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Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/18/84; site masscomp.UUCP
Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!bonnie!masscomp!garyo
From: garyo@masscomp.UUCP (Gary Oberbrunner)
Newsgroups: net.singles
Subject: Re: living with SO
Message-ID: <888@masscomp.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 14-Mar-86 15:01:27 EST
Article-I.D.: masscomp.888
Posted: Fri Mar 14 15:01:27 1986
Date-Received: Sat, 15-Mar-86 04:09:56 EST
References: <793@gamma.UUCP>
Reply-To: garyo@masscomp.UUCP (Gary Oberbrunner)
Followup-To: net.singles
Organization: Masscomp - Westford, MA
Lines: 58
Keywords: soup 'n old clothes
Summary: You are what you is; or character will out

In article <793@gamma.UUCP> tif@gamma.UUCP (Barbara Charles) writes:
>     
>The quote "couples often hide from each other important aspects of their
>true selves" sounds like a cop-out to me, unless the couple has only been
>living with that person for a short while.  If you really "live" with and
>"share with" that person, you can't help but get to know their "true selves."
>Maybe I'm wrong, but at least that's how I feel.  What can you hide from
>someone you live with: false teeth, false eyelashes, that he/she is a slob,
>that you don't like to cook, or that maybe he does, or maybe you don't like
>that he wears jockey short, you want him to wear briefs, etc. (You get the
>message).  I think people have to ask themselves are the things that they
>hide from each are important enough to worry about breaking up over.
>

Unfortunately, a lot more than false eyelashes can get 'hidden' in a
relationship, whether live-in or not.  And often (this is from experience)
with the best of intentions.

   When I first started seeing the person in question, I wanted to be the
best person I could possibly be, partly so she'd think better of me, and
partly because she inspired good behavior just because she seemed so
perfect :-).  So I did my best to spend lots of time with her, give her gifts
of things and time, keep my house clean and do all the things you do when
you're in love.  And I was pretty far gone, so it took a LONG time before I
sat down and took a hard look at the way I was behaving.  What I saw was that
although I was molding myself into a 'better' (in some abstract sense) person
because of her, it wasn't really true to ME - I was pretending to be someone
else for her.  Or for my perception of her.

   After that, I began to be more myself with her.  I stopped cleaning
up all the time so she wouldn't know I was a slob, but more importantly
I stopped cleaning up my HEAD; I stopped policing myself.  This was
after we'd known each other for about two years.  I got a lot more
comfortable with the relationship then, because I was being ME, but she
began to wonder why I'd changed - what had gone wrong with her idyllic
idealized me?

   Fortunately, our communication was good enough for us to work it
out, or at least understand what was happening.  We discovered that
we really didn't know each other as well as we'd thought.  In many
ways, of course, we still had lots in common, and the mutual support
structure we'd built and the crises we'd helped each other through made
us pretty strong.  But the increase in understanding (gad what a
euphemism) definitely changed the nature of the relationship, and
although we eventually broke up we are still very good friends.  But we
found out (I found out?) that without the pretense on my part (and I
now see that it was happening a little on both sides...) we never would
have gotten as involved as we did.

   Well, I can see that I'm rambling here - the point is that even in the
most communicative relationship (and BOY was that one communicative), even
when you think - no, KNOW - that you're being completely open and honest,
and especially when you REALLY care for the other person, things can get
hidden or buried that won't come out for a long time.  But for me, at least,
they always do come out in the end.  As FZ says, you are what you is.

					- take care,
...{harvard,allegra}!masscomp!garyo	  Gary Oberbrunner