So it turns out that I had actually missed a reply to a message I'd sent, this one to a girl named Trina. She was one who was only looking for poly friendly people to hang out with, and that was the basic tone of what I'd sent her.
We had her and her munchkin over for dinner last Saturday; I made lasagna, and since I was making it and she doesn't like beef or pork, I just said "screw it" and made two batches. Frozen leftovers for a while! There was a bit of awkwardness there; her husband is out of the country for a while, so I couldn't get a sense of things from his point of view. But we were able to overcome it; we introduced her to Ticket to Ride and she had fun with that.
The low point of the night was when her son, about 3ish, was swinging a bat we have for the kids and it hit our youngling in the face...she was okay, but the bat disappeared really quickly! We ended up just sitting around the game board after all was done, chatting about various things until our daughter decided it was time for Trina's son to leave, because it was her bedtime...and then proceeded to strip down so she could change for bed. ::sigh::
Susan and I had already decided to have her boyfriend, Ryan, down for Labor Day. Maybe being around me an extra day would calm his quite understandable jitters. So with that in mind, we asked Trina if she wanted to bring her son on over for the same. We thought briefly about having Angie and Erik over as well, but with their need to smoke pot, and the extra kid around, decided against. Besides, Erik and Susan have fallen out of daily contact for some reason. So it'll be us, Ryan, Trina, and Trina's son for a cookout...if I can remember to get a filled propane tank between now and then.
The next day, I realized that I might have sent the wrong message by just inviting her for Labor Day, two weeks away. So I followed up, made sure she knew she was welcome before then, and the fallout was that she came over Tuesday (last night) for dinner again. We played Settlers of Catan afterwards, though Susan bowed out due to an unrelated bad mood and headache. Kids played much more agreeably this time, though neither of the two youngest wanted to eat any part of dinner.
We settled in to watch Across the Universe, the musical set to a bunch of Beatles songs, and tried to put her son down in our youngling's room on a spare kid mattress. The idea was to give her some time to relax, with other adults, with her kid elsewhere...but no. Three year olds are three year olds, and within ten minutes of being tucked into bed, he was downstairs being all kinds of fussy...and of course, hungry. And what was Susan making by now? Cookies. Sheesh. So instead of getting some almost one-on-one time with her alone, in a relaxed environment, she was getting sidetracked by a fussy, hungry, sleepy three year old who wanted to ask a billion questions about the movie.
To her credit, Trina was MUCH more patient with her kid than I would have been if either of mine had been pulling the same stuff. I don't know if it's just the difference between being a father and being a mother, or if it's the differences in her whole state of mind, but whatever it was, she was very understanding and patient with him. She did eventually bail, though, about 45 mins before movie's end, since he obviously wasn't going to let up until he got home.
We texted back and forth today; Susan will be out of town this Saturday visiting Ryan and helping him deal with some personal fallout on his end (after three years of renting a room with another couple, he got told this week he had to leave by month's end...suck city). So Trina and I have decided that we're going to take the kids to the beach together, and we'll probably go back to her apartment afterwards.
I'm not sure how things are going to end up. She had initially posted looking for friends only, and we've definitely gotten there. Susan thinks that Trina likes me a bit more than that, due to clues that I apparently looked right over, and on the plus side, Susan has already said that I should invite her out, and that she'd watch the munchkin so that the two of us could get some alone time.
I'm wanting to take it slow...her husband won't be back until late in the year, and she says that he is perfectly fine with things. I have no reason to disbelieve her, but then I have no reason to believe her 100% either. Even if he is perfectly fine with poly-ville, it'd be different if he was accessible, even for just an afternoon meet-and-greet. But with him gone, and considering how I met Susan to begin with (not my finest hour, but it ended up alright...for us, anyway), I'm somewhat leery of intentionally provoking our budding friendship into a relationship.
I have a feeling, though, that I'm going to end up there.
We had her and her munchkin over for dinner last Saturday; I made lasagna, and since I was making it and she doesn't like beef or pork, I just said "screw it" and made two batches. Frozen leftovers for a while! There was a bit of awkwardness there; her husband is out of the country for a while, so I couldn't get a sense of things from his point of view. But we were able to overcome it; we introduced her to Ticket to Ride and she had fun with that.
The low point of the night was when her son, about 3ish, was swinging a bat we have for the kids and it hit our youngling in the face...she was okay, but the bat disappeared really quickly! We ended up just sitting around the game board after all was done, chatting about various things until our daughter decided it was time for Trina's son to leave, because it was her bedtime...and then proceeded to strip down so she could change for bed. ::sigh::
Susan and I had already decided to have her boyfriend, Ryan, down for Labor Day. Maybe being around me an extra day would calm his quite understandable jitters. So with that in mind, we asked Trina if she wanted to bring her son on over for the same. We thought briefly about having Angie and Erik over as well, but with their need to smoke pot, and the extra kid around, decided against. Besides, Erik and Susan have fallen out of daily contact for some reason. So it'll be us, Ryan, Trina, and Trina's son for a cookout...if I can remember to get a filled propane tank between now and then.
The next day, I realized that I might have sent the wrong message by just inviting her for Labor Day, two weeks away. So I followed up, made sure she knew she was welcome before then, and the fallout was that she came over Tuesday (last night) for dinner again. We played Settlers of Catan afterwards, though Susan bowed out due to an unrelated bad mood and headache. Kids played much more agreeably this time, though neither of the two youngest wanted to eat any part of dinner.
We settled in to watch Across the Universe, the musical set to a bunch of Beatles songs, and tried to put her son down in our youngling's room on a spare kid mattress. The idea was to give her some time to relax, with other adults, with her kid elsewhere...but no. Three year olds are three year olds, and within ten minutes of being tucked into bed, he was downstairs being all kinds of fussy...and of course, hungry. And what was Susan making by now? Cookies. Sheesh. So instead of getting some almost one-on-one time with her alone, in a relaxed environment, she was getting sidetracked by a fussy, hungry, sleepy three year old who wanted to ask a billion questions about the movie.
To her credit, Trina was MUCH more patient with her kid than I would have been if either of mine had been pulling the same stuff. I don't know if it's just the difference between being a father and being a mother, or if it's the differences in her whole state of mind, but whatever it was, she was very understanding and patient with him. She did eventually bail, though, about 45 mins before movie's end, since he obviously wasn't going to let up until he got home.
We texted back and forth today; Susan will be out of town this Saturday visiting Ryan and helping him deal with some personal fallout on his end (after three years of renting a room with another couple, he got told this week he had to leave by month's end...suck city). So Trina and I have decided that we're going to take the kids to the beach together, and we'll probably go back to her apartment afterwards.
I'm not sure how things are going to end up. She had initially posted looking for friends only, and we've definitely gotten there. Susan thinks that Trina likes me a bit more than that, due to clues that I apparently looked right over, and on the plus side, Susan has already said that I should invite her out, and that she'd watch the munchkin so that the two of us could get some alone time.
I'm wanting to take it slow...her husband won't be back until late in the year, and she says that he is perfectly fine with things. I have no reason to disbelieve her, but then I have no reason to believe her 100% either. Even if he is perfectly fine with poly-ville, it'd be different if he was accessible, even for just an afternoon meet-and-greet. But with him gone, and considering how I met Susan to begin with (not my finest hour, but it ended up alright...for us, anyway), I'm somewhat leery of intentionally provoking our budding friendship into a relationship.
I have a feeling, though, that I'm going to end up there.
