Why Do We Do This To Ourselves?
The sun casts a warm, orange glow into my room through the ivory colored horizontal blinds. I roll out of bed, walk to the window and swiftly yank the cord, shutting the blinds before sauntering back to bed like a weary bear, collapsing from exhaustion. I don’t want to get up today--especially today. The day is spent studying, but nothing sinks in. I can’t focus. I feel hopelessly numb and lethargic, with no appetite to speak of. I turn off my phone and leave it on the nightstand, burying my face in pillows, hoping this has all been just some bad dream that will come to pass. I don’t want to hear from anyone. The unwanted advice to go clubbing, get wasted or hook up with a fling become increasingly annoying, coming from single girls who want nothing more than what I had with someone they could call their own.
All I want to do is lay in bed, wallowing in self pity, listening to “Boulevard of Broken Dreams”—on repeat. It’s a sad day to be alone on what would have been a five year anniversary to someone I thought I’d spend the rest of my life with. KFC for dinner with stacked law books and piles of paper at my kitchen table, staring blankly at a computer screen of lecture notes for midterms that no longer mattered to me. I stare out my kitchen window to see a car pull up to the guest parking of the luxury apartment complex I was living at during my first year of law school. I watched, as the guy gets out of the car and walks over to the passenger door to let his girl out, as they take each other arm in arm and go up the stairs to their humble abode.
I turned back at my work, sighing heavily. Dead silence at my kitchen table, a lone silhouette as the sun was slowly setting. The only part of my life I thought I had control over was amiss, as I realized it was back to the drawing board, drowning my sorrows in tumbler after tumbler of orange juice on the rocks.
Why do we put ourselves in positions like this? Why do we, like dumb animals prone to mindless repetition, put the most vulnerable parts of ourselves when we care about someone, on a chopping block, entrusting them with its care without any kind of checks or balances? I don’t hedge my bets in a single stock or type of investment; why should I do so in matters of the heart—because society deems it necessary and socially acceptable? As I down my last glass of orange juice for the night I thought of all the better guys I’d passed up over the years because I didn’t believe in selling someone down the river for someone better. The thought of having three boyfriends who loved me to death never even crossed my mind. It was not an option I even knew about, let alone gave any thought about. All I knew were the people in my life in relationships, many with interpersonal problems who came to me to talk or seek out my advice, and yet despite this I believed that I’d somehow come out of the dating and monogamy game on top, an anomaly because I’d bank of having chosen the right person, like winning in roulette.
Fast forward two years later, still single. I sat in the car with one of my best friends from law school, who recently broke the news to me of her engagement with her first and only longtime college sweetheart. We'd just gotten out of our last class for the night, at 9:45, had dinner nearby and were now sitting in her car. I was in the early stages of seeing someone at the time. My friend (we'll call her Marilyn) told me of how envious she was that I was seeing someone "with money" because of his line of work, as opposed to her fiance who she knew would not be the breadwinner of their relationship. Unbeknownst to her, although perhaps it may have inadvertently slipped out by the expression on my face or intonation of my voice, it sicked me how she could base a relationship on how much money someone was making. It didn't seem right, and it was certainly not why I was seeing who I was seeing.
Marilyn also mentioned from time to time a guy in our class, who'd occasionally have brief exchanges with her in passing, and despite the fact he was also engaged, it was evident the two had an attraction toward one another, though it was unclear to me to what extent. In the end neither acted on their inhibitions, as each went their separate way. As our graduation date grew near and the impending fact that we'd be leaving law school into the work force became more clear it seemed that Marilyn became more annoyed that her soon-to-be- husband was not who she wanted, financially.
"Hey," she said, turning to me. "Do you think James is cute?" "Yes," I said, turning my head to face the windshield, looking straight ahead out into the sea of parked cars that night, "but he's only cute relative to the rest of our class. If you think he's cute, you're going to have a hell of a time when you get out there and work at big firms with way cuter men out there." "I know," she said, sighing. "When you were with Tom, did you ever have doubts?" Without skipping a beat I replied, "No." And that was the last time Marilyn ever mentioned any inclinations about other men to me.
She invited me to the wedding, but I didn't go, and for a long time afterward she was pretty angry with me. Marilyn and her husband had met through church and from what I heard about him as well as how he was when I met him, I couldn't stomach the idea of showing up at their wedding and looking him in the face, knowing that their marriage was doomed to fail. And not surprisingly, last year after 5 years of marriage, they divorced... right in line with the statistic in California that over half of marriages end in divorce within the first six years.
During this time the guy I was seeing suggested that I try polyandry. He helped me realize a lot of things about life I never opened myself up to before. You can go through life keeping your head in the sand, denying the world around you or you can realize people for who they are and act accordingly by taking control of your environment and maximizing what you want out of life by being proactive about it. People are like animals, whose purpose in life is to find what they want and seize it. Then, when they are tired of what they have or find something better, they move onto that. I think in this day and age men have in general figured out not to put up with a woman's crap but unfortunately, women have not stopped begging over men, like dogs. Little girls should not have expectations that people are going to do what they're supposed to do. Little girls should be raised to be judgmental and opinionated, not taking things as they are but understanding that to get what you want out of life, you have to create your own destiny and not rely on a man to get you there.
The best thing I ever did with my life was take it upon myself to become polyandrous. Not only was it due to the realization that I needed more than one person to substantiate everything I want in a partner, it also empowered me to strive for a better life for myself and not settle for less, and not be so co-dependent on a partner but rather, be independent.
Recently, I tried a new, free polyamory dating site called www.BeyondTwo.com for people with interests in and/or living the lifestyle who want to find a place for alt dating. The site has worked out well for me and I know will continue to do so as the site expands and grows in membership, with users from all over the world.