Change in all the areas of my life...

KC43, thanks for replying. Part of the problem is that the *first* "poly" relationship I had (HipsterBoy, if you've read the blog) was ridiculously talkative on text. We probably exchanged thousands of messages in the first six months of our relationship (when it was going well) - partially because we were both in tech jobs so the conversation could just wander back and forth between computers and phones seamlessly. I got good morning and good night texts, I got flirtation, etc etc etc. It spoiled me more than a little bit and so even though I try very hard not to try to *compare*, I still miss it.

Especially since for a while Sunshine and TheKnight were like that too, (they're having issues right now, which I hate but it's not my problem to fix, and thus the conversation is a bit less so) and I could see it in front of me and yet not have it. Bah.
 
Ah, yeah, I understand what you're saying. If you're used to a lot of communication, having little to none can be off-putting. Even for me, despite the fact that I'm used to little or no communication, it's off-putting... I had to ask Boots, and before him S2, to make sure to at least respond to my texts the same day I send them because otherwise I start worrying that I've done something wrong and/or the guy is ghosting on me.

With Boots it was more difficult to adjust, because until our first date we were messaging on OKC or texting almost constantly... but since that date, we barely communicate at all between getting together. I haven't quite dared to ask why. Hubby did the same thing when he and I met; he messaged or texted frequently for the first couple of months we were together, then pretty much stopped. When I asked him why, he said, "I talked to you a lot because I had to make sure you weren't a psycho axe murderer. Now I know you aren't, so I don't have to talk to you as much."
 
When I asked him why, he said, "I talked to you a lot because I had to make sure you weren't a psycho axe murderer. Now I know you aren't, so I don't have to talk to you as much."
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See Kevin's signature line for agreement.

Leetah
 
Well, it appears that not *all* guys are terrible at keeping up contact. I've met someone new - technically we exchanged a few messages back in the summer, but lost touch for a bit until I contacted him again after getting dumped.

I'm rather glad I did. Let's call him... Farmer? I'm afraid that's too obvious though, as he actually is one!

Anyway, we've been talking nearly constantly for the past few weeks, endless strings of emails and FB messages ranging from sex to feminism to food to kids to random banter about TV shows and pop culture. It's exhilarating and wonderful. We've only been on one actual date... talked for hours and hours, closed the restaurant and stayed out far later than I should have at a nearby bar. Only kissed once, at the end, though, and I'm not *entirely* sure what the physical chemistry will work out to - this is going to sound shallow but he's shorter than I usually like. Might have to actually wear flats. (Most of my shoe collection is 3-4" heels, as my usual taste in partners is 10-12" taller than I am, and Farmer's probably only about... 5-6" taller than me? yeah, yeah, it's a minor problem, but it's a thing.)

I haven't had this level of intellectual chemistry with someone since HipsterBoy. We both feel it, it got discussed even (that, in and of itself, is a novelty). But it kind of scares me because I am finally feeling like a real person again, years later... I don't trust myself.

We'll see. At the moment I'm all giggly on NRE.

Speaking of exes, ran into him at a kink meetup the other day. Not literally, and we didn't speak, I don't even KNOW if he saw me as I was there with AnotherArtist and on the other side of the bar, being clumsily hit on by newbies. (Seriously, it was ridiculous, to the point where the organizer of the meetup said something.) I noticed him and went back to my previous conversation, and if there was maybe a smidge more PDA after that than there might have usually been with AA, eh, that was fun for everyone involved...

(AA is as AA always is - smoking hot and really caring when we're together and mostly absent otherwise. It works. Especially as his kinky side is coming out more lately. Yum, so much yum.)

It's funny - a realization I had recently is that the more I like someone as a potential long-term thing, the longer it takes for me to sleep with them. I'll make out with or sometimes fall into bed with people in 1-2 dates if I don't think it's going to be a *thing* long term. But it took me like 4 with AnotherArtist, and I suspect something the same with Farmer just because I don't trust really early NRE **combined** with the hormonal rush of orgasms. Not something I need to change, just interesting.

Oh, and meanwhile TheKnight and Sunshine made up, AND he's been on like, all the first dates in the last few weeks. So it's a good thing I'm not trying to keep a cast of characters updated...
 
And maybe the NRE-fueled contact was too much to be true. Apparently Farmer - though not 100% new to poly, I would have been even warier if he had been - and his wife are not quite as far along in figuring out their boundaries as they thought.

So we had dinner last night, which was lovely on the one hand, but on the other we didn't even kiss, and I haven't heard from him all day. Though that could be his work spinning up on him, as we talked about that too, last night. And part of me wants to just cut and run before getting into some other situation where my connection with someone is modulated through someone else... but we spent SO much time talking about boundaries and how to be fair to people that I *want* to give him a chance. And he *says* he doesn't want to drag *me* into something that gets me (or him) hurt - which is FAR more than HipsterBoy ever gave me.

Perhaps I'm even touchier having just read The Game Changer. Funny that the character I sympathized with most from that was "Elaine"...
 
Fall in this state is so very grey. I hate that... especially with the short days I just feel tired and depressed so very much. So on that front November was rough... December seems to be shaping up to maybe be a little better?

As I sort of intuited after that last dinner, Farmer did end up ghosting, more or less. The texts trailed off, and became banalities about work/daily life rather than the previously fascinating discussions we had been having on life and philosophy and everything. A pity, that, though it does at least mean I don't have to figure out what to do with a relationship where the mental attraction was much stronger than the physical. (This wouldn't be a problem for a lot of people, I suppose, but I'm a touch-oriented person so physical attraction and affection is pretty essential to the way I do relationships - that was one of my problems when I was dating DinoActivist.)

No new characters in the cast seem to be forthcoming - TheKnight thinks I need to rewrite my OKC profile a bit. I think he's right, but I think I'm going to wait until just after the holidays when everyone's in "resolutions for the new year" mode. Things are busy now, and I'm sort of in a cynical and not terribly open to new things place when it comes to people, or at least relationships.

Speaking of DinoActivist, I saw him last week for the first time since our breakup. It was actually not as awkward as it might have been - I went over to he and Sunshine's house for a post-Thanksgiving party, and even meeting his new partner (not bothering with a pseudonym for her) wasn't weird. Honestly, as TheKnight pointed out, he spent much of the evening more or less ignoring her in the same way he used to ignore me, which just sort of dryly amused me. Not my problem now...

Actually that's not entirely true, I'm not really that cynical today. There are actually a lot of fun things going on. Went to a shibari workshop/practice with TheKnight last weekend, and will be going to a big kinky party this weekend, apparently wearing not much more than rope and fishnet and pasties. This will be an experience... especially since ALL of TheKnight's various entanglements will be there.

The Knight has gotten himself SO over his head on the polysaturation front - he's pretty deep in NRE with a new person, who I haven't met yet so I can't give her a name. I like her though, or at least her FB persona. And he's still got Sunshine, and a (very very) occasional play partner, and one other woman who he went on one date with and is supposed go on another. Though that one will probably not last. Silly boy... he has still been paying attention to me, though, so I can't complain.

MartialArtist has popped back up lately. We've had some interesting conversations about jealousy and sex and why he went back to monogamy - it was actually all about him; he couldn't deal with his now-fiancée having sex with other people that he didn't get to see / be involved in, so he cut himself off too for fairness. Which of course lead to discussion of threesomes and how they never really happened organically, and eventually led to a conversation about the potential of me hanging out with him and said fiancée sometime and, hmm, seeing what happened. I'm not really THAT into threesomes, in general, but I think being a unicorn for a couple that I'm not emotionally tied to could be pretty awesome and I haven't had sex with a woman in ages and ages. It'll be a while until this happens, though, as he's doing an internship in another state and won't be back until around the holidays. And she and I may have no chemistry, etc - I've never met her, as she and he were somewhat DADT when he and I were dating, so I know what she looks like but we've never spoken.

The big thing, though... AnotherArtist and I have had a pretty amazing week. He came with me to the party at Sunshine and DinoActivist's Saturday night, which was perfect because I didn't want to be a fifth wheel around DA and his new gf and Sunshine/TheKnight. Not that there weren't lots of other people there, but it was a thing I was worried about. And even though I didn't take him home with me that night (not a good evening for that for physical reasons), he told me how happy he was to get to see me anyway (!!) and we had a lovely time walking around downtown and having a drink after the party.

Last night, though, we went to an graphic design networking event together - he had to go for work and asked me to come along so he'd know *someone* there, and since it was in theory a good opportunity for me to meet some people too, I figured why not? In retrospect, I probably ought to be a little more circumspect about us attending that sort of thing together, but given the nature of the industry, it is *probably* ok. I think I'm more self conscious about our relationship on that front than he is - he's even out at his office, so there's that.

But then we went to a little nearby bar, after, and ended up having a surprisingly honest conversation about our relationship. Surprising, both because it happened (admittedly it took an extra drink in me for that to happn) and because of what was said. Unfortunately that does mean I'm a little fuzzy on the exact details of what was said (damnit, I want to remember because I'm glowing a bit about it), but what it summarized to was "we both really like each other a lot and want to have a closer relationship but both thought the other didn't". My candy-shell of toughness strikes again... Like, he actually used the L word but I didn't - I don't know if I love him or not, I think I could but I'm not sure I'm there yet and I don't want to say it if I"m not sure of it. So we're going to try to hang out more and text more and see what it turns into. I'm pretty excited about this, though it's weird because I have never really tried to create a relationship this... deliberately? I've just fallen into things whether it was a good idea or not. Is this what adults do? Have I finally quit dating like a high-schooler?
 
I've been doing most of my processing with a therapist, lately, so not so much time to write here, LOL. (Side note? Therapy by email is actually really awesome.)

Things have changed rather a lot in the past 4 months, or rather changed around me.

Sunshine and TheKnight broke up not terribly long after my last post - certainly before Christmas. I'm sort of surprised how ok he was with it, but then it had been on life support for a few months so perhaps pulling the plug was the kindest thing.

He's been seeing a few other people since, not sure I know any of them well enough to give them nicknames. One I crushed on for a bit despite my "no more sleeping with husband's girlfriend's" rule, but she seems to be not as much of a thing. One who seems quiet but awesome, but comes with a bit of relationship baggage so we'll see how that all turns out.

I'm only seeing AnotherArtist right now - we celebrated our one year anniversary (at least from our first date) last month with a phenomenal evening at one of the best restaurants in the area - complete with a little bit of amusement because it's the sort of place that tries to remember your partner / the occasion / etc, and he had planned at one point to with his wife but had that canceled by weather (she was entirely ok with me going instead).

I'm still learning to be vulnerable with him - it's not that I don't trust him, exactly, so much as me being afraid to be too real, somehow. But I'm actively trying to break that pattern, especially since there's a little more time and space in his life for me to do so now (one of his partners went platonic, and his wife is spending much more time at her sub's apartment).

TheKnight and I are actually doing well, as well - there was a bit of an ugly phase in January, I suppose. But therapy is helping me be more conscious about how I interact with him, which is what he wanted, and that in turn is making him try to drink less etc, which is what I wanted. ::crosses fingers:: Maybe there is something to this whole therapy thing after all? ::wry smile::

Overall I'm pretty content, and someone would have to be really amazing for me to start something new right now. Amazing, or at least someone that I could do the particular flavor of D/s I like most with - while both of my partners are quite good Tops in a physical sense, I'm not sure either of them have the desire to get into my head in the way that HipsterBoy once did. C'est la vie, I'm sure I'll find it again one day, it's not urgent.
 
So despite "not looking" I went on a date the other day - that was not my best choice! he seemed interesting and had kink cred, so it seemed like a possibility... but ugh. No chemistry, so it ended up VERY tedious.

I think what I actually want right now is to figure out how to deepen the relationship / get more time with AnotherArtist. He spent the evening with me Saturday night - couldn't go out, as I had kid duty since TheKnight had a date. But I cooked him dinner and we watched TV on the couch...ok, sort of watched - in reality we made out like teenagers while waiting to make sure the kid was asleep before heading upstairs. Then of course he literally made me scream once we DID go upstairs (in a purely good way, not kink :D) So much hotness ... combined with so much sweetness... and yet I still feel so tongue-tied around him sometimes.

I... want to tell him I'm falling for him, or have fallen, or something like that. Maybe this wouldn't even be news to him. Part of me thinks he's feeling the same thing and that his love language is actually what mine is - touch - and that my caution feels to him like *I'm* the one being ambiguous (because if I'm truthful, he's more expressive than I am, and I haven't really followed through on a few things that I've said we could do - share calendars and what not - because I wasn't sure how much he wanted that).

I should just ask him what he wants. I mean, it's just a question, right? So isn't "how do you feel about me?" So is "can we be a little more deliberate about scheduling so I know when I'll see you?" I'm not asking just so I can get a particular answer - I mean, clearly I do want one, but it's not a demand, not an ultimatum (but I have so much baggage about questions like this!)

And his life is changing / has changed in ways that I don't know how they're going to affect me - his wife is spending half her time with her other partner, which is great, except now she's talking about changing the timing of that so it's 1 week on / 1 week off rather than the 3-4 day stretches she's doing right now. Which I can understand - she's feeling like she's never "home", so that's a thing. But he mentioned it when he was eating breakfast with TheKnight and I yesterday, and when he said it he was like "oh, I'll still be able to stop by and spend a little time with you even on {wife} at home weeks". And I *think* he meant that to be reassuring - that he still *wanted* to spend time with me on a consistent basis. TheKnight thought it felt very "accidentally putting me into a secondary" role, though, when we discussed it later in the evening, after AA left.

And the thing is that that's prescriptively true - and even though I do want a deeper relationship with him I don't, necessarily, want THAT much more time together. Maybe a more "guaranteed" date (defined as at least a few hours together, ideally with an overnight but not required) once a week, or close to it, with a few random in between extras - coffee or drinks or just random come over and hang out - sometimes. And I feel a little bit bad about asking for that because it's sometimes hard for me to schedule as well - kid, nesting partner with active dating life, local relatives... and only going to get more difficult (ish?) given that it looks like TheKnight is about to take a job that requires a lot more travel.

I should just love and not worry about it. I should...
 
And I am a coward. A very...satisfied.... coward :D, but nonetheless I didn't actually bring up the entire relationship subject last night.

To be fair, part of that was situational - AnotherArtist got stuck at work for a couple extra hours and we ended up skipping the dinner portion of the date and moving on to the "meet friends at a bar for a few hours" and then back to his place, and somehow the moment never quite seemed right.

On the other hand, we DID talk about sharing calendars so as to make seeing each other easier... and we DID talk about future plans... and held each other until we were almost asleep (which I almost never want to do, so that's pretty big), and words just seemed... irrelevant.
 
It's really funny how a shared calendar can actually be a HUGE thing. AnotherArtist and I *finally* shared each others calendars yesterday. Such a little thing - I've done it with other partners before as a casual "oh, hey, btw, if you want to know what I'm up to", pretty early in a relationship. But somehow that never happened with him.

And what's weird is I'm not usually prone to jealousy - but some part of me thought that he was spending massive amounts of time with other people and now I know that that isn't actually true. Not that it ought to matter, but I think i was a little sensitive about that after trying to find any place at all with DinoActivist and finding there really wasn't one.

So somehow I'm feeling far more secure now despite being too much of a coward for the conversation I wanted to have. Yay.
 
This article is making me think, this morning: http://thoughtcatalog.com/heidi-priebe/2015/07/here-is-how-you-love-without-expectation/

You love yourself first. Not necessarily most or best, but first. You don’t cancel plans that you were excited about because somebody else wanted your time. You don’t rearrange your schedule to accommodate a person who may bail at the last moment anyway. You are strict with yourself – even when you want to give in to the impulses of others –because you know that what you want and what you need is not always the same thing.
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I haven't necessarily been doing this the past few years. I started trying to work on a project for myself last night and it's been so long since I touched it, I don't even know where to begin (it's a research project involving obscure articles of clothing from the 1400s, and I haven't sewn or worked on this stuff in 3-4 years now). And this stuff (well, this and food from the same era) was my fascination for a decade.

To love without expectation, you learn to appreciate what’s there. Other people are not ours to own or rearrange or expect things from and the more anticipation we put onto others, the more we let ourselves down in the end. All we can do is appreciate who we have when we have them, and let them go when we do not. To lend our hearts like vacant hotel rooms: celebrating others when they come in and letting them go when they leave. Understanding that at the end of the day, all we can do is refuse occupancy. But we cannot force anyone to stay.
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TheKnight says I believe too strongly in scarcity, it's one of the reasons I have such problems with dating. I don't really believe that there are THAT many people out there that I am compatible with, so I bend myself in knots for the ones that are *almost* compatible rather than letting them go and trying again. He may be right - though I'm starting to truly believe that this isn't the case with AnotherArtist. It was certainly true for HipsterBoy, certainly true for DinoActivist, but this time? I *think* we're both showing up for what we want and not offering things we can't do and... there's no fear underneath this. Uncertainty, yes, but ... not fear, really. And that's pretty amazing.

Because here’s the thing about placing expectations on others: at the root of expectation is need. Need for others to accept you, to validate you, to tell you that you’re good and worthwhile and strong. And if you can do that for yourself – if you can live up to your own expectations and desires, then the need for other people to do so disappears. The need to bend over backwards, to accommodate others, to seek validation from those who do not deserve your heart, disappears.

Who to love and who to leave becomes simple. And expectation slides out the window.
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And so everyone tells me, over and over and over. I think that learning to validate myself may be the one great lesson of my life - I thought I had gotten to that point in my 20s, when Mr. Jones ("when everybody loves you you can never be lonely") quit being the song of my heart. But I think I just narrowed down the number of people I needed to validate me, not actually learned to validate myself. Otherwise I wouldn't feel so needy, so very much of the time. I mean, I'm getting better. But it's a hard thing to focus on.
 
Another post inspired by blog reading

"I no longer fear the day someone who swore I was their universe can no longer see the stars in my eyes as long as they still choose to look until they find them again.” (from here/)
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I worry that I fail at this from both sides with TheKnight. More fighting over him being drunk when we went out last Friday. I slept in the 2nd bedroom that night, and the next. (Though the next was already planned as it was a long standing date with AnotherArtist. Still...)

It wasn't the hot and angry sort of fighting it usually is, though... more ... "baby I've been here before / I've seen this room and I've walked this floor" cold and broken with no hallelujahs to be found.

And he knows it was different... that I'm pretty much done with him choosing booze over me when we get so very little time alone, that I'm tired of being embarrassed when we go out with new people and he's drunk (luckily he's a charming drunk but still), that when I specifically ask him to keep the drinking light because I want sex later (and he enthusiastically agrees) and then he ignores that, even after reminders, I feel like ass and I'm *done* feeling like that.

To his credit, he's trying really hard to not be that person. At least this week. (I've walked this floor.) But the part where I don't entirely believe it and the part where I just can't quite connect with him sexually - even though he's trying so hard to be/do what I've asked, what I said I want - is hard. I mean, even after all the drama we didn't manage to actually be in the same headspace at the same time until last night. And it was... nice. Hell, by many people's standards it was quite good... but I'm pretty easy to turn on and I've been having such ridiculously amazing sex with AnotherArtist that I can't help but compare, especially since we have had better in the past.

But I think part of that is I do look for what's wrong, instead of what's right with us - which is something I need to fix in myself.
 
Also, for the record? that moment when the person you're flirting with happens to "like" the picture of you with HipsterBoy and The Knight and Pink!Girl from when things were good randomly? that moment ::sucks:: even now...
 
So I've found myself thinking about HipsterBoy again this evening. Bah. It's been 2 years since it ended, I'd really thought he'd be out of my head by now. Keeping him out would be easier if we didn't keep running tangentially into each other's social circles though.

I don't even really understand why I'm thinking about him - every time I DO see his photo or a comment he makes, I have a tendency to roll my eyes at him being pretentious and, well, hipster-ish (and other people call him on this too) and not even in affectionate jest, in a "really? really really you just said that? sort of way".

I mean, I always knew those tendencies were there but did I really love a walking Portlandia sketch?

And the answer is yes, and no. I'm seeing one aspect of him - his public face was always that, so whatever - mine is not so different. But truthfully I think what I loved was who I was with him / the face he showed me, that I don't think in retrospect was 100% him anymore than what I showed him was 100% me. I mean, I can remember teasing and flirting when my life was going to SHIT around me.

So perhaps the thing I miss was that idea of myself - kind of like this - https://www.psychologytoday.com/blo...s-in-action/201310/why-can-t-i-get-over-my-ex.

What's really lovely about that is I don't feel like I'm playing that sort of role with AnotherArtist - I don't think he *sees* the bad days, much, yet, but I'm also not pretending to be anything I'm not. Not sexier and more fashionable than I am, not richer than I am (I almost went bankrupt, literally, dating HipsterBoy), not happier than I am, not more OK with weird relationship dynamics.

I mean, there've been a couple times where AnotherArtist has gotten into "relationship balancing trouble" - having to cancel or alter a date with me because of an issue with his wife - but those were all times where he had promised her something on a one time basis (helping her with a grad school app) and then took too long doing it so was trying to keep a promise and STILL popped out to spend time with me despite that. Given how bad I am at deadlines, that was mostly ok - and even more important was that I could actually say "hey, I'm not really happy with this, you're hitting bad relationship buttons" and he tried to make it up to me and it *wasn't* take it or leave it.
 
It's funny that I wrote about "teasing and flirting when my life was going to SHIT around me" last entry, when I sort of had the same thing happen Friday.

TheKnight had been away on a business trip Tues/Wed and much of Thursday, coming home late at night on Thursday. I fucked up, because I had missed him and wanted to reconnect via touch/sex, but he was "tired" and wanted to go to bed and barely acknowledged me. I was really upset about that, flipped out, we fought for a while and then slept and fought a bit in the morning and then I went to my coworking space and we had even more discussion when I got home (he had the day off as comp time).

We ended up in a better place, thank goodness - it was yet another of those fights that go cold, which for me is far worse than shouting and angry. Although then it turned to just rational discussion which makes TheKnight happier. I'll come back to the contents of the conversation, as I'm sort of still processing them.

Then I went out, as I had had a date with AnotherArtist scheduled all week. And oh, but it's weird to go from a spot where you're in this "I love you but everything is fucked up" mood, to... well... as Ferret puts it, poly vacation villa - because sometimes that's what nights with AnotherArtist are, and this one was very much so.

Instant electricity when I walked in the door in a "almost didn't leave for dinner" sort of way, dinner at an (overpriced/overhyped/overrated - WHY this chick is a James Beard winner I have no idea) local celebrity chef's restaurant that was not bad but I almost didn't care if it was good or bad because we were just *floating* on a pheromone-high. Then back to his place where he used every toy in the toy bag on me, resulting in a damn-near-out-of-body-experience orgasm and cuddles and more sex the next morning and and and... yeah. It's pretty damn addictive. And I don't want it to just be the hormones talking but somehow I don't care if it is - though can it possibly still be NRE after a year? I have butterflies and a perma-smirk on my face when I think of him - and yet there are days we don't talk.

Truth be told I'm hesitant to make him any more a part of my daily life because I'm afraid the intermittent nature of our connection is part of why it's so strong. But I suppose there's nothing wrong with having a sometimes-lover... and the idea that it needs to turn into an entangled-type thing is very Relationship Escalator. I mean, not that I would *mind* if that was where it headed - I just don't see a path from here to there, right now, and I'm pretty ok with that.

Perhaps that's just because I feel like entanglement has gone in such mixed directions for TheKnight and I. What our conversation boiled down to was that one of the reasons that he doesn't pursue me sexually is that he feels unloved. Which is sort of unfortunate, given that *I* feel unloved because of the lack of sex. (Sex and romance, for me, are linked in such a way that sex is necessary for romance but romance isn't necessary for sex).

Unfortunately for me, I think his love language is "Acts of Service". No, I know it is - once upon a time his "doing everything for me" made me feel like Buttercup with Wesley in The Princess Bride ("when he was saying "As you wish", what he meant was, "I love you.""). And because of that vibe... and because I'm generally not good at the practicalities of life (call it the ADD or call it the way I was micromanaged growing up), the "emotional labor" of our life together (and the practical labor) does fall more on him. And since I don't see acts of service as loving at ALL, well...

We may be the only people I know that the situation described here falls on the opposite gender roles. Or maybe not - one of the many things we fight about is his mother and her expectations for TheKnight and for us. I think her relationship with his father was much the same until the stroke; and now she keeps trying to slot TheKnight into much the same emotional-and-physical-support role. And now he's stressed by that, and I resent that things have changed, and even resent TheSmallPerson sometimes because the amount of work in our life changed so very much when we had him, in ways I wasn't expecting, and *that* is stressing out TheKnight too and making him... unavailable in the ways that he used to be available.

The reality is I fail a lot of the emotionaltest by more than a little. And some of this stuff, I've tried to nope out of because I found it shallow or unimportant (holidays!), but then TheKnight doesn't feel he can/should do the same. And don't even start on cleaning... ::sigh::

A recurring motif of our fights, really, has been that I don't understand why if he wants stuff to happen, why he can't just TELL me that - like, I know I'm not good at noticing / remembering this stuff (because ADD), but I'm happy to fix things when told (both because I'm a decent person but also because it ties into the "sub" side of me - not the sort of sub that anticipates the service people want, but I *love* being told what to do... mostly because then I don't have to think.)

I assumed (and emotionally, still kind of believe) that this stuff was easy for everyone else (the non-ADD types, I mean). And now we're having every problem in the book.

(Someone linked me to the emotional labor metafilter thread (linked above) right after our fight, and the whole concept is seriously hitting me over the head right now - I've got a lot of guilt, and a lot of "ok, so even if this is true, I have no idea how to fix it".)
 
The degree to which I am smitten right now with AnotherArtist is sort of ridiculous right now. I've seen him 2x since my last note here and I just can't get over how wonderful he makes me feel, even when I had a bad day before seeing him. And it's sort of crazy just how *good* someone who says "oh, I'm just figuring out what I want" in kink can be at completely rock my world, scrape me off the ceiling and leave bruises for a couple days kinky sex. (Seriously, there's a bite mark on my arm that I can't quit looking at since Monday night.)

"these seconds when I'm shaking leave me shuddering / for days she says."


I'm still sort of wondering how to go deeper on the kink side... I want him to Dom me and not just Top me, no matter how good he as at Topping. And I'm afraid of this because it's a problem I keep running into with TheKnight, and I don't want to have the same problems 2x.

But maybe it's just caution - I know that the more I say "yes, this, ...please" and the more he sees what it does to me, the more I get back. And there's no rush... this is still evolving, growing, becoming deeper and more trusting ("not an ax murderer", as has been mentioned on this forum so often...)

I still have too much shame about my desires... still want to just DO and not have to think, or ask, or admit I want something, want to just acquiesce (enthusiastically!) to what my partner wants. Even with TheKnight, even after all these years... though in some ways it's easier with AnotherArtist because of the lack of expectations and the astonishing amount of NRE hormones still present.

Did I mention just how insanely good things are between he and I right now?

... and it doesn't help that TheKnight and I keep having all the hot-and-cold-and-miscommunication. Just for that extra bit of contrast and guilt.
 
They say you shouldn't go looking for poly relationships to find something missing in an existing relationship. Obviously, they're right.

They don't tell you want to do when you find that thing you're missing with someone else and instead of making you feel better, it just makes you feel worse about it being missing elsewhere.

Fucking NRE. (Or is it that AnotherArtist is in love with me, and TheKnight has fallen out? there's a traitorous voice in my head that wonders and fears... I don't want that, I keep fighting that, I make things worse by fearing it...)

I mean, I fucking *know* it's the poly vacation villa effect... but it's not like we do astonishingly "special" things every time I see him - I go to his house, we cook dinner, we watch tv, we fuck, we sleep, we fuck, we drink coffee, I go home... at least that's one way of putting it.

The other way... yeah, we cook dinner but there are kisses and random groping the whole time... we open a bottle of wine and barely drink a glass each because we're so drunk on each other there's no point in drinking it.. later there's more kissing than tv, enough that I only want to watch things I've already seen so that I don't care if I miss it... and the sex is exactly the rough yet gentle way I want it, and going to sleep cuddling makes sense even though I don't usually want to be touched while sleeping (at this point I'd skip the sleep just to feel his body on mine), and we wake up still reaching for each other and drift into this endless space of touching that starts out being about the wonder of us being together and ends with us screaming desire into the dawn. (OK so it wasn't really dawn, I don't do mornings, but I sometimes can't resist the overly poetic turn of phrase.)

I don't think I ever even craved HipsterBoy like I do AnotherArtist when I'm with him. And yet while I miss him when I don't see him for several days I'm not sacrificing my life on the altar of trying to be with him or even stay in communication with him all the time.

Truth be told, no matter how much I want to, I haven't craved TheKnight like that in years either. I want to. I want him to crave me like that. And maybe it's just the hormones that make that possible - I don't want that to be impossible, though. And yet if I don't push it we're more comfortable with each other, we were better together when I just let him be.

'Course, half of this was written while he was in the next room having kinky sex with Joan, the girl he's been dating for six months now. (Oddly enough, I hadn't named her 'till now - part of me just wasn't sure she was going to stick around as it's been an odd relationship from the start. ) That... doesn't help. I still have twinges of "why don't you want that with me?" despite doing the same things with Artist.

So fucking complicated...
 
So the last week has been... something. I'm not sure if that's good or bad. TheKnight and I fought some more, but in a way that actually for once might have led to us having a bit of a breakthrough - he finally heard me about wanting/needing more affectionate touch and since then things have been... good. Mostly. Plus or minus a bit of misinterpreting each other while tired...

And things with AnotherArtist have been wonderful - TheKnight and I threw a big party on Sunday morning/afternoon (epic brunches last till 5!) and AnotherArtist came early and helped set up and just having him around all day, with my friends, was *wonderful*. And he even finally made us FetLife official - yes, it's ridiculous that I care, but in a relationship with very few signposts, that somehow helps.

The three of us are splitting a room at a kink con (Debauchery, I talked about it last year) in a few weeks. I'm completely overwhelmed in thinking about that weekend; there's a level of being a hinge there that is a bit more than I've had to handle before. AnotherArtist will only be there with me, in terms of partners, TheKnight's partner Joan will also be there so there's that, though she's staff. And amusingly, MartialArtist has popped back up and is planning on being there with his fiancée. We've been talking more, lately - he's still trying to wrap his head around poly as he doesn't really *want* monogamy but can't quite figure out how to be ok with poly, at the same time. I'm surprised they're going, truthfully. (And yes, he knows I'm probably not available that weekend and there'd have to be a lot of conversation about us hooking back up, if it was even on the table - I haven't seen him in ages, I don't know if the chemistry would still be there as I'm so much in a very different place than I was 2 years ago. But there is an interesting potential there.)

And I've been flirting online with a ridiculously young for me submissive boy... I SO shouldn't but it's tempting. We'll see what happens.
 
I have to gush somewhere, I guess this is it.

Had an evening/night with Another Artist last night and it was yet again amazing. I don't entirely understand how we can go from so astonishingly *sweet*... the way he kissed me when we went on a walk in a local park ... to so astonishingly, blazingly hot ... the fact that I'm still sore today from the intensity of the sex last night... to both at once... the way his hands tangled in my hair, the way we tried to cuddle this morning before I had to leave and ended up with a quickie I think the neighbors might have heard.

He's... passion like molten caramel seeping through my veins, burning and somehow still new enough to be exciting yet safe, and he holds me so tightly, gently, like I'm a precious thing he'll never let go of.

(The traitorous voice in my head can't help but point out that he's never said I love you, no matter how much his lips scream it against mine.)

How do I reconcile that with a love at home that's deep like the ocean and yet somehow just as fickle, where we're somehow either becalmed in domesticity or wracked by hurricanes of passion gone sideways, when the only thing that's *always* been true in my life is "us" and yet some days I don't think TheKnight sees me at all and some... most? days he only sees me as best friend / mother of his child, and while that ought to be enough I crave feeling electricity across my skin from his touch.

And... they both want me together at the con next weekend. I have no idea how to not let my passion with AnotherArtist hurt TheKnight... I have no idea of how not to let AnotherArtist know that what I share with him I don't share, right now, with TheKnight because that puts too much pressure on our relationship in ways I don't want to do (I've seen that dynamic before and it wasn't pretty for anyone).
 
Home from this year's edition of {the kink con} and I'm still pretty fuzzy. Too tired to really go into details to nearly the degree I did last year (and I'm feeling a little bit too private to write about it on FL, too, I know so many more people there now and I am emotionally far more invested in things that happened than I was last time, too) so I suppose I'll just write about the highlights and a little of the emotional impact.

TheKnight, AnotherArtist and I all traveled to the event together, and oh, but being the center of that V for 72 hours straight was utterly fucking GLORIOUS. I mean, at one point, on Sunday morning while waiting for a class, I was sitting on a couch with my head in Artist's lap while he stroked my hair, with my legs over TheKnight's lap. It was this moment of utter fucking perfection in a weekend full of them.

But I get ahead of myself - there were more lovely bits. At a "sample the kinks" party the first night, Artist discovered he likes electricity (violet wand, for those into such things) as much as I do, which is lovely as Knight __hates__ it so I haven't gotten to play with it much. A definite avenue for future exploration...

The threesome I was worried about turned out to be 95% wonderful with only a little bit of awkwardness - the three of us did an impact scene, first, me blindfolded so that I often didn't know which of them was touching me or which of them were hitting me (sometimes it was obvious, and sometimes it was clearly both at once). That part was nearly perfect - the sex was slightly less so, because they took the blindfold off of me and quit telling me what to do, which just left me at a loss for what to do first and with whom. (They're both on the straight end of heteroflex, and I was being a greedy person who wanted all the attention anyway...)

More classes the next two days - two rope classes that I think will lead to me actually enjoying rope with Knight and now with Artist, for instance, a rather fun spanking class, all sorts of things. Saturday, Knight disappeared to spend the evening with Joan, leaving Artist with me all to himself for the evening... well, mostly! I ended up getting an incredibly sadistic massage, and then I had planned to have another top do a non-sexual fire scene (my first!) with me, but Artist was happy to watch both and take advantage of a floating, endorphin-drunk me, and send me even higher with more impact play. I ended up so far into subspace it was pretty much exactly like what everyone *says* X feels like but it didn't the one time I tried it. By the end of the evening I was reduced to nothing but sensation, holding onto Artist so tightly there was not one more inch of skin that could be touching.

It took everything I could do not to tell him I love him - maybe I do but I don't trust myself and especially didn't trust myself at that moment, too drunk, too open, too raw and I didn't want the first time I said it to be in that state - what if he thought it was just the hormones and not truth?

In some ways the weekend really felt like it was more about Artist than Knight at all. I mean, the things I feared didn't happen - Knight wasn't jealous of what Artist and I share, which really only scared me, I think, because were it reversed I would be. But compersion comes more naturally to Knight than to me, and I love him for it. And instead of having more time together feeling chafing, it only made Artist and I closer, more intimate. I even, at one point, alluded to the fact that the chemistry between us was so much crazier than anything Knight and I share right now and it didn't make things weird, it was just fact, no more scary than some of the dynamics between he and his wife.

So very different than the last time I loved - there's no sense of danger, just a sense of possibility and trust.

And yet I'm still terrified to tell him how I feel. I don't understand...
 
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