divorce

Harrumph!

When I was a girl, all my fairy tales had me believing that one day I could count on being rescued. They lied.

One of the selling points and one of my favorite lines from Pretty Woman, was her dream that she wanted the fairy tale. The prince on a white charger, who she would rescue back. Ah yes, the fairy tale.

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Today’s young women are seeking to be empowered without a male. Society has emasculated the men of today. In some instances, it’s hard to tell gender. Men are being portrayed as either weak, idiots, suppressive, as well as oppressive. I grew up in a period where I was taught I am not complete without a male. It’s a hard habit to break, I must admit.

Since I made that decision to leave my husband, I did it not counting on being rescued.

That was one of the questions he posed at the time and a question I have pondered since. I think I’ve touched on this before but because I’m going through the trials presently, it’s back on my mind.

While I was on my walk, I thought of all the things I wanted say to him and believe it or not, I was quite witty and eloquent but now, head on, it’s gone, lol.

I think part of my problem is that I’m a negative nelly. I can see it in my son, but I have to admit, the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree. I wonder if I don’t sabotage my relationships. I’m a pretty neat lady and lots of fun, but when it comes to relationships I fail miserably.

On that note, my intentions for this new year, is to give of myself abundantly, smile often and bring a smile to others whenever and if at all possible.

Easier said than done. Even though I’ve not driven often since my auto accident and because of Covid; I think I got it unknowingly though unconfirmed. How do I know? Well…

I did the unthinkable. I had my Covid test as required before my colonoscopy and it came out fine. Ideally, it would have been two days before but that would have had to be on Christmas day, so instead I had it done on Friday, the day before. ON Sunday my results were negative. By Monday, I had a horrible headache and some slight sniffles, so I did a nasal wash. I called the on-call nurse to verify and confirm the pre-day procedure. She noticed my congestion and was focusing on Covid rather than the questions I was asking, so I decided to hang up and talk to the doctors nurse.

How many of you have, like me wondered if colds and flu have been lumped together with supposed Covid cases? I thought she was making too much of it, I’m sorry to say, so I blew her off.

We spent Christmas with my mother in law.

After the colonoscopy, I went home and was miserable the next few days. I slept and ached nonstop.

The following weekend, New years day, we spent the day with mother in law and everything was fine.

Last weekend she did an at home test and tested positive. My daughter the nurse, says those are actually 90% accurate and, get this, do not have to be reported.

I’ve sent my doctor my symptoms and that information and gotten no response, so who knows? Did I have it? I don’t know. All I do know is how miserable I felt.

Being sick and miserable, I did ponder once again my intentions. Husband doesn’t want me to go. He figures 30 years were wasted, if I do. Hmmm. Something, I thought of as well, is, I’m no spring chicken, so what am I going to do out there in the big, bad world all alone? Would I be okay? Will I do better or worse? But… I’m not sure I want anyone. Right now I think, no.

We live modestly, but are by no means impoverished. We lack for nothing, really.

There are so many things I want to do. Can I do them with him? He’s not a bad person, but he never looks happy. He is fretting that he’ll never find a replacement, because he knows he’s not a handsome man. Which I find curious. Why do I need to be replaced? Which makes me wonder why he liked me to begin with. He has a dry wit and that can be cool. In sports and games, he just has to win. He has to be the best. Always. The men in my family like him fine, the women not so much, but then I come from a long line of free spirited women.

He once told me I was the foo-fooiest girl he ever dated. Most of the women before me were competitive cyclists and looked and acted like guys. When he spent $60 on our first date, he said he’d never spent that much on anyone! When we mountain-climbed and I had trouble keeping up, he never waited. It was always his friends that would stop and hold until I could catch up and then everyone would immediately pop up and keep going. They’d rested and snacked and I barely got a drink. I chalked it up to his toughening me up. I eventually got better and could keep up, but it always felt like I wasn’t important enough. Now, suddenly I am. It’s funny but the sport I was good at, rock climbing, he didn’t like as much and he was good at that too.

So, I’m at the crossroads. Do I settle for being the page and this is what the prince really looks like?

I’m saying this somewhat tongue in cheek, because I’ve talked to several couples who’ve made similar discoveries since Covid. It’s funny how when you live your day to day life, coming and going and interacting very little, you can put up with so much more. Suddenly confined, you realize, that’s what you’ve been doing. Putting up. For many couples, it went one of two ways, they either fell back in love or realized they had nothing in common.

In all fairness, I’ve noticed in myself, becoming a whiney bitch and that’s not me. Somewhat. I’ve always thought of myself as a glass half full kind of person and yet I find myself grumpy and fussy. I found myself picking at little things like whether or not after 8 years in this house, he still doesn’t know what dishes go where in the cupboard or that dishing the rice from the middle of the pot rather than neatly from the sides is irritating. Leaving the lid off when he dishes himself something to eat and letting it cool off is not considerate for whoever might come after for seconds. He loves to make up words, like a child would. Everything has an adulterated version of the real word. His mom thinks it’s cute. The thing is, I guess some women might actually find it funny or cute. Why is that? I find it annoying. Poor guy, he can’t win. He does have warm, comforting hugs though. I guess that’s something.

Can a man and a woman be just friends, have sex with no love? I say yes to both with a caveat.

Some say it’s impossible, can’t happen…safely and maybe that’s true. My personal feeling is that yes, I can have a friendship with no sexual connection and I’ve known others who have had sexual connections with “just friends” and no emotional tie beyond that… or were they lying to me?

A loaded subject.

I have someone I consider a very dear friend whether he knows it or not. We were lovers once but are no more. Outside of photographs, neither of us has seen one another in over 47 years and I don’t know that I’d recognize him on the street if I saw him but I really like hearing from him and reading about his exploits and I think he enjoys following mine and that’s perfectly fine.

I remember having male friendships when I was young that were strictly platonic and I had the finest time with them but most were gay. No sex. No expectations of sex. I also had one relationship that ended in friendship after a rambunctious love affair that lasted a few weeks. It was hot. Probably one of the hottest affairs I ever had and I really liked the guy. We parted mutually as friends. No hard feelings, no angst, no anything but a warm parting. We eventually lost track of one another.

Recently, I spoke with a young lady who had the great idea to give her spouse permission to have an affair. No, I take that back, she only gave him permission to have sex with someone else. She set the ground rules with both parties, or so she thought, that there would be no emotional involvement between them, just sex. When more developed, she was angry that they hadn’t “followed the rules”. It wasn’t working and she just couldn’t understand why. They had fallen in love. She’s still in the equation but unhappily. In her minds eye, it was supposed to work. (I guess if you play with a loaded gun, be sure you know how to use it or it could backfire.)

I explained to her not everyone is hard wired for sex without love. How awful is that? What makes sex grand is love.

It reminded me of the story of a little girl I once knew who decided she would be a Jehovah’s Witness and her friends would be the people they call on when they knock on doors. This little girl would stash each child in a closet with a scripted dialogue she gave them to repeat as she would proceed door to door “calling” on them. In the meantime they waited in this dark closet for her to get to them.

If they deviated from their given dialogue, she would tsk tsk, shove them back in the closet and have them do it over again until they got it right. Their dialogue would vary from slamming a door in her face, yelling at her, to being interested in “the message” she had to deliver. She was 5 years old and it was humorous then watching this child bully the neighbor kids, some of which were older than her, into doing what she wanted.

But this is not humorous and she is no longer five. The dialogue and wills of others cannot be dictated to. I’m afraid this young lady, like the little girl will discover that love finds a way. I know she thought if he is given permission to stray then perhaps she could have a fling of her own without guilt or without giving up what she has or thinks she has. She wanted the proverbial cake and the right of eating it too.

It reminded me of when my marriage was going south how it was the guy at the desk next to me that was my sounding board for all the things that weren’t working in my marriage. My husband was paranoid, didn’t allow me to do things, he was afraid of everything and used God’s word as a weapon to neutralize everything I believed in or wanted.

It was this co-worker and friend, who I didn’t love initially who became my sanctuary and who I ran to in my sadness and took refuge in. From that innocent beginning love grew and eventually became my partner, life mate and fortunately still friends as well. Oh yes, we don’t agree all the time, but that’s okay, we accept that and agree to disagree which means compromising sometimes. We don’t have to be right all the time and we have the freedom to relish in that at times.

As for the young lady, you might say, “what the hell was she thinking?” Sometimes, in my opinion, in an effort toward “free thinking”, we lose our souls, our sense of fair play, and most of all love. Is it okay to have multiple partners? I don’t think so. But I sampled a few to find the one that was the right fit for me and I’m done. Maybe that’s what all this is about.

The young lady in question was 17 when she married an older man. She was suppressed and molded into developing a mindset that didn’t fit her, only she didn’t know it. Unconsciously she’s been rebelling for some time and he has been trying to redirect her and get her back on the track he believes she needs to be on even though deep down he’s probably hoping she’ll totally derail.

The dilemma: What now?

Her fear like mine was and is “What am I going to do? How do I support myself? What about the kids? Will his ship come in once I’m gone. Wouldn’t that be my luck! Then he’ll say, it was my fault that he never succeeded.” All the same negative self talk I had as well. It’s a safe bet that he’ll do better if they are not together. Why? Because perhaps his lack of success is that he’s as miserable as she has been. Who can flourish in a negative environment?

To stay or not to stay?

She’s going to college right now and is a bit shy of her degree. Yes, it would be hard to support herself and continue with school. She may have to learn to budget and plan and…what about the kids?

Yes, there’s a lot to weigh in at, but …with a little bit of faith it’ll work out. I’m praying for her. In time, I hope she’ll figure it out.