DEAR EMILY,

I used to have a very big crush on a teacher during elementary—it bordered on an obsession. I sent him cards, letters, poems and copies of songs everyday! He politely responded by writing letters to me as well, and gave me a pen. He also treated me and my friends to lunch or snacks and kept me company during graduation and recognition day. I was 12 then, which resulted in gossip in school at the time.

Years later, through social media, I found that he is now teaching in Thailand and has a blog. I sent him an e-mail and, from his response, I sensed he was excited and surprised to hear from me. He wanted to continue our communication. I opened a Hotmail account so my husband wouldn’t read my e-mail.

My teacher is married and had just turned 62. He looks like a wrinkled grandfather, and it looks like he even wears a wig. But he’s still the charming guy I knew from his e-mail messages to me.

I have no plan of rekindling the special relationship we had, but I am just excited at what’s happening. It’s been 26 years and I can’t understand why I’m feeling and acting this way. I know it’s improper to be inspired by a man other than my husband. By the way, I’m a lawyer and 39 years old.

THE INFIDEL

He may have become a wrinkly old man who wears a rug, and though you must have had a momentary shock at the sight of this old teacher, your memory of him, warm and visceral, must have overcome all that.

You are still young at 39 but obviously, there’s already something missing in your life that’s making you reach out to the past for comfort. When you asked if “it’s improper to be inspired” by a man other than your husband, could you have meant “attracted?” Well, I have news for you—it happens. As they say, it’s not humanly possible for any person to live through years of marriage in the top gear of passionate involvement, so what better way to stir your dormant senses than to reminisce the excitement of years ago while in the throes of your budding womanhood? Is this the excitement your psyche is screaming for?

It’s well and good for you to reconnect with this teacher. The distance between both of you is a safe enough barrier to reach out to each other. No doubt he is rejuvenated by your harmless flirtation in cyberspace. But after both your initial excitement is sated, with old stories told and retold and you start finding your reminiscences drying up, what happens now? Start a new chapter and bring it to a new level? Or leave him in the lurch to continue on his slippery slope to old age, never to hear from you again?

Unless you are undertaking some new grand designs for your life, don’t go where angels fear to tread, as the song goes. That might prove too messy and, possibly, heartbreaking.

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