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“School uniforms”

P: Sweetie, do you have any memory of when you first knew that school uniforms meant something special to you?

M: I remember the summer before I started first grade (I was 6). And going shopping for my new uniform with my mother (we didn't wear them for kindergarten). It was exciting and I felt very proud and sort of grown up. One reason it was exciting was that my sister who was 3 but almost as tall and always wanting exactly what I got didn't get one. I was always looking for ways to make it clear that I was the older one you see. So the uniform made me distinct in a way.

P: So the attraction was connected with what it meant about you - it was about belonging and growing up and being part of something with other kids?

M: Sort of. But as much as that, I'd say it was attractive because it meant I was part of something else other than my family. An individual. By belonging to my grade and school I had an identity apart from being simply Mija to my family.

P: <smile> So it was both a way of being different and the same. That's a paradox that most people fall on one side or the other of, but don't feel both parts of, you know?

M: <nod> I wasn't very in tune with other kids when I started school. The fact we were all wearing the same thing seemed very normal to me, but I only felt "one of them" in relation to outsiders - kids from other schools. The uniform was just what I wore, you know? The days we had free dress (few and far between) didn't really feel like school days.

P: Kids that age haven't really developed to the point where they feel strongly about personal fashion and choices like that. So an acceptance of a uniform is probably just rather more natural than for older kids. How do you remember feeling about what the uniform actually was?

M: Mmmm. I remember liking the jumper a lot even though it was blue and I liked red. It was fitted at the waist with a pleated skirt and a front that crossed over into a "v" with two pieces of fabric. The plaid was navy and french blue with black and then highlights of yellow running through it. I didn't like the french blue sweater. It buttoned up the front and had a school patch on the pocket. We wore peter-pan collared shirts buttoned all the way up. They were white.

P: You didn't feel any sense of constraint or annoyance at having to wear the uniform most days? Lots of kids would, I think.

M: I didn't. It just was what I wore. And it wasn't uncomfortable or anything. My mom used to need to remind us to change out of it when we got home. I honestly remember liking it.

P: <smile> It's funny, because even though obviously I have a uniform kink too, my experience as a kid couldn't have been much different. The first thing I did when I got home was take it off. It felt like a kind of escape.

M: <giggle> Maybe it's 'cause I felt that as soon as I left my classroom.

P: Well, yes, though I suppose even at an early age, I had a very strong sense of personal choice - or at least wanting that choice, and feeling entitled to it - so having to wear a uniform felt like a kind of violation of that.

M: I think I was partly used to not really deciding what to wear. Though I remember having favorites. There were clothes for play and church and school. Not a lot of choices. I liked the way they all fitted together - all the parts. The powerful thing for me about some of the uniforms now is the way every item of clothing is part of it - there's nothing random or left to chance. So I know when everything is all right. Does that make sense?

P: Sure. There's a sense of it being correct, in the way that there isn't with ordinary dress. Rules to follow or not follow, and by which your behaviour can be judged.

M: <wiggle> You know, before we met, I'm not sure I'd have said I have a uniform fetish. For me wearing a uniform is sort of a marker of childhood and being cared for and such. It just feels very right to me and thus fits in with my spanking fetish. It's changed some, but that's still the core.

P: So what do you think you've discovered in the past few years that you hadn't realised before?

M: <smile> Why Pablo, I discovered that someone I love gets turned on when I wear a specific uniform a specific way. And suddenly I started to think of parts of the uniform as having an erotic power. That was an amazing discovery. ;)

P: <smile> I do believe you're teasing me, young lady. This was always pre-sexual to you before, but now it's become attached to sexual and more sensual aspects, right?

M: <nod> Yes, exactly. I was only teasing a little. <pout> Honestly, it had always all been about me before. Now it's about you too. I can't wear my uniforms or think about them without thinking of you and the times we've been together.

P: And you're wearing a uniform just now, love, aren't you?

M: <BLUSH> Yes.

P: What is it you're wearing, Mija?

M: I'm wearing what you asked me to, Pablo.

P: And that would be what, miss?

M: (So much of topping is about poor memory skills.) I'm wearing a crisp white shirt with a stiff collar buttoned all the way up. A grey gymslip and white ankle socks and burgundy buckle shoes. A burgundy and grey striped tie. Oh yeah . . . and white gym knickers.

P: That would seem a very British uniform for an American girl to be wearing . . .

M: Despite his Spanish-sounding name, Pablo Stubbs is very British. And the British uniforms are more formal. I have a straw boater too. But it didn't come back from Edinburgh with me. :(

P: No indeed. It's sitting here in my room - watching over me as I type. <smile>

M: Something else you know. Everything except my shoes are things that you gave me - some of which you needed to have made 'cause even English schoolgirls don't wear them any more. Why is this so important that it needed to be so right?

P: <smile> A fetish is nothing if it's not about detail - it's really pretty much a defining factor. So everything does have to be just right, yes, because it's always competing with perfect images in one's head. In my head, of course.

M: I've worn pretty much exactly this for you in person before too, haven't I?

P: Yup. The very same. And having tried to put together a uniform for you over many months - getting just the right things and trying to have them all fit together - there's a great satisfaction and enjoyment from having what you wear be what I've chosen - and what I've bought for you. When we're together, it makes me feel very close. When we're apart it makes me feel close in a very similar way.

M: <nod> When I dressed this morning, I thought of the times you'd been the one dressing me - how embarrassed I always feel.

P: Embarrassed by what?

M: Being dressed and undressed by you is very intimate. I like it, but feel sort of shy too. One side effect of you getting the details so right is that wearing a school uniform I never feel at all grown up. It makes the difference between us seem very large.

P: And not feeling grown up is good at those times, yes?

M: Oh yes. It's mostly very much easier to feel like I need to be good, to do what I'm told and stuff like that when I'm wearing a uniform. Or even parts of it. In fact, I wear something from a uniform almost every day now. It feels so very right because I feel like however much I may pretend at being an adult, there's this reminder that who I am is actually okay.

P: Right. The familiarity is part of the reassurance, in the same way that it was for you as a kid.

M: <nod> I like wearing the knickers and saddle shoes or docs (they have buckles). I feel like myself. It's hard to explain, but I spend a lot of time acting a different way than I feel.

P: Okay, but here's something that might seem puzzling. Some of the things you've mentioned - like the knickers and the tie - aren't things that you wore as a real schoolgirl, so they can't have any childhood associations for you. Their strength doesn't come from your own childhood, then.

M: Hmmmm. That's true about the tie of course. which honestly I mostly like now because they look so nice. but it isn't true about the knickers. These are made very very differently from adult women's panties, even cotton ones. They're the sort of thick heavy stuff with a pattern that's most similar to the sort of panties and underwear that very little (o-my-this is sorta embarrassing to talk about!) kids wear. And that's what they evoke for me. You'd be more right to make the observation you did about the whole collaring thing.

P: Right, yes, though it's something that's come to have a real significance for you - from other directions.

M: What's something? The collar?

P: Right, yes.

M: <nod> That's something where the significance has come from our time together and knowing what it means to you - what it's come to mean between us. It might be easier to talk about this if you talked about the sort of unifoms you like. Or not. I'm not quite sure.

P: <smile> I think you have some idea, though I'm not sure if the place to start isn't with what I wore myself as a kid - because so far as I can remember, I paid attention to aspects of my own school uniforms before I really thought about the uniforms that other kids (especially girls) wore.

M: :) What about the uniform you wore do you remember the most? Or most significantly?

P: Well, I went to school in Britain during the '70s and '80s, and these were state schools, so adherence to uniforms wasn't either particularly consistent or strong. I wore a few different ones, and didn't wear any for some of the time. But I certainly always remember feeling totally conflicted between hating the restraint and lack of choice, and at the same time wanting the uniform to be very formal and strictly enforced. It's hard to explain. Certainly, when I was at the local primary school (I'd have been perhaps 8-10, the uniform was the most formal I wore, and I always took great pains to keep it very smart, yet took it off with great glee when I got home. That's a contradiction that feels important. I might grumble about having to wear it, but if I was going to have to, I would do it as well as I could.

M: <grin> That's very you, my dear. There was a private school in the village you're from. Did they enforce their uniform differently?

P: Yes, though I only really know that now. I don't really have any memories from that age of seeing other uniforms and contrasting them with mine.

M: So you don't remember being aware that there were other kids nearby dressing differently?

P: Not especially, no, except when I was older - and by this time at a school that didn't have much of a uniform at all - and would from time to time see girls from a local private girls' school in their uniforms. That was a uniform with a capital 'U', you know. Totally unmistakable.

M: I guess the reason I asked is that sometimes there seems even here in the US to be something of a class thing caught up in the uniform debates. I can even see that influencing me and the kids I was in school with. There was a sense where we looked down on the kids that went to the schools without uniforms - the ones that were neither private nor (and more importantly) Catholic.

P: <nods> The only sense in which something like that might be true for me - and again this is mostly looking back, I don't think I felt it then - is that I have an association of strict uniforms with more challenging schools. And to a certain extent I always felt a little that I was drifting, not being either pushed or watched over particularly, because I could do stuff easily and on my own.

M: <nod> It just is something I find paradoxical about you. That is, I know from my reading and brief time in Britain that the strict sort of uniform you find most attractive is associated with the sort of schools that have traditionally catered to a class that you don't either identify with or find at all attractive.

P: <smile> That's true. I can't explain it either, but I'm pretty sure that the class thing isn't an issue. It's not an aspiration to a different class, for example.

M: What associations then do you have with strict uniforms (other than a challenging school)? What assumptions do you make when you see a girl dressed in the full uniform kit?

P: Well, this is clearly not true, but I tend to associate it with her being good. Not innocent, exactly, but well-behaved, trying her best, watched over, disciplined, aware of her place in the world, and an acceptance of that. Especially when the girl in question is of an age where she's effectively an adult in the eyes of the law (which is mostly true for 16-18-year-olds here), that acceptance of the rules and disciplines of her school and the visible acceptance in the form of the uniform, is very appealing.

M: <nod> Having spent part of last school year there, I do know what you mean. It seemed most apparent to me in the schools where the girls wore the same uniforms (same styles and colors and all) from the time they were like 7 or 8 until they were ready for university. The very small girls always seemed to look very smart and be very conscious of keeping the uniform right. And then the 12-14-year-olds were generally very sloppy and seeming to rebel against the constraints. But the older girls wore them with a sort of natural (maybe the wrong word?) unselfconsciousness that I remembered from wearing my own in high school. There's sort of a confidence and familiarity with how one looks. And a comfort in keeping it all very neat and tidy.

P: Exactly. :-) They've gone beyond the need to rebel, and - as you said earlier - it's just what they wear. That tension between them as adults and still as children, between making choices for themselves and having them made for them, makes that age a very significant one, and to see girls of that age in an obviously carefully-worn uniform says a lot to me. <smile>

M: <nod> I wonder how common it is for them to remember their uniforms with a spot of wistful longing in the few years after they leave school? I've always missed having mine.

P: <smile> Yes, and I've grown to miss the one I didn't ever really have.

M: <giggle> When we first started talking via e-mail, Pablo, I went back and read your stories. Mostly the Sally ones. And what stood out to me even more than the spanking was the ritual you wrote involving her buying and wearing her shirts. They're boys' rather than girls' shirts. Why did you decide to write it that way?

P: <smile> Someone else asked me that a long time ago, and I couldn't really answer them. Those stories, more than the others I've written since, were specifically written for me, as a way to explore my kinks and fetishes, and I was actually more concerned with writing for me than creating coherent stories, I think. :-) So it's something that clearly made sense to me. I think there are a number of reasons, none of which is the reason, but which might contribute. I find gender-play rather interesting, I think, and it was a way of enhancing the gender play that kind of already exists in that form of uniform - after all, most girls never wear a shirt and tie for the rest of their life after school. It also felt like a way of making the uniform even more formal - men's clothes are more formal than women's. I guess there was also an aspect of giving these choices to Sally, so making her more an active participant in the choosing of the uniform.

M: <nod> That all makes sense. I brought it up, because without that, I'd think the fact my shirts that you gave me are men's rather than women's was solely due to them being easier to find. But you're right that the men's styles are more structured and formal. And of course, women's shirts aren't sized by the collar.

P: That's right. <smile> So it was easier to choose them for you.

M: <looking out at the audience before looking back at you> Collar size is important isn't it? I mean, my impression is that the shirt in general is one of the most important parts of the uniform for you.

P: Right. I guess the collar (and tie) has always been the place where the uniform has been focused for me, you know. So it feels even more important that it be just right.

M: I'm not sure I understand what you mean there.

P: Well, it's both where the eye (my eye, at least) is drawn, and where the uniform is most detailed. Also, to use a different sense, it's the place where (again for me, can't speak for anyone else) the uniform is most keenly felt.

M: That makes sense. For me it's the skirt - the visual plaids and pleats and such. Because I had to be aware of how I was sitting. When you dress me in a uniform, the thing you/we leave for last is the buttoning of the top collar button. And you like it when the shirt is snug there. Actually, sometimes quite tight. And I've grown to like that too. This is something I'm finding it difficult to talk about.

P: <nods> It's maybe the most fetishy thing about my kink. The difference between the collar being loose and not very formal, and it being stiff and snug, makes a very big difference to how the uniform looks and seems to me.

M: It's something that makes an interesting counter-point with a more BDSM notion of collaring, doesnt it?

P: Right. And the odd thing is that that notion has never really meant very much to me - the purely symbolic act, if you like. And yet in the context of a uniform, suddently it's very important. I guess my explanation for that would be that it isn't just the symbolism for me. It's a more sensual thing - it's about how it looks and feels, and also the adherence to a dress code even when it's just that tiny bit uncomfortable. It increases the stakes, if you like.

M: <nod> For me, when you button or even more so when you tighten the collar around my throat it feels like a very possessive gesture - one that for me symbolizes a lot of submission and things like that.

P: Yes. That's powerful for me too, though it needn't mean possession for it to connect with my kink. I can see a schoolgirl whose uniform just happens to include a stiff collar, and instantly I can feel it.

M: <nod> That isn't the case for me. It's more of the feeling of being inside the collar than about how I or someone else may look.

P: Right. For you, this exists in connection to me. For me, it's just a part of my kink.

M: <nod> Is it really part of the spanking fetish for you? (Note my resistance to the word 'kink' continues <g>.)

P: Honestly, I don't think so. I tend to feel that my spanking kink and uniform kink are really separate. They combine very powerfully, but can exist independently.

M: <nod> That's nice for me. Because while being spanked is important to me, wearing the uniform can just mean that I'm your girl, that you're looking after me and doesn't need to mean that you're my headmaster or teacher.

P: Right, yes. :-) I don't really associate it with any playing of roles or assumption of different ages. It's just what you wear sometimes. I guess it's important to make the point that it also doesn't mean I lust after young girls. <smile>

M: For me it is about feeling younger. Not a specific age, but not being an adult. Which is how I feel most of the time so it's really about who I am, rather than being 12 or whatever. Wearing a uniform to me means that I'm being watched over somehow. Because for me that's the association I have with them.

P: <nods> Yes. It seems much clearer for you where this comes from. I'm not sure I can say the same thing for myself.

M: <nod> I'm not sure for me this is a fetish exactly. Symbol seems the more appropriate word. Kink just plain wrong.

P: <smile> It's definitely a fetish for me. I suspect most people who know about these things would try to point to some defining moment in childhood, but I'm not at all sure there is one. If there is, it's lost way back.

M: <nod> Because like the spanking fetish, this goes very far back for you, doesn't it?

P: Sure, as far as I can remember. This is way pre-sexual. It's just always been there, as unexplainable as ever. Like the spanking kink, I've somehow always known it wasn't something to talk openly about. It was just my secret with myself.

M: Does it fit well with your spanking fetish? That is, seeing me right now, would you want to spank me? <flirting a bit>

P: <smiling back> Of course. There's nothing that makes me feel like turning a girl over my lap than seeing her in a strict uniform, looking very smart and well-behaved and good. It's the good girls you have the watch most closely, you know.

M: Then why do you spend so much time watching over me?

P: See my last statement for the answer to that one.

M: No one else thinks I'm good. <pout>

P: Yes, well, I'm not sure anyone knows you as well as I do, kiddo.

M: It's hard to argue with that. But it seems most unfair to be most spankable when I'm being most good.

P: I'm sorry about that. I didn't choose it to be that way - it just is.

M: 'sokay. That's what happens when you take up with pervs. Or so my grandmother always said. ;)

P: So, how do you see school uniforms fitting into your life from now on, Mija?

M: In an ideal world I'd have one that I wore every day even when I didn't want to and I'd need to ask permission not to wear it or to change out of it during certain parts of my day. And while people would know it was a uniform, they wouldn't be surprised to see me in it.

P: In other words, this would be like a real school uniform for you?

M: <nod> Because the constraints of it make me feel more myself. And so, less constrained.

P: <nodding> I understand that very well. Even though it's clearly not a possibility for me, my bottomish fantasies (which are most common when I'm feeling tired and stressed and fragile) take me in similar directions.

M: A real school uniform I wear every day as a real school girl. Not as some sort of permanent play. I know it's hard to make that distinction, but this wouldn't be a game. I felt such envy and longing this summer at the uniform shops. Not just to buy and wear the uniforms, but to have that be normal.

P: Exactly. <smile> And it's rather wonderful that something so simple can have such a deep and powerful effect. It makes me feel very close to you knowing you're wearing what I asked, and that it's something that you might feel a little conspicuous in, but wear anyhow.

M: For now, having to wear a collar a couple of times a week and wearing parts of the uniform have me feeling connected to you. When we're apart that reminds me of the relationship between us and makes me feel good and closer to you. When we're together, having you pick out my uniform and make sure it's right makes it clear to me what we've both agreed to here - that you're responsible for me, and I'm responsible to you. Wearing the uniform when I'm with you reminds me that I don't need to be ashamed of who I am or hide the way things are between us. :) But having bare legs and a pleated skirt may make it too easy for you to smack me ya know.

P: Is there such a thing as too easy?

M: Tops are so lazy. ;b~~~

P: Of course we are, sweetie. <smile> And I'm a switch, remember.

M: Yes, but I so rarely see that side of you when I'm wearing a school uniform. Turning it back at cha, how do you see uniforms fitting into your life? And how has that changed in the past few years?

P: <smile> Well, the obvious answer to the second part is that they've come into my life. :-) It's been wonderful and slightly dizzying to get hooked up with someone I could explore these things with. I'm not sure I expected that would ever happen. I certainly envisage our trying as much as possible to work towards a situation where you're able to wear a uniform just as often as you'd like. That would feel very natural and right for me too, I think. I'd certainly hope we could be in an environment where people around us didn't make it hard, but then I think these days we care about that less than we used to. As for myself, that part of me isn't much explored yet, but I'd like it to be, I think. It's somewhat scary, but well worth the investigation. It's strongly connected with my bottoming fantasies.

M: What would your ideal uniform be like?

P: For me, every bit as strict and formal as the uniforms I'd choose for you, sweetie. <smile> Not really like a uniform I ever wore much, but a lot like the traditional British schoolboy uniform. It wouldn't necessary connect with feeling young, so much as just feeling I could relax into a set of rules, and have that be expected and normal. Obviously, a stiff collar and tie, short pants and knee socks, a sweater and blazer. And the shiniest shoes you ever saw. <smile>

M: Shiny shoes? You?? <boggle> No, but seriously, it sounds like a lovely uniform. :) What colors do you think?

P: Hmmm. Probably a lot of grey, which I rather like wearing. And perhaps a dark green as the other main colour. I'm not sure.

M: :) I like it. Can I be a schoolboy too?

P: <smile> Oh, I think so. You know, part of this for me is being with others in the same uniform. It's not about standing out, or being different, it's about a shared experience, and a shared discipline. Knowing how the others feel in their uniforms, and feeling the same way.

M: <nod> If we could rent the Museum of Education we could do some nice stuff there with other kids. I liked the way they had the children dress in gymslips and stuff.

P: There's clearly a need for somewhere just like that, that can be rented out.

M: :) If there was, I'd propose to you. =8-0

P: Hmmmm. I should get to work on the idea, then.

M: Would it be as important to you as it is to me that someone take you as a schoolboy seriously?

P: Oh, absolutely. I'd want it to be played totally straight.

M: How long can you imagine doing it? A few hours? A day? Much longer?

P: <thinking> I'm honestly not sure. It would probably be hard at first, but in the right circumstances, I think it's entirely possible I could settle into it almost permanently. It would feel very reassuring and relaxing.

M: :) I think so too.

Some useful links:

• Acadamy Wear School Uniforms
  <http://www.acadamy-wear.co.uk/>
  A reputable supplier of authentic British school uniforms. We've used them a few times, and they come with our recommendation.

• Aitken & Niven
  <http://www.aitken-niven.co.uk/>
  A rather wonderfully anachronistic shop in the town where Pablo lives, which is a main supplier of uniforms to Scottish schools.

• Traditional Boys' School Uniform
  <http://www.school.uniform.freeuk.com/>
  We might think this site is a little obsessive, but we realise that we live in a glass house here, so we'll stop short of actually saying it.

• Yahoo directory of school uniform suppliers
  <http://dir.yahoo.com/Business_and_Economy/Companies/Apparel/Uniforms/School/>
  Yahoo's useful directory of (mostly US) school uniform suppliers.

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