I mentioned earlier that I would interleave the blog with stories of my prior cheating behaviors, as well as incidents where I resisted temptation. Here is the first post in the former category.
Recall that Jenny reads these posts and that our relationship is based on honesty, what some would call brutal honesty. All of what I post in the blog has been previously disclosed and discussed with Jenny, but that does not mean that posting is without ramifications. That itself will be an interesting experiment and stressor on the process we have developed so far.
The main reason to keep these previous experiences alive is to use them to teach myself how to keep my relationship going with Jenny. This is part of my basic approach of constant vigilance: Never Sleep.
Lijuan lives a fascinating lifestyle as a member of a major performance acrobatics troupe in China. This is a group that has toured the world, performing amazing acrobatic tricks that often become anchor acts for more famous groups such as Cirque du Soleil. Most of these troupes have feeder organizations, teams of young children who are in training and whose performances are marketed to city tourists, and most of these are performance or circus schools. Their training regimen is very difficult and very disciplined — a 24-hour per day kind of regimen that is difficult to comprehend in the United States quite possibly because it would lead to jail time on the part of the instructors. The Machiavellian result is a truly impressive demonstration of the limits of human athletic capability in flexibility, coordination and strength, as well as a testament to the degree to which removal of choices results in a tremendously productive focus of will.
Lijuan is not the most talented gymnast in her troupe. In fact, she ranks near the bottom rather than the top, although she was a graduate of the Circus Academy. But she is very pretty, more lithe than stocky, and is blessed with both an attractively innocent personality and a clever wit. Her principal talent is acrobatics and naturally she has an incredibly flexible body. When I met her she was eighteen years old, old enough, given her lack of success in the troupe, to start to consider other options for her adult career.
I went to a private demonstration of her group as a guest of a culture minister. The participants ranged from children, perhaps as young as six, and instructors perhaps as old as their mid-thirties, as well as the principal performance troupe. More than the performances, the goal was to understand better the training process, part of an exchange of knowledge on different methods to train high performers.
Afterwards we toured their dorm rooms and training facilities, had several hours to interview students, and later met with many of them at a reception. The seemingly Spartan reception facilities were very luxurious compared to the threadbare dorms and training facilities — with naked incandescent bulbs hanging from wire, flickering fluorescents, peeling paint, although clean — and the participants were quite excited to see a glimpse of what they thought of as luxury. (Nicer facilities are being constructed for the upcoming Olympics, but they will be reserved for the foreign athletes.)
Recall for a moment how luxury is viewed in China. China is not yet a first world country. Most of it is quite poor. The opportunities available to people at large are few and often risky. A well-educated young man in a western province may decide to make his fortune in Shanghai, staking all he owns on the journey itself, only to compete with five million other such hopefuls. A handful of them will become fabulously wealthy, even by the standards of the West, but in a country where services and human life are cheap. More regimented approaches to success also exist, for example through the Communist Party or through sports programs managed by the ministries of culture and sports.
At the same time, the economic free trade zones in China and the real estate boom have contributed to unprecedented wealth in the country, and for the first time this wealth is largely unrelated to the Party. Most of this is concentrated in the hands of a few plutocrats, whose real estate holdings, fleets of Mercedes, luxury clothes, and other lifestyle accouterments are followed breathlessly by the populace. The good life is more tangible and real to the people than ever, visible in the streets of Shanghai or Beijing. The mystery of how this wealth is achieved, the stories of how poor disenfranchised people were able to rise to wealth, and the notion that it was done largely without deep Party connections, make the prospect tantalizing to the common people.
This also has created a distorted economy driven by opportunity and excess, made more unstable by an incredibly uneven distribution of wealth. The old commune system of agrarian resource balance and the parceling of manufacturing rights has been blown away by the quick money from resource speculation, foreign interest, and the new global economy. The result is a new social instability, driven by greed, jealousy, and hope. In short, capitalism.
With this backdrop consider how those trapped in the old models of success, whether low ranking Party politicos or those in the forgotten sports programs slaving away their lives, must feel about the taste of success. For Chinese acrobats, Hong Wang is as good as it gets, and that no longer sounds that great. Celebrities like her have been pushed aside in terms of airtime by media stars, moguls, and global business leaders. The respect of their country at the Olympics, or the pride of representing their culture worldwide at shows, may pale at the new go go go economy. Even at a more pedestrian level, a cousin or girlfriend at school who took a low track without glorifying the Party, say as a secretary or even a prostitute — those that eschewed the Party or traditional success programs — for the first time in memorable history can do far better than those that toed the line, listened to the conventional wisdom, sublimated their will, and trusted the System.
Driven by my naturally curious nature, I was fascinated by people raised in this environment and how they were coping with the massive social changes. And when I was paired up with Lijuan, all of eighteen years and slightly over five feet in height, wide eyed, gracious, ambitious and curious, I couldn't help by engage in some personal research.
Lijuan was picked to be my liaison for two main reasons. Firstly she was trusted. Although not a superstar, she knew her place and for over a decade had been dutiful, quiet, and well-behaved. Such a profile was a prerequisite to meeting foreigners as part of a State function. Secondly Lijuan spoke English relatively well. She studied on her own, and enjoyed watching English programming and reading English books on the meager scraps of spare time and stipend afforded to the students. In fact she had organized and managed a small English practice group among the girls in the troupe and was considering English tutor as a backup career.
During the tour Lijuan served as my student guide. Some readers may have a Japanese-centric view of Asia, with a picture of a shy, eyes-lowered woman shuffling behind the man. China is not like this. In business meetings you do not bow in China, and the women are far more forthright. Among Asian countries China has a high proportion of women in top government and business positions, in fact by some measures, more so than the United States. Credit the communist party for some of this reform away from the foot binding traditions of old. And thus Lijuan was far from shy, rather she was positively chatty and plied me with many questions about my opinions, my business, and my travels. After the tour during the interview she was quite delightfully animated, energetic, demonstrative, and funny — she was by far the most interesting student interview I had. Moreover, rather than just answering questions, she stated her opinions.
At the reception the performers were given some appropriate clothes to wear. Nothing fancy, basically modern updates of traditional Chinese garb of the sort you might see from Shanghai Tang. Nothing provocative, mind you, but attractive. Lijuan talked with me, and had a lot of follow up ideas on what she perceived from my questions to be my interests in their training methods. Her thoughtfulness demonstrated a mind along with that body, and I heard that when other girls would steal away to meet boyfriends, she would go to English reading libraries and bookstores to find books, even, gasp! unsanctioned books. Her energy and innocence were refreshing, she herself was intellectually interesting, and at some point in these conversations I started to really consider her as a sexual partner. I don't know how and why thoughts of sex started in my head (although I will discuss Jenny and my opinions on this later in this post), but they did start, and soon they went from an occasional appraisal of Lijuan’s body to a near-constant generation of fantasy scenarios involving her.
So let me take a moment out of the narrative to talk about when this encounter with Lijuan happened. The entire China trip I am describing happened a year before I was engaged to Jenny, but after we first had sex. It is well after my dalliances with Sanura or the Angels, and overlapped with some of the stalking experiences. Jenny and I were in the process of moving from our initial resolve to be friends to a more serious romance, but it was before the sexual breakthrough we experienced in Paris. There was no specific agreement in place concerning other women, but I knew that Jenny would be hurt if I strayed. Put another way, she would consider it cheating even without a specific agreement in place especially given her trust issues with men and their sexual fidelity from her previous relationships. My own feelings were somewhat ambivalent. At this point the likelihood Jenny and I would end up in a long-term relationship seemed very dim, it is well before I had thought through a framework for our long term relationship. We lived on different continents and played in different worlds. At the time we had both given our relationship long odds; in fact we often would question why we were continuing in a relationship at all.
I say none of this to exonerate myself, only to help set the context. Do not be disappointed, future examples of cheating behavior will be clearer...
I had been with Jenny just the weekend before. I was actually feeling more positive about her after that. We had talked about vacation plans the following month and I was busy making such plans. But apparently that affection that was insufficient because I was mightily tempted by Lijuan.
One of the most inexcusable things about my behavior, in fact, was that I initiated the entire scenario. It was almost impossible for somebody in Lijuan’s position to arrange for an affair. So after working myself up with various fantasy scenarios for the several hour reception, I asked one of my hosts if I could interview Lijuan further.
Initially the host was very agitated and said that other “superior forms of entertainment” could be made available later. I could see that the situation could become sticky, so I dropped it. Instead I went back to talk to Lijuan and told her that I unsuccessfully had tried to get some time with her to further discuss life in China and overseas. She thanked me and said, somewhat wistfully, that it would have been nice. At that point it was not clear to me what she was thinking, not knowing anything about her level of experience with the real world nor any ulterior interests. So we talked some more about the availability of sex and romance, her interests, her future plans, the Chinese way of education, my travel, and so on. It became clearer that she was quite aware of the possible ramifications of going out with me. Apparently much of that knowledge came from soap operas-like mini-series, mostly from Korea, which were quite enlightened about sexual situations; the Asian versions of Sex in the City.
Our conversation was interrupted by a ceremony, and Lijuan was taken away by other duties.
So let us take stock of the situation thus far. My behavior is hardly exemplary:
Lijuan is not forcing herself upon me, no, if anything I was scheming to meet her.
Jenny has done nothing at this point to anger, frustrate, or otherwise drive me away from our relationship.
I have full command of my senses, I am not drinking or under any external influence.
Keep this in mind as I analyze my behavior later.
Lijuan returns later. She is charmingly nervous as she tells me she would like to meet me, and can sneak out to do so if I can meet her at a local library the next day. She gives me a text message number of a friend. She will be able to be out of the dorms for three hours tops and her friend will cover for her.
The surreptitious danger, the innocence of Lijuan, her beauty, the schoolgirl and gymnast thing... the whole package was ripe with sexual potential. Without much thought, I seized the opportunity and agreed. Tomorrow it would be.
That night I spoke with Jenny on the phone. At that point I love you was not yet in our daily vocabulary. But I said nothing about Lijuan.
Did I feel guilty? Surprisingly not. If anything I was excited about Lijuan and avoiding thinking of Jenny at all. When I did, my mind was casting Jenny’s attitude and sexual performance (to date) in an unfavorable light. These were subconscious rationalizations for what I was going to do. Assisting me was the fact that there was much to plan: the driver, the rendezvous, and the evening. I wanted her to enjoy herself, feel luxury first-hand, and introduce her to a gentle and pleasurable sexual experience. I never thought through the whys and the what nexts of the evening.
That evening went as planned. Unsurprisingly the sex was not great; Lijuan did not know what to do, really. She made up for a lot of ignorance with enthusiasm, but it only makes up for so much; I have concluded that a schoolgirl sex fantasy is essentially a sign of a sophomoric midlife crisis. The fantasy of having sex with an acrobat was largely fulfilled with some interesting contortions (the degree of flexibility is not only astounding, but also somewhat disturbing) but it was less sexually pleasurable than expected. Because of my condition, there was no release for me, but she enjoyed herself much more than expected.
We parted with a promise to meet again two days later.
After dropping her off I went back to the hotel and spent over an hour masturbating. Then, perhaps cleared of the obstruction to objective thinking I started to consider what I was doing.
The ease by which I was able to meet Lijuan and the obvious benefit she would have by association with me, was mixing in my brain with the experience I was having with the stalkers and my doubts about Jenny, and my recent experiences with the Angels, the Mistresses, romances, and the too-easy sex. What was I doing with women? What was my goal?
It was clear that I had not built the skills to manage relationships with women I wanted to sponsor, that is, in relationships where much of the power was in my hands. Perhaps in matters of female company I was too nice, or unable or unused to saying no, or something, but I was too easily becoming involved in situations that were merely beneficial in the short term, with significant long term liability to both sides. In the prior years of sexual experimentation I found that I had a power that I had never realized and never before experienced. I was unused to such power.
Moreover it was unclear what was my goal. What did I want? I had some abstract goals and was clearly experimenting with relationships, but these were complex and human experiments. Distressingly, I was starting to live them rather than analyze them, so they were becoming experiences rather than experiments, a dangerous turn of events.
The analysis of my behavior ultimately taught me that I had a weakness for women in need where I could clearly help them in the short term. I had a fondness for projects, women who represented problems to solve. Naturally I had some interest in fulfilling unfulfilled fantasies. And I had some desire to be surrounded by positive energy, represented by youth and charm. In addition, I fed off of innocence, both because it represented potential that I could enable, but also because it represented gratitude and perhaps even worship toward what I could give.
Taken to an extreme, I felt that some of these behaviors would be very negative. It was important to figure out ways to channel these desires into more positive directions.
After an evening of deep thought I came to few conclusions. But one long trail I had built concerned the possibility of channeling the energy toward a single monogamous relationship. I had not yet completely determined that direction, but in many ways this entire incident with Lijuan was the genesis of my thinking concerning the long term framework for a relationship with Jenny.
Some months later Jenny and I both started discussing our previous partners and how we felt about them. It was a difficult discussion, as most such discussions go. We initiated the discussion in the very same place little place where we first pledged ourselves to truth and honesty and where later I gave Jenny our engagement ring, and we concluded that discussion at Whistler, Canada several months later. Jenny was disappointed to hear about Lijuan, but not as badly as I had feared. But her tempered response was due to her greater emotions surrounding a different indiscretion, one that I will write about later. Still, she generally took me to task, laying out fairly clearly her expectations for a long term relationship, and more helpfully, some constructive criticism on my dealings with other women.
Jennys short analysis was that I didn’t know women in the real world and had to learn how to manage myself around them. I have used the experience with Lijuan to focus both of us on what I seem to want, in terms of providing comfort and material things to Jenny and receiving positive energy, engaging in projects, living fantasies, having some short term focus on emotional returns, and even keeping conflict and honesty as a key part of the relationship as a way to continuously have problems to solve. I have also used the experience to recognize the warning signs of what I should avoid and to build huge liabilities for straying: personal, moral, emotional, and financial — whatever I can.
Does it work? Consider for example the recent experience with Amy. I do not think I would have resisted without these other experiences. But then again, perhaps I am only justifying my past behavior.
I add in postscript: Jenny hastens to point out that she fully supported a novel (to me) concept of full closure with ex-girlfriends, or perhaps more appropriately put: potential future regrets. She strongly supported my achieving closure with Lijuan and extensively discussed what it would take to put her to rest in my own mind. In the end I did meet her again as promised (though several months later), explained the situation in no uncertain terms, and helped her with advice and token support in achieving her goals, all with Jenny present. This was remarkably effective in removing vestiges of wistful reminiscence from my mind and granted me a highly neutral perspective that I could use, for example, to write this post.
As a consequence the animals are so tame you can walk up to them and grab them. Which you are not supposed to do. So you take photographs instead.
Some people are surprised to hear that the Galapagos is not deserted and in fact boasts a population of several tens of thousands of native inhabitants. Thus you can also fly in on a commercial jet from various Ecuadorian mainland cities. Either way you are greeted by signs that insist that you should not contribute to child prostitution, which I found odd.
The fascination of the Galapagos is that its remoteness and geologically young age created a distinctive laboratory for evolution. The unique flora and fauna there provide a compelling demonstration of the power of evolution to drive species into ecological niches. Unfortunately our ship was itself a demonstration of evolution in action as well; our fellow tourists adequately demonstrated how homo sapiens technological control over their evolutionary destiny has driven most of us into the niche of thoughtless, witless, pointless consumers. It was clear to me that the tour guides should have offered to guide for free but assessed a dollar for every stupid or repetitive question. Their gross receipts would have soared.
From there we flew into Punta Arenas and managed to travel to Tierra del Fuego, hopping tiny underserviced airports such as Ushuaia Airport. As I have blogged before, the general area is breathtaking. We covered Torres del Paine National Park, Lake Pehoe, Nordenskhold, Laguna Amarga, and the amazing bonai forests of Quebrada de la Feria. We helicoptered to Cape Horn and viewed the angry waters of Drake's Sea and Shackleton's Endurance.
Galapagos provided the natural wonders and South America the physical ones. Definitely a trip to remember.
