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I’m thinking about things in my life that hinted at normative positions I hold now (relationship anarchy, anarchic in general, queer gender identity, vegan). Some of them have really nothing at all that I can remember (vegan) but others do.
Like I think in 3rd grade I actually played around with gender a lot lol. Had lots of girl friends and had longer hair, liked being misgendered(I specifically remember a time at McDonalds when I was offered a girl toy and later when the principal gendered me wrong on a fieldtrip)
Also the Barbie stuff was important to me too. Idk it’s interesting tho how I feel like that stuff stopped being a focus for a long while, and there was probably a great deal of social correction by parents or others and I just kinda went w it, def was not supported to explore
Oh and just to note none of this is like “see! I was x all along!” More like just thinking about influences and how precious dispositions and experiences impacted present
For RA, in high school I def struggled with understanding romance as a distinct thing, and also struggled with monogamy as it felt too constraining.
I have more to say but I have to get ready now, maybe finish later
Ok so for beds, I think I was exposed to this idea early, maybe middle school or high school, and I just loved it. Just bc you live w a “romantic” “partner” doesn’t mean you have to share a bed/room always, or that not sharing means uoure fighting. Sometimes you just need space
And time for the fault of no one, and it’s nice to have a space that feels like relaxing and safe. Gail was always p sketch on the idea but I always had it in mind when thinking about future cohabitation
That is to say I found variable living situations appealing, and that just because there are norms around relationships doesn’t mean you must conform.
Next things are things I learned from/with gail, and were brought up today when talking w parents
1st was my broad use of love. She would tell friends all the time she loved them, including me, and it always felt really nice and warm. Removing that word from a pedastal was super important to me, and continues to be super powerful conception for me to make sense of things
Especially considering the weird shit w Sydney and “I don’t L O V E you I just L O V you” LOL dank memes
Next thing was learning about jealousy. I don’t know what my disposition was like about jealousy prior to Gail, but she had lots of guy friends and I think that was really cool for me (working on heteronormative assumptions) to fix a lot of biases most ppl deal with
I still remember having certain issues with her guy friends but often I think that had to deal with their behavior, which was often coming onto her when she was not interested. There’s always a risk of me understating jealous motivations, but it honestly feels like a lot of it