WOULD YOUR MARRIAGE SURVIVE INFIDELITY? by Linda Lee Greene

Let me say at the outset that my one and only marriage did not survive infidelity. But my divorce occurred many years ago, and I was a different person then. Given similar circumstances, would I pursue the same course of action now?

                To set the stage for this treatise, I grew up internalizing the American sitcom “Father Knows Best,” in which the wife and mother Margaret Anderson (glamorous actress Jane Wyatt) vacuumed the floors, if she ever did vacuum the floors, while her elegant neck was perpetually encircled by a string of perfect pearls and her slender movie-star silhouette was adorned in haute couture dresses. Her greatest tragedy was likely to be a bad perm day at the beauty parlor, and her adoring and loyal husband Jim’s (actor Robert Young) last nerve was apt to be jangled by a cloudburst on his golf day. “Adultery” was a word absent from their lexicon, and even its causes didn’t exist. Of course, my own parents resembled Margaret and Jim Anderson not even a smidgen, and neither did their “hum-drum” marriage. But I, we of my generation, wanted to believe the TV version to be the “real” thing, and all of us were convinced it was our true and only destiny.

                If you are familiar with the TV series “Mad Men,” you’ll get the picture of the vast differences in male and female relationships that beset my generation by the time we approached marriageable age. Drugs, sex, and rock n roll were cultural tsunamis that rearranged our world, and with the changes came rampant bed hopping, even by married individuals. In my experience, married men more than married women indulged in the sport then, and I was one among the majority who abstained. As with my girlfriends and female members of my family, in my heart of hearts, I remained a version of Margaret Anderson and my husband of Jim Anderson. Boy, was I wrong about him! And boy, was I wrong about me! I just bet, though, that if Margaret and Jim Anderson had been swamped by the swirling, dirty, drowning cultural waters of the 1960s and 1970s, they very well might have been swept into the divorce court, too.  

                It took me several years after my divorce to realize, or actually, to admit, that the infidelity was a symptom rather than its cause. And of course, the fact that it was the “accepted” rationale for breaking up our family blinded me to the truth, as well. I had all the evidence against the continuation of my marriage I needed, so why bother to dig any deeper than the specter of the “other women?” Among the “real” culprits were our unrealistic Margaret and Jim Anderson expectations of married life, as were secrets we hid from each other. Everyday proximity was another. “Familiarity breeds contempt” really is true. Is there anyone whom you hate more than your spouse at times, or maybe all the time to a degree—disdain, dislike, disrespect, disapproval, scorn—all the possible synonyms for hatred of him or her stuffed away somewhere in the sub-basement of your consciousness?  

                Nowadays, we have many more opportunities to be better informed about what it takes to forge and maintain a complimentary marriage, to learn new adaptations, and to stop and contemplate Hemingway’s avowal: “The world breaks everyone, and afterwards, many are strong at the broken places.” But I think he should have enlarged his statement with the actuality that many are left cripplingly or fatally weakened at the broken places. What are your thoughts on this subject? And more to the point, would your marriage survive infidelity?             

Linda Lee Greene’s latest novel “Cradle of the Serpent” explores the causes and consequences of infidelity in the long-term marriage of archaeologists Lily and Jacob Light. Hover your mouse here goo.gl/i3UkAV  to find it on Amazon. Look for her on Facebook and on Twitter @LLGreeneAuthor.   

When We Read, We Look for Ourselves in the Words

When we read, we look for ourselves in the words. If we are unable or uninspired to find ourselves there, the words remain meaningless to us. The stories they convey become “throwaway” experiences, never to revisit our minds, never to summon our memories. But if we “become” the old man in Hemingway’s sea; if we “are” Daisy to Fitzgerald’s Gatsby, then literature “is” who we are, or at least, points to whom we might have been, or can be—it is the indelible yardstick against which we measure ourselves. Author Francis Hamit’s “Shenandoah Spy,” a novel of historical fiction based on the true story of Belle Boyd, a legendary female spy for the Confederacy during America’s Civil War, was one of those stories that metamorphosed into a subjective experience for me, and to such an extent that it was surprising to me—surprising and satisfying. Let me tell you why.

                Although I often read and write about history, the Civil War of the United States is not high on my list of subjects; not because it isn’t fascinating in its own right, but rather that it holds less weight for me than other histories such as that of America’s native people, the Great Depression, and World War II. My interest in “Shenandoah Spy,” however was sparked by a social media interchange with its author, an informed and shrewd interchange on his part in response to a posting I submitted on Facebook on the 35^th anniversary of the Kent State Shootings in protest against the Vietnam War. I looked him up and discovered that he has an extensive background in military intelligence and espionage, a résumé I thought he might put to good use in the stories about which he writes. I ordered the book because of its “first-born” chronology in his body of work rather than its subject. But somewhere deep inside me, I also wanted to be “swayed” by a good Civil War story; I wanted to be brought into the fold. Hamit did not disappoint me on that point in “Shenandoah Spy.”

                How is it that in 2015, a reader in the senior years of her life (me) can be transported to a time a century-and-a-half ago and relate to a heroine of only seventeen-years-of-age (Belle Boyd)? The answer is found in Hamit’s presentation of Belle Boyd’s story. He makes room for the reader in the words. He writes with such intimacy and immediacy that it invites the reader to wonder how he/she would have behaved in Boyd’s stead. The reader suffers Boyd’s vulnerabilities; staggers in her exploits; quakes in her boots. And just as importantly for me, this author instilled in me a desire to pay closer attention to this era of my country’s history.   

                Despite my delight in “Shenandoah Spy,” conversely, an aspect of it niggles at my consciousness. Given that it takes place during, and in response to, the “slave-era” of America’s story, a supporting cast of African Americans is to be expected. There can be no such story absent that body of humanity. Hamit isn’t shy about offering a view of the Civil War as one less about “freeing the slaves” and more about other factors, though. The following conversation between characters Brodhead and Strother in the book illustrates this point: ‘“Not for freeing the slaves?” [asks Broadhead]. Strother had to think about it. “In time, on some abstract level, I might be, but this isn’t the way I’d choose to do it. Most people in the South don’t own slaves. They’ve been seduced into this thing by radical elements that wanted to break up the country, and seized upon the activities of the Abolitionists as an excuse.” “And those Abolitionists have stirred up the war fever on this side. Radicals on both sides have pushed this war into being. It could have been prevented.” Brodhead gestured with his hands as if to illustrate the futility of it all. Strother nodded. “The rich and privileged wanted a war and the rest of us will pay for it.”’

                In an excerpt further on in the story, Strother states. ‘“…Most Negroes [in the south] ain’t that displeased with their lot in life. ‘Uncle Tom’s Cabin’ was a masterful load of horse manure when it came to representing the usual situation. You don’t abuse slaves, any more than you would a horse or a cow. It’s not good business and people frown on it. House servants especially have an easy life. They become a part of the family.”’ In that vein, Belle Boyd submits that the Yankees “…exaggerate the colored folks capacity and desire for freedom – those that want it find a way to buy themselves free.”’ Her personal slave Eliza is depicted as one such happy “servant.” Not only does Eliza aid and abet Boyd willingly in her daily life and her spying missions, she is depicted as a personal “friend” rather than as a slave of her mistress. Of course, Hamit puts forth the then self-serving point of view of southerners in his treatise. Following Solomon Northrup’s true story of cruelty suffered at the hands of a slave-owner in “Twelve Years a Slave” that found light in recent times, the portrayal of the master/slave relationship in “Shenandoah Spy” is difficult to reconcile. I suppose, as in any other human enterprise, the minutiae of America’s Civil War ranged every possibility available at the time. Many of those fine points are to be found in “Shenandoah Spy.” It is good reading.

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Linda Lee Greene’s novel “Guardians and Other Angels” is at http://goo.gl/imUwKO. Her novel “Jesus Gandhi Oma Mae Adams,” co-authored with Debra Shiveley Welch, is at http://amzn.to/VazHFG. Her artwork is on view online at www.gallery-llgreene.com. Her Twitter handle is @LLGreeneAuthor.        

Depression/Anxiety vs Creativity

Linda Lee Greene in the heart of Ohio, USA, March 21, 2015  

“The poet Rilke was afraid that if he got rid of his demons, he would lose his angels as well. Of course the danger of clinging to our demons to save our angels is that our demons may well take over.”[1]

Boy, do I relate to that statement. I bet a gang of you do too. My demons began to take over when I was the tender age of sixteen and developed a hyperactive thyroid, wrongly diagnosed at the time, and under-treated for many years thereafter. During those most important years of marriage and childbearing, when, if one can possibly arrange it, it’s a good idea to be at ones best and on top of ones game, too much of the time, I seesawed between depression and anxiety, in my case, depression manifesting as feelings of dissatisfaction, and anxiety as restlessness and a sense of uninterrupted urgency. Believe me, I get the angst of victims of mental disorders.

My children grown and on their own, I ventured into New Age Practices, gave Buddhism a look, tried Yoga, joined a church, read enough spiritual tomes to fill the library of Congress, hunted for a better me in the eyes of lovers who hadn’t a clue (I was divorced by then), all in an effort to just feel better. I finally got diagnosed, the lights came on in my brain, and the mood swings began to level out (but not completely). As a result, I have a life-long dependency on Synthroid, a thyroid replacement hormone, which most of the time, keeps me just level enough that I don’t tip over into total insanity again. Now and then, though, the mood swings get out of control, which requires an adjustment in the dosage of the Synthroid.

During my famine years, and before I knew there was a bona fide organic disorder responsible for my troubles (in large part, at least), I gave various antidepressants a whirl—or more precisely, I contemplated giving them a whirl. The truth is, I got prescriptions for them filled, took them for a few days, and then never touched them again. I was afraid of them! Like Rilke, I was afraid they would kill my creativity, my spark. I was afraid I’d descend, if not into the blackness of full-blown depression/anxiety, but into the gray gloom of a medicated zombie state. I bet a slew of you have also experienced that same fear.

“Blake, Byron, Tennyson, Woolf, Poe, Plath, Kierkegaard, Pound, Hemingway, Van Gogh, Tennessee Williams[2], Stephen King, Robin Williams, to name a few in an endless accounting of artist-sufferers of depression/anxiety, some of whom are among the eighteen percent of creative people who have committed, or are more prone to commit, suicide than depressed people in the general population. Other mental disorders among artistic people present similar terrifying statics.

In tandem with my faulty thyroid messing with my moods, the fact that I’m primarily a right-brained individual—an author of fiction, an artist, and an interior designer, also presents tremendous “real-world” challenges for me. When a fire is burning in my right brain, and its light-filled, stress-free, happy, and filled with understanding people hovering steadfastly in the periphery of my existence, encouraging me, supporting my efforts, giving me space and time and freedom to do my thing, life is good for me. But once the project is finished—the book is published, the artwork is hanging on the gallery walls, the rooms are arranged and decorated down to the last knickknack, my Muse retires to her cave; she pulls its blackout curtain across its door, and wants only solitude and nothing to do with the other side of all her efforts, namely the business associated with them.

That’s where I am now! The cool, silent, seclusion of that cave is calling to me—beckoning me. And do you know why? It’s because the reissue of my novel GUARDIANS AND OTHER ANGELS (http://goo.gl/imUwKO) in ebook is available for purchase again. The email from Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing came through to me yesterday informing me that it is up and running. I had to do a reissue because the original publisher went out of business, rendering the novel no longer available. I will publish a paperback version at a later date. One consequence is that I lost all of the reviews (all of them 5 star reviews) the first edition accumulated. In essence, I have to begin a whole new marketing campaign for it…and since that’s a left-brained activity in which I dislike hanging out, depression and anxiety are back in full force again.    

How about you? Where do you stand on this subject of depression and/or anxiety vs creativity? If you are a seamstress, scrapbooker, photographer, furniture refinisher, cook, gardener, artist, musician, writer, composer, singer...whatever your creative outlet, do your creative efforts get waylaid by depression or anxiety? This is your forum to talk about it. Talking helps!

Linda’s novel Jesus Gandhi Oma Mae Adams, co-authored with Debra Shiveley Welch, is at http://amzn.to/VazHFG

Linda’s artwork is on view online at www.gallery-llgreene.com

Linda’s Twitter handle is @LLGreeneAuthor.

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[1] The Sun, March 2010, “Tim Farrington On Creativity, Depression, And The Dark Night Of The Soul,” by D. Patrick Miller, p 8

[2] Ibid, p 5