Hopping

[ciphergoth]

If it helps, imagine that this was posted to DeadJournal. In other words, it's not a statement of what I really think, but of what parts of my brain sometimes say to me.

Sometimes I feel as if I'm walking down the street, and nearly everyone else is holding one leg behind their back and hopping to their destinations. When I sit down with them in the pub, they talk about how their knees hurt because they hopped all the way from the other side of town. And I have to remember not to say "Well, have you considered walking with both legs then?" because people already know I'm one of those weird bipedalists, and they don't want me shoving it down their throats all the time.

I know that's not the way it really is. I know that other people's choices in these matters are sacred. It's just that this is how it sometimes feels...

Comments

Is it monogamy?

[pavlos.livejournal.com]

Or unisexuality that prompted your recent rant then? In either case I sympathise. I often complain about the discomfort of hopping on one leg, but usually along the lines of "Why do people demand this one-legged stupidity?".

Pavlos

Re: Is it monogamy?

[ciphergoth.livejournal.com]

Monogamy in this case, though purplerabbits points out that something similar applies to eg smoking.

Re: Is it monogamy?

[mhw.livejournal.com]

Uh, "Hop springs eternal"?

/me runs...

Re: Is it monogamy?

[nickys.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure that monogamy doesn't get a bit of a bad press sometimes, because of the other restrictions that seem to be applied at the same time as it.
Being married with 2.4 kids I get to meet lots of similarly married women and I'm horrified at how infrequently they go out. Recently went for a curry with six other women at 7pm in the evening, and they were all hurrying to be home before midnight so as to avoid getting a row from their husbands. Not only that but it turned out that some of them hadn't gone out in the evening without their spouses for THREE YEARS!

Monogamy is a restriction, but in my case it's one I chose freely. I can't claim that I've never looked at another guy in the ten years I've been married, because there are nice people everywhere and I've had many offers that I almost certainly would have taken up if I'd been single, but being close to people as friends is also rewarding, and sometimes the fact that I'm out of the loop as far as availability goes does have it's advantages - I'm neutral in my involvement with other people's relationships, and sometimes that makes it easier to offer help or support when things get complicated.
Also, I'm a safe option - inviting me out for a drink doesn't have the same overtones that inviting a single woman out would, so guys can relax in my company and not worry about trying to impress me, or how things are going to turn out at the end of the evening.

The alternative to monogamy always struck me as quite hard work - all the juggling of relationships and priorities that is required to stop the whole situation getting out of control...
A great adreniline buzz, I'm sure. Maybe I'm just too old for it...

Re: Is it monogamy?

[ciphergoth.livejournal.com]

See my reply to ladycat. Really, it's like any partisan argument, like Mac vs Windows vs Linux or whatever: each side is used to the challenges of what they do and don't consider them a problem, while the challenges the other people have to face seem unbearable.

Though I'm not *quite* as bad on the Linux advocacy front as I am on the x-ogamy front, I think...

Re: Is it monogamy?

[nickys.livejournal.com]

I guess that any interaction with other people has the potential to have problems.
Nobody gets a trouble-free life whatever choices they make. Even if you decide never to have romantic/sexual relationships you'll still have to deal with work colleagues, flatmates, people at the pub, etc, etc.
It's a question of figuring out what compromises you are willing to make and what goals are most important to you.

I would be interested in hearing why you chose x-ogamy and about how the problems and advantages work for you, that is if you're not bored with the topic.

Re: Is it monogamy?

[ciphergoth.livejournal.com]

Not bored with the topic - I should get bored with it faster in truth - but describing why I'm polyamorous would take a long time to answer!

I recommend Alison's two fine essays on the subject, and cornering me in a pub sometime...

http://www.cluefactory.org.uk/alison/writing/nonmonog.html
http://www.cluefactory.org.uk/alison/writing/breaking.html

Re: Is it monogamy?

[nickys.livejournal.com]

Thanks. Those were interesting.
Is it purplerabbits Alison who wrote them?

It occurred to me that her complaints in the second article about people demanding that she justify her choices sound a lot like some of the ongoing debates of parenthood - in particular the one about working mothers versus stay at home mothers, where people sometimes have difficulty accepting that other people can make other choices which are neither better nor worse, but simply different.

[ladycat.livejournal.com]

But if I walk with both legs then they both give way and I collapse in a heap on the floor and find it very hard to get up again. Even if I were using both legs I'd prefer my partners to hop, not many people are as self assured as you m'dear.

A complete aside: When I'm feeling better poke me about the language of fans. It's something I think you might like.

[ciphergoth.livejournal.com]

Hmm, I'm not sure the analogy will stretch very far before it snaps...

I don't mean to put pressure on any of my monogamous friends to defend their decisions. I haven't presented any kind of argument as to why one might be better than the other: I've assumed it as a premise of my analogy! I'm not talking about the way things really are, just the way I feel sometimes.

And yes, that would be great! When are you in Edinburgh?

[ladycat.livejournal.com]

End of July for about a month. If I pull myself together before then...