Whirlwind Romance

My poor little blog gets a bit neglected these days. It's largely because I am a little too well-known around Second Life. I can't talk about other people and my relationships with them because they, too, are well-known, sometimes only by association.  It seems a bit unfair for them to have to read about my feelings, let alone to know that many others are reading too.

I always wanted this blog to be a true and accurate history of what I went through in my Second Life. But I am part of a community, and cannot write what I wouldn't write in my local newspaper.

I don't expect it's much fun being the partner of chryblnd Scribe. I am always more or less at work, no matter where I am. Like almost everyone who works in SL, I work with creative people, who don't really schedule their problems to suit business hours. I am known at almost everything I go to, and I am very often running the events I go to. There's not a lot of time, and what time there is might not be quality time. Sometimes I am drained from interactions through the day, sometimes I am working through my own issues. These are things that happen to many couples. I try hard to schedule a big enough slab of time that some of it will be quality time. And I try to withdraw from the fray, when I can; but those strategies can create a double edged sword too.

And like everyone else, I have my own quirks, fears and insecurities.

Friends know that my long-term friend and I parted company in February. It's difficult to describe it, now, as much more than a friendship. I thought it was more, certainly, and though I have no problem compartmentalising first and second lives, it seems, in hindsight, that I valued the friendship as a virtual romantic attachment. And the other person did not see it that way.

As the relationship came undone, I was devastated by the loss and the fallout. The pain was ferocious. There's more to that, but it has to be private.

In May I met someone new, and it drew some of the poison out of me. It was fun, and it scratched an itch. He was charming and alluring,very romantic and yes, it moved fast, and yes, it's over now.

My chagrin is a weight that pulls down my face and drags on my spirit. I also feel the lack of all that wonder and delight.

So here are the positives I have learned. There are negatives, but forgive me, I spend all day with those. We don't need to do those.

• Different relationships can have different dynamics, and sometimes how your last relationship ended is no indicator of how your next will start
• Yes, it actually is possible to move into a new relationship without baggage
• Love is lovely, and I need to be able to love freely. I am expressive and Second Life is an outlet for the expression of exactly that romantic love
• When I am happy, I am nice to people, and people are nice back. I smile when I buy my bus ticket, I answer the phone with a positive demeanour, and it legitimately affects the outcomes.
• There's a reason lovers don't factor into my self-care plan. Only I can care for myself properly, and when I do it right, I do it very well indeed.

I have had five romantic relationships in my almost six years in SL. That's more than I intended, or would have thought remotely likely.

Meet Jet. He's my dog. He looks like he can take being chryblnd Scribe's dog :-)