ICE-age dilemma brings on icy response
We are living in strange and challenging times, when people are confronted with moral choices that sometimes have grave consequences. You and she are both wrestling with an ethical dilemma, and while you can justify your own choice, you shouldn't challenge hers.
Dear Amy: I have/had a close friend for years, but he's still upset about me sleeping with his wife years ago.
Here's the deal: they had been separated for five years at the time, and he had slept with many other women in the meantime -- (she had, too). He had moved to the other side of the country to find work.
He found a new girlfriend, they moved in together and they finally bought a house together. Yes, he was still (technically) married at this time. They finally got a divorce four years later.
Was it really wrong for me to sleep with his wife? I was single at the time.
-- Confused in Virginia
Dear Confused: It isn't "wrong" for two consenting and available adults to hook up. However, there does seem to be an unwritten friendship rule that friends shouldn't hook up with one another's exes. That having been said, it happens all the time. And good friendships sometimes take a hit when it does happen, even though the reaction is irrational.
Your friend doesn't own his ex, or you. You should encourage him to get over it, already.
Dear Amy: The question from "Mother in a Brave New World" involved two women who were married to one another. One was invited to a baby shower and the other wasn't.
Amy, I think in your reading of this letter, you confused the characters and the two women's names, rendering your answer nonsensical.
-- Reader
Dear Reader: It's actually more complicated than that, and involved me trimming a sentence from the letter which would have illuminated everything. I apologize for my error, and thank all of the readers who caught it.
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(You can contact Amy Dickinson via email: askamy@amydickinson.com. Readers may send postal mail to Ask Amy, P.O. Box 194, Freeville, NY 13068. You can also follow her on Twitter @askingamy or "like" her on Facebook.)
