Originally Posted by
Airwick
Recently, someone special indicated she wanted to join me on the next tour. I was surprised,...It's exciting, but also scary.
One issue that we need to find a compromise on is staying in touch with friends and family. She's already indicated she's looking forward to blogging, or as I call it, journalizing.
It's her decision, but I know her decision will affect our tour. I'm against it, but want to give touring with a partner (or at least her) a fair shake,....
My brilliant idea is to ask her to limit her daily entries to "eight sentences or less."
Can this be a reasonable compromise?
My tendency is to tread lightly into other people's relationships. However, you did ask, so...
You've indicted in a followup your concern for the time and effort it might take for your companion to blog/journal her trip. Asking her to limit it to eight sentences or less is essentially asking her not to spend any effort or take any time doing it. I don't see the compromise. She gives up blogging (except for the equivalent of a couple of twitter updates) and you give up what?
People tour on bikes for different reasons. For some, its an individual accomplishment. "Gee, look what I did. I rode across the entire US by myself."
For others it's a vacation, a chance to see the country from a bike's perspective and pace. "Gee, look at what I saw on my bike trip."
If you see the pending tour as an opportunity to log another accomplishment and your companion sees it as a chance to spend some time with you and share her experience with friends and family, the seeds of conflict are already sewn. I don't know that I've characterized your motivations accurately at all. You're the best judge of that.
It seems to me, the first order of business is to agree on the purpose and goals of the joint tour. Once you two really agree on that, I think the blogging and other details will work themselves out nicely.