"Two anecdotes come to mind. The first is this, so this newspaper journalist interviews this couple who have been married for sixty years. He asked the wife how they did it. She says that they married when cars were still rare. They lived on a farm and had a horse drawn buggy pulled by a donkey. So as they plod to the farm the donkey stops, just stops."
Greg had a sip of whiskey. Veronica watched him with interest. Greg was average looking, average body more like a marathon athlete, average height maybe a little below, average brown hair, average haircut, average suit. What set Greg apart was his piercing blue eyes. He could stare into her soul with those eyes, they missed nothing; those eyes understood a lot more than was said but never said anything. That is unless it had to do with getting naked and fucking until somebody begged to stop. Somehow he always missed the romance invitation cues.
"" Donkey that's the first time." The old man warned and they donkey plodded on. Then the donkey stops. "Donkey that's the second time." The farmer warned, the donkey started going again. The donkey stops again, eight miles from the farm. The farmer takes his shotgun and shoots the donkey dead. With nothing to do but walk the newlyweds walk eight miles home. At home the husband takes a seat and tells her to make some coffee. The wife says she is tired from walking eight miles in high heels on a dust road. "Woman that's the first time." He warns. After that there were no more problems in their marriage."
The men listening burst into laughter. Greg had that ability, of telling a story in his quiet way that drew listeners. He was never rude, he never threatened, he never shouted, yet the feds, the soldiers, the lawyers who drank there never tried to push him. Veronica listened to the punchline officially offended. Her therapist practice had a lot of relationship counseling in which the industry doctrine was to encourage an atmosphere of respectful discussion. Authoritarian dispositions were strongly discourage. Additionally she was a woman after all, such a blatant suppression of women was terrible. Privately though she was intrigued, a power dynamic was established and from that the couple succeeded.
"What is the second story?" Veronica asked keeping her professional cool.
"So a young man wants to marry this young lady. He's at Sunday lunch with her family and finds her grandad sitting in the shade with a beer on his stomach looking at his family. "Sir how did you stay married so long?" the young man asks. "Well son, when we married Elsie and I agreed that I would make the big decisions and she could make the little ones. Well what do you know, fifty years, three houses, four kids, two careers, and my own business; and there were no major decisions!""
Veronica looked at Greg without understanding his point. One story had been about a mysoginistic ass, the other about a pussy whipped wimp. Neither story indicate that any of the four people were particularly admirable. She had just confessed her disappointing day in which two wonderful people had decided to divorce despite her best efforts to save their marriage. She wanted reassurance that her job meant something, he had just gently peed on that. It was her last effort to get him to seduce her away from her current boyfriend, a complete asshole who made tons of money buying and selling commodities. She was deciding to just drop him.
"What's your point?"
"Relationships are never democratic. One must lead, one must not. It's not about who brings the most money in, it's not about university graduation. It's not about being two healthy, well balanced, well adapted people respecting each other. It's about who has the authority, that needs to be established before the first date if possible. It must be agreed and habitual before two people waltz down the aisle. How that power structure is achieved is between the two. How it is maintained under challenge needs to be agreed upon through experience."
Veronica could not let that go.
"But that opens the door to all sorts of abuse! There must be communication, it must be open, honest, and trusting."
"Absolutely! That becomes much easier if the authority is respected and never challenged because it has been seen to work for the two involved. Rather than to encourage reconciliation and make up sex it's better to find out what the power distribution was and to understand if they were happy with it, understood it. The best thing you can do for a failing marriage is to establish an authority structure and enforce it. Go back to those two lovely people and you will find that things started going wrong when the power structure was challenged."
"So who do you think should have the power in a relationship?"
"The one who takes responsibility. That is never given, it is always taken."
"Not the honest one?"
"Do you see that hooker? I have a more honest relationship with her than I have with you. It's simple, I want to get laid and she wants my money. On the other hand you want me to screw you well enough that leaving your boyfriend is a pleasure without telling me you even have one. You want me to have the guts to take him on but then you want me to give you the power which is the reward for courage. So if open and honest relationships are to be encouraged, where does that put you or any of the half dozen women who have tried to get laid with me?"
Greg had not raised his voice. He had not changed his body language either. Yet Veronica knew every person in the bar was listening to every word. He had said she was worse than a hooker, and he had reason to, he was dead right about what she wanted. She was furious though.
"Did it occur to you that I'm married? Did it occur to you that I might not consider you worth firing my wife for? What motivation did you give me outside of getting laid? Loyalty? Did you offer half your income, something you would want of me because you dress a way higher price than your business allows for." Greg carried on.
"Get out!"
"No. I did not impose on you. You came to sit here. Come back when you have something of substance. I am not easy or comfortable or malleable."
Veronica sat furious and blushing staring at those piercing blue eyes that pinned her to the chair and dared her to run. If she did she would run forever. The future if she ran now was spread out before her, she would run to her boyfriend, marry him to be safe, and be utterly bored in five years to divorce him for another man you did not have Greg's ethics and hopefully bigger balls than brains.
On the other hand Greg was incredibly dangerous, with that perceptiveness, with that intellect, with that ethic. She calmed down enough to realize that he had revealed more about himself in the last half an hour than in five months of being a regular at this bar. That meant something. He had always evaded questions about his job. Clearly it had a lot to do with psychology.
"You're right about my boyfriend. What do you do Greg?"
