However we may judge their consequences, these liaisons are not frivolous. Their power is often as mystifying to the person involved in the secret as they are to the spouse who uncovers it. But having heard the same story so many times, I know that there is a method to the madness—an underlying riddle of human nature that leads people to unexpected trespasses. I often feel like part therapist, part philosopher—explaining to couples the existential paradoxes that make what seems inconceivable also quite logical.
