Confession

Placebo's "Slave to the Wage" (Lyrics Below) popped up on my iPod shuffle the other day, whilst I was on the train home and it took me back to some dark times, two years ago that I have never really talked about to anybody except my very best friend. This retrospective thought has also been brought about by the fact that I am now working in the same building (although for a different company) and doing the same daily commute that I was when the following situation unfolded.

About this time of year, two years ago I met somebody, let's call her "Charlotte", in a lift on my way to the gym at lunchtime. We briefly talked about gym's and running and somewhat impetuously I ran after her down an escalator and gave her my business card and told her that if she ever wanted to go to the gym, I could sign her in as a guest.

I say impetuously, because this is not the sort of behaviour expected of a "happily" married man with two children, particularly as to this day my wife does still not know about Charlotte.

I say "happily" because at the time I wasn't very happily married. To use the cliche I think I was having a bit of a mid-life crisis which I think started when my first child was born, and continued for a couple of years. This really manifested itself when I started commuting daily to London on the train, which opened up a whole host of flirtatious opportunities. I guess I married quite young and up until that point I had nevr had a long-term relationship, mainly down to my own lack of self-confidence, but suddenly I was like a kid in a sweetshop?!?!

At about the same time, I also started chatting regularly to a girl I had met on the train, and more importantly / significantly started deliberately getting the train she caught, rather than the earlier one that I was more used to taking. Lets call her "Lynsey".

Anyway, back to Charlotte. We exchanged more and more flirtatious emails, me still not telling her that I was married, until she suggested that we meet for a drink. I agreed, but then wracked with guilt couldn't decide on whether to continue to avoid the issue of my marriage or come clean to her - I thought at the very least, she deserved lunch out of my deceit?!?!

So I arrange to meet Charlotte for lunch, and spend the whole morning beforehand nervously wondering whether I should come clean or not. In the end I do come clean. She takes it remarkably well, although with the caveat "I don't do married men" and as a consequence she agrees to stay in touch.

What follows is a summer of platonic lunches, coffees, trips to the theatre and text messaging, all without the knowledge of my wife. Charlotte takes an interest in my marital issues and is a good listener, but the relationship is no more than that, and never will be as she is firmly and resolutely in control and wouldn't let me do anything stupid, at least with her. At the same time I am seeing Lynsey on the train on a virtually twice-daily basis and swapping text messages. Again this is platonic, and although I enjoy the "illicitness" of the relationship, again it is purely platonic as she just needs a friend to talk to.

Anyway, the crux comes when after a lot of soul searching and discussion I decide that given what's going on at home, that's it's probably best if I leave my wife and children? I felt that I wasn't making anybody happy, and if I was running around chasing after other women, however "platonically" then surely things couldn't be right?

Typing it two years later makes it all seem a bit surreal, as though I'm writing about somebody else. Basically though, when push-comes-to-shove I can't / don't do it, but do sit down with my wife an tell her how I feel. She is obviously devastated as for her it has come out of the blue, and we go through a difficult few weeks - To be honest the repercussions are still being felt some two years later as you'd expect. But, we settle down back into soem form of 'normality', given that I am still seeing Lynsey and Charlotte and confiding in them.

Then after about a month since I nearly left home, my wife finds a text from Lynsey on my phone and I am forced to come clean about her at least. I think, rightly or wrongly, that it's probably not best to mention Charlotte as well? What I do decide is to not contact her again, and given that it was always me that initiated the contact, this does not represent too many issues and she just disappears from my life. I never saw or heard from her again.

Again we have a difficult few weeks whilst we come to terms with what I've done, and again there are still repercussions, but by and large we get on with our lives.

Importantly, it kicked me out of my self-centred, selfish, almost childish "mid-life crisis" and made me realise what I had put at stake. Things will never quite be the same again, but perhaps what doesn't kill us makes us stronger? I have a loving and forgiving wife, and although the grass may appear greener somewhere else, that's very rarely the case.

SO what does Placebo have to do with all of this? Well a line from "Slave to the Wage" struck a bit of a chord with me whilst I was going through all of this. "All it takes is one decision, A lot of guts - A little vision, To wave your worries and cares Goodbye".

At the time I thought the tough decision was to leave my wife and family. On hearing it the other day, surrounded by all these memories I now realise that to run away and leave was an easy decision - To stay and put things right, which I think I have, as best I can.....Now that was the tough, and ultimately the correct decision.

Placebo - Slave to the Wage

Run away from all your boredom
Run away from all your whoredom and wave
Your worries and cares
Goodbye

All it takes is one decision
A lot of guts, a little vision to wave
Your worries and cares
Goodbye

Its a maze for rats to try
Its a maze for rats to try
Its a race, a race for rats
A race for rats to die

Its a race, a race for rats
A race for rats to die

Sick and tired of Maggy's farm
Shes a bitch with broken arms to wave
Your worries and cares
Goodbye

Its a maze for rats to try
Its a maze for rats to try
Its a race, a race for rats
A race for rats to die

I have hesitated about putting this post up, and making it viewable to all as it raises some serious issues about my realtionships with people outside of my marriage. In light of the whole Lynsey thing, my wife has made it clear that she would prefer it that I didn't have a Blog. To this end, as far as she is aware, I don't have a blog and therefore all of the "relationships" I have with people of Vox are a secret. Those people with which I have particularly close relationships may feel that this is not morally defensible. Perhaps not, but I am not sure if my marriage would survive their disclosure?

On reflection, I seriously hurt the feelings of Lynsey, when I discontinued our relationship - although interestingly she had not told her boyfriend about me - and I still feel guilty about the collateral damage that resulted from my actions - If you take her motives at face value, she just needed a friend to talk to, perhaps as I do / did. Perhaps Vox offers the opportunity to completely bare my soul, in the knowledge that those to which I do are unlikely to ever have any contact with my wife, and therefore betray that "confidence", even by subtle nuances. Again, the people I involve in this may have a different view on the morality of that, particularly if they have been deceived in the past.

They know that I am not "whiter than white", but the degree of my "greyness" may come as a bit of a shock to them and may alter their view of me. I'm not looking for absolution - This is my mess and mine alone. I guess I'm just at the point where I need to be honest to myself and to them.