Porphyria Returns

[amul]

This strange interaction between Porphyria and I continues. I am never quite sure what is permissible, what is encouraged, and what is to be avoided. All the more difficult because Porphyria seems to shy away from direct questions, and the only thing I've learned to be certain of during her last visits is that if I ask directly, the answer becomes "no."

My carefully cultivated blunt approach is useless here, and while she tries to hint and suggest what her attitudes are, the language is not natural to me. I try, as she encourages, to accept that she wouldn't make the trip if she didn't value my company. Try to believe that the ardor she returns when I make a move indicates desire. But she never comes to me, and I find this confusing. I expected that by now she would have started to express herself at least occasionally in the language I speak, that I would be familiar enough with her to understand her.

I do understand her, when she talks of others, when it is not about her and I, and this confuses me even further.

The crux of it, I suppose, is that we both want half of the "normal" thing from each other, and the confusion rests in the exact definition of what that half looks like, what we're comfortable taking from each other, given time and geography and the quantum mechanics of trust. This only highlights the communication issue.

I keep thinking that she and I might be better served if she did not have to grapple with both being my houseguest, and wanting to spend time with me in particular ways. If she was crashing somewhere else, and our time together was by specific design, a few hours to be spent in a particular way, then I would have a much clearer understanding of what sort of behavior I could engage in while we were together. Perhaps then I would know, at any given moment, if I could reach out to hold her hand, or draw her tiny, lithe figure up against me. I would not have to watch as she plans for time with others and feel as though it was an opportunity lost for me.

Unfortunately, this grates against my most basic, most brutal, most overwhelming urge regarding Porphyria. What I want above all else is to be a safe and trusted space in her life. I want my home to be somewhere she feels comfortable lingering in, and I want my time with her to feel lazy and unrushed. I want to be a vacation for her, from the tides of her work-a-day life, from the pressures of potential long-term relationships, from the constant predator-and-prey tendencies that seem to mark so many of her male/female relationships.

And back to the front again, the wheels spin another revolution as I circle the wagons around my deeper truths and desires: that part of me which looks at all of my existence as an education thinks that this is not the classroom I think it is. Time with her should not be about what I can give, it suggests, but a chance to learn once more how to ask for what I want.

Or maybe....just maybe...I should look at this as a chance to just have some gorram fun and stop worrying all the time about Shoulds.

Comments

[fudjo.livejournal.com]

If she's unable or unwilling to tell you want she wants, if you are frustrated that you don't know what the ground rules are, if the communication issues are that bad, end it. You're not going to get what you want out of it.

Oh, and that bit about watching her plan time with others? That's bullshit. It's disrespectful of her.

I went through much the same thing two years ago, and it caused me no end of stress, frustration, and hurt. Respect yourself and get out of this.

[amul.livejournal.com]

I appreciate the support, but I wonder if you are (and by extension, I am) making a critically false assumption. Porphyria and I aren't dating, and she isn't coming to Chicago to visit me. She's coming to Chicago for work, and to visit a fair number of friends. The last few times, including this trip, she asked to stay with me.

A large part of my alternative relationship choices revolves around the idea that I don't want to say "no" to what life has to offer me, just because I'm looking for something particular at the end of the day.

Does that invalidate your argument, or only support it further? I can't tell. What do you think?

[fudjo.livejournal.com]

I'm not making a judgement call or pre-supposition about what you're doing. Whatever you're doing, the rules and expectations have to be clear, and if communication is an issue and continues to be an issue, get out.

[gailmom.livejournal.com]

"Should" is a dangerous word. Whether we apply it to ourselves or to another, should rarely makes anyone happy. Who is it that writes these shoulds? Shoulds are expectations, either that we place on others, or that we place on us, or that we *feel* others place on us...they are rarely reflections of any sort of truth or need.

The sun *will* rise in the east, and I *should* get up shortly therafter...unless that day I *need* to be in bed.

The phone *will* ring, and I *should* answer it, unless I *need* to be attending to something else.

The holidays *are* coming, and I *should* throw and attend parties, unless this year I *need* to slow down and turn inward instead of outward.

etc.

Your friend chooses to spend time in your space, and you choose to allow it. Where you go from there is a matter of your choices and of hers, there isn't any "should" to it, there only ever "is".

Should is a dirty word.

[vrimj.livejournal.com]

I know I am a high stickler for this sort of thing, but in your shoes I would not be having a physical relationship. I want consent, and I want it clearly expressed and when someone is not impaired. You see I am a vein creature and the idea that someone might regret what we do cuts to my core. So I lothe holdbacks, assumptions, buts and other conditions on the acceptance of physical pleasure in people I take to bed. As I get older and crankier I find I lack tolerance for quibblers and those who do not boldy embrace me, so I give them a miss. My body might occasionally call me fool, but my emotional self is all the happier for it.