Passing Ships

Yesterday was good. Yesterday helped.

Yesterday the wife and I spent time together. Real time. Affectionate time. We addressed the fact that there hasn’t been a feeling of intimacy between us lately. She confessed that she’s been scared; that she’s not good enough, that I’ll want someone else, that she won’t be enough. She admitted that these fears have made her closed off and distant.

And I listened. And I comforted her, and we embraced. And things became better.

But better doesn’t mean solved. We didn’t discuss mono v. poly, although there were allusions to the schism. When I comforted her, I was honest at all times; that I love her, that I want to commit my life to her, that more than anything want us to be together and in love for the rest of our lives. All of this was true, and all of this was what she needed to hear.

But I don’t know if she thinks that this means I’m “done” with looking into poly. That this was just some notion that occurred to me and I entertained it for a short while as a hypothetical. This is far from the case. And last night was not the proper time to delve into all of this. And right now isn’t either. After some extended strain and distance- both physical and emotional- what we both need right now is closeness and togetherness. Simplicity in each other.

So there will be a time for these important conversations. And we will have a lot to talk about, a lot to process, and plenty to reflect upon. But for now, let’s just enjoy what we have, where we are with each other.

Tonight, with our re-won closeness and connection, the wife shared with me something that is right out of the heart of one of my prior posts here on this blog. And I did my best to echo back her sentiments and share some of mine, but I couldn’t, I wouldn’t, allow myself to tell her everything about what she was saying, how much I had thought over this exact same thing. How we are so, so similar, so right for each other. As long as we can work through the divide, through our difference in relationship needs.

Someday her and I will talk about all of this. And I’ll show her that blog post specifically. Show her that it was written weeks before she turned her mind to it, yet it was something we both shared unwittingly. And I will hope that small examples like this will help reassure her doubts and fears that my love for her is no less real, no less meaningful, than it always has been for her. Change doesn’t mean that she is less in my life, just that my life has room for more as well.