What's With Politicians and Infidelity?

The marital infidelity of politicians makes it to the top of the heap in just about any news medium.  We seem to be unable to get enough of such stories.  Aside from gossip and perhaps seeking a way to get some leverage against a politician we don't like, what's in it for us?

As it turns out there can be lots in the stories of adultery by prominent people for all of us.  These are powerful people who have a great deal to lose by cheating on their spouses.  It makes no sense.

I don't think that President Clinton,  Governor Spitzer,  Senator Ensign, or Governor Sanford sat down one day and said "I think that today I will do something obviously stupid and wrong that is likely to destroy my family, my self-esteem, and my career."  They might as well have, but they probably didn't.

Somehow, they figured that it made sense or that the rules did not apply to them or that they wouldn't get caught.  It's easy to laugh at the kid with ADD who says he won't do his homework because the school might burn down tonight,  but this looks a lot like the adult equivalent.  It's easy to see the folly in the criminal's belief that the rules don't apply to him,  but this can be the equivalent just in a different way.

The big lesson for the rest of us most likely is that when it looks like a reasonable risk to break our promises and the rules of society, there probably is a short circuit in our psyche somewhere and it is time for a cooling off period.  Time to just stop and put a space between our impulse and action.

These are not things that only bad people, stupid people, immoral people - - ( in other words people who are not like us ) do;  though these actions are bad, stupid, and immoral and people who do them earn those labels. 

There is no shortage of relationship advice available nor is there a shortage of information about the dangers of infidelity or societal warnings against it.

Clearly there is great danger in the possibility of straying in adultery, infidelity, cheating,  against which none of us is immune.   It is not about someone else. 

We had darned well better be willing to spend time and effort to attend to our mental/emotional/moral health  and  the health of our relationships

before we find ourselves needing infidelity advice.

Are Senior Relationships Mostly Chickens Coming Home To Roost?

Are most senior relationships either monuments to "settling" or just plain awful . . . or is it just the crowd I am aware of? Or, . . . . do we just not care as much about anything as we get older? As a group are we a stable boring bunch or cynical cheaters, adulterers, backroom porn customers, lonely drinkers . . . . or is there something better somewhere else that everyone knows about that I missed when I last looked around?

I certainly do not claim to know the answers to this, but I do know that people look at me kind of funny when I say that I prefer to do things with my wife, that I don't have side conversations about which I don't tell her, that we are as involved in all aspects of our lives as we were when we first met.

Over a quarter century ago now a favorite aunt was waxing eloquent one evening about how one settles into a relationship in such a way that sex and love are assumed and don't need to be affirmed all the time. To which her husband, arguably as perfect a gentleman as I have ever met, spoke up saying "If that is your idea of marriage then I say that your idea of marriage is a crock of shit." That really got my attention especially since I had never heard him talk that way.

I recounted the story to another aunt who smiled and said "Yes. He is and always has been a genuine romantic." I already knew that she and her husband were real romantics too. They both assured me that they had their share of arguments and didn't agree on everything, that they just did it behind closed doors, but I never saw a hint of that. Just genuine affection and mutual respect. If they said they kept that even when they were angry with each other, I believed it. I still do.

I chose to pursue the latter. Truthfully it has been quite a challenge, but not one I intend to back away from. And that's where it stands now.