Soliloquy

Chronicles of a Switch
2013-10-29 11:26:59 (UTC)

an excerpt from D

This is something that D had posted in a journal of his own, almost six months ago. I wanted it here as a reminder that, once, he couldn't stand the thought of losing me.


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Oddly enough one of the best lesson’s I’ve learned about marriage so far has come not from anyone I know but from the show King of the Hill. It’s not on anymore (sadly) but it had a good following. Enough so to engender 13 seasons before going on permanent hiatus. I always liked it because it was very different from the normal animated sitcom. It didn’t rely on pop culture references or cut-away gags. The humor came from fully developed characters with numerous human flaws and good points reacting to the situations they were put in or, more often than not, created themselves. I could go on forever about the show (and frankly I’ve thought about writing a book about philosophy and the show itself) but this article is about the character of Dale Gribble and what he taught me.

For those who don’t know, Dale is the titular character Hank Hill’s next door neighbor and best friend. Dale is an exterminator and a gun toting conspiracy nut. It’s played very lightly and very much for laughs. He has his flaws. He’s a loud mouth. He jumps to conclusions. He’s stubborn. He can be blunt, insulting and usually downright stupid. He’ll drop you in a second if he thinks he can get something from it or if he feels that siding with you would be trouble. But, since this is a comedy, he has a good core. He learns from his mistakes and feels bad about the wrong things he does. And he’s devoted to his wife and son. That devotion is what made me write this.

In the episode Night and Deity, the neighborhood becomes infested with a massive flock of pigeons who proceed to shit on everything and make themselves a general nuisance. Dale, as the local exterminator, sets himself to the problem but completely fails at getting inside the birds heads. He has little recourse but to call in the big guns in the form of a locally known “pigeon god” who happens to be a gorgeous woman named Sheila. Dale and Sheila get on fantastically. Not only is she good looking but she shares his passion for extermination. In fact, its also even shown that they watch the same TV show (Sanford and Son, which Dale frequently stays up late to watch) and have the same opinions on the quality of the actors from season to season. Dale’s wife, Nancy, predictably takes umbrage with this .

A brief word on Nancy Gribble. One of the old jokes of the show and an open secret in the neighborhood, was the fact that Nancy was unashamedly cheating on Dale for many years with her hunky Native American massage therapist John Redcorn. Even going so far as to have his child, Joseph, whose striking resemblance to John and not Dale is a visual joke in itself and is also something Dale just doesn’t seem to notice in the slightest. Even when pointed out to him by Hank in another episode. To Dale, Joseph is his son because Nancy was pregnant at one point and they were married when it happened. The thought never crossed his mind for one moment that Joseph was not his child. How could he not be? After all, Nancy “throws more sex at me than I know what to do with” Dale has said. At this point in the series however Nancy has long since stopped being “unchristian” towards Dale, much to the chagrin of her female neighbor Mihn who can’t see why she’d give up being with the handsome, deep and soulful John Redcorn for dorky, dumb, whitebread Dale.

The situation with Sheila presents a big problem for Nancy. She realizes the poetic irony in stopping her own cheating only to have Dale thrust into a situation where others might do the same. Nancy is genuinely afraid of Dale leaving her for Sheila. Dale looks at Sheila with utter awe and they giggle like kids sharing extermination stories. Nancy can see that they get along so well and she’s very unnerved by it. She even wakes up one night to find Dale not in bed but out in the living room watching TV while talking to Sheila on the phone. What Nancy doesn’t realize is that the idea of being with Sheila doesn’t even flicker across Dale’s thoughts. In one case when Sheila is on a ladder beside him, instead of looking at her ass for the sheer pleasure (as his friend Boomhauer is) he just compares it to Nancy’s ass which, while they share “striking similarities” in his view, is all Dale can think of. In his words “She’s got your hot bod and my hot mind. It’s like some science experiment gone horribly right.”

Nancy, when advised by Hank’s wife Peggy to get more involved in Dale’s everyday life, says his world is really weird and she has no desire to delve into extermination. Peggy responds saying “Yeah well I don’t blame you but, you seem to want to save this thing” meaning Nancy’s marriage. Nancy, eventually taking Peggy’s advice, tries her best to involve herself in Dale’s world more, hoping that it will solidify their marriage. She tempts him into taking her along with him on his route in spite of the fact that he says it “takes a special kind of lady to do what I do.” She’s horrified when one of his jobs requires him to run around a baseball field tossing grenades down gopher holes screaming for Nancy to shoot the animal with a shotgun when it appears. This causes Nancy to become paralyzed by fear shrieking “THIS IS WHAT YOU DO?” All this after embarrassing herself by brilliantly failing to pass him some “Johnson’s PestCo. Bird Repel Gel 350 ml” from a pile of assorted chemicals and poisons, instead accidentally passing him “Diazanon.” A gaffe so funny it prompts him to consider sending the anecdote to “Bugs and Giggles.”

Realizing she’ll never match Sheila’s passion for extermination, she instead tries a different tactic. After she overhears Sheila inviting Dale on an overnight mission to get rid of the rats, pigeons and silverfish from the EconoSuites, Nancy gives Sheila a gift certificate for a free massage with John Redcorn. She even goes so far as to tell her to ask for the “migraine special.” Treating Nancy for “migraines” was what John Redcorn was supposedly doing all these years. (To his credit however, he once cured four of her migraines in one night) The migraine special is, of course, code for him to seduce her. He tries but Sheila can’t stop gushing about Dale during the massage. She feels they have a primal connection and can’t wait for their overnight mission. Needless to say, John Redcorn completely fails sadly telling Nancy that the massage was “just a massage” but also saying that he thinks Sheila is very interested in Dale and that she shouldn’t let him go out on the job with Sheila.

Terrified, as Dale gets ready to leave for the night, Nancy desperately pleads with him and then finally forbids him to go saying “You just tell your.....little friend to go home.” Dale simply tells her “Well that’s not being very friendly. I never told you to tell your friend John Redcorn to go home.” unwittingly wounding Nancy very deeply just as he heads out. Sheila does her best to finally seal the deal with Dale. She uses a trail of rat urine to lure Dale to the rooftop where she has a picnic with wine waiting. There they talk about animal mating rituals while wondering absently if “they’ll ever win this war” against all the pests in the world. Finally Sheila just admits that Dale is “one of the sweetest, gentlest, funniest men” she’s ever known and asks him if he’d like to come downstairs where she’s rented a room and has “brandy warming in the coffee maker.” Stunned, he asks if she’s “attempting to...’know’ him” whereupon she replies that it’s “just us tonight.” Dale stands up and delivers a short but poignant and heartwarming speech.

“Oh no missy! There are three people here tonight: You, me and my wife.” He says, pointing to his wedding ring. “I’ve taken two oaths in my life: One to the NRA and one to Nancy Hicks-Gribble. Nay, Nancy Hicks! I stood in front of God and all my friends, swearing to be an honorable and truthful man. So I’m not going to lie, I have felt a small insect-like attraction to you. But my wife is the greatest woman there ever was! I think you should go.” That completely stunned me. To Dale, his wedding ring is not only a symbol of his marriage but a constant physical connection to his wife. His ring means she is always present with him whatever he does. That just amazed me. I’d never thought of things in quite that way. We’re told a lot in the media about “soul-mates.” That one person who, supposedly, will provide for every need and fulfill every fantasy. Someone who will innately get us and accept us on every level. You and this person will totally click instantainously and everything will be wonderful. We’re told we’ll eventually find this person and that, when we do, the love we feel will be so utterly perfect and enduring that we’ll marry them and ride happily off into the sunset to our own little “forever after.”

Its pretty clear that Sheila is set up to be such a person for Dale. So much so that it even seems clear to Peggy, whom Nancy confides in. During the course of the series its shown quite often that, other than being in love, Nancy and Dale share very very little in common. Dale is obsessed with asinine conspiracy theories, his gun club, get-rich-quick schemes (often involving the dubious help of a shady Latin assistant known only as Octavio) and pest control. Nancy, a local TV weather woman, is more interested in social climbing, hanging out with her married female neighbors and gossiping. Sheila is the perfect woman for Dale, so it seems. By rights they should be together. But Dale is already married to Nancy and hopelessly in love with her to boot. No one woman even comes close in his mind. Even physically attractive women serve only to remind him of how attractive his wife is.

In the year I’ve been married, I can’t honestly say it’s been perfect. I’ve always heard that the first few years are the best and that its all downhill from there. This oft repeated sentiment even scared me off marriage totally in the beginning despite the fact that I love my wife and look forward to spending the rest of my life with her. After all, who wants to get married when, as sitcoms, movies and stand-up comics constantly remind us, its all going to end in disappointment, regret, bitterness and divorce? Who would want to destroy a wonderful romance and a good relationship in such a way if marriage ultimately stagnates and slides down into that kind of terrifying emotional swamp? As a child of divorce I understand this firsthand having watched my own parents marriage collapse under the weight of two people who just didn’t get along and weren’t right for each other.

It’s been a stressful time and both me and my wife have struggled. We broke up twice in the five years before we were hitched. Both times were my fault. Once, I left her for someone else to whom I felt a deep physical attraction which I thought I couldn’t possibly deny. That ended after a few months and I earned my very first truly broken heart of the kind sad love songs are carved from. No, I hadn’t been in many relationships before my wife. I’d only had one short term girlfriend before meeting my wife and very few sexual partners. In fact, my wife had been the longest relationship I’d ever been in up to that point (One year I believe). The second time was after we’d been together a few years and I felt that I wasn’t sure if I was truly in love with her anymore or even what love really meant. After much soul searching I came to realize that I did in fact love her very much. Down to my core. Life without her was simply empty and bleak and I didn’t want to live in it. That ultimately proved to me just how much I did love her.

But in the past two years we’ve come into the BDSM scene and, more pointedly, this year I ran into a beautiful woman: [Bubbles]. We met at a play party and clicked right off the bat and started talking. It wasn’t long before we dashed off and scened. At the end of the night when I hugged her goodbye my wife saw a look come over [Bubbles]’s face which she described as “just pure bliss.” Soon [Bubbles] and I were talking every night and found we shared so much in common. You can tell where this is going can’t you? Eventually we found ourselves quite in love even though we were both married.

You hear a lot about “Poly” in the scene. You hear from poly people how monogamous people “just don’t get it.” You hear from monogamous people how they’re sick of Poly people making them feel weird or uncomfortable or that they’re somehow wrong or uptight because they choose to be with only one person sexually and emotionally. A lot of bile gets thrown both ways. [Bubbles]’s married and has a girlfriend who is engaged to a man. Each of them have a sub with whom they’re sexual and emotional. I’m married. My wife has a sub with whom she’s in love. For a long time that was the way of things. My wife had her girl and I...just had my wife. Then [Bubbles] came along and I found myself falling hard and fast and my wife was deathly afraid of this. Much like Nancy, if I may get back around to my point.

I found myself involved in a poly marriage as the boyfriend of a married woman and my own wife suddenly had to deal with her husband being in love with someone who wasn’t her. Not only this but, as I’m exploring and growing in the BDSM community, the opportunity comes to me to have scenes with the women I meet and click with. This also threatens and upsets my wife even when I say that my intention is just to play with the person and not to eventually have intercourse. Its the intimacy of the act that upsets her. An intimacy she wants from me and doesn’t always get.

I’m not perfect. I’m no Dale Gribble. Gods above and below, I wish I was! I have LOTS of sexual and emotional hang-ups that make being married to me, let’s face it, not peaches and cream. My wife considers herself monogamous (a point that, in light of the facts I’ve put forth, is an arguable statement). I...quite frankly don’t feel the same way about myself. I have the capacity to be in love with multiple people at the same time. I am at present deeply in love with two women. They are the pillars of my life. One, my comfort and my home. The other, a blazing fire. Both my joy and my treasure. I’d trade neither for the other and couldn’t ever choose between them.

But, I’m still only married to one. That ring means something to me. I treasure it. I feel naked when I forget it in the shower. I twist it on my finger when I’m bored or spin it on a tabletop when I need a distraction. That’s not to say I treat it lightly. When it got its first scratch I was very upset. My wife is afraid when I play with others. She and I don’t get to play very often due to schedule conflicts with work and the fact that we room with another couple which includes my wife’s sub. My wife is afraid I won’t want to play with her anymore. That I’ll get my BDSM needs from other more available women and leave my wife, whom I collared officially a few months ago, in the dust. But, once again circling back to my point, King of the Hill and Dale Gribble has put me in the mind of something.

When I go out alone or with [Bubbles] to play parties and events, even though my wife and I have established rules about what I’m to do or not do and with/to whom, my wife isn’t physically there to oversee it most of the time. I’m a habitual rule breaker. Since I’ve been married I’ve nearly slipped with two women, coming close to doing something bad, and terribly harming my wife’s trust and faith in me. In my mind, at this point, she has every right to be distrustful of me when I’m out of her sight. But, by Dale Gribble’s thinking, she never is. When I find myself tempted to go too far, what I need to do is look down at my left hand. That silver band (yes we chose silver. She doesn’t care for gold) is where my wife resides at all times. No matter what another woman might bring to the table or offer me physically, my wife is right there beside me. I don’t take my ring off to scene. Like Dale, it never even crossed my mind to do so. Anyone who plays with me, any friend or stranger, needs to realize that the scene will include three people: Myself, the sub and my wife.

No moment of satisfaction, no act of sex, no fulfillment of ANY fantasy I have could EVER possibly be worth losing my wife’s trust and faith for the last and final time. I can...Not...Lose...My wife. It’s just that simple. Being married to her, wearing that ring, means I take my vows and my beloved wife with me on my travels throughout this world whether its down to the corner store or off somewhere to a wild and crazy party. No nubile young thing with pouty lips and absoLUTEly no tans lines can overpower this little hoop. No willing, wet and eager slave could conquer my metal band. Why? Because my wife is always present beside me. Always. I’m never alone. It’s never “just us tonight.” I threw that idea out the window that snowy January morning when I put on fancy clothes and, to quote Dale, stood before God and all my friends and made a promise. Not a promise to love. I’d already done that. But a promise to live and grow old, to laugh and cry, fly and fall, starve and feast and, ultimately, die beside this shockingly faithful, devoted, trustworthy, Gorram amazing woman I was lucky enough to stumble across in a comic shop and who, for some strange damn reason, fell head over heels for yours truly.

Dale Gribble showed me what it means to be married and how to be faithful. Poly or monogamous, faithfulness and devotion aren’t something exclusive to one person. They’re the ideas that you respect, treasure and hold dear a certain someone and their rules for how to behave. WHATEVER those rules might be. From “Don’t stick your dick in someone without asking” to “You only stick your dick in me.” No matter what you might want or feel, because of that devotion, you abjure your sudden flashes of desire if they aren’t in accordance with what’s been laid down in honesty and sealed with trust. Would it be nice if my wife said to me one morning “Fuck anyone you want, Dee! I’m 10,000% OK with this and, in fact, that shit turns me on! Let’s find a hot chick right away and fuck her brains out like rabid stoats!”? Yes! Of course! I’d be thrilled. But that’s not who my wife is. That’s not who I married. That’s not the person I carry with me on my left hand every time I step out the door. I respect my wife. No matter what. I’m have trouble with sex and women. I’m weak in that way. I’ve slipped and stumbled and fallen on my face because of it. But I get up again and set my jaw firmly. Like Dale Gribble, I look down at my wedding ring and know that, even if we aren’t 100% compatible my wife and I, even if we aren’t soul-mates, we’re married. And that makes my life worth living. No one else can compete. No one can tempt me. My wife is always with me. A cartoon showed me that. Funny, huh?


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When I see how rabidly D is attracted to his new sub, his friend, companion and lover, it's tempting to beleive that he never really cared for me at all. When I see how freely and joyously he gives of himself, his time and his money it's tempting to compare how little he gave to me. It's difficult to remember that, once, he was loving and tender. And it's difficult to carry on, seeing the man I love, the man whose attention I craved, whose affection I yearned for, totally fixated on someone else. And sometimes, I have to remind myself that I married him for a reason.

But, he broke me. I am shattered in ways I didn't even realize until he was no longer the reason I had to hold those pieces together. And when that burden becomes too much to bear, when I want to rage at him for encouraging me to destroy myself, I must remember to look back and realize that his greatest sin was that he never really SAW me for who, and what, I truly was.




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