I really am not a big watcher of the Joy Behar show but my separated-at-birth twin, Margaret Cho, was on the other night so I had to tune in. For those of you who don't know or don't have the ability to see, I am often mistaken for Mah-gah-ret whenever she is in town or whenever I am somewhere besides the rock. I have been asked for my autograph by a tourist in the bathroom of the Makena Prince Hotel and at the Starbucks in the Rio Hotel by a group of ladies from New Jersey. No matter how much I insisted that I was not Margaret and was not even Korean (not that they really cared to listen to a lecture on the many different types of Asians in the world), they were positive that I was her but just trying to keep myself on the DL to avoid paparazzi.
The Behar interview was the usual View-esq type of stuff, how's your TV show, how's your tour, etc. until they got to the Tweets that had been sent in by viewers, including one tweet that asked why did Margaret marry a dude if she was bisexual. Margaret explained that she and her husband do not believe in monogamy so she shares him with a woman that he's been with for over 10 years and she has relationships with various folks of various genders. She said it works for them and they've been successfully married for a while so why change it.
I started thinking about all of the marriages of folks that I know that have imploded or are currently in a state of BP-sized oil ball disaster and the thing is, many of them have bit the dust because of the introduction of a third person into the marriage. Whether it was a hot and heavy affair with some insignificant bimbo or himbo, a deeply emotional but platonic bond with someone of the opposite sex, an online relationship with the potential to go somewhere or simply putting friendship with one's girls or guys above one's spouse, bringing a side salad to the marital table is never the first step to resurrecting wedded bliss. Yet, there persists a belief or perhaps a justification that in some magical way, this person will solve every problem that you have within yourself or within your marriage because he or she is everything that the person you are married to is not.
Perhaps it is just easier to deal with the pain and disappointment and self-flagellation that inevitably comes with the demise of a marriage by bringing in someone who will serve as your soul's band-aid. It is surely easier to jump off a high cliff if you know there is a soft, fluffy, down filled, brand news mattress waiting at the bottom to prevent you from smashing your soul and self-esteem into a million little pieces. When the choice is jump off the cliff into the black hole of being newly single or into the sparking light of new girlfriend or new boyfriend (what do people of a certain age call each other anyway?), my guess is most people would go to the light.
However, we all know that while a band-aid may stop the bleeding, when it is removed, there will still be a scar.
No comments:
Post a Comment