It's not just in my head (or those of my pervy friends) that calligraphy and spanking meet. This evening as I was reading through Marc Drogin's Calligraphy of the Middle Ages, one paragraph on page 20 rather leapt out.
The Teaching of Writing
The Teacher was absolute ruler in his domain, and students who misbehaved or fell below expectations were often punished swiftly, harshly and in full view of the class as a warning to others. Some teachers wielded "palmers," sticks with round, flattened heads with which to slap students palms. More common, as seen in Plate 3* within the capital letter C, was the whipping of a student with birch branches. This birching scene is from an English manuscript of the mid-fourteenth century, at which time monasteries had long ceased to be the major source of elementary education.
As I sat next to Paul reading this, I felt my face flush a bit as I read the passage, especially the line "students who misbehaved or fell below expectations were often punished swiftly, harshly and in full view of the class as a warning to others." Surely Mr. Drogin couldn't have written that with the expectation of it having such an effect on me.
It's almost enough to make me ask for a smacking. Except I'm still sore from a severe caning last Sunday and expect another tomorrow so have a bit of trepidation about the state of my bottom. (These are Regulars -- I'm not being punished for anything.)
-o=0=o-
I've started a new blog, caligráfica, specifically about studying calligraphy. While I like the idea of posting everything in one place (here), I'd like my teacher to be able to read what I write about practicing but suspect giving her this URL would inhibit me in writing about kink. That's not something I want to happen. That said, I'm not keeping the connection to this blog too secret -- I've linked back and forth from here to there. Please feel free to comment on caligráfica posts with your usual identities.
I am still going to write about calligraphy here too. Your comments and thoughts have been embarrassingly kind and mean a great deal.
-o=0=o-
Paul and I went and saw Terry Gilliam's film, The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus, which I absolutely loved. It may be my favorite movie of his ever, certainly since Time Bandits. It's lush, fantasy filled and truly a visual feast. Highly recommended.
---
*Sadly the reproduction is too muddy to make out even in the book so there was no point in scanning it.
