Competition Breeds Excellence in Captivity

There is a popular conception that you have to be something like a billionaire to own a private island. The truth is that you can buy a private island for less than $100,000 US dollars, or about a quarter of the median price of a house in the United States in 2025. Admittedly, the logistics of getting a construction crew and materials out to sea to build an underground apartment costs considerably more. Private jets also are more expensive, but one can be had for less than a million US dollars if you are willing to go the used route. All to say this is not out of reach for anyone who has a good career in a first-world country, so long as one does not have extravagant tastes.

I am not trying to pretend that I am not rich. Especially compared to 99% of the people of the world, who would all certainly say I am. But I am not ‘fuck you rich.’ I do not own mansions on multiple continents, or order increasingly longer yachts, in what boils down to an inverse dick-measuring contest for the wealthiest assholes in the world. My plane has decent range so I can fly over the oceans, but it is not something like a new Gulfstream G800, where I would not have to stop for fuel going from Sydney to Dallas. I am licensed as an instrument-rated pilot, so I do not have to rely on anyone else. Hiring pilots goes against my fiscally conservative instincts, and I could not have anyone connecting me to the island destination, nor who I was bringing there.

Now, a little about me: sure I have some unique professional experiences and sexual tastes that are not considered mainstream. But from outwards appearances, I am not that out of the ordinary. I would like to think I look maybe a little better than average—flattery from ex-girlfriends and one-night stands aside—but most of that I can credit to enjoying intense workouts, a habit that predates my military days. There is a popular misconception that operators from special units all look like Olympic athletes, but the truth is that we come in all shapes and sizes. Personally, I am around average height and can blend into many crowds, which has proven to be a useful trait when hunting humans in the military and as a civilian now. Hell, no matter what girls have said, I know my dick isn’t that much bigger than average either. 

My parents were both college educated, so no surprise that I ended up graduating from what are considered “good schools.” I made my money in a fairly traditional fashion: got good grades, then a good job, and that led to an even better job. Not going to lie: I never was in dire straights because I inherited a little bit when my parents passed away while I was in the military, and they certainly set me up for success in how they raised me. Nevertheless, I made more money by my 30s than they did in their lifetimes. 

I like to think I did pretty well for myself when it came to picking up girls. Not because I was rich or because I claimed to be something like a US Navy SEAL, though those are admittedly factors. Because I did not grow up as wealthy as I am now, I can attest that a lot of women around the world are attracted to money—though not all.  As much as my ego would like to think I could get in a hot girl’s pants with just good looks and charm, there is some truth that women have a biological response when they realize a man is in a famous special operations unit. In spite of that I hated the guys who played the ‘hero’ card, and our senior enlisted leaders would lay hands on any new guy who blew our cover. 

Not that I ever had any delusions about our ability to remain anonymous in a third-world country, as a group of Westerners who looked like they had protein and calories to burn in a gym. When we met women it seemed that trying to be secretive about our job apparently only added the allure of our mystery. Every one of us would realize on our first overseas trip that local girls could pick us out better than any actual foreign intelligence agent, having seen several rotations of our teams come through the same cities and establishments. Hell, when I used to hit the bars with the boys, we sometimes joked that we had sired children all over the 3rd world that we did not know about. 

When it comes to all my long-term relationships, my girlfriends fit the same pattern: pretty, with couple have been truly stunning, well-educated, at least middle-class, working hard in promising careers, and satisfying in bed—though nothing extraordinary. Each of us had been happy together, but it was not my ultimate happiness. For what it is worth, I am still on good terms with almost all of them, except the truly crazy ones. I never had the urge to explore BDSM with any of them, for I knew nothing safe, sane or consensual would come close to what I fantasized about. That was ok with me in my previous normal life. But I sealed my decision to turn away from a normal life with a vasectomy, which took a little searching to find a well-respected surgeon who was willing to perform the operation on a single man with no children. I dreamt of an alternative life that was nothing like a traditional relationship in Western culture with vows of monogamy, a big car full of kids, and a house with a white picket fence in suburbia.