Work and Play

[greenstorm]

Well, work goes on, no surprise there. I'd say I'm definitely settled into it now, the full five-days-most-weeks thing, and I'm able to work with it a bit to keep comfortable with the flexibility I have.

I'm getting very used to my clients. The routine is becoming, well, routine. Familiar.

Playtime, on the other hand, has unstabilised and gone spinning off into a mass of unpredictable bits. It's interesting: theoretically we've got a skeleton of a plan back up and running, or still up and running, just as we have for the last few months. This one doesn't feel (yet?) like it's a comfortable thing for me to lean on, though the last one did.

Certainly this one's very new, and you can't judge anything without giving it some time first.

I know all the unpredictability leads me to play with the idea of monogamy in my head. I play with it in a fantasy way, where I don't look too closely at the details, and where it gets me a consistent person in bed next to me every night just so there is always 1) someone and 2) the someone I choose.

It's kind of funny, in a way. The stereotype is that guys particularly fantasise about multiple women, and here I'm thinking, maybe I'd like just one? I also think about adding another partner in there, or really zooming ahead on casual dating, to fill some of these empty evenings. The weirdness about that is that what I want from my relationships is a sense of closeness and familiarity and reliability primarily, rather than either sex or new relationship excitement, so I kind of dread the first stages of anything. And, of course, by the time any relationship settles down to what I want it to be, it'll take a lot of work to fit it in timewise as a large part of the problem now has to do with poorly-fitted schedules.

Of course, that's people-play.

Work on the garden continues, though I admit that more and more I want to be able to step out my own door at any time and into it. No calling ahead to check, no stepping on a bus with time overhead, just the ability to suddenly be out in my garden, that's what I want. Ahwell. God still outpaces the bad by far. :) I bought a couple of low-growing heathers to add to the rose garden, which will then be 'complete' until I stick some bulbs in in the fall, and possibly a couple of other things as thought permits. It needs sage and thyme, too.

I have some VanDusen classes coming up, in addition to the guiding program. I'm adding more as I get the money. I look forward to those, definitely.

Pottery's got two weeks or so left and then it's over. I hope to grab a membership so I can continue working on the wheel there when time permits -- it'll be a nice option to have everyday, except within specified Wednesday class time.

I'm meeting up with Trevor again this weekend. I need to leave my purse at home. He -always- finds things I really need to buy. I always really regret not buying them, but at the same time, no money...

Maybe we should just hang out at home and drink tea or something.

More play: rereading American Gods and looking for clues that become only slightly more obvious the second time around. Cooking a little bit, on and off. Very little Everquest, the number of free hours I have over at TOH is pretty low total. Trying amusing little restaurants once in awhile. I love the tiny ones where the owners cook the food for you when you order it and they're all solicitous afterwards. Possibly hanging out at a hot tub with a friend of TOW's at some point. Hm. I'm sure I'll find newe things to do when I'm done the book too... give that one a couple of hours.

And that's a bunch of what's on my mind just now. :)

Take care.

Comments

[silverseastar.livejournal.com]

Sounds like a busy full life. I can relate on some levels for sure. Only add some kids in there, and ya get the picture. I wish I had anywhere to garden at all. My stuff is in pots on our deck, waiting for my future home. Can you let me know if Van Dusen offers a botanical drawing class? They used to a while back and I'm dying to take it.

[greenstorm.livejournal.com]

If you type VanDusen into google.com, asone word, I believe the first hit is their page. Their courses should be on there. It's March 27 and 28 this year, I think, and -may- be full already. Give em a call quick. :)

[darthmaus.livejournal.com]

Hey Sweetie -- Hubby and I worked stuff out (was a quick, easy discussion actually -- as the days lengthen, my sanity improves, and I'm easier to deal with... thanks to ALL of you for sticking with me through the winter ;-) regarding time between the two of us, so that's no problem.

He brought something up that I hadn't thought of: if we're moving in together, we need to adjust our ideas on the 'alone-time' thing. Of course, we'll all be able to arrange alone-time and couple-time as needed for dates and stuff, but the casual evenings of low-key alone/couple time will be pretty hard to come by, because there will almost always be people in the house. I'm interested to know what your thoughts are on this -- do you think your needs will change, and how do you think we can arrange to meet them? (and everyone else's of course ;)

So right now I've got two alone-evenings with him (Tuesday and Wednesday), and I'm going to go down to one in a couple of weeks (probably after pottery ends). I'm going to learn how to better get the feeling of connection that I need from my interactions with him when you and/or K are around. In fact, that's something I'm going to need to learn how to do with every combination of us.

Anyway, the empty nights situation will be better for both of us when K is on days, I would think, and will also be easier to manage when he's in school. I do think we might want to arrange to spend more time all together (ie at least in the same house) when that is the case, rather than splitting off into couples by default (like, say, one or two nights split off rather than four during the week) so we can *all* learn to get what we need when we're all together.

Note that none of this changes the current sleeping schedule, which is just fine by me -- as far as I'm concerned, that one's a done deal, at least until your VanDusen thing is done with (and by that point my schedule and K's will be changing too).

Goodness, but that was a long comment.

[greenstorm.livejournal.com]

Yes, I'd talked about it just a little bit with Kynnin, but in the context of: will people be okay doing their own thing in the house when two people need some time alone together. The way I see it is this: there's lots of stuff I do in my own house. I play Everquest, I cook, I clean, I garden, I read, I use the pottery wheel(!), whatever. And so, if we live together, I'm still going to be doing a lot of that /on my own/. And although everything will be a little more flexible because we don't need to worry about transportation, I still will plan to do that stuff when I know other people need alone time together, and will specifically plan not to do it when I'm going to get alone time with another person. So, f'rinstance, when I have a date with your husband I won't ignore him to do gardening, or when I have a date with you I won't ignore you to play Everquest. But because I still need to do those things, I won't be impacting you all the time, hanging around when you need time to yourself(ves). It's like when normal people live together, right?

The one thing I am a little concerned about is this: because of the amount that I work, my free time is approximately even right now to your hubby's and our SO's. Well, it's a little greater, but my need for alone time is a little greater too. So we need approximately the same proportion of social time vs. apart-in-the-house time. I have the feeling that it'll work out that way with you too, because it has in the past, but I'm not completely certain about it. It's something I've been thinking about, anyhow.

I don't think everything will work flawlessly without planning, but I do think that after awhile the planning will become unneccessary, as we settle into it. Three years in, maybe?

Until then, I know I'll be fine if I have /uninterrupted/ time with everyone sometimes, and certainly not as often as I do now. A lot of the time I spend with people now is reestablishing a sense of familiarity, and I won't need to do that then.

Anyhow, those are a couple of my thoughts on the whole thing. I'll be entertained to see how the sex works out, personally, as I'm sure are all the people reading this comment who aren't in poly living-together type relationships. I agree that we'll need to have a discussion or two, though.

Oh, speaking of which: Trevor's coming out Saturday afternoon. We can have the planning discussion for the basement earlyish Saturday, or sometime Sunday. Wanna nose around and see when's best for you guys, and the SO can read this himself and let us know?

This peek into Greenie's life has been brought to you by www.livejournal.com. ;P

Time

[saxifrage00.livejournal.com]

Any time this weekend is good for me. I will want to get out to/bring her out from Mission to see Caroline at some point, but planning for when with her works as well as it does with Nerdboy and J; I'm not counting on it being this weekend.

So, yeah. Whenever works for me. :)

[darthmaus.livejournal.com]

The one thing I am a little concerned about is this: because of the amount that I work, my free time is approximately even right now to your hubby's and our SO's. Well, it's a little greater, but my need for alone time is a little greater too. So we need approximately the same proportion of social time vs. apart-in-the-house time.

What exactly is the concern here? Since I have worked full-time in the past (and am currently occupying myself with pursuits that add up to the time requirements of a full-time job), and since Hubby and I have been through this before when he's had a work crunch, I understand this phenomenon.

Is your concern that I will demand more time than people can reasonably give, because I have more free time available? That's not likely -- first of all, because I *don't* in fact have a ton more free time than you, and second because I understand this situation from both ends already through personal experience.

[greenstorm.livejournal.com]

I have a great deal of faith in our ability to sort stuff out when we know what's going on. :) The concern was, I suppose, that you'd unconsciously expect more and feel dissatisfied. It's pretty much disappeared by your acknowledgement that you're aware of the possibility.

[greenstorm.livejournal.com]

Oh, one addition: I don't have a need for casual alone-time with one person much. The current system, you may remember this, was designed because your hubby doesn't like to commit to dates. So I said, hey, here I'll be available a lot, so we have the chance to spend focused time when you feel like it without planning beforehand. That was sort of the purpose in the beginning. I like talking to him lots, and that can be interrupted by other people wandering through sometimes, but on the whole I'd like more all-together time than we have now.

[greenstorm.livejournal.com]

Haha. Addendum 2, then I really need to get to work.

I don't know that spending more time all together is useful as a trial run to figure out our needs for moving in together. It might not hurt, but a couple of things:

1) Space. Both having enough physical space in any one location and the ownership of private space issues are in here. I know, for myself, not having that personal space around is hard on me. Certainly, without my own bedroom/nook/computer room/loft bed I'm not comfortable stepping up the amount of interaction significantly.

2) Endings. To spend time all together when you know you're going home at the end of the night -- well, it's a different situation. And that's not so important except for this one:

3) Time. On the days when I'm not already there, I need to be in bed about two hours after your hubby comes home, so there's not much time to spend together there.

My brain cut out its functioning partway through that post, but what I mean is just this:

I do think we might want to arrange to spend more time all together (ie at least in the same house)

may not lead to this:

so we can *all* learn to get what we need when we're all together.

so cleanly, and that I have concerns about upping the amount of together-time in which I personally am involved at this point because some of the things I need (space) will not be present, and it will introduce things I don't need because of that lack of space (staying up too late/moving around in the middle of the night to accomodate other sleeping arrangements).

I'll think about this a little more. We can talk this weekend, I think that's when we see each other next. Friday?

*runs off to work*

[darthmaus.livejournal.com]

I'll think about this a little more. We can talk this weekend, I think that's when we see each other next. Friday?

Yeah, sure. I think you're hearing a far more abrupt and significant change than what I intended to suggest, though -- what I'm thinking shouldn't really be so disruptive.

It basically comes down to this: you know how when K is on afternoons I hang around here on one of your evenings here, until he gets home? Well, I'm suggesting that when he's on days, the four of us hang around, not necesarily interacting, just sharing the space, for the evening until bedtime (when we would probably split up again). So it's certainly no more 'interaction' or together-time than you're doing now -- I'm just thinking of preventing us from decreasing that time when K is on days, because I think we'll default to coupling off *more*.

Make sense?

[greenstorm.livejournal.com]

Ahh! Yeah. That makes a lot more sense. I was thinking about the times he's on afternoons, that we would somehow all hang out. I'm still a little worried about how much overall space is available for it, but it's much more logistically feasible in my mind now.

:)

Plus it means more gardening for me! *chuckle*