A friend's son, aged maybe eight or nine at the time, asked, "Mom, what's homosexual?"

My friend, blushing madly but determined to do the right thing, went into a careful explanation: you know most men like to fall in love with ladies, well, there are some men who like to fall in love with men, and those men blah blah blah...

... and the penny dropped, the lad's face lit up, and he exclaimed "Oh! Homosexual is GAY!"

... twice a day for a couple of months, in the middle of both pregnancies. And I don't think this is unusual, because there was a cheap Mexican place across the street from the medical complex where I saw my obstetrician, and at lunchtime the line of preggos was out the door.

This is the situation for which pro-dommes were invented. The marriage is basically sound, but he has a kink that's important to him, and she doesn't share it, and their lives are complex enough that a full open relationship isn't practical. Enter the paid professional, whose job it is to assess and meet his needs without overstepping any agreed-upon relationship boundaries. Many pros would be happy to include the wife in a session, as a spectator or student or co-top, thus enabling her to experience what he wants without the pressure of having to make it happen all by herself.

There are, in fact, classes that the wife could take to help her become more comfortable with this role -- if she's to dominate him successfully, she has to figure out a way to get her needs met too; otherwise the internal tension between acting dominant while actually being in service to his fantasy will tear her up (I've seen a lot of women damaged by this sort of thing). Many leather conferences and erotic boutiques offer workshops for novice dominant women, and at least one retired pro-domme (Cleo Dubois in the Bay Area) teaches weekend-long intensives for dominant women and their partners. (Such an environment might be a wake-up call for the husband -- a more experienced dominant would have the objectivity to point out to him that he's asking for a great deal and not offering much in return.)

There are also several good books written for women exploring domination -- "The Sexually Dominant Woman," "The Mistress Manual," and "The Art of Sensual Female Dominance," to name a few. Also, "When Someone You Love Is Kinky" is a guide for spouses and friends of kinky people, and "Healing Sex" is a non-judgmental guide for survivors of abuse and trauma who are trying to find fulfilling sexuality.

Any or all of these resources might help with this thorny problem...

Janet Hardy

Greenery Press

(publisher of a few of these titles)

You're not there to earn a degree. You're not there to get grades. You're there to spend four years picking the best brains your university can find.

On your campus there are many people who know a great deal and who have really interesting ways to assemble what they know. (This isn't true of all your teachers by a long shot, but it won't take long to figure out which are which.) Find those people, engage with them, and soak up as much as you can.

I went to college thinking I already knew everything and that my job was to figure out how little I had to do to get a degree (to attest to how much I already knew). As a result, I wasted four precious years and a lot of my folks' money. Thirty years later I went back to school for a master's, knowing that this time I was going to put as *much* into it as I could... and it's been a blast.

My undergraduate career is one of my few genuine regrets. The knowledge I passed up!!

I know it's not very northern Californian of me, but I do enjoy malls. I'd enjoy them more, though, if they had more of a "public square" feeling to them.

How about farmer's markets inside the mall once or twice a week? And other events that encourage interaction and connection... maybe chess and game tables in the food court, or a "soapbox" area where people can sound off for whoever wants to stop and listen for a while. Maybe an old-fashioned pub where everybody sits together to talk -- if the alcohol's a problem, make it a soda fountain instead; the idea is a layout that encourages lingering and conversation, instead of rushing off to the next consumer experience.

I'd also appreciate genuinely comfortable seating (not hard wooden benches designed to make you get up and move along to spend more money). And I have to agree with the several other posters who ask for local and independent shops instead of the same tired chains. If mall rents are too high for the indies, how about shared spaces where several independent stores in related but noncompeting lines (say, a clothing shop and a shoe store and a cosmetics store, or a bookstore and a music store and a shop that sells candles and gifties) can all share floor space?