A tale of two Thanksgivings

Two households, two different time zones, two very different holidays ....

We drove down to visit my parents yesterday for Thanksgiving. We had thought about staying home, but Wife was not feeling up to all the cooking so we drove the two hours instead. And all in all, the day went unexpectedly well. My brother and his girlfriend were there, my folks prepared twice as much food as we could possibly have eaten, and everything went pretty well. Wife and my father even managed to discuss politics civilly, intelligently, and without screaming at each other. (After 25 years you would think that this would no longer be noteworthy, because they would have learned to skate around each other. But trust me, it's noteworthy.) We spent the night, were well-fed again this morning at breakfast, and finally hit the road for home. No dramatic news, but a pleasant (and filling!) visit all around. Just what Thanksgiving ought to be.
____________________

Meanwhile, in another place far far away, D asked her husband for a divorce.

Early Thursday morning, she sent me an e-mail which said, in part:

I asked [my husband] for a divorce. I set a period of six months to reflect and consider the options, but I don't have any real doubt that my decision at the end of the waiting period will be the same as it is today. I simply said that I found it impossible to live without sex and that I saw no possibility of that changing in our relationship. Then I basically let him hammer me as a person and accepted his critique. It's not easy to accept that I have deeply hurt and rejected someone who has always been a good husband, excellent father and fine human being because he was unwilling to conform to my views on sexuality and human attractiveness. It is not, I am painfully aware, anything you have ever done to Wife, who clearly gained as much weight as [my husband]-if not a great deal more-and yet you loved her and made love to her. I cannot do likewise. And believe me, Hosea, if I could have willed it different, I would have done so. [My husband] finds my views controlling (It's your way or the highway, I was angrily told), shallow, stubborn, bitterly unkind, and deeply wounding. He is furious with me, and I have to own all the anger because on the deepest level, to refuse to love someone for who they are is a very great sin. I simply don't know how to change, and to fake something I cannot feel seems to betray sexuality on every level.

[My husband] rightly said that at one point he lost 90 pounds and it made no difference in our sex life. He is right on both accounts; my only answer is that he was still furious with me, and gained all the weight back very quickly. Even if we had wanted to work on the relationship-a partnership that had been gone for ten years and needed some long term repair- we never had the time. Second, it became extremely clear that he lost the weight only to prove me wrong.... God, Hosea...how bad do I come across here? Terrible, I know. All I can say-and it's not a defense-is that the physical matters to me. I love your mind and your amazing ability with words and abstract concepts, but when I make love to you, it's your body I embrace, your scent and sweat that cause me to swoon, your mouth that pleasures mine...all the attributes of a beautifully built man that Cavafy celebrates so well. I simply don't know what else to say.

This news upset me a lot. OK, partly I admit I get really irrational on the subject of divorce. It is a lot easier for me to cope with adultery than with divorce. I try to keep my opinions under control on this site because I know that a lot of people in the blogosphere have very different lives and experiences from me ... but you have probably already picked up on my general attitude. (After all, if divorce weren't a really big deal to me, what are the odds that I would still be with Wife?)

I also can't escape the feeling that D made this move with me in mind. If not ... well, what else has changed in her life in the last several years? Her husband has been fat and out of shape for years now; she has been unable to feel any attraction for him throughout all that time. And yet, through all those years she never asked him for a divorce. Now she does ... although she admits that the cost to her will be very high, because she claims to be a devout Catholic and divorce will mean that she is permanently denied the Eucharist. What has changed? What is the relevant variable in the equation? I see only one thing ... and that is her affair with me. So notwithstanding any protestations from her to the contrary, I can't help wondering if this move was sparked at some level by our meeting in a hotel room a week and a half ago for two nights of rapturous fucking.

Anyway, I panicked. Thursday morning, just before we all left for my parents' house, I sent her an e-mail asking basically, "What? Are you sure? And by the way, are you doing this on my account, because you think I'm going to leave Wife right away, or she's going to die or something?" Then we left, and I was out of touch for ... well, maybe about 30 hours more or less.

I came back to no fewer than three long e-mails, overflowing with anger and hurt and umbrage. Hadn't she already said that she knew I would never leave Wife? (Umm, yeah, she has said that ... but why else would she seek a divorce exactly now?) How could I possibly think that she saw marriage purely one-dimensionally? (I dunno ... isn't that more or less what she herself said above?) And what the hell do I know about Catholicism anyway, to allow me to question her commitment to it? (Not enough, I admit ... but the things she herself has told me make the stakes sound pretty high and is she sure this is really what she wants to do?)

What is it with me and emotionally high-maintenance women, anyway? Have I asked this before?

I don't know where this conversation is going to end up. As soon as we got back and I read her three, I wrote her an e-mail apologizing for hurting her; she replied that of course she loves me and forgives me so never mind about all that; and about an hour ago I finished one more e-mail to her explaining that I still don't understand her motivations. I have no idea what she is going to say or where this is going.

Never a dull moment, huh? Happy Thanksgiving.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch ..., 2

Normally I wouldn't write a whole new post just to reply to comments. I may have an inflated sense of the value of my own writing, but not quite that inflated. On the other hand, I started to reply to a small number of comments on yesterday's post and found myself writing quite a lot. So I figured maybe I should put my reply into a regular post after all, if only because the margins are wider and it will fit better .... :-)

So here goes.

First, as a general remark, I have to say Thank you again, all of you -- as always -- for your support. I've been discussing the issues with D too, and haven't come to a lot of solidity yet. (One of these days I'm going to break down and give D the URL to this blog, just to get out of so much double-typing. You have no idea how close I have come more than once.)

Kyra wrote in part: "Well of course I should have anticipated this. But I was so wrapped up in anticipation over your visit with D ... that I didn't think about it....

But obviously that is trivial compared to the other events. How disturbing it must be for you to learn such things. Would you normally be doing some of those things? I ask because what I find most disturbing is whether she shut down more than normal and if so, why? Your last sentences are haunting. I hope that is not the reason why. I wonder actually if she might have shut down because of your absence. Given how important you said it was to Wife that she be independent perhaps that is as haunting as your last sentences.

So what will you do now with this information? Will you stop her from driving? And is her condition terminal in that way?

Double hugs for you, K.

PS and yes, of course I want to hear how things are with D now."

Kyra -- First of all, thank you for the compliment. Since you too write a blog with a clear narrative line (the whole divorce saga, at present), I am especially flattered to hear that my story is so compelling. (I mean, it is pretty compelling to me, but then I live it.)

Yes, normally I would be doing almost all those other tasks: taking the boys to their evening commitments, making dinner ... these days pretty much anything that has to happen after 6pm is mine. I have mentioned that Wife's health and energy levels are deteriorating visibly, and some time soon I should post a few more details to explain this.

At the same time, it is also undeniable that Wife is more likely to break down when I leave. For years I had noticed that she got sick reliably within 24 hours of my plane leaving the ground. The first few years I had to travel for work, she would call me a day into my trip telling me she was sick and I had to come back. (Once she called me because the cat had gotten out and she needed my help retrieving her ... at a distance of how many miles?) I finally pointed out this pattern to her, and she got really offended, as if I were claiming that her illnesses hadn't been real but were only ploys to manipulate me. Well, that idea had crossed my mind (in truth) but I had already rejected it because it didn't fit the data ... by which I mean that I could usually see she was still sick when I got home. So what I told her in reply was that no, my point had been about the stress it caused her for me to leave. Because we all know that stress makes one more likely to get sick, especially if one is already in fragile health. The irony is that I make Wife so crazy in so many ways ... but I don't think she has any clue what she would ever do without me. I have said this before, I think, but without giving all of the reasons why.

What will I do now? I honestly don't know. I think it would be very hard for me to stop her from driving; on the other hand, D has said unequivocally that I have to make arrangements before my next trip for someone else to drive the boys as much as possible, so that they are not in her car when she is behind the wheel. If I set this up (somehow!) as a convenience to her, she will probably accept it.

Terminal? In the long run, yes. (See my reply to L., below.) In the short run, typically not. Meanwhile thanks for the hugs. And you want me to run straight back to the story of D? You're a born romantic, aren't you?

Coquette wrote in part: "Sounds like some fairly serious depression. Is your wife on meds for that? If so, does she also see a psychologist? Have you had her back to the doctor in any case to check?

The depression could certainly be the result of Boyfriend 5's cancellation..."

Wife is under the care of a rheumatologist, a neurologist, an internist, and a psychiatrist. She is indeed on a cocktail of psychiatric medications, along with a bunch of others, to address her severe, "treatment-resistant" cyclic depression. And her rheumatologist recently ran a bunch of bloodwork to try to understand why she has been so sick lately. He has encouraged her to seek out an Ear, Nose, and Throat specialist as well, but she has not been able to summon up the motivation to make the phone calls. Nor has she had the motivation to follow up on her bloodwork.

Her depression could certainly be influenced by Boyfriend 5's no-show. But I wouldn't quite say "caused". Certainly she suffered with it decades before Boyfriend 5 came on the scene. Plus she is in touch with him daily by IM. But yes, no doubt it is a contributing factor.

Veni wrote in part: "I believe ... that your wife has had a difficult time getting her medication properly? Is she actually taking it?" Wife has indeed had a difficult time getting some of her medications (not all), but she takes her anti-depressant cocktail religiously. That having been said, her psychiatrist is currently adjusting the mix for her. November was probably not the right month in which to make this experiment, since it is one her her two nadirs during the year. But he is new for her (her old psychiatrist recently retired) and is kind of feeling his way. Also, he's meeting with her once a week with the idea of heading off any downward spirals. Still, I am not completely sure that she is exerting the effort to comunicate clearly with him.

And finally, L., wrote in part: "So, Hosea, what's wrong with her? Is it depression or something physical?"

Wife's two primary diagnoses are: depression (on the mental plane) and lupus or SLE (systemic lupus erythematosus). There are a number of secondary diagnoses that go along with these or contribute to them, such as ADD or (according to her newest psychiatrist) a mild case of OCD exacerbating the depression; along with fibromyalgia and some other auto-immune diseases in the wake of the lupus.

The lupus is terminal but not yet. By this I mean that there is no known cure (yet) so someday it will do her in. However, most lupus patients die ultimately from the toxic effects of their medication. This process takes decades, and lupus has been known to get a lot easier in some women after menopause. (Nobody knows why.) So there is a possibility that she could get enough better to go off of much of her medication, some time before the mdication kills her. Or maybe not. Again, nobody knows for sure. Wife's rheumatologist is confident that one day a cure will be discovered, but he is not certain that Wife will live to see it.

Based on the experiences of a lot of other people she has talked to, Wife has tended to assume that the lupus would give her another decade or so. But nothing about it is certain. The boys have grown up for as long as they can remember knowing that Mommy is sick and that one day she'll die ... just not right away. I'm not sure how they have internalized this.

It's late and I can't keep my eyes open. I'll come back to polish this later.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch ...

While I was away on my business trip, what was going on at home?

The developments about which I was eagerest to learn were all about Boyfriend 5. But after all that thought and preparation, this was a pure anticlimax. The day he was supposed to arrive, he IM'ed Wife to tell her something terrible had happened (his father was attacked by political enemies and lay broken in the hospital) ... and while of course he was willing to come anyway, because he had said that he would, nonetheless he felt torn in two because he couldn't stop thinking about his poor suffering father by whose side he felt he ought to stay. I must admit he showed (as he does too often) a true mastery at plucking Wife's heartstrings like a banjo; and of course she said no, no, you have to stay there. We'll find another time.

I'm really not very surprised. While I had to plan as if he were going to show up, my cynical side never really expected him to. I had been half thinking all along that he would announce a crisis at the last minute, and -- sure enough! -- he did exactly that. At some level, I have to wonder what Wife thought of his story. I mean, if he were travelling by conventional means and were coming all the way from the Old Country, he would already have been en route by the time this calamity transpired, which means he probably would have gone ahead and shown up anyway. On the other hand if the family can really teleport -- and he claims that his father is a far more powerful magician than he is, so presumably he can teleport better -- then how could enemies ever attack him in the first place? Why couldn't he just vanish and reappear somewhere else? But of course I no longer expect Wife to dissect these stories analytically.

Oh, I almost forgot -- in other news, Boyfriend 5 says he is a vampire. Wife does not appear to have laughed in his virtual face. (Hey, don't look at me. I don't write this stuff; I just report it.)

Far more important in the long run, I think, is the state of Wife's health.

Wife has been really tired for the last several months -- most of the year, in fact. She isn't eating, or not much. She sleeps a lot. When she gets tired, she simply shuts down. She has been going to bed between 7:00 and 8:00 in the evening. So it was no surprise to me when she e-mailed me that the boys were not getting driven to any of their evening commitments -- she had tried to arrange help, had not succeeded, and couldn't do it herself. OK, well none of that will make the sky fall in.

But Tuesday she had a regularly-scheduled parent-teacher conference with Son 2's teacher. In the past, her conferences with this woman have always been very ... well, let's call them "engaged." By this I mean that Wife is usually fighting with the teacher, demanding special assignments for our boys (each of them in turn) so that they are more challenged than they will ever be with normal homework. Wife used to teach, after all, and she has strong opinions and high ambitions for our children. But the teacher actually telephoned me in a far city, the next evening, to say she was worried about Wife -- apparently because they didn't fight during this week's conference. The way she put it was that Wife was usually ... "advocating" for the kids very strenuously; and this time she was calm, almost bored. "Yeah, well Son 2 doesn't seem to want to challenge himself much. Oh, is that what you are going to assign him? That's nice, ... whatever ...." The change was dramatic enough that she wondered if there were a problem with Wife's medications, or indeed if it was safe for Wife to drive.

The answer to that last questions appear to be "Maybe not." When I got home on Thursday, Wife was lying apparently asleep on her bed (although she responded a little to my coming in); Son 2 was sitting next to her reading. Son 1 was still at school.

I asked Son 2 about the week. Oh, it was fine. Here's the mail; there's the stack of bills that Mom saved for you.

Were you and Son 1 a big help for Mom? Yes, Dad -- well, basically she would go to bed as soon as she got home from picking Son 1 up at school. Then we would get dinner for ourselves and do our homework and stuff.

Mom really fell asleep that early? Yeah -- actually one afternoon it was pretty scary because we had to keep talking to her the whole way back from getting Son 1 at school, so she wouldn't fall asleep while she was driving. But we got home fine, so it was OK. I'm glad you're back, Daddy.

Stories like this are a little scary. And it doesn't help when I talk to Wife, as I did this morning, and she says she finds she can no longer care enough to fix herself food, or to fight with our son's teacher, or to do any of a hundred things she used to do.

I cannot help but be reminded of a story that Bertrand Russell used to tell:

"My grandmother was a woman of caustic and biting wit. When she was eighty-three, she became kind and gentle. I had never found her so reasonable. She noticed the change in herself, and, reading the handwriting on the wall, she said to me, "Bertie, I'll soon be dead." And she soon was."

First date

I am away from home on business. Never mind exactly where, just suffice it to say that Wife and the kids are in a different time zone. This morning, as I left my hotel room for work, D left the same room to travel 700 miles back to her home and her job, from which she had taken a couple of "personal days". This evening, after spending a scant 10 hours apart, she called me on the telephone and we talked for two hours, making me wonder whether we had not perhaps been magically transformed back into high school students when I wasn't looking.

How on earth did we get here?

All month, it seems, I have been promising a post analyzing my current situation with D, unpacking my motivations, trying to understand what is going on. That post is not this one. I still mean to write it -- heck, D wants to read it too, or at any rate she wants answers to the same questions. But tonight I am going to write narrative, while it is still fresh in my mind. As too often in real life, analysis and understanding will have to wait till later ....

Ever since the end of last month, I have known that I had a date with D for the first couple nights of this week. In the ensuing weeks we worked out the logistics, although obstacles seemed to manifest out of thin air. It didn't help that D was still talking on the phone with Wife every afternoon, and Wife would liven up her litany of complaints about her life with aimless comments to the effect that I drink too much (not true) and snore like a freight train (no idea if this is true or not). This led D to e-mail me in a hurry asking how much alcohol she should expect me to drink each night (answer: none -- I really had an entirely different vice on my mind!) and when I was planning to tell her about the snoring because she is such a light sleeper. It is almost as if Wife suspected D's interest, and was trying to scare her off. (Maybe that's even true.) In any event, we finally sorted through all the arrangements, and I got on the plane Sunday morning for the city where I am now.

By remarkable good luck, D flies on the same carrier as I do, and lands at the same terminal; this means that she doesn't have to cross the security check and is sitting at my gate waiting for me when I get off the plane. She looks up and sees me, smiles, puts down her book, stands up ... and the next thing I remember is that we are kissing. Really kissing. The most we had ever exchanged before was a friendly hug and a light peck on the cheek, ... but this is Very Serious Kissing. When we break for air (and to go get my luggage), D is breathing hard and looks like a drowning woman who has just been pulled ashore. So we collect my suitcase, hail the airport shuttle, and rent a car; and we punctuate each stop along the way with ... another kiss.

Arrive at hotel. Check in. Find room. Once in the room, I call home as always: "Hi sweetheart, just letting you know I got here safely. Hope you're all doing fine. Did Son 1 win his game? Oh, that's too bad. Is he doing his homework now? I see. Well, it was a long flight, so I'm going to unpack and maybe find some dinner. I love you too; give my love to the boys. Bye." Click.

And now, where where we? Oh right, ... kissing.

D and I are standing, embracing, kissing. She runs her fingers through my hair; I caress her back through her sweater. When she starts to unbutton my shirt, I move my hands around to do likewise ... and she giggles nervously. "Oh well, I guess you have to see me," she says. For all the desperate "hunger" she has articulated so eloquently in her e-mails, D is embarrassed at the prospect of my seeing her undressed. Now, at one level I understand this: D is in her mid-fifties; she has the better part of a decade on me in age. But it's not so easy to fuck with your clothes on. So she finally, a little ruefully, parts with her sweater, her shirt, her very plain and functional bra, her pants .... And my God, if ever there were a woman with nothing to be embarrassed about! D is beautiful. Her skin is soft and smooth and delicate. Her breasts are perfectly shaped -- you would never know they fed two children, except perhaps by how delectable her nipples look. The hair on her head is mostly grey by now; but her pubic hair is thick and rich and there is not a grey hair in sight. I am in awe.

There is no way I can keep this a straight, chronological narrative, because from here the exact sequence gets all confused. We never get dinner that night. We never even order room service. From the time we undress until we finally turn out the light is easily four hours, maybe closer to five. But a couple of details stand out.

At one point D cradles me in her arms, and she says "I am learning so much about you that I never knew."

"Like what?"

"I'm learning that you are desperately shy. Hosea, I've known you for almost twenty years, and I never knew that before! But I can feel it all through your body, as I run my hands over you."

Well, of course she is right. It's hard to see it, because I do my best not to act shy -- ironically, it's generally the people who "know me best" who have the hardest time seeing this. But I talk about it a little bit in this post, and I discuss it with Jane in the comments afterwards. And there is no mask you can wear when you are naked in bed with somebody.

Actually, I suppose it was pretty easy for her to tell. D is as sexy as any woman I can imagine; to hold her and caress her is sheer glory. But something -- and I agree with her diagnosis of shyness -- crippled me in the most embarrassing possible way for a guy in bed. [Three cheers for the anonymity of blogs!] If D herself had not been so loving, I would have been truly humiliated. But she said she knew it was shyness and nothing else -- that she could feel it through my skin, and that it was obvious from how I held her.

One positive consequence of this unexpected disability is that it gave me a lot of time to focus all over D's body -- to kiss, to lick, to suckle, to stroke, to caress, to rub. And she enjoyed every bit of the attention -- ecstatically, abundantly, and over and over and over again! After years of Wife's depressingly permanent anorgasmia, I found D's endless enthusiasm to be a deep joy and profoundly gratifying.

Besides, the "crippling effect" did not last forever. Way, way, way too long by my lights ... but not forever.

What more can I say? We finally turn out the lights -- way too late, considering I have to work in the morning. We sleep. D says I don't snore (at least, not that night). Monday morning I get ready for work, while D gazes at me adoringly. And Monday evening, when I get back to the hotel, it is more or less the same again. Dazzling. Exciting. And hours long.

OK, Monday evening we actually do interrupt to get a shower and order room service. And we punctuate the sex with conversation. We even talk about Wife, although D is feeling increasingly conflicted about her dual relationship as my lover and Wife's confidante. But the gist of the evening is the same, and we still turn out the lights far too late.

And Tuesday morning -- with sore regrets for the unimaginative limitations imposed by the real world -- we go our separate ways. I spend the day missing her, only paying half attention at work. And in the evening, just before our two-hour phone call, I get an e-mail from her.

When I had first landed at the airport, I gave D a book of poems by Constantine Cavafy, a poet whose work I love, and of whom she had never heard. In her e-mail to me, she wrote:

I spent the flight reading Cavafy...truly lovely poetry and remarkably easy to read. Looking out the window, all I could see was your face and eyes...my sense of wonder and delight is much better expressed by this Cavafy poem:

...I saw a beautiful body
that Eros must have fashioned with his boundless skill,
designing with delight the symmetrical limbs,
moulding the tall, sculpted frame,
tenderly drawing the face,
and bestowing, with a touch of his hand,
a feeling on the brow, in the eyes and on the lips.
.

Wife's brave decision ...?

So, ... after all the discussion in this counseling session, ... after the further analysis in this phone call, ... what did Wife finally decide to do about my request for a copy of the hotel receipt?

What else? She came as close as she could to pleasing everybody, by agreeing to pay for the room herself. That was the one escape clause which Boyfriend 5 had given her; plus, this way she could give me what I asked for and the worst case is I would complain about the cost. Since she believes that I always complain about the cost of everything (especially in cases where I keep my mouth scrupulously shut), this prospect doesn't seem so bad to her. So everybody gets more or less what they asked for, she doesn't have to feel "caught in the middle," and she doesn't have to make any really hard choices.

I thought there was a chance that she might really engage with the question of personal responsibility. I thought there was a possibility that she might really raise her sights above victimhood, that she might see herself making responsible choices in difficult situations while flanked with the risk of loss on both sides, that seeing this would lift her self-image to the point that she no longer felt trapped and victimized by life.

Why do I ever get my hopes up any more?

.

"Like iron filings to a magnet"

A couple hours after this counseling session, I telephoned D and we talked for an hour. Since she hadn't spoken to Wife that day, she asked me how the session went and I summarized it for her.

Of course she agreed right away that this was progress, and that it is high time somebody kicked Wife in the ass about accepting some responsibility for the situations she creates around herself. D is every bit as sick as I am of Wife's perpetual victimhood and cowardice. And I expressed the fond hope that exercising her ability to make choices in conditions of high responsibility could help strengthen Wife's backbone in other parts of her life.

D demurred for a bit, and finally urged a qualification. Yes, the act of choosing responsibly might itself be strengthening, insofar as it means Wife would have to stop seeing herself as a victim. But, she added, to leave it at that would be to fail to understand that either way Wife risks losing a whole lot ... and that this loss could actually be emotionally weakening. Of course D conceded that what Wife would lose by choosing against me is a lot of real, tangible stuff. But she reminded me that the power of fantasy is so strong for Wife that losing Boyfriend 5 could be just as hard for her. Still, she soberly agreed that it would be good for Wife to have to make a choice in full awareness of the consequences, and that this could be an opportunity to help make things better between Wife and me.

But at that point D got very quiet, very serious, almost solemn. Why? Well, of course as Wife's friend she wants whatever is to Wife's long-term benefit. And as she loves me, so she wants me to get what I want too, and it is clear that in a perfect world I would like things to improve between Wife and me.

But Hosea, if Wife chooses to come back to you and the two of you decide to make it work, ... then where does that leave us?

Ooops. Probably should have seen that one coming. But I didn't. Does anybody know if they give out prizes for cluelessness?

I wasn't sure what to say to this. I was tempted to ask, Why does it have to leave us anywhere? God knows it wouldn't be the first time in history that a married man found himself fucking both his wife and his mistress. And the whole character of our affair -- the emotional and intellectual timbre -- is sure to be completely different from the character of my marriage with Wife. Besides which, D herself is still married. And when I asked her once what her plans for that marriage were, I got back a long paragraph of ruminations that ended in saying she didn't know. So how much difference does it make whether our marriages are functional or not?

On the other hand, D admits that she is a lot more possessive than Wife; while she grudgingly concedes that Wife has the prior claim on my time and attention -- or rather, let's cut the crap, the prior claim on my bed -- she's not happy about it and she wouldn't tolerate her husband having a mistress that she knew about. So I think that in some ways, D may be rationalizing this whole engagement on the grounds that she's currently not fucking her husband (because he has a bunch of health problems, and has let himself get dreadfully out of shape, and physical attractiveness matters a lot to D), and I'm not fucking Wife. If either of those changed, she might start having more troubles with it.

On the third hand, D has also admitted that there really is no rationalizing or justifying this affair, outside the affair itself. There is no line of argument that makes it "right". So in that case, I have to wonder why it makes any difference what either of us is doing with our respective spouse? But I guess this will be an ongoing topic.

Anyway, back to the question: where does that leave us?

I still didn't know what to say, so D started picking her way through the topic. Back when we first began talking about sex and infidelity, I had summarized for her some of the thoughts that I have spelled out at greater length in some of the posts on this blog. I had also pointed out the experience of some of the other infidelity bloggers in our community, that their affairs ultimately spiralled completely out of their control and put them at risk for significant heartbreak or desolation one way or another. At the time, she had more or less dismissed the suggestion that the risk was that great, writing, "All creative activity imposes limits; it doesn't have to be a tragic situation filled with tears and heartbreak.... We are, for better or worse, adults." But Thursday, on the phone, she admitted that she was starting to question her earlier sang-froid. Looking at her own feelings -- jealousy, possessiveness, insecurity -- when she contemplated the prospect that things might improve between Wife and me, she agreed that yes indeed there is the possibility of significant catastrophe down this road. The tears and heartbreak might prove to be real after all.

But we are going into it with our eyes open. We both realize that this kind of emotional disaster is a possible -- perhaps even likely -- outcome; but we hope that there will be enough intrinsic value in the affair itself to be worth it. D chuckled a little bit and remarked that in some ways this was really stupid -- why on earth would we sign up voluntarily for something that we knew could turn out so badly? But then she answered her own question:

"You know, Hosea -- it doesn't matter. You could show me all the reasons in the world to stay away, and I couldn't do it. Right now I am attracted to you like iron filings to a magnet. Whatever happens to me after that, I'll just have to deal with it."

And to that, I think, there is no answer. Besides, it is intoxicating to hear.
.

Counseling 15

In the last episode of our soggy melodrama, Wife had agreed not to bring Boyfriend 5 to the house, but to go rent a hotel room for them to meet in some time next week. A couple of days later, I made the obvious follow-on remark to Wife that of course it is very easy to say she's going to meet him in a hotel and then bring him to the house anyway -- after all, I'll be out of town -- so could I please have a photocopy of the receipt? Surely it would have been obvious to anybody I was going to ask for this. It was obvious to all of you, wasn't it?

But it seemed to take Wife by surprise. She said she'd have to ask Boyfriend 5. Then she never got back to me.

So when we met Thursday in Counselor's office, I asked about it. Is this OK? Can I get the photocopy?

Apparently the answer was No. Or, well, mostly No. When Wife asked Boyfriend 5, so she says, he got very angry and insulted. I was trying to control him. I was trying to force him to do one little nit-picking thing after another. If he was going to pay for the room, then I shouldn't have the slightest say in anything. He should be free to come and go as he likes. What's the problem, don't I trust him? [insert smirk here] I should be willing to take his word on things without having to check. And so on, and on, and on .... He conceded grudgingly that if Wife paid the hotel bill, then he would have no say in the matter; but he still didn't like it. (I should note that Boyfriend 5 always gets really mad when he wants to scare Wife away from probing in a certain direction; in retrospect, this last-minute concession of his makes me think the real issue is that he fears my getting his credit card information. Or maybe he just wanted to make her pick up the tab while still looking gallant?)

When Wife finished relaying this second-hand tirade, I commented simply that no, of course I don't trust him. She knows that already. And when it comes to this kind of thing, I don't trust her either. Again, this is hardly news. So without a receipt, I have to assume that they went around behind my back. Without a receipt, I have to assume that they came to the house after agreeing not to. Without a receipt, I have to assume that it is no longer possible for me to make agreements with Wife about anything, because if she pretends to agree to something it is only for the purpose of duping or exploiting me. I didn't quite want to threaten her with something irreversible, but I wanted to make it clear that this is not a minor issue to me.

Wife, for her part, responded in an absolutely classic fashion: she's just a victim caught in the middle between the two of us, trying to placate us both; the problem is that neither of us will accommodate the other; whatever happens, one of us will walk away unhappy ....

And at this moment both Counselor and I seized on the last point and said, Exactly!

From there, Counselor and I more or less tag-teamed Wife. I no longer remember who said what. But both of us insisted that Wife is the one in a position of power here, because one way or another she is going to make a decision on the question of the receipt. That decision will mean either that she takes a stand with Boyfriend 5 to face me down ("Hosea, you're not getting a receipt!"), or that she takes a stand with me to face him down ("Boyfriend 5, either you agree that Hosea gets the receipt or don't come."). But one way or another, she is going to tell one of us, "I'm choosing for the other guy and you don't get what you want."

Will one of us walk away unhappy? You bet. While the choice is hers, and while it is free in the sense that it is uncoerced, it is not free in the sense of being without cost. Choosing either direction will have consequences, probably serious consequences. So she has to shoulder the responsibility for those consequences. She can't find a way to make everybody happy, so she has to choose whom she is going to make unhappy. She might feel sorry in the abstract, but she will choose to do it anyway because that choice is less bad than the alternative. And she has to realize that this is a position of power -- indeed, she holds the most power in this whole enterprise. The mask of helplessness that she has hidden behind for years now just doesn't fit any more. She can no longer afford the cowardice that has made her wear it for so long.

"But either way I choose, I'm probably going to end up losing one relationship or the other."

And Counselor said, "Maybe what you are seeing is that if you are true to yourself, you can't keep both relationships anyway."

Wife walked out of his office at the end of the hour looking a very somber and unhappy woman. And all I could think was "Hallelujah!"
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Was this just a backrub? part 2

At the same time that I posted yesterday's story and question below, I sent it to D in an e-mail. The substance of her answer agreed with all the responses I got here, but the tone was far more urgent. She wrote as follows:

Hosea, any court I've worked for would consider the behavior you describe as totally inappropriate -- wildly so -- and any lawyer with training in sexual matters would consider the request part of an attempt to groom the child for further sexualized behavior. That may ultimately be with the groomer, or with other partners the groomer arranges for the child. Hosea, you MUST intervene here and insist that all touching behaviors without clothes on (and I'd suggest that neither child or adult should appear without clothes in front of the other after eight or nine) -- particularly by the adult, but also for the child -- be avoided. Boundaries! It's not a matter of being a sexual prude -- I'm not -- but there is a world of research that suggests that family dynamics involving sexuality are highly charged in our society. Ask yourself -- if Son 2 talked about his behavior with his mother with friends or teachers (the teachers would be required by law to contact the authories. Absolutely. I would if a child told me what you described. I'd be fired in a heartbeat if this came out in court and it was clear I had not notified the authorities.), would he be ridiculed or feel embarrassed when he found that his friends had no such experiences? If the answer is yes -- and it is -- then it's inappropriate, and any court would consider it damaging to the child and want it to stop. Lotion? Come on, Hosea. I use it every day and have never asked a child to apply it. This isn't something done for her because she's ill, it's for low level sexual gratification, those "little grey areas" you once humorously mentioned, but there is nothing remotely funny about this behavior. By allowing it to be continue you can be held for 'neglect', for failing to stop something you knew was happening and should have known was harmful for the child. She could be charged with 'abuse' , the most serious charge, and risk losing her child. Scary? Yes. Professionally accurate? Yes again. Do something -- today -- and make it stick.

I think we have lots to discuss. Thank you for asking for my view. I realize I sound harsh, but if you could see my face and feel my hands touching yours with compassion, you'd realize that I saw a whole lot in the five years I was a GAL [Guardian ad litem], and nothing you describe is new to me. That said, I also know the consequences, and how difficult it is for the child to deal with the shame and confusion such blurred boundaries present. I have every reason to believe you will protect your children -- just do it.

Wow.

None of the comments I got yesterday were quite as intense, but everybody expressed discomfort with the story. This reassured me, because I felt discomfort too. That's why I asked the question. And here's what I did:

My very first reaction was not to know quite what to do, so I tried calling D -- even though it was an unexpected time, and a great essay on how not to get busted says never to call at unexpected times. But my call rolled directly into D’s voice mail, from which I deduced either that she was on the phone or that she had shut your phone off. However, I took seriously her injunction that this could not wait, and so I decided to wing it.

My next step was to take Son 2 for a walk. He asked "Am I in trouble?" and I assured him that he absolutely was not. But I asked him about lotioning Wife's front, and had he done this before? He said quite clearly that he had done it only once before last night (for a total of twice ever). The first time, it was at Wife's instigation or suggestion. The second time (that would have to mean last night) it was his idea, "Because I know that area builds up a lot of dead, dry skin, and lotion is the best way to get rid of dead skin." But why did I ask? I have to admit I stammered a bit while trying to figure out the right way to put it; but finally I just pointed out that a woman's breasts are part of the private areas of her body, and ....

Well, I got no farther than that and Son 2 shot ahead of me down the sidewalk. He was plainly either embarrassed or ashamed. When I caught up with him, he said "So I am in trouble!" And I had to take some time to explain to him that no, he wasn't in trouble. Yes, it was inappropriate for him to be lotioning Wife's breasts; yes, if he mentioned that to one of his friends or teachers, they would probably get upset. But no, that didn't mean that he was at fault! How could he be, if no-one had ever taught him that it was inappropriate? Could he explain the Pythagorean Theorem if nobody ever taught it to him? I just wanted to explain this to him now, so that he would understand and there wouldn't be an issue later. We ended up talking far longer about why I wasn't mad at him, than about why he shouldn't lotion Wife's breasts. But in the end, I think he understood both points.

Next, I went to talk to Wife. She was lying down, back in the bedroom. "So, did you and Son 2 have a nice walk?"

"Yes, we did. I was talking to Son 2 about lotioning your front last night."

Click. I could almost see and hear her defenses falling into place.

"So you told him all about why he's not supposed to do that?"

"No, I really didn't have to explain that at all. When I pointed out that breasts are a private part of the body, he understood immediately and was very embarrassed. Or ashamed. Most of what I had to explain to him was that it wasn't his fault."

Wife said very little to that, and indeed said almost nothing throughout the "discussion". I used the example of a daughter, and pointed out that if, hypothetically, we had a ten year old daughter who had been lotioning me when I was stark naked, all it would have taken is one phone call by Wife to make sure I never saw my children again. Of course Wife told me that her intentions had not been sexual. Rather than contradicting her (which would mean either telling her she was lying, or telling her she didn't understand her own motives -- and I didn't look forward to either of those discussions), I added simply that the intentions of a man being lotioned by his daughter might not start off sexual either ... but then suddenly instead of being 10 she's 14, and things spiral out of control. Wouldn't she be alarmed if I allowed a daughter to lotion me while I was naked?

She said that she didn't know ... that it was hard to put herself in that situation.

Privately I think that means just that she didn't want to accept the obvious implications, but I didn't say that. What I said was, "Are you sure? Don't you think you would actually say 'Hey, stop! I've been a victim of sexual abuse, so I know that it starts slow and subtle! I know that it starts with things that look like they might be innocent! But I also know that's not where it ends, and I'm not going to let my daughter suffer the same way I suffered!' Wouldn't you say that instead?"

She was resolutely silent to that question.

Since Wife was clearly not going to engage in the conversation, I just wrapped it up by repeating the basic idea why this behavior looks so inappropriate, and by reminding her that I had already explained it to Son 2. I hope this is enough. Knowing how embarrassed Son 2 gets at the slightest mention of romance or sex, I think it may be.

You know, I'm sure that in Wife's conscious mind, there was no sexual intention. But I think her conscious mind is not the whole story. For years, Wife has been very jealous of her relationship with Son 2; for years she has cultivated it, and I have always had a general unease that she has trouble knowing where to put the boundaries. (I mean, I think that boundaries have often been a problem for Wife in general; but I think the problem is more pronounced in her relationship with Son 2 than in almost any other.) Partly, this may be a result of her own sexual abuse when she was a girl ... what I have read suggests to me that those who were abused are often foggier on what is an appropriate boundary than those who were not. But I think another part of it is just that Wife is so desperately hungry for love (of all forms), but she can't bring herself to ask for (e.g.) physical love from me. So I think she is trying to fill that hunger with her children, who still love her unconditionally and from whom she is still willing to accept love. It's not a pretty situation, but I think that may be part of it.

Was this just a backrub?

I want your opinion on something that happened this evening. I can't decide quite what to think, other than that it looked very odd.

The boys were getting ready for bed; Son 2 had already taken his shower, Son 1 was in the shower. Son 2 offered to rub lotion on Wife's back, which he does often. She generally reciprocates by giving him a backrub afterwards. I was in the next room on the computer. When I came into the bedroom for something, Son 2 [age 10] was rubbing lotion between Wife's breasts; she had rolled over on her back stark naked for him to lotion her front. Later, after the boys went to bed, I asked her if she thought there was anything unusual about that. She said no she didn't, and in fact she has let him lotion her like that a few times before, but she was also too groggy to be able to discuss it at all clearly. So after trying to carry on a conversation for a few minutes, I gave up and let her sleep.

Anyway, I'm trying to decide. Is this something bland and boring and not even worth noticing? Is it offbeat but no more than that? Or do I have reason to be disturbed? I am reasonably sure that if I polled the PTA, it would not show up as a majority practice -- but after all, what does that prove? Nothing, I realize. So I am not quite sure what to think, and an opinion would be welcome. Even if it is a stupid question, by all means feel free to tell me so ....

Sixfold trivia

I have been tagged by Gotta Change It over at Chicken Scratch for a meme. Here are the rules:

1. Link to the person who tagged you
2. Post the rules on your blog
3. Share six non-important things/habits/quirks about yourself
4. Tag six random people at the end of your post by linking to their blogs
5. Let each random person know they have been tagged by leaving a comment on his/her website
__________

Six unimportant things about me? Let's see if I can narrow it down to only six ....

1. My grandfather worked on the Manhattan Project. (No, you've never heard of him. Trust me.)

2. My family moved once a year from the time I was born until I was 7. We're talking big moves, too: across the country, to another country, that kind of thing. The first neighborhood that I remember well enough to be nostalgic about it is a good three thousand miles from where I live today.

3. When I was 9, I had a supporting role in a made-for-TV movie. We're only talking about a one-hour after-school special -- something with a totally impossible plot -- but I got out of school for a couple of weeks while it was being filmed, and it was a lot of fun. (No, you haven't seen it. That was a long time ago, and it has since plunged into a well-deserved obscurity.) A couple of years later, I made a TV ad for Mazda, as they were introducing the "rotary engine." (Again, you haven't seen it. Heck, I never saw it.)

4. When I was applying to colleges, I was accepted by Harvard but turned them down in favor of a tiny institution that nobody else at my high school had ever heard of.

5. The first girl that ever got naked for me was my next-door neighbor when we were both 4. The next one was a girlfriend my senior year of college. (I was pretty shy.) The third one was Wife (although it happened a year before we actually got married).

6. Speaking of shy .... I am always very quiet and mousy in a new or unusual situation. (This baffles people who know me well, who can never get me to shut up.) In particular, I always start new jobs as The Quiet Guy ... you know, the one who tries his best to disappear against the wallpaper? Despite this, it always happens -- at every job I have ever held -- that one day I am introduced to somebody who says, "Oh, so you're Hosea. I've heard so much about you." (A variant experience is that I walk down the hall and someone I have never seen before in my life waves and shouts "Hi there, Hosea!" on his way past.)


Now I have to tag six other people who haven't already done this meme:

L, over at Melted Candy
Coquette, over at Meeting Madison
Infidel, over at Infidel at the Gates
Apollo, over at Apollo's Fire
KJ, over at Space Between
Titus the Lazy Philosopher, over at Philosophy of Infidelity

Counseling 14, Discussing her plans

Well, contrary to D's fears on the subject, Wife told me today about her plans to see Boyfriend 5 the week I am out of town.

We were just getting settled, and Counselor asked if we remembered where we had left off last week. Yes, I volunteered -- we were talking about the possibility of Boyfriend 5 visiting some time, and you suggested that we brainstorm together to figure out how to handle the logistics of it. But we haven't done any of that brainstorming yet, because our schedules these days mean that we rarely talk at all.

At that point, Wife spoke up and mentioned the news that Boyfriend 5 might be able to come to town one day while I was gone. I probably should have acted more surprised, so that she would be less likely to think I might have heard it before. But as it was, I simply smirked at the suggestion that the timing was a remarkable coincidence. Imagine that it should just so happen the one week he was free was the week I would be gone ...! Who'd a thunk it?

OK, what about the logistics? Where are you going to meet? You remember I don't want them in the house, right ...?

I remember, Wife replied. But I don't want to spend all bloody day in a coffee shop drinking stale coffee. Besides, you have to remember that these guys are terrorists. (Oh yeah, forgot that part) There is a price on the heads of the whole family, so they never want to stay out in the open long. Therefore I really want to bring him to the house.

Counselor kept trying to interrupt to explore the process we were going through, and to make sure we could express our feelings about it. Any other time I would have gone along with him, but today I was a little impatient: Sure, that's great, we should explore that stuff -- but you heard Wife. She's talking about a visit planned for two weeks from now. Let's get the plans nailed down now and then go back to discuss our feelings about it all.

So, I asked Wife, do you have any other ideas about where you and Boyfriend 5 could meet?

No, she said. None. Well, OK a couple, but I know they won't work.

Like what?

Well, I guess if your only objection was to him coming to the house, then maybe we could meet at a hotel or something. But I know you won't accept that either.

This was the point I had been waiting for. In fact, while I knew nothing about the timing until D's phone call yesterday, I knew that Wife and Boyfriend 5 had discussed the possibility of checking into a hotel, and Boyfriend 5 had told her very confidently, Hosea will not accept that alternative. Hosea claims that his only concern is for your safety or that I don't steal the silver spoons, but all he really wants is to control your every move. There is no way he will accept his wife meeting a strange man in a hotel room.

So of course I said yes.

Naturally it wasn't quite that easy. Counselor kept asking me what exactly it was that made me not want them in the house. (I insisted I didn't want to go there right now, or we'd never get back to the topic at hand.) Wife had a bunch of complaints about hotels, like she wouldn't have our bookshelf handy in case she wanted to look up something to read to them, or she wouldn't have a kitchen handy in case they wanted lunch, or there wouldn't be a hotel anywhere in town that would let them check in before noon, or .... (Wife is very good at finding everything that could possibly go wrong with any plan you care to propose. If anybody knows of a job opening for a gloom-and-doom prophet, drop me a note.) Wife also said she felt like this solution was being shoved down her throat and once again she was powerless before the tyrannical Hosea. She kept this up until I objected, Wait a minute. If this is unilateral tyranny, then what do you think a compromise would look like here? I have accepted every single thing you want out of this proposal to get together with your Internet boyfriend except this one issue of the location where you meet. The only way I could possibly be more flexible would be to die. (Or leave, I thought privately, in which case you could do any damn fool thing you felt like. But that would have been pique speaking, and I didn't say it.) What in all this can you possibly give up in order to meet me "halfway"? When I put it like that, she backed down and agreed that this was a solution where she had been heard, and where she had had the power to negotiate some of what she wanted rather than simply having to capitulate. Sweet of her to see it that way, and all ....

The last few minutes of the session (yes, that really did take the better part of an hour) was devoted to comparative trivia. Where would Wife find a hotel that would let her check in at 8:30 am, just after the kids had gone to school? Counselor and I both pointed out that this is November and not exactly prime hotel season, so any hotel in town would be likely to work with her on this. I also pointed out, maybe a little indelicately, that every town (ours included) has some establishments who cater to an ... ummm ... hourly clientele, and if she could find one of these then doubtless the staff could be very accommodating. Also it would probably be cheaper than a high-end place, which is another plus. Wife said she'd make a few phone calls.

I never thought I'd see the day that I was encouraging my wife to check into a seedy, hourly motel with some stranger she had met on the Internet. It is a sign of where things have drifted to that this looks better to me than the other alternatives.

Now if only she sticks to the plan -- which means, if only Boyfriend 5 doesn't persuade her to change it behind my back. And if only he doesn't knock her over the head or something. I suppose I should still worry about that stuff too, but at this point I am trying to pick my battles. The fact that I don't want to cancel my trip isn't even my primary motivation, solid motivation though it be. I think the comments on yesterday's post are largely sound when they point out that I wouldn't have a lot to gain by staying home, because then it will just be some other week instead. And I can't stay home forever.

So we'll see how it goes.
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My plans, her plans ...?

I just got off the phone with D. She had been talking with Wife (remember, they are best friends and talk almost every day, these days) and Wife mentioned that I have a business trip coming up. "Oh really?" asks D, who of course has already been making plans to meet me there.

Yes, continued Wife, and apparently Boyfriend 5 is planning to visit Wife during the same time span. In our house? Sure, just not when the kids are home from school. (Wife knows I don't want him in our house, and the kids might not keep their mouths shut.)

Now, D has learned by this point that just because Wife says something doesn't make it true. And just because Boyfriend 5 tells Wife something doesn't make it true, either. So this could be pure fantasy all the way around.

But Wife told D that she is still sending Boyfriend 5 small amounts of money on a regular basis. (If so, it's not out of any account that I can see, unless she is sending him cash through the mail. But why would she lie about something like that?) And of course I think Boyfriend 5 is a con artist, and not the glamorous terrorist he claims to be. This is all old news to all of you.

So, ... supposing he shows up ... what then? Honestly if all they want to do is fuck, I am long past worrying about that. Have a nice time, and change the sheets when you are done. But they could do that in a motel. On the other hand, if Boyfriend 5 wants to use his visit as an occasion to pocket valuables, it might be a long time before we ever saw something missing: God knows the house is so cluttered it could be months, and then we would assume we had just lost whatever it was. (It really is bad, that way.)

D said that of course if I wanted to cancel my business trip and stay home, she'd understand. She'd be "bereft" (her word), but she'd understand. And really, she and I are on the same page, I think, when it comes to my responsibilities (and hers) to our respective households. Neither of us intends to abandon those, so I know she means it.

Only what do I want to do? Never mind that my employer is kind of expecting me to take this trip ... never mind that I have already cancelled something like 3 business trips in the last year -- an unprecedented number for me. Even if the trip were purely elective (it's not), the fact is that I also really want to see D, too. But I don't like the idea of this schmuck having the opportunity to help himself to Wife's jewelry, or our checking account numbers, or our credit card statements, or anything like that. And our house is so disorderly that if he were inside, he could easily lay his hands on any one of those things in the time it would take Wife to go to the bathroom.

So I have some thinking to do. D said she was too exhausted to think straight (she's been working long hours and then e-mailing me when she should be sleeping), so I should figure out the right thing to do and let her know.

Never a dull moment, huh?

Gotta Change It has tagged me for a meme, but that will have to wait.
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Gratitude

In a telephone conversation last week, D mentioned that she rarely hears any sense of gratitude from me ... not to this or that person, but at a more basic level for the real blessings in my life. I wasn't quite sure what to tell her, although it is true that this is the kind of thing I don't often express where people can hear me. Sometimes I see the most remarkable coincidences drop into place, as it were providentially, and when I see them I say a little "thank you" in my heart. But I usually don't say it out loud, and sometimes it takes me a while to notice.

My upcoming business trip was originally scheduled for this very week: I was due to leave on Sunday, November 2. On Monday October 27 (six days before my flight), I found out there had been a mix-up and the fellow whom I was travelling to meet was planning to arrive on November 17 ... hadn't I known? (No, in fact, his office had never informed me.) So I scrambled to change a lot of plans, all of a sudden.

Three days later, on Thursday, October 30, D and I exchanged a couple of remarkable e-mails, ending with the one in which I mentioned this trip. Had it not been for the mix-up at the other guy's office, there would have been no time -- between Friday morning and Sunday afternoon -- to pull together plans for her to come see me.

I just realized five minutes ago how providential the schedule mix-up was. Of course you could argue that this makes Providence into an accomplice in adultery, but I'm not interested in going down that path right now.

And I can assure you I am grateful ...

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