JULY 1979, the disco years, age 29
NOW WHAT?
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Given that
Patricia's demise followed on the heels of Joanne's
departure, two corners of the Temptation Triangle had been
eliminated. Only Victoria remained. How will she
react when she discovers Patricia has bit the dust?
Or more to the point, will I be able to resist Victoria if
she continues to invite me to participate in her European
Arrangement?
Welcome to the
Main Event.
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Through no fault of his own,
King Arthur lost his wife to the amorous
advances of a man he had trusted. Things did not
work out very well. Lancelot became a hermit. Guinevere became
a nun at Amesbury. Lives were lost in duels and the morale of
Arthur's Kingdom was
shattered. Did I want to do this to Michael?
Of course not. Did I wish to damage the life of
Victoria's daughter
in the same way my life was sabotaged by my father's
affair? Of course not. Did I wish to jeopardize my
dance program, the very thing I had dedicated my life to grow and
preserve? Of course not.
At the same
time, I was forced to admit I desired Victoria.
If I wasn't careful, I could very easily fall for this woman.
My conscience and desire wrestled over the issue
constantly. Take my word for it, women who look like
Victoria
are difficult to turn down. Anyone can have lofty morals in private thoughts, but when a beautiful woman
comes knocking and opens her arms, that
is the real test of fire. It is no secret that
passion can override common sense. When Victoria
declared her love for me at La Madeleine in May, I came
perilously close to giving in to temptation. Ever
since, I had nightmares related to Victoria's power over me.
The fear of
letting down my guard became a daily burden. I could
resist the forbidden woman if she behaved and kept her
distance, but would my defenses hold if Victoria got too
close? What would happen if Victoria put her arms
around me and got me aroused? That was my biggest
fear. If she made another strong
move, I did not trust myself to do the right thing.
The best
defense is an ounce of prevention, so I needed to head
this strong-willed woman off at the pass. So I had used Joanne
and Patricia to serve as my front line of defense.
Sorry to say, neither woman provided the strongest
antidote to an affair... 'Love'. I was not in love with
either woman. However, I did have feelings for Victoria.
Those feelings made me vulnerable to
Victoria's charms. However, despite my weakness, I was
determined to say no.
As
long as Victoria wore her Wedding Ring, I
vowed there would be no Adultery.
Only one
problem. What Victoria wants, Victoria gets.
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The happiest time in
Victoria's Fairy Tale life had been college.
That is where she had met her Prince. Michael was the
smartest, most
handsome man on campus. Together they were
the Golden Couple.
Victoria enjoyed immense popularity. She
was the leader of a close-knit group of friends that did everything together.
Every weekend was a party... a trip to the beach, dancing in someone's clubhouse, a game of backyard volleyball,
charades, a night at the movies, card games, you name it.
Victoria was the one who organized the events. It was a perfect
existence... laughter, fun, friendship,
belonging. Victoria described her college
experience as neverending bliss. What a
shame it had to end.
Following
graduate school,
Michael was
brilliant at cancer research, but he always seemed to be working.
Victoria waited at home and felt increasingly useless
and unimportant. Victoria had once been leader of the pack, but that
almost seemed like a previous life. She had allowed motherhood
and matrimony to prevent
her from being this vibrant person again.
Victoria's isolation was the perfect example of
the cynical saying "If you are afraid of loneliness,
don't get married."
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The Coming of
Disco changed all that. Now for the first time in her
adult life, Victoria was accomplishing things and regaining
the popularity that existed in her Prom Queen high school
days and Leader of the Pack college days.
Now that Victoria was the
Supreme Diva of Disco, her self-esteem and energy came
rushing back. Victoria loved the Disco
World. Someone had rubbed the genie's bottle and freed her
to pursue exciting opportunities. Recognized as the dynamic Go-Go
Girl who could do anything, Victoria had regained her former identity. Unwilling to return to
a Genie's bottle
of eternal loneliness, Victoria loved her life in the
spotlight so much, she did not want it to end.
This was the
happiest Victoria had been in years. She had
everything that mattered... loving husband, wonderful child,
secure home, terrific friends, status, popularity, dancing.
She loved her Disco projects... teaching, performing,
organizing parties, talking to friends on the phone.
The Disco scene was good, clean fun for everyone. It seemed to
me Victoria was taking a Magic Carpet Ride
of her own. The big question was whether the destination of her flight was meant to
include me. In the beginning Victoria had
enjoyed the support of her husband. Michael knew
how depressed his wife had been sitting at home.
Seeing Victoria emerge from her slump and come roaring back
to life had to be gratifying. Furthermore Michael
enjoyed the camaraderie Victoria had created with his
colleagues from the Medical Center. No doubt he too
enjoyed the chance to resurrect the tight-knit group from
college with his
Camelot Friends.
To my eyes,
Michael was a wonderful man. No one is
perfect, but Michael came a lot closer than most to being an
awesome husband. However, if Michael had one failing, it was his
inability to stand up to his strong-willed wife.
That said, let me add a disclaimer. Neither Michael
nor Victoria ever explained the dynamics of their marriage
to me. Therefore, anything I say about their relationship is
conjecture. I have based my guesswork on observation
and snippets of conversation coming from Victoria. But
how much of what Victoria told me
could I believe? In other words, take what I say with
a grain of salt.
Victoria had
started as a friend who offered to help me teach one night a
week. Then she became my mentor. Victoria had
shown me things about running the dance program that had
never occurred to me in the eight months before she came
along. But then something went wrong. Terribly wrong.
There was our near meltdown in mid-May, the Dance with the
Devil. One month later Victoria suggested her European
Arrangement. Why was she willing to risk hurting
her family to pursue me? Was I really that
special? I seriously doubted that. A more likely
reason for her interest was the
popularity and excitement of the Disco World. Hard
as it was to believe, Victoria was willing to risk her near-perfect
marriage, her daughter's security and her life of
comfort in exchange for this
dream lifestyle. The craziest thing of all is that
her pursuit of me was totally unnecessary. She could
have her dream lifestyle without the need to risk her
marriage. All
Victoria had to do was bypass the Affair. In return I
would offer my
friendship and promise to help fulfill her ambitions.
Michael was an intelligent man.
Surely he saw the same danger signs that I did.
Although he never confided in me, I am certain
he resented Victoria's frequent absences at night to pursue
her dance activities. I also believe Michael
suspected his wife's feelings for me had entered the Danger
Zone. Michael need look no further than the ugly
allegations made by Patricia during Scorched Earth to know
something was wrong. Although he believed me when I said
no lines had been crossed, I suspect he also feared his
wife was tip-toeing way too close to the line. Surely
Michael objected to his wife's Disco obsession, but
obviously his protests did no good.
What was
this woman
thinking (or not thinking)? Everyone agreed Victoria and Michael were the
Golden Couple, the best-matched
pair they had ever met. To jeopardize a good marriage
to chase a dance teacher struck observers as a
lousy trade (me too by the way). No one
around her... not Michael, not me,
Michael's co-workers, Victoria's girlfriends...
could understand Victoria's behavior.
I have to wonder if Victoria herself even understood what she
was doing.
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There is one
major factor to consider. The Throne belonged to
Victoria. Not only did she earn it through her
talent, she seized it through her cunning. Now
that her rivals were gone, the only person who
could take the Throne away was me. But why would I
do that? I had no earthly reason to sabotage
Victoria's standing!
Even if I found a new girlfriend, Victoria was far too
valuable to my business to send her packing. Furthermore I felt a
strong loyalty towards the woman. My gratitude for
Victoria's help was so immense, I would gladly share the
dance program with her. I just wished she would
stay out of my love life.
I had already begun to
pay Victoria a salary, so why couldn't she settle for
turning her Disco efforts into a part-time job and
bypass the romance angle?
Talk it over with Michael and see what he was
comfortable with. Victoria wished to perform.
Fine, I was willing to do that with her. Why else would I train
with Victoria and Glen once a week? I was willing
to cooperate with every one of Victoria's dreams under
one condition... Honor her marriage. This simple compromise would have allowed Victoria to
keep Michael happy and enjoy her popularity in the
process. But no, chasing me was too important to
accept this obvious solution.
It remains a
Mystery to understand why
possessing me was so damn important.
I was the Forbidden Apple of Disco Discord. To
chase me guaranteed a Trojan War worth of ruin. Yes, my market value had increased thanks
to the allure of Disco. However, with one Disco
after another closing, my career seemed increasingly
built upon quicksand. Patricia's infamous Rock
Star words were etched in memory.
"How
will you support a family teaching Disco line dances
for $15 an hour?"
It hurt to
say it, but Patricia had a good point. It was one
thing to pursue a shaky future on my own, but another
thing to take on the responsibility of
dependents. Why would a woman like Victoria take a
chance on me based on my current situation? Let's face
it, I was little better than whipped cream.
Tasty, but hardly steak and potatoes. I might be cute enough for a
fling, but I had limited husband
potential. You want to know something sad? I believe Victoria reached the
identical conclusion. That is what the 'European
Arrangement' conversation was about. In her
eyes, I was Mistress material,
interesting enough to take to bed, but certainly not
marriage material.
Like most
people, I looked to Psychology to explain Victoria's
self-destructive behavior. I ran through the usual
psychobabble... rebellion, the need to chase a Bad Boy,
the need to pay her husband back for neglecting her, the
chance to prove her value, loneliness, need for attention,
blah blah blah. These explanations did not satisfy
me. I even wondered if I was
irresistible. Sorry to say, the answer was no.
Just ask Patricia.
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I asked myself
why Victoria continually defied her husband's pleas to curtail her
Disco obsession. Victoria had
everything a woman could want at her fingertips.
What did she stand to gain from
gambling her perfect life on me?
By willingly jeopardizing her marriage, the risk Victoria
undertook
was so incomprehensible that I would spend a lifetime
looking for answers. To me, it was
like a Death Wish, the compulsion to drive a car over a cliff.
Victoria's strange behavior left me so unsettled that I
eventually discarded every psychological theory for the simplest...
and weirdest...
explanation of all: Cosmic Blindness.
Have you ever asked yourself if it is possible we are meant
to follow a Life Script that unfortunately
includes predetermined incidents of self-destructive behavior?
Before I continue, let me warn the Reader that this is a
very unpleasant theory. For one thing, Cosmic
Blindness violates our cherished concept of Free Will.
To begin with, this theory implies that some of our thoughts
are NOT OUR OWN. It also means that at certain points in our life our common sense
will be temporarily removed, thereby forcing us to enter a puppet-like state.
No longer able to think clearly, we make a senseless mistake
as part of our Fate. Forced to
deal with the consequences, we are bewildered to understand what
might have
caused this foolish, totally uncharacteristic behavior.
Here is an
example. I am blind in my left eye due to a knife
accident at age 5. I was pulling the knife on a rope towards
me instead of away from me. I knew better, so why the
mistake? I was stronger when 'pulling' the
knife as opposed to pushing it, so I ignored the danger and did it the wrong way to
finish faster.
Okay, so I did something stupid, but it proves nothing. Lots of people do
stupid things. To err is human. But
what if I was deliberately prevented from thinking
straight? What if it was Rick Archer's Fate to be
blind in one eye? That is Cosmic Blindness.
Have you ever
heard the expression 'Love is Blind'? Think of all
the people who ask themselves why they ignored their
misgivings and entered into a
bad marriage.
"What was I thinking? What was
wrong with me? I was an idiot to marry that man!
I knew all along I was taking a huge chance, so why didn't I listen to
my own warning?"
Based on what I
experienced with Victoria, I came to believe she was
mysteriously deprived of her better judgment. I admit
Cosmic Blindness is a radical theory, so I do not expect
people to take my word for it.
However, as one reads the ensuing events, I predict my
crazy theory might actually start to make a person wonder.
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