what matters most in a relationship?
i've long thought it was maybe dedication or devotion, maybe communication or cooperation. and while all of those things are awesome and necessary for me to *enjoy* a relationship (of any kind--from work colleague to lover), i've recently come up against the lowest common denominator in my mind: respect.
what's funny is i didn't accord respect much, er, respect in the past. i mean, i respect humanity and individually almost anyone i have more than one chance interaction with. and aside from occasional verbal blunders wherein i accidentally malign a group (saying "boys want to fix, girls want sympathy" to someone who is transitioning female-to-male being my latest foot-in-mouth snafu--generally i believe this to be true but perhaps indelicately phrased at that moment), i act like it in a fairly non-ambiguous way. are you angry after we interact? that was not my goal. did i screw up? i am truly sorry, it was not my intention. do we disagree? fine, but we can do so without name calling or such intense focus that we can't find something to connect and cooperate on as well, even if it's not politics/green hair/religion/what constitutes good sex. heck, i once upon a time hung out with a dude who sent spam email for a living, and though i totally totally disliked his work (and in fact, my work at the time was largely undoing his work!), once he realized that i wasn't into what he did but also wasn't being a dick about it, we grew to have a rather good relationship based on him teaching me hackeysack and me teaching him basic self-defense. this perhaps hearkens back to one of my life philosophies, stolen from the movie the roadie, "everything works if you let it", but no matter, i respect you enough to not hit you or devolve to ad hominem attacks or anything else uncouth.
certainly i do not always get this respect reflected back at me, for instance when i'm riding my bike legally in the middle of an auto lane since there is not enough room for me+car in said lane (this is legal in texas and oregon--ride "as far to the right as is practical and not hazardous", to paraphrase the legalese), and someone in a car behind me is shouting at me to get off the road and passing me unsafely (say, around a blind corner, with inches to spare, at high speed, while shouting and looking at me instead of watching the road. funny how often that all happens in one go. where i mean funny uh-oh, not funny ha-ha). those people i do scream at, usually something like "you just threatened my life." that kind of thing is about as disrespectful a thing i can think of to experience, so i lose a lot of my zen nature when it happens and feel not in the least bad about being angry and derogatory to the actor, particularly since they never even hear my insults. but that's rare, and certainly i will not threaten them (or their protective metal cage) back--i'm not a guy who whips out my u-lock and starts pounding on windows or anything. so while i do not respect them at that moment, neither do i let me disrespect sink to the same level as theirs and even if there is no positive result, at least i didn't make their day memorably worse.
there's also the case of someone like bill-gates-as-microsoft-ceo or george-bush-as-president, where someone is driving an aspect of my life (acting in my name, be it as leader of my country or leader of my industry) in a way that i feel is so totally wrongheaded i just can't find much common ground. and while i was writing that, i realize i can still summon some respect for those guys--gates made it easy once he turned into a huge philanthropist, and bush, well, i have a great (liberal) friend who was an aide of his while governor of texas, and even she has good things to say about him. not total losses, respectwise--i can find things to respect in their lives. fortunately i never met total scum like charles manson or someone who kills kittens in their spare time, i guess?
so, i feel like a respectful person. and maybe i get more respect back as a result. but when i feel disrespected, more than when i feel unliked or unappreciated...if the person who i'm in conflict with can at least offer some respect for me doing what i feel is right...we can carry on in our lives without having to avoid one another. if not...well, not so much. and that was part of what got between me and shads. i don't think she doesn't respect me. but she did some stuff that i felt was disrespectful and didn't really apologize until i prompted for it. in balance, she's mostly respectful, but wasn't in some important areas that got lost for a little while, and so i had to tone down our relationship from "close friends" to "friends that could build something good, again". we'll see how it goes..
what do you think is most important in a relationship? i realize i got a little heady there, but maybe you have something more like "humor", or "does not have an intolerable odor". tell me!
what's funny is i didn't accord respect much, er, respect in the past. i mean, i respect humanity and individually almost anyone i have more than one chance interaction with. and aside from occasional verbal blunders wherein i accidentally malign a group (saying "boys want to fix, girls want sympathy" to someone who is transitioning female-to-male being my latest foot-in-mouth snafu--generally i believe this to be true but perhaps indelicately phrased at that moment), i act like it in a fairly non-ambiguous way. are you angry after we interact? that was not my goal. did i screw up? i am truly sorry, it was not my intention. do we disagree? fine, but we can do so without name calling or such intense focus that we can't find something to connect and cooperate on as well, even if it's not politics/green hair/religion/what constitutes good sex. heck, i once upon a time hung out with a dude who sent spam email for a living, and though i totally totally disliked his work (and in fact, my work at the time was largely undoing his work!), once he realized that i wasn't into what he did but also wasn't being a dick about it, we grew to have a rather good relationship based on him teaching me hackeysack and me teaching him basic self-defense. this perhaps hearkens back to one of my life philosophies, stolen from the movie the roadie, "everything works if you let it", but no matter, i respect you enough to not hit you or devolve to ad hominem attacks or anything else uncouth.
certainly i do not always get this respect reflected back at me, for instance when i'm riding my bike legally in the middle of an auto lane since there is not enough room for me+car in said lane (this is legal in texas and oregon--ride "as far to the right as is practical and not hazardous", to paraphrase the legalese), and someone in a car behind me is shouting at me to get off the road and passing me unsafely (say, around a blind corner, with inches to spare, at high speed, while shouting and looking at me instead of watching the road. funny how often that all happens in one go. where i mean funny uh-oh, not funny ha-ha). those people i do scream at, usually something like "you just threatened my life." that kind of thing is about as disrespectful a thing i can think of to experience, so i lose a lot of my zen nature when it happens and feel not in the least bad about being angry and derogatory to the actor, particularly since they never even hear my insults. but that's rare, and certainly i will not threaten them (or their protective metal cage) back--i'm not a guy who whips out my u-lock and starts pounding on windows or anything. so while i do not respect them at that moment, neither do i let me disrespect sink to the same level as theirs and even if there is no positive result, at least i didn't make their day memorably worse.
there's also the case of someone like bill-gates-as-microsoft-ceo or george-bush-as-president, where someone is driving an aspect of my life (acting in my name, be it as leader of my country or leader of my industry) in a way that i feel is so totally wrongheaded i just can't find much common ground. and while i was writing that, i realize i can still summon some respect for those guys--gates made it easy once he turned into a huge philanthropist, and bush, well, i have a great (liberal) friend who was an aide of his while governor of texas, and even she has good things to say about him. not total losses, respectwise--i can find things to respect in their lives. fortunately i never met total scum like charles manson or someone who kills kittens in their spare time, i guess?
so, i feel like a respectful person. and maybe i get more respect back as a result. but when i feel disrespected, more than when i feel unliked or unappreciated...if the person who i'm in conflict with can at least offer some respect for me doing what i feel is right...we can carry on in our lives without having to avoid one another. if not...well, not so much. and that was part of what got between me and shads. i don't think she doesn't respect me. but she did some stuff that i felt was disrespectful and didn't really apologize until i prompted for it. in balance, she's mostly respectful, but wasn't in some important areas that got lost for a little while, and so i had to tone down our relationship from "close friends" to "friends that could build something good, again". we'll see how it goes..
what do you think is most important in a relationship? i realize i got a little heady there, but maybe you have something more like "humor", or "does not have an intolerable odor". tell me!