#leatherfolk

I've been yelling into the tumblr void about many things lately and lots of y'all are enjoying it (which is wild and very sweet).

So, here's a list of the zines I currently have written - if you want hard copies, DM me and I will mail them to you. (and, if you're in the PNW come to Olympia zine fest and you can get these and others from @tslurcollective in person!)

$5/per but always pay what you can (including $0 - I want leather folks to have leather literature!!). Any money I make from these is going straight to some emergency medical bills that insurance isn't covering.

Becoming a locally known bootblack and leather prevert has its upsides🖤

Why is it I always cry when I hear Piaf sing “C’est a Hambourg?” How many docks have I waited on only to discover the joys and brotherhood of the world’s special men. “Les bras s’ouvrent à l’infini.” Yes, I embraced infinity many times. It was indescribable. One can never turn back.

Somewhere in the corner of the room a claw moves, a pen scratches. Self-delusion, decides the scribe. To the point of death. Characteristic of psychoses is a blind adherence to a course of life that flirts with danger and even death.

The scribe can write what he wants. I have written my sentences in words in which I believe. Willful pride? The sexual delusions of a whore? The insatiability of a pig-hole? What is there to believe in these days except the sound of the rain? I tell you, I wouldn’t mind if you did this to yourself, or if you let me into the sleaze of your manhole. Or if you did it to me again. I knew what I was doing, what I did. I understood there were dangers, even death, in the fire. I faced those dangers in statements of love and intensity and I stand by them. In the long run, I feel better for it. Me, the rebel. Listening to the sound of the rain. ]

I'm trying to restore my partner's very crunchy, salt damaged winter bike jacket... And I suddenly realise that all my understanding of leather care relies on knowing what kind of tan it is, to start with. My gut says gentle wipedown with glycerin soap and then the tiniest bit of neatsfoot oil, buffed back off an hour or so after it goes on, absolutely avoiding silicone wax like the plague.

So, you're looking after a very sentimentally valuable leather jacket, looks like a very traditional Perfecto type, made somewhere between the 60s and early 80s, with an acetate lining and grain that looks like this:

Slowly, trying not to look like a nervous colt, I moved around behind Charley and began to caress his broad, muscular back, which was stretched flat from his arms being bound and extended. With my right index finger I began to draw a pattern on his back. The roomful of men was quiet but restless and questioning. What was the kid doing? These were unfamiliar gestures. Running a fingertip over someone’s back might be odd, even kinky, but was it sadism? They kept quiet and watched.

What no one knew was that I had embedded a razor-sharp scalpel into the fingertip of my glove. The tracery I was creating on Charley’s back was being gently cut into the topmost layer of his skin– not quite deep enough to raise blood but just enough to split the skin. It only took a few minutes to create the design but to me those moments seemed like hours. Then I stepped back, picked up a broad leather paddle, and with all the force I could muster, smacked the paddle flat against Charley’s back three times. The impact caused the skin to split open and the blood to rush to the surface and fill the thin lines that I had cut into his back. Slowly at first and then more quickly, the blood oozed out until the full design became clear to everyone in the room. I had cut a large, smiling sunburst into my lover’s back. Under the sunburst were the words HAPPY BIRTHDAY. A little humor can go a long, long way. The gasps of wonder and amusement in the room were my reward. I had begun the evening as a lanky kid but now I had earned my place among serious men.

Jason was the first to grab me. Where, he wondered, had I learned that nasty trick? I explained that I’d thought it up on my own and confessed that I had to practice on my own arms and legs until I developed the right touch. He howled with laughter when I told him that Charley had believed my story about the cuts being cat scratches.

My relationship with Charley deepened and became more profound for us both. It was to be forever in our hearts and minds.”

–From the essay One Among Many: the Seduction and Training of a Leatherman by Thom Magister, from the book Leatherfolk: Radical Sex, People, Politics and Practice, edited by Mark Thompson