Q- How can any reasonable person consider adultery a complement to marriage? Adultery is against all we, in a civilized society, were raised to believe. Where is your faith?
A- Reason is reason and faith is faith. Marriage and monogamy is ideal for society. It, ideally, delegates responsibility for support, rearing and socialization of children to the family and eases the burden on society and breaks the population up into more easily managed entities.
Q- What is an ideal affair?
A- The answer to this question varies according to what result is sought. If you seek an affair to get out of a bad relationship and into a new one is different from one you would seek if you only wanted to supplement an otherwise satisfying marriage. To my mind, an ideal affair would be with someone who lives close (it is difficult to find time with one another especially if both lovers are married), one who has no interest in destroying either relationship, one who can give you what you fail to find in your marriage, and most important, one who is there when they're needed the most. To my mind, an affair should be peaceful. While, to others, an ideal affair could be one which totally destroys the marriage. This remark sounds strange, but in abusive marriages sometimes an affair makes the difference between staying and surrendering to the abuse or leaving and finding a happier life.
Q- Why don't you devote your talents to strengthening marital bonds rather than destroying them?
A- Perhaps I am. While this book may not apply to your marriage, it may apply to others. The error in such thinking is basing all relationships on your own. If you were contemplating an affair where could you go to seek advice? Could you go to your best friend, your mother, bishop, pastor or your garage mechanic? And if you did, would they tell you what they felt you wanted to hear or what they considered was socially expected of them? Would their opinion change depending on if the knew, loved or hated your husband?
Q- Do you really believe sex is a solution to all problems in marriage?
A- Not all problems, but if that is what is lacking, I certainly do. Is there really a substitute? Sometimes it is not sex that is lacking, but it is sex that provides the satisfaction. Call it an equal exchange. Sometimes it is just the tender touch, the show of affection, the interest of another human being that is sought. Sex, and the orgasm, is the "strictly human" natural climax of this exchange. No other animal in God's kingdom is capable of this.
Q- Sex is sex, it all feels the same. Society assigns too much value to sex.
A- And I suppose a Corvette is just like your granddad's old John Deere? I kissed a neighborhood wife a few years ago. It was one of those long, passionate, deep kisses, but still just a simple kiss. What started out as an easy repair of a leaky drain and a "thank you" peck on the cheek led to one of the most intense, emotional, heart pounding, coronary experiences I have had in years. You can attribute it to "a first kiss" or "a forbidden fruit" or even "a fatal attraction", if you want. The fact is it was absolutely "soul shaking". And judging from her almost immediate, shortly drawn and rapid, heavy breaths, it was certainly no John Deere for her either.
Q- Sex is not a basic human need. Tell it like it is!
A- After I quit writing, one of the most fascinating jobs I held was as a Psych Tech at a State Mental Hospital. What I brought from there, other than three cracked ribs, among other injuries, was an important observation. I noticed that when most people lose their minds there seems to be two prominent separate effects. One is an obsession with religion (the cracked ribs) and the other is an obsession with sex (without a doubt, the gravest on injuries). At the hospital, the floor below mine warehoused the geriatric patients. One of those patients was a sweet, frail old lady in a wheelchair. Every new male tech was warned never to get within arms reach of this frail lady and never put yourself in a situation where you are alone with her in a corridor. This lady could walk, and although I could never prove it, I still strongly believe the wheelchair was a clever ploy to lull unsuspecting Tech into a false sense of security. This lady got me one time with a grip of iron that would bring tears to superman's eyes. She had me crying like a baby. It took three Tech and a crowbar to get her off me and all she could do was giggle and crush.
Q- You are not a trained therapist. Where do you get off telling women to have affairs or not to have affairs?
A- You are absolutely correct. I don't think I would like the responsibility of being wrong and hurting someone. I also sometimes wonder that if I were would it destroy my objectivity. I would rather report the facts than subscribe to the contemporary thoughts and practices required of my chosen field. Only recently has therapists and counselors recognized that some marriage are not worth saving. It is much like the good old days no sociologist has been able to find where marriage was a blissful nuclear unit of happiness and security. Because of the reluctance to invade the sanctity of marriage, little research had been possible. Many marriages presented a tranquil facade while a volcano spewed pain and abuse beneath. But that barrier of matrimony could not be broken. I was privy to one of these tranquil volcanos where the woman was advised to "hold the marriage together at all costs" by her religious counselors. She was later excommunicated from her church, after being accused of having an affair, during a "he did it, she did it" divorce battle. She had been excommunicated even though the church had been counseling this couple for years for the behind-the-facade abuse she had suffered for years. Here the sanctity of marriage held precedence over human dignity and happiness. In some respects little has changed. I am not advising or counseling women to have or not to have affairs. I present the facts and leave it for the reader to evaluate the information.
Excerpt from a letter: This man is dangerous....and so is his opinions. He should not be allowed to write!
Response: I don't mean to be less than professional but, I hope you're gorgeous because I just fell in love. This excerpt, which hopefully was not meant as it was written, illustrates the all too common point of view that if it does not conform to accepted social norms it should be destroyed. One only needs consider the proud southern states and their treatment of the un-whites in the sixties and before. Separate drinking fountains, schools, housing, rights and privileges for Blacks, for instance, were accepted social norms. If you were raised with such beliefs, anything to the contrary would be unthinkable.
Q- Why are you writing this book for women and not for both sexes? You say you are objective. Is this not a form of bias?
A- Women are more vulnerable and, I believe, more often hurt by the affair. Men do not get pregnant and deserted; are rarely used or abused; are not as susceptible to contracting infectious diseases, for obvious reasons, as the woman; and men do not suffer the same social stigma associated with adultery as women do. There are additional personal reasons, but they are my own. This is a difficult subject. The difficulty is lessened when the focus can be narrowed, writing for one gender makes it considerably easier. And finally, pure objectivity is most likely an impossibility. Being human does have its short comings. Do you think my objectivity is less than those counselors who excommunicated the woman for having an affair?
Q- I really enjoy your writing. I think having a page like this set up for a debate would be fascinating. Also, you are a hard man to catch online. Why is that?
A- Thank you, I appreciate that. A debate page would be quite interesting, but don't read more into me than there is. I am afraid with such a page I would have little time for much else. And the reason why you cannot catch me online is I do most my work off and only go on to collect my mail and upload completed pages or download what information I need.