On Saturday 16th June 2012, I headed to Dragon Hall in London’s Covent Garden for (if I remember correctly) my 4th visit to annual polyamory event PolyDay. The first time I attended, I knew no one other than the two people I travelled there with, but these days I can always be sure to spot more than a few familiar faces. The schedule for this year’s event was interesting and I made my session choices in advance, looking forward to some in depth discussions.
Having been exploring poly for a few years now, I began my afternoon with a session entitled Poly 201. This discussion ended up being far too big for the room it had been allocated – fewer newbies than last year! – so we started by moving downstairs to the main hall. Thankfully our facilitators had brought home made cookies and cake to soften the blow of this disruption! There were a great many discussion topics once this workshop got going, but the ones that prompted the most questions were legal aspects and coming out. Some people thought it was a “matter of honour” to be out to all about any and all serious long term relationships, but others acknowledged that it depends on the people in those relationships (and their families) as to whether or not this would be possible.
Next up for me was a session on Polyamory in the Academic World. We were given a brief introduction to the existing research that our session host had done on the subject of consensual non-monogamy, before splitting in to groups to come up with additional questions for the (admittedly small) list of UK researchers in this area to tackle next. My little group came up with questions on linguistics, libido and even eccentricity! Hopefully the first thing that someone will find out for us is just how many people in the UK self identify as non-monogamous in some way, as that seemed to be a common theme across the groups. There really is very little academic research being done in this area of personal relationships.
During the next session, I stepped outside to find food and chat to friends. This left me refreshed and ready for Amanda Jones‘ session on Dealing With The Media. This gave a fascinating look at what to consider when connecting with journalists regarding the complicated, misunderstood and extremely personal topic of polyamory. From print articles to television documentaries and radio interviews, Amanda had useful tips for every scenario and answered many questions from participants who were both enthusiastic and wary. She has offered to write up her notes on her blog, so do keep an eye out for that post if you are keen on speaking to journalists but want to be prepared.
The final session on my list for the day was on Poly Parenting. The people who assembled in the main hall for this were a mixed bunch: parents with kids in tow, those who are planning on becoming parents, and also some people who don’t want kids of their own but who wanted to better understand the needs of those who do. Sadly, this session was so large that I couldn’t hear everything people were saying and so I ducked out early on. However, I heard that it was a useful forum for discussing how parenting and polyamory fit together. This topic perhaps needs a day to itself!
Overall, I found PolyDay to be a useful opportunity to connect with friends, meet new people and discuss topics relevant to my lifestyle choice. As many of the sessions had to switch rooms, I would suggest that the organisers perhaps try to gauge interest in each of the workshops beforehand next year, but no one seemed especially put out by all the moving around. Although I may not have had more than one thing in common with many of the people there, I think there was enough variety in the day to ensure that most folk would find something of interest. Sadly, Monica Heisey’s write up of PolyDay for Vice painted quite a different picture of the day. It wasn’t all about plasticine!