by Maria Bello
Now, sitting on my couch watching the married guy on television, I hear him calling the actress with whom he is having an affair “sweet baby” and I can’t believe what I am hearing. I remember a real scene like this, years ago in my kitchen in Venice.
“How’s my sweet baby?” he would say, walking into my kitchen and taking me into a big bear hug.
“I’m good today, baby. How are you?” I would ask. And I was good. I felt strong and resilient in his presence.
“Well, let’s see, I’ve just spent the night with the love of my life, my favorite playmate, my sweet baby, I think I’m pretty good.”
And now this “sweet baby” wants to vomit. This is who he is and might always be. I wonder if the other actress knows yet.
I made similar mistakes over the years, but never again with a married man. I would choose men and think that the adrenaline high I got from the push and pull wasn’t just sex but was actually love. It was a hard lesson: adrenaline does not equal love. But it doesn’t negate it either.
The definition of desire is to want something you do not have. In a marriage, or other committed relationships, especially after years together, each person seems to know the other inside and out. They have the person so it may become difficult to desire them. Some people seek sexual satisfaction outside their relationships, even though they may be totally sure that they would not leave their committed partner or family. The truth is, we have no idea what goes on in people’s bedrooms or in their heads. Some people place more value on partnership than sex. But sex in secret holds appeal for many.
Many of my heroes have had sexual relationships outside of their committed relationships. But does that make them bad people, or take away the fact that they have contributed to this world in incredible ways? Many wives of men who have cheated stay with their husbands, and certain people are appalled by that. I’m not. I understand. To me, sexual desire and love are two different things. That certainly doesn’t mean that people inside of long-term committed relationships don’t have great sex. I know some who do. But not many, if I’m honest. Those who do often say the same thing, “It comes and goes.” And maybe it does. But let’s be real, for many it just goes. And then what happens? People either start to lie and look outside of their relationship, or they find a way to make it work. I was told by a therapist many years ago that I just needed to heal my “daddy issues” and then I would be able to have guilt-free sex with a man I was not in love with. She wasn’t a very good therapist.
It has been written that all but two of our presidents have had affairs. I’m not sure I believe the number, but it sure makes me very curious. JFK, Martin Luther King Jr., and so many others who made the world a better place were considered adulterers. Does that make them bad people? And it seems to me that the people who point the fingers are often just as guilty, if not more so.
One of my friends has been married for close to 20 years. She has beautiful children, is funny and compassionate and sexy. So was her husband. She found out last year that this kind man was not only having affairs, but much worse. This great dad, and I won’t take that away from him, was having group sex with different swingers almost every day for years. Can you imagine? My friend thought they were best friends. She said what I’ve heard many people say: it wasn’t the infidelity that was the worst part, it was the lying and the disregard he had for her. This is an extreme circumstance, but is this man a criminal? Certainly not to his kids.
I believe that the book Fifty Shades of Grey became a worldwide phenomenon because people were finally given a chance to explore their fantasies in a safe way. Many authors have done the same throughout the years. If you were turned on by Fifty Shades of Grey, go read Miller or Nin or Hemingway or Roth or Edna St. Vincent Millay.
Most people will never admit their sexual proclivities. You usually have no idea what your partner is thinking about when having sex. Could be he/she is thinking of kittens and feet. Unless you are in someone’s bed and someone’s head, someone’s sexuality should be no business of yours. So a call to action to all therapists, please keep trying to isolate the gene that makes all of us confused about our sexuality. But maybe we aren’t sick after all. Maybe there is no “cure” and we should just accept that sexuality is more complicated and fluid than we’ve been led to believe. Whoever has a handle on sexuality, our unconscious, and why we are often blinded by desire please let me know.
So does my having an affair with a married man make me a bad girl? If the answer is categorically yes or no then we’re all missing the point. Yes, I hurt people I loved, and I take responsibility for that. I also found a freedom in expressing my sexuality that I hadn’t felt before. I began to understand that for many people, sex does not equal love and that our primal physical drive isn’t necessarily bad. Sometimes, two people can just admit their connection is not sexual, but they share the same values, ideas, likes and dislikes, family and friends. And, at a certain point in life, sexuality doesn’t seem all that important. I’m just at the beginning of my romantic relationship with Clare and we are still in the discovery stage. Will it be that way forever? Probably not. As much as we hate to admit it, people do not stay the same and neither will we. Relationships change constantly. I think if we are conscious enough, we can accept the change without throwing out the love. I am grateful to say that most of the people I’ve been in romantic relationships with remain my friends and family. And I’ve been on both sides. Partners of mine have had affairs. Though it was incredibly painful, I eventually and quite quickly saw the humanness in all of it.
I sometimes find the most difficult thing is to live in the gray area of life—to live in the indecision, to listen to all of the voices screaming inside of us to be heard, with no judgment. I could never figure out if I was a “good girl” or a “bad girl.” Seems life would be so much simpler with clear definitions. At times I think I’ve figured out something only to be surprised in the next instant by who I am and what I’m capable of.
Clare and I have a collection of original black-and-white photos above our bed. They are stunning portraits of Georgia O’Keeffe, Beatrice Wood, Ernest Hemingway, Colette, Henry Miller, Edna St. Vincent Millay, Anaïs Nin, and other writers and artists that we admire. They have many things in common, including being people who brought to light, in words or pictures, our deepest feelings. They were also people who were passionate, had affairs, families, and lovers. Some were bisexual, some were just plain sexual. Some lied and some did not. But they all lived their passions and desires. They didn’t assume that sex, family life, friendships all had to be the same, forever.
So let’s not pretend that only bad people have affairs, or make decisions based on desire and animal passion. At least, let’s throw out our inclination to point fingers and name names, and instead accept that we can never know what is in someone else’s head, or how we might turn if overcome with feeling.
5
AM I PERFECT?
Is there a secret to being perfect?
“As much as I try, I cannot get him out of my head, even though I know he is bad for me,” I said in angst to my dear friend John.
“Then I will move into your head immediately,” he replied. “We’ll have plenty of room once we move him out. He doesn’t belong either in your head or in your bed. He just serves your addiction to pain. You’re the most wonderful, gifted, brilliant, lovable woman . . . you’d have to travel far and wide to find someone damaged enough to not cherish and love you, but somehow you’re able to find them. I think you’re the one who’s committed to hurting you. He’s just a screen on which you project your cruelty to yourself. I love you very much and won’t allow you to keep doing this to yourself. The ‘mean you’ doesn’t deserve the wonderful you as a brain mate. When I get over there, we’re going to move her out, too. It makes me feel sad when you are hurting so it’s got to stop, because I won’t leave you and I know you don’t want to make me feel like shit. So it’s got to stop. I love you more than you hurt.”
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br /> I was walking down the path on the beach in Santa Monica with my friend John Calley when we he said this to me some years ago. John was a 70-year-old movie producer, an ex–studio head who loved books, napping, and me.
John and I met when he saw a movie of mine in 2003 called The Cooler. He found out who my manager was, and asked if he could meet with me. All I knew was that I was meeting with a producer who possibly wanted to offer me a job.
I was living in a loft in Venice at the time, and having a fantasy affair with an actor. I was filled with anxiety and angst. John and I were supposed to meet at a fancy restaurant in Santa Monica, but I was such a hermit then that I asked if he could meet me at a dumpy Mexican restaurant down the street from me instead.
As soon as I walked into the dimly lit place, I recognized him sitting at a booth. And not because I had already looked him up. I had no idea what he looked like, how old he was, or what his list of movies was. But I knew him—like I knew the willow tree in my backyard when I was growing up. He may have been the most familiar person I’d ever met for the first time.
We immediately started getting into the nitty-gritty. We never spoke about movies, the business, or any of the usual formalities. We talked about love and relationships and their complications, right away. He was warm and funny, and smart, but not in an overly earnest or smothering way. He got the humor of life. John understood that all of the serious things and all of the hurtful things we live through help us grow. From that day on, and for the next five years, we spoke almost every day.
John had a wonderful family, one of the first modern families I have ever witnessed. His modern family consisted of his stepchildren, an ex-wife, and her new husband, all of whom he adored. They lived in Canada so he didn’t see them that much. He had many friends, his best friend being the late Mike Nichols. John was so respected in our business that he was almost revered. People speak of him as the most honest gentleman who ever worked in Hollywood. I was lucky to meet him some years before he died. By then, it was mostly just his dear friend Martha and I who spent time with John. We always shared our deepest thoughts with each other, either on the phone or in person.
I am going to share some of those conversations with you. Here’s the backstory though: We originally had the conversations because I was developing a character based on him for a novel that I was writing at the time. We sat at my kitchen table in Venice for hours and days as I recorded some of our best talks. After John passed away, I went back to them, and I realized just how profound they were. I decided they needed to be shared, not as fiction, but as the real words of a man who had helped me accept all of the pieces of myself by sharing with me all of the pieces of himself.
At this point in my life, every man I met was the one. John understood completely.
“Jesus Christ,” he said. “I was in ‘obsession’ for more than half my life.”
When we talked about love versus passion, or if they were the same thing or mutually exclusive, he said, “Romantic love may be an illusion, but it is a powerful one. When you look back, you see that those guys are all the same, interchangeable really. One was not better than the other. The common denominator is you. You bring the passion to the table. It’s you who drives it. Remember that.”
Even when I had the loveliest live-in boyfriend, I was not satisfied. I was all about the chase. I loved the beginning of our courtship, the not-knowing phase, but once we settled into the routine of watching Hoarders at night and doing Jackson’s homework together, the intensity wore off. I told John once that my boyfriend was a great companion. John said, “If you want a companion, why don’t you just get a dog?”
John was funny, too.
I was driven, yet ashamed of my sexuality back then. He embraced and celebrated it, as he had with all the women he had been in love with in his life. And there were many. Some were real, some just fantasy. He constantly affirmed to me that there was nothing to be ashamed of by being a woman driven my passion.
“You are a highly sexualized woman, like all the women that you love and admire. You are Anaïs. By the way, did I ever tell you I made out with her in a closet in the Hamptons? She was hot for it even at sixty-five.”
I wanted to be that woman, but at the same time I wanted to be with someone who loved and cherished me and who would never let me go.
“I love and cherish you.”
“I know, but it’s not the same thing. I don’t have sex with you.”
“If my goddamned dick worked we probably would be.”
I visualized Anaïs Nin and how cool she was to live in her body and mind at the same time. She influenced my behavior sexually. With some men I even tried to be Anaïs, as highly charged, as reckless and sexually fearless. One day, in a manic state, I sat crying at 6 A.M. on a balcony at my rental apartment in Vancouver, drinking a scotch and talking to John on the phone. There was a man in the next room who I was working with, doing the push-pull dance. He had a girlfriend back in New York. We had had a terrible night, with me withholding so he would come forward, and my Anaïs act just wasn’t working. I felt rejected. I knew he just wanted sex and what I really wanted was sex and love.
“But he is rejecting me, because he has a girlfriend,” I said.
“Bullshit. He can’t keep his hands off you. You’re a lot better off than the model girlfriend who is at home, waiting for him to stop fooling around with you and give her a call. He’s not a bad guy,” John replied. “Just not plausible for you. You’re right in that you made him up in your head. Who is he really?”
John was right; I had blown him up in my head to be someone or something much more important than he was. I thought he, like most of the other men, had the power to save me. I should have known better when I caught him jerking off to his own image on the Internet.
John and I would sit in a restaurant for hours as everyone looked at us as if we were having an illicit affair. The rich, dirty old man and the pretty movie star. We were used to it. If people only knew the truth, that he was completely impotent and that I was only attracted to young assholes. He had had his share of young asshole women over the years, so we had that in common, too.
“So this was back in the sixties, before you were born,” John said. “This woman was the most beautiful woman I had ever seen. Anyway, I fell in love, or should I say, I fell in anxiety.
“When we were together, it was brilliant in the beginning. She was funny and charming and made me feel funny and charming. She said, on one of our first nights together, that we should just get married. I took it to mean that she was crazy about me, but then she wouldn’t take my calls for a week. When she did call, I would run to her. She would suck me in with ‘you’re the only one’ and all that shit, then she would drink a bottle of Jack Daniel’s and fall asleep drunk. I really thought if she loved me, I would finally be someone.”
When I asked John how he finally got over his obsession, he told me it took him about a year. He went to a healer, a woman he had heard about in Burbank. She was a nice-looking, middle-aged woman with blue eyes and white hair. She had him close his eyes and do a meditation for about an hour. He was bored out of his mind and all he could think about was the girl with the Jack Daniel’s. And when he finally opened his eyes, the healer blew what she said was white light in his face and said, “Everything is now fine.”
All he could think was, “Yeah right, asshole, how much do I owe you?”
It wasn’t until he got into the elevator that he realized that he wasn’t thinking about his obsession for the first time in a year. From that day on, his feelings were gone. He didn’t know how it happened, because he didn’t even believe in the white light; he just knew something had changed.
“When the anxiety was gone, so was my ‘love’ for her.”
I asked him how I could find this lady. I needed her.
“Beats me,” he replied. “That was thirty years ago. She’s probably dead.”
But he reminded me I didn’t need this woman, I just neede
d to stop giving men my power. I wish I had listened.
Years later we were together, talking about another man I was involved with. I was again looking for a powerful man who would take me away from all my pain. I was humiliated that I had gone to his bed once again with his sweet cunning words, and then he left and didn’t call for a week.
Once again John listened. Once again he had wise things to say.
“Humiliation means I should be ashamed of myself because I’ve done something wrong. Humility is to want to be something beyond what is actually possible for a human being to be. There is no value judgment in humility. You want to have a magical effect on him. I mean, you are valuable, but no God. No woman will fix him. Every time you think of him see a line with way too much intensity in it. A high-tension wire. You are trying to fix him and he is trying to get you to fix him. That is divine, not human. Take that intensity and point it upwards. To God.”
The reason he knew all this stuff wasn’t because he had read about it in books, he had lived it. One day, he explained to me how he came to do what he did, and how he decided to follow a different path. “I was head of a huge production company at the time. I have no idea why. I always hated the movie business, but I was good at it. But one day after too many years of the bullshit, I woke up and realized that I was so unhappy. So, I decided to go off to an island by myself and figure out what would make me happy.”
“And you discovered that you like reading and sleeping the best, right?” I asked, because he had told me that these were his favorite activities many, many times.
He laughed. “That’s right. But it took me years to figure that out. It took a long time, walking the beach every day, for me to have my breakthrough.”
