A while back on the NDN Back Room, there was a discussion regarding time travel. To wit: If you could travel back in time to influence a decision point in history, what would it be? The usual suspects like killing so-and-so or preventing whats-his-name from being killed were explicitly excluded, and you could assume that you had the wherewithal to actually make a difference.
I gave the matter much prayerful meditation. At first, I wanted to go back and convince Henry VIII not to split with the Catholic Church over Ann Boelyn, but that seemed a little too esoteric for me (not to mention not a guarantee that a Protestant church wouldn't have formed in England anyway). Talking President Nixon out of doing Watergate seemed to be a waste of time -- if he didn't get caught for that, he would've been caught for something.
Then it came to me, and I knew exactly where I'd set my Wayback Machine: New York City, January, 1975. I'd sit down with John Lennon and convince him he should stay with May Pang rather than meet with Yoko Ono, a meeting resulting in the end of Lennon's "Lost Weekend" and his relationship with Pang.
May Pang was good for John Lennon. While with her, he rekindled a number of relationships, not the least of which were those with his former Beatles bandmates. Near the end of 1974, there was talk of some musical collaboration and healing of hurts. If that had continued, I can only imagine the kind of music produced. Or maybe I can't, because it would boggle the mind.
But in January of 1975, Lennon ended up back with Ono, and everything went back to square one. Lennon created more music, but remained estranged from his fellow Beatles. And six years later, he was still in NYC when Mark David Chapman walked up to him in front of the Dakota. If he'd still been with Pang, they'd likely have been in California instead.
Perhaps not earth-shattering, but that's where I'd choose to go.
Saturday, January 28, 2012
Wednesday, January 4, 2012
Not Have Affairs
Every now and then, I'm reminded how little I understand the concept of marital infidelity. Such an occasion afforded itself this afternoon, when I read this article on baby boomers getting divorced.
As I said, I really don't understand why people have affairs. But what boggles my mind further is why people of advanced ages do it. Note one of the opening paragraphs in the linked article:
I just don't get it. Some guy in his mid to late 50s had an affair with his secretary? Why would you do that at this point in your life? More importantly, what led the secretary to look at this 50-something married doofus and think, "Yeah, gotta get me some of that". She obviously envisioned some kind of end-game, but damned if I can figure out what it might be.
When you get married, it's supposed to be forever. I know sometimes events transpire that can affect things, but all else equal, you're supposed to be in it for the long haul. People complain about celebrity "marriages" and goofy relationships, but as with politics, what we see simply represents the extreme edge of what the general population has brewing in it.
I could never have an affair. Even if my rule of thumb above didn't trump all, at the bare minimum I lack the necessary legerdemain to pull it off. At the end of most days, I'm lucky if I can remember what I actually did. The thought of maintaining both an actual and virtual life, each with its own itinerary and cast of characters to keep straight and separate, gives me a facial tic.
Besides, as I noted above, what's the end-game of an affair? If it's meaningless sex, there's no point. You're banging around with no purpose, and neither your state-sanctioned relationship nor its illicit counterpart will grow in any meaningful way. It's like masturbation with a partner.
If it's meaningful sex, that creates a skiff full of problems all its own. Do you think your fellow conspirator is going to leave the marriage for you? Forget the myriad complications of doing that in the first place, why do you want to hitch your wagon to a person who is that much of a shit? Why go through all that only to end up on the other side of the coin in a couple years?
There are a fair share of people who shouldn't get married in the first place. If you like sowing your wild oats, better to rent yourself out to the field owners than waste everyone's time and money buying the property. Marriage these days is viewed as a commodity, something to be "had" rather than something to be embraced. Witness all the ridiculous weddings out there, the trappings of which get more mind-boggling by the year. If you're thinking more about the checkbook than anything else, you're doing it wrong, and that's how you end up getting Kardashianed.
That's why I don't have a big problem with people who choose to cohabit. Marriage is something you need to be serious about, and if for whatever reason it doesn't work for you, no worries. Shoehorning yourself into one to satisfy someone else's weird notion of propriety does no one any favors.
So if you are married, and you either are stepping out or are thinking about it, pull your head out of your ass. You stood up and took vows. Strap up and take them seriously. If you're being stepped out on, you have my sympathies, along with the promise if I'm on your jury, I'll never vote to convict.
As I said, I really don't understand why people have affairs. But what boggles my mind further is why people of advanced ages do it. Note one of the opening paragraphs in the linked article:
A few weeks ago we learned friends of ours who had been married for 32 years were heading to divorce court; he was having an affair with his secretary and his wife had no idea.
I just don't get it. Some guy in his mid to late 50s had an affair with his secretary? Why would you do that at this point in your life? More importantly, what led the secretary to look at this 50-something married doofus and think, "Yeah, gotta get me some of that". She obviously envisioned some kind of end-game, but damned if I can figure out what it might be.
When you get married, it's supposed to be forever. I know sometimes events transpire that can affect things, but all else equal, you're supposed to be in it for the long haul. People complain about celebrity "marriages" and goofy relationships, but as with politics, what we see simply represents the extreme edge of what the general population has brewing in it.
I could never have an affair. Even if my rule of thumb above didn't trump all, at the bare minimum I lack the necessary legerdemain to pull it off. At the end of most days, I'm lucky if I can remember what I actually did. The thought of maintaining both an actual and virtual life, each with its own itinerary and cast of characters to keep straight and separate, gives me a facial tic.
Besides, as I noted above, what's the end-game of an affair? If it's meaningless sex, there's no point. You're banging around with no purpose, and neither your state-sanctioned relationship nor its illicit counterpart will grow in any meaningful way. It's like masturbation with a partner.
If it's meaningful sex, that creates a skiff full of problems all its own. Do you think your fellow conspirator is going to leave the marriage for you? Forget the myriad complications of doing that in the first place, why do you want to hitch your wagon to a person who is that much of a shit? Why go through all that only to end up on the other side of the coin in a couple years?
There are a fair share of people who shouldn't get married in the first place. If you like sowing your wild oats, better to rent yourself out to the field owners than waste everyone's time and money buying the property. Marriage these days is viewed as a commodity, something to be "had" rather than something to be embraced. Witness all the ridiculous weddings out there, the trappings of which get more mind-boggling by the year. If you're thinking more about the checkbook than anything else, you're doing it wrong, and that's how you end up getting Kardashianed.
That's why I don't have a big problem with people who choose to cohabit. Marriage is something you need to be serious about, and if for whatever reason it doesn't work for you, no worries. Shoehorning yourself into one to satisfy someone else's weird notion of propriety does no one any favors.
So if you are married, and you either are stepping out or are thinking about it, pull your head out of your ass. You stood up and took vows. Strap up and take them seriously. If you're being stepped out on, you have my sympathies, along with the promise if I'm on your jury, I'll never vote to convict.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)