PQ 8.6 — Do I think that if my partner falls in love with another person, he will leave me for that person?
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When I was in school, a lot of my classmates loved multiple choice exams.
I didn’t.
I was that student who wouldn’t just pick an answer. Next to ambiguously worded questions, I’d write my reasoning — and how another answer could be true by different logic.
Sometimes my answer was that there _was _no right answer. And my explanation would detail why and then indicate which I _believed _to be the answer the teacher was shooting for. The one that seemed the least wrong.
When I went to college and we had Scantrons, I’d write my explanation on the exam booklet itself, fill in the relevant bubble on the answer sheet and walk up to have a chat with the professor as I handed it in.
Sometimes the prof would dismiss me, and it annoyed them.
But other times, they thanked me and would write the answer on the whiteboard while others were still taking the exam. And give the whole class credit for the question.
One thing was for sure: I was that kid who preferred essay exams.
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I did in fact worry when I was new to polyamory that if my partner fell in love with someone else that they’d leave me for that other person.
But I’ve come to realize that love, relationships, and social connection are a lot more complicated than that.
And my problem was that I was treating them all like multiple choice exams.
When really? They’re more like essays. And if you’re fortunate enough, the joy you get from knowing others? Might fill a whole book.
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This post is part of a series in which I answer each of the chapter-end questions in More than Two with an essay. For the entire list of questions & answers, please see this indexed list.