The Other Man

Introduction-1

Introduction

He’s a trespasser, an interloper, the peckerwood who gets between you and your lover, partner or mate. The male equivalent of Cleopatra, Mae West, and Jessica Rabbit rolled into one threatening package. He’s an accident waiting to happen: the skateboarder 'round the bend, the smiling barista with the extra hot mocha, or the computer geek eager to retool your mate’s hard drive. He’s a relationship gatecrasher, bound by no rules and with no sense of fair play. Who is he? He’s the other man, and like Caesar, he comes, he sees, he conquers, and leaves behind something akin to a lingering, twenty-four hour flu or at worst, a really bad case of the Black Death.

If we’re young, in our late twenties or early thirties, there’s a glimmer of hope. We pick ourselves up and move on. If older, our new best friend might be our analyst or possibly the urologist we now see on a regular basis.

As the walking wounded, we don’t eat. We can’t sleep. We sense that the earth has stopped rotating. The minutes drag like hours, the days like years. We pass a mirror and see ourselves as we really are: unwanted and unloved. We are too fat, too short, too everything. We should have exercised more at the gym, lifted weights. Spent extra time on the treadmill, less in the Jacuzzi. We finger the dark circles under our eyes and notice the beginning of a double chin. Are those jowls? We notice wrinkles no sane person would ever call laugh lines. In desperation, we secretly check our partner’s computer and search his emails. We open bedroom drawers digging for clues, evidence of his deception. We become other man detectives.