This entry is supposed to briefly address Tim’s deceit. We’ll see how brief it ends up being. :)
I can’t bring myself to care. By that, I mean that I don’t feel the sharp sting of betrayal one might imagine would accompany such a revelation.
If anything, that message from Jill’s friend could not have come at a more opportune time. Tim’s sneaky behavior mitigates the fallout from my own blundered disclosure to him regarding my relationship with you. After all, he has apparently been operating like this for three years. He can’t exactly say I’m the only one keeping secrets.
It’s not that I feel like his own lying actually justifies my cheating on him, but it does seem to make him feel less inclined to leave me high and dry. I’m not sure that he really would have anyway, but now I don’t have to find out. I’m grateful for that.
And also, the thing is, I understand. He feels a sense of responsibility for her. His real concern is not so much for her health, but for the fact that he does not believe she has the life skills she needs to take care of herself and that she has no one else in her life to look after her besides him.
I had no idea about this until recently, but she is no longer on speaking terms with either of her two children, both of whom have started their own families and have produced grandchildren she has never met. Her mother committed suicide when she was nine (and, depending on what day she tells that story, she did or did not discover the body).
Her father is alive, but she does not speak to him. Nor does she speak to any of her siblings or their families. Nor does she speak to her ex-husband, the father of her two estranged children. Tim says that, for as long as he’s known her, she has had a rotating cast of friends, not one of whom manage to stay around for longer than several months before there is a cataclysmic falling out and they are banished from her life.
This is all to say, Tim feels like he’s all she’s got. For better or worse, he has supported her and her lifestyle for 23 years and she’s used to that. I’m sure his presence makes her feel better. And I’m sure being there for her makes him feel better.
And you know what? I’m okay with that.