I am coming out of 8 years of self imposed singleness, introspection and evolution. yeah yeah, had the heart broken like us all, but I am alive and happy now and ready to love again. I met an exceptional woman in May, she is poly, very open and honest, we like each other and I am looking forward to becoming her friendintimate. Not only am i new to poly, but new to dating. the last time I dated, the use of email was minimal and texting non existant, now it is de riguer.
Do you feel modern rapid communication technology has changed parameters of communication, or just the expectations of it?
Now while I am NOT sitting here freaking out, I am trying to figure out if waiting 9 days for a response to an email I sent to find out when we can see each other again is a passive agressive version of “I’m just not that into you” ( the old me ) versus “She is a very very very busy workaholic extrovert with a partner, girlfriend, career and has just met you, no biggie” ( the new me). Not trying to have you determine her motives, but since the first thing she told me was her desire to communicate in a timely manner, I am stumped as to whther my definition of timely manner is skewed due to access to email and texting……..
That’s a very interesting question.
Confession: I owe an email to someone I’m friends with. In checking the date, it’s been nearly nine days with me, too! I like the person a great deal (he’ll be getting an email before you see this, by the way), and in my case it really has been that I forgot to make a note to myself to answer the email in the throes of a psycho busy time. I really am so busy I have to flag emails and set a date and time to respond to them or they don’t get answered. This is especially true when it deals with the scheduling of time, as I really do have to lay out a schedule to get to stuff and arrange for times to do things1.
That said, yes, sometimes not answering can be a little passive aggressive. Sometimes, it’s just someone being flaky. I guess the real question is how much flakiness are you willing to put up with before you’re not into that person, ya know?
I will suggest one way to find out how this chick feels.
Ask her. Asking a question is a very good way to find out about things, as we all learned on Sesame Street. If you’re wondering about something, sure, it can feel real vulnerable to ask a direct question about it. I get that, and I sympathize. I’ve neglected to ask direct questions of people when I’m wondering about things from that same vulnerability. The price I pay is not knowing the answer. I suppose when not knowing is more painful than a possible answer one doesn’t want, it becomes easier to ask the question, huh? I’m in favor of asking for lots of reasons. It establishes a great precinct of open communication, it lets your potential know that you’re willing to find things out directly rather than fiddling around and projecting, and it also gives a good opportunity for someone whose email has been dropped by accident.
Good luck in your new relationships. But remember, if this doesn’t work out, there really are six billion people on this planet. If a cannibal can find someone to volunteer to be killed and eaten, surely our problems of finding the appropriate relationships to suit us are considerably more minimal2.
1Public thanks to my sweet and generous FWB for not getting irritated with schedule flakiness on my part, by the way. 😉
2Shamelessly stolen from another dear and treasured friend.