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From the Mistress
Aug. 5th, 2011 01:22 amI'm reading an article about the differences between a mistress and a homewrecker. "The mistress is the hidden, secret lover, but the homewrecker is the same woman splashed on every tabloid cover with her baby — his or not — suddenly labeled “love child” in alarmingly large and yellow type". The author says "literature written from the perspective of the mistress is few and far between. At most, the mistress is a stock character, there to provide comic relief in the predictability of her faith that he’ll get a divorce (see: Carrie Fisher’s character in When Harry Met Sally), or there as a catalyst for the really important characters — the husband and the wife.".
Ok, so this isn't "literature", but I thought that maybe there's something to that statement - that we rarely hear from the Mistress. Perhaps because we so rarely hear from her, that it's easy to revile her, or make fun of her. Or maybe because she is reviled that it's easier for her to remain unheard.
The author writes that society tends to think that "one of the primary responsibilities of the mistress is to keep quiet and keep her secrets safe. But also, perhaps, we don’t much care. We are free to assume that she is a desperate type, miserable and alone. Not marriage material herself, she becomes a vindictive force, out to ruin what she can’t have". And "The woman is supposed to tend to her own nest, that’s her nature, and so with the mistress there must be something damaged, something sick, some as-yet unknown or diagnosed personality disorder warping her feminine desires, or else why go after another woman’s husband?" I agree with the author that this is what society thinks of mistresses, but I beg to differ with society.
Sure, there are women out there who are like that - both the secretive, sad, pathetic mistress type and the vindictive hateful bitch homewrecker type. It's a planet of over 6 billion people, I'm positive there are just about every type out there, somewhere. What I disagree on is this caricature of women being of these two types in order to be in love with a married man, that there are only these two types, and that this is as deep as the women get even if they are one of those two types.
The author says "In two paragraphs, [Lisa Appignanesi] dismisses the single woman in love with a married man as a delusional twit, fooling herself into thinking that if he might leave his wife, or in the remote chance that he does, that he’ll remain faithful to her. It’s tempting to talk about the mistress only in terms that reveal hidden truths about marriage and married people. That’s how she’s been talked about for centuries. But who is she? The sad, lonely woman begging her lover to leave his wife? Or someone else entirely?" Who indeed?
The following may apply to people of all genders, but I'm going to stick with the genders given in the original article - a woman involved with a married man, for simplicity of narrative. You can also substitute "married" for any other term implying romantic partnership and it will still apply, as it does for all my relationships, even with the non-married ones, but I'm going to stick with "married", again, for simplicity.
There are lots of reasons why a woman would become involved with a married man, love being foremost among them. A woman does not have to be desperate, miserable, or alone to find a married man interesting. Some other woman already found him interesting enough to marry, so why should it be some character flaw on the mistress' part that she also finds him interesting? Love is probably the most common reason to become involved with a married man. Sexual attraction is probably the next most common, and trailing behind is money, fame, coercion, desperation, etc.
I am not desperate for loving a married man. In fact, I have ridiculously high self-esteem and I think I'm pretty damn terrific. If I were not involved with the men I'm involved with, I would be involved with someone else. I have no doubt about that. Even when I have periods of not being partnered at all, I know I will find partners. I am absolutely secure in the idea that I am desirable. Not to everyone, no. But to someone.
I am also not miserable. I know people read my journal full of rants and ravings and think that I'm angry all the time. That couldn't be further from the truth. I put the vast majority of my rants and ravings into this journal so that I can go about the rest of my life being happy. The world is such a fascinating, wonderous place, that I don't really have much time to be miserable.
Not being marriage material, well, I suppose that depends on what, exactly, marriage material is? If you mean being the property exchanged to ally families together, yeah, I'd have to agree that I'm not marriage material. If you mean being the happy homemaker, content to spend my days cleaning house, raising babies, and deriving my entire identity from my associations to my husband and children? Yeah, I'm not really that marriage material either. If you mean the type of person who takes a vow before a god, promising to make a union of two humans and one creepy, jealous, voyeuristic ghost and spending the rest of her days performing tasks for her husband for the purpose of attaining the approval of the tempermental sky-daddy, you got me, I'm not really that marriage material either.
But if you mean a person who wants to build a partnership with another human being, to share love and laughter, to support each other during hard times, to create a shared history with someone, to be someone's companion, to explore life and sex with someone, to create an intimacy that cannot be compared to any other, well, if that's what you mean when you say "marriage", then I could be marriage material after all.
The thing is, in my world, that "marriage type" is not incompatible with being in love with a married man. That type of relationship is not out of reach to this mistress.
If you mean a person who wants to take advantage of financial and legal benefits bestowed upon a select class of people, I might be that kind of marriage material too. Generally speaking, my only real beef with marriage is the conflation of legal, emotional, and religious states into a single word and the total lack of deliberate understanding or intention and the massive implicit assumptions that people tend to make such a weighty decision with, not to mention the current discrimination of said word. But I've no problem with people who make conscious and deliberate fully-informed decisions to enter into a legal partnership for governmental benefits, and frankly, this nation's deplorable healthcare situation has me ready to walk down that aisle just for that.
But the bottom line is that "marriage material" and "mistress" can coexist in the same person, depending on the definition of "marriage". "Marriage" is still a possibility for me, if by marriage you mean either a legal contract for benefits or building a shared life together with another person. Because this mistress is not out to supplant, usurp, or take anything away from the wife. This mistress feels nothing but joy and approval at her lover's marriage, for as long as that marriage provides *them* with joy. This mistress supports any other relationship her lover chooses to have with only the following two caveats: 1) that the relationship makes him happy; 2) that the relationship does not directly lower my own quality of life or my relationship with my lover.
Some people think that the very existence of another relationship automatically violates caveat #2 - the very fact that he has a wife necessarily and automatically reduces the quality of life and the quality of relationship for the mistress (and vice versa). But it doesn't have to be that way. Just as I welcome the presence of my lover's wife, so does the wife welcome the presence of me as the mistress. Because she also recognizes that I am not out to supplant, usurp, or take anything away from her, and that I encourage their continued relationship and the happiness that it brings them.
And because she recognizes that about me, she also feels the same way towards me. She is not out to supplant, usurp, or take anything away from me, and she encourages my continued relationship with her husband, and the happiness that it brings us. In that sense, even though she has the legal paperwork and the longer history, she is as much a "mistress" to our relationship as I am to theirs (and, sometimes, I even have the longer history than the wife, or wife-like partner).
I am involved with a married man because I fell in love with him. I fell in love with him after becoming sexually attracted to him. I did not choose to become involved with a married man because I was afraid that I would not find anything "better". I did not choose to become involved with a married man because I believed I could coax him away from his wife and then to be faithful to me. I did not choose to become involved with a married man because I'm too busy being independent for a "full time" partner. I am involved with a married man because I love him. It is as simple, and as complex, as that.
I am not "settling" for a second-rate relationship. I would not have fallen in love if he were a second-rate person. I am not sitting patiently by his feet waiting for table scraps. If that was how he treated me, I would not have fallen in love with him. My relationship with him, as are all my relationships, are every bit as deep and fulfilling and filled with potential as any relationship I have had with someone who was not married. Moreso, in fact, considering that I am no longer in those relationships that have ended, and yet I am still in this relationship with a married man.
Should my relationship with him ever end, that will not change the truth of my statements here at this time. Regardless of my future, my present is such that I am in this relationship for one reason - because I love him. Not because I'm afraid to be alone, not because I'm deluding myself about the stability of his marriage, not because it's convenient, not because it's part-time, not because I get material gain from being a "kept woman", not because I think I don't deserve better, not for any of the reasons people assign to cardboard mistresses to make themselves feel better about knowing that there are women out there willing to be involved with other people's husbands.
I KNOW I deserve a good partner - that's why I chose the ones that I have, they are good men. I KNOW I will not be alone if I don't want to be. I KNOW he will not leave his wife for me (thank all that is good about the universe!). I am with a married man for the same reasons that anyone is with anyone - because I love him, because we share common values, dreams, goals, and interests, because he is a good person, and because he's freaking phenomenal in bed. Isn't that why those wives are with their husbands? It shouldn't be difficult to grasp that, if a man was deemed so worthy by his wife, that some other woman wouldn't see the same in him too. It shouldn't be difficult to grasp that a man who loves his wife and is a caring, compassionate partner, he would not only be attractive to someone who is not his wife, but that he has it within him to be a caring, compassionate partner to someone who is not his wife. Being caring and compassionate to one's wife and having a mistress are not mutually exclusive states. A mistress, and a confident, self-assured, loving, lovable, and multi-faceted woman are not mutually exclusive either.
If, as the article states, there are two types, a mistress who is a secret and a homewrecker who is public and vindictive, then either the definitions are wrong, or there is a third type - a woman who is not secret, but not vindictive, loved and welcomed, whole, complete, complex, and happy. And that is me.
Ok, so this isn't "literature", but I thought that maybe there's something to that statement - that we rarely hear from the Mistress. Perhaps because we so rarely hear from her, that it's easy to revile her, or make fun of her. Or maybe because she is reviled that it's easier for her to remain unheard.
The author writes that society tends to think that "one of the primary responsibilities of the mistress is to keep quiet and keep her secrets safe. But also, perhaps, we don’t much care. We are free to assume that she is a desperate type, miserable and alone. Not marriage material herself, she becomes a vindictive force, out to ruin what she can’t have". And "The woman is supposed to tend to her own nest, that’s her nature, and so with the mistress there must be something damaged, something sick, some as-yet unknown or diagnosed personality disorder warping her feminine desires, or else why go after another woman’s husband?" I agree with the author that this is what society thinks of mistresses, but I beg to differ with society.
Sure, there are women out there who are like that - both the secretive, sad, pathetic mistress type and the vindictive hateful bitch homewrecker type. It's a planet of over 6 billion people, I'm positive there are just about every type out there, somewhere. What I disagree on is this caricature of women being of these two types in order to be in love with a married man, that there are only these two types, and that this is as deep as the women get even if they are one of those two types.
The author says "In two paragraphs, [Lisa Appignanesi] dismisses the single woman in love with a married man as a delusional twit, fooling herself into thinking that if he might leave his wife, or in the remote chance that he does, that he’ll remain faithful to her. It’s tempting to talk about the mistress only in terms that reveal hidden truths about marriage and married people. That’s how she’s been talked about for centuries. But who is she? The sad, lonely woman begging her lover to leave his wife? Or someone else entirely?" Who indeed?
The following may apply to people of all genders, but I'm going to stick with the genders given in the original article - a woman involved with a married man, for simplicity of narrative. You can also substitute "married" for any other term implying romantic partnership and it will still apply, as it does for all my relationships, even with the non-married ones, but I'm going to stick with "married", again, for simplicity.
There are lots of reasons why a woman would become involved with a married man, love being foremost among them. A woman does not have to be desperate, miserable, or alone to find a married man interesting. Some other woman already found him interesting enough to marry, so why should it be some character flaw on the mistress' part that she also finds him interesting? Love is probably the most common reason to become involved with a married man. Sexual attraction is probably the next most common, and trailing behind is money, fame, coercion, desperation, etc.
I am not desperate for loving a married man. In fact, I have ridiculously high self-esteem and I think I'm pretty damn terrific. If I were not involved with the men I'm involved with, I would be involved with someone else. I have no doubt about that. Even when I have periods of not being partnered at all, I know I will find partners. I am absolutely secure in the idea that I am desirable. Not to everyone, no. But to someone.
I am also not miserable. I know people read my journal full of rants and ravings and think that I'm angry all the time. That couldn't be further from the truth. I put the vast majority of my rants and ravings into this journal so that I can go about the rest of my life being happy. The world is such a fascinating, wonderous place, that I don't really have much time to be miserable.
Not being marriage material, well, I suppose that depends on what, exactly, marriage material is? If you mean being the property exchanged to ally families together, yeah, I'd have to agree that I'm not marriage material. If you mean being the happy homemaker, content to spend my days cleaning house, raising babies, and deriving my entire identity from my associations to my husband and children? Yeah, I'm not really that marriage material either. If you mean the type of person who takes a vow before a god, promising to make a union of two humans and one creepy, jealous, voyeuristic ghost and spending the rest of her days performing tasks for her husband for the purpose of attaining the approval of the tempermental sky-daddy, you got me, I'm not really that marriage material either.
But if you mean a person who wants to build a partnership with another human being, to share love and laughter, to support each other during hard times, to create a shared history with someone, to be someone's companion, to explore life and sex with someone, to create an intimacy that cannot be compared to any other, well, if that's what you mean when you say "marriage", then I could be marriage material after all.
The thing is, in my world, that "marriage type" is not incompatible with being in love with a married man. That type of relationship is not out of reach to this mistress.
If you mean a person who wants to take advantage of financial and legal benefits bestowed upon a select class of people, I might be that kind of marriage material too. Generally speaking, my only real beef with marriage is the conflation of legal, emotional, and religious states into a single word and the total lack of deliberate understanding or intention and the massive implicit assumptions that people tend to make such a weighty decision with, not to mention the current discrimination of said word. But I've no problem with people who make conscious and deliberate fully-informed decisions to enter into a legal partnership for governmental benefits, and frankly, this nation's deplorable healthcare situation has me ready to walk down that aisle just for that.
But the bottom line is that "marriage material" and "mistress" can coexist in the same person, depending on the definition of "marriage". "Marriage" is still a possibility for me, if by marriage you mean either a legal contract for benefits or building a shared life together with another person. Because this mistress is not out to supplant, usurp, or take anything away from the wife. This mistress feels nothing but joy and approval at her lover's marriage, for as long as that marriage provides *them* with joy. This mistress supports any other relationship her lover chooses to have with only the following two caveats: 1) that the relationship makes him happy; 2) that the relationship does not directly lower my own quality of life or my relationship with my lover.
Some people think that the very existence of another relationship automatically violates caveat #2 - the very fact that he has a wife necessarily and automatically reduces the quality of life and the quality of relationship for the mistress (and vice versa). But it doesn't have to be that way. Just as I welcome the presence of my lover's wife, so does the wife welcome the presence of me as the mistress. Because she also recognizes that I am not out to supplant, usurp, or take anything away from her, and that I encourage their continued relationship and the happiness that it brings them.
And because she recognizes that about me, she also feels the same way towards me. She is not out to supplant, usurp, or take anything away from me, and she encourages my continued relationship with her husband, and the happiness that it brings us. In that sense, even though she has the legal paperwork and the longer history, she is as much a "mistress" to our relationship as I am to theirs (and, sometimes, I even have the longer history than the wife, or wife-like partner).
I am involved with a married man because I fell in love with him. I fell in love with him after becoming sexually attracted to him. I did not choose to become involved with a married man because I was afraid that I would not find anything "better". I did not choose to become involved with a married man because I believed I could coax him away from his wife and then to be faithful to me. I did not choose to become involved with a married man because I'm too busy being independent for a "full time" partner. I am involved with a married man because I love him. It is as simple, and as complex, as that.
I am not "settling" for a second-rate relationship. I would not have fallen in love if he were a second-rate person. I am not sitting patiently by his feet waiting for table scraps. If that was how he treated me, I would not have fallen in love with him. My relationship with him, as are all my relationships, are every bit as deep and fulfilling and filled with potential as any relationship I have had with someone who was not married. Moreso, in fact, considering that I am no longer in those relationships that have ended, and yet I am still in this relationship with a married man.
Should my relationship with him ever end, that will not change the truth of my statements here at this time. Regardless of my future, my present is such that I am in this relationship for one reason - because I love him. Not because I'm afraid to be alone, not because I'm deluding myself about the stability of his marriage, not because it's convenient, not because it's part-time, not because I get material gain from being a "kept woman", not because I think I don't deserve better, not for any of the reasons people assign to cardboard mistresses to make themselves feel better about knowing that there are women out there willing to be involved with other people's husbands.
I KNOW I deserve a good partner - that's why I chose the ones that I have, they are good men. I KNOW I will not be alone if I don't want to be. I KNOW he will not leave his wife for me (thank all that is good about the universe!). I am with a married man for the same reasons that anyone is with anyone - because I love him, because we share common values, dreams, goals, and interests, because he is a good person, and because he's freaking phenomenal in bed. Isn't that why those wives are with their husbands? It shouldn't be difficult to grasp that, if a man was deemed so worthy by his wife, that some other woman wouldn't see the same in him too. It shouldn't be difficult to grasp that a man who loves his wife and is a caring, compassionate partner, he would not only be attractive to someone who is not his wife, but that he has it within him to be a caring, compassionate partner to someone who is not his wife. Being caring and compassionate to one's wife and having a mistress are not mutually exclusive states. A mistress, and a confident, self-assured, loving, lovable, and multi-faceted woman are not mutually exclusive either.
If, as the article states, there are two types, a mistress who is a secret and a homewrecker who is public and vindictive, then either the definitions are wrong, or there is a third type - a woman who is not secret, but not vindictive, loved and welcomed, whole, complete, complex, and happy. And that is me.
