I took the advice to stay away from other women, not date, don't get involved, etc. with somewhat of a pinch of salt. What harm would it do to dip my toe back in the water? After all, I've spent most of my adult life in a relationship - it's what I know, it's what I like, it's what I am comfortable with.
But now I can see the point. Don't get me wrong, I am in love with a beautiful, strong, intelligent woman, but there is now this feeling of wanting to just do my own thing when I want to do it. I've become conditioned to always ensuring that what I did was okay with someone else and this past year or so has shown me the occasional glimpse of what it's like to have complete free will to do whatever, whenever, wherever, and with whomever... it feels good!! And it's a time I don't want to miss out on.
If you're newly separated you need time to get back to normal. Everything has been upside down in my life for the past few years and it's only right about now can I say that I'm beginning to lose the numb feeling. Take time for yourself - don't rush back in.
Monday, November 26, 2007
Wednesday, November 21, 2007
For Sale: Two children
Beena while since I posted. Not much of a diary this once a month lark. The good news is that if I'm not posting then the chances are that life is back to smooth sailing. But like any sea, that's temporary and the waves will crash again.
Last week we were back in court. Thankfully, this nightmare is now over and I am divorced. I took the ex back to court because she wouldn't agree to give permission for the children to leave the country on vacation with me. Even with the constant requests from the children for her to let them go she was a brick wall.
"I have my reasons", said she. "Please tell me then", said I. "I'd rather not", says she. And the music continues to play, and the dancers continue to dance. She managed to drag this on enough over summer to ensure that they missed their chance while they had it to go.
The day before the court date we (my lawyer and I) received word that she would allow the children to go to Europe with no strings attached. Except, there was the little matter over some disputed property amounting to a value of around $20,000. She wanted it. I refused to allow her to have it and, surprise surprise, we couldn't get an agreement from them to this 'no strings attached' deal. We went to court the next day and it was looking like 50/50 odds whether I'd win the day on the property issue and the chances are that if I lost I'd be stuck with her legal bill. So, they offered the deal again, bit better, we spilt the property and I get the kids.
So, there we have it. I thanked her lawyer for the offer asked how he manages to sleep at night knowing that he is a peddlar of children. He asked me to be not so rude and I obviously apologized. My mistake - I confused selling and exploitation. I confused the roles. My wife was selling the children; the lawyer was creating the framework for the exploitation. I asked how they could object and link the children to this kind of transaction but they were, for a change, quite silent.
I took the deal.
I could care less about money and property when it relates to the hopes, desires, and dreams of my children. To throw the children into a pot along with everything else created by a marriage is nothing short of disgusting. I wrote my ex an email that day to mark the moment of this new low. I had no point other than to create a record of the day that she put a sticker price on each of the children and took home her pieces of silver. She doesn't have blood on her hands, but she has the tears of small children that wanted to go away with me and couldn't.
Her point often was that the timing wasn't right. To this end she was spot on. The timing was too soon and giving the kids their rights simply didn't fit in with her legal strategy.
Shame on you. And shame on anyone that ever toys with the lives of their children to support whatever notion of fairness lies inside your brain.
Last week we were back in court. Thankfully, this nightmare is now over and I am divorced. I took the ex back to court because she wouldn't agree to give permission for the children to leave the country on vacation with me. Even with the constant requests from the children for her to let them go she was a brick wall.
"I have my reasons", said she. "Please tell me then", said I. "I'd rather not", says she. And the music continues to play, and the dancers continue to dance. She managed to drag this on enough over summer to ensure that they missed their chance while they had it to go.
The day before the court date we (my lawyer and I) received word that she would allow the children to go to Europe with no strings attached. Except, there was the little matter over some disputed property amounting to a value of around $20,000. She wanted it. I refused to allow her to have it and, surprise surprise, we couldn't get an agreement from them to this 'no strings attached' deal. We went to court the next day and it was looking like 50/50 odds whether I'd win the day on the property issue and the chances are that if I lost I'd be stuck with her legal bill. So, they offered the deal again, bit better, we spilt the property and I get the kids.
So, there we have it. I thanked her lawyer for the offer asked how he manages to sleep at night knowing that he is a peddlar of children. He asked me to be not so rude and I obviously apologized. My mistake - I confused selling and exploitation. I confused the roles. My wife was selling the children; the lawyer was creating the framework for the exploitation. I asked how they could object and link the children to this kind of transaction but they were, for a change, quite silent.
I took the deal.
I could care less about money and property when it relates to the hopes, desires, and dreams of my children. To throw the children into a pot along with everything else created by a marriage is nothing short of disgusting. I wrote my ex an email that day to mark the moment of this new low. I had no point other than to create a record of the day that she put a sticker price on each of the children and took home her pieces of silver. She doesn't have blood on her hands, but she has the tears of small children that wanted to go away with me and couldn't.
Her point often was that the timing wasn't right. To this end she was spot on. The timing was too soon and giving the kids their rights simply didn't fit in with her legal strategy.
Shame on you. And shame on anyone that ever toys with the lives of their children to support whatever notion of fairness lies inside your brain.
Friday, October 12, 2007
My new role - babysitter
I thought the going rate for a babysitter was around $8-$10 an hour.
It turns out that there is a ready supply of free babysitters. They're older, more mature, sometimes more responsible, hardly likely to bring a date around, burn the place the down, or eat you out of house and home. Neither are they likely to run up a phone bill. They're also called 'Fathers'.
I find it amazing that it's always in the 'best interests of the children' to have the father watch the kids when she wants to do something and always 'not in the best interests of the kids' (disruptive to schedule, something already planned, etc.) when I want to see the girls.
It turns out that there is a ready supply of free babysitters. They're older, more mature, sometimes more responsible, hardly likely to bring a date around, burn the place the down, or eat you out of house and home. Neither are they likely to run up a phone bill. They're also called 'Fathers'.
I find it amazing that it's always in the 'best interests of the children' to have the father watch the kids when she wants to do something and always 'not in the best interests of the kids' (disruptive to schedule, something already planned, etc.) when I want to see the girls.
Monday, October 8, 2007
Religion - That Old Chesnut
My ex comes from a fairly strict catholic background. Which effectively means that her family demonstrates to the entire world that they're great Christians and then, while nobody's looking, do the exact opposite of what you'd expect of people following Christian principles. Oh, sure, they give a good amount of money to the church, they even make sizable donations to various church-led charities, and their names appear on the various lists that the church puts out to show who's giving what. What great catholics they are; what great Christians. Of course, my ex mother-in-law can screw her husband's best friend behind his back but as long as she donates and goes to confession it'll wipe the slate clean.
To lay it out there, I do not believe in God. I also believe that organized religion is a terrible institution that is primarily geared to put the fear of hell (literally and metaphorically) into people to get them to do, en masse, exactly what the church wants them to. This had it's place thousands of years ago when the church was effectively the government and the ideas behind republics, democracies, and elected parliaments were just beginning to take shape. But not today.
Anyway, before I get off on too much of a tangent, I was reading a book. It's called "God is not Great" by Christopher Hitchens. It's a fabulous book and the girls saw me reading it. Naturally inquisitive, they asked me what is was all about. So, I told them.
My ex insists that the girls go to catholic religion classes once a week after school. She also sent them, without my knowledge, to a week long camp that was put on by the catholic church. Suffice to say, the brainwashing is fully operational.
My 8 year old is very smart. Both the girls are smart, but because the eldest is 2 years older she's at a point where she can apply more reason to what she hears. She asks some great questions and concludes that there is no such thing as God either. I warn her that this is just my opinion and the opinion of the writer of the book. What she needs to do is to always keep an open mind and inquire for herself. I must admit, when she said that she was going to go to her next religion class and tell the teacher that there was no God a shiver ran down my spine and could only imagine what would happen the day after that conversation took place.
The scary part of all this was my 6 year old. She said there absolutely was a God and he's in all of us. She said that she had proof because when she was at the camp she was afraid of jumping in the 5' end but the teacher told her God would help her float so if she believed then she would float. She jumped in, floated, and now believes that God did this. Another miracle.
Here's the deal - my 6 year old can swim about 5 feet before she runs out of steam and starts to go under. She's less than 4' tall. And now she thinks that God is a flotation device. How completely fucked up can these people get? I'll go along with the classes and offset what they say with my own input so they can make their own mind up but when it comes to telling them complete bullshit that could effectively put their lives at risk I have to draw a line.
To lay it out there, I do not believe in God. I also believe that organized religion is a terrible institution that is primarily geared to put the fear of hell (literally and metaphorically) into people to get them to do, en masse, exactly what the church wants them to. This had it's place thousands of years ago when the church was effectively the government and the ideas behind republics, democracies, and elected parliaments were just beginning to take shape. But not today.
Anyway, before I get off on too much of a tangent, I was reading a book. It's called "God is not Great" by Christopher Hitchens. It's a fabulous book and the girls saw me reading it. Naturally inquisitive, they asked me what is was all about. So, I told them.
My ex insists that the girls go to catholic religion classes once a week after school. She also sent them, without my knowledge, to a week long camp that was put on by the catholic church. Suffice to say, the brainwashing is fully operational.
My 8 year old is very smart. Both the girls are smart, but because the eldest is 2 years older she's at a point where she can apply more reason to what she hears. She asks some great questions and concludes that there is no such thing as God either. I warn her that this is just my opinion and the opinion of the writer of the book. What she needs to do is to always keep an open mind and inquire for herself. I must admit, when she said that she was going to go to her next religion class and tell the teacher that there was no God a shiver ran down my spine and could only imagine what would happen the day after that conversation took place.
The scary part of all this was my 6 year old. She said there absolutely was a God and he's in all of us. She said that she had proof because when she was at the camp she was afraid of jumping in the 5' end but the teacher told her God would help her float so if she believed then she would float. She jumped in, floated, and now believes that God did this. Another miracle.
Here's the deal - my 6 year old can swim about 5 feet before she runs out of steam and starts to go under. She's less than 4' tall. And now she thinks that God is a flotation device. How completely fucked up can these people get? I'll go along with the classes and offset what they say with my own input so they can make their own mind up but when it comes to telling them complete bullshit that could effectively put their lives at risk I have to draw a line.
The New Boyfriend
Well it had to happen eventually.. the new boyfriend shows up.
The girls talked about 'mom's boyfriend' this weekend. After receiving a truly awful email and an accompanying ear bashing from the ex about my girlfriend I was astonished at the hypocrisy. Ex was caught out red handed and with it firmly stuck in the cookie jar.
I told the ex that the girls had mentioned that she had a boyfriend, let's call him "The guy that is soon going to find out exactly how much this woman costs to keep alive and better make sure he's prepared to pay the price" or "Mr. X" for short. She said it was none of my business, but she has a 'friend' and the girls have met him in a 'work environment'. Then I said that I knew about this because my daughter told me that she discovered he and her at 1am in the morning in a room in the house supposedly away from little prying eyes. Ahhh... Ex turns a slight shade of red. Then she offers the explanation that they were just 'friends' and were 'talking'. So, 'just friends' come round at 1am and 'just talk' in a room that my daughter can peer into and see an activity that is obviously not talking. Ahhh... Ex gets redder. "Okay", say she. He is my boyfriend and maybe I should tell the girls.
Well how about you tell me!!
It's absolutely to be expected that new people will come into our lives. Thank God they do because we both deserve to be happy. Life is way too short to be miserable. But, always use the same yardstick to react to that other person and always treat the ex in exactly the same way as one would expect to be treated.
The girls talked about 'mom's boyfriend' this weekend. After receiving a truly awful email and an accompanying ear bashing from the ex about my girlfriend I was astonished at the hypocrisy. Ex was caught out red handed and with it firmly stuck in the cookie jar.
I told the ex that the girls had mentioned that she had a boyfriend, let's call him "The guy that is soon going to find out exactly how much this woman costs to keep alive and better make sure he's prepared to pay the price" or "Mr. X" for short. She said it was none of my business, but she has a 'friend' and the girls have met him in a 'work environment'. Then I said that I knew about this because my daughter told me that she discovered he and her at 1am in the morning in a room in the house supposedly away from little prying eyes. Ahhh... Ex turns a slight shade of red. Then she offers the explanation that they were just 'friends' and were 'talking'. So, 'just friends' come round at 1am and 'just talk' in a room that my daughter can peer into and see an activity that is obviously not talking. Ahhh... Ex gets redder. "Okay", say she. He is my boyfriend and maybe I should tell the girls.
Well how about you tell me!!
It's absolutely to be expected that new people will come into our lives. Thank God they do because we both deserve to be happy. Life is way too short to be miserable. But, always use the same yardstick to react to that other person and always treat the ex in exactly the same way as one would expect to be treated.
Monday, October 1, 2007
The Anger Mirror
Anger towards another person is so very often anger that we have with ourselves but just directed at another so that we can make sense of it all.
I'm convinced that most of the anger and bitterness that my ex has towards me is really just anger with herself. She and I spent years in a loveless relationship and the only thing keeping her in it, in my opinion, was that the timing wasn't right. She stayed in with the view that she could get out when the kids started school and she could go get a job. The job she thought she'd take is very different from the one she ended up with. In other words, she actually has to go to work with this one.
She ended up with much less than she thought she was going to get. She must have been fuming on the day that she found out just exactly how much it would be that she'd be leaving the marriage with. Suffice to say, she surely thought that sticking in it didn't pay off.
I feel really sorry for her occasionally. Here's a woman that effectively prostituted herself (except there was no sex involved) so that she could time it right, get out, take a boat load of cash, and then get a cushy job to fill in the gaps. It didn't work out for her so she must be looking at me as the John that ran out on her.
She looks through the anger mirror, it's one way, and hopefully one day her reflection will bounce back and hit her in the face. Maybe at that time she'll stop blaming me and being angry with me for her decision to hang on in there.
I'm convinced that most of the anger and bitterness that my ex has towards me is really just anger with herself. She and I spent years in a loveless relationship and the only thing keeping her in it, in my opinion, was that the timing wasn't right. She stayed in with the view that she could get out when the kids started school and she could go get a job. The job she thought she'd take is very different from the one she ended up with. In other words, she actually has to go to work with this one.
She ended up with much less than she thought she was going to get. She must have been fuming on the day that she found out just exactly how much it would be that she'd be leaving the marriage with. Suffice to say, she surely thought that sticking in it didn't pay off.
I feel really sorry for her occasionally. Here's a woman that effectively prostituted herself (except there was no sex involved) so that she could time it right, get out, take a boat load of cash, and then get a cushy job to fill in the gaps. It didn't work out for her so she must be looking at me as the John that ran out on her.
She looks through the anger mirror, it's one way, and hopefully one day her reflection will bounce back and hit her in the face. Maybe at that time she'll stop blaming me and being angry with me for her decision to hang on in there.
Sunday, September 30, 2007
Scruples
In the 80's there was a board game called Scruples. It was a funny game, for adults, that had you discuss great moral dilemmas and your friends playing the game would vote on what course of action you'd take..
I find that my entire personal life is now a living version of this game. Dating, introducing the girls to a new love in my life, etc. I'm very fortunate that I have found a beautiful, intelligent, and strong woman who sees enough in me to be happy to be my girlfriend. She loves the girls and the girls love being around her. For the first time in years the girls are seeing what it's like for two adults to love and care for each other. They're seeing the role model that demonstrates love, nurturing, and respect - something my ex and I were never really able to show them.
But here's the rub, my ex has a problem with all of this. My girlfriend isn't allowed to spend the night if the girls are with me and I can tell from the questions that the girls ask me that they are being primed to find out more information to take back to base camp. Now the lawyers have been brought back into the frame. Her position being that I am being monumentally selfish and irresponsible by allowing my daughters to see that an unmarried couple can share a bedroom. Apparently I am promoting and supporting the notion that it's ok to have sex if you're not married; a moral minefield that I am supposedly pushing my daughters into.
Personally, I'd like to focus on the issue of them having (or not having, more to the point) sex when they become teenagers. Giving them a foundation where they understand that sex is only appropriate in a loving, stable, and respectful relationship is only going to be possible if they see one of these relationships for themselves. Of course I believe that in a perfect world two people meet, fall in love, get married, and these two virgins have sex for the first time on the night of their wedding, they live until they're an old age, never straying, and they pass away in their sleep. But that's probably not what's going to happen so we do the best we can.
How frustrating it is to finally be able to show the girls all that they have been missing only to have it pushed back in my face. In this game of scruples it's not the children who win.
I find that my entire personal life is now a living version of this game. Dating, introducing the girls to a new love in my life, etc. I'm very fortunate that I have found a beautiful, intelligent, and strong woman who sees enough in me to be happy to be my girlfriend. She loves the girls and the girls love being around her. For the first time in years the girls are seeing what it's like for two adults to love and care for each other. They're seeing the role model that demonstrates love, nurturing, and respect - something my ex and I were never really able to show them.
But here's the rub, my ex has a problem with all of this. My girlfriend isn't allowed to spend the night if the girls are with me and I can tell from the questions that the girls ask me that they are being primed to find out more information to take back to base camp. Now the lawyers have been brought back into the frame. Her position being that I am being monumentally selfish and irresponsible by allowing my daughters to see that an unmarried couple can share a bedroom. Apparently I am promoting and supporting the notion that it's ok to have sex if you're not married; a moral minefield that I am supposedly pushing my daughters into.
Personally, I'd like to focus on the issue of them having (or not having, more to the point) sex when they become teenagers. Giving them a foundation where they understand that sex is only appropriate in a loving, stable, and respectful relationship is only going to be possible if they see one of these relationships for themselves. Of course I believe that in a perfect world two people meet, fall in love, get married, and these two virgins have sex for the first time on the night of their wedding, they live until they're an old age, never straying, and they pass away in their sleep. But that's probably not what's going to happen so we do the best we can.
How frustrating it is to finally be able to show the girls all that they have been missing only to have it pushed back in my face. In this game of scruples it's not the children who win.
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