Head Seeking Long Term Relationship; Heart Seeking Spring Fling

Yesterday I had a date with a German guy. I didn’t think much of him being German when I agreed to meet for coffee, but when I asked if he had liked living in Berlin, he specified he still lived there — that he’s only in the US temporarily.

From that, our coffee date extended into a walk, and then to a bar where I lingered much longer than I’d intended until finally, I was forced to go back home for my evening class.

See, there’s something about a temporary lover…

When I think about polyamory, I envision having another stable, happy relationship, maybe with someone who has a sex drive to match mine and who enjoys playing with some bondage and D/s dynamics. We would see each other a couple of times a week and live happily ever after.

But then I wonder, Is this just leftover monogamous programming? This fairy tale fantasy of “happily ever after,” only with two partners instead of one?

Because if I considered every relationship that didn’t end with “happily ever after” a bust, I would have wasted a hell of a lot of time.

And in fact, some of my best relationship experiences have been short — even before polyamory. Maybe they ended painfully, but that doesn’t mean the pleasure wasn’t pleasing, the connection wasn’t powerful, or the love wasn’t true. It just means that nothing lasts forever — not even “happily ever after.”

As a kid, you might close the storybook and imagine the lovers’ happiness continues infinitely. Even in the best case though, they might live a long life together with minimal bickering before dying at the exact same time, holding hands in their sleep.

That’s sweet — but I think there’s some part of our human nature that also thrives on knowing, from the start, that romance is temporary.

We romanticize summer romance for a reason too, don’t we?

Maybe they ended painfully, but that doesn’t mean the pleasure wasn’t pleasing, the connection wasn’t powerful, or the love wasn’t true.

My first summer romance was also my first kiss.

I was 14, about to start high school. Jordan was staying the summer with his grandmother and joined up with the neighborhood gang, which consisted of myself, a girl and a boy, both about my age, my sister who was two years older, and an eight-year-old boy (I’m not sure how he got involved). When Jordan arrived, all three of us girls swooned. He had floppy, blond hair, a skater boy vibe, and was oh so cute.

The five of us (not including the 8-year-old) decided to sneak out after dark one night after spending the whole day riding bikes and hanging out (certainly not playing!) at the playground.

This was before cell phones, so we somehow just managed to time it right. After the lights went out in the house, my sister tiptowed down the hall and quietly opened my bedroom door. Together, we opened the window as wide as it would go, removed the screen, and crawled out.

I wore my nightgown which I thought was the most beautiful, romantic, elegant thing possible. I floated down the empty neighborhood streets like a romantic spector in my long, pale green gown, which my mom had bought me from the “grown up” section of J.C. Penny. It also happened to be almost entirely transparent.

I hadn’t yet developed self-consciousness about my body, and didn’t consider that I shouldn’t wander the streets late at night, essentially naked. I merely liked the fabric.

We all found ourselves at the playground, mist rising ghostlike over the damp field.

We sat in the circle and played truth or dare. After a few warm-up truths, my sister dared me to kiss Jordan. A flood of excitement rushed through my body as I realized I was going to have my first kiss before my older sister.

I crawled toward Jordan in the sand and placed my lips against his. They were soft and sweet.

The thought of a French kiss was gross and weird at the time, but I wanted to do this kind of kiss, again and again, every night forever.

I wanted to spend the days riding bikes, sitting on the monkey bars, swinging as high as I could, my toes pointed at the sunshine with my friends and this boy whose lips I’d felt with my own.

I remember how resistant I felt about leaving for our family vacation later that summer. I remember writing Jordan letters for a short time after the summer ended and he went back home. I remember pining for him.

But what I don’t remember is a broken heart.

None of us had chosen to end our little group romance, it just ended due to the natural flow of the tides.

I’ve had other short romances since then.

I’ve had lovers who left, or whom I left, due to life, not discord. And there’s something that feels meaningful and beautiful, even with — or maybe partly because — of the sorrow.

“Parting is such sweet sorrow, That I shall say goodnight till it be morrow…” — Romeo and Juliet

In any case, when yesterday, my date told me that he was only in the city temporarily (which in glancing over his profile, I realized he had written front and center) my thinking mind was all, Oh don’t go getting mixed up in a relationship that’s only going to end in heartbreak — but my heart decided something different.

My heart decided it was a good idea to take a walk after finishing our coffees, even though it was cold and drizzly. And then, when he said maybe we should go inside again because it was actually quite cold, to my heart led him to a bar, not another cafe, and ordered a hard cider, even though it wasn’t even 4 pm and I had class in two hours.

I lingered, and when I finally had to leave for class, I offered to drop him off at the train stop near me. I let him know that it would lengthen his journey home by at least a half-hour. He decided that was a pretty good idea.

So I drove him to the station and we hugged goodbye quickly before he lept out, traffic piling up behind my stopped car. Before he shut the door, I shouted, “I’ll message you my number!”

Later, after sending him my number through the dating app, he replied with his own — a European number.

Yes, this is definitely going to be a temporary romance.

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This post was previously published on MEDIUM.COM.

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You might also like these from The Good Men Project:

.. In Modern Relationships, We Cheat Every Single Day

Compliments Men Would Love to Hear More Often

.10 Things Good Men Should Never Do in a Relationship

It’s Not Just Sex That He is Longing For. It’s This

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