ABOUT TIME: Relationship - Are You Serious?

    How much time do you need to...

    Consider yourself in a serious relationship?

Friend wrote this post:  “Relationship question for all of you interested in weighing in: What is the least amount of times you think a couple can see each other on a weekly basis and say that they are in a ‘Serious Relationship’? Personally I have no number and am aware that work schedules, family/friend time, personal time, life obligations, etc. come into play so I am fine with whatever works, even once or twice a week, but I am just curious... what do others think? How often do you see your partner? What is your criteria and what is the absolute minimum you would accept?

 First off, Friend, you sound like a real giver.  What is the absolute minimum I would accept?  That is not how you start a negotiation.  Of course, if you’re a fairly authentic individual, it’s not really a negotiation but an experience.  Desperation is kind of like lowball pricing.  Maybe short-sale.  Short-sale is neat if…

I’m getting into that.

Does that mean you’d be bidding on a short-sale property and thus property would be either of you?

I think that’s the wrong question.

How about, what do you have to give? 

The other just appears that you don’t have a piece to spare.  That’s coming from a forty-four-year-old woman with three kids living in southern Westchester with far too many hobbies.  I read something once that narrowing your curiosities was a sign of maturity.  It was bad news.  Perhaps that makes me the girl version of Peter Pan.  Ummm, even though Peter Pan in the stage version WAS a girl (see: Julie Andrews).  It’s not a time to pick on people though.  It’s a time to investigate the time commitment of a serious relationship.

I’d like to shift that.  Let’s call it a “Committed Relationship” in which partners promise to keep each other safe by restricting certain intimacies, physical and emotional, that are unique to them.

            Just for kicks lets try on a Mock Dear Abby column to see if this one fits you.  Or, for the sake of analogy or, more dramatically, embellishment:

Dear Abby, 

My husband/boyfriend/partner is chatting online with a woman.  He’s telling her what he won’t tell me.  But I wish he would, even if it would risk hurt feelings.  The acute hurt comes from not trusting me with whatever his derelictions, hesitations, fears, hardships, disappointments are.  All I want is for him to tell me, mostly so he can rise up from them and know that there’s no chance of failure in sharing yourself.  
I've spent #___ years with this man and he's never taken the time to either disclose himself to me or even be mildly supportive.

Signed,

Getting Divorced from Scared and Selfish

Dear Getting Divorced from Scared and Selfish,

            Your concerns are real.  Men maybe different than women in their entitlements to emotion and disclosure, but relationships are about relations in every way.  How you relate determines must of who you become and how you accept each other and yourself.  Big ideas to learn from.  It sounds like you know what you need.

Signed,

Abby

 P.S.  It's okay if you kill him in his sleep.  

None of that is about time.  Time is something I monitor with a schedule of three kids, work, writing, and exercise because I’ve been blessed with this vessel of creativity, love for human differences, and hyperactivity (I should probably be taking meds for this but I’m hoping age will kill that off).  I do not watch TV because I have very little free spots of it, and I’d rather space out and tie up story knots or just listen to music.  My head is already too busy for TV information and I get the news via the internet.  Meditating to resolve whatever parenting snag is tugging at me also works.  And it’s very quiet… ahhhhh.

There just isn’t a lot of time.  I mean, really, I barely have time to read anymore.  Reading comes slowly to me because I read every single word.  Being an author makes you respect every single word.  It’s a curse but it’s also the little knots that tie up the loose ends of my errant spirit.

Time means the most, is what I think I’m saying here.  So, I suppose my take on this is that the once or twice per week of physical presence is fine.  But to me I think that having and giving space with that presence is a huge challenge.  People are so complicated, get their feelings hurt, need time when it’s not available.  What they want and what they do can be on opposite sides of the planet.  Actions and words, the same.  Sometimes just being there when you don’t really want to be, but find out it’s importance, is the serious part.  Or the committed part.  But you have the love part.  Any parent can probably relate to this and the unexpected magic that can happen in those moments.

So, committed or serious would seem to require time because depth requires it.  Hijacking a life, not required.  Changing yourself for someone else in a way that is contrary to your inner voice of intuition and just how you are.  Not required, in my book.  Owning anyone or trying to… 

Corny, but as Keb Mo would say, “That’s not love.  Love don’t feel that way…”

My intention was to, uh, include all kinds of comments to Friend’s post, but it would be so long and that would take more time.  You can comment on your own, if you feel inclined.

Be yourself.  It’s advice from my (now and present very much not short-sale but real) mentors gave me.  That was the best news I’d heard in a long time.  And she does give me her time.  More than most would.