So

I am now, officially, seeing two people. It feels… normal. Surprisingly normal. In all honesty, I was in complete agony yesterday, because I felt like I could only possibly be neglecting one person or another in this situation, and I couldn’t see my way through to how this would be manageable. The logistics were terrifying, and more than that the idea that I would get involved with someone, one or more relationships would fail, and I’d have to go through the breakup with T all over again. I just don’t know that I have another one of those in me.

But once things were less theoretical, it was fine. I was able to just exist in the moment. I could be with A and just be with her, without either living in my own head or spending the whole time worrying that I was doing something to Carrie. Both of them have been brilliant through this, A accepting that I have certain things to give and others that are in reserve for someone else, Carrie giving me my space; I think I’ve put myself through more anguish than anyone else. I’m sure there’s some wish on everyone’s part that all of this could be done without scheduling conflicts, but to the extent that it’s possible everyone is aware of and accepting-of-to-happy-with the arrangements in place.

I’m sure there will be stumbling blocks. A asked if Carrie and I have anything she should be aware of, but of course as of yet any rules we have are still unconscious and haven’t been hashed out. And Carrie and I still don’t live together, so weekend time is to some extent “our time”, but weekends are also the only real time that I can see A. The logistics are a little difficult, but if logistics are the only problems we hit I think we’ll be fine.

The most striking thing about this, though, is how non-striking it is. Carrie and A have met and like each other. A and I have moved into territory where we both know where we stand, and I, at least, feel much less like I’m in that awkward territory that I’ve had so much trouble with in the past. I woke up today in a new relationship, and it feels good, and it feels right, and it feels normal.

Well, nothing much has come of any of the previous contacts, which I mostly expected, but at least they were not unmitigated disasters. They were, at worst, fairly mitigated, and were in fact generally pleasant. It probably even helps a little, as I have something datelike in the works and I don’t seem to be completely panicking about it.

It helps that A has been doing exactly what I need her to do in the run-up to our actually meeting. She’s matched my forthrightness with her own, and we’ve been able to frankly say what’s on our minds and to discuss things directly. She’s maintained contact and hasn’t needed me to chase her down. She suggested a couple of times and places to meet once it became obvious that we’d both like to. I have not had to worry that I was pushing too hard, that I was not pushing hard enough, or that the last e-mail I sent included something that bothered her.

The upshot of all of this is that Carrie and I are both going to Northampton this weekend to grab dinner and see Amanda Palmer with the person in question. Where things will go after that I won’t speculate, but that’s an improvement; instead of assuming the worst, I’m simply not speculating.

I’m coming along.

That went well

Enjoyable conversation, and a kiss at the end (well, three). An invitation to group sex declined because I don’t know the other people involved, but still. I suspect that I will see this person again.

Dinner

I have, for want of a better word, a “date” tonight. This causes an odd mix of feelings for me, mostly negative, if I’m honest. Guilt, anxiety, apprehension, a little anticipation. What I’m hoping for is that it goes well; what I’m used to is a horrible flameout. If I see this person, we like each other, and then we continue to see each other, this will be a first for me.

I need to not associate this sort of thing so horribly, though, and the only way to stop is to keep trying and hope it starts to work out. This is taking a very, very long time. If you’d told me, last July, that a year and a half later I still wouldn’t be seeing anyone else, I don’t know what I’d have said. If you’d told me that Carrie would stop seeing other people eventually and we’d be essentially monogamous for a year or more, I also don’t know how I’d have reacted. This isn’t what I was expecting or looking for, and except in the sense that I’m very satisfied with my relationship with Carrie, it’s not what I want.

I keep being made to feel guilty, too, about having expectations, or nebulous desires to “see other people”. Or else I’m made to feel guilty about not wanting monogamy, depending on to whom I’m speaking. Actually, “made” to feel this way is the wrong word; I’m reacting to a deep-seated socialization that the way that, on a gut level, I want my relationships to work is wrong, and that affects me very strongly.

Anyway. I have a date tonight. We’ll see.

Counterintuition

To some extent, I know that I’m making too much of my difficulties here, but I have a lot that I’m unlearning. In most social interactions, I have a strong intuitive sense of how to act–what I’m signaling, what other people are feeling, and the minute reactions that make up that flow of information. I’m good at “reading” people, sure, but that’s a small part of it. I’m also very god at carefully conveying what I want, with or without words, and at fitting in to new situations fairly seamlessly.

That breaks down a bit in situations that involve, for want of a better word, “romance”. I continue to be able to read and respond to a situation, but there’s another layer of information involved that I can’t get at. Maybe I can tell that someone’s interested, but I can’t necessarily tell if they’re available, or if they’re available for what I’m available for. I can’t tell if they’d be understanding or upset if, after enough flirting to establish mutual interest, they found out that I’m attached. I don’t know if that kind of reveal would hurt a budding friendship; in the past, sometimes it does and sometimes it doesn’t.

It’s a lot like the way that I feel a bit awkward over the phone or in chat. I’m missing an information channel that I know is out there, that is relevant to the conversation. What’s worse, I find myself trying to deduce the missing info based on even more minute signals, and they just aren’t actually relevant. I’m trying to make assumptions to fill in the blanks.

I’m also operating under a set of unconscious demographic assumptions that aren’t applicable out here, but I also don’t have a feel for the new ones. In Indy, only a minority of people would even be understanding if I made it clear I wasn’t looking for monogamy, even if I wasn’t talking about seeing them; the rest would vary between horribly offended and merely creeped out. People are more understanding out here, but I still don’t have a feel for where that puts things on the flirting-with-the-waitress spectrum.

I’m also not sure where and how I should disclose. If I meet someone I find attractive, in which order should I do the following:

• Establish mutual interest
• Mention my girlfriend
• Indicate that I’m nonmonogamous
• Ask them out

I’m sure that I’m making more of this than it warrants, of course, and I’ll pick this up over time. I changed a lot of things in my life recently, and catching up my social sense to my new situation is slow but steady. If anything, most of what I’m doing is unlearning a way of acting that never made a lot of sense to me. The default assumption that for most people every interaction is an audition for The One is something that I learned accidentally and would not mind divesting myself of even if it were still useful.

Contact

In the past week, I’ve been approached a few times by folks who seem interested in dating me, and that seem equally interesting to me. That’s an awful lot; about as many as have previously expressed an interest in all the time that Carrie and I have been together. These all seemed a little more serious, too, although we’ll see if anything comes of it.

It reminds me, though, of all the little bits of etiquette that I have yet to learn, or perhaps that Carrie and I have yet to create. I’m not sure when to let her know that someone’s contacted me, or that I’ve contacted someone; most such things peter out before there’s even an actual face-to-face meeting, so right at the beginning seems superfluous, but I also don’t know that it’s okay for me to just drop “I have a date tomorrow” on her–at least, not yet. It would be one thing if this were an open relationship that had been humming along in we’re-seeing-other-people mode for a while, but as of yet I haven’t dated anyone else since (well before) Carrie and I got together. As much as we’re ostensibly open, if I did start seeing someone else it would be a big change in the character of the relationship.

Or would it? I guess I don’t know. The whole thing seems momentous to me, but it’s possible that’s just because I haven’t done it before. Maybe I’m placing too much emphasis on it, but I’m just trying to be sure to disclose as much as possible, and if I miscalculate I want it to be in saying too much rather than saying too little.

I think I’m doing this the right way. I’m waiting until I’ve had a couple of exchanges to bother Carrie with the information, although I may still be disclosing earlier than necessary, as people are still drifting out of contact after I let her know but before we actually meet. I’m letting people know that I’m in an open relationship but that I’m new to the idea. I feel like I’m trying to strike a careful balance between too much and too little info, but it’s possible that I’m agonizing over nothing, and that whether or not this works isn’t really dependent on micromanaging my disclosure. I just don’t know.

The last thing that I want to do is to be unable to date other people. The second to last thing that I want to do is to screw everything up royally and hurt the existing or any future relationships. The third to last thing that I want to do is to hurt people unnecessarily. These are all extremely important things, but they do come down pretty much in that order.

I just feel out of my element here. Anything related to dating makes me feel awkward and out of sorts, like I missed a day of class or something when everyone else got this info.

Happiness Writes White

Life marches on. I really don’t have any new soul-searching to mention; I’m happy in my life and my relationship, and things are currently even-keeled. Knock on wood, don’t name trouble, and all that rot, but all too often people fail to mention the good parts of something because commentary is easy when things are bad.

Unfortunately, happiness really is uninspiring. So take the brevity of this post as a good sign.

My eyes are only half green

I have not, historically, been a jealous person. So when recently I started experiencing actual, noticeable jealousy, I was a little startled. It’s a feeling that I’m unused to, and so it’s one that I don’t have any defenses against. It’s a rather terrible, vertiginous sensation, and it’s been a learning experience.

When I say that I haven’t really experienced jealousy before, I’m separating jealousy from envy. I have been envious before, and still am. I’m often envious of Carrie for having had experiences that I haven’t, which is not limited to her having multiple intimate relationships; she’s much more of a world-traveler than I, and has worked in more places, known more people, and held jobs that were part of her identity rather than merely a paycheck. I’m envious of people that seem to navigate the dating scene more adeptly than I. I’m envious of people whose opportunities seem to have exceeded mine. It’s generally irrational, and always painful. That’s a feeling that I’m used to, though, and while it’s sometimes ugly, it’s also sometimes inspiration to move forward on something that I wouldn’t have the impetus for on my own. It’s usually an unpleasant feeling, but it’s useful.

Recently, though, and gradually, I’ve begun experiencing actual jealousy toward others Carrie has an interest in, or expresses an interest in. I hadn’t really noted the difference between the two sensations previously, partly because I just honestly don’t have much experience with this one. I have not built up a tolerance. A mild reaction strikes me as one of the worst things I’ve ever felt. It hasn’t gotten past mild reactions, but it’s a disturbing trend.

I finally noticed what was happening recently at Waterfire. Carrie and I had been last year, and one of the same performers was there. Carrie expressed an interest in the guy, as she had the last time, but this time I responded jealously. I (think I) wasn’t particularly bad about it, but it was enough that Carrie saw it; we’re finely tuned each-others’-emotions detectors at this point, but for it to be visible at all is very, very new. It’s wasn’t anything dramatic or spectacular, and I did not make a scene or cause a problem, but I was disturbed.

This is related, I’m sure, to the fact that, as time goes by, it gets tougher instead of easier for me to handle a theoretically open relationship. This is what I was looking for and what I wanted, but, as previously discussed, I have difficulty with the abstract in my life; without the openness as a concrete thing on my side, I feel like I’m in an essentially monogamous relationship with a non-monogamous partner.

Shortly after the aforementioned night, Carrie and I had a discussion about the subject. In it she reassured me that, no matter what I might be worrying about, she wasn’t going to be leaving me. But her leaving isn’t my fear. What my anxiety stems from is the potential of being stuck by myself while Carrie goes out with other people, that my inability to date will continue past the point where we two are as focused on each other as we are. That’s difficult to stomach even as trouble borrowed from the future, so I’ve no idea how I’ll handle it when it becomes trouble existing in the present.

That discussion was awful and painful while it was going on, but cathartic. Afterward, and since, I’ve felt much more comfortable, and that nagging sensation is eminently dealable. I’m not even sure what was said that made me feel so much better, and it may have been something as simple as talking about what I was going through. I’ve been running through this cycle where my tension hits a critical mass, and I melt down a little bit, and then I readjust to the new level and am all right, then I gradually get worse until I crack again. This time, I had tried not to have the break and just deal with mounting stress, and so I was at a greater level of tension when I finally let it through.

But there’s more to this newfound copaceticity than catharsis. Carrie expressed some uncertainty about her future, as well, during our discussion, and that suddenly made this feel like a joint venture rather than merely something I had to carry. She’s been trying to get across to me that our positions are more similar in her estimation than I feel they are; I had put this down to an attempt to make me feel better. This time, something in the way she said it made me realize that she legitimately feels that way, and suddenly this became a joint venture rather than just some burden I was carrying.

I hesitate to declare myself better, but I feel at least as if we’ve hit a milestone. Previously, I felt as if it were my responsibility to get my head on straight and just soldier alone through whatever I’m feeling. Now, I’m realizing that just because obstacles exist in my head, that doesn’t make them any less our obstacles to get past. I’m sure we have/had/will have obstacles in Carrie’s head, as well, and in that case I’d want to be involved in the resolution. In fact, it’s a special kind of unfair to insist that problems that affect Carrie are mine and mine alone to deal with. I wouldn’t be happy if our situations were reversed and she said the same.

I’ve been happy since we got together, but I’ve been anxious, too. That anxiety isn’t gone, but it has lessened and I feel like it’s temporary, now. I may actually reach my goal of just being able to relax and enjoy being in love. If nothing else, I’ve finally fully realized that I have a partner in this.

Adaptation

The past few weeks have seen my social calendar go rapidly from nigh empty to bursting, with very little in between. Making friends seems to be an exponential experience, autocatalytic. After a few months lamenting my lack of a social circle I am embarrassed by my riches.

So, of course, having just evolved legs, I decided that running was my best move.

S is a friend I’ve known for about three weeks now, introduced by another mutual friend at a coffee shop show. She is funny and interesting, and we get along very well. We were spending at least a couple of evenings a week together, and I, being “open” in more than one way, had talked quite a bit about my relationship, its status, and other people I might maybe possibly but probably not date in the future. I’m not sure if being as gabby about this stuff as I am is the best move in a new friendship, but I don’t really know another way to be.

S sent me an e-mail one day to let me know that, while she was fine with my discussing Carrie, talking about other maybe-possibly dates was uncomfortable for her, in part because she found me “mentally stimulating and physically attractive”. I responded to let her know that I found her the same, and that if I a) knew how to ask people out and b) thought she’d be interested in an open relationship, I would ask her out. I assumed that, like everyone else I’ve met, she wouldn’t be copacetic with the idea of dating me under the circumstances, and so didn’t think that would go anywhere.

A few days later, while driving her home from a show, S asked me what the next step would be, if she said that she was okay with Carrie. I, as my blog readers might know, don’t have the faintest idea what the next step would be, and let her know that, but I said that we should talk more the next day. I wasn’t comfortable with making any sort of move right then and there, partly because I didn’t want to spring it on Carrie as a fait accompli, and partly because I’ve never dated more than one person at a time and I just wanted to be careful not to make the wrong move and lose the friendship. I dropped her at her place after awkwardly kissing her on the cheek, and went home to ponder.

S and I went out to dinner the next night, and I explained my nervousness. I let her know that my relationship is more open in theory, at least on my end, than in practice, which I had apparently not yet brought up in our conversations. I explained that I think I’m a bad choice for someone’s first open-dating experience, which is also true. S took this as rejection, and I could not convey the nuance of wanting to date but also wanting to let her know that I think her dating me is a bad idea, so ultimately I conceded that a rejection is the clearest thing one could take from that. Dating me right now is necessarily murky.

We had an uncomfortable dessert, and then I took her home. She said that she’d be all right, and that the friendship wasn’t ruined. I went home upset that I still don’t know how to date, but congratulating myself for not getting into a relationship wherein we’d both be nervous and uncomfortable. I mean, I want to date other people, and I wanted to date S, but what I need right now are friendships. I need to establish myself here. So as much as I’m uncomfortable with being Carrie’s involuntarily monogamous partner, I felt like I’d done well.

A few days later, S’s brunch club got together, and I had a +1 invite. Naturally, I took Carrie. This was the first time that S had really seen Carrie and I interact, having only met her briefly, and also the first real chance that the two of them had had to talk. Carrie and I did our couply, flirty thing the way that we usually do, and while I felt like S was getting uncomfortable toward the end of the brunch that was something expected and something S’d warned me about. I just thought of it as a step on the return to normalcy.

The next morning, I received an e-mail from her telling me that the friendship was ruined. She said that seeing Carrie and me together had shown her that I didn’t really want to date anyone else, that she didn’t need this kind of drama, and that she felt like she’d been roped into some little game that Carrie and I were playing.

I was devastated. This played precisely to my fears and anxieties about this relationship style; that other people can’t grasp that I can still be madly devoted to Carrie and want to date other people. I was sickened that I’d ruined a friendship, and convinced that I’d lost that whole social group that I felt had been such a long time coming. I felt lost, and spent much of that morning crying, which did not have the best effect on the weekend trip that Carrie and I had gone on, although that turned out to be mostly salvageable.

After a day or so, I was less sad than angry at someone who barely knew me presumed to understand what I wanted more than I did. I also thought, from her angry tone and assumption that we were playing games, that she must have believed I was not as devoted to Carrie as I am. I wrote back, saying in no uncertain terms that she was entirely mistaken with her assessment of my motives and that I was more than upset at her presumption, and that it was a shame that we couldn’t be friends but that I’d go ahead and avoid the social groups we were both in so as to minimize contact.

We both cooled off, and exchanged a few more e-mails. I think the friendship is repaired. There’s no real chance of dating, or at least no real desire on my part to do so at this point, and we’re much more lukewarm than we were. Still, though, I have my friends and my social calendar.

In some ways, this is a learning experience: I won’t again let anyone know that I’m interested in them until I’m clear about not only my situation but also my lack of experience, and I won’t try to date friends until I’m very well established with them. In other respects, though, it’s exactly what I did not need: it makes me that much more skittish about dating (something I was already horrendously, awkwardly skittish about), makes me more convinced that I just won’t be able to date while Carrie and I are together, and makes me question that much more whether there really is anyone out there who’s interested in me without wanting to claim me as their own. My preexisting anxieties are magnified, and they were already rather large.

Eskimo Love

It’s not true that the Inuit have hundreds of words for snow (although I’m told that they give great hugs), but the phenomenon of focal vocabulary is very real. What we tend to deal with more than others develops its own, granulated lexicon that isn’t used by and isn’t useful to people who don’t have to describe a subject in great detail.

Artists have words for color that the rest of us don’t need. Programmers speak of multiple programming languages, multiple types of data, but a normal computer user just clicks an icon. Hobbyist gamers know of many more types of dice than the usual cubes. Writers have many types of character, poets many types of rhyme.

Why do lovers only have one word for love?

We love, all of us, every day. We swim in love, we live in love, we are propelled by and held back by love. We are lovers, every one of us. Why do we not have more words for it? Sure, a trip to a thesaurus turns up a list of synonyms, but none of them suit my purposes. Traveling back to ancient Greek gives us more roots, but still I need more grain in my descriptions. I find myself, lately, needing words that for some reason have never existed in any language, but I think surely they should.

I need a word that says “I love you like someone I’ve always known and never knew it. I’ve always loved you, I just had to meet you to find out.”

I need a word for, “I love you, not like I love her, but not like I love my good friend here, either.”

I need to say, “I love you, and I love him/her, and I’m terrified of one love harming the other.”

I need to be able to say, “I love the parts of you that I know, and I don’t know you very well, but I’d love to find out if I love the rest.”

“I love you like you were my parent.”

“Even though you are my parent, I love you like a brother. Sometimes, I think, I love you like I was your father.”

“I love you like a brother, but not like I love my brother”

“I love you, Z, because you’re my brother, but damn you’re exasperating sometimes.”

“I don’t even know you but I love you with all my heart and it hurts me so much when you hurt yourself.”

“I loved you. I love you. I wish I’d known you better”

I have twice needed to say, “I love you with all my heart, but it is destroying me to stay with you, and it will destroy me slightly less to leave, and I hate, I hate, I hate that I have to do what I have to do, and if you hate me for it that will make two of us.” I hope that I never need to say it again, but if I do it would be nice to have a word for it.

I need to say, “I love you for loving her the way that I couldn’t. Be better for her than I was.”

I have wanted to say, “I love you, not the way that you love me, but I love you. It is more/less/different than what you want, but please stay in my life and learn to accept what I have to give.”

I need to say, “I love you, fervently but quietly and always. It underpins everything I do, twining my life, and touching everything that I touch. You have moved and changed me in ways I will never more than barely realize, and I, as I am now, this gestalt Nick of the moment, would never have existed without you. I need you, not because I want you, but because I, this me that you see, could not else be. “

I need a word for, “I love you and I want nothing more than for you to love me back.”

I love you.