The Ineffable Allure Of A December-May Affair - Extending Anthony Barker's Sexual Pull-By Date

The Coleman Silk character in Phillip Roth's The Human Stain is having an affair with a much younger woman.  His friend and colleague calls him on it, saying she is not of the same background, education and culture, and more importantly she is being shadowed by her schizophrenic, dangerous ex-husband. 'She's nothing but trouble, Coleman', he says. 

 

Silk pauses, reflects, hesitates, but then replies, 'Granted she's not my first love, and granted she's not my best love; but she's certainly my last love.  Doesn't that count for something?'

In Coleman's case it very much does.  A respected man wrongly accused by colleagues at the college where he teachers and was dean, prematurely widowed, and angry at the system which caused his disgrace and his wife's death, finds solace, comfort, satisfaction, and renewal in his relationship with Faunia Farley, janitor, cleaning woman, and milker at a local dairy. 

It is an old story, older men who leave their wives for or have an affair with a younger woman. There is something inevitable about a man's desire well into his elder years.  Konstantin Levin, Tolstoy's character in Anna Karenina notes God's greatest irony - to have created an intelligent, sentient, creative, insightful, humorous soul, granted him but a few decades on earth and then consigned him for all eternity in the cold, hard ground of the steppes. 

 

A more severe irony is that this same God created men with a lifelong desire for women, but granted them but a few decades to satisfy it.  The longer a man has to fulfill his sexual desire, the luckier he is. Few men whose virility persists well into advancing years do anything about it, either so set in their ways, hopelessly married, or somehow faithful to the idea of fidelity. 

Coleman does not go quietly into the night but takes Faunia as a lover and suffers the consequences, murdered by the crazed, schizophrenic ex-husband.  Yet he has no regrets and lives with the constant threat of Lester with equanimity. The epiphany, the resurrection the renewal, the reaffirmation has been so profound, that even death does not deter him. 

Anthony Barker was long since retired, and was enjoying a second career in academia.  His marriage was stable, his grown children reasonably happy in their marriages, and his days were satisfyingly filled with the intellectual pursuits he had little time for during his professional career. Yet the itch, that itch, was increasingly troublesome, and despite the lessons of Coleman Silk, he felt hopeless.  Who would have him?  He had neither the wealth to attract young women, nor a position of political power, a la Henry Kissinger ('Power is the ultimate aphrodisiac'), so he would have to fend for himself. 

Museums, art galleries, the gym, coffee shops, oyster bars? Fine for younger men but impossibly clumsy for a man of his age. He no longer had an office to go to, no Annette from Accounting, no trysts at the Mayflower. 

There was always the constant companion of reserve - the marriage, trust, honesty could not be so easily tested or dismissed without consequence. 

Marc Antony in Shakespeare's Antony and Cleopatra, is besotted by the Egyptian queen, a younger woman, and he risks everything - his field command, his place in the Roman triumvirate, his future - for her. A typical man, not unlike Anthony Barker, a man trapped by a genetic imperative. 

'Hire a prostitute', his doctor half-facetiously said, ironically because the man had many lovers, a Jewish Lothario. Anthony hesitated, not sure if he was being toyed with, the old fox of a doctor always smiling and insinuating. 

'AIDS is a thing of the past', said the doctor, 'and at your age something else will get you before the incubation period is over'. 

There was indeed that option, for Madame Currier's establishment was well-known in town, the go-to place for incidental sex; but Anthony had never before resorted to what had always been referred to as 'darktown pleasures', ghetto time, rather inappropriate and unnecessary for someone of his natural sexual appeal. Yet, there he was, approaching his pull-by date, desperate.  

A close friend of Anthony's had, like Coleman Silk, taken a young lover, and said that he felt gifted, an early Christmas present, an unexpected treat, a delight.  

But would sex with a young prostitute have the same annealing, epiphanic properties? Weren't the cheating, the infidelity, and the young emotions that go along with illicit sex be absent? No amount of money could buy something as transformative as his friend had experienced. 

'Try it, what do you have to lose?', he said

Anthony's suspicion was correct. Legions of satisfied veterans of December-May affairs report the same experience. When age disappears and when she loves your patience and your sheer delight, that is what the affair is all about.  It isn't the sex that rejuvenates, that restores confidence and virility - it's the adoration, the very feminine claim that sex starts and ends with emotion. Sex with a prostitute would have none of that, none of the stuff of regeneration. 

Yet there was the feel of youth, the softness and impossibly generous sensuality - that could be had for sale, could it not?  Might a young prostitute be but the first step to restoration, the remaining building taking time and some serendipity?

He gave in and gave up.  He had no recourse. The ticking clock needed no winding.  It was time, do or die; and so it was that he made and appointment with Madame Currier and paid top dollar for la creme do la creme of her establishment.  It was worth every nickel.  It might not have been restoration and certainly not renewal, but there was no substitution for the sheer physicality of the event.  It was recalling, heady times. It was, despite the cash on the night table, exactly what he had hoped for. 

The Sultan of Izmir, grand pasha of the Ottoman Empire, master of a harem of twenty young women from Azerbaijan to Palestine had written in his memoir:

She came to me in flowing silk, a delicate flower, an Arab princess worthy of Cleopatra and Nefertiti but without their worldliness. She was as innocent as the morning dew, as nubile and desirous as a maiden, a sheer delight. 

And the next night came Usha, olive-skinned beauty from the Levant, dressed in satin, covered with pearls and jewels from the Orient

And the next night came a blonde star, a green-eyed daughter of Alexander the Great from the hills of Mathura...

Neither love nor restitution, nor epiphany were in play in the pasha's realm, not a single verse. 

A man who had always prided himself on his attractiveness to women said that he had never resorted to prostitution. Why should I?, he said; but a colleague corrected him. 'Apples and oranges', he said. 

And so it was that Anthony Barker learned about the nature of sex, and how one thing always leads to another.  One was never sure whether he reconciled with his wife, found that young lover which had always eluded him, returned to Madame Currier's establishment or all three.  His epiphany was not at all what he expected, but then again it never is. 

The Exorcism Of Donald Trump - Convinced That He Is Evil, The Left Resorts To Sorcery

'The houngan can raise the dead', said Antonine Fougere, Director of the Bureau of Land Development in Port-au-Prince. 

Voodoo is the religion of Haiti, derived from the pagan ceremonies of Dahomey and imported to the New World by slave traders, and the houngan - the ceremonial priest -was known for his recalling spirits from the dead, returning zombies, the living dead, back to their graves, and for inspiring ordinary people to fits of orgasmic revelation. 

 

The houngan can also cast spells on people. Best known are the macabre dolls into which pins are driven to blind, maim, or render insane the distant victim.  'I put a spell on you', sang Screamin' Jay Hawkins black artist, descendant of slaves and inheritor of African mysticism, more distant from the black magic of Dahomey than his Haitian brothers, but a believer nonetheless. 

The Salem witch trials were said to have been inspired by a possessed Haitian woman who had unearthly powers and the ability to cast out devils. The witch trials, it was said, were as close to African tribalism as could be imagined, strange and ironic in the white, Puritan world of 17th century Massachusetts but hysterically wild and untamed nevertheless. 

The Evil Eye is common throughout much of the world.  Old Italians still talk of 'malocchio', Indian mothers dress their infant sons as girls to fool the evil spirits, and modern Turks hang a talisman in their homes to prevent the evil eye. 

Children are convinced that monsters lie under their beds, fantasies dismissed by parents but reminiscent of a deep-seated, ancient human fear of evil. 

The Devil is at the heart of Christianity. Evil cannot possibly be incidental, the Church proclaims.  Milton's Paradise Lost is all about the existential fight between good and evil, Jesus and the Devil. Most fundamental Christians believe that the devil is among us, and is responsible for the evil in the world. 

It is not surprising therefore that progressives have assumed that Donald Trump is not only possessed by evil, but is evil incarnate - the ultimate, final stage of devilish inhabitance. It can only be so, there is no other explanation, no possible reason why the man has so deliberately begun to destroy all the good that they have accomplished.  It is one thing to embark on unholy plans, but another entirely to wantonly destroy good, an act which is the very definition of evil.

'Immanence' is the word that progressives now use for this incarnation, preferring to avoid using religious terms, given their anti-catechetical sentiments. However they know that the man is evil, possessed by the Devil, and a threat not only to America but all humanity. 

The problem, however, is this.  The Left has run on the premise that Trump is evil, and so if by some mysterious, tribal, ancestral means that evil were exorcised, Trump and his government would observe the rule of law, the Constitution, and traditional means of governance. The Left would have no shibboleth, no demon, no unholy figure to hate. Better to leave well enough alone, some advisors said, rather than remove the principle issue of the Democratic party. 

On the other hand, if by some unusual intervention, the man were suddenly cleared and cleansed of evil, they would be given credit. 

'Stop it', said Billings Harper, chief advisor to the Democrat Party, political strategist, and principle operative for the 2028 presidential campaign. 'Imminent disaster', he warned, veering into uncharted dangerous territory. 'We have branded the man with enough secular intimations of evil, that we don't need to be the party of exorcism'. 

Yet one member of the Congressional inner circle, Alphonse Baillergeau, Haitian, long-standing patriotic American, Democratic loyalist and trusted advisor to authority, felt there was something to the initiative. He was a true believer in Voodoo, and although he publicly professed Christianity he never strayed far from its roots.

As far as he knew, there were indeed evil spirits abroad,  and only with the power of Africa's tribal mysteries could they be chased away. Unofficially he would travel to Port-au-Prince and contact those who knew far more than he about the black arts, and would report back in a week. 

'What you wanna do, fada?' asked the wizened, black as the ace of spades, grizzled old man sitting on the porch of his mud and wattle home in Les Cayes. 'Hex da man? I got me some mighty potions for that kind o' trouble.’

'Watch what happens to dat white man sittin' over dere under the palm tree'. 

The white man scratched his arm, then his leg, then got up a did a St. Vitus' dance, a whirling dervish, whooping and hollering like a crazy man.  'You see dere', said the houngan. 'He ain't got no bugs on him but my bugs', and no sooner had the man started jumping up and down that he stopped, looked at his arms and legs, and sat down. 

'I gots lots more where dat come from'. 

'Incantations is what I got for big men.  Chants you know, spells and like', and with that he gave the Washington aide a palm leaf with Creole writing.  'Dis will do da trick, fada, but you got be careful dis mighty almighty magic', and with that he swallowed the last of his palm wine and disappeared. 

'How'd it go?', asked the minority chair of the House Ways and Means committee. 'Fine' said Alphonse and set about planning a trial run.  The President was going to speak to the press tomorrow, fueled up and and as angry as a hive full of bees over tariffs, and perhaps he could be 'encouraged' to say a few kind words for the loyal opposition which would soon be responsible for the shift in tariff policy necessitated by the Supreme Court ruling. A small gesture, but in the scope of voodoo things, significant to say the least. 

It worked, and the President paid homage. 

'I want mine', wrote the houngan in a handwritten message delivered to Alphonse. The aide had not expected payment due.  It was a matter between Haitian brothers after all but there it was, his nose wide open, blackmail a short flight away.  If consorting with tribal barbarism ever got out...

Now of course all this was just fol-de-rol and an example of just how far progressive hysteria and Trump hatred can go.  The 'homage' was nothing more than national realpolitik.  Under the new court ruling, the President would have to work with Congress, marshal a few votes from the other side of the aisle not difficult for a man for all his bombast had some of LBJ's arm-twisting genes. 

The amazing thing was not that Alphonse went deep dark magic, but that senior Democrat leaders listened. They actually, even if momentarily, believed that the President was actually possessed. 

'Nutcases' said one Republican who had gotten wind of the aborted scheme, but took it in stride as just one more bald, idiotic attempt to bring their man down. Unsuccessful, of course, as all the lawfare, lies, and innuendoes had been; but this was, wow! quite a show.  

Alphonse believed that the spell had worked, that the bug crawling affair was but one example of voodoo's dark powers, and so he returned to Haiti, gave up his suit and tie, and was last seen as naked as a Hindu sadhu walking the streets of Petionville. 

'I wish it had worked', said Trump when told of the affair. 'I could use some of that'. 

'Come Hither' - A Woman's Seductive Allure Lost In An Uppity Age

Lucretia Billings had always known that she was destined for something important, not just aprons and frilly dresses like her mother.  No, she would make something of herself, a name, a reputation, a place in history.  The old days of Kinder, Kirche, Kuchen were long gone and those of feminist arousal, championship, and destiny were upon her.  

Of course, daughter of a most appealing, seductive femme for a mother, she had her work cut out for her.  Lucretia had been properly schooled in the arts of subtle feminine persuasion - the arts of Cleopatra, Mata Hari, and millennia of women who, gifted with natural beauty and sexual appeal, learned how to use them. 

Mrs. Billings, Lucretia's mother could have had any of the young, wealthy, attractive suitors who came calling at Hastings Court, her ancestral home; but waited patiently until she had the prize caught in her carefully-woven web.  Cabot Potter Lodge had always been in her sights - scion of one of America's finest families, Harvard graduate, and junior partner at Locke, Burnham & Fiske - and she wasted no time in seducing her prey. 

Securing money, position, influence, and social status with no more than a voluptuous figure, sensuality, and a breathless come-hither allure was far easier than punching a Wall Street clock, or fighting little nasty Jews for prime New York real estate. 

And so it was that the upbringing of young Lucretia was consistent with this moral philosophy - women have something that men want and will fight for, so why dawdle?  'Men are darlings, but they are fools', Mrs. Billings told her daughter, 'and the sooner you realize this, the better'. 

But life, society, mores, and ambitions never remain the same, and Lucretia's generation valued other things like work, professional success, adulation, and power.  Women have for far too long labored under a male yoke, she was told, and revolution was at hand. Grasp the reins of power while you can. 

So the young, nubile, ineluctably seductive and alluring Lucretia became an uppity woman - a bitch, a cunt, a harridan in search of her rightful place atop society's ladder.  Her classmates at Columbia dressed her, directed her, and made her into a New Age woman, ready to do battle. 

At first Lucretia felt disoriented.  Her heritage and her upbringing could not so easily be dismissed.  More importantly she knew that feminine wiles, that limned and poetically endorsed trait of the most endowed women, were far easier weapons with which to storm the battlements than the screeching creeds of feminist cant. 

Yet her sisters insisted that she lose the eyeliner, the blush, and the décolleté and fold into the fare of the militant Left.   Confronting misogyny and the racism and homophobia it spawned required frontal attack not the backdoor, insidious, and outmoded tricks of a pre-feminist era. 

So, Lucretia marched with her feminist sisters, banging up against age-old prejudices and assumptions, howling and screeching to no effect.  Men in power did not want legions of bull-dykey looking women bustling up to their redoubts.  Women were a pain the ass to begin with, and now with all this feminist curiosity, were intolerable. 

One encounter with a Republican operative, on the sly in the basement apartment of a Dupont Circle duplex, was enough to convince her that her and her mother's way was right.  A little pussy aimed in the right direction could do wonders 

Congressman X of District Y was an easy mark, a pushover, a john in need.  Lucretia could have her way with him, this desperately lonely striver with a cunt for a wife. 

The old ways are the best ways, Lucretia knew. Why waste energy, resources, and time in proposing, postulating, and demonstrating when the key to influence was in the bedroom?

The Congressman didn't exactly change his vote, but his colleagues were nonetheless surprised at his conciliatory gestures to the right.  Pillow talk was indeed the operative vehicle in official Washington, and Lucretia was a master. 

A woman with sexual allure and political savvy can go places in Washington, and before long Lucretia was known - not as a courtesan but a woman of intellect and influence. She had seduced the Congressman's mind as well as his body - the easiest thing in the world for a savvy, confident woman to achieve, 

The War Between the Sexes is a misnomer, because men have laid down their arms before women conquerors since time immemorial.  Rosalind, Viola, and Portia of Shakespeare's Comedies, women who run rings around their besotted suitors, are eternal woman - a naturally powerful, controlling interest in sexual politics. Physical strength and socially endowed privilege? Nonsense.  Men can be outbid, outperformed, outclassed by women at every turn - not by the force of will but by sheer, irresistible desire. 

 

Why would a woman of Lucretia Billings’ caliber and pedigree even bother with the likes of Congressman X?  Because she could.  Reminded of the Animal Farm meme, 'Four legs good, two legs bad', she claimed what women always knew - women reign and always will. 

Not only do women have a jump start because hound dog men once getting a whiff cannot back off, but because they control paternity, the hole card of sexual poker, the future is female. 

'What's life like in Washington?', asked Lucretia's Great Aunt Margaret, a woman of the old, old school without a clue of anything after 1938; to which Lucretia responded, 'Fine, Aunt Maggie, just fine' and poured herself another Lustau Reserve sherry.

Lucretia made her way famously in Washington - never a courtesan or paid consort but a woman of natural sexual promise and influence. She flew under the censorious radar of official Washington, was the nouveau Hostess of Georgetown par excellence, sought after by young swells, arrivistes and political insiders alike. 

When it was time to leave Washington - a matter of lines and wrinkles, boredom, and disinterest - she retired happily to her home in Chillicothe and when her bonds matured, to a villa on St Bart's.