“What if being polyamorous makes us realize we want to be monogamous?” Brad asked me the other day.

“Then I’ll consider it a success.” I said.

The fact is, I’ll consider our journey into polyamory a success no matter where it takes us.

I went on my first date since Brad the other night. It was nice – some sort of soul music and wine downtown. He seemed a little shy and quiet. He had a long beard and an Appalachian accent – from what I could tell over the music – an interesting contrast to the Midwestern love of my life.

Three glasses of wine in, I asked if we could take a walk because I couldn’t hear a word he was saying. In true Southern gentleman style, he offered me his coat. I can’t remember much of what we said to each other, but I remember enjoying myself. Although still a stranger, his eyes and speech revealed him as a good, honest person.

I have no idea if it will go anywhere, but the important thing is I had fun in the moment. I’ll never have a first date with Brad again, so it was nice to have a first date with someone, to experience that mystery and anticipation of the unknown.

After five years together, Brad is mostly known to me. And that has a whole other value – trust, history, familiarity, security, friendship and lasting love. I never want to lose that.

All I want is to learn to live in the moment, spontaneously, fully. Polyamory is part of that quest. I can’t live spontaneously and according to my desires in each moment, if my whole romantic life is mapped out and set in stone. My love for Brad can’t be alive and real if we’re only together because a piece of paper says we’re legally bonded and financially entangled together.

Something about being aware of the fact that Brad and I are free to love another – and another – gives us a whole new appreciation for each other. Seeing or even thinking about Brad with another woman is the spark that reignites my passion for him. And apparently the thought of me with another man helps him to see me in a fresh light as well.

Watching me get dressed for my date gave him the urge to have me right then and there. And since my date we’ve been fighting less.

And yesterday, we had the moment I’d been waiting for. The rare moment, when two people want each other, with the same intensity, at the same time. The moment when love comes naturally and doesn’t need to be forced or feigned. The moment where two old, familiar bodies become vibrant and new – where they join together in mutual ecstasy, and then hold each other until the tremors quiet into peaceful bliss.

Thanks to polyamory, I’m truly learning to live in the moment, without trying to escape it.