October 23, 2006
iranian.com

Where do I begin? It has been so long since I wrote for you, dear faithful readers.  I feel like a disloyal mistress.  A deserter.  Much has happened, since before the World Cup, when I wrote for you last. This summer was so tumultuous and packed with activities, emotions, pleasures and pains that there was little time left to write. How could I maintain this degree of sincere description when so much was taking place?

But, alas, I have come back. I have come back to you to beg forgiveness and ask you to once again sit at my side and listen with your eyes to this tale of love and lust spread before you in black and white

It is a sign telling of the nature of the affair that not much has changed though much has happened between Napoleon and I.  It also reveals the highly skilled nature of our rather experienced lover. For as naïve and ‘American’ as I am -- I am still an ambitious woman whom, you can be sure, is relentless in her pursuit of bettering her lot in any given situation.  I am as competitive and as manipulative as any other forty-something woman with half a brain.  But for Napoleon, I am no match.  This is partly due to the fact that though I understand the nature of relationships my powers of manipulation go limp whenever they are about to be put to practice. I am a better theoretician of the art of seduction than a practitioner of it.  But this lover boy is also incredibly clever and knows exactly how much to push and how much to pull. Any other guy and he would either be gone by now or I would have moved into the prime-time slot in his life.  Of course, I tell myself, he has it easy: picking on some mid-aged woman, twice divorced, single mom, with no social life and a weight problem!

Anyway, as the French say, “plus ça change plus c’est la meme chose.” Certainly this is true when it comes to me, my lover and his partner.  How lame and unromantic it sounds when the one your lover is betraying is a ‘partner’ rather than a wife. It keeps me from, at least, feeling at one with all the colorful mistresses of history. It leaves me without history in a freefall outside of any context. Or even worse in the wrong kind of context: in back alleys with easy Puerto-Ricans on crack -- or drunken co-eds willingly getting gang banged in frat houses only to be laughed at all semester.  Imagine if Diana was Charles’ girlfriend -- that wouldn’t make Camilla such a heroine now would it?

No, being the mistress of a man with a girlfriend or a partner, even if he has tried to make babies with her, is simply lame. It is an oxymoron. It simply means that you are too fat, or something, for the guy to want to tell others he is fucking you. Punto. No and, ifs or buts about it.  In Farsi we say ‘nemeekhad root koneh’ or he doesn’t want to reveal you because it is shameful to do so.  When you don’t ‘roo’ somebody it is usually because you are ashamed of them.

You see, dear readers, why I have not been writing?  What should I do? Beg your indulgence make you co-dependents in this game of humiliation I am playing? How can I take a post-feminist erotic view of my situation when it is really all about female weakness--or not even that lofty, it is about my particular weakness? The truth is that everything about this relationship is lopsided.  Everything is the way he wants it.  My whole sorry life revolves around a man whose own life revolves around someone else.  And do regular orgasms make-up for a life of humiliation and angst? Of course not. No woman or even man with a modicum of integrity would stay in a relationship like this.

Not unless they were not in love which would make it fine and keep them from being victims.  How I envy those creatures, better than me, who can enjoy affairs and relationships without falling in love the same way they did when they were sixteen!  What super race of women they are. Those who take what they want and move on.

Those who simply do not fall head-over-heals in love. Those who can compartmentalize. Keep duties, feelings and thoughts in different nooks and crannies of the neat office space that is their mind. My mind is more like a washing machine stuck on one cycle turning all the mess that makes up my life -- not separating them for structure but just cleaning them for clarity.  A clarity that sometimes hurts and never renders the handling of the mess any easier.

Ok, he just called. And this happens often that is why I am still in this so called affair. He says hello his voice is so soothing and works instantly like some Pavlovian call to calm and pleasure. He is attentive and kind when I am angry which is more and more frequent. He cradles my anger with his voice and words, rocks it to sleep, and makes me want to forget all my complaints and take him in my mouth and suck him hard and deep.  He calls several times a day. If I tell him I am angry or upset or just plain depressed he calls more.  He asks me how I am and what he can do to make me feel better.  He talks in that baby voice, that I had first heard him use with his girlfriend, and that long-time lovers or those deeply in love use as if rendering their desire childlike makes it more sincere.  He never promises anything or even suggests much outside of our routine but somehow he calms me down and makes me want to wait, however long it takes, till I see him next till I can hold him again and feel the wave of desire go down my spine. 

It is all very erotic. My complaints his response. Here is where his skill is shamelessly revealed. Knowing how much I crave him sexually he knows that with the little hope that his earnestly caring words bestow I can hold on, not fall apart, till our next meeting which is never too far away. Sometimes when he can’t be with me in the late night he comes and sees me for an hour or so in the early evening. We have tea and talk and his proximity reassures me for a while.  He tries hard not to hurt me without really conceding anything.  A carpet-dealer of a lover he is great at holding his ground without losing the customer.

Anyway, who knows if this is bad for me or not?  Maybe god is testing my patience.  Knowing that patience is the virtue I most lack he is trying to teach it to me readying me for some greater calamity to come -- or perhaps old-age sainthood and wisdom. 

Why do we need to be put on a pedestal? Why can we not think that someone wants us simply because we give good blow jobs? Certainly, a man would not mind if a woman wants him for sex? Why should I?  I have a lover who is kind and civil and great in bed with whom I have more sex than with both my ex’s put together -- why should I feel humiliated by it? Because he is not proud of me? Because he will not leave another woman for me?  But is that the only way we can feel good about a relationship? Why is being the ‘official’ woman in somebody’s life better, more prestigious than being the one he likes to fuck the most? When I was the neglected wife I dreamed of being someone’s mistress. But we yearn to be loved. Was it Tolstoy who wrote, ‘a woman’s greatest ambition is to be loved?’ I can stand being a beloved mistress but not just a fat one you like fondling under the covers, in the dark, away from the preying eyes of friends who judge.

The problem is, dear readers, that when I get to this point in a relationship where I start feeling fat, I, in fact, start gaining weight.  It is a defense mechanism.  I think somewhere deep down my body wants to reject the object of my desire because she deems him harmful.  So I cannot stop eating knowing that eventually this very act will bring about my utter fall and therefore eventual salvation from this man. The fat I carry on my body is my protective shield, my guarantee against another shitty affair.  That is why at the end of all my love-affairs I tend to gain weight with a ridiculous rapidity. Frankly only writing keeps me from going to that fridge right now.

He called again. This time I let him have it. I told him that I cannot even write an erotic piece any more. That even my writing is becoming a complaining bitch who knows she is not loved but who is too weak to break up.  He assured me of his affection, his caring, and his support. He promised me he would try harder to keep me happy.  He kissed the phone before hanging up waiting for my response that never came.  And now I will go to pick up the kids, buy groceries and cook all the while thinking of seeing him later tonight: of holding his face to my breast and letting him suck my nipples like he always does. Comment