Conversations with Friends

**I should preface this post with a little information: I have never felt that monogamy works for everyone. Statistics on divorce supports this. I adore conversations that make me think about alternative narratives of life. I have always been a odd duck so to speak and have very unique opinions on life and relationships. I also have never viewed any loving relationship as bad. I do not believe there is only one person, one soulmate, out there for everyone. Most of the world would be single because the chance of meeting that one person would be astronomical. I truly do believe it is possible to love more than one person and there is nothing wrong with it. What has been wrong is how society and religion has pigeonholed everyone into the single idea that the only right relationship is a lifetime marriage of one man and one woman. Humans are far more interesting than that and our capacity to love is far more infinite**

always wonderful to have a good friend. That person that knows just how to entertain you or what you need. Last night my friend called me and we had the most fascinating conversation. Now this might not seem all that great to some people but I have a love of all things anthropological, which might seem odd since I generally find people awful but there is a difference between understanding how people work and having to deal with people. I prefer the former.

Now I am not very good at being an "off-the-cuff" speaker most of the time. I like to choose my words and thoughts very carefully. I am very precise about expressing myself as a general rule, so philosophical ramblings, "what if" tangents, and talking about deeper myself are not easy conversations for me. I like to chew on things for a long time, review, and edited to make sure I am expressing my thoughts and opinions in the clearest way possible. It's why I prefer writing things down.

I was presented with a "what if" idea to mull over after a conversation regarding people and the variety of alternative relationships/lifestyles that are out there. Now I am, admittedly, in a very unique relationship right now with my husband living in a different state, so this was all very interesting to me. I have close friends and acquaintances in "alternative" relationships like polyamory or friends that have differing sexual orientations like gay, pansexual, etc.

Well, we stuck to the idea of polyamory for most of the conversation and I was presented with the "what if" - What if you or your husband met someone you cared about and wanted to keep with you openly, what would be done and how do you think you'd each react? Now this was presented in part because of the way we have been living our lives completely apart except for small visits, phone calls, and gaming online. So I suppose the possibility of one of us meeting someone new isn't entirely out of the realm of possibility, if looked at logically.

In fact, I have an acquaintance that just went through something similar in recent years. Granted, they weren't living apart but he found someone else he cared for just as much as his wife and now they live a polyamory lifestyle. Now I find this very interesting because there are kids involved and there are four people involved, he and the new love were both married. I wish I knew them better because I have so many questions; how do you explain it to children, how did you present it to your spouses, how did they take it originally, how do you seemingly make it work so well? So many questions. My curiosity gets the better of me sometimes.

Anyway, this whole thing got me to thinking...what would happen? My husband and I are very different people in many ways including mindsets. While we are also very similar. We are both easygoing, caring, open-minded people but he is far more traditional in many ways than I am. I would like to thank my friend for keeping me up until 4-4:30am thinking about this. Never give me an interesting "what if" to ponder late at night. My brain can't let it go. LOL

Personally, after some serious thought, I'd welcome the addition if there was true caring involved. I'd be excited that my husband met someone he cared for as much as he cared for me. I would embrace the idea. However, this is where I think we'd differ. He's very traditional when it comes to his own relationships so I think he'd be offended, angry, and threatened. I can just visualize the anger now. It's weird how different people in a string relationship can be. Now I could be wrong and he would surprise me by being into the idea but I doubt it. I've been married to this man for 25 years and he's only surprised me twice, both recently but still it's only twice. I can read him like a book.

tl;dr Last night I was presented with the idea of my marriage being less than traditional in various settings and it kept me awake because I am a geek about human behavior.