Interview iwth Corral

Preface:  When I initially approached Coral about interviewing her, her only condition was that she’d love to have me interrogate it out of her.  Alas, that’s hard to negotiate between Portland and Ohio, so I’ve formatted the interview a bit different for fun.  When, not if, the actual interrogation happens…. you’ll know about it here!

Coral is blindfolded and bound to a rough-hewn, straight backed, wood chair.  Her hands are tied behind her with natural hemp rope and the same rope has been used to secure a spreader bar to her ankles.  Her mane of hair is beginning to tangle due to sweat. 

Her blindfold is violently sliced through with a razor sharp silver blade.  As her eyes adjust to the light, she finds herself in a small, cinder block room with no windows.  She looks down to her feet, just now noticing her ankles being bound.  Between her feet she sees the drain in the floor... and her mind reels at what atrocities might have happened here before…

Then she hears a voice…

Lady Justice: Who are you? 

I’m Coral Mallow.

Lady Justice: What sort of woman are you? 

 300 lb statuesque, sadomasochistic, bi-sexual, hyper-sexual, multi-amorous, owner, Ordeal Path worker, dominant, artist, geek, educator, switch! Adores books, thrift stores, chocolate, restaurants, puppets, comics, travel, and the randomness of life!

Lady Justice: We’ll start out simple….if you were to compare yourself to someone famous, who would it be? 

Coral: One of my heroes is Mel Blanc. I love being able to alter my voice to fit whatever fun I'm having. Role-play is kooky in my house.

Lady Justice: When did you first realize you were a pervert?  And how?

Coral: I always had leanings as a child, but awareness came around 14. My masturbation fantasies and beginning experimentation involved leather restraints, collars, gloves, military style uniforms, blades, and blood. Of course I also had superpowers and minions in my fantasies... so you see I was doomed. My first blowjob involved being grabbed by the hair and "shown" how to do it properly.

Lady Justice: What a nasty girl!  Tell me, did you like it?!?

Coral: Oh yes, I loved that. Still do. Another odd kink found when I became sexually active at 16 is that I can only get off on top if my partner is bound and in pain. Ah, the discoveries of a teenage girl.

Lady Justice: You might be my pet now…. But, what were your hobbies?

Coral: I have a wonderful craft and art room. I spend a great deal of time sewing, painting, drawing, sculpting, making jewelry, and in general creating. I am an amateur storyteller. I am beginning to play with photography. I am a bibliophile. My idea of porn is www.powells.com . I read always and obsessively. I write and am trying to hone that skill. I love dancing especially in rain and singing. I collect gloves, hats, and boots.

Lady Justice: You have a lot to say, but I might gag that pretty mouth soon.  Sum your thoughts up in one favorite quote.

Coral: "I don't regret the things I did. I regret the things I didn't do." - Katherine Hepburn

Lady Justice: How long have you been involved in “activities” in the leather community? 

Coral: I have been involved as an adult with the larger kink community for 8 years, the leather community for 5 years. 

Lady Justice: Do you feel there is anything vital missing from today’s leather community?

Coral: Yes, an understanding that we are NOT one big community, but different tribes and clans that share certain passions and commonalities and persecutions. 

Lady Justice: Let’s delve a little deeper now…. Don’t force me to punish you!  What is your definition of a “leatherwoman”?  What are her responsibilities?

Coral: A leatherwoman identifies strongly not just with hot BDSM leather sex, but with a commitment to being herself unrepentantly. Her responsibilities are whatever she holds to be in the best interest for herself, family, property, and community. Even if they are not much fun, things need to be done.  

Lady Justice: You’re bound to my chair and completely vulnerable to me right now, but which roles in the Leather BDSM lifestyle do you fit? 

Coral: Mentor is the first one I think of. I enjoy the role and wear it proudly. I am a scene sadist (not clinical) and a masochist, sexually and non-sexually deriving pleasure from consensual pain, challenge, and discomfort. I am an Owner. I choose that identity twofold, because I do not feel I have achieved Mastery of any kind and because my Boy does not identify as a Slave. Owner and Property fit us very well for explanation purposes. My title to my Boy is Alpha. I am Mama to one person and that is Ben and Travis' Boy Patrick. It is a title of safety, love, and honor. Ryan is a natural Daddy so it is a challenge and a privilege to find others to help me raise him in the community so he can fully enjoy this life. I am a dominant woman, but hate to identify as an adjective. That's just me.

Lady Justice: What keeps you passionate about the leather community? 

Coral: Long periods of time without it. I take breaks and spend time with other communities and my family. Visiting leather and kink communities outside of my state is a great way to remain passionate because you meet such amazing humans. It is so nice and relaxing to remember what it is to play without scene drama, commitments, or expectations.

Lady Justice: I need to know where to send a ransom note and the details of your capture….What organizations do you belong to?  Are you an officer of any of these groups?

Coral: I am currently a member of Bad Girls, PLA, Bodybound, FLAG, and the Oregon Bears and the West Coast Assholes! 

Lady Justice: Give me all the dirt on leather competitions.  Leave no stone unturned.  I’d hate to gag you for not giving me the details!

Coral: Leather competitions can be a great deal of fun. They can also be agonizingly boring. Part of being a titleholder is fundraising and representation, be it for a bar or a state. This means one should know how to speak, interact and to some extent perform in and for the public. Nothing is more embarrassing than a representative who cannot speak properly nor have a concept of basic manners let alone leather protocols.

I find a great deal of camaraderie at the actual competitions surrounded by people wearing their patches and medals. I have also been dismissed trying to talk with other titleholders at just kink events when not wearing a vest. There is a certain amount of elitism that is really unnecessary in titles won by answering bad pop questions and enacting 5 minute stage fantasies. Yes, we get grilled behind the scenes; we should know who we are and why we are doing this. That doesn't mean everyone who supports us should. That’s why they get the show, and we get the L.A.T.'s behind the scenes.

Competitions are a great place to come together to show support and brother/sisterhood. Unfortunately, they are sometimes the only place we show that solidarity.

Lady Justice: Give me all the juicy details on your boy/s!  I might endeavor to get them in my clutches.

Coral: 6"4 tall, dark, and sometime pain in my arse is My Boy! He is a switch and a natural Daddy. He is the creepiest mad scientist to bottom. He favors drumming, Florentine flogging, boot worship, and nipple torture as a top. As a bottom he is a wonderful needle slut, restraints, being used as an art supply and flying whether on hooks or with rope. He spends a great deal of his time playing an upright bass, behind a camera and maintaining his identity as a house kitten.

Ryan served 5 years with his previous Owner, the Marine Corps. (Although anyone who owns a Marine knows that it is more of a loan.)When he chose to return to civilian life he found the kink community in Portland and through that me. He found me at a very dark time in my life. In an amazingly short period of time, I collared him with two 4 Gage hooks to the back and we have been walking together since. We have had many challenges to our paths of guidance and service time and again proving to each other that this is absolutely how we should be. His boots were awarded privately and when he earned his boy cap I presented it to him onstage at the NW Master slave competition (Northwest Leather Celebration) last year.

Lady Justice: Now, tell us about more about your leather family.  Names, etc… do you think they can save you now?

Coral: My leather family consists of people who I consider to BE family that share the common bond of leather/kink. That means that these people can actually call members of my blood family just to talk, for help, whatever. Family is important, not the form it takes.

My leather family includes Lee Harrington, boyfriend, lasagna, storyteller and fellow godnip toy.

Lisa Blue, friend, mentor, hook slinger, piercer, bitching partner, and all around damn fine human.

 Ben Brown Jr. my sash husband who is a socialist, coffee slinging, media artist, activist bear! His husband Travis, who is a sexy Louisianan cooking, nurse, bear. Their boy Patrick soulful, bitchy cow, fagtastic, sculpture artist bear. He is the only person allowed to call me Mama.

Mac… our chocolate geek, gender queer, drummer boy cousin.

Then we have purveyor of happy dark realities, tangler of rope, the sibling Raven.

The magnificent Lynnda Hale keeper of happy cats, glass artist, performer extraordinaire (and her wife who I don’t have permission to crow about) and Mama to Shell NW Community Bootblack 2008, pain slut, keeper of all that is camouflage and pink.

There are a few others such as adam and Violet, Spider, Choirgirl, Bldrnnr and her Daddy, Jaguar, and She who wishes to Verb my Noun, who I don’t have permission to discuss in a public forum but know they are loved!

Lady Justice (tapping a tawse against my left palm) : Have you ever conducted a leather workshop?  What was the topic?  If you were to teach more leather workshops, what topics would you teach?

Coral: I have many workshops I teach. Being an educator is a major part of who I am. I have taught a Kink 101 class at Portland State University as well as a co-lecture with my sash husband Ben Brown Jr. : Standing Tall In Our Boots: A history of leadership and activism in the leather community past and present. That was a shocking experience for us both as we came to find that kids working in the Queer Resource Center didn't know what Stonewall was. It made it very clear to us why we do what we do.

Other most requested classes are:

Primal Play, Menstrual Play, How to get the most out of your Property: An investment guide for Owners, 24/7 and living separately, Body to Body Impact Play, Why are you hitting me?, Bound to be Difficult (about playing with bondage eels), Terms of Service, Alternative Scene Identities, Needles: Stick them in and Show them off!, They're beautiful I'm not and how to get over it, Glove Fetish, and my Boy's class The Kinky Domestic.

I am currently working on a class about owning and being owned by people who have been in military service. Ryan is working on a "Straight guys guide to playing with gay men." 

Lady Justice: Now fess up, young lady!  What is your stance on “Old Guard” versus “New Guard” leather protocols and rules?

Coral: Honestly? My stance is: Get Over It. 

Very few people of my generation have met anyone of the Old Guard, A great many of the New Guard now affect the very attitudes they were railing against. A lot of the newer generations don't give a damn at all because all they see is a bunch of infighting. 

Honesty, Integrity, Commitment, and Respect are the cornerstones of what we are supposedly about. Yet we spend so much time policing each others ideas and ideals we lose sight of them. Let me also be the one to point out that as we get more open and inclusive in our worlds we branch out and fracture. Then we come together again in a new form of our culture. This is natural. Some people want high protocol, some just want to fuck in a pool of blood.

We are loosing our identities as player communities and becoming kvetching societies. I am Unguarded; I choose to uphold the ideas and spirit that drew me to this lifestyle. I CHOOSE to learn and teach the history and etiquette of the Old and New Guard for myself, my Property, and my students. I also choose to teach them to find what rings true and live that truth rather that fit into someone else’s little box.

Lady Justice: Do others outside the leather community know you’re into leather?  If not…. I could blackmail you if you don’t answer all my questions….

Coral: I am