Exposed
Matt’s in New York and he told me over MSN that his wife had read my reply to Valerina and Jeremy’s comments. “She cried the whole night.” He typed. “What?” I typed back. “Why’d you show her in the first place?”
According to him, she had seen the reply on his laptop screen when he walked away to get a glass of water. Matt does not know my blog address but he knows I write about him. I had told him that I had received some comments from strangers that both touched and made me think about my affair with him. He wanted to read my reply to the comments so I had sent him my reply in a word document, which he had carelessly opened and left on his screen.
“So what now?” I asked. I don't know what to think. I feel so guilty I made her cry.
“I don’t know” he replies.
According to him, she had seen the reply on his laptop screen when he walked away to get a glass of water. Matt does not know my blog address but he knows I write about him. I had told him that I had received some comments from strangers that both touched and made me think about my affair with him. He wanted to read my reply to the comments so I had sent him my reply in a word document, which he had carelessly opened and left on his screen.
“So what now?” I asked. I don't know what to think. I feel so guilty I made her cry.
“I don’t know” he replies.
1 Comments:
I can quite understand how devastated Matt’s wife must have been when she read what you’d written in response to the comments of Valerina and myself.
Which raises the question of why Matt was careless enough so his wife could read what you wrote. Was it a genuine mistake, or could it have been that, unconsciously, he wanted her to see it, perhaps out of his guilt, and to be punished for it?
In what you wrote, you said that “affairs” were not meant to last, and that with you and Matt there won’t be a “happily ever after”.
My first thought is that yours and Matt’s romantic feelings for the other will last a lot longer than if you were openly living together or married to each other, because in affairs like yours with Matt, your opportunities to meet are relatively few, and have risk attached. So you both (I assume) look eagerly forward to when next you meet, anticipating it with excitement, and then once you meet, the minutes begin to tick away, and each fleeting second is precious and to be savoured to the full. Thus you don’t take each other for granted, as you might if you and he were openly free to love.
And don’t beat up on yourself for having this affair with Matt, since it does take two to tango. Also, you are obviously giving him something he isn’t getting in his marriage, regardless if it’s his fault or his wife’s. And I assume he is giving you something you aren’t getting from any other man, either because there isn’t one around, or if there is, he doesn’t give you what Matt does.
So why not just live the moment, because life is mostly very unexciting, and so it is natural to grab any available excitement with both hands (and what is more exciting than a love affair? Well, watching football perhaps, but even then.....)
This no doubt all sounds selfish and sinful, but who of us is a saint? So if you feel guilty, just live with it, for life isn’t perfect, and neither are any of us.
As for the notion “happily ever after”, this applies to fewer and fewer marriages, at least in western Europe and North America (I don’t know how it is nowadays in Singapore), where 50 per cent of marriages end in divorce. But if you and Matt wish your relationship to last, how about, in addition to being lovers, also being each other’s friend, where you discover common interests, so that when the bloom of the romance eventually fades, you can continue as very good friends? This is easier said than done, I know, but it isn’t impossible.
Would I be correct in assuming that very soon after you and Matt met, you became lovers? If so, it is a pity, because had you known each other as, say, co-workers, you might have built up a simple friendship slowly, out of initially discussing common work problems, then gradually becoming friends, then finally, but after a long time, lovers. Thus the romantic part of your relationship would merely be the icing on the cake, which has a solid platonic foundation.
Even though your relationship with Matt probably didn’t develop this way, how about just acknowledging the fact of this, and then try widening the scope of your relationship with him beyond the realm of the sexual?
Again, this is easier said than done, but not impossible.
Meanwhile I’ll continue to follow the course of this relationship on your bog with interest.
Post a Comment
<< Home