Polyamory and True Love

Continuing from last week’s blog:

Amazon.com Stranger in a Strange Land Buy Link

In the book Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert A. Heinlein, Jubal Harshaw tells Ben Caxton, “Love is the condition in which the happiness of another person is essential to your own.”  This is the kind of love Eric, the Phantom has for Christine Daaé in The Phantom of the Opera, and Eponine has for Marius in Les Miserables.

 

Amazon.com Phantom Movie Buy Link

Do you think if push came to shove you would be willing to sacrifice your love and freely give him/her to another because him/her happiness is so important to you that you could not live knowing they are miserable without that person?

I think I can say yes to that question.  Fan of Heinlein that I am, I read Stranger in a Strange Land and Time Enough for Love long ago.  I grasped Heinlein’s ideas about being able to love more than one person at a time.  I didn’t stop loving Elizabeth when Christine came along.  Why should I stop loving my Dear Hubby or boyfriend if another man came along?  Or if another woman came along (provided she was a good woman who I knew would not take advantage of him or hurt him).

I didn’t know there was a name for such relationships until much later.  It’s called polyamory.  The difference between a poly relationship and cheating is honesty and communication.  If you have a relationship with someone behind my back, you’re cheating.  If you are honest and communicate with both the other lady and me and we have the right to see other men and we are honest and communicate openly with you and them, we are polyamorous.  I always thought military families should be poly so if one husband was deployed there would be someone around to fix the plumbing or the car or whatever when it broke.  Not to mention co-wives keep you company and to babysit when you need a break.  And there are the financial advantages of mingled incomes, having been a Navy wife who never had enough money and always had stuff break down when DH was out to sea.  But, I digress.

I ran into a group of poly people at a karaoke bar, and started dating a man.  We happened to be exclusive for about a year.  Didn’t exactly mean to be, but were.  I care a lot about this man and he is legally blind and unable to drive.  When we decided we wanted to be closer, we lived in the same apartment building.  (Neither of us wanted to live together, but that enabled us to see each other daily and still have our own space.)  I drove; he carried.  And, I drove him out to meet other women because I knew I could not fill all of his needs, and if I was going to have co-sweeties I wanted to be sure they were people with whom I was compatible as well.  Of course, we’re human.  We can’t all be like Jubal Harshaw and Ben Caxton or like Eric and Eponine, or Sidney Carton in A Tale of Two Cities.  Boy, that’ll make you cry, too!  Except for poor Sidney who had to be where he was in order for Lucie Manette to have her HEA, if Raoul and Eric had been able to share Christine and Cosette and Eponine had been able to share Marius, those movies would have had much happier endings.  But then, I guess they were meant to be gut-wrenching tear-jerkers.  Clearly Victor Hugo was not writing a romance, nor was Gaston Leroux.  I wonder what they’d think of the musical versions that have us women swooning over the likes of Alfie Bowe, Hugh Jackman and Gerard Butler and grabbing for the tissues?

I do not consider programs like Big Love to portray polyamory.  The polygamy of religious sects in which woman are treated as chattel and do not have the same right to add men to the family that their husbands do to add women is not my idea of true love.  And if I get onto that soapbox, I’ll have a third blog and it will be a rant.  I do believe Elizabeth is making a roast and may possibly even have finished staining the deck around the pool by the time I get there for supper.  Who knows?  We may even watch a movie musical this evening.  Seems that’s where I started this tome.  All though, I’ve cut it in half so by the time you read this, it will be next week.

For Whom Do You Cry? True Love

 

My daughters and I love musical theatre.  I can’t afford live performances, but many of the good ones come out as movies and I can afford those.  The movie version of Les Miserables came out around my birthday this year and my eldest daughter, Elizabeth and I celebrated by going to see it.  Critics panned the singing, saying the movie cast wasn’t as good as the casts on Broadway or the West End of London.  I don’t care, Hugh Jackman, Russell Crowe (who knew he was such a rich baritone?), Anne Hathaway, and Eddie Redmayne all made us cry.  And Samantha Barks sang the role of Eponine with Alfie Bowe in the West End cast as well as on the PBS 25^th Anniversary special, so no one could possibly have faulted her singing in the movie.  Referring to the 25^th Anniversary special, I personally think Nick Jonas is better looking than Eddie Redmayne, but that’s just me.

Another favorite of ours is The Phantom of the Opera.  I believe I watched that on disc with my younger daughter, Christine.  Gerard Butler singing the part of Eric, The Phantom [yeah, the hunky one who stars in all of those romantic comedies] and Emmy Rossum as Christine Daaé gave me chills—so much so that I had to look up the name of the young man who sang the part of Raoul (Patrick Wilson).  Elizabeth loves the music so much she had two of her cousins sing “All I Ask of You” at her wedding, which I found funny.  I would have expected Christine to use that song since her name is in it.  Elizabeth has an old copy of the original West End cast with Michael Crawford as Eric and Sarah Brightman as Christine Daaé.  What brought this up to me what riding to a family reunion yesterday with Elizabeth and listening to that recording twice on the way to the Upper Peninsula of Michigan from Chicago and once on the way home.

At the end of "The Phantom," I found myself crying not for Raoul and Christine who got their happily-ever-after, but for Eric.  I was trying to figure out who loved Christine the most—Raoul who was willing to give his life for her, or Eric who was willing to live the rest of his life alone so she could be happy with the man she truly loved?

In the book Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert A. Heinlein, Jubal Harshaw tells Ben Caxton, “Love is the condition in which the happiness of another person is essential to your own.”  This is the kind of love Eric has for Christine.  And it’s the kind of love Eponine has for Marius.  True, she puts herself into harm’s way and takes a bullet for him, but not before she leads him to Cosette’s house and prevents her father and his ruffians from hauling Jean Val Jean out of the house and taking him to Javert.  She puts Marius’ happiness with the woman he truly loves above her own.  And again, I cried more for Eponine’s sacrifice than I did for Cosette and Marius’ HEA.  I think “On My Own” is even more moving than “I Dreamed a Dream” for that reason.  While Fantine’s lover may have taken her childhood and left her with a daughter she could not support, at least she had a summer of happiness and a child to love.  Eponine never even had that much.

So—for whom do you cry?

“Unpacking—Or Moving is Such a Pain” from Rock Bound

This time it isn’t my political prisoners who have moved; it’s me.  When my daughter got engaged last winter, she and her fiancé looked at their families and decided our house was the logical place for everyone to live, as his house was too small for four generations.  So, he, his daughter and baby granddaughter moved in with my daughter, granddaughter and me.  Needless to say, the only one who got along with everybody was the baby.  No wait, Marshall’s dog, Amonte, was jealous of Sydney.  He was used to being the baby of their family.

The living room became my bedroom and things clearly needed to change the day the priest came to call.  Our house was in front of the Volo Auto Museum, across the street from a Catholic church.  Marshall got married in the Catholic Church and that’s where the kids want to have their wedding.  My ex-hubby was Catholic and I turned Catholic when I married him because I believed families should go to church together, so my kids were raised Catholic.  My girls turned away from Catholicism for many years and Elizabeth’s first two marriages took place under the auspices of the Presbyterian Church.  But in recent years she’s grown closer to her paternal grandmother and gone back to the Catholic Church.  Anyway, since we live right there, when some paperwork came in for Marshall’s annulment, Father Anthony figured he’d walk it over.  He woke me so I rolled out of bed and answered the door.  Fortunately, living in such a crowded house, I got in the habit of sleeping fully clothed so I was dressed when I opened the door and invited him in.  I swear, the poor man almost fainted when he saw my bed taking up half the room—although, he was standing by my recliner, so technically he was in my living room.  One step to his left and he would have been in my office.  ;-)  Yes, it was a small room.

At any rate, it was obvious we were overcrowded.  The house was a pressure cooker and tempers were getting shorter by the day, so I put my name on the list for government senior housing.  I expected it to take months, if not years to get an apartment.  Imagine my surprise when I got a phone call two days later.  They had not one, but two apartments available for me and one of them was in the only building in Lake County, Illinois that includes heat.  So, I’ve moved. 

I’m mostly unpacked.  My new place is tiny and I’ve decided I need to rearrange my living room so I’ve not yet unpacked my china cabinet.  I’ll wait until the kids come back over and move it into the corner before I unpack my china and crystal.  At least the boxes are on my pantry shelves.  The worst part of this move, however, is that I don’t have room for all of my books.  I guess I’m finally going to have to give away most of them.  I suppose a lot of people think, “They’re just books.  Big deal.”

I’m an author and a reader.  Giving away my books is a big deal.  One of the times I moved, someone asked if I’d ever heard of a library.  My response?  “Of course I have.  I’m building one!”  Needless to say, my dream house includes at least one room lined with books.  And nowadays, most of them would be written by friends of mine.  Wow!  Is that a great thought or what?  It didn’t help when it came time to move, though, that most of my friends were writers who live out of state or even out of the country.  It’s not like my author friends from Down Under could come over and carry a few boxes for pizza and beer.

Otherwise, I’m settled.  Hopefully this will be the last one, unless I manage to make a major splash, make all the best-seller lists, and buy that dream house with the library, indoor pool/hot tub, etc.  Well…  A girl can dream, can’t she?

Speaking of Rock Bound, here’s an excerpt.

October, 2051

Moon Base Alpha

Annie slowly climbed back to consciousness. She noticed the guards were sort of sliding along the aisles, and then realized she was on the Moon and they were trying to walk in the much-lower lunar gravity. As she exited the shuttle, Annie, too, was awestruck by the stark beauty of the lunar surface and the star-studded velvet vault above her.

Mount Aragaeus towered close by. Like Jake, Annie had half expected to see snow on such a tall mountain and had expected it to be jagged rather than rounded, but it was bare rock, like the rest of the surface. She turned, saw the Earth hanging in blue, green, brown and white splendor above the shuttle and glanced quickly away from the blinding ice of the polar caps. There was a storm brewing over parts of Canada and the United States and it looked just like the satellite photos they showed on the weather each evening, although the effect was breathtaking when viewed on the huge globe hanging before them. The women lined up next to the shuttle, noticing figures coming through the airlock toward them.

A guard prodded Annie and she moved toward the airlock with Crystal and Vivian, all stumbling, looking over their shoulders at the Earth, as they learned to keep up with the long, loping strides of the guards.

The large airlock was the size of a freight elevator and they cycled into the dome all together.

“Remove your p-suits, ladies,” a female voice instructed over their helmet radios. The women removed their suits and faced the guard. “I’m Chief Kazinski,” she said. “You’ll help the men put away the supplies.” Her blonde hair was cropped short, and her green eyes looked serious as she concentrated on her chart. “Anything marked “Rec” stays in here. We’ll set up the galley at that end.” She gestured at the wall farthest from the door. “Your bedding and clothes are in the crates marked ‘Women.’ Your barracks is Compartment One, down that…tunnel.” She consulted the chart again and pointed to an airlock to the left of the one through which they had entered.

Each tunnel was accessed by an airlock at each end, a safety measure to prevent widespread damage in case of any breaches. A large enough hole could create an explosive decompression and kill everyone. Sealing each dome separately with airlocks at the entrances and exits would serve to minimize loss of life.

~*~

A detail sorted the crates while other prisoners delivered them to their designated sites. Prisoners in each barracks opened long, thin crates about a foot deep which became bunks that attached to the walls in tiers of four. Furthermore, each bunk was also a locker already filled with their clothing. Their names were stenciled on the sides of their bunks. The bedding had been packed in crates and had to be sorted and distributed among the bunks.

There was a head compartment inside each wedge-shaped barracks room. They had been instructed on the use of the heads before they left Earth. There were sonic showers and sinks, and waste was removed from the toilets by a pressure evacuation system that in some way separated the liquid from solid so the liquid could be sterilized and recycled, and the solid waste was used as fertilizer in the hydroponic farms. Annie didn’t want to think about what the liquid was used for after it was sterilized and distilled. Clean though it was, she didn’t want to think she was in any way drinking it.

The prisoners surveyed their bedding, which consisted of a very thin foam mattress, a small pillow, one pillowcase, two sheets and a thin blanket. When Annie saw the mattress, she wondered how she would ever get any sleep on such a thin cushion, or how that little blanket could possibly keep her warm, but her fears were allayed the first night. In the low gravity of the Moon, the one inch-thick mattress provided plenty of padding, and the temperature in the barracks was constant and comfortable.

Finally the prisoners lined up in the rec area.

Length:  270 Pages

Price Paperback:  $11.99

Price E-Book:  $5.99

Buy Link Paperback: Createspace

Buy Link E-Book:  Smashwords

You’ll notice I always include the publisher’s buy link.  That’s because authors usually receive 40% of the book price from the publisher.  Editors and cover artists usually receive about 5%.  When you buy a book from Amazon, Barnes & Noble or another third-party vendor, they take a hefty cut and the author, editors and cover artists receive their cuts from what is left.  So, if a book costs $5.99 at E-Book Publisher.com and you buy from there, the author will receive about $2.40.  If you buy the book at Amazon, the author will receive about $0.83.

Downloading the file from your computer to your Kindle is as easy as transferring any file from your computer to a USB flash drive.  Plug the USB end of your chord into a USB port on your computer and simply move the file from your “Downloads” box to your Kindle/Documents/Books directory.  I actually download my books using “Save As” to a “Books” file on my computer that’s sorted by my publisher, friends, and books “to review,” and then transfer them to my Kindle from there.  That way, if there’s a glitch with my Kindle, the books are on my computer.  Your author will be happy you did when he/she sees his/her royalty statement.

Happy Birthday

She Who Was the Helmet-Maker's Once Beautiful Wife

After last week’s blog, I’m not quite sure what to write this week.  I wrote about time flying, and my goals for this year, so this week, I think I’ll simply quote one of my favorite passages from one of my favorite authors, Robert A. Heinlein.  In the book “Stranger in a Strange Land” Ben Caxton, a news reporter is having a discussion with Jubal Harshaw who is sort of the paternal figure of the book, in a room with replicas of Rodin’s sculptures.  Ben has just made a derogatory comment on the nude of an old woman, “She Who Was The Helmet-Maker's Once Beautiful Wife.”  This is Jubal’s response.

“Anybody can look at a pretty girl and see a pretty girl. An artist can look at a pretty girl and see the old woman she will become. A better artist can look at an old woman and see the pretty girl that she used to be. But a great artist-a master—and that is what Auguste Rodin was—can look at an old woman, portray her exactly as she is...and force the viewer to see the pretty girl she used to be...and more than that, he can make anyone with the sensitivity of an armadillo, or even you, see that this lovely young girl is still alive, not old and ugly at all, but simply prisoned inside her ruined body. He can make you feel the quiet, endless tragedy that there was never a girl born who ever grew older than eighteen in her heart...no matter what the merciless hours have done to her. Look at her, Ben. Growing old doesn't matter to you and me; we were never meant to be admired—but it does to them.”

At Twenty

September 2011, Age 60

Is there any one of us who doesn’t bop to a song from the year we were eighteen? Or glance in the mirror and wonder who that old woman is?  Sure—I earned every wrinkle, laugh line, grey hair.  I wouldn’t trade my kids or grandkids or great-granddaughter for all the gold in the world.  But I still love rock and roll.  I still have some good moves on the dance floor, and I don’t ever plan to get stodgy!

Lea Shizas MuseItUp Publishing, Inc.

My birthday is actually tomorrow, January 9, but…Lea Shizas, of MuseItUp Publishing, it’s your birthday today!  Happy Birthday, Boss Lady!

I promised gifts!  Comment and you’ll be entered into a drawing to win copies of both Rock Bound and Rock Crazy!

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