I have apparently succeeded in giving Numbers Guy the impression that I am a well-organized person who cleans the house regularly (even if I do sometimes leave food in the refrigerator until it gets gross.)
And that may not exactly be true, but I have made a point of making sure the house is clean when he comes over, especially the kitchen when he cooks for us. And I’m really glad he appreciates it.
So I know this sounds silly, but:
He asked me how often I clean my kitchen! Squee!
Numbers Guy really is cute. I like listening to him talk about computer games.
Between Sparkly and Numbers Guy, I am apparently doomed to be the person who has the best executive function and least-fucked-up sleep schedule out of the household. (And re: executive function, that’s saying something.) Criticize whatever else about me you want to criticize, but I cook and I buy food and I clean things, on a not-completely-awful schedule.
Sometimes I selfishly wish that I could live with someone who was more on top of these things than I am, for a change, so I could follow their lead instead of always being the one to push.
Maybe I underestimate how much Sparkly’s job takes out of em.
Something just reminded me of the period of time when Sparkly and I were both in high school, and Sparkly was dating a guy. And. Heh. My (non-jealous) reaction to that, in retrospect, predicts pretty well that I would end up polyamorous.
I’m not sure if I was aware of polyamory at the time, and I definitely wasn’t thinking of my feelings for Sparkly as either romantic or sexual then, but. Still.
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So, for the majority of the time before we both left for college, Sparkly and I saw each other only once a week for choir rehearsal, and only got to actually talk to each other for maybe half an hour total? A few minutes before and after rehearsal, plus the fifteen-minute break. That was the only time in which I saw or talked to em at all. I saw my only actual friends for half an hour once a week, plus a concert or two.
At this time, I had a cell phone and Sparkly didn’t, and eir mother heavily limited and policed how much ey could use the phone at home. When ey started dating this guy, that meant ey had no regular way to talk to him outside of school. So– I don’t remember who first suggested it, but I let em use my phone during that fifteen-minute break, so ey could talk to him. And as I remember it, ey would spend pretty much the whole fifteen-minute break on the phone, and sometimes I’d sit by em and keep em company, and I felt a bit sad about not getting to talk to em as much, but mostly I was genuinely glad that I could help em talk to this guy, who ey really liked and who made em happy. I was really glad that I could make that happen, even though it meant significantly less time with em for me.
And now, of course, I feel the same way, except that I can spend plenty of time with em, and I have the knowledge that ey is committed to me and considers me equal to Numbers Guy to fall back on when I do feel lonely, and it doesn’t feel even a little bit like a sacrifice.
So I’ve actually been inclined towards polyamory since well before I ever experienced real sexual attraction or fell in love. Like several years before. Huh.
Sparkly is home, very tired and headachy from spending so much time in the car. Apparently ey felt left out during a lot of the trip, because Numbers Guy jumped into seeing all his old friends and didn’t include em very well, but they ended up having a good talk about that, and the last day went better.
I never know what to write about it, because it’s all wibbly unspecific feelings, but Sparkly and Numbers Guy are both so wonderful, and they’re so cute together. Watching them play with our cats is one of my favorite things. Playful and snuggly and cute suits them both so well.
It really seems like Numbers Guy has gotten a lot more comfortable with the situation, too, which is a relief. I honestly really like him, and it’s great that we’re able to talk to each other and be friendly. He even offered to pay for my ticket to [fan organization event], although I said no because I didn’t really want to go.
Numbers Guy and I are actually sort of friends now, which is really nice. We can talk to each other, and he includes me in silly things like when he goes around patting people on the head at parties, and he hugs me– and sometimes he asks permission to hug me, which is extra awesome.
He’s really an incredibly sweet person. I’m glad Sparkly found him.
All the men there (who were aware of it, as far as I know) were entertainingly angry on my behalf, later, although they acted normal and smoothed things over at the time.
The woman who was next to me for most of it smoothed things over both with the drunk dude, and with me when he was out of the room. “Well, he’s very drunk. And he thinks you’re cute, that’s nice. And I’ve had much worse drunk handsy dudes.”
I don’t think this reflects negatively on her at all, it’s just interesting as an example of different perspectives on sexism. It’s easy to be angry about something when it’s mostly hypothetical to you. When it happens to you a lot, on the other hand, you do your best to dismiss it and get on with your day.
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The really tiresome thing about drunk people is that whatever you tell them doesn’t stick. It may be easy to distract them momentarily, but they keep coming back to the same ideas. Repeatedly moving away, saying No, you can’t touch me (calmly and neutrally in tone), even physically moving his hand off my leg, didn’t deter him at all. The really tiresome thing is that this common property of drunkenness means that if I had made a scene, even that wouldn’t have deterred him.
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This is only semi-related, but– I guess it sometimes strikes people as weird, when I say rude or challenging or uncompromising things in my normal calm tone of voice? Like they find it hard to take what I’m saying seriously. The issue is, I do mean it seriously, I just don’t want to go too far in the opposite direction and sound really aggressive. I thought I was hitting about the right tone of friendly “no”, at least for some of it? I don’t know.
Numbers Guy, being sarcastic: “Oh, [Minty] be weird? Of course not. She’s totally normal, obviously.”
I mean, not that this is news to me, but, like, IMAGINE A WORLD where I’m not obviously weird to everyone who meets me??? He’s seen me at the best and most social I’ve ever been in my life, basically, and this is still his reaction.
I’m not mad at him, at all, it’s just… This is what my life is like. If you were wondering. This is why I have the perspective on life that I do. People are always going to think I’m weird.
Some Open Space 