3 years ago – when we met

Max and I celebrated our 3 year anniversary yesterday, so I thought it was timely to blog about how we met. Three and a bit years ago I found myself single and just wanting a bit of fun as I had left a tumultuous 6 month relationship, which had followed a serious 2 year relationship. So fun was my priority. I went on to a lesbian dating/community website, I had been on this website off and on for a few years. I never really liked the website as I found it very vanilla with a pinch on 80-90s radical feminism. I should confess that I am not in line with radical feminism, the ones that wear jean overalls and hate men. I find that these feminists only like women to behave a certain way, and being Femme was not to their liking. Don’t get me wrong, feminism has been a wonderful thing for women and society in general. I just don’t understand how some can fight for women’s rights and then say the only way to be a woman is their way. Feminism should mean that a woman has the chance to be a woman any way she chooses. Anyway I digress, I went on the lesbian website (as it really is the only one that has a big enough potential dating pool) and did a search for Butch. Only eight came up, this lesbian website does not encourage Butches, Femmes, Trans and generally queer people. Well Max was on top of the list and he has his photo up (cute, I thought), so I gave him a ‘hello’. He said hello back, so I messaged that I am not into internet chatting so let’s meet up for coffee. He agreed, so we meet up for coffee then had dinner. We got along very well, and we were both looking for only “casual encounters”. Max was a year out of a 10 year relationship. The dinner went well and I ended up at his place. I decided not to spend the night, as I was keen not to send any messages of wanting a relationship (as I really was not looking for one). Anyway, we agreed that we were happy to have a casual relationship and not see each other anymore than once per fortnight.

Well that didn’t last long. We started seeing each once per week the next week! It is hard to say no to great sex. Within about 4 weeks I started to crush hard, I was really falling for him. I realise when we were hanging out I was becoming nervous around him because I liked him so much, he picked this up and teased me about it. Later he admits he did this so he looked all cool and casual, even though he didn’t feel cool and casual. I think about six weeks in, I confessed to him that I really liked him, he still played it cool. So we continued on seeing each other once to twice a week for few weeks, and finally we spoke really openly about our feelings for each other and not wanting it to end and become official. We acknowledge what we were practically in was a relationship so let’s keep going. Our relationship was just so much fun. We get along on many levels and have very similar views on relationships and life in general. Out of all of my relationships, this relationship has been so easy. Fun, easy, wonderful, safe, exciting, comfortable, what more could I want!

For most of my lesbian relationships I have run them very slow, for example not moving in for at least a year of going out, keeping things separate for as long as possible I guess. However with Max I was practically moved in within four or five months of first meeting. Such a ‘lesbian’ thing and we joked about that, because we knew we were not mainstream lesbians. I should highlight the ‘practically moved in’ means that I still continued to pay rent elsewhere, but slowly moved all my clothes over and didn’t spend a night were I rented. I was in my final year of my doctorate, and didn’t want to move in with someone and possible break up with them and move out in the last year of my dissertation. So I did not move in with Max until January 2010. We bought a house together in October 2010. We registered our relationship on the state register at around the same time. This is the most committed relationship I have ever been in, and it is funny to think that it was never supposed to be that way. I love our relationship. Max may have physically changed in many ways, however the foundations that we built together has never changed, and I don’t think they will anytime soon.