No matter what...this too shall pass.

Impermanence. 

I am striving not to cling TOO desperately to the good times in life and despise the bad.  I suspect it is best to live in each moment as much as possible, knowing that the experience will be over soon enough and possibly even forgotten one day - although hopefully not.

Lately, returning in my mind to both the beautiful memories and the tremendous pain I have felt since the birth of the Trifecta has kept my entire being grounded in reality, while still teetering on the brink of fantasy.  I can't speak for everyone, but looking back, I feel like we are all now such tremendously different people than we were at the beginning (when we thought we were wise and knew ourselves so well).  Back then I imagined there was no way of telling where or who we would be right now.

It is a busy time of year.  It is a busy time in life.  In all things, I will let myself actually FEEL, so as not to get to the end and realize I was too busy to notice the details.  There are moments that I don't want to end and there are times that I wish "it" would all go away, but the impermanence is an equalizing factor.  Impermanence brings balance.  No decisions will be made in my mind based solely on a single experience or set of similar experiences, because that would surely be representative of only one elevation of the roller coaster we're on.

Until the end, I hope to laugh a little more loudly than I should, cry a little more often, and pause a moment too long before I reply.  I will be aware of that strange look that crosses my face when I say something I'm not really sure about, but I will say it anyhow.  I will want to be alone when it's best to be around others, and I will likely blurt things out when it's best to keep quiet. 

I have faith that it will all work itself out in the end.

Still crazy after all of these months

It's December and the Trifecta is well into its second year and going strong. Chloe and her daughter have a sweet little dog now and have moved into a nicer apartment. Chloe and Missy are still colleagues at work and that is going pretty well. I'm doing fine as well.

We've overcome a lot of challenges together. one of the nice things about there being three of us is that it keeps us honest. We know that we've got two others to make decisions with, and anything we come up with gets double the scrutiny, and also double the refining. Thusly we make good decisions together.

Each of our experiences of the relationship is rather different. We each get different things from being in this relationship. I love the challenge of being with two women. It occupies my mind and body, it pushes me to be a better man and a more complete individual. I have to be more sweet, more strong, more wise and more clever. And with double the scruinty, I can't get away with mailing it in, ever. The Trifecta keeps me sharp and focused.

I love Missy and Chloe. They are my life. They are my heart. More than anything, I want to deserve them, and keep on deserving them.

Love,

Red

As tempted as I am to spend this time writing about all the beautiful sunshine and happiness that happened on our recent "family" vacation, the rest of it should be recorded too - in the hopes that someday, somehow, we may look back and laugh.

It has been over a year since the beginning of the Trifecta.  In the early times, I assumed that a magical day would come where I would be able to safely look back and say that I had seen it all...experienced ALL of the dark, weird, uncomfortable moments.  I (stupidly) hoped that it wouldn't take a year.  I would've laughed if anyone had told me back then that it would not only take MORE than a year, but that I might never be happy with some things - important things.

Am I a big baby?  Apparently.  I suspect that I will always mourn the loss of that childish dream of a single, perfect soul mate.  A guilty pleasure of mine is the sappy, predictable romantic comedy, so this is clearly a problem.  I suspect I will continue to be sad and feel sorry for myself every time, at the very moment the boy finds the girl he was meant to be with, and they live happily ever after.  I know reality.  I know the feeling that you've found your soul mate, and then a few years later being miserable and angry and disappointed.  I know divorce.  I also know bliss.  I know that some of the most intensely spectacular moments I have ever had have been within the Trifecta - beautiful moments that I truly believe would be impossible between just two people.  Yet I will always mourn the loss of the boy/girl sould mate phenomena.

I have considered the possiblity that maybe THREE people could be soul mates.  We have all gone through this-and-that to become the people we are, in the place we are, and that the universe brought us together, and so on and so forth...  The death of that theory is in the numbers.  The beauty of the soul mate dream (in MY mind, anyhow) is that you can be yourself - the good, the bad and the ugly - with a single other person who will love you despite all of your flaws.  That will always be impossible with us, because we will always have to put someone (or everyone) else's feelings first - and we're good at it, otherwise we wouldn't have made it this far.  It is frustrating how difficult it is for me to relax enough to experience a meltdown and get all boo-hooey and sappy and greedy for love and affection, for fear that someone's feelings will be hurt.  I worry "have we left him alone too long?  Is he lonely?", or "will her feelings be hurt if we go someplace nice and she's not here?"  I have realized that we aren't a glob of three people, but there are two separate one-on-one relationships that I am fortunate enough to have.  They will always be in flux though, and I will always need to be concerned about someone being short changed.  I want everyone to be happy with me all the time...unrealistic, I know. 

So alas, we arrive again at the beginning - no mysteries have been solved and no answers learned...welcome to my world.

Mother******* Nature.

Recently we went on an epic roadtrip. We had kids with us and visited Red's parents, but along the way we got a few nights of Trifecta-only time. It was bliss.

But I have to say, Mother Nature can be a bitch.

The first half of the trip, I was menstruating. The second half, Chloe was menstruating. WTF?? It was quite a parade to rain on. Happily, none of us is particularly squeamish about that sort of thing, but nonetheless the whole phenomenon tends to render each of us girls crampy and cranky and generally uncomfortable.

Then again ... we got up above 9,000 feet one day toward the end, looking around at the mountains (still with snow on them!), the lake, the wildlife, the shockingly blue sky ... and I thought: okay, Mother. I guess you dish out the beauty and the beastliness both. I'll take that.

What a tease.

Two more nights.

For the last three weeks, because of various summer anomalies in other people's schedules, Chloe and Red and I have had the house to ourselves. Her clothes are hanging next to mine in the closet. She replaced our showerhead (which I suspect was out of sheer exasperation, but I choose to see it as incredibly sweet). I've stopped being jealous of Red having the middle of the bed. We've even figured out the exact right configuration and timing of open windows and doors, to keep that bed at the right temperature!

And now, it's about to end.

Regular routines resume, and the fact is we don't live together. Yet. Might never. And it makes me terribly, awfully sad to give up the temporary taste of it.

At the same time, I'm silly with joy over how much fun it's been. And how comfortable. We're not sick of each other, and even though there's been way more work hours than usual for two of us, we've all gotten through that with humor and grace.

There was an earlier period like this, where we got to see what it was like to spend every night together for a while. We're so much closer now. More practical? Not necessarily ... we keep saying we're going to catch up on sleep, but then we keep oops having more CRAZY hot awesome blinding sex almost every time we go to bed. Sheesh.

Next week makes a year we've been a triple. We can hold out long enough to finally achieve the Trifecta Dream Home, right?

*yawn*

So very boring.

Well, no: the Trifecta continues to be the most novel and engaging thing in my life, and I want to spend every minute I possibly can just reveling in it.

And there are still periods of melodrama. There's a family member who thinks Chloe and Red are having an affair, without me knowing (which would make me the THICKEST wife EVER), and while we would love to disabuse this person of their delusion, that would probably blow our cover at work, which might get someone fired. So we're still debating what to do, and how to arrange life around this person (total avoidance is not an option).

There are exciting new discoveries. (Remember Mexico, where we learned that straight boys AND straight girls gave us the thumbs-up? Turns out, gay guys are also impressed by Red! And make us feel welcome in their bars, so far without exception.)

I finally got everybody rings. Here is one of them:

Because in three weeks, we reach our one-year mark.

I'm pretty sure I have never been this happy. By turns it gets dramatic, weird, exciting, and confusing. But it also has gotten *comfortable*. It has become the default, the Way Things Are. That may be the best part of all.

Yes!

This post is going to be boring, because all I really have to say is that I am happy. This relationship is going well. Really well. I am happy. Um, what else...Missy and Chloe make me happy. Like, constantly. I'm so blissed out. What bad writing this makes for.

They've made me a stronger, more confident, better man. And I'm more able to help them out when they need it. I'm full of gratitude for C&M and I can't wait until the next time I am with them. I've felt that way for...10+ months now and I still do. They occupy my mind, body and spirit in a way nothing or no one ever has. I love love LOVE it. There's no place I'd rather be than right here, right now. I am having the time of my life. What an adventure. I can't wait to see what happens next. I could go on and on, but for your sake I'll stop gushing now :)

Thank you Chloe, thank you Missy, sincerely, for daring to go on this ride with me. I love you both with all of my heart.

-Red

Mr. Frog's Wild Ride.

Yes, I know it's Mr. Toad. Stick with me here.

There is this cute little froggy video game for your smartphone (I used to play NO games at all), discovered by Chloe while we three were on our one epic ski trip of the winter. The weather was so bad we barely made it to our destination, and the conditions on the slopes were terrible -- so we mostly spent our time eating Mexican food, drinking, and snuggling in huge hotel beds while the wind howled and the snow piled up outside. I know, terrible. Also we played the froggy game. You can send frogs to one another, or just amuse yourself with your own frogs if you're the one in the backseat for a couple of hours. It's harmless, and not particularly competitive (although Red has gotten way farther than me or Chloe, and makes no secret of it, bless his heart). Mostly it's cute.

Among the things I like about the frogs is the "Happy" progress bar. If you cause your frog to eat lots of flies, it gets more happy; it stays happy if you fill its habitat with nice scenery, and other frogs. The happiness doesn't drain away unless you put the frog somewhere dreary and lonely. You can breed your frogs (which is how you get even more interesting kinds of frogs); you'd think this would also increase happiness, but it doesn't -- the mating is rather perfunctory (and in real life I guess it doesn't even require the frogs to interact), so I can overlook that one. Of course in the Trifecta, mating DOES increase happiness, and therefore should happen as often as possible.

Over the recent holiday weekend, we three plopped down in our favorite habitat: the hot, dry one, where we're free to be completely open and relaxed about who we are. No professional obligations. No need to keep up a pretense of respectability. Perfectly okay to express our sweetness in public. After my prolonged fit of ill temper the previous week, I expected this to restore me to 100% even-keeled enduring sanity. Surprise: it didn't. What it did do, intensely, was drive my "Happy" bar all the way to the right within the first few hours. The next day I had a dip: a few minutes of irrational weepiness, with about a half-hour hangover. The rest of that day and night were spectacular ... adventures, excitement, abandon. The next night I had another brief sulk, during which I even scowled at Chloe (unusual), but it passed. The rest of the vacation was blissful. Happy bar upon returning home: 98%.

Since then there have been assorted logistical nightmares, long hours at work, extra family demands pulling us away from each other. These, we are familiar with. My indicator drops by a few percentage points here or there, but surges back when we have a few hours to ourselves. We're planning another trip to the desert habitat, and that alone -- pure Trifecta time to look forward to -- keeps me going.

Variability is tolerable. Ten months, as of today; that shows what we can accommodate.

Chloe is right: this blog is not a representative sample of what our days are like. Mostly we are mellow, healthy, and incredibly kind to each other. I think it's when we get surprised that we make noise, and I'm glad we do.

Keeps me hopping.

We are good.

I have no ulterior motive…I am not here to steal anyone away from anyone else.  I didn’t weasel my way into this, and I was not coerced.   I didn’t expect to be here today, feeling the way I do.  When it began, my only plan was to explore the possibilities and satisfy a vague sense of curiosity. 

Last summer I had lunch with an old friend that I hadn’t seen in 24 years.  I remembered that when I knew him before, I sincerely enjoyed his company – he was bright, amusing, handsome, attentive, interesting…those things about him haven’t changed.  He said he was happily married (but didn’t need to – it was clear to me when I saw them together).  She is so sweet and caring, beautiful, honest, sharp, funny…I loved that they truly enjoyed each other’s company so much.  If that hadn’t been the foundation that we built this relationship on, it would not still exist.  There aren’t enough hours in the day or patience in the world that can add the variable of another person to a weak or damaged relationship and expect anything good to come of it. 

Y’all can be worried about what might be bothering any or all of us at any given time.  Feel free to be concerned about someone being taken advantage of or not being treated properly.   One of the many qualities that makes each of us great individually, and the Trifecta strong as a unit, is our compassion and empathy for the feelings of the others.  We are strong and caring, and we face head-on the obstacles that arise.  This blog is not necessarily indicative of our everyday lives.  It is a place we come to vent, daydream, muse, and explore ideas.  It is a place where we can safely express ourselves and talk about things without fear of hurting anyone’s feelings, OR…(my personal favorite) beating a dead horse.

Rest assured…we are good.

Missy gets messy.

From a couple of posts over the past nine months, one might think that Chloe had cornered the market on unexpected eruptions of emotion. She has not.

I mentioned recently that I have been surprised to find myself the Least Bothered Person In The Room, through that period of storms. Maybe I jinxed myself: since then, more days than not, I am the one of us who's having the worst day. (Not that it's a contest.)

Several features about the Trifecta have contributed to my discomfort over the past couple of weeks. Mind you, some of the triggers are external events that have nothing to do with us -- but the nature of my response, and the effect that my behavior has had on the threesome, are frankly freaking me out a little.

I take my meds. I'm not in a giant episode of pathologic proportions. It's just, I hate feeling angry or resentful or sad ever at all, and I especially hate it when those feelings burst out at the wrong moment and bring my partners down. I'm usually the sweetness-and-light type, and even when I'm cranky, it tends to be only mild to moderate. There was a while there when Red was uncharacteristically moody (even before the storm), and it did scare me. That got better. Lately, he's "concerned" about me instead, and I think he and Chloe are having secret conversations about just how alarmed they should be.

The answer is, I don't know.

One of my parents was a scary yeller, so I don't yell. Even raising my voice for more than two sentences kind of shocks me -- and I've done it at Red at least three times in the last week. I don't cry unless there's a damn good reason, yet the weeping has overcome me a couple of times this week, at what seem to be trivial provocations.

Maybe it's that we keep shifting and settling into a new equilibrium, only to find that we're not done yet. A little like when your lover turns over in bed, halfway waking you up, then both of you falling back asleep. Except sometimes you don't. And now there are two who can wake me.

I want to scream: why does it have to be MY work that has the only elasticity? Such that if we as a family need more money, the only way to get it is for me to work more hours? Which leaves the other two with all kinds of time together without me, which in theory doesn't make me jealous, because I know they'd rather have me there, and it's not that I don't want her to be with him, or that I don't want him to be with her, it's that *I* want to be with **ANYONE** and that makes me sad and childish and unreasonable and I hate it.

Someone treats Chloe badly at our workplace, and I become enraged. I have less than half of the control over anything that happens there, but I have a thousand times more investment in her happiness than anyone else does. Or than I would have for any other colleague. And she is ridiculously protective of my happiness, sometimes to her detriment. On the one hand, I want her to stay there forever so that I can make her life better and she can make my life better and I can at least get a peek at her almost every day ... and on the other hand, I want her to gain a better opportunity, with something closer to the compensation she deserves, and where each of us is not clouded by our devotion to the other. I want to not have to be so careful around each other while other people are watching. And I can't stand wanting two opposing things so strongly.

All this grimness on my part has been a wet blanket, on the evenings when we three only get to spend an hour or two together after work, and then have to go our separate ways. If I squelch my discontent, I'm disconnected. If I let it show, they both are more blue.

These past four days, the not-just-happy-hour kind, have included a lot of fun. An evening at the ballpark just the three of us, a movie with the kids, a big family dinner with everyone from grandma to auntie to grandkids, a low-key barbecue today. Two of those nights were filled with stay-up-late, sprain-your-privates, super-glue bonding type mindblowing sex. On the downside, I had to work late Friday night, worked half of Saturday, and most of Sunday. Felt sorry for myself almost every minute. But, I come home to find Chloe has fed the kids and put away the dishes. The next I day I come home to find Red has vacuumed the house and is entertaining my ailing mother, whose arrival I missed because of work. The day after that I come home to find that Chloe has shucked the corn and made a new pitcher of tea, and Red has fired up the coals and fixed the kitchen drawers.

I come home.

I come home to find:

I come home to find love.


Somehow I have to either get a grip, or get used to not having a grip. Somehow.

NOT for the faint of heart.

For a while now, I have been trying to identify a single thing (or even a list of things) that might be the unspeakable thing that makes the Trifecta impossible.  Everyone tells us it’s impossible – that we don’t stand a chance…shoot, we tell OURSELVES that a lot.  Some people even tell us of similar experiences they’ve had that have failed, and why.  I suppose it’s a defense mechanism of mine…solve the puzzle of what “the thing” is so that I can try to avoid it or prevent it or fix it before it explodes in my face.  This is not for everyone – it is not for the faint of heart.

Well I haven’t quite figured out “the thing” (what am I, a genius?!), but I have narrowed it down to something workable that feels so much less frightening than the deep, dark unknown. 

It turns out that "the thing" isn't a single thing at all, but EVERYTHING.  Everything that I have done, seen, felt, thought, planned for, envisioned, etc. in a traditional M/F relationship has been one way – the way that society taught me, the way that was modeled by my parents and relatives and the way I learned on my own while dating and being married.  I became accustomed to it – expecting certain things, feeling certain ways, it was my norm.  Relationships were two dimensional.  Everything in the Trifecta is so much more intense than what I have spent my whole life learning – it is not “a thing” about the Trifecta that makes it volatile or fragile, it is the intensity level of EVERY SINGLE THING!  We are definitely in 3-D now.  The highs are higher, lows are lower, anger is more harmful, hurt is more painful…it’s like my world is more saturated now.  It can be beautiful, but it can also be excruciating and just downright exhausting. 

I feel like I learned to swim in a heated pool and have accidentally fallen into the ocean.  The idea is the same – I can still swim, but the waves are HUGE!  People drown out here.  There are things here that I don’t even know the names of…that could eat me!

This is not for the faint of heart.  We must be strong.  We must be careful.  We must be ready for anything.  The odds of one person being able to handle such a thing on an ongoing basis seems improbable.  The odds of my accidentally stumbling upon not one, but TWO other people who can do the same, and who want to be with ME?  Please.  That number has a decimal point and a lot of zeros behind it.

Yeah, baby.

The Trifecta has how been around long enough to have made a baby.

(Don't worry: although both women are of childbearing age, there is no chance of a baby actually happening.)

Point is, we've kept this going for a while ... longer than I could have realistically predicted, even though from the early going I've wanted to make promises, and dream dreams, and imagine us all growing old together.

Chloe wondered what we should name the hypothetical now-gestated-and-birthed baby. I suggested "Triffany". Red went with "Ashley". I think I was laughing so hard at this point, I didn't notice whether Chloe proposed a name.

It has been a volatile few weeks here; a lot of laughter, a few tears, scattered showers of anger, some sighs with rolled-eyes. The other two seem to keep feeling aftershocks of our tremor last month. Me, I'm in the unfamiliar position of Least Bothered Person In The Room. Which makes me the ideal shopper for a king size bed in the upcoming holiday sales! (Red insists we must test out any candidate mattresses together, and although there's no need to excessively embarrass a salesperson, it would be natural to leave them scratching their heads as to which two of us are the couple.) Anyway, while Chloe and Red ponder the implications of whatever there is to ponder, I will scour catalogs and propose testable items. I guess that sorta makes me the guy, this week.

Did I mention that the reason we need a new bed, in addition to the obvious crowding problem, is that we've worn the current one OUT? In a GOOD way??

Yeah, baby!

No, you cannot join us.

Two points to make tonight:

#1 Just because we are a "threesome" and you know it, doesn't mean we are open to "fun" with you. No, you cannot join us. I know it may make you feel less inhibited to be around us because of what you think we are and what we do, but, um no. We do appreciate being "out" to some friends and recognized for what we are by some perceptive strangers, and the notoriety is new to us, but, well, no. We are devoted to each other, and without these particular three individuals, two girls and a guy, there would be no Trifecta. None of us is replaceable, none of us is available, and we don't want to include you in any of our reindeer games. Sorry.

#2 We are in a three-person relationship. We sometimes experience emotions, feelings and sensations rather unlike what occur in a two-person relationship. It is often euphoric and exhilarating. Sometimes it is...not. But new feelings and new experiences both good and bad keep on happening, almost daily, still, 9 months in to this adventure. The important thing is for us to communicate what we feel, when we feel it, even if we do not know where it comes from or why we feel it. It's gonna be new and it's gonna take us by surprise, because we haven't been here before and there is no roadmap. We're traveling together through gingham. There is only each other to rely on, and rely on each other we must. We should be patient and kind when one of us is feeling hurt or angry. We can take turns being the strong one (or ones), and leave no one behind. And we should speak our minds in the moment, even if there is risk of hurting another, or grinding the fun to a halt. We will each of us make mistakes. We will trod on each others feelings. There's six feet here after all...we must make room for all of them to dance. Here we are, together, strong & madly in love. We should talk with each other, about each other (separately and together) and work together to love each other best. We each have unique insights on the other two. The perspective of any two of us on the other is powerful good. We should run our ideas and decisions by each other. When we do, we execute them better. We are three. We can leverage the power of three smart, loving, passionate individuals. I think this is the best way forward. There is potential for long, good life here.

Love,

Red

How to Enlist Your Wife's Help in Getting Your Girlfriend to Stop Sleeping With Her Husband

Tonight: great communication and no nookie. And it was AWESOME!!!!!!

Oh, and BTW, if you steal our book title I will SUE your ass.

-Red

TRIFECTACURE

There was a time when I would've officially staked a claim on being least emotional of the three of us.

Until recently (i.e., last week), my fallback was to blame the sudden tears, or biting sarcasm that seemed to erupt from me out of nowhere, on hormones.  I was blissfully naive.  I had no idea where that stuff was coming from.  It was new and foreign to me.  Now I realize what has gradually been occurring over the past few months...a Trifectacure!  Similar to getting a good (and consequently painful) pedicure, all of the tough skin and calouses gained by enduring unhealthy relationships have been unceremoniously scoured away, and what remains is raw, red, throbbing newness. 

Hopefully after some time, I will grow a new layer of skin, less thick and tough than the last, to replace what has been chafed off (mostly just this past weekend).  Maybe being a little more sensitive than usual will serve me well and bring more kindness and empathy to my repertoire?  Until then, we will all have to live with my short fuse and tearful eruptions (sorry guys)...

Impossible things

If you've done six impossible things before breakfast, why not round it off with dinner at Milliway's, the restaurant at the end of the universe?
-- Douglas Adams, "The Restaurant at the End of the Universe"

I want it all and I want it now. I want the best of both worlds. I also want to have principles to live by. I like my moral compass. I can bend, adjust, change, adapt. But I won't be anybody's fool or doormat. Been there, been that (that was marriage #1). Not again.

Me'n'Missy'n'Chloe are doomed to fail. We are an impossibility. We can not possibly have all that we want. Something has to give, and it does, every single day. Yet here we are still, unlikely as it is, more than 8 months in to this adventure, still together, still in love, still eager to see each other again and again. We lament the complication of our lives, but we will not split up in order to simplify. We long for the open lives of others, the advantages that couples have over a threesome. But we will not forsake the magic of our trifecta to go back to that couples' life. We are dependent and interdependent and intertwined in ways that are certainly unwise. But we persevere against the odds. How?

We are dedicated to each other. There is something about this particular mix of personalities which has staying power. Any of us could end this, on any day, but none of us want to. What we want is...each other, every day. When we are together, and sharing, and laughing...none of us has experienced anything like this. We all know that if this ends, there will never again be anything so fucking crazy good as this. We're a great fit. How else to say it?

I am the most unlikely threesome participant ever. I have never had a one-night stand. Everyone has had a one night stand, right? Well, not me. I can count my sexual partners on one hand. And that includes the two women I currently sleep with. I'm one of those sensitive nice guys who confuses love and sex and gets hurt when others do not. I do not have a tough skin. I have not overcome much adversity. I'm a smarty pants know-it-all, sheltered, clever. And finally, I am not young. It seems that most polyamory-types do not start at it at age 40. But I did get this party started. And this party ain't stoppin', so long as the love & respect endures.

Impossible things? Yeah, we do those. Now, what's for dinner?

---Red

The other shoe drops.

It had to happen sometime: recently, like a sudden storm, broke the first wrenching conflict we've had in the whole eight months. It took what was forecast to be a sunny weekend and plunged us into darkness.

I think we are okay, individually and jointly. But it's by no means certain. And the storm laid bare the (obvious but until then unacknowledged) fact that this could all go away in an instant. It would be messier than the end of your average secret relationship, in that Chloe runs my business (which was NOT my idea, rather my partner's, and we've been aiming for an exit strategy all along but not expecting to deploy it for a few months yet), and our families are pretty thoroughly entwined. We can get away with this because, well, women have women friends, right? And when someone's going through a divorce, they go stay at their friend's house a lot, right? (Yeah, there's that happening too.)

Anyway, it's early days to see how this seismic event will affect us. But I'm cautiously optimistic. The Trifecta started out as fun; I don’t think any of us foresaw the tumble of events that have led us to where we are now, and the intensity that would develop as a result. Upheaval was ultimately inevitable.

Each of us three, as it turns out, has demons. These may or may not be fatal. I had such a desperate hunger for affection, earlier in life, that at first I was just plain reckless, and later wound up in two long and awful relationships in a row. I have learned much since then. What I’ve got with Red is healthy. But I notice my anxiety rising when I feel tremors of interpersonal conflict, and I feel that old panic: "do anything to keep from being left behind!" At such a point I recall a Sufi poet, advising me to invite that nasty feeling into the house, and see what it has to tell me.

Of all the things I never imagined, one is this: what if Red wants to call it quits? I’ve known from the start that the odds are against this relationship lasting very long, and I’ve always assumed that if it ended, the reason would be that Chloe walked away. She’s the one at a stark and persisting disadvantage. I guess I might have thought, in a fleeting way, that Red and I could together decide it’s not a going concern. But it never occurred to me to wonder: what if one of the original pair decides they’ve had enough? It goes without saying that Chloe could shut things down unilaterally. But does Red get veto power over what I want? Or do I, over him? Would either of us keep seeing Chloe without the other? These are thoughts so alien I could not think them, could not conceive of them.

These thoughts have now been thought.

It happens all the time, that one person of a pair makes a bad choice. The two go through a crisis: there are spasms of doubt, anger, grief. There may be fear: will we survive this? Will one of us decide it’s a deal-breaker? Now draw the polygon: whose deal gets broken, among three?

A decade ago, someone in my marriage made a bad call. One of us threw in the towel. The other was not willing to let that happen. I had never seen a conflict successfully resolved, in any of my relationships, or anyone else’s. Red convinced me it was possible – not a foregone conclusion, but possible. He was right. I was surprised. Here we are now, with me making the case for taking our time, doing the hard work, giving everyone the benefit of the doubt. Assuming the best.

Chaos is – as I often tell my patients about certain symptoms – not dangerous in itself. Merely uncomfortable. If we learn to sit with it, it has less power to lay us low. Here I sit.

Trifecta meets chaos.

According to Dictionary.com:

Chaos Theory
Part of Speech:	n
Definition:	the study of unpredictable and complex dynamic systems that are highly sensitive to small changes in external conditions

It says that small differences or miscalculations result in widely diverging outcomes that make the system unpredictable. 

The mistake I made isn’t really important, right?  Of course it is.  But I’m hoping to not be so stupid again, and that we will all look back on it one day and laugh.  For now the best I can do is learn.  I made some miscalculations, and we all suffered the repercussions this weekend.  In the Trifecta at least, little baby miscalculations can and will lead to big scary unpredictability and hugely complex dynamics.

Miscalculation #1:  Men are men are men.   

In retrospect, it occurs to me that some women probably figure this out earlier on in life, and I may be a victim of my history of serial monogamy.  Apparently instead of knowing a little bit about all men, I know a whole lot about a select few.   There ARE men out there with feelings, with souls, with morals that don’t fly out the window the moment a pretty girl (or in this case two, heehee) walks by.  And there is at least ONE out there who can be brilliant both on the job AND after hours.  In some situations, I am learning that Red will rarely react the same way as any other man I have ever known.

Miscalculation #2:  If I have two partners, I will have twice the good and only half the bad. 

Uh…WHAT?  The doctor calls this “magical thinking.”  It is a relationship, not a middle school algebra equation.  If it were an algebra equation, it would be A+B+C=X, which is useless.  When there are highs, they are idyllic.  When there are lows, they are painfully excruciating.  The difference is that with three people you are enjoying the happiness of TWO other people but also suffering their pain and bitterness as well.  I felt the pain I caused one, I felt the pain I caused the other, I felt the pain between the two of them caused by me, and I felt the pain I caused the threesome as a whole.  Repeat after me...holy CRAP.

Miscalculation #3:  If I have an issue with one person in the Trifecta, it is an issue between the two of us. 

Nice try.  Actually in this, everyone is a stakeholder in EVERYTHING about EVERYONE.  We all have different thresholds and opinions.  It's not a matter of 'one deals with one', but more 'one deals with one, and the other, and they deal with each other, and the two deal with the one, and the other two deal with the other one', and so on and so forth.  WOW.   Besides all that, it was a revelation for me that if either Red or Missy made an ultimatum that ended the Trifecta, and it was over an issue that didn’t bother the other person as much, it could cause a huge rift in THEIR relationship.  Strange, but I never thought I’d be that important – I felt that since I was the one who came last, I would be the first to go if there were insurmountable problems.  So once again, it’s just not as simple as one (one=ME) would like to believe.

There are many more mistakes to be made and no way to prepare for them or predict the outcome.  That is really the bottom line.  My conclusion is that we should just accept the chaos, enjoy the good times, work through the bad times, and reap the benefits of being with two other people who seem willing to do the same.  

Bring it on, Chaos - we may just kick your ASS.

TRIFEXICO!!!

No one has ever asked us, out in the world, "What is the deal?" It's been a bit surprising, really, since there are times and places when we are openly affectionate in all directions.

It finally happened.

We took a trip, different from all our other trips, and way farther outside our usual orbit -- all the way across the border. On top of that, we went out to a club that is strictly intended for over-the-top partying, where a good third of the population was half my age. We never do this.

Within a half hour, a complete stranger came up and asked "What is the deal?" It happened while Chloe and I were off finding the restroom. Interestingly, it was the girl of the young couple across the firepit from us who got up and boldly approached Red. He confirmed that both of those ladies were, in fact, his girlfriends. After we came back, the three of us chatted briefly with the couple, and it was charming. Before long, two guys came over: they asked all three of us, "are you together??" -- and upon hearing "yes", instigated a chant of "three-some! three-some!" which got some other partiers to cheer as well. A young girl with a fake lei around her neck appeared and wanted to know details: to me and Chloe, she asked "Are you like sister wives?" We laughed, and Chloe said "No, we love each other!" The girl seemed flabbergasted. "I've always been curious about that sort of thing", she shared. And then she kept going. "You two don't get jealous over him?" Red said "Oh yeah, sure there's jealousy. That's part of the deal." Her eyes widened. She looked us over again -- you could see the cogs turning in her head -- and wondered "Do you all share a bed??" We cheerfully related that we do. A really big bed, preferably. This apparently was the biggest shocker of all.

Not long after, a guy asked Red, out of the girls' hearing, "What's your secret?" To which Red replied: "Be honest, and be clear about what you want." (This did not seem to be what the young man wanted to hear.) I guess we were becoming local celebrities at this point, because another guy standing on the far side of the fire pit pointed at Red and shouted, "He's my hero!"

At last. The applause Red has deserved all along, for bringing this about. We were tickled.

As the evening went on, and the booze flowed freely, and each of us was smooching the others at regular intervals, it just got sillier. Sometime after midnight, Chloe and I were at the bar (where she was employing her amazing horse-whistle skills to get us a bartender), and a much-pierced young man asked me: "Are you guys lesbians?" I laughed and said "Not exactly", which made him look very confused. "There's a guy involved," I explained. And this impressed him so much that he handed Chloe a free drink.

That's right, folks, among hundreds of twenty-somethings in short skirts and fancy pants, we three forty-somethings in jeans were the toast of the town. Now, we could see right off the bat that there were some differences in how the guys and the girls were processing this information. Not one of the guys gave any hint of realizing it's a triangle and not a V. It seemed they uniformly wanted to know How Can I, Right Now, Get Two Girls To Go Home With Me. The girls at least noticed that the three axes were approximately equal, and that a lot of it has to do with me and Chloe being close. The girl with the lei seemed disappointed when my answer to "How did you do it?" was "It took until after I was 40 to figure it out." I can't blame her. But seriously, you do not want to be giving advice on how to launch a threesome in the middle of inebriated mayhem.

Plenty of times I have danced on whatever available surface, singing along, and spilling my beer. I have afterward fallen into bed exhausted and ravenous. I have poured sand out of my pockets the next morning. But never, ever, have I felt so young and so old all at the same time. How about that.

TIME OUT.

*fweeeeeet* goes the referee's whistle.

Enough with the stress-from-every-direction. I hereby call a moratorium on nonsense generated by parents, children, former spouses, employers, co-workers, insurance companies, mobile phone providers, people who crash into your car, electricians, attorneys, software tech support, and people who park in your designated space.

Seriously.

As previously noted, it's great to have more than one person to lean on in your relationship. But really that's only helpful if everyone is taking turns having a rough day. Unfortunately, the Trifecta makes for a bigger target for misfortune than a two-way does. So if two or (heaven forbid) three people are suffering? Yeesh.

Okay, just making note of this regrettable corollary. Now I will wipe the gatorade off my face and lumber back onto the field.

The green eyed monster.

"They" say that jealousy is one of the biggest issues in a polyamorous relationship.

I am not a jealous person by nature. I've never been wild about the idea of any of my long-term partners stepping out on me, but I don't tend to be suspicious, and I never got mad if Red flirted with other women in social settings. He has always had lunch dates with various women he knew through work or from before we got together, and would tell me all about them. Actually, that's how this whole Chloe connection started. Lunch.

So over lunch yesterday, as the three of us munched on tortilla chips (which Chloe salted as soon as the basket arrived on the table, without tasting them first, because that's what she always does -- God love her), Red alluded to the fact that I sometimes get jealous in the Trifecta. I acknowledged it. They wanted to know more. (Remember my objection to rectangular restaurant tables? This time, I was solo on one side, and it was actually perfect, to be looking at them both at once so they could see my eyes.) Was it when Red would kiss or hug Chloe out in public? No. Maybe on the couple of occasions when they'd gotten home before me and had a roll in the hay without me? Not that either. It's not about percentage of time, nor about my work often making me the last one to arrive at happy hour.

It's that certain boundaries, rules, habits and assumptions on Red's part have changed since Chloe came along. Most of these changes are, in my view, for the better. So what's the problem? It's that when one of these is something I had lobbied for before, and he had held his position, but the barrier fell in an instant when it was something Chloe wanted, I felt slighted. What, this thing was off-limits then, but now it's acceptable? Because he wants to make her happy?

Let me be clear: Red treats me well, and he always has. From the very beginning, more than a decade ago, he has made me feel like I'm important, like I matter. He listens to me. He takes my feelings and ideas seriously. And each of us has molded our selves to the other: he never used to drink single malt whiskey, and now he delights in a glass (and can tell you which corner of Scotland it comes from). I could not have cared less about baseball before, but I ended up craving season tickets and watching most of the rest of the games on TV (and can often tell you the first baseman's batting average on the spot).

So it's not like I have any good reason to feel put out. This is normal. This is how New Relationship Energy affects people. It's just ... when it's me, when it's my existing partner who is suddenly listening to different music and making different vacation decisions and eating extra-salty chips ... I have gotten indignant here and there. None of this is Chloe's doing. It's not like she's the Arbiter Of Soundtrack And Outdoor Activities -- these are all things Red has spontaneously evolved on. And as he has gently pointed out to me, I have been evolving on Chloe's behalf also. So, okay. There we are. No reason for jealousy.

Doesn't matter.

There it is. I can be scared of it, or angry about it, or sad that things aren't the same as they were when it was just Red and me. Or, I can pause for a moment, and notice: this day is suffused with love. Affection. Relaxed laughter. Last night was superlative.

Don't it make my green eyes blue?

Insight.

If I ever find myself upset over, confused by, or concerned about Missy or Red, I am lucky enough to have the other to confide in.

I am new, and they are not.  They know each other like a hand knows a glove.  At times (i.e., when I'm feeling sorry for myself) it's a lonely place to be...but I am discovering that I am in an overwhelmingly unique and covetous position when it comes to insight.

I have learned that many of my concerns over either Red or Missy (their ups and downs, their likes or dislikes, their worries and woes) can usually be quickly and easily explained by the other.  I now understand how fortunate I am in that respect.

No one knows ME like that.

I recognize that the two of them are at a distinct disadvantage for that very reason.

Neither of them has any sort of road map or instruction manual to help them understand ME (of course I think I'm the easiest person in the world to understand...which makes it true, right?)!  My moods are new, my insights (or lack thereof) are unusual, my ups and downs are unpredictable and probably irrational to them.  In that respect, I am a mystery.

I'm not sure what any of it means - I only wanted to make note of it. I will continue to endeavor to be the most transparent and honest, loving and giving, open and devoted partner possible so that I can be an effective third axis of the Trifecta. 

Maybe someday I will be known.  Maybe someday one of them will be able to explain me to the other...or to MYSELF, for that matter.  Please let that happen.

I stand corrected.

(Though I will point out that this is American Greetings, not Hallmark. Still -- good job, Red.)

Stupid Hallmark.

Not one of their cards is appropriate for this occasion.

Long ago we came up with the idea of starting a line of greeting-cards for people in unconventional situations like ours. Now, more than ever, is when we'd be raking in the dough. (Chloe, by the way, is an amazing fount of business ideas for untapped niche markets.)

Of course, Hallmark also doesn't make cards that convey other sentiments that would be useful right now: "Bummer about all the work you're going to have to do this week. I love you and will make it worth your while!" Or, "When you have a low-grade fever and would rather be anywhere but the office, remember you are loved." How about: "There's nothing a lame ex-spouse can throw at you that can't be deflected by a martini!" Or maybe: "Tax time is just another good reason for happy hour!"

But, I'll manage without a pre-boughten card, and just tell both my Valentines: I am enormously grateful for you, and my love and desire and affection and joy have no bounds.

One day.

One day I will wear a ring that is matched by one on Chloe's finger.

(Remember I said I wished I could decorate each of my loves discreetly? I did that at Christmas, actually. No one has commented on how Chloe's necklace and my earrings and Red's keychain are of the same design. Probably no one has noticed. Maybe my sister, but now that I've come out to her, she probably just hasn't bothered to mention it. You'd have to be paying attention, and be fairly close to my ears, to put three and three together. We have fantasized about getting rings, though, that would be unmistakably identical, fashioned after the one Red wears now. At the office this would be enormously awkward. But somewhere down the road it will happen, regardless.)

One day I will take both of them with me to every "spouse-included" event I attend.

(Back when we were almost brand-new, I took them both to a reunion -- thousands of miles away, where barely anyone still knew me well, and they hadn't ever met Red, so me bringing both my husband and my best friend didn't really raise any eyebrows. But I want it to be the norm, for me to show up with plus-two instead of plus-one; if it's a doctor setting where that simply isn't acceptable, I will decline. So far I'm still feeling the pressure to be "normal", because doctors in this community Just Don't Do That. But sometime in our future, I will eliminate the occasions to leave Chloe behind.)

One day I will be fearless.

(Because the fear of losing the Trifecta will outweigh the fear of disapproval. Or, more positively, the strength of the Trifecta will overcome any risk I perceive. Although Red's position is fairly high-up, and his workplace is a pretty conservative one, he's probably safe professionally, even if we were to be discovered. But until his children are out of the nest, discovery could provoke a legal and emotional catastrophe. Meanwhile, as long as Chloe and I work together, neither of us can afford discovery. Happily, she is likely to find a better situation sooner or later, and that pressure will ease. Still, though, people just don't want to think of an authority figure -- which I am to some degree, even though I don't want to be -- as someone THIS unconventional. But somewhere in the time to come, I will cease to care.)

One day I will arrange my work and my life such that we are comfortable, and when all this discretion is no longer needed, I will show my love so vividly, you'll have to stand back and gape. Watch me.

...on coming out.

As I sit here writing a long-overdue thank you card to Red's mom & dad for their holiday hospitality, it occurs to me how cathartic "coming out" really is.

People expect heterosexuals.  People have even come to expect homosexuals.  People do NOT expect...this.

There are so many difficult conversations in life, but I would've never predicted just how difficult this one would be.  I tried so many times to tell my mom about the Trifecta, to no avail.  I have considered tackling it with my daughter (who, at almost 19 years old, is certainly at least capable of understanding), but the right time has never presented itself.  Then I admittedly took the coward's way out by having "the talk" with my favorite Aunt via email.   Email!

Red had the talk with his mom on the phone pro-actively in advance of their Thanksgiving visit, and Missy (brave soul) told her sister over dinner?  Wow.  Each time one of us comes out to someone, it feels like a small victory for our team.  It draws us out from the cold, dark shadows into the buttery-warm glow of the sunshine.  It lends some sort of reality to the silly fantasy that has somehow evolved into this LIFE we share together.

Each time someone new knows, I feel like an elephant-sized weight has been lifted from my chest - like I can breathe again, when I never realized my breathing was restricted to begin with.

It makes me marvel at how incredibly liberating it will feel when there is no pretending, no acting, no hiding...

Transformation

I am lucky. Maybe not the luckiest of all men, but fortune has for the most part smiled upon me. I sleep with two incredible women on a regular basis. *blush* Not every night. Not even most nights. Not as much as any of us three would want. There is an ex-wife, a separated husband, and daughters, all of whom should not know. There are credit problems. There is child support. And other real-life stressors. Simplicity, my life is not.

But the love among us three is qualitatively different from couple-love. It circulates and flows in soul-baring dynamicity. It exposes all your flaws and carries you past lovely and dangerous emotional seascapes. It can give exhilirating confidence, or it can rip at your insecurities. And lying or deception? Impossible. One or the other will detect your BS in a hot moment. This love is not for the faint of heart.

Trifecta love is transforming me. I do not know into what. Maybe transforming is what I am now. I was a planner, now I live in the moment. I used to care about politics, sports, the news of the day. I used to feel more or less secure. I was a smarty-pants know it all, clever boy. Now I live for these women and our future together. I take nothing for granted. I am grateful for my job, for my house, for my kids. I am grateful most of all for Missy and Chloe. I know all of it could be gone in an instant. I know that I know far less than I had thought. I will be with them again soon--a few hours now--and everything else will melt away into the background and I will have bliss again. A time out of time, all too brief before reality crashes down again. One day I hope real life and trifecta life will be not so far apart and the burdens of secrecy will be gone. I am working for that future.

...and I would choose this path every time, though I know not where it leads.

I am coming to you soon, my loves!

Red

Like the deserts miss the rain

Drought is nothing new in the American west. In various places I've lived, they've gone on for four, five, six years. We adjust our sprinklers, put a brick in the toilet, and use low-flow shower heads -- which, though unsatisfying, are not exactly a drastic hardship.

An eleven-day drought of Chloe, though, nearly killed me.

Okay, that's an exaggeration: but it did make me realize how completely I've come to think of the Trifecta as the New Normal.

Things happen, routines evolve, there is the tug of other people's needs outside our triangle. The gravitational field of the relationship weakens. Then, like a sleeper taking a deep unbidden breath and rolling over, the whole thing shifts, and we look around again, and say: Oh. Right. This!

Can't wait to drink at that pool again.

There IS an "I" in "Trifecta".

The Trifecta Power effect is, as we've established, astonishing. It's enough to power a small city. A corollary, it seems, is that the relationship requires even more re-charging than a two-way does.

The interval between the last re-charging and this one was pretty draining. Holidays, family, social events, choosing how much of us to share with whom, spans of time where we were barely able to talk for a few minutes a day ... So, yeah, this weekend was sorely needed. And indeed we did it up: commemorating five months together, we returned to our desert getaway, strolled the streets with arms around each other, ate great Mexican food, lounged in the pool and the hot tub, drank good wine, talked and talked, and tried to scandalize the room service girl. (She seemed unfazed. Which may say more about our choice of venue than about us -- probably she's seen way more outrageous stuff than this threesome.)

And of course we romped in bed for hours, and hours, and hours. In between each of those other activities, we played. Sometimes sweet, other times serious, or silly, or lazy, or lava-hot. Every which way. Crazy good. As the team doctor, I have strictly prescribed this sexual healing as regularly as possible.

Yep, I'm a doctor, and this has one distinct disadvantage. Patients and hospitals expect to be able to reach me 24 / 7. Now if I'm truly on vacation, I have other doctors cover my calls. But if I'm simply not on-site, I usually stay on the pager -- it's quicker for me to do a thorough and safe job of solving a problem, since I know the situation, than for one of my backup colleagues to sort it out. I only get disturbed at a late hour maybe once a month. But somehow, TWICE in the past five months, that late-night call has come during a moment when I'm just about to climax. Not kidding. And good lord, that would be distracting even in a relationship that's as old and comfortable as a well-worn shoe. In the present context? It would seriously have the potential to ruin a great orgasm.

But no. My teammates know that it's perfectly safe for me to take up to an hour to return a page. (Any true emergencies are made known by the answering service calling my phone directly, if the page didn't get answered.) And my lovers have, on both these occasions, brought me back to the moment: with hotness and determination, they have brought me through the distractions, and carried me into the end zone.

None of us is, as a rule, sexually selfish. But Chloe and Red have taught me the benefits of being temporarily self-centered. Letting them dote on me. Letting the rest of the world wait for my pleasure, our pleasure, to come first. Every time, the world has been just fine for those few minutes without me. And my body and my psyche are healthier and stronger for the loving this allows.

Now, if I could just prescribe this kind of thing for my patients ....

Drinking my love from the curvy cup!

I remember as a child being seated at the table for dinner with my glass of milk...the same milk my brothers were drinking, and declaring bravely (i.e. loud & obnoxiously) how unfair things were.  My mom would then insist (like all wise mothers) "sweetie, your glass isn't bigger or smaller, it is just DIFFERENT.  You have the same milk from the same carton, and the same amount, but your glass is just special from theirs."  Yes folks, "special from." 

So after much introspection, my wise conclusion (thanks to dear ol' mom) is that girl/girl love is similar to drinking milk from a special cup.  The love is not bigger or smaller, better or worse than what I have shared with a man, just different and special. 

Early on, I was surprised to discover the fierce loyalty and protection (of all things...really!) I felt towards Missy.  This is something I have never been comfortable expressing to a man - probably because I have never been in the company of one who demonstrated that he could handle letting his guard down that much.  In retrospect, I am sorry that they were so insecure.  They repeatedly shut down something in me that could have been great for them.

As silly as it sounds, I love the freedom of not being concerned over who is on top or on bottom, wondering if I'm being too pushy or demanding, and whether or not it's ok to explore.  There are no egos to feed.  That has been the big difference.  Not the breasts or soft skin or sweet words (which there are plenty of...), but just plain-old freedom to be myself.

Loving with these two beautiful people has allowed me the confidence and autonomy to know myself better.  It has been simply exquisite to finally comprehend how the curvy cup, unique in so many ways from other cups, could contain just as much (if not more) tasty, high-quality STUFF.

Now if a mom ever had the kind of power to teach that - more kids would just shut up and drink their milk.

Things to sigh about.

Chloe, your shirt is hanging on the back of a chair over there. The denim one. The problem with that shirt is not that it's in my dining room, it's that it's empty. I know I'll be seeing you in less than twelve hours, but I want you NOW. I want to comb your hair back with my fingers, scratch your neck a little, and kiss your impossibly smooth lips.

Red, your keys are right here. You're usually so aware of your surroundings, but some days lately when you've been blissed out you've had to hunt for your keys (the way I do all the time). It makes me giggle, but I don't mean to be derisive. I'm just enjoying your intoxication.

We need more pronouns. It's true we've been making good use of "y'all" (native for me, not for either of y'all, but generally sounding fairly natural nowadays). But we wrestle with the "we" that means 'you-and-me-but-not-other-you', versus the "we" that means 'all-of-us' ... and the "you[with a silent Red]" and "you[with a silent Chloe]". Minor misunderstandings, transient. There are languages in which these things would be disambiguated as we go. But here we are stuck with English, and we manage. I still reserve the right to complain.

Let us engage in a different kind of sighing, soon, okay?