[Quick recap: I'm involved with Kevin and Jed, all poly. Jed isn't deeply involved with anything else right now; Kev's still involved with Karina, but she lives in Australia and I love her anyway. Everyone up to speed?]
So Kevin may have a new love interest soon. It's actually someone I know, and know well -- one of my old college roommates. She's in Chicago, on the rebound from a relationship that appears to be over (at the moment, anyway), and very into Kev. He's considering it.
Aaaiiiggghhh!
:-)
Don't let anyone ever tell you that poly people don't get insecure or jealous. I suppose I know a few who don't, but they are by far the exception, rather than the rule.
I called him last night, and she was over; they were 'hanging out'. I chatted with them for a bit, assured her that I wasn't going to come out there and kill her, and hung up the phone. I then proceeded to spend at least half an hour trying to fall asleep and instead thinking:
- I wonder if they're having sex right now?
- She's really thin -- maybe he's more attracted to her.
- She's new -- he'll be really into her for a while (it's called NRE -- New Relationship Energy in poly circles -- that blissful euphoria felt during the first stages of a relationship)
- What if he likes her better?
- What if she's less neurotic than I am?
- She looks really cute -- is she prettier than I am?
- I hope she isn't dumb enough to try to take him away from me, 'cause then I *would* have to kill her
- Of course, I can't really do anything if he wants to leave
- Aigh!
- Calm down. Calm down already.
- She's so thin!
- I wonder if they're having sex right now?
- Not going to think about it. Get up. Do some exercise or something.
- I can't afford the energy to deal with this right now.
- But it would be awfully hypocritical of me to ask him to not do this.
- And I do like her. We got along pretty well as roommates. Well, except for the dishes.
- It might make him happier.
- It might be fun. Doing girl stuff with her when I'm in town. Shopping.
- She has great clothing sense. She looks fabulous.
- Aigh!
- Calm down.
- etc.
He called me half an hour later, told me she had gone, and then we talked about it, mostly having a good chuckle over it.
- "Glad you called. I was feeling kinda insecure."
- "What about?"
- "You want the whole list?"
- "Sure -- well, how about just the reasonable ones?"
- [laugh] "Umm...I'm not sure there are any reasonable ones..."
3:45. [smile] Just had a nice long talk with Karina. I'm so glad their overseas rates are so much lower than ours; I could never have afforded to just chitchat with her for an hour if it were on my tab. We talked over the whole Kev/new relationship thing, and she pretty much agreed with me on my assessment of things; it'll be interesting to see how it plays out. We also talked about her own future plans; she's finishing up her M.A. in philosophy, and it looks like she may try to upgrade to a Ph.D. (which I gather involves just a year or two more work). That's be kinda cool -- with her and me and Kevin all having Ph.D.'s. :-) We'll see...she's a bit tired of academia at the moment, I think.
(Of course, the above assumes that I actually make it through my program, which is still very much up in the air. :-)
Good teaching day today; I was introducing them to oral presentations, and I gave them some demo presentations and had them critique. So I pretended I was a sex educator, come to teach a college class about herpes. In the first presentation, I did the standard under-prepared student thing: shuffled in, didn't look up from the floor, mumbled a lot, said 'um' and 'y'know', was vague and disorganized, and finished after about two minutes (instead of taking the full five). They chuckled a bit, and critiqued that one well. Where I really had them rolling, though (and it became very difficult to stay in character as a result), was in the second version, when I came bounding into the room like an over-enthusiastic summer camp leader:
"Hello everyone!"
[mutters of hello...]
"I can't hear you! Hello, everyone!"
"Hello!"
"I'm here today to teach you about HERPES!" [really loud -- I'm sure they
could hear me in the hall]
[snickers]
"Can everyone say that? Herpes!"
"Herpes!"
"Let's spell it together! [I go up to blackboard and write letters as
we chant:] H -- E -- R -- P -- E -- S!"
"Very good, boys and girls!"
I then went on to provide a really judgemental ("Promiscuity is bad! And if you get herpes, then you're bad!") and patronizing presentation. I treated them like ten-year-olds. I asked everyone to raise their hands if they had herpes! I told them not to put their mouth on someone else's 'thing'. They totally smashed me in critique, being especially cutting about the judgmentalism and invasive nature of the questions, and I was so proud of them. :-)
It was a fun presentation 'cause it got a lot of laughs -- but I do think they actually learned something about two of the extremes they should avoid in giving presentations. We also talked about how to handle sensitive or awkward subject matter. The third presentation I gave was as close as I could get to a model presentation -- an 'um' here or there and I could have been just a bit more animated (I was in a pretty dry, clinical mode), so hopefully they'll have some idea what they need to do when they give their own presentations in a week. And it was just fun getting them to laugh a little.
(I will admit the ulterior motive of actually conveying a little sex ed information during the final, serious presentation. Shh... Don't tell my department).
I wish I could be that inspired for every class. Ah well.
Tired now. Reading Harry Potter. Dealing with little bits of work here and there, but mostly taking it easy today, I think. Tomorrow I'll pick up my new prescription and then go work at Borders for the day. That's the current plan, anyway.