People keep asking me strange things. Things like “what’s your mission statement?” Or “What’s your theme for the next year?” What do I look like? Google?
I don’t have a theme. I don’t
have a mission statement. I just want to
pay my bills and raise my child and talk shit with my friends and love the
amazing people who have graced my life.
Is that good enough for a mission statement? How about surviving? Is that a theme? I know that they are asked with the best of
intentions. I understand that people who
care about me what to have a direction and a purpose, and I love that they care
enough about me to ask those questions.
However, I’ve spent the last three years just trying to remind myself to
breath. So, pardon me if defining my “mission”
is a little overwhelming. Stop asking
me. And degrading me for not defining my
purpose really doesn’t encourage me to do all the painful, tedious soul
searching that it requires.
But goddamnit if those people might be right. Maybe the approach was a little ineffective,
but they might be right. Maybe you do
need to verbally define your purpose.
Maybe you need to document that purpose, somehow, so that you don’t
forget what it is. However, you can’t do
that if you don’t acknowledge the reason you need direction. I think, now, that may have been the reason I
was so combative when people continued to ask me where I was going: Because I hadn’t come to terms with where I
had been.
I never thought I would be discussing where I’d been here,
in this very public forum. I know I talk
a lot about my upbringing and my hippie parents and my child and even my failed
marriage. But I never thought that I
would sit down and write about my divorce.
I never wanted to share the remarkably intimate details of how my
marriage failed. I never wanted to put
myself, or the man I was married to for 12 years ,in a precarious situation by
reliving what we did wrong . But I’m
doing it now. Because if I don’t, I might
never move forward.
I won’t rehash the entire 12 years. That’s just nonsense. But essentially, what started at 11:PM on a
cold, April in Reno, NV, when I was barely 20, would dictate how my entire
life, to this point unfolded. This is
where it started. I met Mike at my boss’
house in December, when I was 19. We
spent three weeks together before my boat got underway for two months. His boat got underway shortly
thereafter. But we were committed to
making this work. I guess that’s what
you do when you are 19, and 22, respectively.
When both of the boats came back, we had about two weeks together,
before I was getting underway again. So,
as any rational, now 20 year old, would do, I broke up with Mike. At the Spaghetti Factory in Jack London
Square. Only to go see him at work the
next day. We agreed we would talk it
over after work. When he walked through
the door, I said “get in the car.” He
looked at me, confused, and said “uh.
Where we going? And who’s car are
we going in?” Huh. That was a good question. We were going to Reno, to get married. I just hadn’t told him yet. But the transportation predicament was a
challenge. We weren’t going to get over
the Sierra’s in my ’68 Volkswagon Karmann Ghia.
And we weren’t going to get there in his car, because it was in
Bakersfield, as he’d he’d loaned it to a friend with a family emergency. So, I looked at Mike’s friend Chris. And shook his head. “Nope.
Not in the Miata.” Chris wanted
nothing to do with this, but once I hunted down a car, he was along for the
ride. Mostly, so he could try to talk us
both out of doing this. It was clearly a
bad idea. And God love Chris for giving
us every reason to not do it, but I was not going to be stopped. I was 20 now, and I’d had a boyfriend for
four months. (of which, I had spent 5
weeks with). How could this not work
out?? Poor Chris, somehow, he remained loyal
to both of us, through all of it.
Anyway. Of course, I
told you that story to tell you this story.
That crazy idea I’d had two weeks after my 20th birthday,
turned into more than a decade. As all
newlyweds, we were very much in love in the beginning. Lot’s of kissing and touching and talking and
laughing and sex. So much sex. Amazing sex.
There was a time that I looked at him and I said “I’m going to make you
have sex with me at least three times a day, for the rest of our lives. That’s a promise” If you aren’t laughing, you clearly have
never been married. Or had a
relationship. Or had sex. It’s such a novel idea. Sex three times a day. That’s not out of the question at all. But then things happened. Like life and careers and school and
groceries and stuff. So, needless to say,
that pipedream didn’t last very long.
But that promise always haunted us.
It didn’t matter how much we loved each other or that we were best friends
or that we had committed to each other.
When the promise wasn’t fulfilled, neither one of us was either.
There were always disruptions, so the amazing sex turned into
obligatory sex. Then obligatory sex
turned into very little sex. Until one
day, seemingly out of nowhere, Mike came to me and told me he was going to
leave me. I was so confused. I was so pissed. I was so ready for a fight. So, we fought. We had it the fuck out in the kitchen, with
our toddler sleeping two rooms down. We
yelled and screamed and I threw things.
We cussed and acted hateful. And
when it was all hashed out, it came down to sex. That made me even more resentful. He was going to leave his wife and his child
because of sex. Oh, that’s real grown
up. Finally, we talked it out and we
decided to go to therapy. Too late.
We didn’t like our therapist. Hell, at that point, we didn’t even like each
other anymore. Even though we were best
friends, we couldn’t stand to be alone together. Because it was always the same
conversation. So, by the time we
realized what was happening, we had isolated each other so significantly, that
the thought of sex was too much pressure to enjoy. Then finally, on a dark Alaskan night, all of
the hostility and resentment imploded around us. It was a week before we were leaving
Alaska. In a hotel room downtown, and we
were so hateful and angry to each other, that I went down to the lobby and
bought two plane tickets, one for me, one for Radley, to Texas. One way tickets. To go stay with a friend while I figured it all out. I didn’t know if I was ever going to go back
to Mike at that point.
While I was in Texas, two things happened. 1.) I realized
I didn’t like Texas. 2.) I figured out that I needed to keep my family
together. So, three weeks later, I
boarded a plane for California to go meet my husband. And as we took off over East Texas, I looked
down and swore to myself “Even if I am unhappy, I will never let Mike or Radley
know. I will be happy for them.” The classic “fake it til you make it”
maneuver. And I was committed to
it. I got to California and got a job
and made friends and had sex with my husband.
It was all good and fine until it wasn’t anymore. Then, one late winter day, I realized that I
just couldn’t fake it. I wasn’t
happy. There were too many burned
bridges, there were too many scars, it was too much work to try to be
happy.
As I was driving to take Radley to see my mom, I had three
hours in the car, in silence, to think about it. When I got to my mom’s house, I sat on her
patio, and told her I couldn’t do it anymore.
She looked at me, devastated, and said “can’t you just try a little
harder?” I just shook my head. On the three hour drive home, I thought about
how I was going to tell him. There was
no good way to say it. So, as we sat in
the back yard watching the sunset, as we had so many times before, I looked
down and said “I’m not happy.”
Silence. Silence. More silence.
Then it all started. All of the
divorce stuff. The name calling and the
object claiming and the tears. That was
the hardest day of my life. And the days
that followed, only got harder.
I found a place to live.
I moved out. I watched my friends
disappear, one by one. And I wondered if
I had made the right decision. It was
probably easiest in the beginning. But
as the weeks turned into months, and the months to years, I really began to
suffer the consequences of my decision.
At first, seeing Radley so confused about having to live it two
different homes was the worst of it. But
my divorced friends assured me that he would eventually be grateful that he didn’t’
have to grow up in a home with parents who resented each other. So, I waited, patiently, for that day to
come. It still hasn’t. Then, I realized I was lonely. So, I stumbled into bed with the first
asshole who could find my house. And I
thought this will help. Right? Because the best way to get over one is to
get under another. Only, things didn’t
really make form with that guy, not matter how long I waited. And the phone conversations with Sallie Mae
every couple of months about why my student loan payments were late. Again.
That didn’t make anything better.
Then, on top of it all, I had to see my ex husband at least once a
week. And I was so used to him being my
best friend, that I couldn’t deal with the pain of not having him in my life
anymore. Now, be reminded, this was all
my decision. This way my choice. These were my actions that got us here.
On the day our divorce was finalized, we stood in front of
the judge, and she looked back at us, left eyebrow raised, and said: “are you sure you aren’t missing
something? This is the most amicable
divorce I’ve ever presided over.” We
both nodded our heads and said “yes ma’am.”
She said again: “Are you sure?” Again, we nodded. Then we walked out of the courthouse and Mike
stopped, tears in his eyes and said “I’m sorry.
I didn’t know you were unhappy.
Before this, this is the happiest I’d been in eight years.” That’s when I lost it. I started sobbing uncontrollably. And I looked at him and said “this isn’t your
fault. This was both of us. I wasn’t happy.” I didn’t say anything else. I just left.
But what I should have said was “This wasn’t your fault. It was me.
I pretended to be happy when I wasn’t and you suffered because I
manipulated you into believing that I was OK when I was not at all OK. Then I threw you to the fucking wolves when I
finally admitted that I wasn’t happy.
This is my fault.” I didn’t say that though.
Now, don’t get me wrong.
My marriage wasn’t perfect. I
just wanted more for all of us, whatever the fuck that means. And sure, If I had stuck around, Radley
wouldn’t have to adjust to two different homes every week. And I’d be able to more readily pay my
student loan bills. I probably wouldn’t
get those looks of sympathy and judgment from the other moms at soccer. But that’s the lot that my decisions have created
for me. And I’m willing to accept it
now. But I could never have created a
mission statement or identified a theme if I didn’t acknowledge what challenges
me. First.
The other day, a friend told me about his “compass.” At the time, the idea didn’t make sense to
me. I thought “how can you have four
ideas that point in different directions and want to move towards each of them?” You know, because a compass points you in a
certain direction and away from other directions. But then I got it. Maybe you need to travel all of the
directions before you find your destination.
So, this year, on my compass, there is no true north. There is no magnetic declination. There is no correction between where you
should be going an where you are actually going. My compass reads: Find your livelihood. Enjoy who you love.
Don’t forget to laugh. A
lot. And get your shit together because
the choices of your past no longer dictate your future.
-Inner Peas
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