Here’s a link to my other blog, and particularly to a little bit of writing I did this summer while I was travelling around in Asia and Australia. Thought a little bit of fun might lighten up the mood of the regular stuff I put on here. (p.s. Dom – this is the stuff that I should but am too scared to actually do anything with!)
Sextet
This is a play I wrote a few summers ago that was then performed at the McGill Drama Festival in Montreal.
It deals with the relationships of six friends and was my attempt to figure out where I stood in terms of all of the different possibilities for love and intimacy and where myself and my friends were at in our own lives and relationships.
Adultery, non-monogamy and polyamory
I know I already said this yesterday, but being sick: totally not fun. Granted I feel a little better; I haven’t taken anything to ease the pain this morning, which is a step because it means that my head is no longer throbbing like mad. It’s also highly inconvenient to be sick at this time of year when one is a student. I have a gazillion things to do in the next three weeks and getting a significant chunk of them done today and yesterday was in the schedule. I also know that either way I go today — if I take more codeine or the like or if I don’t — my brain will be equally messy and it will be rather challenging to get the paper on adultery/monogamy/polyamory written. I have been avoiding housework, so there are dishes piling up, my room is a disaster and I actually need to clean properly which will end up being postponed once again. I am doing my laundry, which is good, but that’s probably the easiest housework-related thing to do in terms of labour-intensity.
I am totally fine with writing, though, so I think that I’ll sit here and brainstorm for my paper and ignore the mess that is the rest of my life and my body. Bleuch. Even my mouth tastes metallicky and gross.
Hmmm… so the paper I have to write is pretty open-ended. I know that I want to write about monogamy/non-monogamy in Western society and the contradiction between the ways in which people speak and the ways they act. Essentially, most people aren’t really monogamous because very few stay in the same relationship for their whole lives. There is more of a tendency toward serial monogamy, which is even a stretch based on the fact that so many people cheat and/or have long drawn out affairs during their relationships. That’s where it makes a lot of sense to be polyamorous. I think that it’s the term that scares so many people. The whole idea of being classified as someone in an open relationship or as a poly person means that whoever is making these decisions is stepping outside of the normal mainstream sexual lifestyle, even if the norm is more destructive in that usually what happens is that people cheat, and either keep it hidden (therefore creating a barrier between partners through lies), or tell the other partner and have to come to terms with what in our society is considered the greatest betrayal. Of course, we also live in a society where jealousy is considered to be the worst of the worst emotions and people seem to think that it’s an emotion that legitimizes all sorts of deplorable behaviour – i.e. destroying other people’s property, physically hurting them, harassing them and all sorts of other absolutely unacceptable things.
Now there are two ways I think we could go with this. We could say (a) people are clearly not naturally monogamous and through an acceptance of non-monogamy and by discussing alternative ways of being with one’s partners, we could come to a solution that enables people to have the sexual relationships they desire while simultaneously keeping the foundations of the primary relationship strong and healthy with full disclosure and honesty. Or (b), which I think is more realistic in a society where most people probably wouldn’t be capable of getting their jealousy under control or sharing their partners, people need to accept that relationships take work, and that while we do live in a consumer culture where everything else comes and goes and is constantly upgraded to the newest model, one’s life partner should be that: a partner for life. If you are willing to make that commitment in the first place, then you should take to heart just how difficult it may be at times… and rewarding at others. That said, obviously any relationship that becomes abusive needs to be dealt with and no person should stay in a physically or emotionally harmful situation without seeking help.
There is a really interesting article written by Bonnie Zare about “Sentimentalized Adultery” in which she describes the way that the film industry sensationalizes cheating and gives it a sort of legitimacy through portraying adulterers in a sympathetic light.
(Little non-sequitur: I was just shocked to notice that at the top of my gmail inbox there’s an ad that says: Date Lonely Married Women – www.LonelyCheatingWives.com – Date Lonely Housewives in Your Area Instantly. How absolutely awful/telling is that?)
Anyhow… where was I? Yes, so Bonnie Zare’s article looks at the reasons why adultery has become more acceptable in recent years. In contrast to what has happening in the mid-twentieth century, when all adulterers in film were portrayed as villains or seductresses, nowadays, there are entire films based on, and tv series that follow adulterous couples who the audience feel sympathy for and are cheering on. She notes that there are a few changes in society that have caused the shift from “adultery as tragedy to adultery as a solution.” These are:
- the liberalization of sexual mores
- the social acceptance of divorce (which goes hand in hand with the relaxation of ideas surrounding adultery)
- the success of feminism, which aided women’s material and psychological independence
- higher expectations of marriage’s emotional rewards
- birth-control, which enables people to try out partners without necessarily having to commit long-term due to children
- the ever-growing isolation in people’s daily lives due to long commutes, easy tv stimulation, dual career commitments and lack of community
- contemporary consumer culture which has overtaken family values and says that “whatever you have is never enough.”
Zare goes on to focus on this final point, which I also think is a most interesting way to view the prevalence and acceptance of adultery and why it happens. In my last relationship we stated early on that if we were to find someone better, then we would talk about it and that would be that. It was as though it was the only legitimate way for us to break up — if there was truly a better option out there, then of course, it was fine for us to switch tracks. I never really thought about it as anything bad (and I still don’t because we never made a long term commitment) but it does absolutely fall into this idea of consumer culture where if there is something better, more exciting, more interesting, more titillating, then out goes the old, in comes the new. I’m not going to say that this is wrong, because there are lots of relationships that do need to end, and perhaps should have ended long before the newer model comes in because the partners are used to one another and don’t want to be alone, or are codependent or whatever other myriad factors exist. But that’s not really the point. It’s just really interesting that people are willing to stick with what they have until they see something more exciting, and then sometimes regardless of the fact that that exciting new playmate might not be an ideal match, will risk everything they have for some momentary action. (Not to draw myself into this too much, but I can happily say that in my recent life-altering episode, I absolutely did find someone who is helping me to find myself and is, at this stage, 100% better for me. YAY!)
Another point that Zare speaks to in discussing The English Patient is the fact that sometimes the adulterous actors aren’t necessarily unhappy in their present relationship. In this film, the female character who has an affair is actually happily married. There doesn’t seem to be anything to do with her relationship that drives her to this transgression, it’s really something that happens in the heat of the moment, when she (Katharine) and Almasy, her lover, happen to get stuck in a sandstorm and discover that they have certain things in common, including a connection and passion that neither seems to be able to deny. This is why, perhaps a little simplistically, it seems sensible to me that polyamory could be a good way to go for many people because it takes an understanding of love as something that isn’t a zero-sum game, that we can love more than one person at once and that desire for another has nothing to do with the person you’re with, but simply shows that you are attracted to or feel a connection with another person. Of course, it’s a whole lot more complicated than this, and I think that if you are in a committed relationship, then talking about options and being honest and open about attractions to other people, regardless of the jealousy it may stir up, is the best way to be. Oftentimes, if we’re honest, then the transgressions don’t happen because weighing up the different factors with a person you love makes everything a little clearer. And relationships aren’t easy — there is a certain amount of work that goes into committing to someone for a lifetime, or just for a period of one’s life, and having open channels of communication is the most important thing.
Ooh…my brain’s starting to feel like it’s going to melt. I’ll have to get back to this later. Nap time.
Gunslinger Girl Awesomeness
One thing a lot of people don’t know about me is how much I love anime. I think perhaps it seems a little strange and/or contradictory that I of all people love watching little kids kick bad-guy ass (’cause come on — that’s really what most of it comes down to), but there’s something about sensationally violent cartoons with interesting futuristic and technological, not to mention philosophical subtext, that really sucks me in.
I just watched the whole of Gunslinger Girl — a totally wicked series set in Italy about an intelligence agency that uses little girl cyborgs as assassins. Each team is called a fratelli (siblings in Italian) and the handlers and their cyborgs have these really interesting and intimate relationships. I actually just cried in the last episode when the girls were all out watching a meteor shower singing Beethoven’s ninth, and being so human and incredibly awesome that one of the handlers comments on it. I know that sounds a little trite, but it’s truly an amazing series. I also really love how the makers of a lot of more recent anime deal with issues of technology and the ethics behind it. Even if the writing may lack a bit here and there, under it all there is a deep desire to try to understand where we are going and how to deal with issues of technology and humanity. The whole machine with feelings thing. Kicks ass.
Longing
It was dark down below
sunglasses and towels
and flip-flops strewn about
and there I was
alone in my confusion
He came down and I shuddered
not knowing how to tell
how to be alright
how to be honest when the feelings
were more true than I could describe
A sweet transgression in
steam and cold
a magnetic pull so strong
that with all my might I could not
break away from his touch
I feel it as I write now
the unreality of overstepping
the boundaries I did not want
the taste of his skin and breath
and longing that lingers still
breathing
breathing
the sun draped
across our entangled bodies
door half open
his eyes are closed
but I can see inside
his breath even
a hint of a smile
across his sleeping calm
I feel like death.
I think I’m going to take some codeine. So against my general practices, but right now, feeling so necessary.
Ugh.
feverish
I’m sick. Last night was the strangest sleep I can remember having in ages. I was pretty much awake the whole night, with a throbbing headache and in some sort of weird half-dream state dominated by anime cyborg child assassins after having watched the first four episodes of Gunslinger Girl. I don’t know why I didn’t just accept that I was sick and take something right away to get rid of the pain, especially seeing as I still have Ollie’s giant store of every kind of prescription drug available on the market.
I eventually took some paracetamol this morning, and fell asleep for a while, having just now woken up in a puddle of perspiration and shivering. Goddamn fever. This is the first time that living on my own is seriously unappealing. I wish I had someone here to take care of me.
I did wake up at about 6am and send Dom a text message. And then waited for his response because I figured he’d come say hi. Which he did just now although he had to run away again. I wish he were here.
Yeah… so I am totally and completely in love with him. Terrifying, no? Something I wrote on here bothered him yesterday. I’m not certain what it was, but it must have been something about how I interpret my life and/or maybe something I wrote about not being sure what type of person I am. The thing is, I’m just so afraid of allowing myself to fall too deeply. I know that he doesn’t want to hurt me and I believe him when he says that I don’t have to worry, that he’ll keep me safe, but it’s so very difficult to allow someone to keep you from falling when you know perfectly well that they’re also the person who could hurt you the most if something were to change.
I hope nothing changes. I try to be a little objective about it, but it’s just too good. My heart feels like it’s being wrung out like a towel. I’m terrified but excited. I want all of this love. I want the things he’s been telling me he wants to give me. I want us to make it work and stay together until he comes back and then travel and document the world and be happy and adventurous together. I want to be able to wake up next to him every morning and hear his little sighs and morning noises, and just stare at him with the morning sun gently brushing his face and feel the love radiating from me to him. I don’t want this feeling to go away, the feeling like nothing else matters because we’re in love and we have each other and because of that everything will be okay.
And, my God, it’s scary to think that I feel this way about someone. And I’m not making it up, and I’m not pretending any of these feelings. And it’s not like I’m projecting characteristics onto him to make things better than they are. They just are. Right from those very first moments when we met, it was obvious that there was an amazing spark, a connection unlike any I’ve felt, a real connection, not just lust, or excitement, but something deeper than that. And yeah, it’s absolutely terrifying. And when he was upset last night and didn’t want to tell me what it was that scared me even more because I didn’t want to upset him. I know that I’m not going to treat this relationship like I did with Ollie and just back down about things that I think or feel, and I want to be completely open and honest with him. It just really scares me so very much to think that maybe he won’t like the person I am when it comes down to it and he sees underneath all of the other layers. Well…it’s a chance I’m willing to take. It feels crazy to be so willing to risk oneself. I think crazier would be to push it away because it’s too scary though. My God, I feel vulnerable.
poly/ness
I am researching for a presentation on polyamory which I have to give in a few weeks and I feel as though I am beginning to become saturated with all sorts of crazy relationship and power dynamics. Don’t get me wrong: I really love studying sexuality and thinking about ways in which to deconstruct dominant heteronormative assumptions that underlie most of the ways in which people relate to each other in society. It’s just that when you spend so much time reading about the same things, sometimes it becomes easy to start believing things that you’re not sure you actually do align yourself with.
In the context of my relationship with Ollie, it’s recent end, and the reasons why it broke apart, it’s really interesting to be reading about the ways people negotiate ethical and emotionally fulfilling poly relationships. Reading Easton and Liszt’s The Ethical Slut is actually a really helpful tool at this point in my life. Although I would never usually read self-help books, this one is really helping me see certain errors that I was making in my relationship with Ollie and in other past relationships. The idea of owning one’s emotions is pretty key. Ollie actually mentioned in his last email to me a few days ago that it often amazed him that we never really fought. Then when we broke up, he realised that this was a clear indicator of how screwed up things really were — I was conceding everything to him without even putting up a fight. And we didn’t even see it at the time.
Do I think that the agreements that I had with Ollie were unfair? Yes and no. They did come about because of a strong desire in me to please, but at the same time, when we first talked about having a somewhat open relationship we were both really comfortable with the boundaries we set and I legitimately wasn’t bothered by his being with other women, as long as the connection was only physical. But as things changed in the relationship and other aspects of our being together dwindled, it definitely started to bother me. The night we spent with Adrienne really bothered me. And I couldn’t figure it out at the time, and I got upset with myself for being a hypocrite and for going back on my word, when now I realise that people change, and comfort levels change, and all of the other emotional baggage that accumulated over the course of the time we spent together meant that by the end I really wasn’t comfortable with him being with other women, most particularly because things between us definitely weren’t great.
I wonder if I am a polyamorous person by nature or if I simply like the ideas of being freed from social constraints enough to be okay with sharing the people you love and finding passion and love and tenderness and companionship in many places outside of the primary relationship? Or am I really a romantic who doesn’t want to share the person I’m with and want to find “the one,” Mister Right, and live happily ever after? I actually don’t have an answer to that question at all right now. I like to think that I will find one person I want to spend the rest of my life with and that everything will be wonderful and the spark won’t ever die and we’ll live harmoniously together, obviously working to maintain a balance and accepting and acknowledging that with security, the passion might dwindle a little, but that as long as we keep fanning the flames, the spark will never die.
Adrienne told me that while she and Ken were together they had sex every day. They were together for nearly four years. That’s impressive.
I don’t like to think that so much of humanity and our humanness boils down to our sexuality, but at the same time, I wholeheartedly accept that it does. There are obviously all of the overriding moral values that try to pretend that sex isn’t everything, but if it wasn’t so important, then why would the state spend so much time trying to keep it under control and why would there be so much outrage when people begin to talk about kids being sexual or politicians doing illicit things or any person who doesn’t fit within the heteronormative system wanting to legitimize their relationships? It’s all really sad. And I know that I’m coming from an uber-liberal position of middle-class educated white privilege, but it just seems counter-intuitive to me that people get so hung up on things that don’t actually affect them. If you want to be married with 2.5 kids and a dog and a station wagon in suburbia, power to you. But if you want to live in a polyamorous network of lovers and friends and mutual support and multiple sexualities, then even more power to you because you’re actually making a choice about how you live your life rather than digesting the hegemonic discourse pervading Western society.
It’s funny because the whole time I was with Ollie I would never have considered myself to be polyamorous, but now that I know how it’s (loosely) defined, we were having a poly relationship. I was definitely having intimate emotional relationships with multiple people at the same time, and I don’t think that it took away from the relationship I had with Ollie. When things were good and we were doing our thing and seeing other people and going on dates and then inviting all of our close friends over for dinner parties to meet each other, things were spectacular(a specific enjoyable evening when Ric and Daniel, Cry and Dina were all there comes to mind!). It’s just that I didn’t allow my real anxieties and the jealously I felt to come out and by not seeing my feelings as valid I was in effect slowly sabotaging what we had. If I had been honest about my feelings none of it would have happened. But maybe we would have broken up the first time when he was with Isabelle. Or the next time with Cry…or…. I was just too forgiving. And too incapable of accepting the hurt that he caused me when he transgressed those carefully set boundaries. And too willing to accept the emotional bullying that came when I happened to slip a toe over the line drawn for me, even if I hadn’t realised that I had done it in the first place.
I shan’t do that again. I’m in a completely different situation now. It sort of blows my mind that things with Dom have escalated this quickly, but at the same time there’s no point in trying to stop these things from happening. One never knows how life will change from one moment to the next. And I really don’t like the idea of him being with anyone else. Just thinking of it gives me this icky cringey feeling that I am willing to accept is jealousy, and is simply a sign of the fact that I do really care and want him to be with me (only). And I think that if you can accept jealously it’s fine. No more burying it, but neither will I wallow in it. I’m a forgiving person and that’s the mistake I made with Ollie. I was too forgiving and consequently sidelined my own feelings because I wanted everything to be okay again. In the future if anything nasty happens I will accept how I feel and be upset and cry and rage (although that emotion, thus far, has never surfaced, I would quite like to see what happens when it does) . And then hopefully after some ugliness my partner and I can kiss and make love and feel wonderful together again with a little work. That sounds like a good way forward to me. I wonder if it will be with Dom?
Contentedness
Montreal was really beautiful today. Despite the fact that it’s getting significantly colder (it dropped down to about -3′c last night. Not a nice temperature to be standing outside in), today the sun was shining and it was absolutely glorious walking across the city by way of the mountain. There were even a few people gathered in the park, playing tam tams and enjoying the warmth generated by the shining sun.
Today was a remarkably good day. I just woke up from a nap. Had a lovely lunch with Heather and Shon, who have finally left after three days of being very good house guests, but in my space nonetheless. I talked to Dom this morning and again a little while ago when he called me. And I got a really wonderful email from Ollie telling me what he thought had happened when I exploded last month. Turns out that he knows exactly where I am and was at, and that while neither of us saw it when we were inside it, now with a little space, it’s blaringly obvious that I was burying my emotions and bottling up the frustration I felt at making certain concessions so that things could be easier for him, for us.
So now I’m feeling even more relaxed. It looks like when Ollie gets back we will be able to be friends, which is really important to me seeing as he was and probably still is the best friend I’ve ever had. He even told me that he’s happy that I had a chance to connect with Dom after he left, which is very big of him, even if I’m not sure which sentiments back that up.
Reading through the things that I wrote way back when about my relationship with Ward really made me realise how little I have changed in all this time, and that I need to spend a little more time keeping things in perspective. I also need to try to actually remember the lessons I learn when I have these major blow-outs, rather than trying to push them out of my consciousness and memory.
