I got sick of looking at slick, commercial bondage photos. I wanted to get in touch with rank-and-file kinksters. I wanted to talk with the real roping hoi polloi. So I placed an ad in a magazine. The photo I sent showed one of my former girlfriends, hanging by her heels in my apartment. I was proud of the skillful way I'd strung her up. She was wearing stockings and nothing else, and her eyes held a look of surprise. My personal message read: "I'm looking for others who share my interests."

In response, I received:

Several photos of a woman wearing heart-shaped sunglasses and handcuffs, sitting around a house. With a note: "We don't want to hear from you. We want to hear from your girlfriend. Please ask her to write to us."

A photo of a woman in bra, stockings and heels, roped to a chair in a motel room. On the doorknob next to her, a "Do not disturb" sign. The message: "When our kids see us going out, they say, 'We know you're doing something. We just don't know what it is!'"

A shot of a woman in jeans and T-shirt, facing away, hands tied behind her back, along with a rambling letter about unusually cold weather in the South. Sender: the woman in the picture. Her request: "I'd like to see anything that shows hands tied behind the back."

Many photos of a woman wearing different wigs, bound inside and outside a ranch-style home in the Midwest . Her spouse's note: "Our wives are lucky to have husbands like us."

Shots of a couple of different women, wearing nurse's uniforms, tied hand and foot on someone's living-room floor. On a bookshelf: medical titles.

An instant photo of a Hispanic-looking woman with her shirt open, her wrists cuffed to an eyebolt over her head. Message: "She was very shy."

A photo of a nude woman standing in front of a mirror, so as to be visible front and back, with cord wrapped around her wrists, breasts and upper arms. Partner's note: "I don't know why I do it. I was just born to do it."

Photos of a woman in a Spandex body suit and a single leather glove around her arms. Husband's note: "I'm a professional photographer."

A series of a smiling woman handcuffed in the back of a minivan, legs held apart with a broomstick. Message: "We want to see home videos."

A print of a woman, wearing black boots and black underwear, hanging upside down with legs spread and arms stretched down to a wood block on the floor. Message: "My interests are various."

An instant shot of a topless woman, hugging a tree, handcuffed to the trunk, with whip marks on her back. Message: "She was sent by her husband. I returned her after a weekend of punishment."

A couple of photos of a woman wearing jeans and no top, suspended hammock-style from a basement beam. From a person identified only as Mail Sender.

A letter with no photos, just the statement "We suspect that we are are more hard-core than you. Please send photos of your more extreme activities, if you have any."

I took all of the photos I had received and taped them neatly in plastic sheet protectors in a three-ring binder.