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RELATING & DATING: BEYOND THE HOOKUP

A 5-Part Salon Series. Relate and Date Differently!

Open? Closed? It’s Complicated.

Love, Sex, Jealousy & Agreements

featuring

Jordan Costen & Jerry St. Louis

moderators of The Queer and Kinky Couch Podcast

Are you looking for an open or closed relationship, or do you just wanna "kick it?

Exploring? ...Or just avoiding the conversation?

Open relationships. Closed relationships. Situations, "entanglements", or "friends with benefits". Whatever we call it, somebody still has to communicate.

The next installment of Fertile Ground Salon’s Relating & Dating Series returns with real talk about the many ways Black gay and same-gender-loving men date, love, connect, and have sex.

Some of us want an exclusive relationship. Others are exploring open relationships, casual intimacy, friends with benefits, or something nobody has quite defined yet. But many of us are afraid to talk about it. So what happens when the feelings are real—but the rules are fuzzy?

Together, we’ll get into:

• What an open relationship really requires

• How to talk about opening—or closing—a current relationship

• Situations & Entanglements: Are we satisfied or settling?

• Friends with benefits: is it working for you?

• Sharing fantasies, kinks, and sexual curiosity

• Dating “preferences” and the people we rule out

Jordan and Jerry are Black gay licensed therapists who bring insight, personal experience, humor, and candor to conversations about relationships, sexuality, pleasure, and mental health.

Through @theQueerandKinkyCouch, they tackle the questions people are already discussing with their friends—just with better tools and fewer side-eyes.

Did you know what day Saturday, June 27th is?

National HIV Testing Day

Heart to Hand of Prince George's County will provide confidential onsite HIV testing for National HIV Testing Day.

Come, know your status, grab a bite, meet somebody new, and join the conversation.

GOOD BITES & GROWN VIBES.

Come ready to eat, sip, laugh, connect, and say what you really think.

Seats are limited. Register now.

This is the third of five salon discussions designed to move us through clarity, readiness, skill , & practice.

OPEN ACCESS | COMMUNITY SUPPORTED

• Fertile Ground salons are usually without charge and produced through collective investment.

• Even with all-volunteer staff, the true cost for each salon approaches $100 per guest (venue, food, beverage, overhead, collaborators).

• We invite you to contribute at a level that reflects the value you experience and the future you want to see sustained.

• We appreciate you. Only your support makes this possible.

• Suggested Community Investment Donation: $50 | $75 | $100+

Fertile Ground Salon is a non-profit community outreach program of Creative Stepping Stones, Inc., a 501(c)(3) organization.

PARKING

• Free parking is available at the adjacent parking lot.