Pairs With Spares

Nicole, James and Rebecca acknowledge that a group marriage requires work that a monogamous one does not. "At first, I felt interrupted all the time," says Rebecca. "We all have different communication styles."

"Sure, if I'm putting the baby to bed for two hours while they're having hot sex, I get annoyed," says Nicole. "But it's not because they're having sex without me. It's because I'm really tired and I've been putting a baby to bed for two hours."

A group of grandmotherly women -- who all may be in a relationship, it's a little unclear -- stop by to admire the toddler.

Feeling shy, the child is out of his seat again, angling for more cake. James gets out of his chair, ready to run interference, and takes a moment to exchange a glance with his two partners. It's a look that clearly says, "We really need a fourth."

* * *

When you watch people interact at Poly Living, it can seem that we humans have no idea what makes people happy inside relationships, or what arrangements people need to navigate the world.

Serena Anderlini-D'Onofrio, a professor who traveled to Pennsylvania from Puerto Rico for the conference, puts it this way: "What is my sexuality? I don't know. I'm an artist. One day I paint a face, the next day I paint a landscape. Why should I paint the same thing every day?"

There is, however, jealousy. Everyone at Poly Living has a story about jealousy, or sometimes, a story about non-jealousy. Michael Rios, a poly from Arlington with mad-professor hair and a goatee, likes to tell about the time that he spent four hours on the phone with his wife's new boyfriend, trying to convince him that he was totally cool with them dating.

The wife and Rios aren't together anymore, but he and his current partner, Sarah Taub, still count her among their closest friends. Rios, 59, has been similarly supportive of Taub's other relationships.

She'd come home from Boston, where a romantic interest lived, "and Michael would just smell wrong," says Taub, 39, wearing a tie-dye shirt and sharing an orange with Rios. "There was always a period of adjustment that could be a little tense."

"At first you denied it," Rios says reassuringly. "But that was your process of self-discovery."

But most of the stories are about actual jealousy, especially from mono-poly couples, the ones in which one half of the relationship never planned on sharing.

Joe LaVasseur and his girlfriend, Victoria, who asked that her last name be excluded because her other partner is not out, were a couple like this. They met four years ago, and by the time LaVasseur, a 25-year-old with a shaved head, wire-rimmed glasses and owly, thoughtful eyes, learned Victoria, 28, was poly ("Something I had no experience with," he says), he was too smitten to stop seeing her.

The couple are sitting on a couch outside a conference room at the convention, waiting for a seminar on improving communication between personality types (he procrastinates; she doesn't). Victoria, who has long, thick hair and perfect, porcelain doll skin, rubs LaVasseur's shoulders. He absent-mindedly kisses her hand.

"It was hard," LaVasseur says. "I'd always identified my self-worth by my relationships. I felt really insecure that I wasn't enough for her."

They developed a system. If Victoria so much as thinks she's interested in someone else, she tells LaVasseur immediately. "Then, later, I'll say, 'I'm thinking about kissing them,' " says Victoria. "And then, 'I'm thinking about getting serious.' "

Ironically, what's helped LaVasseur's jealousy the most was meeting his girlfriend's other partner, with whom she lives. He recognized how different he and the other guy were, and realized that what Victoria got out of that other relationship would not compete with what they had together.

There is thoughtfulness, mindfulness, that goes into each one of their interactions. (A favorite poly joke: "Swingers have sex. Polys have conversations.")

Whatever their lifestyle is, it's not easy, and it doesn't allow for a whole lot of me-time. "Sometimes," says Victoria, "I have to pull out my planner and say, 'We have three hours on Sunday. Want to see a movie?' "

Later that night, Victoria and LaVasseur have signed up to be facilitators at a cuddle party -- a nonsexual outlet for people of all ages to spoon, tickle, pat and snuggle each other. It requires facilitators because cuddle parties come with 40 minutes' worth of rules on how to snuggle respectfully.

The two of them aren't sitting anywhere near each other; in fact, LaVasseur is demonstrating proper cuddle etiquette with another woman, one old enough to be his mother.

Victoria looks on contentedly; she catches his eye and they smile.

They seem ridiculously in love.