Cheaters
I’ve not posted in too long because of cheating. I spiraled into dark self-indulgence, but justified. My earlier, too-raw post about it (since deleted) brought concern from readers.
Cheating is my guilty pleasure. Not “cheating,” but watching that cheesy old reality TV show Cheaters. It’s a warning I heed.
I love the concerned monotone in the host’s overwritten scripts (whether Clark Gable—grandson of the actor—or Joey Greco or Peter Pankey). The clumsy “big words” that describe their detectives’ surveillance tapes seem to strain to impress: “The unidentified gentlemen helps his lady love descend from his truck...” And when confronted with the evidence, the startled cheaters screech from tears to outrage every time: “Get those cameras out of my face!” For me this is the accident I can’t look away from. I search out these reruns on Saturday mornings like I’m a kid again looking for Road Runner cartoons, but icky now.
For me it’s a warning, this low-budget skim off the surface of reality. But why? I don’t identify with any of them. I’m not cheated on, having avoided relationship status for years. The truth is that it’s not lovers who destroy me the easiest, but friends. I expect more from friends.
On Cheaters, those caught-in-the-act devious duos who date behind a partner’s back are exposed by the swarm of camera crews that invade bars, bedrooms, and stores to expose them. But that’s not what I relate to. It’s the concept that’s radioactive for me. It’s what’s lit up in those camera lights, the screams, tears, and fistfights. Trust.
Friends are my stockade walls. The cement blocks made of various traits, like the needy or the fun, the wily or the pliable—they hold me up on battlement walls of self-protection and keep my balance. It’s crucial because below I see the lapping flames of The End. The end of self-confidence anyway. I use those solid walls of interlocked friends to stay alive above the inferno because they will listen to me whine, laugh at my dramatics, and keep me real. All without expecting anything in return except that: being their support when we reverse roles.
Friends are more valuable than lovers because they accept the facets of me and my secrets, more than any lover can or should. After all, somebody’s got to challenge and complain about me. So I give friends my trust. I show it in generosity. But the warning of Cheaters reminds me of those times when the universe slips, and friends become petty tyrants like lovers in our worst fights.
I forget that betrayal can happen because it’s so rare for me. But when a friend morphs into a soulless zombie I vow to murder them. Traitors. I plan in my head how to get away with murder. Payback. But I never do it because there’s nothing to do. They’re already dead to me. Although I do wonder if they realize the strength of my hurt? I satisfy myself with knowing they’ll have bad luck although they might not know it comes from me. It does. And this extends to sleazy business people who’ve cheated me as well. …Wait for it.
Friendship is trust.
I’ve found it breaks rarely for me, unlike those faithless exposed by Cheaters. But when friendship is destroyed, there is no way to mend. Wait for it.