Bonus Episode (4.5) - A Guy Screwed Me; I Was Bored

Listen to full episode:

An email from Kimmer reveals that Carol, George, and George's girlfriend Marilyn were interviewed for a book titled "Threesomes" in the late 1980s. 

Paul finds the book on eBay and shares with Nora the story of Carol and George's first days of swinging, how The Silver Chain really got its start, and the lasting impact Marilyn had on their marriage, told in their own words.

Episode Transcript

Bonus: "A Guy Screwed Me; I Was Bored."

Hi everyone. It's me, Paul. And let me just say this one is a doozy. So much so that we interrupt our regularly scheduled podcast to bring you a this bonus episode about Carol and George. Their first experiences as swingers. How The Silver Chain really got its start. And the real story of Carol and George's three way realtionship with a woman named Marilyn -- told in their own words.

This story starts just days before the release of Time Capsule's first episode -- when I receive an email from Kimmer. 

EMAIL CHIME

Nora reading email: Hi Paul. Did you know that part of their story is in a book while I do have it in my library? My library is in storage. I have no idea who the author is, but I'm pretty sure the title is threesomes.

That's our show's producer, Nora McInerny, reading Kimmer's email and freaking out with me in unison.

It's very old. Yes. Their names were changed for the book and I'm not sure when it was written, but their story is about them and Marilyn. Mom gave me a copy of the book, but I don't remember what her reasoning was. I know that I looked through and figured out which couple they were. The only thing that stands out in my mind is that the author describes my mom as a massive woman?!

Carol was a very average to small woman. She was, uh, from the photos that we have, she was not a massive woman. I, I'm 6'1 I'm a massive woman just by default. I just felt like, uh, okay. I couldn't remember if we talked about that. If that's old news. Sorry. I can't keep track of what I've said or who I've said it to.

Same. Yeah. Same. Exactly. Same Kimmer. Was this old news to you? Or was this new news to you? This was complete news to me. She's like, I'll send it to you if I can find it in storage. Oh, no, she said, I think my mother had a copy and we're cleaning out her house.

If I find it, I'll send it to you, but I don't know when that will be because I don't like going to the post office and I'm like, okay, onto eBay I go. 

And deliver Ebay did. As you probably figured out by now, this episode isn't suitable for children. Also, apologies for my audio. I recorded from inside the equivalent of a metal garbage can. But there are no re-dos with a discussion like this. So, sit back, grab your favorite beverage, and get ready for a tale Nora and I couldn't make up if we tried. 

So today we are going to discuss this book threesomes by Arno Carlin. It was written in 1988. Okay. So, um. 15 years after the start of The Silver Chain, this book came out. 

 What's really exciting about this for me. Is that through all of the attempts to reach Carol before she passed away, all of the discussions that we've had with Kimmer, and with Dr. Bob, and with Pastor Lisa, all these people that tell us about Carol, we've never actually heard anything directly quoted from Carol, aside from what she's written in the newsletter, so this actually gives us a much deeper understanding of Carol and George and their inner world. Yeah, especially because, uh, for a few reasons, the newsletters were written for an audience of people who knew them in a very specific context, who knew Carol as a founding couple within The Silver Chain, who engaged with her.

Socially, possibly sexually, she was a leader in that space, but this book is anonymous and it's being written by somebody else too. And I do think that there's always a difference between the story as you tell it for a specific audience and the story that somebody else can pull out of you when they're talking to you or interviewing you.

Absolutely. And also, there's the veil of anonymity, where they're under aliases, so Carol is Maria and George is John and Marilyn is Connie, but I mean, come on Connie, Connie. I mean, they have the woman that's the third named Connie. That's all I'm saying. What would you name her? Oh, Samantha.

Oh, I know. That's such a sexy name. Samantha, Veronica. Yeah. I feel like if you're named Samantha or Veronica. You are innately hot. Like, you don't have a choice but to grow up to be hot with those names. Is Vanna White's real name Savannah?

I think so. When I, when I was in, I was, I mean I have all of my diaries from childhood, and I used to keep a list of baby names, and I was like dead set that I would have a girl named Savannah and call her Vanna after Vanna White. Okay. Sorry. Um, so no, so it's Connie. So Connie is Marilyn. Okay, Maria is Carol and George is John. We'll make a chart for the, on your, on the newsletter. Yes. So not only were their names changed, but their location was changed as well.

 So this is the text that Kimmer speaks of. Maria, a massive Midwestern housewife in her fifties, now living in Florida, has been swinging with her husband for 15 years. She can still describe in detail, with immediacy, the first time this happened to her.

In a significant preface, as we begin her sexual history, she says that her father died when she was a small child, and she grew up in a sexually restrictive, all female household. Oh,a massive Midwestern woman. Um, I'm going to just be hung up on that for a long time. 

We have a description of George In addition to the one of Carol and now, so she's a massive Midwestern woman. Now, after I'm done with this, you get to tell me which one you think is more flattering. Okay. Alright. George is of middle height with even features gray hair and a tired slump.

hearing him on the phone. One envisions someone older because of the ingratiating. Little break in his voice. He smiles and laughs. A good deal, often at nothing. Funny. This seems to happen at moments of minor stress or of any strong emotion. Like Carol, he is hospitable, outgoing, and helpful as he can be.

However, he is cordial without giving off much warmth. He himself says he has difficulty making friends. Though mild mannered, he has moments of quiet, stubborn anger. It is easy to imagine him focusing on something and going after it on autopilot. In an obsessive emotional monotone. 

I'd rather be called a massive woman. I'll, I'll take massive. I don't want a tired slump, a tired slump, an obsessive manner, , monotone, like they're basically saying like this guy would be a chore to be in any kind of relationship with. 

BEAT HERE

John was the only child in a poor, devout family of Swedish extraction. I have never heard. It sounds like he's like a sauce that's like used in a French restaurant.

John developed strong religious feelings in his teens and went to Bible college. After preparing for the ministry and doing some preaching, he became disillusioned with the church and entered technical work.

He met Maria when he was 18 and experienced his first dating and petting with her. I want to bring back petting as a Me too! I think that's so, it just like conjures such a, safe exploratory feeling. Other than, I think, I'm going to request petting when I come home. Petting!

I think it's so sweet. They had coitus, a word that should be outlawed, um. They had coitus, uh, immediately go to jail. They had coitus when he was 19 and married a year later. He did not experience oral sex or extramarital coitus until his mid thirties. But he had been working all along to get Maria to join him in swinging.

So, John's agenda All along.

Yeah, it's interesting for this to be like his agenda for him to be disillusioned with organized religion and also, I'm not saying this is the case for everybody, but the breadth of his sexual experience it sounds like was interesting.

Yeah. His first, right, was being with Carol. And I'm not saying that it, like, everyone needs to, you know, sleep around, but I think even just, like, dating, you learn about yourself through relationships with other people, through romantic relationships, and I don't know, it's, it's not surprising to me when people Find themselves like dissatisfied or unsatisfied in a romantic relationship that has been just the center of everything.

That's a lot of pressure to put on any one relationship and it's not entirely natural either. You know, 

I think what this was doing is it was creating an environment where, your spouse didn't have to be everything where you could form sexual relationships, of course, but you could also form connections and friendships outside of your marriage that would fulfill you in ways that your marriage wouldn't or couldn't. What's interesting here too is that Maria, a. k. a. Carol, was the more sexually experienced of the couple at this point. So, it sounds like George, perhaps had a curiosity that, He never really fulfilled.

And then when they're interviewing Carol, she says, I was a very sexually oriented, younger woman. I dressed up in low cut dresses and high heels. I enjoyed compliments. But when. John wanted me to dress to show me off.

It was a challenge to my moral standards because I was brought up to expect something different as a wife, which is a whole other can of worms. Right. And like an impossible standard for women which is you have to be. Cute enough and exciting enough and sexy enough to attract a man and then also turn that off in certain context so that you can be respectable and there's quotation marks around that and that you can be a wife and what is a wife but, , a caregiver and a housekeeper and a eventual mother and, Also, in some contexts, uh, a sexual being, 

so reading that, it makes it sound like, I don't know, like Carol really was being pushed and pulled into these different personas and versions of herself. At such a young age when you don't even know who you are. Yeah. When you're 20. 

This is where I think we get the most. Insight into Carol's thoughts and her mind is, what I just shared., there is an actual, just straight out interview with the author. Why don't you be Carol here? And I'll be Arno. I've always wanted to be Arno and you resisted when John wanted you to do what you'd enjoyed when you were single. He has a strong voyeuristic streak, and he has always wanted me to play at things.

Starting months after the marriage, he would ask me to wear sheer tops, tight hot pants, and fall open necklines. We need to bring hot pants back. Bring back hot pants. For me. For middle aged gay men. Alright. Lots of men like their wives to look sexy. Okay. Alright, Arno. Seriously. What is going on here?

Lots of men like their wives to look sexy. But you think this went beyond where it should. At first, it was such a threat to my psyche. Growing up in an all female home, I'm not comfortable with most men in situations where I'm not in control. I felt manipulated and at one time I went through great anger at him about it.

It's made me insecure. He fears offending me and no longer asks very often. I finally saw the dressing up as misuse, but he couldn't see how badly he was hurting me no matter how I explained, I stopped him cold in his tracks by gaining weight starting 10 years ago. Wow.

Oh. Yeah. And he wanted you to get into swinging. He started talking about it three or six months after the marriage. He did it for 16 years before I said yes. It was a battle of wills. No means no, George. Geez, finally I did it. And as per normal, I enjoyed it more than he did. Laughs. For him, it was like, is this all there is?

For me, it's a personal validation. Damn. The table's turned. Mm hmm. So, okay, I'll do it. Oh, I actually love this. I actually love this and I'm getting validated and it's not filling the void in the man who pushed me into it. Yeah. I mean, one of the things that we don't talk about very much that I discussed with Dan and Lacey when I interviewed them is that men often go into swinging expecting that they're going to have the time of their lives.

And it's not like every woman wants to have sex with them. Can you believe it? I know. It's so funny to me because also like I spent all of my twenties being like, okay, uh, like suck my stomach in. Trying to like be absolutely perfect only to find that, uh, every man was just happy to be there.

, just grateful to enter the secret garden. And, meanwhile, are straight men just walking around thinking like that at any point, any woman would want to bang them because that's That's the exact opposite of how I was socialized, there was a comment on our Instagram and someone said, um, uh, I love that so far in the show, it's women turning the tables and being like, okay, fine.

A friend sent me a screenshot of that. Yeah. And I was like, yep, they totally get it. They totally understand what this show is. So, actually, Carol has an affair, with a coworker, uh, I'm going to share this with you. So, Arno asked her, when was your first sex outside marriage? A few years into the marriage with a man I worked with, oh my gosh, he propositioned me, I told John and he got all happy and said, go for it.

I felt apprehensive, insecure, but he seemed a very gentle person. It happened six or seven times, always in our home. Then I realized he was becoming involved and jealous of John. Did John want to know the details? Yes, it was very exciting for him to know I was doing it. I had another partner, briefly, before swinging.

Okay, so, damn, good for her. Yeah, I don't want to swing, but I will have affairs. I will have affairs, but honestly, because my husband wants me to because it's exciting for him, and I don't know, like, Kimmer read all this Carol gave her the book. Carol gave her the book, which I think like to me this, and now that I know what's in it to me, like the gift of that book to our daughter is like, I want you to understand something about me and I want you to understand something about your father.

And I want you to understand something about our marriage and that Crosses a lot of, boundaries that I personally would not want to cross with my parents. And also, we meet our parents where they are, right? We are born into a family that we have no choice over. Um, we are born into whatever situation they are in.

And a large part of a parent child relationship, your parents are Mystery to you, you know, there's so much about your parents that you will never know and possibly should never know. And parents are also people, and I think from all of the reading of Carol's that I've done from, from this, from , listening to hours and hours of tape of, of her children, like she strikes me as a woman who really did want to be known.

 A lot of the people that you see. In nursing homes or, in the grocery store alone, like are people who had very, very rich, complicated lives before they were somebody's mother, while they were somebody's mother, while they were somebody's grandmother and every single person.

Is like a time capsule waiting to be opened and every single person leaves behind like this trail of stuff that mostly gets covered up and not intentionally right just gets lost to the sands of time. This book was out there and like a part of Carol wanted to say, like, don't miss this.

 I want you to have this because I want somebody to know that I am Maria. And this is how all of this happened. And this is how I became who I am and my kids became who they are. And, I don't know, maybe this is just like my own midlife motherhood perspective, too. Carol and George married young.

They were raised in environments where they didn't know. That there was a life outside of the life they lived, and so they went about life kind of on that path. And they were both looking for something outside of that.

And I feel like for Carol more than George, it was a very cerebral, experience for her. Where she was finding her identity and finding What she wanted in life and, and trying to figure out who she was as a person beyond being a mother, beyond being a daughter, beyond being someone that, battled depression.

Oh my god, Nora, if I would have had a child when I was 20, the therapy bills would be through the roof. I mean, I don't think I'm a bad person by any means, but I definitely was not equipped to raise a child.

Um, at that age, there's no way. And it's also like You know, regardless of when you have kids, having a family, having any kind of romantic relationship is like this constant rebalancing of the scales between the needs that you have as a person, the needs that you have as a couple, and there are the needs that you are aware of and Can verbalize the needs you are aware of and cannot verbalize and the needs that you are unaware of go unverbalized go unmet and grow into something else.

What else is in this book? What else did you learn about them? Well, we're going to get into swinging. Okay. So, George continues to urge Carol to go into this. George gets a swingers magazine and he's trying to get started, but then he meets an older couple who ran a swing club and they told Carol and George about a place in New York.

And it just so happened that Carol and George were going on vacation in New York. George says at our first party in New York, there were four or five couples. I ended up with a beautiful model. I came fast and got soft, which had never happened to me. It was a horrible experience. Never happened before.

Damn that model. Yeah. Yeah, it was a horrible experience. Then there was a party on Saturday. I was with a beautiful girl and in the middle of it, she asked the guy next to us for his address. I'd been having a ball and then I felt awful. It was so impersonal like, is Carol there?

Carol is there. I'm going to send you some clips about her experience here. I'm going to apologize in advance for some of the language that I'm asking you to repeat. But I think we may want to share. this with our listeners who are, curious about Carol and curious about George. Swinging began slowly. We weren't meeting the right couples. It was good, bad, indifferent. Then we made a trip to New York that blew our minds. We went to a Wednesday night swinger social and wound up in an apartment with four couples. I was on the floor, five on one, all the rest on me. all oral, anal, all at me, you name it, but not in a rough, crude manner.

Okay. Uh, then also guys, everybody at this point should know, like I went to Catholic school, I learned, I learned plant reproduction full stop. Okay. That's it. Plant reproduction only. Okay. Okay. Then Friday. Okay. So, wow. That's, that does not. Sounds slow, but that's okay. So it's like they tried it, but then they went to New York and it was just five on one.

Well, that was Wednesday. That was a Wednesday. That was a Wednesday night. Oh my God. Then Friday we went to a swinger's house and we were in a threesome that lasted for several hours. Again, it was raw sex, but good sex, but more than I wanted at one time. The next night, jeez Louise, the next night we went to a swinger's party in the village.

There were 14 couples, plus some, in two rooms. The action was mostly couples, but I saw a few threes. A guy screwed me. I was bored. Man, if that's not my twenties, that should be your t shirt screwed me semicolon. I was bored I went on for a couple of hours and finally extricated myself and got up.

It went on for a couple of hours. There was a guy, a cab driver who couldn't get it up. He took me to his girlfriend and she bit my clit. So I got away from her. Jeez. Jeez Louise. Jeez Louise. Woo. Okay. Wow. This is like from the suburbs of Minnesota to the village. Listen to her to a Wednesday, Friday, Saturday.

Just wow. Wow. That's a lot. That's a lot. So slowly and all at once is how it happened. Yeah. Damn. And for everybody, look at, this is this kind of sexiness that I think the whole team was kind of expecting. From this podcast, right? Newsletters. Sorry. There's nothing sexy in the newsletters. We're going to talk to these people.

Sorry, but if you can believe it, and we can, um, nobody is going to give you like dirty details about who 50, 60 years ago. Um, I can, I can, I could probably not describe anything that happened 15 years ago, 20 years ago, I'm like, I don't know, a guy screwed me, semicolon, I was bored. I was bored! But it lasted for hours, first of all.

For hours, who wouldn't be bored? Who wouldn't be bored? There's only so much you can do guys and gals. There's only so much, there's only so many. Yeah. Varieties. Okay. I just want to say here, because we're talking about their agenda, because I was a little overwhelmed as well, like Wednesday, Friday and Saturday.

But then I think about it through the sort of like perspective of the fact that they are on vacation, they're in New York and they're like, okay, we're going to explore swinging. And we're going to fuck until we enjoy it. Um, this is like when you go to when you go to Italy and you want to sleep in, but you can't because you got to go see the Coliseum.

You don't want to go see it, but you're only in Italy for that day. You got to get to the Vatican. Sorry, we got to go to church. Okay. Sorry. You got to go to the Duomo. Sorry. You got to climb up all these stairs. Sorry. It's really hard. Yeah, sorry. Sorry, you're going to have sex until you like it. And then even when you don't like it, even when your ego is bruised because the girl that you're having sex with actually wants somebody else's home address and not yours.

And you went soft and limp after just a few minutes. I know. But guess what, Nora? It's never Carol totally sees the Vatican. Yes, she does in the next paragraph. Next paragraph. Okay. I'm ready. I'm ready. Okay. At that point I stood in the room kind of lost and a woman with a soft manner said My husband and I would like to make love to you They proceeded to nibble me from one end to the other crossing in the middle.

It's still one of the best experiences I've had they were so gentle and loving and in tune Another guy and the host went at me the rest of the night first one then the other At 6am I just let out and howled like a dog. I was beyond feeling. That broke up the party. I came out of that trip very burned out physically and emotionally and 100 percent determined to make a go of swinging.

Damn. This is her, this is her origin story. We just got the origin story that, and I wish, I wonder if Carol would have told you this. I don't think so. Yeah. I wonder. I don't, I don't know. I, I think she wanted to like the fact that she gave Kimmer this book says something right. It says that she does want to share this story, but I don't know if she would have shared it with me at, almost 90 years old.

Yeah. In her current state. I think that at this point, recant the part of me where I was like, you know, like, who knows that this is a bad thing to share with your daughter. I think any daughter wants to read this. But I could be wrong. I could be wrong. I, I'm, I'm not, I'm, I don't, I understand why Kimmerer would have blocked out everything except my mother was a massive woman.

I get that. Yep. So good old Arno Carlin, the author explains that overload is a metaphor often used for orgiastic peaks. It is, it is as if the nervous system were a switchboard overheating because it is flooded with too many incoming messages and internal responses.

I mean, that is me. That is me every minute of the day without having an orgasm. Same. That's me. That's me. If the dog is barking and my husband has a record on and he speaks to me, that's, that's how little it takes for me to become overloaded. So guess what, Nora? That was Saturday night.

Guess what they did on Sunday. What, what is there left to do? They went to another party. And after that, George says, I wasn't sure I wanted swinging.

But Carol was, so you ask for something for 16 years. You can't stop asking, even though the answer is no. And finally your wife says, okay, and then you're like, I didn't like that. And your wife is like, I loved it. About a year later back home, we got into it mostly open swinging and I, George couldn't keep up. She was enjoying it. And we were at a party almost every weekend. We went on vacation to Los Angeles and we met a couple. I saw the woman for a week when Carol was away. Never once did I even kiss her.

We talked about fantasies and got psychically in touch. She was the only woman I'd met besides Carol I could have fallen in love with. She stopped seeing me because she was afraid she'd fall in love with me. I don't know if that's why she stopped seeing him, but we're gonna, we're gonna go with it. We're gonna let him have it.

Okay. Wow. So how do you feel about that? Like the fact that like, this is something that George wanted so badly for 16 years and now Carol's the one that's like, I, I want this, I love this. Honestly, I love knowing this. I love this for Carol. Carol is getting her groove for the first time.

Like she's confident and she is in control. And that's such a amazing insight for her to have had to like you mentioned that she Really like to be in control of these situations and this is a way for her to have that like to be in charge

Once they get into swinging, Carol shares that there was a process before they got to building the club. So I just dropped that Into the document.

 There were two years of building friendships and the females pushed the men into forming a club. We needed 50 couples besides ourselves, and we started with 55 brackets. A parent pride, I put in 40 hours a week for the club. At first. I've always played mother hen in groups, so some of the work came easily to me.

Paul, the silver chain. Was started by women

falls off chair

started by women.

Holy fuck. Fuck. Yes, it's not our imagination. It's not what we sensed in the newsletters. It, it was started by the women. They, they push the men into forming a club and my thought is they were like forming friendships. They wanted more meaning beyond the sex. And they're also, as we know, tired of driving around and going out to all these random places.

They wanted there to be like a stabilizing presence within what they were doing. Derek, we got to make this work with our kids schedules, our social schedules, um, the norms of society that dictate that we must stay in these marriages and maybe we even want to stay in these marriages. So what are we going to do as women?

We're going to organize a group and not just any group, it is going to be a deluxe social group with written communications bylaws. Do we know, did any of these other clubs have bylaws? Not to my knowledge. Not to my knowledge, damn. Yeah. Okay, wow, I'm so excited. I love that she's an overachiever. We needed 50 couples besides ourselves. And we started with 55. I could not get 50. I could not get a hundred people to do. And to join any club, there is no way to commit to something socially.

So that's that. And her apparent pride is deserved pride is what I would like to say. I would agree. So I'm going to read you a little bit of George's take on this. So, uh, Carol and I, and a few other couples started a swinging club. Each couple had a different idea of what swinging was. Carol and I were what you'd call utopian swingers, interested in the educational side. We were trying to expand ourselves. We had rap sessions, got people aware of VD, aka STIs, and dealing with themselves and others. Also decided it wasn't fair to limit the scene to couples. So we started a singles club.

They had two clubs? For two years. It, that lasted two years.

Wow. Okay. I know. I don't know anything about this. Okay. Yeah, that's wild. It was about then, in 1978.

When we met Marilyn, she was brought to one of our rap sessions. She was 35 and had divorced fairly recently, and she had a regular guy. We talked and hit it off real well. I asked her out with me. It wasn't secret. Carol and her gentleman friend knew about it. I don't know who Carol's gentleman friend is.

Yeah, okay. Oh, I think he means Marilyn's gentleman friend. Oh, hold on, you're right.

So they had a singles club and that is how they met Marilyn because she was at that point she was divorced. Interesting. Okay. Wow. And Marilyn didn't mention that to us either. No. All right. So now I'm going to share, a little bit more of Carol's interview. I'll be Arno once again. you get to be Carol.

 How did the relationship with Marilyn begin?

John and I were talking about opening the marriage to separate dating. Connie and a friend turned up at a rap session at the club. John liked her. He was like a kid with a new toy. He introduced her. I wasn't impressed or unimpressed. He started dating her and at first that was good.

It gave me free time. We talked about it and other people condemned. He was having all the fun with her, and all he and I talked about was bills and kids, and this is why there's bylaws. This is why. Exactly why. Were you jealous? I had time jealousy. The quality of time. And people kept saying behind my back that I should do something about it.

Carol always came across as such a rule follower in part because as one of the founding couples, they established the rules. Which kind of, even if it, maybe you'll have to correct me if I'm wrong, but if it doesn't explicitly say this is not a place to build a thruple, which I know is a modern portmanteau.

It's implied in the rules that this is for non committal, extramarital sex, not for building another relationship outside of your marriage. You're 100 percent right. The whole idea and the reason why the club was couples only was, one of the reasons was obviously ratio of men to women. Uh, as we learned from Dr.

Bob, there'd only be like one or two women and like 300 men otherwise. , but the other reason was because you wanted to maintain trust within your marriage. And the way that you did that is you played together in this environment in a basement or in a hotel or wherever it was. And so this is actually against the bylaws in that regard.

I hadn't been invited out for coffee by anyone. That's how severe the condemnation was. Her eyes hint at pain beyond tears. Okay, so other people were not happy with the fact that they were breaking the rules, breaking rules that they made they set. It reached the point where all the time I hurt physically, I decided that I would be her friend.

If he liked her, there must be something to her. We got close emotionally. And intellectually,

so you totally called it,

damn, their friendship stems from the fact that they're both in a relationship with this man. Hmm. Hmm. Hmm. Hmm. Hmm. Hmm. And I was really hoping it was the opposite. Also the time jealousy. That is a real commodity. That's exactly why they have those bylaws too.

 It sounds like Carol acknowledges that Marilyn had a very good influence on her as a person and didn't judge her. Whereas it was a time where Carol felt incredibly judged. Because she was allowing this relationship to happen. I can imagine if Carol and George are as they describe themselves, utopian swingers that are focused more on like the study of swinging and carol is, we get the mother hen vibe before she even says it.

Coming into this club, you're going to be like Okay, this woman is, true to the bone, like she is, , she's a straight shooter. She has these bylaws written and, she is going to follow every rule. So imagine that person then breaking the rules. Yeah. Yeah. And guess what?

Those rules were there for a reason. They're like guardrails, you know, man. Oh, man. 

That's why they go into it as couples. Because they're together. So, George says, I felt like I was falling more and more in love with both of them. They both seemed to mean so much to me. However, I couldn't give Carol the same quality time. I was infatuated with Marilyn. We started doing more together.

Marilyn liked Carol, and she felt the best thing she could do was make Carol her friend. But Marilyn wasn't bisexual, which made it difficult when we three were together, because I always felt I had to work at dividing my time as evenly as I could. Poor George. Oh, poor guy. Yeah. God, I'm sorry. I'm sorry.

This is, this was what he was asking for for 16 years. This exact situation where two women are vying for his attention and there's just not enough of him to go around and it like benefits him full stop. 

We went to a swingers conference in 1978. Yeah. And the director didn't know how to handle a threesome.

Okay, so the director was like, I, wait, was this Dr. Bob? I believe so. So now everything's adding up, Paul, because when we met Dr.

Bob, and polyamory, open relationships, all these things were like becoming very zeitgeisty at the time. And we asked that him about that. And like his eyes went dark, you know, like he was like, no, that you shall not pass. Like, he was just like, that is not it.

Right. Like to him, it was no strings attached, no emotional. Anything that's, that's swinging and he was anti, husband's having girlfriends. He was against that. He was not pro. He was not pro. No. So, and then also, like, as we know, Dr. Bob and Geri not only held these conferences, but they coordinated travel, they coordinated hotel stays, etc.

And it sounds like Carol and George and Marilyn were at the conference and were staying for however long the conference was and maybe a few days extra. And so this director worked out a deal for Carol and George and Marilyn to stay with a couple at their home. And this couple that they stayed with had children.

They explained us to their children as Mormons, their kids were about eight and eleven. We three slept a week in a double bed and the kids would come in and bring us breakfast. What? It's okay. They're Mormons. It's okay. They're Mormons. No, bring them breakfast. Bring this man and his two wife, uh, what? Would a hotel be like, Whoa, sorry, three adults, one room.

No, thank you. Like, is that the issue or just that my suspicion is it was financial. Okay. Cause then I'm like, well, if you can't afford to do it, you can't afford to do it. So at this point it sounds to me based on this interview that it's starting to wear a little bit on Carol Carol says that at this stage Marilyn was the only friend she had who was non judgmental.

And she decided that it would be good for Carol to get a job. So, Carol goes and gets a job and she's happy in her job. So then Arno says, What about you and Marilyn sexually? I've had some experiences with women in swinging, and some one on one experiences, but I was never one on one with her.

Although she isn't bi, she could accept my caresses and could also cuddle me. It was a really good scene. I never felt out of place with them in that sense. In what way were you out of place? I'll give you an example. We went to a swinging party and John fell all over Connie about how beautifully she was dressed.

Yet she and I were dressed the same way. Even today, he doesn't know how to make me feel special.

Are you saying he never has made you feel special? In a backhand way he did, if I dressed sexily and skimpily, then his attitude was more positive. And with Marilyn? He was in love with her. She said she loved him, and her action and reaction said she loved him, but she was very disturbed for me.

She used to chew him out about me.

I don't know. I was actually kind of, I was hopeful that it would be more beneficial for Carol and Marilyn than it was George. And I think that I was projecting, um, the fact that it's, we are living in an era where I think the compulsive heterosexuality that has been sort of, I don't know, foisted upon us, just the norm, right?

That has been sort of just like the norm is kind of crumbling. And so in my circle, all, a lot of women I know are. Divorcing their husbands and realizing like maybe they don't want to have a husband. Maybe they want to have a girlfriend. Maybe they want to have a wife. So I was hoping that it was going to be a Carol and Marilyn situation with the side of George.

That's what I was hoping. I totally get that. I also feel like it was in a lot of ways, I'm like, of course, this is just more of the same. This is more of a straight man in the seventies. Having his cake and eating it too and the women just finding a way to make it palatable for them. Yes. And I guess being like, well, I guess we have to be friends because this is what's happening.

Was there ever a question about that the marriage might break up? It was her choice not to break up the marriage. We talked and I offered to back out and let them be happy. She said no, it isn't right. Why wasn't it right? Partly because he isn't giving enough. Like, I don't want him.

Um, also, she needed someone for herself, and she made a choice that it wasn't him. I think that when she met Howard, he fit the mold she was looking for. He resembles her first husband.

Damn.

Also that, you know, Marilyn's like, no, actually like don't break up. Cause like, I definitely don't want to be with him because like, he's just not that great, but also I don't want him to be with you. And I, I'm kind of jealous of your marriage, but I don't want him. Neither of them seem to. Yeah. They're both willing to give him up, but Carol's married to him.

So she's left holding the bag, baby. George says, Marilyn took up a relationship with Howard. She's married to him now, but then he was married to someone else. Marilyn wasn't handling it well. I went to her and suggested she slow down the relationship with him. I sort of came back with an ultimatum.

I couldn't handle her breaking up Howard and his wife. It was ethically wrong and I couldn't deal with that. I felt one wasn't supposed to do those things. What things? When one person, Howard's wife, didn't know what was happening. Cause that's cheating. That's not sweet. That's cheating. Right. So I broke up with Marilyn, and then I realized it was a stupid thing to do.

We got back together, but never again to what it was. There were a few days, but it wasn't the same. Then Howard left his wife, and he and Marilyn moved to North Carolina and got married. I was going through the hell of withdrawal. I visited them once, and we got into a threesome. I felt so left out, I wished it hadn't happened.

I got very little attention. And how long did the close period with her last? Only two or three years. Was it jealousy that prompted your ultimatum? Maybe, but I was full of righteous indignation. I learned that you aren't always right, and what you think is right may not be right for other people. Yeah, that's good insight.

That's really good insight into yourself. Man, oh man. So that's how it ends. It ends with Marilyn having an affair with a married man whose wife doesn't know, getting dumped by her boyfriend whose wife knows. that she's his girlfriend running off with Howard to move to North Carolina and then, , having one threesome with your husband and your ex boyfriend.

And then being sort of like judged for what you're doing, which is a variation on what everybody else in the club is doing. So who's the winner in this? Yeah. Like this is something that actually isolates Carol in two different ways. She's isolated further in her marriage and then she's isolated from this group that she has been building for at this point, four or five years.

And, um, the only person that's getting anything out of it from the sounds of it is George. Yeah, she has to be judged by the group of people that she brought together and mother henned and did all this admin work for, by the way, there's so much admin. And held all these groups, held all these groups, organized all these events, published all these newsletters, had her children producing them and mailing them out.

And, uh, then also, and I think this is something that felt excruciating, listening to you tell George slash John's side of the story. She has to watch her husband be broken up about someone else. Comfort him. Yeah, be heartbroken over he really wanted to have we get carol's perspectiv definitely voicing some o saying. Did you ever think george split off together? I tho But his concepts were so foreign to me. And I told him so. How could love for the two be dependent on each other?

 I did some dating then. There were a couple of men I enjoyed and Marilyn dated one of them too. The nicest evening I ever had though, was when Marilyn and Howard were leaving town And George sent flowers, took me to dinner, and served it to me by candlelight with champagne.

It was the most romantic thing he ever did for me or anyone. I don't think he ever did anything that romantic for her. Has he put it all behind him? I don't know. I'm too used to being his emotional support. He has a hard time committing to people. I know he can see her and be happy. It used to be that he just cried.

She is still my champion. She jumps on his case when she thinks he isn't treating me right. She's the one who convinced me to go to school, which I'm doing now. Recently, she's been spending some time near Jacksonville, and I see her at least once a week, sometimes twice. 

 With her, George's feelings don't come up. She's pretty much told him that if he feels something, it's his problem.

She can compartmentalize her life that way. What does George want at this point? I have no idea. That's what he tells me. He has no idea.

Wow.

So at one point the interviewer asked was Carol ever in an intense serious affair and George says yes There's one that continues now with a guy in Denver. It started around seven years ago He got married a couple of years ago in the slack off and then there was another one at the club You know what I'm

I'm happy for Carol I'm glad that she's like finding Like everybody wants to believe, I think before you're married or maybe even while you're married, that it's like a really romantic, uh, thing. Marriage as a romantic endeavor is is a fairly modern concept.

Marriage for centuries was a strategic partnership. These were alliances that you're forming between families. And I think in a lot of ways, like this is a strategic partnership between Carol and George and, being married, staying married, Does get you more in a lot of cases like financial security, right?

 Like this just seems like a way to Get something out of a marriage, but not everything out of a marriage.

So next marilyn is also interviewed. Oh, she is. Yeah. Okay. Okay.

When Marilyn arrives at the house, I see a tall animated woman with a rather angular face, seven or eight years younger than George and Carol, superficially outgoing, but right now very determined and defensive.

George perks up. He fairly dances around her. She is friendly, but keeps the line sharply drawn. They are only friends now, and she gives him no openings. She and Carol warmly exchange pleasantries as they go from room to room. Marilyn seems to have a slightly dominant role throughout.

One can imagine her taking a strong hand with George and Carol, separately or together. Marilyn probably agreed reluctantly to talk, and she gives one of the most bare, minimal interviews of the study. I do not so much mistrust what she says as wonder what she omits. She seems determined not to tread on old emotional landmines.

Any effort to elicit more than a factual minimum arouses quiet antagonism. She is giving not a full portrait, but more a sanitized sketch. Hmm. Hmm. He's kind of seeing through her, huh? Yeah. We learned that she was in other threesomes.

 The first threesome was when I was soon into swinging with two guys. I'm not really into anonymous sex that much. I generally like just one person. I mean, I love that he's saying she's not saying that much, but just these first three sentences is more than anyone ever said to me. I suppose my favorite threesome is with two men. Same, Marilyn. Same. Leaving things up to them. In other threes, you have to orchestrate. You're conscious of being sure everyone is doing something. If I really get into feeling with one guy, the other guy may feel left out.

A three takes more thought. I did it a few times with George and Carol when I was single. And I've been in some with my husband.

Asked if the threesome with George and Carol was ever emotionally loaded, she says, No, it could have been, but George asked me out, and then Carol and I became good friends, too. She and I were doing small swingers support groups together. I never looked at it as a threesome, since I'm not bi, and I had no romantic involvement with Carol.

I never looked at it as something that would evolve into more.

So imagine being George hearing that after, after talking endlessly about her. Oof. Ugh.

Marilyn seems, in our one meeting, a bit bossy, full of emphatic statements and moment to moment decisions. It is easy to imagine her sweeping into George and Carol's emotionally tight world and becoming a catalyst. She shook George awake emotionally and pushed Carol toward greater autonomy.

George is still in love. Carol, thanks partly to Marilyn, is going to school and aiming at a new midlife career.

George thought he was like playing everyone and George got played. Majorly played. He got played by Carol when he pushed her into swinging and she's like, I like this.

And then he got played emotionally by Marilyn. So I just dropped something in and it's follow up questions that Arno has for Carol, about swing.

Oh boy. Okay. First of all, there's something that you skipped over, which is Carol bringing her Boyfriend home to meet John and the kids. Yes. I figure that if he's worth having a relationship with, he's worthy of knowing my husband and kids. Oh, okay. Now, where are we starting on this one? Do you do much swinging now?

I haven't had much interest recently. I've learned to say no. How did your kids feel about you and George and Marilyn? Angry, hurt, confused. About what in particular? I can't stand these questions. Yeah, I know, seriously. At the whole thing. They aren't really willing to talk about it. I'm only finding out recently how angry they were.

How are you finding out? One of them has talked to me recently and told me what she and one of the boys feel. A little bit. Just what are they angry about? It seems to be directed more at the club than at Marylin, but the other kids still haven't talked about it. Do you think any of them would be comfortable talking to me?

No. Only one of them has recently talked to me. I'm not sure what the others know or feel, but I do see that George abdicated in our home to some degree, and that two of our children have done the same in theirs. Oh wow. Oof.

Oof. Maybe, and maybe that's what Carol wanted her kids to see. Like that she knew that they, like that they were hurt. That she's like recognizing it. I don't know. All we can do is project. All we can do is project. There is irony in what happened to Carol and George in Swinging. She who wanted romance discovered sex. And he, looking for sex, found love. Carol offered to leave him, an offer made not to George, but to Marilyn, who declined. Carol is still hurt and angry over George's lingering mental romance.

She has withdrawn. The chief thing in her life now is her search for achievement and independence outside of the sexual arena.

 It's incredible. It's like a, it's a, it's like a tragedy.

You know what I mean? It's like a Greek tragedy. It is. It's the opposite of the gift of the Magi. Like none of us get the thing we wanted.

Yeah. We, we each gave up something we didn't want to give up and didn't get the thing that we wanted.

We kept this show an exploration of these people from The past, uh, intentionally, right?

Like intentionally to explore their stories, to explore kind of a, uh, real life soap opera. When you watch a soap opera, you get all these wild storylines, but there's almost like, , there's no actual fallout. And in this one, you do see like the actual repercussions. You see kind of how that echoes throughout their lives.

Okay. Also, Paul, I'm so sorry. I can't keep anybody straight. Did we talk to Marilyn? I called Marilyn, after finding out that she was in the club and she declined to talk about it. That's right. I guess who can blame her, but man, I really wish you would have gotten to talk with Carol.

Do you think she would have talked to you about Marilyn. I think she would have talked to me about Marilyn from an academic standpoint. I feel like when Carol is talking about herself in this book, it seems incredibly self aware, but it also seems detached in a way, like she's talking about someone else, like she's studying herself almost.

 It's so self aware to just say, yeah, I was in a situation where I didn't trust men and I had to be in control, it's like, she didn't go to therapy.

 This is her own exploration of herself to come to this 

I wonder if with time too, she might've felt differently about Marilyn. Like, Marilyn's why she, went back to school. She's a person who caused a lot of hurt and pain in her life, and also a person who kind of, pushed her more into her life as well.

But I might be trying to shine that up too much. A part of the fascination with The Silver Chain, with these newsletters, with all of this. is like just this realization that there is kind of nothing new under the sun. 

And I think everybody, even today is just trying to find a way to make life and love and partnership. work for them. And we have like a better imagination about it now, but, um, not by much, not by much. No, I mean, we're still human. We still have our, we still have the same limitations in that respect that we had 50 years ago.

Maybe there's better treatment for some illnesses and diseases. Maybe we have better technology. I don't know if that's a good or bad thing. Um, But we're still human and that doesn't change these, these stories, I wouldn't be surprised if 50 years from now, someone is talking about the current state of relationships and the impacts of that through the same lens that we're doing it right now with these people from the 1970s.

Special thanks to Nora McInerny for reading bad words and sharing her thoughts on this completely wild ride. 

And to you, our listeners. I hope you enjoyed this bonus episode. For more stories like this one, be sure to check out our Substack, TimeCapsule.Substack.Com. It's the place I can share all the visuals and tell a few of the stories we couldn't find the right spot for.

We also have merch. Including a new It's 10 PM Do You Know Where Your Parents Are t-shirt that's hot off the press and available on our website TimeCapsulePodcast.com.

Time Capsule is a produciton of Diversity Hire Ltd. and CYSA Productions in collaboration with Feelings & Co. 

Our Executive Producers are Jennifer Goyne Blake, April Shih and Jack Huston.

Our Producers are Marcel Malekebu and Nora Mcinerny

Jordan Turgeon and Eli Makovetsky are our co-producers AND

Our Engineer is Eric Romani

Time Capsule Theme Music is composed by Louis Stephens

Special thanks to the late Arno Karlen and his book Threesomes for expanding our understanding of the throuple that scandalized The Silver Chain. 

Portions of thie episode were recorded at Podcast Place Studio in Long Beach, California

Until next time, have your cake and eat it to. Just know there could be repercussions. See ya.