Ethlie Remembers the Eighties

Barely. And with regrets.

I was sweating to the oldies, as it were, doing some low-impact cardio to a dorky YouTube of upbeat ‘80s tunes when I listened to the lyrics of The Outfield’s “Your Love” for the first time in more than 30 years. I had heard the lyrics often enough; it was a top 10 Billboard chart hit in 1986 and I was a journalist covering the music industry at the time. I just had never listened to them.

These are the lyrics:

Josie's on a vacation far away
Come around and talk it over
So many things that I want to say
You know I like my girls a little bit older
I just wanna use your love tonight
I don't wanna lose your love tonight

I ain't got many friends left to talk to
No one's around when I'm in trouble
You know I'd do anything for you
Stay the night but keep it undercover
I just wanna use your love tonight, whoa
I don't wanna lose your love tonight

Translation: “My girlfriend’s out of town and even though you’re not really my type, I’m horny and you’re handy. Let’s have a quick roll in the hay… but don’t tell anyone, okay?”

That is a shitty offer from a shitty guy. How did I never notice that before?

Of course, in 1986 I was still acting out a wildly self-destructive pattern of sex and love addiction. An offer like that might have actually have read as flattering to my insecure, low self-esteem self. “He wants me!,” my head would squeal. “He’s choosing me over another woman!,” and that of course makes me even more special. Even though it’s clear that the offer is for a one-night stand, somehow my head convinces me that this time it will be different. Surely my perfect body and my perfect soul (to drag another band into this) will somehow bind him to me for eternity.

As one woman shared in a meeting and made me laugh: “He hasn’t met my trick pelvis yet.”

On the Wikipedia page for “Your Love” — why such a minor work of art has a Wikipedia page, I do not know — they insist that the line “As you leave, please, would you close the door?” means that the girl turned down the offer and sent the fellow back to his Josie. I don’t hear that. I’ve been told to close the door on the way out before, and what it meant was I’m not invited for breakfast. Do I wish I had been the kind of girl who would send this player back to his Josie? Sure. But I wasn't, and I don’t think the girl in the song was, either. I think that interpretation is a retcon from a different cultural era.

I talk pretty freely about my years acting out as a sex and love addict and I don’t feel much shame around it, any more than I am ashamed of having been a drug addict. My brain is wired funny, I never learned healthy coping skills or had good role models, shit happens. Now that I know better, I do better. But I feel guilty for not considering the feelings of the third leg of the triangle when I was the Other Woman. This wasn't trendy modern polyamory. This was men being shitty to their partners and me enabling it, and then feeling sorry for myself because I was getting leftovers and crumbs of his affection.

In 12-step recovery, you make amends to people for the bad stuff you did to them… except when to do so would injure them or others. I don’t get to go back and clean this one up, because the last thing any woman needs to hear is “Hey, sorry I fucked your husband in 1994.” Making amends to the guys involved is frowned upon as well, as the nicest thing you can do for them is leave them the hell alone. So you sit with it. You pay it forward by maybe helping some other people deal with their own sex and love addiction by, I don’t know, maybe writing a book and an embarrassing blog.

Josie, I’m sorry. You deserved better.