Platonic Relationship – …on the B.L.

Seven years ago today, Dylan leaned against my car and asked me to be his girlfriend. I said yes, thinking we’d have a summer fling. We did, but the fling just kept on flinging. I don’t think we could look back on our relationship and call it a fling. We’ve for sure progressed into pawtner territory, which is what we call each other because we are partners in parenting our doggos and in life because that’s just what happens when you build a home with someone.

There is no way I could have known that “yes” would involve moving cross country, starting a new career, adopting a dog, then fourteen whittled down to five more dogs, buying a house, and so many more things. Seven years is such a long time to intertwine lives with someone. It’s been a giant roller coaster. There have been good years and bad years and in between years. We’ve built a life and a family together. We’ve gone through so very much from traveling to moving three times to deaths to COVID to quarantine to not getting paid by the government for months to friend breakups to figuring out who we are to my health issues to so many fucking things, and I don’t hate him. Pretty sure he doesn’t hate me yet either. That’s a win.

Our family is about as far from traditional as we could possibly be, and yet we’re still here making it work every day. It’s not always easy, but we do our best, and most days, that’s good enough. After seven years, there’s not much I don’t know about him and vice versa. He knows me about as well as any human can. And on the bad days, he is the one I come home to and look to for comfort. He’s my best friend, support system, and pawtner.

We’d known each other fourteen days… I thought he was crazy and a saint.

People have never been something I take for granted. I tend to not believe people love me or want me in their life. It’s something I will probably always struggle with. One of the few things in my life I do not question: Dylan’s love for me and my love for him. It’s a choice that we continue to make. We choose to love each other, and that means more because I know his capacity for good and bad and he knows mine. He has had every opportunity to stop loving me, to stop choosing me, and he never has. In my life, that is a gift I do not receive lightly. It is a gift I will forever be grateful for.

Today, I’m looking back at some of my favorite memories we’ve shared. From the ridiculous to the sweet. We’ve lived a life together. I genuinely love our home and family; it means everything to me.

Thirteen days into knowing each other, we went out for my friend’s 21st birthday. I voluntold Dylan to drive. I got so trashed, I ended up peeing my pants and throwing up in his truck. The actual story is far funnier. I lost my underwear in his truck for seven months. I got cocky and mean and an overall shit-show. I woke up thinking I would never hear from this man ever again… I woke up to a text telling me how much he adored me and was grateful I wanted to be with him. So then I thought something was wrong with him… There is, but luckily for me, it’s thinking I’m great.
He loves race cars. It’s why we moved to Houston, but we always had so much fun going to the racetrack together that first summer. I loved watching him race and nerd out on all the things.
We moved to Houston with my clothes, his clothes, my mattress, my kitchen stuff, and that’s really it. The first month in our apartment we sat on a blanket in the middle of the living room. We moved with two weeks notice and almost no money. We were so poor, and we had a blast. (Holy fuck, look at us now. We have too much stuff.)
Adopting Beau was a huge step for us, and one of the best decisions he pressured me into. No regrets. Six and a half years later, she’s still our best girl.
He started cutting my hair when we moved to Houston because I’m too lazy to find a new hairstylist and make an appointment… He still does.
No one is as enthusiastic or supportive of my love of carousels. He hops on with me every time, so we can enjoy it together. Then he lets me ride it alone so he can make sure I get a picture.
During our 2018 trip to Steamboat Springs, Colorado, he let me get him up at 4:30 in the morning so we could watch the hot air balloon festival and the sun rise. It’s still one of my favorite memories.
We moved out of our one bedroom apartment into a bigger apartment in 2019, which allowed me the space to have my first office. Game changer. He pushed for the move, so that I could have the space since I work from home and have no escape.
He didn’t even bat an eye when he walked in the door one day in February 2020 to find a new and very pregnant dog in the house. He just kinda looked at me and went, “So we’re doing this?” And I was like… “It’s up to you!” So now we have six dogs instead of the one.
We bought a house. For the dogs. And ourselves. Mostly for the dogs.
How much he has loved and supported me as best as he can while I navigated my career, my dreams, my travel, my friends, my coming out story. At the end of the day, he is by my side and asks me to just be me because it’s enough.

Bonus

12. He made our home a safe space for me to be me and write what I want to write and feel all of my feelings. He has given me the gift of time. Time to heal and grow and discover and exist. He has shared my pain and joys and burdens and fears. He’s not perfect. Sometimes, he’s a real asshat. But he loves me fiercely, and all he wants is for me to be safe and happy and healthy. And we’re learning how to navigate what that looks like. We’re no longer 23 and 25. We’re in our 30s. We’re entirely different people, and we have found a way to love each other for who we were and who we’ve become. I hope to continue finding ways to love each other in all our variations to come. Because I can’t see my life without the man I thought I’d have a fling with.

Our first picture in our first apartment together.

This was the announcement picture when we rescued the puppies.

We had to announce buying a house with some Pride. I wasn’t an out lesbian yet, but I was a proud pansexual!

A month into dating… We were weird and still are.

December, 2018 at the Art Museum in Chicago.

Baby Kelsey and RaeAnna in December, 2013.

There are people who make you. There are people who break you. There are a few who define you. There are even fewer you can’t imagine living without. There are maybe a handful of people who are all in for the good, the bad, the worse, the horrible, and the healing. Life is hard. Life is really hard, and mine has been a series of uphill battles. People have not been kind and because of that getting to know me is a battle in and of itself.

San Diego. January, 2014. Our first trip together.

I met Kelsey almost six years ago. She was a freshman; I was a senior. I couldn’t tell you what it was about her. Probably a fuck ton of timing. I was raw and broken and alone. I needed a person, and so did she. We became pretty inseparable almost immediately. There’s no sex in this story but a lot of time laying in bed with pets watching stupid TV shows. We both have a deep love of bed, and I’m more comfortable lying in bed with her than anyone else.

In a lot of ways, I found the greatest love story of my life.

Love is tricky even when life is easy. Love takes two parties – at least, it should. Even my dog and I have our ups and downs because we’re two different personalities trying to figure things out as we go. When people love people, well, that’s even harder. People talk. Beau vocalizes. At the end of the day, I feed Beau. Unlike Beau, Kelsey has a choice to be with me. She can feed herself. Also my baggage is pretty fucking heavy. Kelsey didn’t teach me love doesn’t have to be accompanied by bruises or conditions or violence or abuse. She did put love, the real kind, into action, though. She showed me kindness, compassion, respect without ever judging me or making me feel less than. I never saw fear or hatred or pity in her eyes. There was only ever love. Sometimes, sadness. When you love someone, pain is shared, and she has shared mine.

That time Kelsey said I could do heights and I about shit my pants. Spring Break, 2014.

I have made careers and relationships out of hiding who I am and being what other people want. My life for decades was based on pretending and hiding. Unconditional love was a theory; it belonged to other people. The lucky ones. For me, love was bought and sold and revoked. It was anything but free. I spent years searching and working and grasping at something that wasn’t even love to begin with. I put up with abuse and violence because “I love you” was whispered in there somewhere. All I had was words. Love isn’t a word; it’s a verb.

Kelsey may be the only person in the entire world who truly loves me unconditionally. I am unfiltered and utterly me with her. I am never anything but me. Some days, I’m funny and loud and obnoxious and so embarrassing. Some days, I’m in a bad mood. Some days, I cry and cry and cry. Some days, I’m strong. Most days, I’m broken and a little bit of everything. I am quiet. I like quiet; though, most people wouldn’t know it. I talk and make jokes because people don’t ask questions when someone seems open. Kelsey is the only person who doesn’t ask if something’s wrong if I go without talking. She asks questions when I’m ready, but mostly she lets me tell her when I can. She doesn’t push. She respects who I am, no matter who that person is in the moment. Because she knows who I am and where I’ve been. More importantly, she never asks for more than I can give. She sees me and accepts me and doesn’t want anything else.

That time we randomly went to Wisconsin for lunch. 2015.

There are things in my life I’m working through. Have been working through for a lot longer than Kelsey has been in my life. Six years ago, there was a massive upheaval of the few things and people keeping me sane. The first ounce of happiness and stability in my entire life was suddenly gone, and everything else started to disappear along with it. I lost so much so quickly. I was spiralling and raw in a way that I would really like to never be again. Because of that upheaval, I was able to be open with this random 18 year old. For some unknown reason, she didn’t say “Fuck this crazy.” Instead she dug in and dealt with problems no one should ever have to deal with.

The good, the bad, the worse, the horrible, and the healing. Kelsey didn’t become my friend during the good. She hopped in at worse. Then, she watched me hit horrible and stay there for a long time before we got to healing. Maybe, she’ll get good one of these days. She didn’t put me back together again. She gave me a safe space to get it wrong over and over and over again. She continues to watch me put the same pieces together in different orders trying to figure out which way the belong. Hopefully someday, I’ll get it right.

Love stories are often between a boy and a girl who lock eyes across a room and just know. That’s great and all. (Other than being heteronormative. Girl and girl. Boy and boy. Fluid and queer. You do you!) I think some of the most important love stories in our lives are the ones that have nothing to do with sex. Platonic love is just as powerful, if not more so, than the romantic. I have loved men in an all consuming kind of way. They have shaped me, and some have even defined who I would become. No one has ever loved me the way my best friend has. We will never say vows or file taxes together or have children or any number of other quantifiers placed on a successful relationship. Instead, we choose to love each other’s crazy every goddamn day.

Kelsey isn’t perfect. She’s stubborn and picky and moody and a royal pain in my ass. She can be an absolute bitch sometimes. (I can say that because I’m her person. If anyone else calls her that, I will end them.) The thing is, she’s human. She is also kind and generous and smart and strong and patient and funny. She has seen hell and continues on. She is the greatest cat mom ever. Her love for Doodle makes mothers of humans question their love for their child. Kelsey is intensely everything I need in life. I can honestly tell you, there is a huge chance I would not be in this world if it weren’t for her. At the very least, without her, I would be in a very different place in my life, and it would not be better. She became my family and opened up her home to me. She is the person I talk to most. She knows just about everything there is to know about me. My world is better because she is in it.

I need Kelsey in a way I will never need another person. She is my person, and I am hers.

Today is her birthday. I think I could probably write books about our relationship and what she means to me. I love her with all of my heart, and I have so much gratitude for everything she has done for me over the past six years. I refer to our friendship as a love story because it goes beyond friendship. It’s not just coffee or vacation. It’s a relationship. It’s a partnership. It is two people who have shaped and been shaped by one another. I wish I could be with her to celebrate today, but instead I will see her in a week and a half.

Tag: Platonic Relationship

11… Memories We’ve Made Over Seven Years

Happy Birthday Kelsey