I don't know, man

I’m tired of dating. I’m sick of the banter that dies and the thrill of meeting someone new. I don’t want to meet someone new. I want to curl up with someone that knows and loves me. Could I somehow just find them?

It’s made harder because things are so damn amazing with Traveler. I like meeting people, but I really like spending time with him. I wish the other things could be so easy and work so well, but they can’t, because we haven’t known and loved each other for years.

I want to know all the little spots that make them gasp. I want to have our perfect kisses, the ones that melt us and that we’ve learned over time. I want our routines and our habits and the little things we do and are to each other. I want to fall asleep so fast with them too, moments after we came, when we are curled together, sweaty and sated, only to wake up some time later to turn out the lights or the music or cover us both up.  I want to grab our water for our nightstands while they make sure the door is locked. I want to grin like idiots playing candy crush and laughing our asses off in bed. I want to fast forward to the part where it works and the relationship is good.

I want to already be a part of each other’s lives. I don’t want to wonder if they want to see me. I don’t want all the stupid complications of making plans at first, or the nervousness or the wondering. I don’t want to have great online chats and then meet and realize there is no way we ever want to kiss each other. I don’t want the best faces forward and the feeling that I’m sitting across from someone and we are both already thinking… “back to the drawing board”. Hell. I’d rather put on my pajamas and watch a chick flick with my cats sometimes. And so I do. The Boss is really funny, by the way.

I still for the life of me can’t figure out if this guy likes me or is just being nice when he’s not busy.  I like hanging out with him and would probably be happy either way, but I’m not sure if I should stop trying to make plans with him outside of the club if really he’d rather just be fucking. God I hate dating sometimes.

I Don't Know

There are so many things that I don’t know.  I know I had an insanely hot loving close intimate fun weekend.  There were trips to the sex shop for more gear, delicious breakfast casseroles and cookouts, leather cuffs, so much snuggling, petting, great talks about everything, beautiful nights, insanely hot times with just Traveler and I, and then Traveler and I and our new friend Yarn Hooker, and with a new guy I haven’t named yet.  There was wine tasting and homemade pie, games with friends, old friends playing putt putt and laughing over pizza, and a lazy morning just like we like.  There was something in the air this weekend!  I will be enjoying memories of this weekend for some time to come.

And my friend sent me messages yesterday, expressing joy at his partner finding a great new prospect and a tiny bit of trepidation.  What if she likes him better?  What if she only needs the new man?  What if he makes her forget my friend?  He went online to read blogs and found some, all ending with divorce.  Not very encouraging.

I told him honestly that sometimes this life is bitter hard. Relationships USUALLY end before death.  This is true in monogamy and in polyamory and in every other kind of ‘amory too.  How many people do you know that are blissfully coupled with the only person they’ve ever loved and they’ve been together and close and happy for life?  Chances are if you are lucky you can name maybe 5 couples.  That’s 5 couples out of the hundreds or thousands of couples you have known.  It’s not like monogamous relationships are paragons of stability either.  But with the fluid nature of open relationship networks, things do have more opportunity for change, and that really points out the unstable nature of romantic relationships.

I Admit I'm a Bad Poly Sometimes

Alright.  I admit it.

I just read a blog post by Ginger at Poly Nirvana, called Pout.  It’s here.

She’s talking about her “less than perfect” poly feelings as her love is dating and with this other new girl.  She was sort of sharing and admonishing herself and owning up to her stuff.  That’s always kinda rad.  I am a huge believer that what comes from the heart reaches the heart, and such honest sharing is so useful.  When we pour that stuff out people can relate to it.  It’s human.  And of course, it got me thinking.

tiny home in a clearing made of stone and wood

It’s not a pressing matter this second, but I’ve been working on preparing for Traveler to find and date and be with others again.  As far as I know he’s not madly searching for new connections, but I know he’s open to the idea and I think he’d like it.  We talked about it a couple of times and I flipped out about it…twice, sadly.  (I despise that by the way).  Traveler has always been unflinchingly supportive of my dating and sexy exploits and whatever.  He trusts me and supports me, and it’s beautiful.  I want to give him that.  Sometimes I do give him that.  He’s so beautiful, so kind, so sweet and passionate and loving, and he has a special gift for loving that honestly I don’t think it would be right to jealously guard it.  I love him loving his wife and I used to love him loving Peaches.  And it’s a precious thing, to love someone so much that their happiness fills you with joy.  He talks about Quinky Girl sometimes and I just overflow.  He SHOULD have that and she should too.  It’s beautiful.  I love that my love for him includes that.  I love that my love for her does too.  It feels very right.  I feel the same about Cleveland and his wife.  I love my men in part because they are good men that know how to love.

But wives don’t scare me in the same way.

Woke up the Ol' Dating Profile

I woke up my dating profile.  I added pics and changed stuff and posted it greatly anew.  It had been about 2 years since I’d edited it and it seemed like time.  I promptly met a cute guy.  Yay.  We talked.  Double yay.  He messaged ME, and we chatted online in the little OKC chat thing and decided we should talk again and maybe meet and exchanged text numbers.  Happy littlte jig.  He texted me the next day and asked me to meet him and we chatted via text a bit more.  Cool.  We set up a day and I didn’t hear anything until a day or two before the meeting saying he needed to reschedule because he’d forgotten about a friend visiting and plans he had to spend time with them.  That’s fine.  It happens.

I texted him a day or two later.  Nothing.

About 4 or 5 days later he texts that he might be free on next Tuesday but he won’t know until last minute, but next Thursday looks even better.  I reply that next Thursday could be good, and let’s chat and make plans before then.

Thursday (today) he pops and says “Hey.  LIfe’s been a busy thing, but I’m open for this evening.  How about you?”

I say “Oh sorry.  I didn’t hear back and made other plans. We seem to be missing each other communication-wise”.  I add in a following message “I’m interested if you’d like to talk a bit and reschedule.  Obviously if our schedules just don’t align to talk much, that likely wouldn’t work.  But we could give it a shot in the next week and see if it was just a fluke.”

He responds that he didn’t think I would expect to hear back from him.  He says he saw that I said I’d be interested in talking before meeting but he didn’t think that was the expectation.  And he adds that he is a busy grad student and he gets home late and crashes out only to wake up and do it again, without time for texting and chatting. He says this is why he doesn’t want a complicated long-term relationship right now and he can’t have people demanding more than he can reasonably give.  “So no offense intended by not chatting with you since Monday night (it’s a weed later Thursday), but if not chatting for a few little days at a time would be a problem I’d likely disappoint”. 

Trusting Enough to Take a Risk

love dice from http://ronenews92fm.files.wordpress.com/2013/02/love-dice.jpg

So, I’ve been doing some writing and thinking and such about fear. I posted the other day about a fear eruption I’d had. I’m not sitting and stewing and living in fear, and I’ve actually still been enjoying the happiness of a week vacation with my sweet Traveler, but my fear boiled over twice now, and the strength and content of my reaction told me this was in large part about something else and I have work to do.

No, I’m not fucking crazy about the idea of Traveler dating again. I have good and bad reasons for this. I feel like he is a busy guy that can barely keep up with his current investments. He works a fucking lot. A lot lot. As it is with me seeing him twice a week now some of our dates are spent with him working. He doesn’t have time to have two full nights a week with me without doing work. He’s kinda important, you know? So, we get also a little extra time here and there.. maybe once a week sometimes, dinners after working in the yard, or an hour or two of WoW playing here and there while Quinky Girl works late or something, or talking as we clean the kitchen. It’s nice. I like this time filling of my “family battery”. We tend to get at least one date a week and some time on the second one with face-to-face interacting alone time and stuff like kissing and snuggling and fucking and talking, and that fills my “romantic battery”. I’m very happy with the amount of time and activities we currently have and I don’t want to actually lose it. I think that’s reasonable.

He can’t really afford to take the time from Quinky Girl either I don’t think. They see each other a lot, obviously living together and all, but most of their time is spent doing the business of living, like most people. Of course I assume they kiss and snuggle and have good moments even on those days when they are dealing with receipts and grocery shopping and working in the yard and planning their kitchen or whatever, but they have limited face-to-face time and I think she has a “romance battery” and “family battery” like I do too.

a love battery on hot pink from http://4.bp.blogspot.com

But.. this isn’t my choice to make. I can have this opinion all I want, but in the end Traveler will decide how he will spend his time and what matters to him and what he’ll invest in. If he wants to spend time he spends with me with someone else, I can’t fight that. I don’t think that is his plan, and I hope it doesn’t work out that way, but people do choose what matters with the choices they make about how they spend their time. Maybe he’ll choose to get a gardener and spend his time in the yard dating instead. Maybe he’ll get more efficient at paying bills and grocery shopping and cleaning and managing investments and organizing and all those little things people do and he’ll spend THAT time dating and not in separate-togetherness with Quinky Girl. Maybe he’ll spend the time he spends with Quinky Girl dating instead. I freaking hope not. Maybe he’ll stop taking all of his ski-trips and boy’s weekends and holiday-party-trips and family-trips and people coming-to-Seattle-time and spend all of that time dating. Shit, maybe he’ll learn to just sleep a whole lot less and date a night owl. Maybe he’ll find a girl to fuck only when he visits a job site he goes to every other month or so. I don’t know.

I can talk about my concerns rationally and reasonably or talk about what I feel, but in the end, I give him the freedom that he gives me. He can date or fuck or whatever anybody he wants. I might ask him not to fuck certain people if there are compelling reasons to do so, and he can choose to honor my request or not, and I can ask him for what I need for our relationship, but I might not always get it and there may be consequences associated with any action. That’s the way the world works. I don’t need to make rules with him, even if I could or wanted to. There are consequences for every action and I have to talk to him about all of this and then trust him to make the right decisions for himself. I make the decisions for me, and I choose him, but I don’t have to any more than he has to choose me. I hope he’ll consider me and Quinky Girl, and his friendships and his daily life stuff and his family and find a way to meet his needs and be happy too. If he chooses things that cost him our relationship and knowingly chooses them, well… them’s the breaks. Right?

CSS Geeking Out

As part of my “learn to be a better blogger” thing, Cleveland is helping me learn some stuff.   I LOVE learning stuff.

So after we went to dinner, and after a pretty wonderful fucking, we lay naked, side by side, and he taught me some CSS.  It’s a computer language (I think) that lets you make stuff.  We played around with a dummy site on WordPress.org, showing me how to do the things I want to do with pages.  We were talking about abc’s really.. but it rocked.

I’ve decided to learn the technical things I can.  I’m not stupid and I’m pretty good with other sorts of technical things, so I’m feeling good about my odds.

I love this.  I love learning things and growing and I love it even more when hot naked men touch my butt while they tell me things like the difference between margins and padding.  Mmmm.. sexy geeky-ness.

It comes at a good time too.  To be honest I’d begun to be a little concerned about Cleveland and I.  I love him, and he’s a wonderful man, but I was starting to get concerned that our relationship might come to a head because we’ve quite smartly been taking it slow, but it just began to feel like it had no room for growth.  I see him once a week almost all weeks, usually on a Monday for dinner and a chat and a fuck before he runs off home.  It’s hard to think of once a week, almost exclusively weeknight and rarely ever overnight as a relationship after a while.  I’m not talking for everyone of course, but I am talking for me.  It’s okay when you are getting to know one another and when you are trying to take things slow for your partner, and I’m not yet disgruntled, but I could start to see where I could be in the not too distant future if there was never any space.   Turns out he was feeling kinda the same and wants a little more time.  He brought it up actually.  Yay for nice slow growth.  And yay for a little time to do fun geeky shit like learning a little CSS.  That man’s a marvel.  🙂

Change is Good

bitrebels.com

Little things you do can make a big difference to those who love you.  I think there’s a lot of talk about how to show people you love them and there’s lots of stories of grand gestures.  I’m not against them, honestly, but it’s the little stuff that I crave and the little stuff that sustains me.  I love epic dates with deep talks and insanely large amounts of kissing and touch and amaze-balls sex and all of that.  BELIEVE ME.. I don’t turn my nose up at that kinda thing.  But a million little things adding up over time is somehow more soothing to me.  Maybe it’s that I’ve had so many grand gestures that add up to nothing or because I’ve lost really important things when the every day was forgotten, or maybe it’s just my perspective.. whatever.  But big big gestures just aren’t enough.

All The Little Things That Make Me Happy

After he leaves, I don’t change the sheets.  I like sleeping in a place that smells like him. 

I like running my Sunday errands thinking about dinner and football tonight with Traveler and his wife, getting a chance to chill with them at the end of a good weekend and getting to watch some football.

I am eager and nervous for tonight.  I have a date with Boss at the club, at a play party I’ve been meaning to hit.  I’m nervous because I don’t know what to expect.  I’ve never been to this party and I’ve never been to a party with a date.  I’ve never played at the club.  I’ve wanted to.  Are we going to play?  What should I expect?  It makes me happy to think eagerly of possibilities and to not have specific expectations.  It makes me happy to think of chemistry and exploring and fun.  I’m turned on and scared and I kind of like the combination.  I know I don’t really have anything to fear.  I have some control here.  I have some say.  But I like and fear the unknown. 

I feel so encouraged by my loves.  Both of them were supportive about tonight.  When I told Cleveland and Traveler that I was meeting Boss and that we’d be meeting at the club and that it might be a play date (read kinky sex), and that I kind of hoped it was, they were both encouraging.  They kissed me or hugged me and told me to have fun and to be safe.  I waited for a shoe to drop that didn’t.  I would happily have had more conversation or been supportive if there’d been a need for reassurance or support, but there didn’t seem to be even a healthy need for that yet.  I probed a little, trying to encourage them to talk if they wanted to.  I could feel a tiny something in them that they both swore wasn’t there.  I think they naturally had a tiny pinch that they handled internally.  I think they didn’t want to make a thing out of something that they easily managed and I think they were actually okay.  They are very clear that I love them.  I think they know how important they are to me.  That made me feel good.  I like thinking that the groundwork is there for us in all of our talks and kisses and attention and love, that they had little fear.  It would have been and will be okay if they have little things here and there and we talk about it.  But it was nice that nobody melted down.

I am buoyed by Friday’s wonderful date with Cleveland.  It was a stressful week and it took me a little bit to de-stress.  It was wonderful to have time.  We helped Peaches pick up some things at the naughty shop and played Cards Against Humanity with our friends.  It was hilarious and we had the best time.  We had talks and snuggles and pets and amazing sex.  We slept and woke together.  We made plans for our next date and marveled as we always do by getting time together.  Love may be boundless but time and attention are not and I was grateful as ever for it.

I feel content after Saturday’s date with Traveler.  We wanted to do a little something different but weren’t really wanting to get gussied up and frankly we both really LIKE our little routine, so we just ate dinner somewhere different.  Interestingly we talked about our agreements.  Somehow we never explicitly did that and me being me, I liked getting it in words and layed out.  We pretty much have one agreement.  We like to be informed, and will continue to inform each other.  We’re good at it.  We talked about football and World of Warcraft and silly little things.  We had sex that left us both reeling and panting and fell asleep curled together.  He might let us interview him.  He’s thinking about it.

I am so eager to interview both Peaches and then Traveler’s Wife.  They have both agreed to talk to us for the podcast.  So cool!

I’m excited I’ll get to see Traveler’s Wife a lot this week.  We planned a girl’s night and we have Thanksgiving.  I can’t wait to dish with her.  We said we’d let Traveler come to dinner with us but I think we’ll get some girl time too afterward.  I feel so honored and loved to be included in their holiday.  I know a lot of people in my situation will be spending the day alone and have no access to their loved ones, and I’m grateful for such generosity.

And I can’t stop thinking non-stop about Roller Derby.  I joined a beginner’s league and went Saturday to get kitted up with all the things I need to play.  I feel like a kid with new school clothes.  I love my helmet and my gear.  I can’t wait to actually be any good. I just want to skate and skate and skate.  I made a huge Amazon wishlist of tights and socks and booty shorts.  

I’m just happy today and aware of my many blessings.  You ever have days like that when you just want to make gratitude lists? 

 

Old Comfortable Love

This beautiful post was shared by a Ginger at “Poly Nirvana”, and I have to share it too.  It’s achingly true.

Old Love is Not Like Comfortable Slippers by Poly Oliver, at “An Open Book”.

THAT is what I had.  THAT is what I lost.  THAT is why I took so very very long to walk away and why me, a girl who would never tolerate such things, sucked up abuse for almost a year.  I kept thinking any day that he would turn back into himself.  And he didn’t. 

Chain Yankers

Peaches was recently dating this guy.. let’s call him Ass for short.  She and Ass started out as a friends with benefits kinda thing and had some really fantastic sex and then some fun non-sex adventures and some nice time together.. and they fell in love -quickly.  It was intense.  Flurries of texts and professions of amour and all kinds of heat were flowing.  Then he tells her “I can’t stand this.  I can’t share.  I need you to choose. It’s gotta be me or being open.  She thinks about it and decides she wants a shot with this guy and she’s going to let Traveler go.  It makes her sad, but Ass is offering her a relationship that meets a lot more of her needs and desires and she’s not really sure she’s open anyway, having only tried the open thing for Traveler.

The night before she is set to tell Traveler, Ass says “Wait.. don’t pull the trigger.  Actually I can’t do this relationship at all.  My parents expect me to marry a girl from this country we are from and they will never accept you.  I told you from day one I’m only looking to marry girls from this certain country and we were supposed to be casual.  I have to stick to that.  Let’s go back to just being friends with benefits”.

Um.. that never works.  But they tried.  Predictably it was difficult and painful.  Then he cut it off entirely and said “let’s just be friends”.  So they did.  Peaches loved the guy and mourned this.  He called her up soon after saying… “I miss you.  I want to be with you.  Do you miss me?”.  She did.  They hooked up again.  Their crazy crazy chemistry and ease was lovely.  So they again were friends with benefits.. seeing a lot of each other.  Then she was downgraded to once a week max and then offered more, and less.. blah blah blah.  He kept saying come here and go away.  He kept yanking her chain and it did a number on her self esteem, that she’d allowed him to jerk her back and forth like this because she just wanted to be with him.  Ass wasn’t doing it on purpose and he’s not by nature an ass, but he was acting like one in this relationship. It’s painful to have a carrot dangled in your face and ever out of reach.

Chain yankers.

One of the things that makes me crazy about dating is chain yankers.