Power and Infidelity

NPR aired a segment today about something that's been on my mind a lot over the past few years                What Science Tells Us About Power and Infidelity begins by telling us that the Wikipedia entry under "Federal Political Sex Scandals" totals six single-spaced pages. Power generates infidelity, and many of the high-profile men who have been quite literally caught with their pants down in recent years have resigned. All of the brouhaha has forced me to reveal something to myself that I'd rather have kept zipped up: I have a double standard.

It's my opinion that we ought to stay out of other people's bedrooms if it's consenting adults who are inside. The skill with which a congressman or senator or governor represents his constituents doesn't really have much to do with his sex life as long as he isn't spending taxpayer's money or shirking his duties to go "hiking in the Adirondacks." But whenever I've thought this or said it in a discussion, I've found myself secretly wishing that lawyers in private practice were held to the same standard as the politicians who've been forced to resign. They've been sworn into their state bar associations--isn't there something implicit in that oath that says they should be held to a higher standard? That they shouldn't lie or cheat even if the lying and cheating is done only to their wives and families? It would serve my personal cause to have the lying cheating attorneys I know dragged out into the limelight.

But not really. More people would be hurt. More wives. More children. And it wouldn't stop the way power influences the risk-assessing mechanisms in the brains of those in power. Maybe in a perfect world the continuing education the bar associations provide could give attorneys a heads up on what might happen to them. Maybe there could be biofeedback demonstrations, aversion therapy, free marriage counseling. The thought of all that makes me smirk. It sounds like A Clockwork Orange. I know! Big fat bonuses dolled out by big law firms to partners who stay married to their first wives. But money equals power. And well, we know what power equals.

I wish I could poll the trophy wives of powerful husbands. Would they cop to the idea that power attracts? Or would they say they love their husbands for their senses of humor, their over-the-hill physiques, their maturity, who they are as a person? I'm not ruling any of this out. My dad was twenty-six years older than my mother. She was movie-star gorgeous. And now that I think of it, maybe power was involved. My dad owned a grocery store then, and his name was emblazoned on a brick building in Dubuque, Iowa. Maybe she thought they would be rich. T-bones and good booze every night.

Everything fell apart when the big supermarket chains moved into town. The lack of money was a source of stress in our household until the day he died. Maybe that helped them stay together. And that my mother said he reminded her of Clark Gable.

Thank You, Everyone.......

I am grateful for my friends--those in the my real word and those from cyberspace.

I've been discouraged. Dragged down by the undertow of 60-some pages of fictitious forensic accounting.

Thank you for the dinner and conversation. For the phone calls. For the lunch. For sweeping me off to a margarita as big as my head. For your blog comments. For your understanding and patience and love. For holding me--literally or figuratively, all through the night.

It's you I owe--not Mr. Ex.

A white blank page and a swelling rage

I've been captivated by Mumford and Sons ever since the Grammys. I've listened to the album "Sigh No More"over and over as if I were a teenager locked in my room with a "Do Not Disturb Sign" on the door. The mark of a good popular song, I think, is that it seems to be written just for you. For me right now the song, "White Blank Page" is about Mr. Ex, the Little Missus, and me.

I sat on my patio yesterday with 60-some pages of forensic accounting that attempted to prove why I should pay a shit load of money to the man who dumped me. His wedding decor, his life insurance premiums that will go to the Little Missus when he croaks, his doctor bills, parking tickets, remodeling on his house--I owe him for all that and more, the report claims. I get nothing for putting him through law school and supporting his career by keeping the home fires burning. I get nothing for raising our daughters and irreparably compromising my own earning power.

I used to be a writer. I'm not anymore, and I haven't been for a long time. I'm a crazed divorcée pretending to be a writer. Whenever I think I might be able to settle in, there's an email from my attorney--or worse yet, a bill from my attorney. I have to update my Declaration of Income and Expenses or my Schedule of Assets and Debts, or comb through another set of bank statements, and then pay them big bucks to read them. The sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach returns, and I decide to open the fucking Pandora's box of papers pertaining to my divorce. I feel some sick impulse to confirm that yes, he called her every morning and every night for months before I got the news that our empty nest was going to be even emptier than I thought. The next thing I know every last duplicitous moment of his plays through my head like a series of deranged fairy tales. It was comforting every now and then to think that I'd at least get a hunk of cash. "Half of everything I have is yours," he said. I believed that too.

Yesterday, a few pages into the forensic report the gears in my heart were grinding so bad, I called him. He was in his car, and I'll bet his bifocals didn't adjust and he didn't see that it was me. He answered and we talked and he actually agreed to see the mediator I'd tried to arrange last week to no avail.

We'll meet on Saturday, and the mediator has asked each of us to bring a personal statement reflecting at least one thing we really appreciate about the other person or our shared past.

A white blank page and a swelling rage.

I wish I were a writer.

Doesn't this look like a big fat indian wedding to you?

Mr. Ex owes me money. A lot of money.

For a brief review of the chronology of our divorce and the duration of the my struggle to get my share of our joint assets see my sidebar.

I put Mr. Ex through law school. I lavished loving care on the three houses we owned and lived in over the duration of our marriage. Rose gardens, fruit trees, well-kept interiors. I tended hearth and home with complete devotion.

Mr. Ex claims I owe him a stunning 6 figure sum for the 14 months immediately following our split. I wrote checks from our joint account, used our charge cards. The wheels of the divorce machine were turning slowly, and I had no alimony yet.

Now, before the final payout, he's spin-doctoring the books. I spent less money that what my alimony would have amounted to if the system would have pulled itself out of the muck in a timely manner.

The foresic accountant's spread sheet has allocated a variety of items to me that are not mine. Like a 14,000 charge to a place called Distracted by Decor.


Photo credit: distractedbydecor.com