Ahh, the siren call of affair sex. Why, why, why oh why do we continue to risk it when libraries could be filled to the rafters with the stories of fortunes lost, politicians resigning in disgrace, families destroyed and lives lost, all because of affair sex.

Why do we do it? Is it the secrecy of it all? That deliciously mischievous feeling we feel that harkens back to our days as children when we did things we knew we shouldn’t, yet did them anyway? Is it the “dirty” clandestine nature of the act? Two people breaking their vows to find…something with someone else, risking it all just to feel alive for a little while.

Maybe all of the above.

At TMC we think that nowadays more people answer the call of affair sex because it’s so damn easy. At least, the movies and television would have you think so. As we said in our last post, no one tells you about the guilt. And no one, not Ashley Madison, not Adult Friend Finder, not Hollywood, not Craigslist, not your best friend since Kindergarten who’s having an affair with the soccer mom he met at the local PTA meeting, will tell you truth about affair sex.

They won’t, but TMC will.

Here’s the good news. Affair sex can be great. It can be what you need when things are home are unbearable and you need the touch of another human being just to get you through another day. It’s not just the sex act, but just knowing there is another human being out there, somewhere, who misses you, who cares enough to kiss and hold and make love to you can be the difference between a bearable day and one spent running naked and screaming through your gated community.

Here’s the bad news. Affair sex can be filled with guilt and recrimination. If you don’t enter into it with the right mindset then affair sex can destroy your life, and I don’t just mean if your spouse finds out. Many a life has been ruined not by the spouse finding out but by the party having the affair’s need to purge the guilt. Trust me, no one can blow up your life better than you can.

Affair sex will be easy, right? What could be simpler? You meet your potential partner far from home and finally, you’re sitting across from the person you’ve been flirting with for weeks. Truth be told you’ve gotten off thinking about making love to them, how they would feel in your arms, what they would smell like, taste like. You’re ready.

Then, you meet them and the veil of fantasy is lifted. They’re pretty ordinary, not unlike the other moms and dads you see all the time at the soccer games or bake sales. A couple of crow’s feet, maybe a little heavier than the pictures you received, maybe a little less hair and a little more grey than you imagined. That’s not a bad thing, you think. After all, you’re not perfect yourself but maybe you expected something…more. Still, you don’t dwell on that and you smile and when you think they’re not looking you cast surreptitious glances at their body, imagining the naked flesh underneath the work clothes. The waiter arrives in his horrendous uniform covered in those ugly buttons and you cringe for a moment because he looks JUST like your son’s best friend. He isn’t though and you sigh with relief and you order. Soon, the food comes and you’re deep into the getting to know one another phase and you don’t taste the rubbery appetizers and you barely touch your entrée. You take about careers and houses and kids and you wonder how the kids are doing at home, did they eat the dinner you left for them or did they fill up on junk, did Johnny choke up on the bat and did he keep his eye on the ball like you taught him to. You feel a twinge of…something at the thought of your family but you smile and try hard to put them out of your mind.

Soon dinner is over and you walk out to the cars and you share a kiss and you blurt out, “I know a place we can go.” A few minutes later you’re pulling into the lot at a motel and you both walk nervously to the door, pretending this is the most natural thing in the world but feeling like every single person who saw you, from the waiter at the restaurant to the people on the street, even the other motorists you pass, know what you’re about to do.

The room is clean and dirty all at once. It smells freshly cleaned but there’s an odor underneath the fresh pine scent. Whether from smoke or recent clandestine sex or your imagination it’s hard to tell. The sheets are a sickly pastel color which matches the carpets which matches paint which matches the ugly prints on the walls. You turn on the television and the news comes on and you quickly change the channel. The news seems so…ordinary. It’s what you would have on in the background if you were at home right now, washing the dishes or helping the kids with their homework. You flip through the channels and hard core porn appears and you quickly change turn the television off. You move to your companion and you kiss, more out of nervousness than anything else but the kiss builds and soon your hands are running over bodies in places that haven’t been touched in God knows how long. You turn out the lights and get into bed and it feels familiar but strange too. Familiar because you’ve long imagined how it would be to touch another body. Strange because the body you’re touching is different from the one you’ve lain next to for years. It feels different, it moves different it smells different. You kiss again and the kisses are different, the caresses are different and you feel a pang of guilt that push down down down. You wonder if you’ll be able to perform, will everything work, will you embarrass yourself and have to slink home, defeated.

The time comes and condoms appear, bought with cash in a gas station convenience store far, far from home. You haven’t used protection since college but with a little effort it’s on. The sex is hesitant, uncomfortable and over quickly, nothing like the porn star sex he envisioned or the tender loving sex she fantasized. After, they’re together in the dark, her head on his chest, his arm around her, and two strangers lay together, united by broken vows. The sex wasn’t the best. The meal was forgettable. The process of finding each other long, nerve-wracking and secretive, but this, this lying together, this part made it all worth it. This is intimacy and they soak it up greedily, remembering it, storing it for those times when they will be alone and lonely once again. They lay without speaking and she kisses his once-hard chest now beginning to soften with middle age and he softly kisses her hair, the gray just beginning to show and they both know they will be here again. Despite the guilt and the secrets they will be here again. They are cheaters.

If you can’t be faithful, be careful.

TMC

Okay, you’re ready for an affair and you’ve decided to find one online. Congratulations. You’ve joined the ranks of hundreds of thousands of people who make that decision every day. The ads make is seem so easy don’t they, with taglines like “Life is short, have an affair” (www.ashleymadison.com). Just log on, post a picture and before you’re know it you’ll be wallowing in adulterous bliss. It’s not quite that easy though, so before you log on there are a few questions you have to ask yourself.

• How to choose a site?
• Do you want to pay or go the free route?
• What kind of site do you want, a “dating” site or a “hook-up” site.
• If you’re looking for gay/lesbian/transgender hook up do the “mainstream” sites offer that?
• Want to indulge in some fetishes? Where do you go?

There are hundreds of hook-up sites that’ll get you what you want but my personal preference is to stick to the bigger ones. Not only are you guaranteed a huge selection of people to choose from (depending on your area) but they’re generally easier to navigate and offer you bells and whistles like voting, blogs and contests. At TMC we’ve tried them all with varying degrees of success so here, in no particular order, are TMC’s favorite hookup/dating sites.