Archive for boyfriend
Is This All There Is?
Posted by: | Comments“What do you want to do, Randi? Do you want to go upstairs and freshen up or do you want to go sit out on the boat dock?”“The boat dock? Was he crazy?” The heat was still oppressive outside, even at 7 in the evening. “I’ll go upstairs.”
“I ran. Into the master bathroom. Man, I looked a mess. Mascara all over my face. My eyes redder than they were when I’d arrived an hour earlier. “Where’s a towel?” I soaked it in cold water and applied it to my face as a compress.
I heard her voice. Isabel was always gracious—and flirtatious—when she interacted with Tank. We’d met her a few weeks earlier With her partner. He’d contacted me online, wanting to learn more about me. I quickly set the record straight that I had a swing partner and wasn’t interested in playing alone. Much to my surprise, he said he had a partner, too.
She asked to chat with me by phone before the four of us met. I thought I’d met a kindred spirit: a jewish woman, a year older than me. Fairly new to the lifestyle with a kink for spanking, not during sex, but beforehand as a stimulant. She’d been the BDSM route and pulled back a bit in favor of swinging.
It was a Friday evening when we all had dinner together at a brewery. The three of them did most of the talking; I chose to sit back and observe the interactions. This was the first meeting with a couple where Tank and I agreed all we’d do is meet—no play.
We met a second time at a meet-and-greet the following Saturday night. She was all over Tank like a wet noodle. And he was into her in a big way. She was getting the sorts of passion kisses I hadn’t had from him in a while. But that’s the life of a swinger—especially when you’re a single. Sometimes your partner is more turned on by newness than by familiarity and what he can have on a regular basis.
Isabel had shown up at his house this evening for a posture assessment. Her body had been wracked with pain for years—sciatica she said—and Tank felt differently—and had offered to see her professionally for free. She’d been without work a long while and had just started a new sales position.
Once I put myself together, I quietly walked down the stairs and sat on the fourth one from the bottom. I watched through the step railings as Tank had her position her body in various ways so he could assess her pain and her multiple problems. She finally saw me.
“You okay?”
“Yes, I’m fine. Just a little tired.”
“You don’t look well.”
“I know.”
“We have to get together and play soon—the four of us. I’m sooooo looking forward to it.”
Like I didn’t know. She’d been calling me almost daily to say how much she was looking forward to that opportunity. I remember one day in particular when she called to gush about Tank for 45 minutes. And then called back five minutes later to say how sorry she was not to have mentioned her interest in both of us as a couple.
Before she left, she pulled out her calendar and rattled off dates that she and her partner had available to meet with us. Tank had told her at the meet-and-greet he thought it’d be fun to spend the whole night together as a foursome and have breakfast together in the morning. He agreed to a date a few weekends later. I kept quiet.
After she left, he walked me over to the kitchen table and turned two chairs to face each other. I sat down. So did he. And he held my hands in his. We sat quiet for a few minutes.
“I’m not going to see you any more if you decide to no longer continue our relationship.”
“Well, that’s the problem, Randi. It’s a relationship. That’s now how things got started. You were seeking another swing partner to add to the mix and then things changed. Although I am jealous that you know how you feel.”
“Well, I wouldn’t be. It’s painful to love somebody who doesn’t love you back. I’ve known that for a long time. That’s why I never told you how I felt. Was it ever good?”
“It was great in Palm Springs. Everything was moving along great. Then things changed. I had to focus my attention on my daughter because of what happened on our trip (side note: she’d decided to act out at home and Tank pulled in all the reins on her when he got home). And you wanted more time with me—and I didn’t have it. There were birthdays and high school graduations.”
“But you never asked me out.”
“You never gave me a chance, Randi. Every week you were telling me about a party or who’d written to you to play with us. There was never time for me to ask you out.”
“But you told me to orchestrate everything. I was just doing what you told me to do. And now you’re telling me what I’ve done hasn’t been working. What do you want? You need to tell me. Otherwise, I won’t know what to do.”
“I want us to take a break from swinging. For at least a month.”
“What about us? Do you want a break from us too? I told you a long time ago that if ‘we’ don’t find ourselves going forward as a couple, I will disappear. I don’t think I could be your friend given how I feel about you. It would be too hard for me emotionally.” (But truth be told, I didn’t fully understand why this was so important to me. I just knew it was.)
“I want to see you. But I want us to stop having sex. It’s too much. I need to figure out how I feel about you. Without the physical stuff.”
“So what are you saying? You want to press the reset button? What do we call ourselves?”
“Well, I’m not planning to see anyone else so I would be dating you exclusively. So I guess you’d be my girlfriend. Does that work for you?”
“Yes, only we also need to talk about the rules. What I can and can’t do. I’m not going to call you anymore. If you want to see me, you’ll need to call me. And we need to recalibrate regularly so we know if things are going okay. The airline ticket I gave you for the end of September. It’s yours no matter what. I just need to know if you plan on using it with me. I got us a hotel room and things would change for the bat mitzvah we are to attend if you don’t come with me.”
“I need space, Randi. And I need to make sure that my brain, my heart and my physical reactions match. Right now, this (he pointed to his head) isn’t connecting with you.”
I was devastated. He knew how much I prized an intellectual—a brain connection. I felt like a dagger had pierced my heart.
“I understand. But there’s more. God told me to ask you why you’re sabotaging this relationship. Every time things get good, you back away. And your daughter—there are ways you interact with her that are more like interacting with a significant other than a daughter. Sometimes you talk baby talk to her and she pulls hairs out of your back. Those are more intimate acts. I know the two of you have been alone a long time, but I need you to reflect on these things.”
“I need to think about this. You’re telling me things I haven’t thought about.”
I left Tank’s home that evening, not knowing exactly when I’d hear from him again. Whatever lesson I needed to learn had been set in motion.
I Talked to God: Who Did You Speak With?
Posted by: | Comments“How are you?”
“Uhmmm, I’m a bit nervous.”
“How come?”
“I think you broke up with me over the phone on Monday and Tuesday night. I’m not quite sure what to say or how to act. I don’t even know why I’m here.”
I don’t recall the lengthy conversations we’d had prior to this moment. My mind has this ability to forget difficult moments. It’s a habit I picked up with my first husband—to live through the pain of being hit repeatedly.
He sat down next to me and I started to sob. Not small tears. Crocodile tears. And I began to shake. Uncontrollably. 
How did this happen? How did the amazing connection we had get reduced to this moment?
I couldn’t breathe, I’d been crying for close to 72 hours and my sinuses were swollen and inflamed. I looked towards the ceiling, a technique I’d learned from a colleague. A way to stop tears. Try it sometime. It works—until you look down again.
My brain engaged again when I heard:
“I called Lyzette. We talked for two and a half hours. She said the easy way out would be to break up with you. But I said, ‘Lyzette, When have you ever taken the easy way out?’”
I lost it. I mean really lost it. I stood up. Ran to get my purse and keys, turned around and screamed.
“I don’t care how good a friend she is. How dare you talk to her about our issues without talking to me about how you truly feel. I called no one. Not a soul. None of my friends. Not even my sister … I talked G-d. And you say you’re a spiritual man. How dare you do this to me. That’s it. I’m done. Damn it. Take the easy way out. ”
Tank’s face turned pale. He got up from the sofa and walked towards me. He took the purse from my hand and set it on the floor. Softly, he said:
“What did God say?”
“He said, ‘If you were to die tomorrow, what would I regret not having told you?’” (What I couldn’t admit was that this question was one that Tank was to answer about me. What would he regret not having told me if I were to die tomorrow.)
“And, what would that be?”
I put one hand on each side of his face and said for the first time, “I love you. I’ve loved you from the moment we met. I can’t explain it. It just is.”
“You know I don’t feel that way about you. And it bothers me. I should know. After six months I should know. I tried to tell you months ago how difficult this is for me.”
At that very instant, the doorbell rang. She’d arrived.
(to be continued)
CNN, Are You Serious?
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I first read this article (“The Downside of ‘Friends with Benefits’”) the day it was published. The premise is that “friends with benefits” have more “concurrency” (several relationships at once) is speeding up the transmission of STD’s because they don’t protect themselves given they know each other. Evidently, people in romantic relationships tend towards monogamy and thus don’t have this issue.
Really? Huh. What’s wrong with this picture? Who made the assumption that people with multiple partners don’t use protection in their sexual relationships? Or that “friends” don’t talk about the subject? Or that romantic relationships imply monogamy?
When I was 26 years old and divorced from my first husband, I went to work in a hospital in the town in which I’d gotten my college education. One of my closest friends was a woman in Human Resources, Barbie, who interviewed me when I came to the organization. She was gorgeous: tall, perfectly proportioned no matter what she ate, dark brown shoulder-length hair long and thick eyelashes, and porcelain skin accentuated by a perfect smile. I idolized her.
Not only did we see each other at work, we exercised at the same gym four nights a week and went out together on Friday evenings for happy hour as part of a group of about ten women. One of those evenings she stumbled onto Jim. He projected as the perfect gentleman—and had a terrific job. They quickly fell in love and saw each other every moment they could. The rest of us loved him too. We all socialized together. What a gem of a guy.
Several months later, I sauntered to Barbie’s office—we had planned to go to lunch together that day to plan the upcoming weekend’s activities. Only I was told she was home ill. Ill? I’d just seen her the evening before and she seemed just fine. Something didn’t feel right. SO I took a chance and called her at home. Her ex husband, who I also knew—a really sweet guy—answered the phone.
“What are you doing at the house in the middle of the day?”
“I’m doing some laundry for Barbie.”
“Laundry?”
“Yeah. She needed some help.”
“What’s going on? What’s the matter with her?”
“Hold a sec. Let me see if she wants to talk with you.”
Barbie sounded fine when she got on the phone. Didn’t seem like she had a cold or the flu.
“Hi. I was worried about you. They said you were sick so I thought I’d call and see if there was anything I could do to help.”
“No. Nothing you can do.”
“You sure.”
“Yes, I’m sure.”
“You ok?”
“No. Not really.”
“What’s going on, Barbie?”
“Jim and I broke up.”
“Over what?”
“He didn’t tell me he had herpes and now I have it too.”
“Oh my God.”
Only what she didn’t know was that the “oh my God” was not so much for her as it was for me. My mind immediately flew back to my activities two weekends earlier. Barbie had gone out of town for a conference. And Jim had called me, wanting to know if I’d like to play tennis. Having nothing else on my calendar, I immediately accepted. We played outside for hours. Afterwards, we went back to his condo for a beer. When I tried to get up to leave, my whole body ached something fierce. Jim had me lie on the floor on my tummy and proceeded to give me a slow, sensual, full body massage. Before you knew it, we were fucking our brains out in his bedroom. We went through a box of condoms. He had great endurance. The (unprotected) oral sex was also fantastic. Before I left, we both agreed not to say a word about what had happened.
And now, here I was, listening to Barbie tell me he has herpes. And that she did too. I panicked. I wondered if I did. Who would I see? In a hospital, words gets around, no matter which physician you saw or the Hippocratic Oath. Nothing stayed confidential.
As soon as I hung up the phone, I made an appointment at Planned Parenthood, the only place I knew I could go and spill my guts.
Twenty-five years later, I can still recall that phone conversation as though it happened yesterday. It left an indelible imprint on my mind. And a lesson that’s served me well through the years.
Suffice it to say, I don’t buy that people in romantic relationships are monogamous. All you have to do is look at the number of people on the Ashley Madison website where affairs are GUARANTEED. Or that the communication about sex and STD’s is heightened in these sorts of relationships. Nor do I buy that people in concurrency relationships—people like me—aren’t strict about the use of protection. Because we are.
But then again, that sort of story wouldn’t ever make the news.
Welcome to Randi Buckmen's adventures in intimacy—beyond the world of sex. Hear how I’m embracing the possibilities of what can be while remaining a “good girl” in the public’s eye. How did I go from being celibate for three years—and wearing flannel pj's to bed with socks when I was married—to where I am today?
