Where I ponder what I want in my life, including trying things that I haven’t tried yet and being open to new possibilities.

I had a really nice catching up dinner tonight with a semi-new girlfriend. We actually only met briefly once last summer at a women’s networking event. It was really fun talking even briefly then. But somehow I have a hard time pursuing people (whether it’s people I ‘like’ or just new friends) and don’t want to be ‘bothering’ them. Luckily she expressed interest in meeting up and we finally did and it was so great! We talked for almost 3 hrs!! Non-stop. Yay for new girlfriends!

So it was extra fun —for me anyways— because I got to talk about stuff that I usually don’t get to with other Asian girlfriends. Like I told her tonight I know I’m kinda ‘out there’ compared to most other Asian girls and so there’s not many Asian women that I can share this stuff with. Basically we talked about our life dreams, whether to settle down and get married or not, what is the purpose of getting married in the first place, and all our friends that are getting married and some who have even confessed that they are knowingly settling. Like girls who choose a guy that they know is a ‘safe’ bet and they will have security with them, but just not anything too exciting and maybe not all that they had originally hoped for in a guy.

We shared our experiences with our boyfriends and exes. How do you know when you want be with this person forever or marry them? I talked about the institution of marriage and how it has inherent oppressive qualities to it. There is this intangible web that seems to come down that I even sensed during my brief marriage (a very long time ago) —the isolation (for example from other male friends if you’re female), the sub-conscious gender roles that seem to envelop everything and you didn’t even see it coming.

We talked about staying close with an ex and how rare that is. I explained I never had that until now. At the same time me and the ex-BF are figuring things out too— if one of us dates someone, what would that mean, how would the other person feel, etc.

I told her about reading The Ethical Slut (need to get back to reading it) and the idea of the polyamory community that they are trying to explore something different outside of the usual, exclusive, 2 people relationship. And yet they are very open and communicative and really care about each person they’re with. They simply don’t agree with limiting the number of people they love and are close and intimate with.

It’s all very interesting. And I almost feel that I’m at this very interesting crossroads, except it’s more like a crazy maze or something, where I’m discovering and exploring and being open to new and different things. But always going back to asking myself what would make me happy? What do I really want? How do I want my life to look? How will my partner(s) support that? All so exciting!