What's been happening lately?

I realize I have been out of touch for a long, long time. So long, in fact, that I just recently got a private e-mail asking, "Dear Hosea: Have you decided to proceed with a divorce? What has happened with D's? Did she put it off because of her husband's illness?" So yes, I realize it has been a while and maybe a quick summary of the last couple of months would be in order.

With minor smoothing out, here is how I replied.

D has indeed put off any steps towards divorce because of her husband's stroke. He is rebounding pretty well -- and is showing a lot more dedication to eating right and exercise than he ever did before -- but he has memory troubles and there are slight personality shifts. She says his sense of humor is almost completely gone, and he will forget to pay the bills for weeks at a time. This means that she pretty much has to go back to their (his) house every weekend, to check for bills that need paying, to check that there is food in the house, and stuff like that. She still says that she doesn't expect ever to live with him again on a full-time basis, but for the near term it is at any rate very convenient that she can sign checks and other forms with the title "Mrs."

On my side, ... well, I have put the divorce on a mental stack of things that I need to get back to but haven't yet. The last couple of months, Son 1 has been applying to high schools, and the process blows me away. Actually our local public high school isn't bad; but we at least want to consider a couple of private options as well, to see what might work out. (Among other things, a smaller school would give him less chance to fall through the cracks; and until he learns better self-organizational skills, that might be a good thing.) Only, ... I look at the application materials these schools sent out, and they require practically as much as I had to fill out to apply to college.

What does this have to do with me? Well, part of what they all want are statements (read: essays!) from the parents. Also, while of course Son 1 has to write all his own answers, I am not above reminding him that today would be an excellent time to sit down and work on them. (Time management is a skill he still needs to improve.) And there have been campus visits to coordinate, etc. What is more, I want to keep Wife as far away from the schools as possible, because honestly her social skills have deteriorated significantly in the last few years. So I worry that she could alienate Admissions officers.

Anyway, the result is that I haven't gotten back to my draft Parenting Plan document, my draft Financial Plan, and the rest of it. Meanwhile Wife and I have been living with separate money (more or less) and we don't talk or interact all that much. But we are in the same house with both boys, and we are both available to drive them places and spend time with them. It is kind of a temporary stasis. I don't think it can stay that way forever, but maybe by the time we push ahead we will have gotten a better idea of what "ahead" should look like. I am coming to believe that Wife will always have trouble living on her own, because she seems to have trouble with simple things like managing her money and time. D has remarked that it is very likely I'll have to live nearby in the long term, just so I can stop in every so often and make sure she has gotten out of bed and eaten recently. Or opened her bills. In some ways, D and I have both noticed that our situations are becoming more and more alike.

I have other things I want to write about -- I am maybe 2/3 of the way through another installment in the "On lying" series for instance. But this is just a thumbnail sketch which I hope can do duty for weeks and weeks of posting I haven't done. With luck and a little perseverance I'll be back before another month has gone by ....

Ninth date

Another business trip -- a legitimate trip, this time -- and of course D joined me. I flew out the weekend before my first meeting, so we met Friday night at the airport in the faraway city. And at this point we are settling into enough of a pattern during these trips that I'm not sure how much there is to report. D herself commented that we haven't had any major emotional blowups in half a year or more; I think she is right, and I attribute this to our getting to know each other better, and to each of us getting more secure in the relationship. (I am now, as Robert Benchley once wrote, knocking wood so hard that the man in the next room just said, "Come in.") She also commented -- and here too I have to agree -- that the sex continues to get better and better. I credit her with how good it is; she credits me. It's a pleasant combination.

So what did we do with our time, besides fuck? Not a lot. Walked around downtown checking out used book stores, went to a matinee performance of a new play (and not a terribly successful one, I think), ate, talked. Always talked. She stayed over Monday, so we had one more night together after my day at work. And then it was over, all too soon. It is getting harder to see these trips end ....

And of course as soon as she left our correspondence picked right up again. I went to another play the night before I flew home, packed my bag, and then heard -- just as I was settling into bed -- someone out in the hall pound loudly on the door next to mine and bellow "Does anybody want to party?!!!" I stuck my head out of my room (clad only in my underwear, as I had packed most everything else) and asked if they could keep it down. I got a brief "Sorry" from a kid in sweats and no shirt holding a bottle of beer, as a similarly-beer-laden young lady walked between us into the room. (The young lady had a shirt, however.) I wrote D with some amusement that it would have been really practical to have her there, because her grey hair commands instant attention in a setting like that; anyone under the age of about 30 seems to think suddenly that he is talking to his grandmother. I was even more amused by her reply: "Loud neighbors in a hotel can be difficult, but I suppose we should realize that we may have been that couple who caused others close to us to lose some sleep on a couple occasions. A bit of shame-faced laughter here." OK, true enough. (smile)

When I got home, the boys both assured me that everything had gone on an even keel in my absence. I sat down to check in with Wife, and she asked me how my trip had been. I said it was fine and sketched out the parts that didn't involve D.

And then sure enough, Wife's very next question was: "How is D?"

Hosea: [Pause.] I don't know, why don't you call her and ask?

Wife: Well I know you are in touch with her a lot, so I thought you could tell me how she is. I know she texts you a lot, and I assume you talk to her on your phone when you go out for those long walks on the weekends.

I wasn't going to deny anything, but neither did I really feel I needed to volunteer anything; so I acknowledged "We talk," and then asked, "What are you getting at?"

Wife: I don't know. It just seems to me that D is behind a lot of the changes in the house since she was here.

Hosea: Like what?

Wife: Well, like all the vegetarian cooking, and the looking for local free-range meat instead of the cheaper factory-raised meat. In all the years we were together before, you never ever cooked like that. But I know those things are big priorities for D, and you started cooking that way after she visited here. [Then, in a much smaller voice, she added:] And before her visits you still used to tell me you loved me, too.

From there Wife rapidly shifted the topic to a (louder and more self-confident) denunciation of D's throwing away so much of the accumulated stuff in our house (see, e.g., Second Date), and I told her this was ancient history by now. But for a brief moment I found myself wondering whether the reason Wife rehashes so strenuously her resentment over the discarded things might be that the personal side of the changes D has brought about -- most pointedly, losing our marriage* -- is too painful and frightening to look at squarely. In other words, ironically, she might emphasize the things not because she thinks they are more important than the human side, but because they are less important.

I don't know, of course. It is just a thought.


* I should clarify that I have never told Wife openly about my relationship with D, and she has never made any overt accusations. But obviously she can read a calendar, and she has been able to watch the climate at home change. I suspect she may blame D for being a cause and not merely a trigger, but that is a discussion for another time.