“The Poly Middle Way” (South Bay Polys #262 - Oct. 2017)

Last Friday I was at a restaurant with a girlfriend and some folks she knew and someone asked me, “Are you married or single?”  I pulled my girlfriend from another conversation and said, “She wants to know if I’m married or single.”  The girlfriend told her friend that I am polyamorous.  To my surprise, the other person seemed to understand what we meant.

Of course, I should answered for myself.  But since my girlfriend knew the questioner, I was curious what she would suggest.

Later it occurred to me that at various times in the past I have thought that polyamory can be a relationship state in between “married” and “single.”  Or maybe it combines some of each of those conditions usually thought to be opposites.

A polyamorous person can be in a serious, long-term relationship with someone, yet appear to traditional society to be behaving like a “single” person.  They may be seeing several people.  They may flirt, they may become physical with these people. All the while they remain deeply devoted to someone.  This may confuse more traditional people. 

Indeed they may be openly physical and devoted to multiple people, and speak lovingly of them and devote quality time to all of them—totally confusing the Traditional!

Well—I suppose we must explain as well as we can!  <grin>