Cosmic Vision

Floating through time

Chasing dreams

Holding you

Glancing into the night sky

Finding a star

To Wish Upon

KNOWING THE WISH HAS ALREADY COME TRUE

This beautiful man is Ray. He happens to be my lover. We have been together since August 8, 1993. He is my witness. He is the person who has seen me at my best and at my worst. Fed me soup when sick. I have laughed and cried in his arms. I have yelled and screamed at him over frustrations of my life and his. He is the person who bears witness to all my days and living and helps me say yes I am alive.

The summer of 1998 will mark our 5^th anniversary and we are still behaving like silly school girls. Baby talk abounds.

I met Ray 4 months after leaving the seminary. I had many issues to work through and did not want to head into a relationship. I told him he was a great guy, and I would like to get to know him better, but I was not willing to have a monogamous fulltime boyfriend. He had recently left a relationship so this was agreeable.

Basically I got to have my cake and eat it as well! I had a gorgeous guy to have fun with and also got to live out my adolescent sex drive by dating other guys at the same time. As time went on Ray and I discovered we were living an open relationship. There were many issues that resulted from this. We began to feel jealous of each other. And there was the risk of me losing him to someone else and him loosing me to some other guy. It was quite the paradox...we both loved the freedom to play but were constantly stressed with the pull and push of our emotions. I love you, I hate you, I love you, I hate you, just about sums it up.

I believe we did the breakup thing a few times over the first two years. At the beginning of the third year we decided to have a monogamous relationship. It was a very important year for us. We became wonderfully focused on each other and did some of the deep foundational work necessary for a relationship to take root and grow. We began to fall in love! Yes it was during the 3^rd year of our relationship that we actually began to discover love with each other. There were no distractions and we challenged each other immensely.

At the beginning of our fourth year two momentous things occurred. We moved in together and we decided to have an open relationship.

Ray came into my apartment in April of 1996 and said we are moving in together. I looked at him and said, "Okay I'm waiting for the punch line!" We had discussed moving in a couple of months before and decided we were not totally ready and would wait about a year.

But the best laid plans of mice and men often go awry. Ray was being asked to leave his rented room in his uncle's house to make room for a son and new wife.

So in we moved to a two bedroom apartment on July 28, 1996. (We did not have the house warming until a year later. Girls gotta decorate.)

Luckily we knew each other so well and had done so much work, moving in together was a seamless transition. We knew and experienced all the quirks and twitches beforehand. We did the young couple trips to IKEA and the trips to the hardware store for the million paint samples. Ray had never painted before so there is at least one good story surrounding the exercise!!

I truly believe Ray and I have a model of what a gay relationship can be. Not the perfect model, because there is no such thing. Also not the only model. Relationships take on many forms and the best thing to do is to define yours as it works best for you. Live your relationship as you want to live it not as those around you feel you should live it. But with that said I think our definition is a good one and can be a successful one. (I am not being arrogant I am being passionate about my convictions.)

The biggest obstacles to any relationship is fear of losing the other person and jealousy. Before we moved in we both made the commitment that this was the relationship we would work at. Individually we did not give ourselves the option of walking out. I refuse to simply say I can leave or you can leave during times of struggle. We dig in our heals and do the work.

Once that commitment was made we gained a security and maturity in the emotional, spiritual and physical risks we were willing to take with each other. I knew he had no intention of walking and he knew the same of me.

Sexually speaking, we both have high sex drives. We also have different ideas about what kinds of thing we like to do. We are both "tops", but versatile. We know every inch of each others bodies. So it was a natural move for us to have the ability to partake in sexual adventures outside of our relationship. Mind you there are rules. We are open but committed to each other. Having an open relationship is not an invitation to go out every week to find a new sexual partner. That type of activity is a drain on any relationship. Our love for each other is the main focus of our lives. I suppose the easiest cliché would be we realized we have grade A steak at home but every now and then it is nice to have a juicy hamburger!!

We decided that one of the rules would be that we would not maintain a long term emotional relationship with anyone we had sex with. That does not mean we do not get to know people and have quality time with them. It means that the time is limited. It is really a matter of energy. Am I spending the majority of my time trying to make my relationship stronger or am I searching for things outside of my relationship. If it is the second then something is wrong. Again I must repeat, an open relationship is not permission to go hunting for sexual adventures every day or week.

So once a week or every six weeks Ray will come across someone who turns him on and he spends time with them. Ditto for me. We are honest with everyone we approach. We let them know what the situation is. We have also committed to each other to have safe sex. And if something of concern happens we talk about it.

And we have even done the threesome thing twice.

We trust and respect each other. Two words easy to speak, extremely difficult to live, but ultimately essential for any relationship to grow, mature, and survive! Open relationships come in many forms and are not for everyone. It takes a lot of emotional work and maturity. TREAD CAREFULLY!! We even have periods where we decide to be monogamous such as the Christmas Holidays. We also spend the Labour Day weekend away by ourselves and try to be monogamous around the period leading up to it. That way we can harness our energy to be really attentive to each other while we are away.

I enjoy the fact that there are tons of guys who find Ray attractive and wish he was theirs. Same goes for Ray with regards to me. But in the end we fall asleep in each others arms 95% of the time.

As I mentioned at the outset, Ray and I decided that we would end our time together at the end of this past summer(1998). Ray and I never doubt our love for each other. We have different goals and challenges to face on a professional, personal and spiritual level. And though we have travelled beautifully together on our journeys to discover life, there are a few things we have to discover by ourselves. One thing is for sure, we have absolutely no regrets over the last 5 years. I love you Ray! ...thanks for stopping by!