What marriage offers - and what fidelity is meant to protect - is the possibility of moments when what we have chosen and what we desire are the same. Such a convergence obviously cannot be continuous. No relationship can continue very long at its highest emotional pitch. But fidelity prepares us for the return of these moments, which give us the highest joy we can know; that of union, communion, atonement (in the root sense of at-one-ment)...
To forsake all others does not mean - because it cannot mean - to ignore or neglect all others, to hide or be hidden from all others, or to desire or love no others. To live in marriage is a responsible way to live in sexuality, as to live in a household is a responsible way to live in the world. One cannot enact or fulfill one's love for womankind or mankind, or even for all the women or men to whom one is attracted. If one is to have the power and delight of one's sexuality, then the generality of instinct must be resolved in a responsible relationship to a particular person. Similarly, one cannot live in the world; that is, one cannot become, in the easy, generalizing sense with which the phrase is commonly used, a
Richard McCallister:
[Re scheduling] Why not "The Wexler Chronicles"?
Lenny:
Against "Infidelity 101"? We'll get killed.
Richard McCallister:
Well, we'll do better than we will with "Cheating Heart." You said so yourself, Lenny. "Sex will always beat disgusting foods. But in a fight between sex and sex, the sexier show will win," and they have the sexier show. Seems to me that the only way to counter them is to go with an actual scripted story with characters and... *stories* and things. If only for the 35-and-ups. At least we'll do some kind of number.
Vernon Maxwell:
It's an interesting thought, Lenny. FDrom an ad sales perspective, we'll take the high-end cars, the insurance companies.
Exec. #3:
Uh, maybe pharmaceuticals, even?
Lenny:
Yeah. It's just so fucking artsy and... [disgustedly]
Lenny:
smart.
Vernon Maxwell:
Well, I'm sure you'll rein it in.
Women enjoyed, are like romances read, or shows, once seen, mere tricks of the sleight of hand, which, when found out, you only wonder at yourselves for wondering so before at them. 'Tis expectation endears the blessing; Heaven would not be Heaven, could we tell what 'tis. When the plot's out you have done with the play, and when the last act's done, you see the curtain drawn with great indifferency.