What a Weekend...

Woooooooooow.

What a fucking weekend.

As many of you know, this past weekend was the Leather Bear and Cub Contest with Special Guest Mama Reinhardt at Sidewinders Bar. I am so proud of the Albuquerque Leather Community for showing Mama that we are amazing! We got to show her that despite all of the little subgroups we have, we come together for things bigger than our own self interests. It was amazing to see our many groups represented: The Leather Daddies, AboL, TNG, Mama's Family, Duke City Deaf and Hard of Hearing, AEL, ClubFEM, MasT, etc. Forgive me if I spaced listing more. There were sooo many!

Thank you to the amazing judges that came out to pick the 2017 Leather Bear and 2017 Leather cub Titleholders.
Thank you to the contestants who each brought your A-game and made the decision tough.
Thank you to Sidewinders Bar for hosting this contest and giving us a space to call home.
Thank you Michael and Renato for being so open and kind to our community.

The weekend was crazy.

Friday night, I showed up to Sides to meet my 3 Leather brothers. I met Mama briefly and my mother called... My estranged Godmother was flying in from Texas tonight and it would mean a lot if I came to catch up.

Let's back up to about 1999...I know...nearly a decade ago. My mama moved my brother and I up North from Las Cruces and we lost contact with my Godmother Julie. My mama and Julie were best friends in college. We had helped her move out of her husband's place shortly before leaving town.

They vowed to keep in touch...but Julie vanished. My mother was devastated. We sent letter after letter...called everyone we knew...sent emails...called the last place she worked at...nothing proved fruitful.

Fast forward to 2009... I was in high school and everyone was transferring from MySpace to Facebook. I switched over and started a new page called "Find Julie ____________". We had many people "like" the page and share the posts and pictures that I had posted there. We paid search sites for information. We sent letters, made phone calls, and sent emails. Nothing.
We became quite discouraged...and eventually stopped trying to find her. It was as if the wind carried my Godmother away.

Someone saw the picture on Facebook of Julie and recognized her immediately. This person contacted me with Julie's ex-husband's information, meaning well but unintentionally driving the point home that he could be found but she could not...

Here we are on a Friday night and my mama is calling me telling me that she found my God mother through one of those paid information sites and she is flying in TONIGHT. I absolutely could not pass this up as my Godmother and I would not be available to catch up any other night.
I politely excused myself from Mama and Sidewinders and went to a restaurant near the base. I walked through the door and my little brother immediately yelled my Vanilla name.
I walked over to the table and my mama hugged me first. She was crying but I was busy looking over her shoulder at the short grey-haired lady standing behind her with my father. My mum let me go and this strangely unknown yet familiar woman embraced me.
We all sat down and talked for about an hour before my parents took my Godmother to their home.

Following my family visit, I then went to Soch to see a benefit show and enjoy cigars indoors with one of my brothers and boy in consideration. Little did I know that this night would be the first step down into a rabbit hole I was not prepared for.

While I will not go into detail as the story has been told so many times, I should have been more aware that what happened Friday evening would escalate come Sunday night.

Shaken and upset, I arrived at my house in the wee hours of the morning, got no sleep and went back to the grind only hours later.

After work, I attended the Leather Bear and Cub contest at Sidewinders. The Leather Daddies were very generous to grant me a few minutes on stage to pin in our newly patched Corazon Leather titleholders: Curio Lecter and TytheGentleman, which followed the tradition from last year when my titlespouse and I were pinned in. During that small ceremony, I also informed them not to worry because I personally funded their patches with the hope that they would fund the patches of their successors.

A few boys were also patched in to AboL which one of my brothers announced. All in all, we showed Mama how diverse yet united our community is.

Congratulations to our Leather Bear Tim and Leather Cub boy Andy! I know that the two of you will represent New Mexico well.

Following the contest, a number of community members were called into the back bar and pinned in to Mama's Family, including my brother boi Dani. During that ceremony, Sir Adrian proposed to his boy and I caught some amazing pictures of the event. Mama was laughing and crying.

My boy in consideration and I stayed at Sidewinders for a while after. We were laughing, drinking, conversing and having a great time when Sir Adrian called me over to where he and Mama were sitting. Mama was whispering to him for a few minutes before turning to me and asking me to be part of her family. I began to cry, hyperventilate and laugh because I was in shock. I accepted.

Now I anxiously await to hear what name has been chosen for me.

Sunday, I spent serving my community with the Babes and Bullies. We educate people on responsible ownership of bully-type dogs and raise money for shelters and rescues across the Land of Entrapment.

Sunday night, I went to the Wet Munch, stayed through the education portion that I host and set up, and then went back to Sidewinders to perform in a show with a new piece in addition to an old favorite. I performed my old favorite piece.

My Leather Family decided to meet up at Sides and chaos ensued.

I missed my debut piece and walked away from Sidewinders with 2 brothers instead of 3, my boy in consideration, a fuck ton of fear, questions and mistrust.



Now we wait.