KISSES AND MISSES
'Joker' turns jealous over woman he met in card-game chat

By Tanya Bricking Leach

•	Three's company A boyfriend's best friend (who happens to be a woman) is coming between him and his significant other. Is his girlfriend making something out of nothing? Weigh in by voting online.

We met online a year ago in a euchre chat room. At the time she was still in her marriage but very unhappy. We eventually met (in person), but shortly after she decided to try to reconcile her marriage. I told her we could not continue to be involved, so that she could give her all to the reconciliation. It failed, and we reunited last fall.

While we were apart, she developed a friendship with another man in the same euchre chat room. She has only considered him a friend, but the perception in the chat room was that they were an item. Since we have been back together, I have been uncomfortable with her continuing to have contact with him, especially since we spend a lot of time in that euchre room as a source of contact. She is insistent that I am trying to control her friends. I think it is inappropriate and disrespectful to continue with it, especially since the perception in the chat room is they were an item. What is your advice?

Let me get this straight: You flirted with a married woman in an online chat room. Now that her marriage failed and you're together, you're jealous of her other online friends and worried about the perception of people in a euchre chat room?

My advice? What about this doesn't scream: GET A LIFE!? Listen to yourself. You are worried about what people in an Internet chat room think. That is at least one step away from reality. I'm not even sure if being "back together" with your Queen of Hearts is real or imagined — or in some virtual universe.

No matter, my advice is the same: Get out of the chat room. Turn off the computer. Shuffle your cards somewhere else, perhaps in a real-life Friday-night euchre club. Heck, you can start one yourself and hand-pick the members. How's that for control?

Don't get too cocky, though, because it looks as if you're about one hand away from losing that love of yours. (And, no, you can't control her "send" button when it comes to messaging "friends." She's probably enough of a poker face that she'd fool you into thinking whatever she wants.)

You sound like another Joker in her game of escaping her own reality. You know the odds when you're not the one holding all the cards: You win some, you lose some.

Need advice on a topic close to the heart? Write to relationships writer Tanya Bricking Leach at Kisses and Misses, The Advertiser, P.O. Box 3110, Honolulu, HI 96802; kissesandmisses@honoluluadvertiser.com; or fax 525-8055.