)

    sparkle

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  • 30 September, 2006 at 6:45 am
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    CONGRATS honey!!!!! I’m so proud of you, not that you need my praise. That *was* a rather hot story, I wish I had been there to share in it.

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  • 30 September, 2006 at 11:53 am
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    Congrats Haron!! Can’t believe you’re done with studying! I know you worked hard, but lucky you to be over it now!! *hoping she finishes also in 4 years! sigh* (Unfortunately, as you can see, my fear of studying is bigger than the one of spanking. hehe Sorry.)

    Anyway, a caning to celebrate! Congrats again!! I’m really happy for you!

    Huge hugs,
    Kay

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  • 1 October, 2006 at 7:53 pm
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    A huge hug and even more congratulations for you! I can’t believe it’s over either. And what a lovely, lovely entry. Mmmmm…

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  • 2 October, 2006 at 1:15 am
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    Hi, and congratulations on your PhD!!!
    Actually I’m reading your posts since I’ve started working on my thesis, I still have a long way ahead, but I can assure you that your blog provided a LOT of inspiration (and incentives 😉 so far (no, I am NOT working on Tyrer vs UK case ;))
    I just had a small question on my mind lately… what is it with researchers and spanking? I think there must be this freudian link something… don’t you?
    Hugs and thanks for the great blog!
    M.

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  • 2 October, 2006 at 9:43 am
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    Thank you, everyone, for cheering me on. :) I don’t know what I’d been looking forward to more – finishing the thing, or going online to tell everybody about it.

    Sparkle – don’t you worry, there are plenty self-improvement projects Abel can help me with. They all had to simmer in the background for a while, but now I have to go back to things like my piano, and keeping up with the languages, and fiction writing…

    Millie – welcome :) If you ever want to moan about your research, you know where to come! I have no idea how spankos come to be represented so well in academia. Perhaps it’s that in order to do research you need to have some deep-seated masochism?

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  • 2 October, 2006 at 10:29 am
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    Thanks, Haron!
    Speaking of clear signs of the existence of spankos in academia, I don’t know if you noticed that almost every lawyer, no matter if he/she is a human rights lawyer or not, tends to know the ECHR cases on spanked kids or on sadomasochism.
    Moreover, I was very surprised to read an article about writing a thesis some time ago where the author was discussing the relationship between the student and the supervisor. One of the sentences started like this: “the student, often at the feet of the supervisor…” :) Very mmmm I would say!

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  • 2 October, 2006 at 11:39 am
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    Congratulations! I can completely understand the need for closure, as well. What a lovely way to end it – far more genteel than the close of my MPhil!

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  • 2 October, 2006 at 5:59 pm
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    A great entry and indeed there is much to celebrate in submission. Congratulations.

    And I kind of hate to do this, but my own experience was that the submission was only the start of another round of studying.

    Getting ready for the defense was awful. Going over old notes, reading books and papers that I had used years before in the early days of the project, suddenly coming across paragraphs that made me cringe (and they certainly made the examiners cringe – a lot). I suspect that you’ll find reason enough to be a proper student for a few weeks yet. And we all know what that means …

    And as for the Freudian link that Millie asked about. I still struggle with understanding what he meant in his paper, ‘A Child is Being Beaten’, which is, of course, his work on spanking fantasies.

    In a 1997 book, On Freud’s “A Child is Being Beaten”, one American psychoanalyst mentions that, ‘In my own clinical practice I have seldom heard an account of the explicit fantasy of being beaten on the buttocks’. For some reason that little sentence has always amused me. I guess it means that one or two of his clients did a little bit of censoring on the couch.

    And I really like the idea of sipping champagne during a caning. Seems as if that bottle I opened last night went to waste. We only drank it to accompany the smoked salmon.

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  • 3 October, 2006 at 1:44 pm
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    congrats on finishing haron! and this was an incredibly beautiful post, wow. although i haven’t been reading you guys for long it gave me a beautiful glimpse of your journey.

    and i totally agree, if she’s being nice to you then how can you say no or make any kind of fuss? i think there’s something different about it being another woman too but i don’t know whether you’d agree with that.

    i feel for you with being finished. that’s fantastic. :)

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  • 9 December, 2006 at 4:39 pm
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    Haron,

    This is a late post, but this account of yours was one of the first intense spanking experiences of someone else’s that I’ve read about. I have to say that I come back to it a lot in my thinking.

    I did find it striking, too, because of three people involved. I don’t, to speak for myself, imagine being spanked by a few different people or even by or in the presence of someone other than my husband. I think I would die of shame.

    Reply

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