Oh, it’s okay to date (and even sleep with) more than one person, but  as soon as things look to be getting serious, our virtuous hero or heroine must pick one to cling to–and hand the other his/her walking papers. Or be considered a cad, a slut, a very bad person. Of course, if you tire of one lover and dump him or her for someone new in serial monogamy, that’s okay. You’re allowed to work your way through the field, as long as you have the decency to do it one person at a time.

I’ve never bought into that mindset. From the time I discovered orgasms and sex (and in that order), I knew I wanted lots of both. And I saw no good reason why I should limit myself to only one playmate. Alas, wanting and having are two different things. As Spock said to Stonn, his Vulcan rival in Amok Time after winning T’Pring’s hand–and other body parts–in the arena, “After a time, you may find that having is not so pleasing a thing, after all, as wanting. It is not logical. But it is often so.” Well, that’s probably true of someone like T’Pring, who was only interested in either man a means to an end. But it’s not universally true, and it sure as hell isn’t true about sex. Wanting sex is nowhere near as much fun as having sex.

I wanted sex for years before I managed to scratch that itch. I’d like to say “and not for want of trying” but I’d be lying. Shy, introverted, and hindered by a religious upbringing (more out of fear of the consequences if I acted on my desire and got caught, rather than because I believed in the virtue of chastity), I often failed to act on my desires. I also see, in retrospect, a number of missed opportunities; missed, of course, because in my shyness and discomfort, I missed cues that nowadays I’d actually notice. But eventually I succeeded in relieving myself of my unwanted virginity, and spent a year of college having what, at the time, I thought was gloriously exciting sex. Looking back on it, it was pretty bland, unimaginative sex with someone not much more experienced and possibly more inhibited than I was. But at least I was getting laid.

We broke up eventually, since we had nothing in common but sex. And it was much, much too long before I scored again. With someone who introduced me to the concept of polyamory. Multiple sex partners? Sign me up! There’s more to poly than that, of course, but that’s what I heard–and what I liked. We dabbled a little. I had two other partners for a time, though we didn’t see one another often–not nearly as often as I’d have liked. Eventually that primary relationship exploded messily, and I was single again.

Fast-forward a few years, and a couple of other relationships, and I find myself married to Spouse. We have a number of interests in common, including casual sex. So after some discussion, we decide to explore a local sex club. It was scary and exciting beyond belief; we spent over a year visiting regularly, never having sex with anyone else, just watching others having sex in public, and eventually doing so ourselves. Eventually, though, we took the plunge. We swapped with another couple. And then another. We were invited to a sex party, and then another. We fell in with a small group of dedicated swingers. Many others have come and gone (no pun intended), but the core group remains–and it was glorious. It’s still glorious fun, more than a decade later.

They say “write what you know.” So when I began writing with the intent to be published, my experiences informed my fiction. I write erotic romance, with the emphasis on erotic. The requisite “Happily Ever After” ending of traditional romance leaves no room for poly or swinging, but that’s what I enjoy writing most. So I mostly write erotica. The characters, the settings, the events…none of them are taken from real people or places, but I know what it’s like to be in a club or a hotel room, surrounded by naked men and women. I know what it is to see and hear and smell sex happening all around me, or to be the center of attention when I’m part of the couple or group everyone is watching. I couldn’t imagine giving that up, and fortunately, I don’t have to. My spouse enjoys it as much as I do.

It’s not for everyone.

But neither is monogamy.

We don’t think like soldiers. Maybe we should and we might have something that would leave our hearts in tack. Go into the “war” with guns blazing and take out everything that stands in your way.  Of course, it doesn’t always work like that when you join the war and your partner doesn’t.

When you look at the battlefield, you’ll see that there are so many wounded and so few to pick up the pieces. If you’re one of the lucky ones that have found their better half, cherish it and give it your all. It might be the only chance you get.

For all the wonderful authors, let’s stop this war and continue to bring all the lonely hearts some loving through our work. We write for the enjoyment but think of all those people that wish the man in your book…was theirs. You’ve made a lonely heart become a loving heart just by bringing your characters to life.

I hope everyone is having an awesome day and may love find their way to you, if not in real life but through our books.

First, my name is Faith Bicknell-Brown. I’m a repped author, an editor, a teacher, and a mom quickly going insane.

As I was preparing to shower, dress, and ready myself to go into battle with my daughter’s high school principal this morning, I realized that my day to blog here at FAB was today and not tomorrow.

What do I blog about? What do I blog about? What do I…?

I looked over the posts here at FAB and saw a trend of sorts, lol, so I’m going to write about something I discovered last night while talking to my husband, my teens, my teens’ friends, and a couple of my online pals.

I’m intimidating as Hell.

What??? Uh, yeah. I’m intimidating.

I’ve heard that over the years. Even in high school, girls would come up to me and say, “Ya know, I always thought you’d thrash my ass if I tried to talk to you, but once I did, I realized that you’re really nice, funny, and super easy to talk to.”

So why do people think I’m intimidating? My oldest daughter says it’s because I have dark eyes and a very penetrating way of looking at–or through–people when I’m talking to them or watching them. My dau’s bff said it’s because my temper is intense and I’m unpredictable. My youngest dau said that it’s because I have a way of speaking and holding myself that shows I won’t put up with any crap. The hubby insists that I just have an aura that says, ‘don’t piss with  me’ and then add that to my dark eyes and manner of studying someone or making eye contact with them that it freaks people out.

{Shakes head} The thing is that I didn’t REALLY know people felt this way until the past couple of days. Children I don’t know will come up to me and talk my ear off, want me to spend time with them, and remember me from then on, making it a point to seek me out at school or wherever, but adults are afraid to approach me? It just doesn’t make any sense.

My dau’s boyfriend said he was terrified of talking to me about important things because he figured I’d thrash his ass. Again…what??? I replied that I’m one of the most laid back, easygoing people he’ll ever meet. And he remarked that those are the ones you gotta watch out for, lmao.

This made me pause, however. I now worry that when it comes book-signing time readers be afraid to approach me.  Do I sit there with a maniacal smile pasted on my face in the hopes I won’t intimidate anyone?

Is there a magic pill for this condition?

Well, for now, I’ll just utilize it to freak out the moron of a high school principal this morning.

Mwahahaha!

So what kinds of choices? Well, the choice I’m trying to make is how to tell my hubby that I’m taking a part time job at my kids’ karate studio. How should I tell him? Should I wait and tell him with all the kids standing around and shrieking with excitement? Should I call him at work and tell him there so he can’t say anything without other people asking him embarrassing (to him) questions? Should I do it in private so he can rant and rave about how I don’t need to work? Ah, choices.

Oh and for those of you who don’t know me (is there anyone left out there?) I’ve been married for almost 18 years and have eight (yes, that’s right…8) kids. I’ve been a stay at home mom for almost all of my married life.

Back to my choice here. Once upon a time, the choice would have been an easy one. Back at the beginning of my marriage I would have talked it over with him and made a decision with him, most likely taking the job with the understanding that it would be part time and would help our family out. Or even two years ago, I would have let him make the decision for me as I was trying to hold our family together after the death of our youngest son and suffering from a deep depression.

But today I’m a different person. I had my blindfold removed shortly before Christmas and suddenly I could see again. I realized that things had become strained and difficult for everyone because I had not made choices for the last three years. It was time for me to make some.

Sometimes our choices are easy ones. Who’s going to get littlest one a drink while I’m trying to get a scene written down before I lose my train of thought? Easy…which child is closest that I can holler at to do it? Should I make tacos or chicken with stuffing for dinner? Again, easy…tacos, everyone in the family will eat them. Should my characters have sex now or later? (now…now…now)

And then there are those hard ones. Do I stay in a marriage to a man who has admitted he has some serious issues to work through but doesn’t seem to want to actually get help? Who makes promises but doesn’t follow through? If I’m not going to stay, when do I make the decision to leave? After the bankruptcy goes through?  After we have to move from our home? Before all this takes place? What if I want to stay in the marriage? Can I live with a man who acts like Dr Jekyll and Mr. Hyde? When do I draw the line and where is it?

Ah yes, choices. Our lives are full of them and even when we try to ignore them they come back and haunt us, practically begging us to decide on something. We can try to hide from them or run from them but sooner or later they come knocking at the door. Okay, in my case they broke the door down and stomped all over me so I would pay attention…lol. (um, not literally for those who are assuming the worst here)

In thinking about all this I realized there were some things that were almost non-choices, the choice to write, the choice to put my kids first, the choice to keep my family and friends close to me and the choice that I need to be happy too.  These are things that I didn’t even really have to think about.  The hard choices will be made and they will be my choices. Not anyone else’s because I have to live with them, good or bad. They will be made in my time and with a lot of thought. Why? Because like so many of you out there, my choices affect more than just me. They affect my kids, my family, my husband and his family.

Choices…

So what kinds of choices have you made lately?

Yeah, that’s the usual response I get when I meet people in person and say I’m a writer.  Well, it’s actually the second response.  Conversations normally go as follows;

Random person:  “So, what do you do?”

Me:  “I’m a stay-at-home mom, but I also write.”

Random person:  “What do you write about?”

Me:  “Well, I write gay erotic romance.  I’ve had some short stories published and also a novel.  I’m working on the sequel to that right now.”

Random person:  Long pause as they figure out what the hell to say, then, “Oh, that’s um…nice.”

End of conversation.

Over the past couple years since I’ve had my first short story published, I think I’ve figured out a few reasons why I get this pretty standard reaction.  One being when I talk to someone face-to-face, they don’t get the chance to stare at an email while they think of response.  They feel they need to say something fairly quickly since I’m standing in front of them smiling.  But maybe it’s because I am standing in front of them that causes this reaction.  As a guy friend of mine once said to me years ago when I got huffy at him for drooling over a provocatively dressed woman, “Oh, you’re hot too, but you’re like, Marsha Brady hot.”  I never was quite sure how to take that comment, but I translated it into I look like a good girl.  But you know what they say?  It’s the good girls and boys you have to watch out for.

Combine that with the “erotic” part of my statement.  If when I meet people, they instantly get that same impression my friend told me regarding my outward appearance, me spitting out the word erotic just all out stuns them.  It’d be like if there was a very special Brady Bunch episode where Marsha confesses she’s an underage stripper.  You just didn’t see it coming.  And simply being associated with something erotic in any way tends to give the idea that I must be a wild woman swinging naked from a trapeze in my bedroom every night, which so isn’t true.  I’m really clumsy.  I’d be certain to fall off and cause some terrible injury to myself.

The final reason I think people don’t know what to say is by far the saddest, and that’s the bigotry directed toward homosexuality.  Occasionally I get someone who says, “Why do you write that?”  My response, “Because I believe in equal rights, and love is transcendent to gender and sexuality.”  After this declaration, I often see confusion on people’s faces, as if they’re trying to come to grips with this jolt to their minds and beliefs.  Marsha Brady writes hot man-on-man action!  How’d this happen? 

But despite this shock, as the conversation ends and we part ways, I always hold onto the hope that when that person crosses paths with someone deserving of acceptance, whether it’s for sexuality, race, religion, or any of the other so many sad reasons people are singled out, that they’ll show acceptance to them.  Maybe it’s a naïve hope, but I believe acceptance works like a chain reaction.  What a beautiful place the world would be if all preconceived notions could be dropped when we meet a person, and instead of deciding who they must by looking at their outward appearance, we wait until we truly know them as an individual.

Now, that’s not to say confusion is the only reaction I’ve ever gotten when I talk about my writing.  And it’s not to say that I haven’t politely turned down prayers to save my soul, or fought with every bit of my willpower to not burst out laughing at the suggestion I should write children’s books instead (if you’ve read my work, you know why that last suggestion is hysterical), but I’ve also come across people who offer full support.  Those encounters are what swell the hope I have and keep it strong.

So, if you read this and think, “Oh, that’s um…nice,” I’m okay with that.  If you read it and think I’m a total loony, well, you wouldn’t be the first.  Or even if you read this and then think of it the next time you see a Brady Bunch rerun, I’ll take that, too.  But if you read this and think that the next time you meet someone, you’d like to share in the hope I have, then I’ll be overjoyed.

By the way, hello. I’m Karenna Colcroft, and this is my first post on FAB. I’m thrilled to be part of this group, especially with the company I’m in! I write romance and erotic romance under this name, and young adult paranormal under my secret identity. Or maybe this is my secret identity… I haven’t had enough coffee yet today to be sure.

Back to what I was saying. I have a male friend. Actually, several male friends, but this one… Let’s just call him Temptation, since that’s what he is to me. He and I had a little bit of a thing a couple years ago, but it didn’t go anywhere because at the time, he and I lived two hours apart and he’s not into the long-distance thing.

Last summer, I moved in with my fiance. I now live less than a mile from Temptation. Strangely, he vanished for about a year and a half, but about a month before I moved, Temptation showed up at a party at a mutual friend’s house, and we immediately reconnected.

This post, however, isn’t about how tempting he is. I won’t cheat on my fiance, as much fun as it would be to, er, spend some time with Temptation. But I respect my fiance more than that, and Temptation respects me more than that.

Hence the source of the warm fuzzies. Temptation is a very black-and-white kinda guy. He either likes you or he doesn’t. There aren’t a lot of people he likes, and even fewer whom he respects. His respect has to be earned, and it isn’t easy to do so. It’s kind of an honor to be respected by him. He lets even fewer people “in”, and being allowed past even part of his barriers is a huge mark of esteem from him.

I’m honored to be one of those whom he both respects and has allowed, however slightly, “in”. And that has benefits for me, too. When he considers someone a friend, he stands by them no matter what. He and I both belong to a certain chat room. It’s rare for anyone to give me a hard time in there; the regulars know me, and I’m considered one of the nicest people there. Once in a while, though, someone who doesn’t know me so well hassles me.

Which is what happened yesterday. Temptation and I were both in the chat room, bantering as we do sometimes (he’s told me I’m just about the only person he knows who can keep up with his banter) and half-jokingly plotting a new story for me to write, when someone started spouting off about me. I responded, sticking up for myself as much as I could.

Temptation jumped right in, confronting the person and refusing to let up until they apologized to me. And that… Okay, Temptation was angry. He always is when someone gives one of his friends a hard time. And I’ve seen him angry, and it can be a bit scary. But he was sticking up for me, and that gave me the warm fuzzies.

It’s an honor to be his friend and have his respect. And it’s a privilege to have his protection. That’s the warm feeling.

And we’ve all been to the gloomy place where all that loses its lustre. Where silly just becomes stupid, where watching a movie or reading a book sounds better than spending time with our significant (?) other. Where what was once the reason we got up in the morning is now another thing to check on our to-do list.

Surprisingly, that’s the good way to end a relationship. Yes, I know ending and good should create an oxymoron, but it’s true. When you want something to be over, you heal easier, you move on faster, you place the good memories in the treasure-chest of your heart and delete the bad with a small sigh.

But what happens when that magical bond between two people is broken abruptly?

When it’s not the logical result of a succession of events? When someone cheats, lies or just plain lets us down in a way that’s unforgivable? Big words fly high and low in the heat of the moment, even more so when someone is impulsive. “It’s over” is a prevalent phrase we throw around, but how true is it really? Maybe it’s just something we say to hurt the other person the way they hurt us.

Bitterness flows when love ebbs and the hurt takes over. Walking away sometimes is the only thing to do. Or maybe it’s the easiest. Whether it’s heartache or pride that forces us to run, we do. More often than not in this day and age. But what we always seem to forget is that we can run but we can’t hide. From our feelings, from the truth. They follow us around like an annoying shadow, forcing us to go back and pick up the pieces of our broken relationship. Be adults and own up to our mistakes.

You can’t have a fight with only one person.

Greek saying that fits the bill in most cases.

So what happens when the bill’s too much for us to pay, and we realize that we spoke too fast? It’s not always possible to take such a small but powerful word back. Sometimes the hurt we’ve caused by walking away excedes the pain we felt in the first place, and we’re left in limbo. Nowhere to go back to, nowhere to move on to. The chain of reactions has wrapped around our neck and strangles us.

That’s the bittersweet beauty of life though. Pain is also needed so we can learn, adjust, evolve, and hopefully do it right in the future.

So are you a man/woman of your four-letter word? Do you mean it when you tell someone it’s over or do you later regret it?

Feeling alive, excited, desirable, safe, and oh so much still in danger… feeling like every inch of skin could tingle, that our breath could lift us up towards the loved one….

That’s paradise.

Writers are strange creatures sometimes.

To think that sweetness can be found etched into the formerly simple paper of a publishing contract… It doesn’t make sense, if you think about it. Paper is paper. Relationships of any kind are not usually unconditional love and great sex all the time.

Sometimes they are. I keep up my hopes.

The relationship dance often starts with a very small whisper.

A smile on the bus.

A 300 word pitch.

It ends because the other person already has a girl friend.

It ends just because my name wasn’t on the list.

That 300 word pitch.. that was from the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Awards.

I’ll confess that I’m broke enough that the promise of a coupon for a free proof copy enticed me. I’ll also confess that I had my moments of day dreaming about winning the contest. Then I’d be splendid and brilliant and everyone would know it!

The little slights I’ve felt recently would all be redressed! People would see how magnificent I am!

Now, I would like to point out that I’m not alone in either wanting the proof coupon nor in day dreaming about winning.

10,000 of us showed up.

It was a huge Bachelor, and the prize wasn’t even a hunk with a lot of money. Just a little scrap of paper and 15,000 dollars.

There can be such a hole in a person’s soul when a relationship is not accepted, either with a pretty person or with a publisher.

When I’ve come up to the edge of this hole in the past, many people have told me, with great self-righteous certitude I might add, that you have to love yourself first!

As I’ve stood there at this big gapping hole in the past, with those proud ‘wise’ words ringing in my ears, I’ve wondered… just how in the hell does one do that?

It’s not like I don’t want to believe in myself or love myself.

I didn’t wake up and decide that my art was pathetic or my stories lame, or that I, as a person, was just not really up to the standards of our species.

That hole can be filled up with the crazy promise that I will win this time! I’ll win next time! One of my personal favorites, I’ll win a Nobel Prize!  OR So-and-So loves me!

Of the 10,000 hopefuls that entered that contest, gave up their best 300 words, and waited, only 2,000 made it forward. Of those, only 500 will move forward again.

Here’s my pitch:

Don’t go in the cellar.

Cain’s problems didn’t get smaller in Iraq.

Whiskey doesn’t fix anything long enough.

His last chance gets him a job as a caretaker for an old mansion.

It comes with more ghosts than he had before.

Don’t go in the cellar.

A hundred years before a triple homicide made the house notorious.

Shelly Comstock-Gray is still the celebrated murder suspect.

Cain can’t believe the smiling, cheerful ghost hurt anyone.

Mistakes can be deadly.

Don’t go in the cellar.

I thought that was a decent smile… but with nervous fidgets.. looking back, things can always be made better, different, to the point that the pretty person gets off the bus before any smile has even happened.

I expected it to hurt.

Looking down that list, looking for my name… there was a  Winter, but it wasn’t me.

It didn’t hurt though.

Well, maybe just a little.

But it was completely balanced and overcome by kind words from friends, by the strength I have in my close friends.  (The people over at Ethan Day’s group are fantastic, I might add!)

I’ve been doing good things over the last year. Working on my art, writing novels, smiling at people, trying to build friendships… and now I stand at that hole, staring down, and it’s filled up with leaves.  I’m not really sure how it got that way. I wasn’t really doing anything differently than I have done all my life.

I’m pretty sure that those little leaves managed to fill up that hole in my soul because a few great people decided I was worth loving.

Some people like my art. Some people like my writing. I’m making both my art and my writing true to who I am. I like their writing and art.

I don’t feel alone.

So when I smile at some pretty girl on the bus, or boy on the bus, and they aren’t interested in me… it’s just not a good fit. I’ll smile at the next one that catches my eye.

Same thing with publishers. I know my work has good points, bad points. I’m a difficult person to work with sometimes. I’m way too skittish and independent.

I’m not nearly as submissive as I used to think I was. If I was polite and good with lots of rules I had no hand in creating.. then I’d be at a lot of publishers.

I think that relationships and publishers really have a lot in common, or at least our relationship to both does.

I’m not chasing. I’m inviting.

But I’ll go right to the source! No dating service. No agent.

Come here, my sweet reader, come here my darling! I have something wicked and sweet for you!

Come into the river of life with me, my love.

Do you remember your first love?

I think I was 13 when I first fell in love with Allen. He was my 15-year-old next-door neighbor and had the most soulful deep brown eyes and golden blond hair. He played all the sports, had tons of friends, and went to the ‘big’ school, lol. And for the longest time, I didn’t think he even knew I existed.
Way back then, I went to a catholic school in New Brunswick, New Jersey. I was in the middle school, and he was a FRESHMAN in the bigger building just next door. The students over there always looked like they were having so much fun . So, I loved him from afar for a year and a half, and he never knew.
Then came the summer before my freshman year.
Suddenly, he’d stop in front of my house if I was out there or say hello through the window if we happened to catch each other’s eye. Gradually, he began to walk ‘down-street’ with me or come up on the porch to sit and talk for a while at night.
I was beside myself. This Adonis I’d been lusting after for almost two years had finally noticed I was alive. Unfortunately, I became ‘one of the guys’ to him. We hung out all the time, went everywhere together, but he never gave me even the tiniest indication that I was more than a pal. *sigh* Still, you never heard me complain, lol.
August came, and I was really excited about finally going to the ‘big’ school, a freshman. YEAH!

Whoa!! Put on the brakes, missy. Not so fast.
My mother came into my room and dropped the bomb that was sure to decimate my life. “We are moving to Vermont.”
VERMONT?!? Are you effin kidding me? We’re leaving this great city, all my friends, and ALLEN for some hick town in some long forgotten state? Really?

Life was over as I knew it. I was heartbroken, crushed, destroyed, distraught, devastated and any other adjective you can think of. I may have even been a little MAD!
The day we left, I sat in the doorframe of my mother’s VW bus (his name was Willie, but that’s another story), waiting for her to finish up inside the house—okay fine, I may have been sulking—when across the back lawn saunters Allen in all his golden glory. I swear, he always had a golden aura surrounding him. Oh, why am I being punished so greatly?
“So, this is it, huh?” he states with all the esteemed knowledge of the older man he was.
“Yup. It sucks,” I reply. I so don’t want to talk about this with him because I know I’ll start bawling like a baby.
And here it comes folks…
Since I’m here writing this, I obviously didn’t die…but I damn near did. And as I’m remembering all this and jotting it down, the butterflies are swarming in my tummy and my chest is constricting. I shit you not; the memory still gets to me. Wow.
“It sure does suck, Debbie,” he replies. “But I’ll always love you, and I’m gonna miss you forever.”
Before his words even registered in my foggy little brain, he leaned in and planted a 90 second kiss on my lips, came up for air, and goes in again. At this point, I know I’ve transported to some other realm of reality, because when his lips touched mine this time, his hands cradled my head and his tongue begged for permission to enter.
PERMISSION GRANTED, HELLLOO.
The kiss must have lasted for hours—okay well, until we couldn’t breathe any more. Then he just turned and walked away. (Not the last time that happened to me, but alas that’s another story as well.)
WHAT??? I mean, come on! He loved me? Just kissed me like I’ve never been kissed before or since and now he’s gone and I’m leaving for some god forsaken cold-ass country backwoods state and I’ll never see him again? Did it even happen? I touch my hand to my mouth and the moistness remains. Hell yeah it happened.
NOT FAIR I TELL YOU!!
And so began the story of my life. Yes, I am happily married, and yes, I survived the heartbreak (that one and the others to follow) though I don’t know how. But I will never forget my golden boy neighbor and the irony that was our relationship.
As an aside, the following summer I went to the Jersey shore to visit a friend and her family for a couple of weeks. The day before I was to leave, I saw Allen’s sisters on the beach. (Oh, did I forget to mention he had sisters?) Anyway, I asked them if he was there and they said he was working and wouldn’t make it to the beach till the following night. UGGHH!!
I have so often wondered where he is now, what he’s doing, and who the lucky woman is that grabbed his heart. But I like to tell myself I was the first one who had it. Ah, well.
So, who was your first love?