It’s been a topic in my mind in the past, and it came up in a little group chat the other day.

Friends and friendships.  Particularly within kink and/or the industry.

Particular frustrations, to paraphrase, “I thought we were friends, but we don’t talk any more and she no longer replies to me; was I just a customer”
I mean. Possibly. And it can be hard. If you thought the nature of your relationship was different to how the other person saw it.

But friendships in general are very complex.

A SAD REMINDER

I don’t want to give anyone an existential crisis but we probably all have people who we used to be close with, friends with, who we don’t really talk to any more.

School friends – we grow up, go down different routes.
Work Colleagues – especially as we or they change customers.
Others in our social circles – as our circles or lives change.

There’s an old saying that one day we were out playing with friends and went in because it was dark, or for our evening meals, or whatever – and we never actually played with them again.
And this was unknown to us at the time.

WERE THEY OUR FRIENDS?

But add in. A lot in our circles were not our friends.
People who were in our class, but that’s all.
People who we worked with, could be civil with, maybe even get on in an office – but we wouldn’t want to go for a pint after work, let alone have over our houses or so on.
And people who just went to the same bars as us, or were friends of a friend but not OUR friend.

And this is the same. If you see ladies frequently announcing doing stuff together, they may well be friends.
But sometimes clients arrange their own double sessions and the providers aren’t friends.
People working at the same dungeon or premises, that might be all they have in common.
And a photo together at an event happy and smiling is good mutual promo and doesn’t mean anything more.

FRIENDS – OR CUSTOMER SERVICE

So this is something which comes on to clients.
If you go to a restaurant, the waiting staff are friendly to you. Not because they want to be your friend, but because it is their job and it’s good customer service.
If you went to a restaurant and the service was awful, staff were rude, then even if the food is good you might be less likely to go again. (Unless we’re talking something like Karen’s – where rude service is part of the show)

So yes. A provider is going to be friendly to you, because they want you to recommend them, want you to come again, or that it’s simply their job.

(As a side note : some people use this to demand niceties from people online; “you deserve me politeness, as I am a potential customer” – this is obviously being done in bad faith)

Of course, if you’re an arse they might tell you to ‘get fucked’ which is probably a sign they’d rather you didn’t book again. Something sadly some employed can’t do.

OVER FAMILIAR

But, yeah. One of the problems is that people get too familiar.
A Domme once told me, that she tells all her sub, “I’m friendly, I’m not your friend”. She continued with some of the issues she’d had with subs being over familiar – and then pointing out, “OK, if we’re friends… When did we last go to the pub together? or a meal? What do I like outside of kink? When, roughly, is my birthday? What TV/Films/Books do I like? Hell… would you know my real name if we’d not signed release forms?”

A ‘TRICK’

Going further, there’s a piece of sling I once saw called ‘A trick’ which refers to clients who ‘trick’ themselves into thinking there’s any form of connection.
All forms of play can be emotive, and release brain chemicals – a lot of this is purely one way.
The conversation, btw, was about what to do about this. With one Domme saying she hates it when this happens because the only ethical thing to do is to end any arrangements, because continuing to take money is leading the client on.
But yes, of course, there were other Dommes who said it’s not their problem, they’d continue to take the money and sell the fantasy.
And, yep, this then stops when the money does…

I know because of stories like this, it causes a lot of confusion.
“I don’t want a Domme who only sees me as money”, “Is she really my friend?”, and so on.

Prey tell, if your day job stopped paying you – would you still turn up and do it?  Even if you like your job?

LET’S SIMPLIFY – KINK IS EXPENSIVE

Let us take professional providers completely out of the equation.

In my own kink journey, I started to get back in the local kink community in 2013. My first Pro Domme session was 2016, I also started filming in 2016.
But I wasn’t sitting idle for 3 years, before and after any interactions with the Pro side I was going to events, playing, meeting people to play outside of events, and so on.

To play at events you have to go to events and that costs money. Entry fee, travel, clothing that at least meets the dress code.
So there’s definitely no chance of people playing with you *at* events if you don’t go to events.

And play at events is often time limited because other people want to use the equipment, there’s other people about etc.

So if you want private play, then the two (or more) of you have to arrange where to do it.   Home might be a possibility. But in a lot of cases it might be booking a hotel, hiring a dungeon, etc.
And these come with a cost also.

So any expectation for someone to do something “for free” because you feel they’re your friend, is not always possible when it’s something that is going to need a cost.

FRIENDS UNDERSTAND FRIENDS

If you ARE someone’s friend, you can understand why someone who has been at work all day doing play and sessions etc wouldn’t want to then continue this in their free time.

Also, whatever we do for our day jobs.  We probably have friends who we like a lot, but if they called or mailed us for a chat, while we’re at work, we’d want them to understand we couldn’t help right now.
With a lot in the industry working long and/or unsociable hours.

We’ve all probably also been a little guilty of “Ooh, I’ll message them back later” and then not, not because of our own fault. But. Life.
I am also thankful there’s a lot of people in my personal life I don’t see all the time, but when we do see each other we can resume as if it was just last week we last spoke, and the same is a little true in kink.

CIRCLES SHIFT

There’s people where… we probably are just colleagues, or just client/provider, so on… and people where we probably are friends. And I’d hope for that to continue, but circles do shift over time. While I like the idea of still being friends in 5, 10, 20, more years time – I know that it’s best to enjoy now, rather than assuming about the future.
There are people who I was a little closer to, in and out of kink, who I’m not any more and that’s kinda sad, but it’s also kinda life.

TO WRAP IT UP

I’d conclude by saying.  Just enjoy stuff. Enjoy the moment. Never look too much into things.
If you are looking for ‘a friend’ remember that friendships build over time organically, and what happens… happens… you cannot buy a friend, so if a kink friend is important to you then become active in a local kink community and build passive relationships.
Don’t pay someone and then be disappointed they didn’t do more than you paid them for.