Marriage or Hell -- What's the Difference?

I received more than a few comments on my blog about marriage and women and my inability to remain married to one woman for any length of time so I thought I'd provide more details about the root causes of this dilemma. The dynamic that created my philosophy and point of view (and approach to marriage) can be traced to my upbringing and family context. Who we are today is derived from where we came from. Those influences mold us as surely as genetics and our DNA lock in our height, weight and predispositions. Environment, of course, casts a shadow on who we are.

I grew up in a lower middle class family in Brooklyn. My mother was a young housewife at age 19. My father was a press photographer who worked for the NY Daily Mirror. He also owned a photo studio and specialized in photographing weddings and bar mitzvahs. He worked 70 hours a week and his clients included Pan Am and Grossingers. He never read a book or had a thought. He taught me to be a photographer too which I did in the US Army (Signal Corp.). I had assignments in Pakistan with Jackie Kennedy in 1962 and Cuba where I was arrested in 1960 for "spying." I spent nine days in the Morrow Castle prison until the US Embassy got me released.

Many years ago I did the NBC TV show Tom Snyder with my mother. On camera she complained that my father was a "wam bam, thank you ma'am" kind of sexual partner. I was humiliated at this public ridicule of my hard working father. This was before divorce was an option and feminism had clout. The dilemma of my mother seeking fulfillment from a detached husband tested my loyalty to both. Meanwhile, she was having sex with my diet doctor, Harry Stone. My father was being cheated on and my loyalties to my parents were quickly becoming divided. My mother admitted to me when I was 15 that she had had a sexual relationship. My father, on the other hand, had accepted her explanation that her relationship with Dr. Stone was "platonic." Dr. Stone bought my mother a big car and took her on cruises. My dad was too oblivious to reality to know he was cuckolded. I knew. It instilled in me a distrust to marriage and women. That's why I have four failed marriages to my credit and am misogynistic about women. When you review that background, how could it be otherwise?