Hyde and Leather: Pets on Parade

Leather and Hyde

Occasions
Pets on Parade
by Debra Hyde

Memory Lane on Replay

For years, my sister lived in a town small enough to retain several old fashioned traditions, traditions which influenced the rhythm of family gatherings.

We all grow up, don't we? Yet for all our adult steps forward, we're sometimes allowed a few joyous steps back.

Some of them -- like the first day of the fishing season or the start of Summer's tourist traffic -- were inconveniences we commiserated over. Others were more endearing.

Like the annual Pet Parade. Each year during the Lenten season, we'd put off cooking the Sunday roast so my niece could snare her great grandmother's cat, cage it, load it onto her wagon, and parade down Main Street, the cat in mild terror, Jenny in her Sunday best. Although I lived too far away to attend the parade, I shared the moment after the fact, over the Sunday roast. I remember well the infectious and unchecked joy Jen flourished when she talked about parading with all the other kids in town.

Jenny long ago outgrew the pet parade, a reminder that we all grow up, don't we? Yet for all our adult steps forward, we're sometimes allowed a few joyous steps back. That's what I discovered recently when I attended the first-ever Erotic Thoroughbreds. Sponsored by The Water Hole Custom Leather and held in Hartford, Connecticut, this event drew a good 200 people and some 25 ponies, cats, dogs, and tigers from as near as neighboring towns and New York City, to as far away as Arizona, Ohio, and even Germany. For me, however, its greatest attraction was a chance to relive many favorite, special childhood memories.

Which started when I first spied Mackenzie Campbell and her Highland pony, Piper. Mackenzie is a slight-framed, cross-dressing male who, once she dons her riding habit, becomes a twelve-year-old girl struck by horse fever. Piper's a four-year-old, 12 hands high, dun-colored pony, schooled in hunter/jumper and basic dressage. As I quipped with Mackenzie about whether she'd someday work up to three-day eventing, I grew increasingly enamored of the pair.

Mackenzie and Piper had no idea that they culled up wonderful memories for me. You see, once I was a twelve-year-old owner of a 12.5 hands high, bay Hackney pony. Like Mackenzie, I rode hunt seat. And, like Mackenzie, I saddle-broke and schooled my pony. I had a case of horse fever that was so strong, I honestly can't recall not being in love with horses. I think it happened shortly after I learned to say "mama" and "dada." Fortunately, nagging my parents for a pony for the first decade of my life ensured that I went through puberty with boots, spurs, and a riding crop in hand.

Equestrian Elegance and Action

Not every equestrian had such a fleshed-out profile for their mount; some relied on colorful histories instead. Mistress Ride Hard rescued her mount, Sparky, from the meat market and -- because he lacks pedigree -- she's labeled him "a backyard pony."

It didn't take much to imagine Sparky as a full-blooded Lippizaner in motion.

She claims she got Sparky at auction, adding with a twinkle in her eye, "right before they loaded him on the truck."

Sparky may well have lacked pedigree, but he's bright and Mistress Ride Hard's a talented trainer. She not only showed him in hand, but rode him on all fours, working some high-level dressage moves into her presentation. Unfortunately, such intricate and difficult moves as the piaffe, piaffe pirouette, and half-pass on the right and left largely escaped the judges' notice. Not me -- I had Mozart running in my head, in synch with their haute ecolé moves. It didn't take much to imagine Sparky as a full-blooded Lippizaner in motion.

Besides presentations, the show organizers staged fun mini-competitions, like Pop the Balloons, Find Your Master, and Apple Stealing, which took me back to my 4-H days where such gymkhana classes as Sit-a-Buck, Saddle-Up, and Cup-and-Water had riding clubs competing and laughing against ridiculous odds. Like Apple Stealing, where owners hid apple slices on their bodies for their ponies to find, our gymkhana classes were crowd-pleasers. Nothing elicited more laughter from show-goers than the Egg-and-Spoon class in which riders carried eggs on a spoon, first at a trot, then a canter. Ribbons were awarded based on whose egg lasted the longest. No one wound up with egg on their face, but many did have egg on their jodhpurs or chaps.

Obviously, pony play held the highest profile at Erotic Thoroughbreds, and admittedly it's a mushrooming, national trend in the BDSM/fetish scene. So much so that this event drew judges of some notoriety -- author John Warren; Equus Eroticus editor Paul Reed; and Lolita Wolf, SM activist and TES board member, to name just three.

Sensuality was plentiful, from the erotic appeal of chains running from bit ring to nipple rings, to a supplicant mare getting single-tailed on the ass and between the legs.

Many of the pony competitors were members of The Equestrian Center at TES (TEC@TES), and, according to Lolita Wolf, the group is working towards Black Rose '98, where they'll compete for group and individual standings, ala Olympic equestrian events.

I wondered, though, if even national trends fall prey to old, long-standing regional preferences, so I approached Phoenix Pony Trainer and his Palomino pet, Pony Lynn. Coming from Arizona, Phoenix confirmed my suspicions for me: just like in the real equestrian world, Western-style riding prevails in his local group, APEX, where a good dozen members are active in pony play.

Domesticated, but Not Quite Tamed

The afternoon's proceedings weren't all jumping fences and performing dressage routines. Sensuality was plentiful, from the erotic appeal of chains running from bit ring to nipple rings, to a supplicant mare getting single-tailed on the ass and between the legs, to Phoenix Pony Trainer's use of a TENS unit on his pony. For this event, he had attached the pads to Pony Lynn's nipples, but he often includes a dildo in the gear, which, yes, he electrifies as well.

An impromptu stallion/mare bump-and-grind really got to me, but not because of its obvious erotic appeal. Seeing mare and stud together struck up an old memory from third grade, one which stunned me with its reappearance. Back then, I use to pretend I was a horse at recess and I had successfully recruited other little fillies to join my herd. We spent all of recess running and whinnying. But one fine Spring day, I decided we needed to enlarge the herds, so we tried talking the boys into joining us. The teachers caught wind of our attempts to increase the gene pool, as it were, and we all got hauled into one of those segregated meetings -- you know, boys in one room, girls in another -- for a lecture on age-appropriate behavior between the sexes.

The good news was that I wasn't the only instigator in trouble. It seems the girly-girls who stayed on the black top were just as guilty. Their indiscretions? Showing some slip on the monkey bars.

But the bump-and-grind, I know, was all in good fun -- after all, real breeders rely on artificial insemination these days. Besides, the ponies didn't have a monopoly on good fun.

One act stood out for originality -- Lady Ra and her tigers. Surly things, the tigers growled, spit, and swatted, but they also complied with their Mistress.

A pair of cats, Jade and Furry Rascal, performed a spontaneous and endearing game of ball, each trying to outwit the other as they rolled a ball back and forth. Furry's occasional pouncing drew warm laughter from crowd while Jade was cute-as-a-button demure. Likewise, Fuzz, a young pup of a dog caught everyone's attention, especially the Mistress who adopted him on-the-spot for the day. Like any dog, he had habits both good and bad. He was rather obedient on the leash, suggesting he'd had some prior obedience training, but when Mistress turned her back on him at the buffet table, Fuzz strayed into the trash. Event officials deemed him impudent as well as amusing and impounded him on the spot. As he sat in detention, I joked with his Mistress about renaming him Trash Puppy.

One act stood out for originality -- Lady Ra (pronounced "ray") and her tigers. Surly things, the tigers growled, spit, and swatted, but they also complied with their Mistress and climbed onto stools to rear up onto their haunches and jump through a hoop. Lady Ra first débuted her tigers late last year as part of the kick-off ceremonies at a workshop/play party event. "It took a lot of research," she said, "and I love doing that. I wrote up a script and made a prop list. Then I had to 'show' the tigers how to act."

And act they did. I noticed that her tigers were not only mulish about performing certain tricks but they were slow and deliberate in their pace, just like real tigers. Not at all apparent during Lady Ra's demonstration were the obstacles she had to overcome: she had only two tigers instead of her preferred complement of four, and she had to slice her usually twenty-minute act down to five,

It's easy to misjudge or underestimate the value and appeal of role play. Indeed, many of my leather friends "don't get it."

abandoning such favorite tricks as having the tigers turn around in circles on their haunches and walking across a narrow plank. Nonetheless, Lady Ra kept a firm hand and ready whip on her beasts.

Lolita Wolf said she was quite surprised by the tigers' presence and performance. Known for her love of role play, Lolita convincingly promoted the benefits of pretend play to me, saying people often employ it to work out things from their childhood or to recapture the sense of pretend that children know so well and adults have routinely forgotten. "In our community, it's allowed," she said, simply and emphatically.

Remember to Pretend

Lolita's right -- just look at how my own memories and experiences connected me with this event and its participants. Still, it's easy to misjudge or underestimate the value and appeal of role play. Indeed, many of my leather friends "don't get it," quite possibly because when we think of role play, we get stuck on the vanilla, stereotypes of pirate/wench or belly-dancer/sultan, motifs that seem, well, so "unleather."

Instead, think about the pretend play that you embraced in your childhood. Remember the happiness and carefree joy it brought you? The creative freedom? The self-soothing comfort? Remember what simple fun it was?

I do. I remember being the cat to my younger brother's dog. I was Tiger; he was Peetie, and we must've been all of four and two years old, respectively. I remember how my baby-sitter introduced me to my first pretend pony when I was five -- and I rode that pretend pony everywhere for years. I remember how playing pony occupied every outdoor recess for two years in elementary school. I can even still feel the cantering run I developed as a kid. And in remembering all this, I realize that I loped through childhood, mostly happy and untroubled, thanks to my rich fantasies.

Erotic Thoroughbreds: What a thorough happening. I certainly didn't expect to relive so much of my childhood, but I'm glad I did. The sense of wonder and the simple happiness I rediscovered stays with me, even now, as I write these words. I hope it becomes an annual event, mainly because I keep feeling this long-dormant desire welling up inside me and threatening to break free. It seems that the twelve-year-old in me wants to come out and play. And she's tempted to whine a once-familiar refrain: Daddy, can I have a pony?

About the Author

Debra Hyde is a mostly submissive switch who lives in New England with her husband, two children, three cats, and a dog. She says she is "well-owned and well-loved" by a very special Master, and shares a unique triangle with him and her somewhat submissive husband.

"When England Calls," one of Debra's short stories, graces the pages of the recently published Mammoth Book of Historical Erotica. She is currently working on a number of others, as well as the Great American Leather Novel. Her BDSM work has been previously published on the Internet by Leather Online and Section 12, but Leather and Hyde was her first regular column, originally hosted by About.com's BDSM site and relocated here with her kind permission.

Debra also maintains a personal Weblog called Pursed Lips and can be reached at 75222.2150@compuserve.com... but no junk mail or "Wannas," please.