I have an awfully hard time just disliking someone, but a nearly impossible time actually hating someone enough that I really believe if I saw him/her that I wouldn’t be able to resist ripping them limb from limb. Oops, sorry, this is supposed to be a productive blog site at the very least, but I hate people who knowingly and deliberately hurt others. Well, I hate the ones who are so wrapped up in themselves that they only care about what happens to them and not the ones they use.
These musings are on women who destroy families.
Qualifier: what I’m about to write can certainly and easily apply to men, but I’ve really just about had it with women…no, girls…hurting wonderful men who love them and whom I care a lot about. And in all but one instance, I’ve never even met these women.
Reason #1: Cheating women are children. Really. They have gotten stuck at some pubescent stage of growing up. I mean, think about it, they are like children at recess. Sally and Suzie are playing in the sandbox; Sally, who has been digging with a shovel, puts down the shovel, brushes off the sand on her clothes, and steps out of the sandbox to go swing on the swings. But as Suzie moves to pick up the now abandoned shovel, Sally gets all possessive. Now, we know that I’m speaking in metaphor here. Sally was dating Sam, but is now done with Sam and wants to go date Mike. But at the same time, Sally doesn’t want anyone else to date Sam either, so she keeps him. Remember, Sam is the shovel in the sandbox, Mike is a swing on the swingset. As far as Sally is concerned, those two have no reason to ever play together or know about each other. That’s the mentality that allows Sally to justify keeping two men who don’t know about each other or their competition for Sally.
The same thing happens in the cheating situation (we’ll stick with Sally, Sam, and Mike). Sally and Sam are married. But Sally sees Mike and decides she likes/loves him too. While I can’t completely discount the existence of polyamory (where multiple partners all know about each other and agree to be part of a multiple partner relationship), the greed, envy, and secrecy that make cheating bad and sexy are the very things that made lying so attractive to the 5-year-old who discovered that sometimes if she said sister did it she might not get spanked…that reward rather than punishment for getting away with it. Very childish in my mind.
Reason #2: Cheating women can only lie: to themselves, to their children, and to the world. A byproduct of all of the lying necessary to cheat successfully is that at some point, she must begin to lie to herself. Not just the “getting away with it” part but the “this way no one gets hurt” part, followed by the inevitable “we’re all happier this way” part. You see, at some point, Sally will be able to justify keeping her husband Sam and dating Mike on the sly with a line of logic that goes like this: I love Mike and he makes me happy; if I’m happy from being with Mike, then I can be a nicer and better mom to my kids; and if I’m happy from being with Mike and the kids are doing well, then I can be a good wife to Sam. See, everyone is happy. At least that is what Sally has lied to herself about so many times that she now believes her own lies.
Reason #3: Cheating women deserve neither of the men they are with. Whether Mike knows about Sally’s husband Sam or not, Sally isn’t worthy of either of them. Here’s where some things might seem contradictory. But if you are Mike, and you love Sally, and she has said she’s going to leave Sam for you, you want to believe her, right? And if you are Mike, and you love Sally, and she says she has to stay with Sam because that’s what’s best for the kids, you want to believe her right? You wouldn’t love her if she was easily willing to disrupt the kids’ life just for her own pleasures, right?
In my experience as a friend to both Sam and Mike, for Sally to make this work, she has to convince one or both Sam and Mike that he is not good enough to get anyone else, to make him believe that she is the only one who can love him like he needs, despite his many and heinous flaws. In fact, such a strategy protects Sally from exactly what she fears, that she is not worthy of either of them.
What I’ve learned from these musings is that Sally is possibly the best salesperson ever…until it comes time to close the deal. Again, in both Sam’s and Mike’s cases, when push came to shove, Sally ended up with neither man: neither her husband or her lover. Both relationships failed.
And finally, I must acknowledge a special class of women who I think must be mutant, because they can’t possibly be human. These are women who abandon their children. Now, I don’t mean women who determine that someone else can give their child/ren a better life than they can and adopt them out or even sell them; though I may not agree with the method, I can respect them putting their child/ren’s needs and opportunities before theirs. I mean women who simply up and walk away. Drop the kids off at a friend’s house and just never come back from the store.
Now I’ll clarify here, I don’t have children that I can claim on my taxes, nor have I ever been pregnant. And to be honest, I’d be perfectly happy with my life if I never do have any children. But I can’t even abandon a cat or dog on the side of the road, and am horrified by the idea of leaving my nieces or nephews in the car while I take the groceries inside the house first. Truly, I believe in the existence of and challenge genetic researchers to identify the mutant gene that allows mothers to abandon their children.
Oh, and don’t even get me started on what I think of court systems who will give those same women a second chance with those children.
What I’ve ended up with are men friends who I’m pretty sure feel an immense hole in their lives, as if they will have missed some elemental life experience if they can’t find that one perfect love. (Note: I did not say perfect person.) They–the men–are the anti-players they were years ago when we were all younger, more carefree, not yet thinking of settling down but of living. Now they are worried…dare I say scared…that they’ve missed her and haven’t got a clue how to recover their opportunity, if there’s even one left. And, worse, they are scared to try again, to be hurt again. I hope I never get hurt so often or so badly that I can’t try again.
And, in case you are wondering, yes, I full-on friend love all of the Sams and Mikes in my life whom Sally has cheated on, whose children she has abandoned. Nearly all of my Sams and Mikes have been crushes, boyfriends, even lovers at some time, and have remained very dear to me. Thankfully, I can say that I have never been a Sally.
Singing about Cooking 