My 'Significant Other'

In 1992 I was out at a small convention call Ne'a'driar which had moved from it's usual venue (Moat House Hotel, Shepperton) to the Runnymede Hotel, Runnymede.  I was there with my friends Miri Rana, Carole Cooper and Alan Frost.  New friends (at the time) Rob Gorman and John Precedo were also due to attend and they arrived with a third person, who they introduced to me as 'Fin'.

He was tall (6') and had unruly black curly hair and a black curly beard.  He looked like he was enjoying himself and he joined up with the rest of us to wander round the convention.  

I found him quite interesting and, by the end of the convention, we exchanged contact details. I was unemployed, he was working for an large Insurance Company in Caterham. 

We talked a couple of times on the phone but didn't meet up again until January 1993. The Far Isles were holding their Twelfth Night  Revel in Caterham, so I contacted him and invited him along.  He proved to be a good servitor and enjoyed the medieval atmosphere.  After that we saw each other regularly...ish, about once or twice a month. (I was looking for work and he was having car problems, something that continues to this day with transport that we use.)  and we went to more revels, where he took on the persona of Sean Haggislayer. 

We grew closer as time went on, attending many events as a couple regularly. Then he was made redundant and decided to go back to college.  That meant a temporary move to Cumbria where he attended Newton Rigg College, staying with good friends, formerly members of the the Far Isles, Gordon and Araya.  That sort of put our relationship  under a great strain, him being 350 miles away.  

I am a fan of the Darkover novels by Marion Zimmer Bradley, and so when Araya suggested that Fin and I become 'Freemates' we did so, making our declarations before all our friends. That helped to cement our relationship.

Fin did his two years at Newton Rigg and then moved down to where he lives and works now, in East Sussex.  Transport and work permitting (He has a very temperamental Honda 125 and has five or six days work a week, and I am working Monday to Friday so  we see each other at weekends when I haven't got household chores to do and he isn't catching up on domestic work himself.

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