Ok, first off, I cannot believe I'm blogging at all. Please do refer to my Q-n-A thingee-bob sent to my husband, Chuck from Kaleah, who didn't know he'd pass it on to me. Hee hee!

But it got me started. No one get your hopes up too high, though, as this will not become a habit! I got TF work to do, dammit!

I wish to introduce this "Black" chick who has been appearing as a form of Kajira D. - as my Goth persona.

Why a Goth name? Because Kajira is a joyful person (usually) and I can't have a cheese-eatin' grin on 100% of the time. It's just not how I feel. It is usually how I feel while dancing, however.

So now I'm dancing Gothic Fusion BellyDance. Kajira Djoumahna is not who I am then. Another aspect of MySelf appears, and Her Name is Black.

The below is from my Q-n-A about names throughout my life.

Q: If you could change your name, what would you change it to?

A. Already have and I continue to do so. I've had many names.. since about age 4 or 5 I began asking my parents to call me by various names and friends, too.

Then came my career as a writer for punk rock zines, when I could really play with psuedonyms. My most common one I wrote under in those days was Pandora S. Box.

Then came my first husband, whose last mundane name was better than my "given" one, so I still have that for the mundanes.

Then came my involvement with the B&D/S/M scene (no, I've never had a "regular" job I am proud to say!)... As Anne Rice writing as A. Roquelare (or something like that) said in her Beauty series, an excellent Dominatrix can only become so by starting out as an excellent submissive.

So, during my training in The Club and through Chuck's and my early-in-our-relationship involvement with the Society of Janus of SF, I had 3 names over several years. First was Dina, the sub. Next came the "Switch" names: Rayne for sub, Reyna for Dom.

Finally a full-fledged professional Dominatrix with my own dungeon (lighting and industrial hooks, swings, spotlights, black visqueen plastic and many toys comstructed by my dearest one, Chuck) and my name was Mistress Ann.

During this time I discovered bellydance - more later, but as a baby bellydancer, I was also a member of a Vampire Theatrical Co. called "Children of the Damned."

We put on big theatre shows in the old Sonoma Mission Plaza Theatre at Midnight for 3 days or so near Hallowe'en (in The Valley of the Moon, of course!) as well as in the Luther Burbank Center for Performing Arts in downtown Santa Rosa (not the newer one on the outskirts).

We also had lots of fun posing for pics in graveyards, doing Full Moon rituals and generally running around the streets of Sonoma County with our custom-made fangs and vintage bridal gowns (our token guy was the one in black who we were supposed to have been sired by) scaring old people and babies. That was fun! I forgot - gasp! - my Vampire name. That's weird. Maybe my character was too old to remember. LOL!

Then came bellydance - with a couple "starter" names. Then my "real" name, Kajira Djoumahna developed.

Now I have other names as well for various aspects of my personality, the most common new one being Black for my Goth Self. (I think of it as yin-yang, dark and light now.)

It never entered my mind that I "couldn't" change my name. In those early years at age 4 asking my folks to call me "Bluebird" and later, "Pony" after a horse movie I saw, they told me I could change my name whenever I wanted, esp. after I was 18, even legally.

So I guess that was never an issue with me, thanks to my open-minded parents and my own extremely vivid imagination.

I just had to get that out.

Now, about being Goth. This did not come out of the blue (or the black), this has been a part of me all of my life. It may surprise some ppl. who've only known "Kajira" to know more about my "past life" as an extremely active member of the early SF Punk Rock Scene from the late 70s to early 80s.

I even helped get thousands of signtaures to get Jello Biafra's (of the Dead Kennedys) name on the ballot for Mayor of SF. We had great campaign buttons, like: "Jello's record speaks for himself" and others I wish I could remember.

I was always heading for SF (until I moved there, living in either SF or Berkeley/Oakland/Emeryville for over 13 years as a young adult), first to go to Winterland with college boyfriends (I always dated older guys back then) to see late hippie bands like A Beautiful Day and 10 Years After, later on seeing Montrose, The Who, The Stones (many many times, love me Keef!), Queen, Bowie - then punk.

The Mutants, The Police, The Ramones, The B-52s, Blondie, The Tools, The Replacements, The Avengers, The Dead Kennedys (of course), No Alternative (Jeff Rees, Paulette's husband, was the bassist!), Regime, X, Siousie and The Banshees, Black Flag, DOA, The Nuns, Lou Reed with and without The Velvet Underground, The NY Dolls, Pink Section - so many I can see in my mind but cannot remember their names right this sec.

My hair's been dyed for about 3/4 of my life. My lifestyle has always been "alternative." I recently was able to break out my 30-year-old striped socks to wear since they're oh-so-fashionable again now.

So, Black is not out of the blue. It's just a part of me that I ignored while getting straight (yes, I had the downfalls of a life led full-speed-ahead - but I lived past 30 which wasn't supposed to happen - I thought then) and especially while working for a decade getting my Kajira Djoumahna/BlackSheep BellyDance Fomat for ATS BD developed.

Now it is up and running and is built-in to be open to some evolution. I have teachers around the world and I am grateful and happy about my contribution to the world of dance that brings so much light into the world through this vehicle.

But now that it's in the good hands of my Acting Director and Apprentice, Seba, I felt the old super-alternative feelings needing attention again.

The closest thing to the feeling I got back in the Punk heydey that I have found today is in the Gothic subculture. Children of Punk, actually. They think Siouxsie is Goth! It's just so cute, I could just squish 'em!

So I identify with the Gothic lifestyle and manner of dress and the elegance Punk never had. The same DIY stuff prevades in both subcultures, not that *I* think Punk still exists in today's world because it died in the early to mid 80s IMO.

Chuck and I picked a "punky-new-wave" song 16 years ago as our wedding song. It was Love Song by The Cure. We also made a point of chooosing Friday the 13th as our wedding day, of course!

Guess once an old Punk, now a new Goth. They are really the same - just a bit more fun being Goth I think. Things are not as serious.

We're not fighting to stop skinheads with razor blades in their boots from entering our Punk club where only pogoing was previously allowed. Pogoing was friendly. If someone fell, they would be helped up by many around them. Shoot, I'd find money all the time by looking down at my ruby slippers on the pogo floor.

But if I'd stooped to pick it up when that slamming /moshing crap started happening I'd have been killed. That's when Punk died and Metal took over.

Part of Siouxsie's "master scheme?" I don't think so. Just mean-spirited assholes with shaved heads and swastikas, ruining it for the rest of us kids who "want to have fu-un, o-oh, grrrls just wanna have fun!" (Cyndi Lauper)...

Not to say I didn't enjoy metal - I was a total Metallica fan at least for their 1st three albums, and also LOVE/D Danzig and The Misfits (though were they hard rock or metal?) I'd say "Hard Thearical Rock" - after all, that big skull onstage was just so funnny yet effective. It always reminded me of the little Stonehenges in Spinal Tap - like what if Danzig's skull was made way too small? LOL!

So yeah, I qualify to be Goth. Been one all my life, just didn't know it until recently. Glad I found out before I died!

LNOL,LNOL! (yes, you can ask me what that means!)

OK, "blogland", cya laytah!

aloha, namaste`, peace, love, dope,

KD a.k.a. Black