Finding someone who is single and interesting is challenging enough. Throw in the poly requirement and the search for love takes on a whole new twist.
So regular poly meet-ups were born.
Online, in living rooms and at happy hours, meet-ups are being hosted so members of the Valley’s polyamorous community have opportunities to meet, swap stories and talk through the highs and lows of the alternative lifestyle.
One such group, Western Mass Poly People, organizes on the website Meetup.com. Kristen, 28, of Northampton, founded the group one night last year while her husband was out on a date.
“It took me a while to adjust to the fact that he was poly,” she said. “So I read some books and listened to podcasts, and now I’ve made it a part of who I am.”
In August, Western Mass Poly People had a meet-up in the downstairs private event room at Mama Iguana’s Mexican restaurant on Main Street in Northampton. The room was slightly claustrophobic and conference-like, but the atmosphere was buoyed by margarita table service. They allowed a reporter to drop by on the condition that everyone remain on a first-name basis.
The 15 people at the meeting ranged in age from mid-20s to mid-70s. Colin, from Williamsburg, has had an open, but not polyamorous, marriage with his wife for 18 years. Karen from Shelburne Falls was monogamously married for 37 years before she left her husband and realized she found the “level of freedom” she needed from the poly community.
The topic that night was “new relationship energy.” How do you support partners when they start to date someone new? And, if a partner suffers heartbreak, how do you react?
“I just try to be a supportive guy,” says Colin. “It doesn’t matter if my wife’s upset about the PTA or a household chore or her new boyfriend. Whatever experiences she’s having, it’s an incredible compliment to me that she always comes back home to talk about it.”
Supporting a primary partner is easier when the third party simply turns out to be a jerk, he adds. “My wife just broke up with a guy like that.”
He turns to Molly from Holyoke. “You know who he is.”
She nods. “Oh yeah, him. I date his wife’s boyfriend.”
The group considers what to do when your lover is involved with a jerk; whether members like to be in relationships with a certain type of person, or whether they choose lovers with wildly different interests and outlooks on life.
Dawn from Worthington remembers feeling jealous when her husband started dating her friend Mel. “But then I got involved with Mel myself, and it helped me to see what a good person she is. Now I don’t feel jealous anymore.”
Dawn and Mel live with their husbands in an open double-marriage. As Dawn explains: “I’m dating her, and her husband, and my husband’s dating her, but he’s not dating her husband.”
Another moment of reflection from the group, marked by the thoughtful crunching of tortilla chips.
For more information about Western Mass Poly People go to Meetup.com and search for the group. WMPP now holds their meetings at the Platinum Pony in Easthampton.•
