I'm not dumb except when it comes to women. I know, I know. Really aren't most men dumb when it comes to women? I know some of us think they know about them, that they understand them, but do they really? I think not. Like most men I just try to muddle through and do things as nearly right as I can. Having said that, I believe that is the reason it took me so long to realize I am really dumb when it comes to women and specifically to my wife. I had seen the signs of her disrespect and cheating for nearly five months before I decided that if there was smoke there might just be a fire I needed to put out.

As the old song went "we got married in a fever hotter than a pepper sprout". I found, wooed and married Kathryn over the course of one year in college. I was attending Oklahoma State University at Stillwater majoring in partying when she stumbled into my life. Ok, ok. My real major was in hotel and restaurant management. The partying was what I did when I should have been studying.

I was also working at Eskimo Joes; a well known and popular college hang out as a bouncer. The bouncers rotated through different stations in the building to do their job. We served at the doors to verify ID's and wandered through the crowd to be sure nothing untoward occurred. There was an upstairs in the bar and one of us was always stationed near the head of the stairs to keep the drunks from falling down them.

I got a quick education on the female of the species while I worked there. I learned which ones would and which ones wouldn't and which ones would some of the time and how to identify each of them. When I manned the post at the head of the stairs I could overlook much of the lower floor. I watched as the women worked the dumb bastards on the main floor below from my post on the balcony. Some of the women had two or three of the poor dumb bastards buying them drinks at the same time in hopes of taking them home or to their cars for a little nookie later in the evening. Many of the young "ladies" would cadge drinks from the dumb men until just before closing time. Usually at last call or slightly before there would be a large exodus of these women. They would use the pretense of going to the restroom before leaving with the young man that had treated them for the evening to allow them to dart out the back door that opened off the hallway to the restrooms. This, of course, pissed off the men and many times they had to be counseled by one of the bouncers to calm them down. I knew which of the young women routinely played this game and as a public service I would warn my friends or sometimes just a guy I thought was nice and didn't deserve getting shit on about them. Others I just let get taken.

Anyway, one Saturday evening after a home game I was working and watching the drunks make fools of themselves when this absolute goddess stumbled into my arms. Drunk was an understatement for her. She was totally blotto and claimed to not even know where she was. She couldn't find the friends she had supposedly came with but I understood that. I had never seen her with those women before and they were one of the worst groups to duck out the back door after drinking free for the entire night. I was pretty sure they were gone, gone, gone. It was after last call and they normally darted out when last call was announced.

About that time with Kathryn literally draped in my arms the man she had been cadging drinks from came up. He glared at me and grabbed her by the arm. "Come on Callie," he said. "We need to get out of here. I was beginning to think you had disappeared on me."

Well, now I knew her name I thought. I was about to let her go with the young man when she roused somewhat and looked at him with a questioning look on her face. "My name's not Callie, its Kathryn. Who're you? Why do I have to go with you? Where are Cindy and the other girls? I was supposed to go with them when the bar closed."

The man just pulled on her arm and said, "Callie, Kathryn, whatever. I been buying you drinks all night long and you're coming home with me now."

Kathryn roused herself once more and tried to stand and jerk away from the man. She looked scared and said, "NO. I don't know you and I don't want to go with you. Now leave me alone."

The man tried to pull her away once more and she resisted. I decided she really didn't know him and didn't want to go so I pulled her toward a chair and tried to get between them. "Whoa there Dude," I said. "It looks like the lady doesn't want to go with you. Now why don't you just move along like she asked before we have trouble?"

A mask of hatred came over his face and he pushed me. "Back off Asshole. The bitch is with me and we're leaving. Now let it drop if you know what's good for you."

I moved back a little then grabbed his arm and locked it behind his back with a quick twist. He yelled out in pain as one of my fellow bouncers came up. "You have a problem here Dave?"

"Naw. The dude here wanted to take the lady with him but she didn't want to go. He didn't want to take no for an answer but I think he understands now—don't you?" When I said that I pulled upward on the butthead's arm a little more and he yelped in pain once again and rose onto his tiptoes.

"Ow, yeah, I got it. Just let me go asshole."

I walked the man to the door and out to the sidewalk's edge. I gave him a little push and said, "Ok beat it bub. We got your picture now so don't want to have any more trouble from you or we'll have to call in security next time."

I walked back into the building to see a couple of the waitresses clustered around Kathryn. She had passed out in the chair. Damn, now what I wondered.

Patty looked at me and said, "Dave Kathryn lives in my dorm. If you'll help me get her back to the dorm and into her room I can take care of her from there."

Well, that's what I did and that is how I became one of Kathryn's favorite people. The next weekend I was working Friday night when the beautiful woman bounced up to me, threw her arms around me and hugged me before she put a very sloppy and long kiss on my lips.

I pushed her back and said, "Whoa, what's that all about?"

"You saved me last Saturday. Patty told me you kept that asshole from taking me home then you drove us back to the dorm and helped her get me into my room. I don't know what would have happened to me if you hadn't saved me. I didn't even know him and my asshole friends did the old drink and dash out the back door at last call trick without me. I was supposed to go with them but they didn't wait for me they just took off. I never even heard them call last call so I missed it."

Well for the next two years when I was working Kathryn was always near me for protection. We got to know each other very well and began dating a few months after I saved her. When we graduated we got married. Kathryn is just a little high maintenance. She likes to party and dance and she likes to eat good food and drink fine wine. That's ok; we have great jobs and no children so we can afford it. We just can't afford as much as she wants right now and that pisses her off when I tell her we can't go out until after payday.

Several of our arguments about money revolve around the fact my parents are pretty well off. They own a large Farm Store and almost four sections of farmland in our home town. We have a large year round fishing and hunting resort on the land also. When I tell Kathryn we can't afford something she almost always yells that if I wasn't such an idiot I would get it from my parents. She thinks I should go back home and take a management job from Dad so we can make big bucks and be the big duck in the little puddle. I have told her repeatedly that I am here in this job to gain some real world experience and learn how the big boys do it before I return to our company. The resort manager plans to retire in three more years and I will be taking over his job at that time. That isn't fast enough for Kathryn.

I began getting snide comments about my ability to earn enough to pay our bills. Occasionally Kathryn would go out after work with her friends and come back home smashed. Many times over the last several months I had to pick her up or pay for a cab. About five months ago all that stopped. Oh, she still came home blitzed and many times I had to go to her office with her the next day to pick up her car. Sometimes I had to take her to her favorite bar to pick it up but I never had to pay off the cab or pick her up. A time or two I found her sleeping on the living room floor when I came down the next morning. I wondered how she got into the house if she passed out on the floor inside the door.

Finally after several arguments I decided to find out what was really going on. I did what many men do in such a situation. I bought recorders and placed them in Kathryn's purse, car and even one in her office hidden under her desk. I had our landline tapped and bought the necessary gear to copy her cell phone calls.

What I found out killed my love for her. She had become sexually involved with one of the men she worked with. Many of the late nights and the shopping trips on Saturday with the girls over the last five months had been her liaisons with good old Gregory Anders. He was one of those obnoxious salesmen you hate. Greg was arrogant, had a smarmy smile and was a suck up to his 'betters'. His one saving grace, well perhaps not, was not only was he the highest paid salesman in her company but his father owned the damn place.

I had enough recordings to understand two things. When I had cut down on our visits to high priced dining establishments and cut down on entertaining and buying fine wines and going to expensive plays and so forth Kathryn complained long and loudly at work about how I mistreated her. Gregory picked up on her unhappiness and began following the women on their nights out. He flashed his money, bought them drinks and generally showed them the good life until he had Kathryn's interest. From there he managed to get her to meet him for lunch at expensive Bistros. After she was hooked on his high spending ways he invited her to evening meals after work at posh places.

After a few weeks of this Kathryn had succumbed to his seduction and began spending time in bed with Gregory. He began giving her orders and to my shock she obeyed them. All he had to do was threaten to cut off his largesse and she knuckled under to his demands. Blow job in the car? Sure honey. Sex in the restaurant bathroom? Ok whatever you want honey.

I even had recordings of him telling her to cut down on the sex we had because he didn't want my sloppy seconds. He told her she had to make sure more than 24 hours went by from the time she screwed me until she did him or he would drop her. He said, "I refuse to have sex with my woman after she's been with some looser. I don't care how you do it but you make sure you're clean before you come to me."

Our sex life rapidly began to decline and revolved around good old Gregory's sales trips out of town and on Sundays. He was never with her on a Sunday so that rapidly became my only guaranteed day of loving. I have to admit I really didn't care much after I found out what was going on. I had only kept the cheating bitch around as long as I had because I was preparing for the divorce. Thankfully we had only been married about 27 months and there were no kids yet when I found out about good old Greg and Kate (She HATES to be called Kate so that is how I think of her now). We were renting a pretty nice condo and buying two new vehicles. She of course had to have a BMW. I was really happy with my 2010 F150 Super Crew 4X4 I had bought new when we got out of college.

When we went out she refused to ride in "that damn old truck" and insisted we drive her car. Of course we don't go out together much now. I just do enough with her to keep her in the dark. Today begins my revenge on Kate and Greg. She has a date with him for tonight. She plans to meet him at the mall at 6:30 p.m. They are going for drinks then to a new French restaurant for supper. Afterwards they are going dancing. She told me she was going out with the girls to a baby shower.