Ok, so I’m looking up relationship in the dictionary. Mutual dealings or connections, as among persons groups or nations. With this definition I am in a relationship with every person I know, and a couple of nations.
Now let’s look up seeing each other. As a whole, the term does not exist, but if you look under ‘see’ it does say, to visit regularly and socially. So, if you are “seeing someone,” I guess you could say the two of you are in a relationship. But under these flimsy definitions I ‘see’ most of the people I work with, a few people in Virginia, and a couple in California. By this definition, I should feel most committed to my daughter. For it is her I ‘see’ most often, and her I find myself considering when decisions are made that affect my life.
Under no circumstance to these definitions mention anything about monogamy, commitment, loyalty or responsibility. Nowhere in these certain terms does it talk at all about exclusivity or liability.
Even the term boyfriend is defined as a favored male companion or sweetheart. Meaning, and I think Sublime said it perfectly, “you’re not the only one, but you’re the best.”
And none of the terms equal the mutual understanding that kissing another person would jeopardize that act of ‘seeing’ each other.
So here is my sitch. I am ‘seeing’ someone. We have not established or labeled ourselves. We have only agreed that we enjoy each other’s company. Yet kissing someone else this weekend sent him into a bit of a spin up. He was angry. When I asked him why he was so upset, he answered, “You cheated on me. Wouldn’t you be mad if I cheated on you?”
“That question left me speechless and wondering, at what point does someone have the right to ask you to consider them? At what point do you give someone power over your other relationships, and your relations? And at what point do you just cut the shit and just say “I want you to be the only one and the best?”
In this day and age, do you even ever get that right? It seems to me that being faithful is not human nature. If it was, everyone would be doing it, instead of just doing it.
Posts
You're right, it isn't human nature...but neither is politely settling disputes over coffee (it is actually much faster and more "human" to smash in skulls). Human's decided that Human Nature caused too many problems and so they invented contracts and lawyers to work out those contracts. We later realized our mistakes and tried to get rid of the lawyers but they assure us that our contract says we can't. At any rate, the important thing here is until you set the parameters there is no violation. Human Nature gives us romance and passion and love and lust...but only in the contract do we find security and strength. So you acted out of human nature, which is fine as long as the outcomes of that are what you really desire.
ReplyDelete