April 6, 2020:

Apparently her husband suggested me. Me being the sex expert and all. In reality he lusted after a different and rather younger Asian student in his ESL class. I suspect he strong-armed his unhappy wife to seek solace elsewhere specifically to leave himself free.

I was lonely and it felt good to be wanted, until it became clear she wanted me more for lessons than for connection. She wanted our encounters to be as much about her as I was willing to let them be, with as little reciprocity as possible. It was an artifact of her years of frustration with her husband, but it made my loneliness worse, and I disliked it. In the end I snapped, gave vent to my own mounting anger by treating her the way she'd been treating me. I made the final time together all about me. Then I told her there'd be no more.

We haven't stayed in touch. I don't really like her, being honest with myself. Rather, more precisely, I dislike the way she behaved, and that colors what had at first been my affection for her.

The latter is a recent trend in my life. As I re-evaluate the lessons of past failures I experience less affection for the partners whose behaviors I now see as disingenuous, or manipulative, or selfish. The impact of therapy and meds, with depression under better control. Perhaps also to some degree the impact of lockdown, where there's more time to reflect, without the noise of day-to-day contact.