Isn't it weird to think that your grandmother might have been a slut? That she backdoor cheated on her boyfriend with your grandfather. Or, that your best friend - who's impeccably ethical - fell for one of her college students, denied it to her board and secretly married him? Is it not shady to cheat on a terminally ill wife? Or sh*t talk your best friend's boyfriend only to start dating him 3 months later?
There must be something deeply encoded in us that really subscribes to the idiom "all's fare in love and war." That romantic destiny is not subject to the same ethical and moral scrutiny we hold ourselves to in other domains of our life. In short that "good people" and "good couples" are often born out of "bad situations" or "bad choices".
In shorter, Love Is A Battlefield. Thank you, Pat Benetar.
Perhaps it's inevitable and I'm being naïve -- Nobody's lover is handed to them fresh out of the box on a silver platter. People's lives intersect, overlap and run into each other. Our life paths are not really paths at all, but 10 lane highways full of bobbing and weaving, car pooling and flat tires. Still, it seems odd, that many of us don't own up to the sketchy launch pads that our relationships launched from.
By the time a few months or years have gone by the original story often gets spinned or sanitized. "Your grandma was dating a real pig and I rescued her." or, "Debbie didn't really like your Dad so much, but I did so we made a choice and aren't you glad we did, otherwise you wouldn't have been born."
Now, please know the FG doesn't write this from a high branch of moral judgment. Who among us hasn't married a woman already legally married in Uruguay (joke). Paraguay. But, I just wanted to put it out there, to open the floor to you readers. Where do you stand on this issue?
Are we OK with a society that cloaks mean behavior under the banner of "I did it for True Love?"
Am I underestimating the fall out from situations like this?
Is there an alternative to getting what you Need without stepping on toes and hearts?
Should we overlook our moral low points because True Love needs to be captured come hell or high water?
Relationships
I know grandma's dirty secrets, and I'm glad, it'll make a great book someday. Just you wait.
I love this article, but hate the word slut. To me, the word sounds so derogatory.
well I know my grandma was hot stuff!
at 19 she had a baby with a soldier who proposed to her and she turned him down, only to be followed by 4 more proposals one of those men even offering to buy her a house.. not a family house, her OWN FREAKIN HOUSE! when she already had an illigitimit child.... obviously she musta been workin it hardcore! the last proposal was my grandpa and she ended up having 7 more kids (yikes!)
I gave my number to a guy who wasn’t proud of his past. At 16 his first ride was a motorcycle & he was a pothead. At 40 he came full cycle: he was tooling around on a scooter & on probation for possession of controlled substance. He decided to refocus his energy toward himself & started to working out & cleaning up. It took him a few years, but he has a stable job & seems pretty normal now.
Who am I to judge? I have my 1st child at 17 & still in high school. He’s a guy who took his time growing up & I was force to. We sorted ended up at the same place in life, but took different paths getting here. Nobody’s perfect, not even you reading this. As long as we have a life lesson along the way, it’s ok…
A married man with kids was divorcing his wife. While I was living with my future husband, this guy pursued me and told me he had always wanted to be with me and now was our chance to be together. At the time, my future husband did not seem like he was ever going to marry me so I was flattered... I thought about "All's fair in Love and War" but that's not who I am. No exciting stories for my grandchildren. Boring works for me.