Distance Learning: Reflection

Co-Authored with Joost of Bad Girls Need Good Spankings

Sarah and David’s story began here

Almost immediately upon her semi-self-imposed exile to the corner, Sarah noticed the cobwebs and let out a sigh of exasperation. She’d just cleaned a few days ago, how did they come back so quickly? Sarah shivered a bit at the implication of the thought, cringing at the memory of her previous anxiety-ridden corner time. It hadn’t been the impending spanking weighing on her nerves then either. She’d thought that Tuesday’s Deep Clean would have helped this time around, but nature seemed to have won this round. Sarah tried to banish the thought from her mind, but there was precious little else to focus on in the corner. The reminder, she chided herself, that’s what she had been instructed to think of.

While not the strictest assignment she’d received from David while under his discipline, the evening awaiting her would be an ordeal to remember. Particularly the essay bit, she thought to herself. She had ideas of what to write- plenty of them- but the whole concept of writing something top to bottom without the chance to go back and edit would be a challenge for sure. For once, she was grateful for the corner time; she needed the time to compose her thoughts and perhaps even come up with a suitable opening line. At least she would get the spanking she craved. If mistakes earned her swats on her bare bottom, she knew she was more or less guaranteed to be very sore by the time she went to bed.

A movement in the corner of her eye made her start as she twitched her gaze in the direction of the disturbance. After a moment of confusion, she let out a laugh at the realisation that it wasn’t one of her little eight-legged friends come to pester her in her moment of vulnerability but her own flyaway hair. She took in her shadow splayed in the corner before her. The lighting and angles accentuated her frazzled appearance, making the wisps that had worked their way free of her hair clip over the course of a long day at the office look like horns growing out of the top of her head. Betraying the nastier side of her nature, Sarah thought ruefully. It had been a long day, and a long week, and she knew she deeply needed this evening of discipline to reorient herself.

It had been her idea, and she was grateful that he had not only agreed, but had seized the notion with gusto, prescribing what seemed to be a nastily creative reminder for her to complete this evening. She had asked for this, Sarah reminded herself as she shivered with both the thought of what was to come and of the chill that was creeping through her as she stood motionless in her corner. Corner time in winter is an entirely different beast than in the summer, she thought as she shuffled her feet in an effort to return a bit of warmth and circulation to her extremities, making a mental note to take suitable precautions before her next stint in the corner.

Just in time, her timer beeped her release, and Sarah collapsed onto her bed, rubbing her chilled toes with one hand as she cast about under the bed for her slippers with the other.

Once warmed, Sarah set about mutilating dinner.

Her cooking had improved under David’s encouragement, though she was hardly a master chef. Thus far she had confined her efforts mostly to various stir-fry type dishes of chicken and the more familiar of vegetables at the local market. In a brave mood this week, she selected a package of diced beef, hoping that her experiment would be edible. She had planned to make a stew, but given her other obligations for the evening and limited supplies of ingredients with which to cobble together a second meal should her experiment fail, she fell back on a more familiar preparation of sauteed mushrooms and onions.

Sarah looked over her remaining ingredients, but decided against adding anything else tonight. The broccoli would steam well to go with the leftover chicken breast for tomorrow’s lunch, and the carrots would likely join tonight’s leftovers in a soup. Sarah smirked at the ginger; there would be no need for that tonight.

The vegetable portion of the meal was coming together nicely, Sarah thought to herself several minutes later as she proudly admired the nicely browned vegetables through the tears their chopping had produced. She had always teared more than was typical while preparing onions, though they were delicious enough to be worth the pain. Sarah smiled at the thought, wondering if this might have been an early sign of the same disposition that led her to seek out David’s discipline.

Her smile faded when she looked at the pan of beef, which was now swimming in more grease than could possibly be healthy. She should have known, she cursed herself, she’d worked with ground beef occasionally before when experimenting with chilli, and should have remembered that it would require draining. She glanced around the kitchen for a suitable container- chilli always involved a plethora of cans that were ready to receive the liquid waste. Her concoction this evening, while she was proud of it’s use of fresh ingredients, was noticeably lacking in similar containers. She decided on the plastic container the mushrooms had came in, praying that it wouldn’t melt as she carefully tipped the grease into it. It mostly held its form, and she thanked her lucky stars and whatever deity or deities had been on her side in this gamble and carried on with her cooking.

The meal was quite satisfactory, Sarah decided when she sat down to enjoy it a few minutes later, munching away as she checked her e-mail for the evening. A tad overcooked, she noted for next time, but certainly edible and a nice change of pace. Spearing the last mushroom, Sarah nodded in satisfaction as she delivered her plate to the sink where it joined the rest of the night’s dishes. She was sorely tempted to leave the mess until the morning, but David had instructed her to tidy up before the next phase of her reminder, so she began the chore, and even threw in a load of laundry while she was at it, all the while thinking on what awaited her for the remainder of the evening.

In her distraction, she had forgotten the container of grease until she accidentally knocked it from the counter, making a glorious mess across her jeans, slippers, and most of the kitchen floor.

Sarah gaped at the mess in dismay for a few moments before setting her emotions aside and entering triage mode.
The floor, while the largest part of the mess, would clean easily enough. The slippers were on their way out anyway, worn and frayed as they were from heavy use. Her jeans however, required some quick action to save. She tried her best in the sink, but couldn’t do much more than rid the garment of the more obvious clumps of muck. This was a job for a machine, she thought, glancing down at the washing merrily going about the work she had set it to before this minor crisis. Though the load had just started, the washer would remain “helpfully” locked for the next hour or so. She’d need at least another hour after that for the next load. Unless the essay writing went very poorly indeed, she needed to buy herself some time if she had any hope of following David’s instructions to put herself to bed as soon as she’d completed his assigned tasks. While she was frequently tempted to disobey his occasional order for an early bedtime, if she was going to court punishment in that manner she wanted to do something far more gratifying than laundry.

She read his message again, contemplating a quick note to explain her predicament. As she rescanned the final line in the dinner section, she let out a laugh. He had instructed her to “tidy up.” Although he probably just meant from dinner, she could probably find another hour’s worth of chores or so to bide her time until the washing machine was ready for the next round. Besides, extra chores seemed to fit the punishment-like mood nicely.

Thus Sarah embarked on a not wholly necessary flurry of sweeping and scrubbing and polishing, though she made sure to pay particular attention to the clearing of the cobwebs in the corner she would soon be revisiting.

As the washer beeped the end of it’s load, Sarah quickly replaced the contents with her soiled jeans and a few other items she’d rounded up in the course of her cleaning, and set the machine to work again. Unable to think of any reason to delay the next step of her reminder- or at least any reason that David would find acceptable- she took herself to her room and began stripping out of the rest of her clothing as instructed.

As she stood in her underwear- the plan white panties that she had come to associate with discipline and only wore when instructed to do so, she felt silly. And cold. Sarah quickly retrieved the portable heater from the closet, deciding that comfort would be well worth the cost of a bit more electricity tonight, aimed it at her corner, set her timer, and took her place for the second time that evening. She felt even sillier standing in the corner- times like these she sometimes began to doubt the wisdom of submitting to discipline from someone she had yet to meet and who had no way of knowing for sure what it was that she did after receiving his instructions.

She tried to imagine how she must look standing there, and the shadow of her frazzled hair didn’t help her take the situation any more seriously. It was even worse than it had been last time, no doubt frizzed further by her cooking and cleaning efforts. It now formed a veritable corona around her head, the shadow stretching far enough to reach the east coast of England on the map she’d tacked up on the wall, nearly reaching the small star that marked her friend Murphy’s home town. Sarah laughed aloud at the irony, wondering what Murphy would think of her hair if she could see it now. Murphy had been so patient with her in her “girly lessons” with Sarah, gradually teaching her about makeup, clothing, frills and lace and perfumes and all manner of things that Sarah had never had much interest in before. Sarah was a slow learner in this area, but was making progress. Just that day, a box had arrived full of potions and lotions that she’d ordered under Murphy’s guidance. Sarah smiled as she thought of the box- testing a few of the items before bed tonight would be very fitting, as it was Murphy who was instrumental in encouraging her to seek a disciplinarian and therefore somewhat responsible for the state in which she now found herself.

Thinking of Murphy, she felt her emotions settling. She’d met Murphy and her partner online as well, and despite her nerves the first time they’d met in person, they had become two of her closest friends. They were proof that sometimes internet-people truly are just as they present themselves. Sometimes they truly are worthy of trust.

David had certainly earned a measure of her trust, she thought as she reflected on several patient, loving snippets from his messages that had been ingrained in her memory from numerous readings.

The beeping of her timer jolted Sarah from her reverie, and she blushed in shame despite the lack of audience in her room. Even if David had been there, he wouldn’t have known that her thoughts had most certainly not been on the essay she was to write next, as he had instructed. She considered just ploughing ahead; her corner time had been served. Still, she felt guilty for having not exactly followed his instructions specifying how she was to spend her time in the corner. Thinking momentarily of David’s instructions for the essay made her mind up. She was not to correct mistakes as she wrote, and would therefore need to know what she wanted to write before she began. Sarah knew she was nowhere near ready for this, and could make good use of another ten minutes in the corner.

Sighing, she reset the timer and firmly placed herself back in the corner, determined to make a better effort this time. She did succeed at keeping her mind on her assigned essay, though despite the extra time to think her thoughts were no less muddled when the timer beeped again than they had been the last time. She briefly considered a third round, but quickly dismissed the idea. David might understand and support her decision to repeat the corner time once- he had similarly supported her habit of repeating swats that didn’t meet her expectations when executing the spankings he assigned, but he had also made it clear that she was not to take liberties in increasing the severity of her assignments. Part of the reason she had sought his mentorship was that she was often hard on herself and had sought his moderating influence, an influence that would be completely lost if she did not follow his instructions as closely as she could.

She had indeed reflected on what she had learned under David’s guidance this time, though was no closer to sorting them into something that could become a readable essay than she had been before she started. Sarah bristled in frustration, wondering if it would be so bad to write as she normally did, rather than following David’s instructions about not correcting her mistakes. She donned her school uniform slowly, which helped calm her and enforced the idea that this was indeed a disciplinary assignment. She smiled as she knotted her tie. It was a lovely knot, she thought to herself, and a pity that David was not here to admire her efforts and her improvement in this particular skill. She remembered the first time she had tied the tie, nervously anticipating both Mark’s reaction to her outfit and her impending spanking, an affair that was still largely foreign to her at the time. It had taken her several tries to make the knot presentable on that occasion- and several occasions afterwards- though she’d noticed that her tying had become considerably more reliable lately. Practice does indeed make perfect.

Looking at her reflection in the uniform, she felt instantly more submissive, and knew that she would not want to live with the guilt of disobeying him, disobeying his instructions for a reminder she had requested no less, for the sake of a better essay. She would just need to make her best effort within the parameters specified. As the thoughts roiled in her head, Sarah grunted in frustration. Still, she thought, she’d made a habit of writing when her mind was in such a state, and had often found it helpful before.

Sarah sat down to write.

Nearly half an hour later, Sarah was still watching her cursor flash on an otherwise blank screen. She wanted to write, she had no shortage of things to say, but she also had no idea where to begin. David had been very clear in his instructions for the essay: she was not to go back, not to correct any of her mistakes. Sarah knew that this would be challenging, given her propensity to write erratically and clean up later, but had not expected it to be quite this hard.

Her gaze drifted to the notebook on the far side of the table. True, he had said she was not to use her delete key, but a quick read though his instructions confirmed that he had made no such rules about using paper. Sarah seized the notebook, rounded up a pen, and began to jot down her ideas, adding scraggly lines to join the thoughts together in something resembling a logical sequence. She hoped that David wouldn’t mind; she had given it an honest try, but if she had any hope of producing something coherent she needed to work her thoughts out before starting to type. If he did mind, well, then she wouldn’t need to worry about hinting at the need for a reminder for a good while. Satisfied, and much calmer, Sarah began to type.

It was still slow going. Even with a vague outline of what she had planned to write, it was difficult to come up with the proper words when needed. Sarah was unaccustomed to pausing when stuck for a word, her mind already rushing on to the next thought, and tonight the typos quickly added up despite her best efforts. Her bottom twitched as she counted her mistakes in just the first paragraph. The correction phase, aided by her heavy wooden spoon, would be no picnic. She would not have fared well in the world of ink pens and typewriters.

Sarah kept a close eye on the word count, determined to get as close as she could to the 500 words specified, but found to her horror that the final paragraph was nearly twice as long as intended, overshooting the target by nearly fifty words.

As Sarah finalised her error-counting, she pondered what to do about the word count. She doubted David would want her to take a stroke for each extra word. She didn’t even know how precisely he had expected her to meet the 500 word specification. She read his message again, looking for clues that might help her know how he would deal with this. This was one of the most frustrating parts of long-distance discipline, she thought. Despite her best efforts to ask for clarification before beginning her assignments, something always cropped up which required a degree of interpretation. Her instinct was to be harsh with herself, interpreting his instructions as strictly as possible, but he had made it clear that such behaviour was not warranted and may even be punishable in itself. She was to be disciplined, not abused, and he would not tolerate any actions she took that teetered across the line of reasonable consequences.

David had specified that her spanking should consist of one stroke per error, but that it should be doubled if under twenty. Sarah smirked- she knew there was small chance of that even before beginning, and had indeed earned nearly forty six swats for typos alone. He had gone on to say that this number would also be doubled for her final spanking at bedtime, unless that would bring her to more than sixty strokes, in which case the same number would suffice.

Mulling this over, Sarah decided firmly against one stroke per word oversbot; that would have brought her total close to one hundred, which he didn’t seem keen on. Sarah settled for rounding her spanking up to fifty strokes total, for no reason other than that fifty was a nice round number and seemed to fall within his expectations for a reasonable spanking.

Resolved, Sarah rose from her chair, bending over the table and reaching for her spoon. The first swat made her wince; the implement was hefty and harsh, with a long handle that made it easy to apply to herself but also very fearsome. Sarah gritted her teeth as she continued the spanking, focusing on delivering the swats in groups of ten, reminding herself to breathe between sets before gathering her wits to start again. This strategy seemed to work well, as only one or two swats per set landed badly, much better than her usual ratio.

Finishing the spanking with an especially hard whack, which landed distressingly low on her thigh, Sarah sat back down with a wince to correct her mistakes. Having already been carefully counted and marked, this step went blissfully quickly. Reading over the essay one more time, Sarah couldn’t find any additional errors, something which she was quite relieved by, as David had been ominously vague about the consequences of so doing. She hoped he wouldn’t find anything additional either, but knew that she was rather weak at proofreading her own writing.

Although she couldn’t find errors, per se, Sarah wasn’t quite satisfied with what she had produced. It was coherent, but decidedly clunkier than her normal writing, and she desperately wanted to fix it. Was it worth incurring additional penalties from David for correcting things that might not be errors? Sarah toyed with the idea before settling on a compromise. Copying the whole essay onto a different page, she took a few minutes to edit it to her satisfaction. This way, at least she would be completely transparent about what she had changed and David could make up his own mind as to the consequences. Content with her product, Sarah sent it off to her mentor and shut down her computer.

She eyed the spoon warily as she picked it up, as though she might intimidate it into being less stingy. Her bottom still throbbed from the first spanking, and she was not looking forward to repeating the experience as David had instructed. It had to be her least favourite implement, though it no doubt was effective in delivering the severe spanking she had desired, or, rather, had desired when she wasn’t about to execute it.

Sarah used the same strategy as the first time, though delivered the swats decidedly slower. She was trying her hardest to make them count, and needed more time to recover and aim properly as the pain continued to build. She was genuinely relieved when the ordeal was over, and took great pleasure in chucking the spoon back into the shadowy depths of the corner closet, safely out of sight and mind until David instructed her to dig it out again, something that hopefully wouldn’t happen for a good long time.

She carefully peeled off her uniform, folding it carefully even though she doubted anyone would be around to see if it were wrinkled the next time it was used. It was the principle of the thing, she reminded herself as she straightened her blouse on its hanger before heading off for the shower.

The hot water made her jump as it hit her bottom, and Sarah frantically readjusted the controls. It was an old shower, and not truly up to the challenge of heating water in winter, though tonight it seemed plenty warm. Once adjusted to a soothing lukewarm, Sarah luxuriated in the flow, taking her time as she selected one of her new shampoos, carefully lathering it and enjoying the rich floral scent. She could get used to this, she decided.

A shower can only last so long though, and soon Sarah was dried and nearly ready for bed. She looked wistfully at her book, longing to spend some quality time with it as she usually did in the evenings. David had been clear that there were to be no electronics, but hadn’t specifically forbidden reading. Besides, this wasn’t really a punishment, just a reminder. It didn’t seem fair to deprive her of such an innocent part of her bedtime routine. A sore bottom was indeed relaxing once the worst of the sting faded, but it was no substitute for a good book. Surely just a few pages. . .
Sarah shook herself to get rid of the thought. Even without looking at David’s instructions again- she’d read them enough to know them by heart- she knew that he would not approve of that particular activity now. He had intended for her to have an early bedtime, immediately preceded by her final spanking, and reading did not factor into his instructions. Sarah knew that if this was to work, she needed to obey as faithfully as she could, and had no desire to force him to specify future assignments in quasi-legalese by trying to exploit loopholes.

Kicking her book under her bed to rid herself of the temptation, Sarah picked up her new paddle that was to be used for the final spanking. It was her largest implement, nearly a foot in diameter, though not terribly thick or heavy. She had only used it once, having picked it up only a few weeks ago from a kitchen supply store, rescuing it from what would have been a very dull life as a cutting board. She had been quite satisfied with its wide-spread sting, and David had seemed pleased by her description as well. She had intended to sand it a bit more, as it had a decidedly unfinished feel. David had also hinted that she might well benefit from investing a bit of effort in improving the implement, but Sarah had yet to act on his suggestion. She had a feeling that she would be well motivated to do so after tonight’s spanking.

Sarah bent over her bed, and administered the first swat. It stung pleasantly, the large surface of the paddle covering most of her bottom, preventing it from doing too much damage to any one spot. Its size also prevented her from problems with her aim as it was nearly impossible to miss her target.

Sarah began to struggle as she approached the halfway mark of her spanking. Her previous introduction to the paddle had been a mere ten swats- enough to sting, but not for long. Over longer applications, however, the burn built considerably and Sarah found herself gasping for breath and wincing at each stroke. After a brief break, Sarah administered the rest of the paddling, trying to maintain the strength of each stroke even as her arm began to ache.

Her spanking finished, Sarah rubbed her bottom, delighting in the post-spanking heat and proud of the results of her efforts. She carefully donned her pyjamas, turned out the light, and tucked herself into bed. As she drifted off to sleep, she began mentally composing her report to David on her experience with his assignment. Her thoughts were pleasant, though jumbled, and she was grateful that he had not required her to track mistakes in that exercise as well. Her emotions about her discipline were confusing enough without compounding her communication with additional rules, though if he chose to do so she knew that she’d never have to worry about going long without a sore bum!

Continued