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dive for dreams
or a slogan may topple you
(trees are their roots
and wind is wind)
trust your heart
if the seas catch fire
(and live by love
though the stars walk backward)
honour the past
but welcome the future
(and dance your death
away at the wedding)
never mind a world
with its villains or heroes
(for good likes girls
and tomorrow and the earth)
in spite of everything
which breathes and moves, since Doom
(with white longest hands
neating each crease)
will smooth entirely our minds
-before leaving my room
i turn, and (stooping
through the morning) kiss
this pillow, dear
where our heads lived and were.

~E.E. Cummings

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"Love is everything it's cracked up to be. 

That's why people are so cynical about it. 

It really is worth fighting for, risking everything for. 

And the trouble is, if you don't risk everything, you risk even more."

-Erica Jong

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We must develop a deeper interest and greater understanding of the people we meet here or abroad. Like us, they are passengers on board that mysterious ship called life.

-Ella Maillart

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“Really important meetings are planned by the souls long before the bodies see each other.”

- Paulo Coelho

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by Mark Fischer on Flickr

Evidently the universe is trying to teach me something. 

Communication between lovers, between paramours, is paramount.  It is sometimes hard work, exhausting, frustrating and complicated.  Communication between metamours, those who are concomitant to paramours... partners of partners... is healthy, important, and sometimes just plain hard.

I spent the past weekend with Shepherd, and his primary, at her home in Houston.  I will call her Shepherdess, and hope that it conveys the deepest respect and appreciation, for that is what I feel.   The purpose of this visit, was to make a connection, forge a friendship.  I do not take lightly being invited, and for the most part I felt very, very welcomed.  This weekend was a new experience for all of us.  Not something we've done before, not something we were even sure how to do.  Shepherd and Shepherdess have a relationship dynamic that is the opposite of ours.  She is his Domme.  He is my Top.  I have never been in a Domme household.  The dynamic is foreign to me.  I tried very hard to bear in mind that I was there by her good graces, that every opportunity to both be alone with Shepherd and to share him with her was a gift.  i wasn't always completely comfortable, but I did feel very welcome, very much at home.

Shepherdess has done many things to make me feel an important and accepted part of Shepherd's life.  I don't know that I could welcome Husband's girl into my home and my bed, (Yes, we slept in a king sized bed... with Shepherd in the middle.) watch her kiss him, and flirt with him, and fall asleep in his arms.  Yet I was able to do all those things this weekend, and to see Shepherd do all those things with Shepherdess, too.  I was grateful, and that helped me to not give jealousy a place.  There was no real reason to feel jealous.  I was included.

There were two small things that happened that made me feel not so good.  I struggled with these two things, because I do not believe they were intentional.  But they did hurt my feelings.  I think they were born out of the fact that this sort of sharing isn't something any of us has done before.  I know it was uncomfortable for all of us.  I think we did a damned good job, in spite of a few rough edges.  I did not want to taint the good with my feelings of insecurity.  I kept them to myself, hating the thought of confrontation, and seeming ungrateful or disrespectful.  I took some time to journal about them late one night, and clear my thoughts so I could let them go for a time and enjoy the company.

I expressed them to Shepherd on the drive home; and that is a challenge for me.  I hate conflict so very much, I was tempted to hold them in.  But I am learning.  Emotions need to be heard, acknowledged, so they can pass.  And now, those things have been expressed to Shepherdess as well, by Shepherd, because she sensed there was something wrong, and he was honest when she asked.

There's more... of course.

On Monday, there was a miscommunication between Poet, myself, and Poet's primary.  I was trying to act with honor and integrity, but did not have all of the information.  It seems neither did Poet's primary.  Feelings were hurt, communication was strained to the point of breaking.  We have been up all hours of the night trying to work out this tangle.  Apologies have been made, and steps are being taken toward resolution, clearer communication.  Feelings have been expressed and heard, so now they can pass through us.

by Ell Brown on Flickr

Damn, this is fucking difficult!

I am sure that things will work out fine... that we will continue to learn and grow, to practice generosity and acceptance.  I wish sometimes it weren't so hard... on all of us.  

We are human. We are insecure. We are risking. 

I believe it is worth it, and am committed to being ethical, respectful, and honorable.  I will fail, but I will keep trying.  This too shall make us, all of us, stronger.  I just have to figure out what to do next, to address the feelings, and express my gratitude and respect.  I wish there were a book of answers for dummies.  Relationships don't work that way.

This road is bumpy.

Don't forget your maps, Travelers.

Phoenix

Change is the constant, the signal for rebirth, the egg of the phoenix.

~Christina Baldwin

by Temari 09 on Flickr

He said to me, “Baby, imagine being invited to witness the birth of a most incredible, beautiful creature you can imagine. That’s what it’s like to have you in my life.” …and he calls me his poet. Shepherd sees me as a being in the midst of rebirth. I suppose I see myself much the same way -- a sort of phoenix being reborn, not from the ashes of my life, but still, reborn. 

In a conversation with my young adult daughter last week, she confided in me that she sees herself as a curious person; eager to learn and to experience all life has to offer. She’s wondering about how that will translate into her most important, romantic relationship. She worries that she will get bored after choosing the one man to marry and raise a family alongside. My baby girl knows that monogamy isn’t her only option. She also knows that monogamy is a perfectly viable choice on her list. What struck me about her revelation is that I know exactly how she feels.

I remember as a young woman being excited about making those soul-connections with others. The majority of my friends were men, and I didn’t date all that much until I was a senior in high school. But there was something different in me, a hunger – a passion that many wouldn’t acknowledge, or at least some tried to discourage. “You’re too intense… too emotional… too idealistic.” I heard all these indictments from so called friends, and well meaning acquaintances.

At the age of nineteen, I was just beginning to explore the world when I found myself pregnant. Immediately the course of my life changed. My flight was grounded. I married, because it was the only choice given me. I began a family three months before my twentieth birthday. Four years later I had three babies, and was single again. Don’t misunderstand me, because I loved raising my kids. I was a damned good mother – the very best I knew how to be. I’m proud of the adults my children became, and of the investment I made to be their full-time mom.

However, a few years ago I worked myself out of that job as one by one, each of my children launched out on their own and began to fly. The grieving process for that separation was something I never anticipated, but in time I learned to accept that this was how life works. Watching them test their wings, I felt those old dreams fluttering to life in my spirit. It was time for me to go back and explore that life that I’d traded in exchange for motherhood and family, twenty years before.

Some would say that I am the woman who grew unhappy in her marriage, and went through a crisis, deciding to abandon all that I’d worked so hard to build for selfish reasons. I was feeling old, and realizing that my life was half over. So I went a little crazy, and decided I wanted more -- more men, more sex, and more life. The truth is that all those things are true, in a very narrow sense. But I didn’t become polyamorous overnight because the label fit the sort of life I’d just come to decide I wanted. I think this broken bird inside of me has always been waiting to spread her wings and chase those dreams that she earlier laid aside.

Now I find myself exploring, working, building the muscles it takes to fly, and it’s intense. It’s hard, and exhausting, and wonderful. I spend a great deal of time worrying and crying, thinking and communicating, writing and examining my heart. This life is complicated. This being reborn process is painful. But every time I break through and find that plateau where I can soar and rest and think about how truly fortunate I am – I realize the true worth of my struggles.

This is the intensity I’ve always craved. This complicated, painful, stretching rebirth is just who I am, and just where I belong. I’m glad others think it’s a privilege to witness. For me, living it is nothing less that truly amazing – and in the end, if someone who loves me is moved to poetry by the life I’m living, I’m truly blessed to be so loved.

Flying

by Dave Hamster on Flickr

Flying without feathers is not easy; my wings have no feathers.
~Titus Maccius Plautus
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When once you have tasted flight, you will forever walk the earth with your eyes turned skyward, for there you have been, and there you will always long to return.
~Leonardo Da Vinci
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I pick the prettiest part of the sky and I melt into the wing and then into the air, till I'm just soul on a sunbeam.
~Richard Bach
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If happy little bluebirds fly beyond the rainbow, why oh why can't I?
~E.Y. Harburg
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I have my tickets... or my confirmation number anyway. I have my boarding pass... or I suppose I have my early-bird boarding confirmation, too.  The point is, on Friday morning I'll be flying 251 miles to see my Shepherd.  I am beside myself with eagerness and joy.  

There's something wonderful about the space between here and there, only when I'm in it, of course.  It's like slipping through a portal between worlds, and lingering there a while, butterflies dancing in my stomach.  There's a shift from my world to his, and back again.  

In Shepherd's world, there's a place for me, I fit there, welcomed by him and those who are important in his life.  It's a place where I go alone, leaving behind my motherness, my wifeness, my daughterness, my employeeness.  (I know, creating new words, I can't leave behind my writerness.)  In Shepherd's world I am just me, just his girl, and his poet, wanted and loved for being myself.

Husband's world is no less incredible.  In his world, in my primary world, I get to be wife, mother, daughter, sister, Mimi, lover and friend.  I wouldn't trade Husband's world for anything.  It's just that the two are a universe apart for me.  And that's a good thing.  Distance means I go, escape into Shepherd's world and enjoy. Then I come back  to Husband's world, refreshed, if a bit bruised.  I am welcomed with love and acceptance, and I am cherished for being me.

The truth is this.  In Shepherd's world, I miss Husband.  In Husband's world, I miss Shepherd.  I'm always wishing someone were there, or I were with someone, or that we were all... and that is too much to hope for, at this point.  Though I've wondered what it would be like just to sit down to dinner with both of them, or to celebrate a birthday, or a holiday with the men who carry my heart.

The other truth is this.  In that flying space between Shepherd and Husband, I am alone.  Waiting in the airport after my last trip to see Shepherd, I found myself staring out the window at the purple Dallas sky, as tears fell from my lashes.  I felt alone.  I missed Shepherd.  I missed Husband.  I'd had an amazing weekend, was tired and sore and incredibly happy.  I was looking forward to falling asleep in Husband's arms.  And I cried in my loneliness, then boarded a plane, and rode the wind back home.

It will be much the same this Friday morning, as I fly south to meet Shepherd.  I will be excited, eager to see him, to hold him close and feel his lips on mine.  Yet in part of my heart, I will begin missing husband.  I will feel acutely that sense of being alone, without either of them.    It's not always a bad thing.  Sometimes a few moments alone is exactly what I need to be able to breathe.  But I'm aware, always aware, of the distance between me and the ones I'm without.

At least I know I can fly.