Jacob Lawrence, The Lovers (1946)

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January 7, 2005:

Did I betray her?

Her hurt feelings are easy to understand. More than probably any other decision of my little life I'd take that one back if it were possible. Not because I'm convinced it was ethically wrong but because of how painful it's been for her.

The truth is that despite my sympathy for her I see it as a reasonable thing to have done. We'd broken up. I was free. I thought I might be interested in another friend. That friend and I checked it out gingerly, which is to say we made-out a little, and we discovered that there was no romantic connection. End chapter. Turn page.

I don't see that as disloyal, just as human, and while I very much regret the pain it caused I find myself unable to summon sympathy for it as an issue between us so long after.

Contrast the experience with actions of her own. She had real sex with a friend of hers while she and I were in our first year together. Orgasm, fluid exchange, the whole sticky business. At a time when she was emphatically not free. I never held that over her head and I really have never felt that it merited such a loud label as "betrayal". People make mistakes. It doesn't make them evil. My only purpose in raising the memory is that by any reasonable comparison of the two actions it's worse.

Why then does does this remain alive? I have no idea. Except perhaps the general human tendency for one's own sins to count for less in one's eyes than the sins of others. Maybe that's why she'd totally forgotten her own indiscretion until I reminded her. Or maybe it's why I can't see my actions as something so horrible as she portrays them.

I don't think there's a moral to this story. There's only confusion, and our attempts to do the best we can.

This doesn't change how I feel. I'd undo this history if I could because I hate the pain I caused her. But I revolt at the label.

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