Exes, friends, TOCOTOXen
Stef
been a friend for as long as I've known zir. At times there has been a
romantic component to our friendship. For a brief time we were sexually
involved, but the chemistry wasn't particularly strong. We're both
having a hard time with grief right now and it was good to have someone
to talk to about that; I worry about boring/upsetting my partners and
friends by going on about it.
I'd like to hear about meaningful relationships in your life that never
quite fit into any of the standard pigeonholes.
--
Stef ** st...@cat-and-dragon.com **
** cat-and-dragon.com/stef ** firecat.livejournal.com **
**
Experienced people liken handling an angry feral kitten to wrestling
with a animated cactus. -- http://www.messybeast.com/feralkit.htm
Ed
> In the wee hours of last night I had a long IM chat with someone.
> Zie's been a friend for as long as I've known zir. At times there has
> been a romantic component to our friendship. For a brief time we were
> sexually involved, but the chemistry wasn't particularly strong. We're
> both having a hard time with grief right now and it was good to have
> someone to talk to about that; I worry about boring/upsetting my
> partners and friends by going on about it.
>
> I'd like to hear about meaningful relationships in your life that
> never quite fit into any of the standard pigeonholes.
My closest and most meaningful friendships are, unquestionably, with
folks that I once had some sort of romantic and/or intimate relationship
with.
In fact, the biggest heartbreak of my life was not a romantic
relationship ending but the that friend breaking off contact with me
long after the romatnic relationship had ended.
But, at present, arguably the closest person in my life right now is
someone I have known for ten years, and with whom we tried a couple of
different ways of having a more intimate relationship. Our psychic
connection was always stronger than any physical one.
I have been stressing over my lack of a job, some general aimlessness in
life and other daily woes that comes from too much time and not enough
money. He has had other complicated stresses, mostly around being
separated from his partner by immigration hassles. We have relied on
each other completely to get through our respective anxieties.
I love my primary partner and we talk about these things too. If I had
to live with someone during a time like this, I'm glad it's with him.
He's really been awesome. But it is so wonderful to be able to have
someone to talk to, who is more objective, more outside my situation
than my partner is, yet who I know I can trust completely and who I know
truly feels empathy for me, and who knows he can rely on me in the same
way.
As an aside, this long-distance intimate friend was the first openly
nonmongamous person I had ever met and he was living with a long term
partner when we first started dating. It was, for me, an odd yet
thrilling adventure for me at the time which has clearly motivated the
nature of all my relationships since.
--
Ed
Deborah Ruppert
> I'd like to hear about meaningful relationships in your life that never
> quite fit into any of the standard pigeonholes.
That would be...S. We've now known each other more than 30 years
(could I *possibly* be that old? granted, we did start young...).
We've been friends all this time, were FWB for a while, tried to
be partners in various configurations with other spouses, tried
to be Mistress/collared slave, spent time apart. I know I can't
live with her but I do want her in my life. We know we love each
other. We stay in reasonably close contact (scheduled, since her
ADD means that anything immediately shiny will make her lose
contact, and any more, I refuse to be part of relationships in
which I do all the work).
I finally just started referring to her as one of my TOCOTOXen,
and what we do now is comfortable and connecting. We each know
we'll be there for each other when needed. We have more shared
history than almost anyone else in my life.
But then, I'm several sigmas from the mean as far as most any
pigeonholes go, not just the relationship ones. Yay for letting
things be what they are going to be!
Deborah
Pat Kight
> st...@panix.com (Stef) wrote in news:he9iok$gt8$1...@reader1.panix.com:
>
>> In the wee hours of last night I had a long IM chat with someone.
>> Zie's been a friend for as long as I've known zir. At times there has
>> been a romantic component to our friendship. For a brief time we were
>> sexually involved, but the chemistry wasn't particularly strong. We're
>> both having a hard time with grief right now and it was good to have
>> someone to talk to about that; I worry about boring/upsetting my
>> partners and friends by going on about it.
>>
>> I'd like to hear about meaningful relationships in your life that
>> never quite fit into any of the standard pigeonholes.
>
> My closest and most meaningful friendships are, unquestionably, with
> folks that I once had some sort of romantic and/or intimate relationship
> with.
Interesting. Most of mine aren't, although I'm on friendly terms with
every ex I'm still in touch with. That may be because most of them went
on to other romantic relationships soon after we split up, and out of a
desire not to interfere with that, I've put a sort of ... respectful
distance ... between us that we never quite overcame.
The person I think of as my best friend is a woman I haven't seen for
close to 20 years; we met when I was 21 and she was 19, and lived
together on and off for most of my college years. For a time, in the two
years after her son was born, we had the closest thing to
marriage-and-a-family I've ever had, sans any sexual component. (She's
forthrightly solidly heterosexual, and although I'm not, I'd never have
risked screwing up the friendship by making unwelcomed advances. We were
amused, years after the fact, to learn how many of our friends assumed
we were lovers). We lost touch for 5-6 years and recently reconnected,
and both agreed that even during that time, we thought of each other as
best friends for life.
I've found, over the years, that the depths of my feelings for, and
sense of intimacy with, a person can persist pretty much forever without
actually seeing or communicating with them very often. When we do
reconnect, it's as if we're picking up a conversation in mid-sentence,
with no need to catch up at all.
(I don't want to suggest that I have a lot of friendships of that sort;
I can count them on my two hands with fingers left over, but they're
very dear to me).
--
Pat Kight
kig...@peak.org
eilinel
> In the wee hours of last night I had a long IM chat with someone. Zie's
> been a friend for as long as I've known zir. At times there has been a
> romantic component to our friendship. For a brief time we were sexually
> involved, but the chemistry wasn't particularly strong. We're both
> having a hard time with grief right now and it was good to have someone
> to talk to about that; I worry about boring/upsetting my partners and
> friends by going on about it.
>
> I'd like to hear about meaningful relationships in your life that never
> quite fit into any of the standard pigeonholes.
> --
That would be Sweetums before we became partners. We might go weeks
without talking, and months without seeing each other, but we fell
right back into comfortable conversation whenever we were together. He
talked to me about his emotional upheaval when trying to decide what
to do about W3 vs. W4. And the ultimate gesture of friendship, I
believe, was during the time (I was aware) he'd broken off the affair
with W4; the man I was in love with at the time was tagging after W4,
and W4 was tacitly encouraging it (even though she didn't want him)
and telling me to just get over it. I took an opportunity to make a
serious pass at Sweetums; instead of just jumping on it, as I'd
supposed he would, he stopped, asked "What's wrong?" and ultimately
turned me down because he knew it wouldn't be good for me.
Eilinel
Ed
news:A9adnS5eUqvGG5XW...@scnresearch.com:
> I've found, over the years, that the depths of my feelings for, and
> sense of intimacy with, a person can persist pretty much forever
> without actually seeing or communicating with them very often. When we
> do reconnect, it's as if we're picking up a conversation in
> mid-sentence, with no need to catch up at all.
>
Actually, this hasn't worked for me. Perhaps it has to do with the
people, but someone I wish I was still close to is a F2M transexual
(whom I had dated before we both came out and again after we both came
out). It took us a long, long while for us to cross over the threshhold
from being good friends to lovers, but once we did, we were largely
unseparable.
But now, he has moved off and has lived with his partner for quite a few
years and we exchange emails maybe twice a year. When I had a chance to
see him a couple years back, we met for lunch. It was as if we had
started over. It was awkward and we had lost the "handles" we had taken
so long to develop to communicate deeply. It was a sad lunch for me.
I haven't decided, even now, a couple years hence, if I should try to
reinvest in that relationship, even though I can only do it from 800
miles away.
But since that's the only example I can think of that I'm still close to
but have lost regular touch with, I don't know if I'm really different,
or if I just have a single different experience.
--
Ed
Dan Abel
wrote:
> In the wee hours of last night I had a long IM chat with someone. Zie's
> been a friend for as long as I've known zir. At times there has been a
> romantic component to our friendship. For a brief time we were sexually
> involved, but the chemistry wasn't particularly strong. We're both
> having a hard time with grief right now and it was good to have someone
> to talk to about that; I worry about boring/upsetting my partners and
> friends by going on about it.
I was just listening to a therapist last week talking about this exact
thing. She wasn't specifically talking to me, but it was a group
session. She said that when people are having strong feelings about
something, that the first people they talk to are the people closest to
them. But those people can get overloaded in time, and if that happens,
it's best to find a person or group going through similar things, or
find a therapist.
Many years ago, my wife and I lost a child. It was extremely traumatic.
Of course we talked a lot with each other. At some point, though, I was
ready to just sit and contemplate, but she wanted to talk more. Our
pediatrician had recommended a group. It was for parents who had lost
children. We went together a couple of times. After that, she went and
I stayed home. She also had friends, all parents, who she talked to.
We got through it just fine, but it would have been a strain if she
hadn't had those other outlets.
--
Dan Abel
Petaluma, California USA
da...@sonic.net
Ed
news:dabel-ED15F1....@c-61-68-245-199.per.connect.net.au:
> In article <he9iok$gt8$1...@reader1.panix.com>, st...@panix.com (Stef)
> wrote:
>
>> In the wee hours of last night I had a long IM chat with someone.
>> Zie's been a friend for as long as I've known zir. At times there has
>> been a romantic component to our friendship. For a brief time we were
>> sexually involved, but the chemistry wasn't particularly strong.
>> We're both having a hard time with grief right now and it was good to
>> have someone to talk to about that; I worry about boring/upsetting my
>> partners and friends by going on about it.
>
> I was just listening to a therapist last week talking about this exact
> thing. She wasn't specifically talking to me, but it was a group
> session. She said that when people are having strong feelings about
> something, that the first people they talk to are the people closest
> to them. But those people can get overloaded in time, and if that
> happens, it's best to find a person or group going through similar
> things, or find a therapist.
Or just a good, somewhat less involved friend.
>
> Many years ago, my wife and I lost a child. It was extremely
> traumatic. Of course we talked a lot with each other. At some point,
> though, I was ready to just sit and contemplate, but she wanted to
> talk more. Our pediatrician had recommended a group. It was for
> parents who had lost children. We went together a couple of times.
> After that, she went and I stayed home. She also had friends, all
> parents, who she talked to. We got through it just fine, but it would
> have been a strain if she hadn't had those other outlets.
This makes a lot of sense.
I know your loss is in the distant pass, but I still empathize. I can
imagine nothing more traumatic that could have ever happened to me in my
life.
But, more generally, it is definitely during the tough times in life
that the importance of the valuable people in your life (even if you
meet them through direct action because of the trauma, as in your group
example) becomes vividly clear.
--
Ed
Susan Davis
>
> I'd like to hear about meaningful relationships in your life that never
> quite fit into any of the standard pigeonholes.
Four words: sweetie-like friend thingy. (Actually, *ex*-sweetie-like
friend thingy; I'll leave it to you if that makes it four words or
five.) I made a terrible (and regret-saturated) mistake a number of
years ago, which tacked the "ex" on to the front of that, but we still
say "I love you" and mean it.
And my boyfriend is similarly unpidgeonholeable -- we're somewhere
nebulous between "secondary" and "FWB," and might have worked out as a
monogamous relationship if I'd been unattached when I met him. But he's
very much Not Poly, and has never been completely comfortable with it,
which has limited our relationship.
--
Susan Davis <s...@sue.net>
Susan Davis
>
> I've found, over the years, that the depths of my feelings for, and
> sense of intimacy with, a person can persist pretty much forever without
> actually seeing or communicating with them very often. When we do
> reconnect, it's as if we're picking up a conversation in mid-sentence,
> with no need to catch up at all.
This, this is me. Regrettably, it gets tested a lot since I'm a truly
wretched correspondent, and not at all good at keeping up with out of
town friends or sweeties, though I'm not having that problem with my LDR
primary at the moment.
--
Susan Davis <s...@sue.net>
Steve Pope
>In alt.polyamory, (Stef) wrote in <he9iok$gt8$1...@reader1.panix.com>::
>>I'd like to hear about meaningful relationships in your life that never
>>quite fit into any of the standard pigeonholes.
>All of them?
I was about to say the same thing....
S.
Pat Kight
And this is me, right down to not having much trouble staying in touch
with my LDR beloved. Thanks be to the miracles of teh Internets.
I've learned not to beat myself up over it; I am who I am, and it's not
as though my distant loved ones are any better at keeping in touch than
I am. But I do occasionally find myself thinking of someone I haven't
been in touch with for years, and wondering whether it's too late to
rekindle the connection. I try, sometimes, and sometimes it works, but
just as often it results in a brief burst of correspondence before we
both go back to our old ways.
--
Pat Kight
kig...@peak.org
Stef
Chickpea <chic...@gmx.co.uk> wrote:
>In alt.polyamory, (Stef) wrote in <he9iok$gt8$1...@reader1.panix.com>::
>
>>been a friend for as long as I've known zir. At times there has been a
>>romantic component to our friendship. For a brief time we were sexually
>>involved, but the chemistry wasn't particularly strong. We're both
>>having a hard time with grief right now and it was good to have someone
>>to talk to about that; I worry about boring/upsetting my partners and
>>friends by going on about it.
>>
>>I'd like to hear about meaningful relationships in your life that never
>>quite fit into any of the standard pigeonholes.
>
Sure!
--
Stef ** st...@cat-and-dragon.com **
** cat-and-dragon.com/stef ** firecat.livejournal.com **
**
This 'telephone' has too many shortcomings to be seriously considered as
a means of communication. The device is inherently of no value to us."
--Western Union internal memo, 1876.
Aahz Maruch
>
>I'd like to hear about meaningful relationships in your life that never
>quite fit into any of the standard pigeonholes.
Why "never"? Some of my relationships have varied between "standard" and
TOCOTOX; that's more common for me than relationships that were never
standard. Of course, one could easily argue that pretty much all my
relationships don't fit standard pigeonholes.
--
Hugs and backrubs -- I break Rule 6 http://rule6.info/
<*> <*> <*>
'Some people, when confronted with a problem, think "I know, I'll use regular
expressions". Now they have two problems.' --Jamie Zawinski, comp.emacs
Stef
>In article <he9iok$gt8$1...@reader1.panix.com>, Stef <st...@panix.com> wrote:
>>
>>I'd like to hear about meaningful relationships in your life that never
>>quite fit into any of the standard pigeonholes.
>
>Why "never"? Some of my relationships have varied between "standard" and
>TOCOTOX; that's more common for me than relationships that were never
>standard. Of course, one could easily argue that pretty much all my
>relationships don't fit standard pigeonholes.
Actually the relationship I wrote about at the beginning of this thread
had a "standard" shape for a while (from a poly point of view -- it
could be labeled "secondaries" or "sweeties").
Stef, who would rather hear about the relationships than about the
wording of her request, but who knows this *is* alt.poly, after all.
--
Stef ** st...@cat-and-dragon.com **
** cat-and-dragon.com/stef ** firecat.livejournal.com **
**
"Maybe we can link up to someone who's meditating and download
enlightenment." -- Tachikomo (AI robot), _Ghost in the Shell: Stand
Alone Complex 2_
Stef
Susan Davis <futab...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>Stef:
>>
>> I'd like to hear about meaningful relationships in your life that never
>> quite fit into any of the standard pigeonholes.
>
>Four words: sweetie-like friend thingy. (Actually, *ex*-sweetie-like
>friend thingy; I'll leave it to you if that makes it four words or
>five.) I made a terrible (and regret-saturated) mistake a number of
>years ago, which tacked the "ex" on to the front of that, but we still
>say "I love you" and mean it.
I don't say "I love you" to as many people as I feel it about, despite
hearing advice throughout the years that I ought to say it to whomever I
feel that way about.
>And my boyfriend is similarly unpidgeonholeable -- we're somewhere
>nebulous between "secondary" and "FWB," and might have worked out as a
>monogamous relationship if I'd been unattached when I met him. But he's
>very much Not Poly, and has never been completely comfortable with it,
>which has limited our relationship.
I'm glad you've worked out a way to be together anyway.
--
Stef ** st...@cat-and-dragon.com **
** cat-and-dragon.com/stef ** firecat.livejournal.com **
**
"Happy agreement day!"
"I'm glad we have a day for agreement, and tomorrow we can get back to
our usual disagreement." -- AM/SJM
Stef
Dan Abel <da...@sonic.net> wrote:
>In article <he9iok$gt8$1...@reader1.panix.com>, st...@panix.com (Stef)
>wrote:
>
>> In the wee hours of last night I had a long IM chat with someone. Zie's
>> been a friend for as long as I've known zir. At times there has been a
>> romantic component to our friendship. For a brief time we were sexually
>> involved, but the chemistry wasn't particularly strong. We're both
>> having a hard time with grief right now and it was good to have someone
>> to talk to about that; I worry about boring/upsetting my partners and
>> friends by going on about it.
>
>I was just listening to a therapist last week talking about this exact
>thing. She wasn't specifically talking to me, but it was a group
>session. She said that when people are having strong feelings about
>something, that the first people they talk to are the people closest to
>them. But those people can get overloaded in time, and if that happens,
>it's best to find a person or group going through similar things, or
>find a therapist.
Yes, that makes sense. It's good to spread it out.
>Many years ago, my wife and I lost a child. It was extremely traumatic.
>Of course we talked a lot with each other. At some point, though, I was
>ready to just sit and contemplate, but she wanted to talk more. Our
>pediatrician had recommended a group. It was for parents who had lost
>children. We went together a couple of times. After that, she went and
>I stayed home. She also had friends, all parents, who she talked to.
>We got through it just fine, but it would have been a strain if she
>hadn't had those other outlets.
I'm sorry for your loss. I'm glad that you both got through it in a way
that worked for you.
--
Stef ** st...@cat-and-dragon.com **
** cat-and-dragon.com/stef ** firecat.livejournal.com **
**
I would like to be the air
that inhabits you for a moment
only. I would like to be that unnoticed
& that necessary.
-- Margaret Atwood, "Variations on the Word Sleep"
Serene Vannoy
> In article <hec5jc$ogp$1...@news.eternal-september.org>,
> Susan Davis <futab...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>> Stef:
>>> I'd like to hear about meaningful relationships in your life that never
>>> quite fit into any of the standard pigeonholes.
>> Four words: sweetie-like friend thingy. (Actually, *ex*-sweetie-like
>> friend thingy; I'll leave it to you if that makes it four words or
>> five.) I made a terrible (and regret-saturated) mistake a number of
>> years ago, which tacked the "ex" on to the front of that, but we still
>> say "I love you" and mean it.
>
> I don't say "I love you" to as many people as I feel it about, despite
> hearing advice throughout the years that I ought to say it to whomever I
> feel that way about.
I mistrust advice that takes that kind of one-size-fits-all approach. I
prefer trusting people to decide for themselves whether saying "I love
you" works for them, and for the relationships in question.
I go through phases when "I love you" feels like a vulnerability I'm not
ready for, even if the person I would say it to would totally understand
that I am expressing love-of-friends or a familial thing. Other times, I
feel free and generous with my "I love you"s, and I will carefully guard
my ability to decide for myself when I feel okay with saying those
words. Mostly, these days, everyone I love hears it with a fair bit of
frequency, but that's because that's where I am at the moment, not
because it's the right way to go about things.
Serene
Stef
Deborah Ruppert <drup...@clearspringlabs.com> wrote:
>Stef wrote:
>
>> I'd like to hear about meaningful relationships in your life that never
>> quite fit into any of the standard pigeonholes.
>
>That would be...S. We've now known each other more than 30 years
>(could I *possibly* be that old? granted, we did start young...).
>We've been friends all this time, were FWB for a while, tried to
>be partners in various configurations with other spouses, tried
>to be Mistress/collared slave, spent time apart. I know I can't
>live with her but I do want her in my life. We know we love each
>other. We stay in reasonably close contact (scheduled, since her
>ADD means that anything immediately shiny will make her lose
>contact, and any more, I refuse to be part of relationships in
>which I do all the work).
Yay for better living through scheduling[tm]!
--
Stef ** st...@cat-and-dragon.com **
** cat-and-dragon.com/stef ** firecat.livejournal.com **
**
And the Lady Bast, her fur thinning and her eyes milky and dim, summons
all the power at her disposal, pulls together tiny strands of belief, a
handful of instants of half-hearted worship. At a cat show in Glasgow, a
teenage boy stares at a one-year-old Abyssinian and, for a moment, he
sees a goddess. Head held high, eyes clear, fur sleek, she walks to the
Dreaming. -- Bast prepares for the wake, in SANDMAN #70, part one of
"The Wake" (Neil Gaiman)