I'm George, mwm, 52

by George Everyman

  Whatever the circumstances, neither Dewayne nor Abby denied the accusations at the encounter, so whether Kimberly was bluffing or not, we can now conclude that they are still at it, which seems to be fine with me but devastating for Kimberly.

  Chapter 13: The Aftermath, or How Are George and Abby Faring?

  I suppose it's best to give you a clearer picture of our everyday relationship so that you can get a sense of what has or hasn't changed since the encounter. OK, I'll confess right from the get go that nothing has changed. But since I started this, let me tell you anyway how things were and are. And then I'll tell you why things haven't changed which is probably a lot more interesting than how they might have changed.

  Abby, as I have implied, but maybe not said outright, is a piece of work. Almost everybody likes her, and why not. She's cute, she's friendly, she's a great mom to our kids, she can be tough as nails when it's needed, but can be soft and compliant when called for. The total package.

  Except.

  She really doesn't appreciate me as much as I think she could and should. No, I'm not asking for worship or anything close. Mainly because I'm not a saint. Far, far from perfect. But give me a break, I keep telling her. Try to balance the good with the bad. Abby doesn't like to do that, alas. I tell her she's mentally lazy, which, I'm sure, doesn't help a bit. But if she just saw some shades of gray instead of living in her black and white world where a man is either a saint or a beast, my life would be a lot easier.

  I've always detected a hint of her feeling like she has to fight for her rights in our marriage. Hell, hint is too mild a word. It's the elephant in the living room. It's almost as though if she concedes that I am right about something, it makes her wrong. That's bullshit. Total bullshit. And I tell her that frequently. To no avail. I also mention my shades of gray theory often, to which she just pulls, out of her ass it seems, some random things that I do wrong or have done wrong, in her opinion, in the past, and in her mind that's sufficient ammunition to support her saint or sinner mindset, and you can guess where that leaves me.

  I sometimes tell her the joke about "if a tree falls in the woods and no one hears it, is the man still wrong?," and she says yes the man is wrong, and she doesn't really think it's much of a joke.

  How does a man who dearly loves his wife deal with that kind of shit? Well, it's hard, I have to tell you. Is there a counterpart to misogyny in which a woman just hates most, if not all, men? Let's call it Mr. Ogyny. Maybe I'm being too strong here. Maybe it only seems that she hates me, or at least hates most of the things I do, but it sure feels like the burden of proof about my worthiness, is squarely on my shoulders, every hour of every fucking day. Glad I got that out.

  Chapter 14: The Paintings

  I like to paint. Oils on canvas and watercolors.

  On Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, I truly think I am a creative genius. One of the greatest, no actually the greatest, painter in the history of the world. My works belong in the greatest museums in the world.

  On Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays I think that Abby is totally right, i.e. I am a fool wasting my time and it's embarrassing that I even attempt it and I know she wishes I would just burn the fucking canvasses I have done and make room in the house for something of at least minimal value.

  On Sundays, I ignore the little man who talks to me as above, and I just paint, which makes me a Sunday painter, which is about the most disparaging term you could give anyone, i.e. you don't even have the conviction to pursue your passion enough to give up your day job.

  Abby calls me a hoarder, and therefore in her black and white world, and in line with her iron clad conviction that she is always right, I am a hoarder in her mind. And since all she cares about is what is in her mind, I would be more successful trying to convince her that the moon is parmesan cheese than trying to convince her that there are shades of gray when it comes to the definition of a hoarder.

  When we moved into the condo, to simplify our lives, I thought, we had to do some major throwing away of stuff. I keep all the financial records, so when we moved I had about twenty boxes of those records and some personal stuff I had accumulated over the twenty four years of our marriage, and then some stuff my mother had given me from my childhood. My stuff takes up about one third of one room. Not bad when we lived in a thirteen room house, but a little bit of a problem when we moved to the five room condo. In reality there are three rooms, because the kitchen/dining/living all flow together.

  My stuff takes up one third of the spare bedroom which is only a problem when the kids come home for the holidays. But I swear, they can still walk on either side of the double bed, barely, even if they can't use the closet because it's full of my paintings.

  The one third of the room occupied is not just the twenty or so boxes, but also contains the paintings.

  When I started painting it was 1998 and I thought that since 2000 was a milestone, it would be appropriate to do something special to herald in the new century. So I decided to do a leap year special, painting one a day for the year.

  The first (yes it was one of many) series was entitled "366 variations of the Lake George Blue Spruce" honoring the huge blue spruce tree in the back yard of our summer home at lake George in Upstate New York. Ironically, as it turns out, it was a Douglas fir.

  I'm color blind, and in my zeal to paint with blue because it's one of the few colors I can see clearly, I kind of glossed over the fact that the tree is brown or green or one of those muddy colors that I have trouble with. The paintings are definitely blue and Van Gogh would have no doubt approved, at least as regards to painting trees any fucking color you want, even though he would have never used the word fucking because he was very religious.

  The next series in 2004 was "366 Views of NYC" based on photos I took there in 2003, and then 2008 was "366 Attempts to Crack the DNA Code of Simplicity" and that series included a companion water color each day, and in 2012, if I'm still alive and able, it's going to be something that I haven't quite gotten my brain around yet, but I still have time.

  I admit, that when you do the math, the three series of canvasses alone, and the other random ones I've done over the years does add up.

  But, does she really just expect me to haul them to the local dump?

  About a year ago, I made out a simple list of things to do when I died, so that Abby, presumably consumed and overwhelmed with grief, would not have such a burden on her dealing with those mundane things I have handled, gladly I might add, our entire marriage. Insurance, social security, bank accounts, property deeds, etc. etc...

  I was careful to point out that even though she saw little or no value in the paintings, she would be prudent to create a room for them, where she could simply close the door and ignore them, instead of getting rid of them, because there was a chance, in my mind it was a slam dunk, that they would be of great value in the future.

  I didn't go into my conviction that she would have been depriving the world of one of the greatest treasures ever created by mankind (I made the list on a Wednesday). I figured if I said "great value" that would be much more effective in making her think at least twice before trashing them.

  Chapter 15: Why Did We Get Married Again?

  I would not be surprised if you are thinking, at this point, just why did you guys get married in the first place given your apparent lack of, shall we say politely, any common ground? I ask myself that daily, and, I have to admit, would be surprised if Abby doesn't do the same. Marriage is a compromise, I keep reminding myself.

  I've got to admit that I do like the concept of marriage. Not every part of it, mind you, not by far, but having someone around, who at least tolerates you, is pretty nice. Even in my darkest hours, even when I think a divorce is the only alternative, I still know that I love Abby deeply and that getting divorced would serve neither of us well, especially me, for reasons I've already expounded on. I think that was in chapter seven. Yes it was, I just went back and looked. It was about Deborah and Edith
and their quests for the perfect man.

  Maybe we are at a crossroads as a society. Maybe we have bottomed out regarding divorce rates. Maybe marriage is morphing to accommodate our modern world and the rise of women in the workplace which in turn is helping to raise the percentage of women who cheat because they have better access than the old model of stay at home moms who only had each other and the kids to commiserate with.

  I for one, and I know I'm not the only one, like it when I read that women are catching up on the cheating curve. It's only fair. And it definitely increases my odds of being able to find one. Hell, I already found one. And she, i.e. Lara, is so far evolved, sociologically speaking, that she and her husband have already figured out that they both win when they allow the other to fuck other people.

  If we can just tackle jealousy head on. If we can do some deep thinking about the nature of jealousy. If we can come to realize that jealousy can be a huge aphrodisiac. If we can just not let jealousy control us. Then we can begin to use the jealousy, instead of it consuming us.

  How fucking stupid is it, if you sit down and think about it, in a calm manner, if you can, before the deed, to kill your lover out of a jealous rage? What have you accomplished? Absufuckinglutly nothing. You're forever not going to have her or him. You're going to be locked up in some shit hole for the rest of your life, at best. Oh wait a minute, you have accomplished something. You've made sure that no one can ever love him or her again. The only problem with that logic? You're number one on that list of people.

  So, just to be clear, as you can see, I'm not in the 'kill your spouse to solve the problem' camp. But more importantly I'm not in the 'divorce your spouse to solve the problem' camp either. I've spent half of my life with Abby, and I'm going to do everything in my power to make sure I spend the rest of my life with her. I'm hoping she feels the same way.

  Chapter 16: More on Dewayne and His Two Wives

  I want to be fair here. As fair as I can be, which may not be all that fair. Dewayne is not my type, and I'm not talking sexually here. He's nice enough, I guess. But I like a less self assured person. Maybe I'm just jealous, but I don't think so. It's like this. When I heard, from Kimberly, that Abby was fucking him, a lot went through my head, and you have already heard a lot of it. But there's a lot more. What if am wrong about divorced ladies, specifically Abby, finding the perfect man the second time around? What if my whole theory is totally wrong and what if Abby and I got divorced and she did find someone a whole lot better than me. What if her black and white theory is right and Dewayne is white and I'm black. That just sounded racist, i.e. why is black bad and white good? It wasn't meant that way, but I'm on a roll here so I'm not going to try and address that here and now, but I will later. Twice, I'm pretty sure.

  It's funny what fears we have. It's also scary. So maybe I'm afraid that Dewayne is better than me, maybe sexually, maybe in all ways, and that Abby will see that and leave me for him. But wait, he just got married, and that was after he had been fucking Abby, so probably Kimberly was better than Abby. But then again, maybe he saw Abby as unattainable and he settled for Kimberly? Maybe I was lucky in that he didn't know that Abby might have left me if he had pursued her harder. God, what am I saying? Am I saying that I don't think I'm good enough for Abby or that Dewayne might be better? Sometimes too much thinking drives a person crazy. I need a glass of wine. But it's not five pm yet, alas.

  I was going to tell you about Dewayne's first wife, but it's just not worth it and it's not really relevant except to the point that she left him for another man. They just weren't compatible. It didn't last long. The second wife, i.e. Kimberly, is nice enough, except of course, when she was on the rampage about him fucking my wife, and can we really blame her? I'm not sure how many people embrace the open marriage concept, or some variant thereof, at this point, but it's pretty clear she is not among them. Dewayne certainly seems to embrace it, as least from his perspective, but can we assume that he'd be ok to know that Kimberly was servicing me, for example?

  Abby and I missed their wedding because we had a previous engagement with some friends of mine. I was willing to break the date with my friends if Abby wanted to, but she said no. Keep in mind this is before I knew about their torrid affair, at least I'm assuming it was/is torrid. Aren't all affairs torrid? However, I was still in the I'm hoping Abby is fucking Dewayne mode, and since it was just fantasy to me, but not to them, I was aroused by the jealousy, with none of the attendant potential anger and pain, once again because it hadn't happened yet, in my mind.

  The wedding pictures looked nice and Abby told me five (I counted them) times how beautiful her ring was, both before and after the wedding. I took this as a huge insult and a potential challenge since hers is much smaller, but I reminded myself that we were quite poor when we got married and could barely afford wedding bands and it was love that counted, but I was having serious doubts now, those five times, that she felt the same way.

  Chapter 17: Some Ironies

  One of the biggest ironies in this whole situation is that I was so enthralled with Lara, when we were an us, that I was searching for a way to get Abby to go after her lust and strike up something with her boyfriend, at least I thought that was all he was at the time, when in reality, he was already her lover.

  I have to say that Abby is always more sexual during the summer because she is not working. She is a teacher and that consumes most of her energy and the last thing she usually wants to do, nine months of the year, is have sex with me, in any form, except maybe Saturday night, and that's not a given by any means.

  But during the summer, she drinks more, hangs out with her girlfriends and sisters, and I bet they talk some sex talk, so she is usually ready for some action a few times a week. So my heightened sexuality from my contact with Lara, combined with Abby's relaxed mode made for a very good summer sexually. Now that I think about it, maybe she was missing Dewayne, and I was just a stand in? Shit.

  Another irony. I'm the one who has the higher libido, or at least that's what I've always assumed but it's Abby who consummated the open marriage first, and basically behind my back, which really violated the spirit of an open marriage, but as you now know, she doesn't like the concept of open marriage because it's on the fringe and she is such a straight shooter. What a crock of shit. I mean regarding her being a straight shooter.

  Chapter 18: My Feelings Are Hurt

  I don't think I have adequately described the pain I have when Abby ignores my creative endeavors. Not only does she ignore them, she thinks they are unmanly, I truly believe. Maybe that's the whole attraction to Dewayne, the jock. Maybe a man should be a man, and not a sissy painter. Geez. But Picasso wasn't a fucking sissy. And how about Jackson Pollock? Shit, he got drunk and fought every night.

  So maybe I need to be more of a man's man. But I'm not. I'm not some sissy fag pussy at all. But I am sensitive and I have cried on occasion. Maybe that's the kiss of death in her eyes. Who the fuck knows. All I know is that my paintings are destined to change the world. It's Friday, after all.

  Chapter 19: I Talk to Kimberly

  It had to happen, i.e. 'the talk', and she wasn't calling me so I emailed her. I'm better at reaching out by email than by phone. The phone adds another dimension that I really don't need. Just the basics. No reason for anyone to try and guess my mood or intensions by reading the emotions in my voice. It's like the cute little cartoon of the dog typing on a keyboard and the caption says, "no one knows you are a dog on the internet."

  I emailed Kimberly, unbeknownst to Abby and, I hope, Dewayne. Not that I needed to hide anything. Shit, I deserved, and so did Kimberly, some serious fucking with another person since our cheater spouses had already done it. I would have gladly settled for her, but I was guessing it was not vice versa since she hadn't made any moves on me yet. I wanted to keep the email neutral and above board just in case Abby or Dewayne ever saw it, though, which was probably showing a paranoid side of me.

  "Kim," I said, hoping i
t was ok to call her Kim, "do you think it might be appropriate for us to meet and talk?" I sat there wondering if I should send it, and then I just slowly hit the send key. Immediately I regretted it. Damn, what the fuck am I doing, I thought, but it was too late. I left my office immediately, not wanting to think what/where/when we would talk about when/if she responded. Notice the 'we' because I wasn't about to carry the whole burden of the conversation myself.

  Later that day I came back to the office and saw an email from her. I was instantly aroused. What if she was going to invite me over to her house when Dewayne was gone? Maybe she wanted to revenge fuck me in their bed. Nice.

  Her email read, "George, I'm not sure what you want to talk about and if you want to involve Dewayne or Abby or both." That was it. Kind of negative, don't you think? I sure did. Sure didn't sound very friendly. I re read it about five times, looking for hidden meanings. I couldn't find any. It was pretty straight forward. So I attempted a reply. "Kim," I started, using Kim since she didn't sign hers Kimberly thus signaling me that Kim was ok, or at least that's how I interpreted it, "I'm really not sure about what I want to say and I think it should be just us." I liked using us. I also liked that I was sounding as cryptic and confusing as she was. And vulnerable. That's what I was trying to express.