Exclusivity without the promise of

I'll call him "Rapido" because he talks fast.

I met him two weeks ago at Sweethearts, actually. I IM'd him first and, soon after, I got other IMs. Then someone asked me to dance a split second before he did.

As a matter of principle, I went with the other guy who asked me first, but he turned out to be in his 20s and we didn't have anything to talk about as soon as we hopped on the pose balls. So I excused myself and explained that I was already chatting with someone when he asked me to dance and I felt that I made the wrong decision. The 20-something was surprisingly very gracious and he understood. I IM'd him again the next day, apologizing, and he was still very gracious. Whoever he ends up with will be a very lucky woman indeed.

Anyway, Rapido smiled when I said I was free again for that dance, and we went to Sunset Jazz, where there was less lag. We chatted only for about 15 minutes, then he excused himself soon in order to talk with a friend. I figured that was it. He friended me but I'm still being a hermit, so I turned off my status for him too.

Then a few days ago, I decided to go to Franks. I needed company. Franks was as laggy as usual, but I saw a yellow dot on my mini-map and it turned out to be Harper, so I waved in IM. After a brief exchange with her, I saw another yellow dot farther towards the corner and it turned out to be Rapido, so I said hi.

I asked him why he was just sitting there and not dancing. He said he was waiting for me. Uh-huh. LOL. But I needed flattery that day, so I went along. After struggling with the lag, he tp'd me to his rental place instead and we danced for a bit.

Well, it turned out that he's not just a fast talker but a fast mover too. Not that I minded. After sex, he said he had to work and he gave me a link to a radio station. I didn't quite get what the significance was. I thanked him and said I was listening to my own music. He laughed, then he had to go.

Back in my work loft, I tried the link anyway and heard a man with a rich full baritone voice, speaking in Spanish, and some music. The radio program reminded me of radio shows I grew up listening to, with the announcer interrupting the music every so often. The music was fast and had a strong beat and it really wasn't what I enjoy listening to, so I turned it off after a while and went back to listening to Il Divo.

I thought he would be gone the rest of the day, but he logged back in after a couple of hours. I realized that was him on the radio. So, we talked some more and had sex some more, until I was so tired. I logged off at 5:45am.

I usually outlast the men. They log off long before I do, and they don't need as much sex as I do. But I think I've met my match.

The next day, we had sex again before his show. But this time, he logged in using the computer inside the studio and sat with me throughout his show. And this time, I listened. Because I told him that I didn't like the music, he played Frank Sinatra's "Strangers in the Night" and mentioned my name on the air, challenging in Spanish that if I didn't like Frank, then I didn't like the music. When he found out my RL nickname, he mixed it in with other trivia during the show. And he repeated it a few times. I was blown away. After his show, we continued chatting and had sex again.

That's been our routine everyday for the past four days, from 11pm to 5am or 6am. Talking, laughing, learning about each other. He's learning English and I'm relearning Spanish.

And we're defining our boundaries. He's very demanding. He wants exclusivity, for one. After thinking about it and remembering my last affair, I said no. I would give him exclusivity anyway because he fulfills my sexual needs, but I won't promise it. He asked why. I said it's because I've seen way too many men in SL cheat on their wives and their partners. It's not so much because I want to have sex with other men; it's that I don't want to worry if he's having sex with other women. If we're not exclusive, then I wouldn't care if he does. It's not the sex itself that ruins a relationship, but the lost of trust. This way, there are no promises to be broken, because the promise wasn't made in the first place. He laughed but he understood my point.

So, theoretically, we're not exclusive. But, in practice, we are. At least, for now.

Gone

I honestly don't know what happened. All of a sudden, he was avoiding me, he was logging in only when I wasn't in, and he wasn't responding to either emails or IMs.

He had done it to someone else before. Once, when we were chatting, he said he was ignoring a friend who sent him an IM and not responding at all. He said they were meaningless. So, I figured, this time, I became one of the "meaningless".

So, when I finally caught him online, I said my goodbyes as civilly as I could. In a monologue, because he never responded. He probably already muted me by then, like he did his ex.

I don't think I jumped the gun too soon, although my instinct was to run away as fast as I could. But I gave him the benefit of a doubt for almost a week. That was almost half the length of the affair itself.

I had been in a similar situation in the past. Opened my soul to another, who suddenly decided to stop talking to me for no apparent reason. Well, not apparent to me, at least. It was very painful then and I'm sure some of the pain this time around came from that first incident.

I sent him a copy of the monologue by email, just to make sure. I was already hiding from everyone since the day before, to be a hermit for a while. The next day, he removed me from his friends list.

That was last week. I'm still being a hermit.

132.25 kilometers

That's how far I ran this weekend on the Relay for Life track in Second Life. That was about 15.5 laps, with each lap taking 8,500 meters and approximately 45 minutes.

I was up all night, since I had out-of-town friends visiting yesterday, and it's easier at night anyway. Of course, I took breaks too.

This year, I prepared for the hourly themes. But, when one of the DJs on the music stream reminded us of Kimmera Madison's RFL gown, I kept an eye out for it and bought it when I passed by the vendor. I decided to use that instead for the Formal Wear lap, just before the Closing Ceremonies.

Kevlin (who wanted to show me his new shape) tagged along with the "Walk and Talk" for a while. Hans (who came as a cute little ferret) was planning to, but work called his attention and he never got back. Vann came just briefly. But all of them got a luminary. The MODA models joined me at 8am today and we sashayed our way through the lag in our gorgeous gowns. After the Closing Ceremonies, I did one more lap, but, this time, dancing.

What's awesome is that, during the RFL, all the oldbies come out of the woodwork. So many familiar names on the track. Not just friends and acquaintances either, but also people whose names I've only seen as creators on prims.

As of 11am today, the total amount raised was US$214,211.

And, oh, yeah, unlike last year, I already have a boyfriend. ;)

Gone blonde

Well, he met me as a blonde. And he likes blondes. So, ...



Yup, I've gone blonde. :)

There are several reasons I changed the skin too. My old skin doesn't look quite right with blonde. He met my alt in this skin as a blonde (don't ask). He thinks this skin looks "angelic" and softer than my old skin.

I've created brand new alts for lovers before. Alt #9 was a redhead because her lover is attracted to redheads. So, why not go blonde for this new lover?

It's still going well. We still keep talking, talking, talking, like old friends catching up on each other's lives after a lifetime of being apart. Maybe our souls *are* old friends catching up on each other's lives after a lifetime of being apart.

I feel very comfortable around him. No pressure, no rush. And there is a depth of character in him that I never expected and it's a wonderful surprise.

(If you notice another face superimposed over the trees and lake, yup, that's him.)

Gone exclusive

He was born in SL two weeks after I was. In January 9, 2007, he stood two meters away from me during a live music event. (I found a line in my chat logs where my radar said he was "02m" away.)

Yesterday, I met him. Today, we became exclusive. On all alts.

We talked for hours today. We found out we have so many things in common, both in RL and in SL. And we shared the same perspective about SL; we both acknowledge that SL is not separate from RL, and we both know how powerful this medium could be.

After he logged off, I tried to transfer my cuddles HUD and my sex HUD (both from Digital Dreams) from my RP alt to Opal, and I forgot that I had set Opal to busy. SL ate the HUDs; they're not in either inventory. Maybe the universe is trying to tell me something....

(Update: The HUDs eventually showed up in my inventory. I guess I can have sex again. LOL)

"RL takes precedence"

When someone says "RL takes precedence," what they really mean is that you're not important. To them, you're just a doll that they take down from the shelf to play with when they feel like it, then they put you back up on the shelf when they're done.

Of course, they don't like it when you treat them the same way, because, well, *they* are important.

But that's just the way things are. *We* and *ours* are important to ourselves. And everybody else is chopped liver. And we assign greater value to things that are tangible, or at least things that *seem* tangible to us. Except it's too arrogant to admit that, so people just say, "RL takes precedence."

I've never said "RL takes precedence." But if the occasion arises, I hope that I'd be courageously honest enough to say, "I'm sorry, you're not that important to me. Cutting my toenails in RL takes precedence over you in SL."

Benchmarking beauty

Noni Abeyante asked the MODA Spotlight models to create a comp card. I didn't know there was such a thing until now. Apparently, it's like a mini-portfolio / business card for models.

Anyway, after looking at several examples on the web, I came up with this, which is laid out more like a magazine spread.



The hardest part of the process is choosing which pictures to include, even after limiting my choices to the ones where I'm wearing my current skin.

And the paradigm shift of the day is when I looked at old pictures and think, "Oh, my god, I'm so ugly!" even where I thought I looked drop-dead gorgeous when the picture was taken. This is the exact opposite of my reaction when I look at my old RL pictures and realize that I didn't look as bad as I thought when I was younger.

And I've come to the realization that, not only do we not own our beauty as Black says, but our perception of beauty changes, depending on who we are at that point in time. And, maybe, it is also influenced by how much control we have in how we look.