I had an affair with a married man when I was 18. He was 28, I think?
Memory does not serve here.
In my defense, I have no defense. He doesn’t either. Ad I am typing this out and forcing myself to remember, it was all pretty yucky.
He was new in town, we played pool after my kitchen shifts at the restaurant I worked at.
He was older, obvs, interesting, charming, he had traveled and I got really good at pool that winter.
He didn’t wear a ring, the flirtation and courtship went on for 4 months at least and it wasn’t until our relationship escalated to physical that he told me he was married. He had always referred to his wife in a past tense, I assumed divorce as would have anyone, in fact most of the people who worked with me where we met assumed the same, so it wasn’t just me he had fooled.
Still not a defense. I am not looking for absolution here, just story-telling, it’s what I do. And there is a point to this, there always is, and I almost always take the long way around.
I remember being angry when he finally told me the truth, I felt tricked and betrayed. Never a nice feeling.
But god gave us all free will and 18 year old me really liked him, I didn’t really know better and I was already emotionally invested. Part of me was kind of excited by the whole thing.
I pouted for a few days and then said okay.
It lasted maybe another 2 months. He bought me red cowboy boots and orchids. And then he left his wife.
He wanted me to move in with him, take over being a housewife.
I immediately came to my senses and I broke up with him.
I had no idea what I wanted, but I knew it wasn’t that.
This is such ancient history that I can barely recall much but his first name and his glasses.
So why am I bringing it up?
Kamala’s vagina.
I love these women on their soapboxes deciding on some moral pretense that someone the new Vice President of the United States of America is somehow less worthy because of her vagina, and its activities over 30 years ago.
The job I had where I met the married dude I got through nepotism, plain and simple. Most jobs I have gotten because I knew someone. It doesn’t matter how you get a job; it matters if you can do well enough at it to keep it. I kept that job for 3 years and then I fucked up badly and was promptly fired.
Shit happens.
She was 22, I was 18.
Yes, there is some difference between the emotional maturity of an 18 year old me and a 22 year old her, but not a lot.
And honestly… Why the fuck does it matter how she got into her field 3+ decades ago?
I don’t like a lot of things she has done since, career-wise. She wouldn’t have been my first choice. I loved Warren personally and my heart broke a bit when she dropped out.
The difference between myself and the internalized misogyny crew ripping her to shreds on the internet is I don’t conveniently forget the mistakes I have made.
I have fucked some questionable creatures. See above. See the whole blog really.
Damn your wife, I’d be your mistress just to have you around.
Cleopatra, The Lumineers
And this is coming from someone who was cheated on within an inch of my life. I went crazy, was on antidepressants, opiates and lost 30+ pounds while being cheated on for 7 years. I don’t recognize the me I was back then. I was jealous, weak, stubborn and ultimately stupid.
While I don’t exactly blame myself, I know I did things wrong too, like not getting out at the first sign and ignoring so many red flags.
And like all these women blaming Kamala, I blamed the mistress too.
In retrospect, in my situation, they really loved each other, and I should have just gotten out of the way. I know that now and will carry that lesson to the end of my days.
If you are the least loved person in the house, you are in the wrong house. Michael Xavier
I was in the wrong house.
There is some serious internalized misogyny in this world. Men don’t need to hold us down and tear us apart, we do it to each other.
#metoo should have been the end of it, we should have all realized we are in this together, we should have rallied with the good men and stopped all this nonsense, but that was 3 years ago, and we seem to have completely forgotten. 55% of (white) women voted for a rapist instead of a woman, twice now.
I really hate this “ideal” that women are supposed to be non-sexual (but still sexualized) creatures who get married at 18-25 and just stay home and cook and clean. Anything else is a scandal and opens us up to ridicule and persecution, like we never made it out of Salem.
Need I remind you, it’s 2020, body autonomy is a thing, and we have our first woman vice president.
I for one, choose to celebrate this. It’s a big deal. What she did 30 years ago is not.
I invite every woman trying to tear her down to revisit her teens and 20’s and air out your own closet and skeletons contained therein.
Even Jesus defended Mary Magdalene by saying let he who is without sin cast the first stone.
Don’t y’all pretend to love Jesus?
Just take your pocket of rocks and go home. Have missionary vanilla sex with your boring husband every other Tuesday after book club and let the rest of us fight the good fight so maybe your daughters can live in a world without the oppression of the patriarchy pitting them against each other.