You may have noticed I haven’t been around much this month — either here, on Patreon, or on social media.
That’s because the most amazing awful thing happened and I am still reveling in it.
Amazing awful?
Yup. See, it’s kinda awful for someone when they are supposed to move into a new apartment and learn at the last minute that the electric can’t be turned on. The landlord didn’t arrange an inspection before you signed the lease. (Being fair, he had it inspected before he put it up for rental, just it sat too long with the electric off and needed to be reinspected.)
But when the result of this bit of awful is that your formerly LDR partners who you haven’t seen in nearly 2 years get to stay with you for over a week while everything gets sorted out… that’s pretty amazing.
It hasn’t been easy — nothing that involves multiple autistic people and unexpected change is ever easy. And it really messed up A’s visit with Michael two weekends ago. (Two weekends! We thought they’d be here 2 days, maybe a bit longer. AHHHH!!!!)
It’s been way way way too much, and absolutely amazing. Also, renewed confirmation of our belief that our living together will work really well when we can afford/find the right place. Even with fighting with utilities, multiple car breakdowns, some family news breaking Michael for a few days, and… Oh, so much more craziness that normally would send me and Michael or Michon or Dilip Numitor Amalia Chetana Waller spiraling down into complete nonfunctional mess. But we are all doing better than we would without all that horrible shit.
Group living isn’t for everyone, but somehow, for us four autistic introverts, nothing is better.
I haven’t written anything about my Generational Household goal in a while. Not since last February when we THOUGHT we had a farm. That fell through — the farmhouse needed too much work and wouldn’t be in move-in condition before we’d need to move given lease end dates and all. So we had to say no. And I’ve kinda been avoiding the whole topic because losing that chance hurt. It was a beautiful place and the landlords/sellers were people I thought we could work with.
But I’ve long collected sayings and quotes about resilience:
Fall down seven times, get up eight / …fall seven times and rise again
The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred with sweat and dust and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs and comes short again and again…
If you fail the first time then you’ll just have to try harder the second time.
You may tread me in the very dirt
But still, like dust, I’ll rise.
You get the idea. (And if you don’t know where these come from, give a google and see what you find!)
We are now living within 15 minutes of each other (instead of hours!). Or, well, we will be once they get moved in. Right now, we are living on top of each other. (Electric finally got turned on Friday. Once the car is fixed (again…) Dilip Numetor Chetana Waller will get finished moving everything in. They’ll probably be settled by the end of the week.)
He thinks he’ll be able to save enough from his new job here for us to start looking for a place we can all live together by this time next year. I think he’s being optimistic, but I can easily see it within two years.
In the meantime, we’ll be spending every weekend together and seeing each other most weekdays. (The older kids will be in cyber school together and will be doing their school work together.)
(My blogging platform is yelling at me about this not being ‘readable’ because I haven’t used headings. I’m finding I like these breaks a lot better.)
Next week, I might delve a bit into how-to-polyamory territory, discussing how we are making this work, ways we have failed at making this work, and what other folks can learn from our experience. Because it hasn’t all been smooth sailing. But it’s still been awesome.
Obligatory new book plug:
Polyamory and Kink is coming out on Friday. Pre-order now with your preferred online retailer.