Goofy grin

The last several days I have caught myself sliding into a goofy grin.  I recognize this grin and the state of mind behind it.  What I don't know is whether it is premature.

To fill in the story I have to back up: a few days to Christmas Eve, or possibly twenty years.

Twenty years?  Why yes.  Twenty years ago next week -- the very beginning of January, 1993 -- I started a job at a small tech startup here in town.  (The company has since closed and I'm working somewhere else now.)  My position had been created new, because they realized they needed someone to handle a certain collection of tasks full-time; up till then those tasks had been covered at best part time by a woman I'll call Debbie, who had finally insisted that someone else needed to take them over.  So while my boss was some other guy, Debbie did most of my training.

Debbie and I spent a lot of time together, first because she was training me and then because we were just talking.  I liked her a lot: she was quiet, serious, and compassionate -- Unitarian, for what it's worth, with all the social sensibilities that usually implies.  And she seemed to like me.  I never pushed it any farther than talking -- "just good friends" -- because, well, I'm shy and we were both married and this was twenty years ago.  I wasn't ready to go there yet.  And so I never really had any way to check whether she had gotten to the point that I had gotten to, where my heart did a little flutter whenever I was around her, or thought about her.

More precisely, she never said anything about feelings on her side, but I had my suspicions.  About a year later, maybe less, she and her husband and their daughter moved to Europe for a couple of years.  People often lose track of each other after a move that significant, but we kept in regular touch by e-mail.  When they came back, she returned to work at the same company part-time for a couple more years.  Her hours were such that we didn't see each other a lot, but we had lunch together when we could.  Sometimes at a local restaurant.  Once or twice she drove me to her house and we ate there.  And then after a while suddenly every time we met for lunch it turned out that her husband had asked to join us too.  Every single time.  His idea, or hers?  It couldn't have been just my charming personality.  Had she said something at home?  Was he feeling jealous and overprotective?  Or did she feel she needed a chaperone?  And if the latter, was it because she was worried about where I might be taking us?  Or about herself?

So many questions, and I never asked them out loud.  I never learned any answers.  And then after a while Debbie took another job somewhere else and we really didn't see each other any more.  Once in a great while I would hear what was going on with her through common friends.  Occasionally she would send out a mass e-mail to her friends when something big happened ... like when she changed careers altogether, or when her daughter went off to college, or when she and her husband split up.  I saw her once when a bunch of us from that company (long sinnce closed) got together for the funeral of one of our erstwhile co-workers, but we didn't exchange any words.  The crowd was big and it was hardly the time.

And then this week -- Monday, Christmas Eve -- I had to go out to the grocery store for one or two last-minute things that we just had to have.  I had picked them off the shelves and was standing trying to decide whether to get one more bottle of wine as well or whether to check out ... when I noticed that there was something familiar about that woman over there in the checkout line.  She was greyer than I remembered, and looked older ... but then we've all gotten older with time.  Was that Debbie?  Or just someone who looked kind of like her?  I admit that I stared for a minute, trying to decide.  She looked around -- maybe she felt my eyes on the back of her neck -- and saw me.  We just looked at each other face to face for a moment, each thinking.  Then she picked up her basket of groceries, murmured "Excuse me" to the woman behind her in line, and came out to talk to me.  It was Debbie.

We talked a little bit.  How are you doing?  OK, how about you?  I told her that the boys are both in high school and doing well (though I'm not quite sure whether they were even born yet back when we worked together).  And I told her that Wife and I are separating.  She asked if I had heard that she and her husband had divorced.  (I had.)  She added that it had taken a long time to get everything finalized, and I get the impression that it wasn't exactly a smooth divorce.  She agreed with me that even a failed marriage can be very educational.  Then we exchanged e-mail addresses and went our separate ways.

A couple of days after Christmas I sent her a quick note to follow up.  I wanted to keep it light, because (as noted) I really wasn't sure if she felt quite the same way I did.  And for that matter, how much of my feelings were just a decade and more of accumulated fantasy, rather than anything based in reality?  Better to start off light.

Bright and early Thursday morning, I wrote her:

Hi Debbie,

It was great to bump into you at the store the other day.  Once the hubbub of the holidays has subsided, does your schedule have space in it for a cup of coffee?  I'd love to continue the conversation.

All the best, as always,

Hosea

Not twenty minutes later, I got back a reply:

Hi Hosea,

It was, indeed, good to run into you, although bittersweet.  I find you have been much on my mind these past few days and I have been wishing you well-being and the best possible outcome, whatever that may be. 

I'd love to continue the conversation over a cup of coffee after the holidays!  As I mentioned, [here she discussed some holiday plans that last through January 3rd], so any time after that would be good for me.   I work [these and those days].  Most other days I have time free, so just let me know what will work for you.

may you be well,
Debbie

Bittersweet?  I've been much on her mind?  Sounds promising.  So I wrote back:

Hi again,

I'm glad we'll be able to get together.  Too often I have dawdled or neglected to follow up with someone and the meeting grows stale.  I wanted to be sure that didn't happen with you.

I go back to work on the 2nd.  [Then I described my schedule for the next couple weeks.]  So gosh, shall we throw a dart at a wall?  How about noon on Friday the 4th?  Or if that looks inconvenient, by all means toss back another day instead.

And then the next big question: where? 

Looking forward to this,

Hosea

She agreed to the 4th and asked me to propose a place.  I suggested three options, and she wrote back:

I like [this one] and their quiet little tables nestled into nooks and crannies are good for talking, so let's go there.  Shall I meet you there at noon?

As I said once before, it appears that I have a date. Let's see how it goes.

Oh, and in case I forget to mention it ... Happy New Year!

Wife's sleepover?

This was a little odd.  A couple of days ago, Wife announced -- to me and the boys -- that she was going to spend the next couple of nights over at the house of Boyfriend 7 (Jenner).  To my knowledge she has never discussed her affairs openly with the boys (although I sometimes suspect that she confides in Son 2), so I cocked an eyebrow at this.  Her story was that Boyfriend 7 and his wife were both home, but that she was very sick and he had injured his hip so he couldn't look after her.  So she had offered to come over and look after them both.

Huh?  I didn't think she was all that close to Jenner's wife; and while of course she is fucking Boyfriend 7, she has never discussed it openly.  The cover story made almost no sense, so I assumed that it was a transparent fabrication, that Jenner's wife was out of town visiting relatives, and that this was an excuse to spend the next few days humping like bunnies with Boyfriend 7.  Even so I was a little surprised that she would schedule it for now, when she has always claimed that her top priority is to spend time with the boys and here they are both home on Break.

So I did a little snooping on her phone and found out I was wrong.  The story was absolutely true, as far as Jenner and his wife were concerned.  I still can't be sure of Wife's motivations, but the back story was correct.

Also, in the end it never happened.  She got as far as packing an overnight bag with enough stuff to last her a couple of days, and then Jenner texted her not to come.  Apparently their daughter had offered to come over that night (now that makes a little more sense); then the next night Jenner's wife was feeling better and the situation had passed.

Still, it was odd.

Normal teenager

Janeway has suggested -- I believe with respect to my last post -- that I tell Wife that the boys are just behaving like normal teenagers when they want nothing to do with us.  Hell, I remember being a teenager, and "spending a whole lot of time talking to my parents" sure wasn't one of my top priorities.

But I have had limited success pitching this concept to Wife.  Or rather, let me call it inconsistent success.  Some days she is perfectly willing to accept the explanation.  Other days she insists that when she was a teenager, by God she wanted to talk with her mother every single day and she even kept in touch with her father out of duty: so what's wrong with our kids, anyway?  [Her parents were never strictly speaking divorced, but they lived apart almost all the time Wife was growing up.]

When she was ranting about Christmas presents (and segued into ranting about how Son 1 doesn't keep in touch with her) I did try suggesting that Son 1 was, in this, behaving no differently than she would have behaved at her age.  Surely she didn't really want to spend a lot of time with her folks?  Couldn't she put herself in his shoes and translate that sentiment to him?

She answered, "Well I had a reason, because at every holiday or school event or family get-together my father was always drunk off his ass, dribbling spit and embarrassing everyone. And I don't do any of that, so it's not the same."

It was on the tip of my tongue to explain to her, "Yes it is the same. No, you don't get drunk and you don't dribble spit. But at every holiday or school event or family get-together you do indeed embarrass everyone ... by insisting on joining every conversation and then misunderstanding what it is about so that your 'expert comments' have nothing to do with the point, by nattering on so long that nobody else can get a word in edgeways even when you have nothing to say, and by complaining bitterly about everything. It is just as embarrassing as anything your father could ever have done, and it is no surprise to me that the boys want to keep you insulated away from their lives and their friends."

But I didn't say it.  I have learned that the things I really want to say because they give me a warm, self-righteous glow while saying them are always things I regret later.  Some day, maybe after the paperwork goes through, I think it might be useful for her to be told these things.  But maybe not right now.

When Christmas is a competition

For the most part, I think Christmas went pretty well.  Wife, Son 2, and I drove to my parents' house, as usual.  We met Son 1 there -- he had gotten out of school for Winter Break a couple days before and had just stuck around their house helping out rather than making the several-hour trip home just to turn around and drive back Christmas Day.  (I think I have mentioned that my parents live about five minutes from Hogwarts.)  The day was festive, we all had lots to eat, and Wife didn't get into any bitter arguments with my dad ... or anyone else.  When we left that evening, it all seemed fine.

Once we were back home, however, it became clear that Wife was wound up over the presents.  One of the ones that troubled her the most was that Brother had given Son 1 an electric guitar. 

A bit of background: Brother is the rock musician in the family.  He works various temp assignments as a day job, but his real interest is music.  Apparently he and Son 1 were visiting some time recently and Son 1 started plinking on one of Brother's guitars, trying to pick out a tune.  They talked and then Brother e-mailed me asking if it would be OK for him to get Son 1 a guitar for Christmas.  I couldn't think of any reason why not. 

Brother: I suppose I was just thinking of how you and the neighbors would like the noise?

Hosea: You mean like when you were Son 1's age and Dad got you some second-hand drums? No, I'm not too worried. Heck, it will mostly be his dorm-mates who have to listen to him.  I think it's fine.

Turns out, though, that it troubled Wife.  Why?  Because it was more expensive than anything she got him, or I did. 

Wife: That must have cost $800. There's no way I can compete with that!

Hosea: Uh, ... compete? What do you mean?

Wife: Well I can't afford to buy Son 1 anything costing $800!

Hosea: So what?

Wife: "So what"?? I'm his mother, that's what! What's he going to think when your brother gets him such an expensive gift and I can't do the same?

Hosea: What do you mean? Are you saying that every Christmas you want the most expensive gifts to the boys to be the ones coming from you?

Wife: Yes! Well, ... or from you. But yes, I still want to have some kind of place in his life.

Hosea: You do. What are you talking about? You're his mother. Of course you have a place in his life. We both do. And if you didn't, do you really think you could buy a place with gifts?

Wife: Are you happy with the place you have in his life?

Hosea: Of course. What do you mean?

Wife: Because I'm not! I have no place in his life any more. I text him several times a week and I get nothing back ... or at most a one word reply. I call him and he won't pick up the call. OK, I get it, he might be in class. But then he "forgets" to call back -- ever! If you're happy with your place in his life, then obviously he answers your texts and he takes your calls. Obviously you must talk to him all the time -- you must have a thriving communication with him -- and it's just me that he's avoiding! It's just me that he never wants to talk to! And now I can't even give him Christmas presents that he likes? What does that leave me, Hosea? What in Hell does that leave me?

There was nothing that I could say to this.  The errors were so obvious: her place in the boys' lives has nothing to do with buying them gifts; I don't talk to Son 1 any more often than she does, but I'm OK with that; whether he likes a present has nothing to do with how much it costs.  And so on.  But I have tried to tell her this kind of thing before, and she can't hear it.  I might as well be speaking Chinese.  And so I had nothing very useful to say for the rest of that evening.  Fortunately it was late and she went to bed soon.

Boyfriend 8

By the way, not that it matters (not that you care, nor I) but Wife has added another boyfriend to her stable.  This one is an unemployed physicist, or something like that.  He has spent the last couple of years just seeing her for coffee, nothing more.  Turns out he figured she was off the market because she and I hadn't actually instituted proceedings.  (I guess she must not have told him about Boyfriends 6 and 7, to say nothing of those in the past).  Now that we are filling out discovery forms for each other, he suddenly wanted her in bed. 

(And no, she didn't actually tell me any of this; I just found out anyway.)

Whatever.  Maybe if she collects enough boyfriends at a time she'll be less of a selfish, grasping harridan as we work out a settlement.  Maybe pigs will fly.  You just never know.

Anyway, it's someone new to keep her busy.

Sleeping pills

Wife takes sleeping pills before she goes to bed.  OK, fine, she takes so many other kinds of pills that what's one more?  She says she can't sleep without taking them.

Only why does she also take them in the morning?

I think it is force of habit -- maybe -- but if it is then this is a habit that is impermeable to reason or common sense.  When she wakes up in the middle of the night to pee, she always takes another sleeping pill before going back to bed.  It's absolutely routine.  She fears -- can it be fear? -- that she won't be able to get back to sleep without it.  And she fears -- again, is that it? -- not being able to get back to sleep.  So she reaches for a pill.

Only, ... what about this morning?  Son 2 (who has been home on Christmas Break since Saturday) had an early doctor's appointment, so she was planning to get up at 6:00 am to get dressed and breakfasted in time to take him.  She set her alarm expressly last night before turning in.  And then she got up to pee this morning at 4:47. 

I happen to know the time because she rolled over just before getting up and poked me in a way that woke me sharply and immediately.  (At the time I thought it must have been deliberate, because she often pokes me like that if she deems I am snoring too loudly.)  Anyway, I woke up and saw the clock.  And a couple minutes later she got up and toddled into the bathroom.

When she finally came back it was nearly 5:00, and I was still irritated at having been (so I thought) deliberately awakened.  So I rather unkindly got up, turned on the light, and suggested we both get up.  This way she'd have more time to get ready in the morning, which always takes her amazingly long anyway.  She was understandably displeased, but went along with it.

So here we were getting going a little after 5:00 in the morning.  I got dressed.  She started making coffee ... grumbling but perfectly coherent.  Within a half an hour, though, she was staggering, unable to focus, and unable to speak clearly.  I asked her what was wrong and she explained -- as peevishly as she could manage in her stupefied state -- that she had taken a sleeping pill when she had gone to pee.

What the fuck??  It was nearly 5:00 then ... had she forgotten that she was planning to wake up anyway in just over an hour?  Admittedly it was still dark -- hell, it's winter -- but how hard would it have been to glance at the same clock I saw?  Or the big clock on the wall immediately to her left in the bathroom ... actually in front of her while she was on the toilet?  How hard would it have been to reflect that the pill would take thirty to sixty minutes to dissolve in her stomach, and so would only start taking effect about the time she wanted to get up anyway?  Or a little before, sure, but there is no possible way it could have worn off by the time she wanted to get up ... no way it could do anything but incapacitate her.  How could she not see this?

But this is normal.  I don't even say anything about it any more, because I know she is incapable of understanding.  I could say "Don't take a sleeping pill if it is within two hours of when you want to wake up," and she will say "But then I won't be able to get back to sleep."  Whatever I say at that point -- for example, "Maybe so but in that case you just have to live with it because if you take the pill you will never wake up on time" -- she'll answer "But I have to have my sleep. I'll get sick if I don't get enough sleep."  And then she will alternate those two answers from there on out, no matter what else I might try to say.  She will not -- cannot? or is not willing to? -- understand that there can possibly be a bigger picture than the one she has painted for herself that says:

1. If it is bedtime, you have to go to sleep so go to step 3.
2. If you wake up and it is still dark then you have to go to sleep so go to step 3.
3. Any time you have to go to sleep (such as in steps 1 or 2), take a pill.

I cannot tell if this is willfulness or stupidity.  But there are certain conversations where she is defended by a mental wall that is just impermeable.  This is one of them. 

So in the end I gave her a shove in the direction of bed and she fell back asleep.  Son 2 got up and asked why Mom wasn't up yet, adding "Is she plastered on drugs?"  I rolled my eyes and sighed Yes.  So I took him to his doctor's appointment and got to work late.  They spent the day decorating the tree and it looks very pretty.  And now she is in bed  again for the night, having taken her nightly dose of medications, including her sleeping pills.  And so it goes.

Peace, Molly

Sometimes I think I talk too much about movies.  But a well-done movie can often convey a point better and more forcefully than I ever could on my own.

This evening I saw Steven Spielberg's Lincoln.  Of course it has gotten much praise as a fine movie.  I have seen several reviews praising Daniel Day-Lewis's portrayal of the President.

I have yet to read a review, though, that says much about Sally Field as Mary Todd Lincoln.  Let me say, for my own part, that she nails it.  More precisely, I don't know a thing about the historical Mary Todd Lincoln.  The character that she nails, perfectly, exquisitely, is Wife.  Not in all the surface details, perhaps, though the hints at her spending mania are a nice touch.  But the psychological characterization is scarily exact.  Watch the scene where Mary falls completely to pieces and Abe threatens her with the madhouse, and you have seen any number of the shrieking fights between us over the years.  I don't claim to have struck as honorable a figure as Day-Lewis's Lincoln in these arguments, but Field's Mary is perfect.

And if you are able to see a kind of greatness in her hysteria -- a jagged, rough-hewn grandeur in the sheer magnitude of her suffering, something that compels your respect and awe even against your will -- then you will have some idea what I saw in Wife all those years.  You will see -- beyond all the mundane practicalities -- a deeper part of why I stayed so long.

P.S. added in September, 2021: For purposes of future retrieval, you can think of this post as if it were subtitled "Movie meme 3.5." 

Eating while drinking, 2

Is it just me, or has anybody else found that different kinds of alcohol work differently on them?  I find that wine and beer make me sleepy and sluggish, while spirits – whiskey, brandy, vodka – are more likely to energize me if I sip them slowly.  It’s strange.  I can drink a glass or three of wine with dinner, and I’m ready for bed.  But if I then pour myself a nightcap of something stonger, I can stay up for hours.  I may have to refresh the nightcap, of course, and I won’t vouch for how I feel in the morning if I make a late night of it.  But it intrigues me that the same chemical can have such different effects.

Meanwhile, I am putting on weight again.  I mentioned in an earlier post that I have been drinking more regularly as a way to damp down the anxiety of living with Wife.  And elsewhere I believe I have mentioned that drinking encourages me to eat more.  Q.E.D.  At this point I figure I’ll cut back when I’m somewhere else.

God, I have got to get out of here!

Thoughts on failure, 5: hiding

A while ago, TLP (The Last Psychiatrist) wrote an article around the subject of narcissism, where he used this selection from the movie “Glengarry Glen Ross.”  In it, Alec Baldwin’s character delivers what must be the most hostile motivational speech in the history of cinema, telling three poorly-performing salesmen that they had better turn their numbers around or else get out.  And he claims to be reasonably clear in his own mind that the speech is a waste of time, because “A loser is a loser.”  In other words, if you guys were going to perform you’d already be performing instead of sitting around krechtzing and making excuses.  You’re not going to make it in sales.  Leave.

TLP’s recurrent theme is narcissism, so he broadens the application of the scene past merely sales.  Don’t feed yourself a story about “who you really are” when it flies in the face of reality.  Don't tell yourself, “Well my day job is XYZ – just to pay the bills – but in my heart I’m a writer and as soon as I can get some money ahead I’ll quit my job and start writing.”  The answer, of course, is “So what have you already written?”  Because the only way to be a writer is to write.  (Ursula LeGuin makes the same point with light humor and a lot less belligerence in her essay, “Talking about writing”.)

So what about me?  Do I “define myself” [awful phrase] by my day job?  Hell, no.  As you all know far too well, I think of myself as some kind of freelance intellectual or workaday philosopher.  But that’s certainly not how I earn my living.  D once commented on this too, saying, “Hosea, I sometimes think you spend 95% of your time hiding.”  She pointed out that I am cheerful and pleasant to people, but in a way that keeps them at arm’s length; she added that that my work is just a role I put on in the morning instead of being something integral to me (as being a teacher is integral to her); and she wondered aloud what my life would be like if I ever stopped hiding and simply chose to become who I am.

Why don’t I follow her advice?  Do I really prefer beguiling myself with narcissistic fantasy to living in the real world?

It’s not that, exactly.  It’s rather that – long before I ever saw the movie – I worried that “a loser is a loser.”

For a long time my father told himself he was an actor, even while he worked at a number of other careers including professor and businessman.  He’d be in every show the local community theater put on; he’d play summer stock; and honestly he was (and is) pretty good.  Then finally, when he was about the age I am now, he had the opportunity to devote himself full-time to acting.  He didn’t need to go to an office, he didn’t need to answer to anybody else, his time was his own to spend on his art.  And he pissed it away.  He squandered time on any number of stupid projects that went nowhere.  He sat around and read.  He dreamed … the way he dreamed when he still had to go to work, the dreams he was supposed to be realizing now.  And yes, he got some small parts here and there.  He made a couple of commercials from which he still gets residuals.  But he never became the next Lionel Barrymore.  Hell, he never even became the next Danny DeVito (which is more the type he would have been playing).  When he didn’t have an external structure imposed on his life from the outside, he didn’t have any structure at all.  And what he accomplished was not much.

This is why I have always wanted to make sure I work for somebody else: self-employment holds no charm for me.  This is why I never want to strike out on my own, seeking fame and fortune as … well, whatever the hell it is I think I am.  Because I think it won’t happen.  The reason we celebrate great successes, after all, is that they are rare.  I know I can piss away my time every bit as unprofitably as my father did; comes the weekend, I can watch myself do it.  And there is a kind of comfort in working for somebody else, even doing something kind of dull and meaningless, because that means somebody else will make me get out of bed in the morning.

It may be hiding, but I fear the alternative.  And I do not have the confidence that I can overcome my own impulses towards frittering and lethargy.

Another view of Thanksgiving

I wrote yesterday that I thought Thanksgiving had gone pretty well because Wife and my father had not started screeching at each other.  This morning I picked up an e-mail from my dad which acknowledged that part but had a slightly different evaluation all the same.  He wrote (in part) as follows:

Our visit to the Durmstrang Thanksgiving Dinner was an interesting excursion. I think the school looks like a pretty wonderful place and I'm glad that Son 2 is so happy there and that they are so happy with him. Your mom and I felt very welcomed by the faculty: they seem like a truly wonderful and dedicated team who are devoted to their students and the learning ideals of the school. We felt considerably less welcome by Son 2. I got the feeling that he wished we had not come. I was utterly unable to engage him in any conversation at all, although not for want of trying. As we left, I thanked him for inviting us; he replied curtly, "I didn't!" With that kind of welcome I don't think we'll plan on returning for any more such adventures. Maybe when he graduates in 2016 ... ? 

As you know, Son 1 undertook to keep the peace between Wife and me by extracting promises on both sides that we would avoid any confrontation or anything that might conceivably lead to a confrontation. I believe I fulfilled my part of the bargain. I uttered no negative criticism of anything that I thought she might hold dear, and I feigned deafness whenever she made an uncalled-for snarky remark to me. It seemed to work. No shouting from her. I don't know if her disparaging comments are delivered out of malice or if it is just a habit she got from her mother. When Son 1 was having supper with us on Tuesday, he responded sarcastically to something I'd said and then joked "I learned sarcasm from the best of them: my Mom!" Except in Son 1's case there was humor in his remark and not any malice.

I don't mean to add to your emotional burdens -- they are heavy and numerous enough already -- but I related the above as an explanation for why your mom and I are having second thoughts about hosting any sort of big family get-together this Christmas. It hardly seems worth the trouble.

Right.  I guess there are levels of success in anything, and while we reached at least the bottom rung of bare civility we may not have gotten much farther.  I wrote back as follows:

Glad you got home safely, and yes I was pleased that the day went off as smoothly as it did.  I am grateful that you were able to be so careful and indulgent with Wife; on this side I tried to reinforce Son 1's message a couple of nights before.  I think at this point that she doesn't even hear herself (so to speak) and therefore has no idea how malicious the things she says are.  But at least she didn't start hollering.

Not sure quite what to say about Son 2.  We didn't get much of a chance to talk to him either.  Yesterday we went back up for the parent events and then checked him out for the afternoon to go to the movies.  (We saw "Skyfall".)  But we had to hurry him back to get him checked back in on time, leaving Wife lamenting that she didn't get "any" (read "much") time with him.  The thing is, I'm well aware that Son 2 doesn't want to spend a lot of time with us either, and I joke with him about it; but I don't especially blame him.  I can see plenty of reasons he might not want to.  I try to be more pleasant and engaging than Wife is, but it is still easy for me to imagine that the whole Family Thing just doesn't appeal to him a lot.  So I don't push it; and when he comes up with reasons that he "has to" get back to campus earlier rather than stick around, I tend to support him rather than arguing with him.

So what about Christmas?  I admit it had not occurred to me that you might bow out completely, though your reasons make lots of sense.  I had been thinking that it would be most prudent to circumscribe rather carefully the amount of time Wife spent visiting, in much the same spirit that animated Son 1's proposal this time; and so I had imagined that she (and I, as driver) should not plan on spending the night but rather on driving down and back the same day.  My thoughts were more fluid concerning the boys, since I was musing vaguely (in the mode of several years ago) that they might like to stay on and visit you for a while.  But perhaps we shouldn't plan for that either.  I don't know.  I can't say that you are wrong, but my thinking had not proceeded that far ahead yet.

It's not a solid answer, I guess, but what you say makes some sense to me.

But it leaves me wondering what exactly we are seeing here?  Is this a kinder-and-gentler version of some Tennessee Williams script about the decay and collapse of a family that has rotted from within?  Or what is it?

Happy Thanksgiving

Actually it wasn’t bad.  After all Son 1’s worries about a “shit-storm” between Wife and my dad, they were pretty civil to each other.

Of course, part of the credit goes to Son 1.  Because of his (all too natural) worries, he took the initiative to talk with my father and with Wife separately to broker a deal that each of them would be on their best behavior.  My dad wouldn’t make feminist jokes or quote Rush Limbaugh (both of which annoy Wife), not would he start singing old show tunes (which deeply embarrasses Son 2, whose school we were visiting for Thanksgiving).  Wife, in turn, would not take the bait and start carping in case my dad slipped up, and she would otherwise be sweet and presentable.  I had been thinking in the back of my head I would have to have this conversation with both of them, but Son 1 beat me to it.  Good for him.

I tried to reinforce this message in a long conversation with Wife Tuesday night, one that may in retrospect not have done much good but I felt I ought to try.  I was trying to encourage her not to feel so combative about her life in general, using my father as a test case, and asked her “Even if he starts saying stupid shit, trashing your political opinions or lobbing worn-out personal barbs in your direction, why do you take it seriously? Why not just figure he’s talking but it’s only talk? Does it buy you anything to prove to him that you are right? Does it feed you or pay your bills?”  No, of course not.  “Then why do you care? What do you lose if you just let him blather on aimlessly?”

“Face.”

Oh.  Right.  Whatever.  The conversation took a lot longer than that, but that was the gist of it.  Anyway, she did promise to be nice on Thanksgiving Day.

And so it was a pleasant day.  There was no bickering.  We got to see Son 2, whose school always puts on a huge feast for Thanksgiving, inviting families and friends to come there rather than sending the students home.  My brother and his girlfriend visited too, and we all wandered around and overate.  It was fun, especially considering how other family visits have gone.  The only downside from my point of view was that Wife never stopped talking for the whole trip, and so there was a running patter of the sound of her voice on the edge of my consciousness for hours.  When we got home I had to go out to walk around the block for an hour or so, just to clear my head and get some quiet.  But I suppose this might be at least partly because I never talk to her and she doesn’t have a lot of people to talk to most days.  Maybe the prospect of having human interaction made her feel like a kid in a candy store.  I could spin other theories, but that’s the most generous so I’ll stick with it ….

"She took you away from me!"

During the same dinner when Wife complained about making salads -- this was Monday night -- she started complaining about D again.  But the lead-in was a little roundabout.

It started when Wife complained that I hadn't done something or other that she wanted (I don't remember what) and I replied that she had never asked me.  How was I supposed to know?  By reading her mind?  She replied that of course she had never asked me, because she knew perfectly well that my answer would be No.  And I told her, ...

Hosea:  You know, every time you say you know perfectly well what I'm going to say, you always turn out to be dead wrong.  Maybe you should give up trying to second-guess me.  I know that way back when you used to claim to be psychic.  [She did.]  But it's obviously not working any more, if it ever did.  Because you are never right about what you think I am going to say.

Wife:  That's just because you have changed so much.  Nowadays you are not the man I married, and you are not any man I ever knew.  You have changed every single aspect of your personality that I ever knew before, into something I don't know at all.  And you did it just to hate me, just to make me suffer by not having any idea who you are any more.

Hosea:  Gosh, I hardly know what to say.  I guess I'm flattered that you think I have changed every single aspect of my personality.  Most people I know don't think that's possible; they think that if you try really, really hard maybe you can change this or that little surface habit or characteristic.  But to change a whole personality?  That would take real mastery.  I don't think I'm nearly that good, but I'm flattered you do.

Wife:  Yeah, well you didn't change everything.  [She tried to make it sound venomous.]  But I know when you started.  It was the second day that fucking D was here, and you just started to model every single thing she did.  That's when you decided to become vegetarian, and that's when you decided all my books could get thrown in the trash, and that's when you drove her back to her hotel every night which was only ten minutes away and you'd stay there for two hours!  Oh I know you'd make excuses but I also know perfectly well you were spending all that time plotting with each other over exactly how much of my stuff you'd let me keep, and how you were going to screw me over by throwing away the rest of it.  And that's when you'd split bottle after bottle with her of the good wine we got from our wine club.  You never split any of that wine with me, but it was fine to pour it for that fucking D! 

Hosea:  I can guarantee you we weren't spending any time plotting against you.  Good God, the cleaning job was bad enough when it was going on ... the last thing we wanted to do was keep talking about it afterwards.  We were probably discussing philosophy or something.  [I didn't add that actually D and I were fucking like bunnies, and I'm a little surprised that Wife has never accused us of that. Then I went on.]  As for sharing the good wine, you never asked.  Look, do you remember the story of the Prodigal Son, in the Bible?  [She nodded.]  There's a line in there that's so short everyone misses it, but it's really important.  The father is making all these preparations for a big feast as the prodigal son comes home, and the good son -- the one who stayed there all along -- pouts, "You never threw a party like this for me."  The father answers him, "You never asked."  You can't expect me to read your mind.

Wife:  So if I'd been as pushy as that fucking D, then maybe you would have shared some of the good wine with me?  Because that's all she was -- just pushy!  And she made you change every single thing about yourself, so that I'd never know you any more and you'd hate me and want nothing to do with me!  She made you change your personality so that she could take you away from me and I never had you for myself again for a single minute after that!  I hate her so much if I ever see her again I'll put a kitchen knife between her ribs.

By this point the veins were standing out prominently on Wife's forehead, her face was dark red, and she was weeping freely.  I didn't know what to say and I felt like a ninny saying anything.  My first attempt to pull her out of it was a total failure.

Hosea:  You know, I really don't think I changed all that many of my opinions then.  I think there was a lot more continuity in how I felt than you are painting.

Wife:  Well you sure didn't act like it!  You used to act like you cared about me, and now you do everything you can to get as far away from me as possible.

Hosea:  And as for eating less meat and more vegetables, you know part of that dates back to when my dad had his quadruple-bypass.  [This was really weak, because it truly was D who inspired me to change how I eat. My father had his bypass surgery in 2002, and it was another six or seven years before I started eating differently.]

Wife:  Well if that's what made you change, then you deserve to die of clogged arteries and a heart attack and cancer all at once for what you've done to me.

Wow.  What do I say to that?  I had no idea, so I tried a different tack.

Hosea:  Can I ask a question?  Why are you still so upset over things that happened so many years ago?  Most people, if they are angry over something, find their anger dissipates after a while.  Why are you still so worked up over something so old?

She didn't have a clear answer apart from repeating her grievances, but my question did kind of derail her.  And after a while she did calm down enough to say, ...

Wife:  I'm really, really scared.  Two and a half months ago I knew what the future looked like.  Back then I figured even if we didn't have a great marriage we could stick it out and stick together.  And now I'm looking at being all alone and I don't know what to do.  When Christmas rolls around I guess I'll go buy a magazine and just wait it out.  You'll visit your parents with the boys, but you won't want me there.

Hosea:  You know, Babe, none of us knows the future.  None of us knows what is coming our way.  Any of us could be hit by a bus tomorrow.  So you were never as secure as you thought you were.  But the flip side is that things aren't guaranteed to be bad any more than they are guaranteed to be good.  You think you'll be alone because right now you can't foresee who you'll be with.  But you won't really be alone.  I have too much confidence in you for that.  You'll meet new people, make new friends.  You'll have somewhere to be for Christmas: maybe at your nephew's house, or maybe with some new friends you haven't even met yet.  There's never any absolute security outside of God and Heaven.  But I have confidence that you can weather it.  Have some confidence in yourself.

Wife:  I don't.

Hosea:  I know.  But work on it.

And with that we picked up dinner and Wife headed off to bed.

So controlling ...

You all know that Wife has long complained about how controlling I am.  For the last few years I have been making a conscious effort to control less and less of what she does -- especially now that she will have to be on her own in the forseeable future.  You might think she would like this.

What I find ironic, though, is that she hates it.  It makes her very nervous.  And so more and more and more she asks me what to do.  What do you want for dinner?  Gosh, Babe, I dunno.  It's your week to cook.  You decide.  When do you want dinner on the table?  I dunno.  Since you're cooking, why don't you tell me?  Yes, but when do you want it?  Really it's up to you ....

Ironic also is that this doesn't stop her from complaining about "having" to do things just so.  This evening, as she was making a salad, she started complaining about how much work it is to make a salad ... because of all the chopping, I guess.

OK, but you're the cook.  You decide on the menu.  Make what you want.

But I know you always want a salad.

Yes, but you're the cook. You decide on the menu. Make what you want.

But if I don't make a salad you'll just look at me like I'm too lazy, and then you'll sulk off to the kitchen and make one yourself.  

Ummm ... I don't think I do those things, but never mind.  Suppose I do.  Isn't that the best outcome, then?  Because that way we both get what we want?  That way I get a salad (if I feel like it) and you don't have to fix it.  What could be better?  

But then you'll be unhappy.  

Maybe or maybe not, but isn't that my problem?  Why do you care?  

Because I only ever cook to make you happy!  God knows, we never have any of the food I like, or that I want to eat!  No, we all have to eat vegetarian because that's what Hosea wants, even though everybody else in the family thinks it's shit!  But we can never have anything else, because you make all the meals be vegetarian!  

But you're the cook. You decide on the menu. Make what you want.   

(It was on the tip of my tongue to point out that if she were really cooking only what I like, she'd use a lot more mushrooms; also that it's a little odd to talk about my preferences versus "everybody else in the family" when the boys are away at school so there are only the two of us. But I figured neither of those would be a useful point just now ....)  

Anyway, I'm not sure what puzzles me more: her desperate pleading for me to tell her what to do (now that I'm not doing it) or her firm conviction that I'm controlling every aspect of her existence even when I refuse to tell her what to do.  Honestly both of them are kind of strange.

Thoughts on marriage and divorce

You may remember that some years ago I wrote a piece on the meaning of sex. 

Well here is one I posted to my public (philosophical) site on the meaning of marriage.  For what it's worth ....

The last thing I need

Quite a few weeks ago -- I don't quite remember when, but probably in September some time -- Wife made a remark about the possibility of my getting or having a girlfriend.  I think she said something to the effect that, since we are divorcing anyway (and since she has some number of boyfriends herself, plus an active account on OKCupid), it would naturally be fine with her if I were seeing somebody too.  This was after I had broken up with D (although for a while D actually kept writing me as affectionately as ever, thinking perhaps that I didn't really mean it).  And I just chuckled and said, "The last thing I need right now is a romantic relationship."

Wife was plainly a little confused at my answer, and asked, "Really? I'd think with everything that's going on you would want a girlfriend to help support you through this time."

I didn't really answer her -- more just blew it off -- and the conversation went somewhere else.  But only a couple of weeks ago the conversation came back to me, and I understood more clearly why I had said that.

Really there are two reasons.  One is the mundane practical reason that I think I will be in a stronger position with respect to the courts and in the eyes of the boys if I am not currently dating.  Logically it shouldn't work that way, maybe, but in practice I think it does.  (A corollary is that when I am in love my judgement and common sense go completely to hell; so maybe it's not a good thing to invite when I need my wits about me.)

But the other reason is more interesting, and it speaks directly to Wife's question.  When I have a lot going on, why wouldn't I want to be involved with a girlfriend who could help me carry the burdens?

Why not?  Well, because I have no idea what that would look like.  What suddenly hit me, recently, is that the only picture I have in my mind of what a romantic relationship looks like is that it involves me supporting her through her problems, not the other way around.  So of course when I have a shitload of my own burdens to carry I'm not going to be eager to pick up someone else's too.  And so I'm going to be pretty skittish about another girlfriend just now.

I'm happy that I understand my reaction better now.  But I'm a bit disturbed at what I now see about how I perceive romantic relationships.  Maybe this gets back to my old question, "What is it with me and high-maintenance women anyway?" (see also here or really any of these.)

Movie meme, 3

This evening we saw "The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel" (courtesy of Netflix) and I have a new movie image for me and Wife.  Just think of us as Douglas and Jean Ainslie, and you'll have us about pegged.  That makes her the harridan who dominates the marriage; and me the timid, henpecked nebbish who hates his lot in life but goes along with it anyway.  Maybe it's not perfect (at any rate any more), but it once was.

Towards the end of the movie, Douglas speaks to Jean and says:

Look. Can you hear yourself? Can you? Do you have any idea what a terrible person you have become? All you give out is this endless negativity, a refusal to see any kind of light and joy, even when it's staring you in the face, and a desperate need to squash any sign of happiness in me or... or... or... anyone else. It's a wonder that I don't fling myself at the first kind word or gesture that comes my way, but I don't, ou... ou... ou... out of some sense of dried-up loyalty and respect, neither of which I ever bloody get in return.

After the movie, as we were picking up, Wife volunteered that she found it a very painful speech to hear.  Why painful?

Wife:  Because in my mind I can just hear you saying the exact same things to me.

Wow.  Is it that obvious?  Of course, I guess I have said things like that before.  (Even Son 2 once blew up at her in very similar terms.)  But then I have to wonder, ... does she see herself doing the things that call out that reaction in us?

Or ... a more disturbing thought ... has she seen those behaviors and stopped doing them, but I have totally failed to see she's made any progress because I am no longer invested in paying attention or even seeing her any more at all?

Memo: When I first wrote this it was missing the last paragraph, and the next-to-last was also weaker.  But then, I wrote it after finishing off an entire bottle of red wine during dinner and the movie.  Red wine is supposed to be good for you, right? 

Eating meat does what?

A new Indian hygiene textbook aimed at 11-12 year olds says that eating meat makes you cheat, lie, steal, and turn to violence and sex crimes.

Here is the article:  http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/11/17/indian-textbook-meat-eaters-violent-dishonest-sex-criminals_n_2150611.html

I can hear it now:

"Dude, let's score some Big Macs, then find some babes and knock over a liquor store."

"Your Honor, my client pleads Not Guilty by reason of meatloaf."

"The first rule of KFC Club is not to talk about KFC Club."

The possibilities are endless ....

Don't try this at home, 2

The last one of these I posted was pretty bizarre -- I mean, that people would let themselves get caught doing such stupid things -- but there's an argument that people are just stupid.  Sorry, but there it is.

Anyway, here are a couple more things you probably want to avoid: masturbating in a Starbucks (while high), or fucking on the table at an expensive restaurant (and then not paying the bill).

Did I mention people are stupid?

And three cheers to the New York Daily News for its fearless investigative reporting of both important stories.  Say, I just noticed both of these took place in Florida.  Any theories about this? 

Why nice guys lose in relationships

Found this article while browsing the Internet at work, killing time and pretending to get something done.  The title I give it is a little harsher than what he really says; but then the author's title has the same problem: "Why Nice Guys and Gals Finish Last in Love".  Either way, it's another one of these articles I post from time to time that I wish I had known before.  Not that I'm quite sure how to put the advice into practice, but at least I would have been forewarned.

The basic idea is that if you are always doing inconvenient things for your partner and you don't ask her to do inconvenient things for you, then you become more invested in the relationship than she is.  If you are always available to her but she gets away with being unavailable to you, then you both perceive that she is a "scarcer resource" than you are ... and thereby a lot more valuable.  And so on.

He also says, never expect that one day she will suddenly realize all those nice things you have been doing for her, and change her personality instantly in gratitude.

Anyway, here's the link:  http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-attraction-doctor/201211/why-nice-guys-and-gals-finish-last-in-love

The great thing about HR

OK, this is purely silly and has nothing to do with any of the stuff I normally discuss here, but what the hell?

One of my friends at work is our HR Manager.  You'd think that befriending the HR Manager would be politically astute, but in this case I'm not so sure because I can't tell if anybody in senior management ever listens to her.  Still, we have fun swapping stories about the craziness we have to put up with.

But lately I think she's winning.  The other day she got a call from the head office of our parent company telling her that she has to go help with layoffs at some plant neither of us had ever heard of ... in a city that's three or four hours away by car. 

Oh, and it's not just one or two layoffs, but they have closed the entire plant so the employee exit interviews will have to be held in a Burger King nearby. 

Oh, and it's tomorrow.

Why exactly does she have to drop everything and go do this?  "Well, you're so nearby and we really need someone there who is an expert in the labor law of your state, because the other person doing this will be flying out from headquarters."

As she told me this, it was obvious that she was torn between shock and disbelief.  I just asked her if she has ever seen "Up in the Air."  (She hasn't.)

Then I decided to make her a little graphic to take with her or otherwise cheer her up ....

Out on the patio

I set up a second blog today, Hosea's Patio.  The idea is to use it as a place for some of my more philosophical-like pieces, the ones that really don't have anything to do with the main themes here.  Let's see how often I get around to updating it.

Unlike this blog, that one is public.  No harm I assume ....

Wrestling with failure 3, TLP and Narcissus

The next time I write something as horrible and self-indulgent as this, I hope to be reminded (or physically forced) to return once again to read this as a counterpoint.

His quality is variable, but there are times I really appreciate The Last Psychiatrist.

"Don't want to deal with the shit storm"

One of the peculiar things about Durmstrang is that they don't excuse students for Thanksgiving.  Rather, their idea is that students should invite their families to come up and feast on campus.  Thanksgiving is in less than a month at this point, so we have started making plans.  In particular my father has been e-mailing everyone in the family, asking which of a dozen minor variations (on the same basic idea) we all endorse.  I responded with a few pointers and then got this e-mail from Son 1 (only to me, no cc's):

Son 1:  I'd really rather not go to Durmstrang for Thanksgiving, or anywhere for that matter.

Hosea:  "Or anywhere" means what?  Stay at Hogwarts?  I think they lock the dorms.  Stay in [your grandparents' town] or [our town]?  But Grandma and Grandpa and Mom and I will all be eating Thanksgiving dinner at Durmstrang ....

Son 1:  Mostly I don't want to deal with the shit storm I know will erupt between mom and grandpa.

Hosea:  Right.  Got it.

I am hoping that they will both be on their good behavior because we'll be out in public among hundreds of other people.

That is a hope and not a promise, naturally.  And after our last trip to visit you at Hogwarts, I have to admit my confidence level is not at 100%.

But I'm not sure what else we should do, at least this time around. Normally we'd all congregate at Grandma and Grandpa's house.  But since Son 2 will be at Durmstrang, so will Mom and I (and therefore you); and so it would be a little awkward to tell the rest of the family they can't come, especially when the school mailed an invitation straight to Grandma and Grandpa.

If they behave badly, then I think we can say that in future years there have to be some restrictions.  But right now ... I don't have a good alternate plan in mind.  It's awkward, and so I hope for the best.

If you have any more practical ideas, please let me know ....

Son 1:  Besides being somewhere else? No.

What can I say?  The kid's got a point ....  (sigh)

 

"I'll remember this"

It's Friday, and I decided to knock off work early.  Son 2 has been home all week, and he goes back to Durmstrang this Sunday.  So I get home maybe a couple of hours before usual and stroll in.  Wife is sewing and looks up with displeasure: "I didn't expect to see you home this early."  I said, "Well, I can leave," and walked back through the house to see what Son 2 was up to. 

He was playing computer games, and obviously hadn't bothered to get dressed since waking up this morning.  So I told him, "Hey, it's a beautiful day and I'm home early. Go get some clothes on and let's go do something outside."  "Like what?"  "Oh, I don't know but we'll think of something. We can go for a hike or a walk, or we can go to a park, or ... hell, I don't know. But go get some clothes on and let's go somewhere."

About this time, Wife came storming into the back of the house -- mad, but I couldn't figure out at whom?  Maybe even she didn't know.

"What's going on here? You two are going out to do something? Every day this week I've tried to do something with you [speaking to Son 2] so we could spend time together; and whenever I ask you what you want to do you just say 'I don't know' and then you go play on that damned computer. And now you [speaking to me] come swooping in like some kind of savior, and the two of you are going to go off to do something fun together?" 

There was a lot more in the same vein.  Obviously she was upset that ... well, something.  At any rate she was upset.  Maybe it was that she hadn't had a perfect week of mother-son bonding with Son 2 to match the movie in her head of what this last week ought to have been like.  I see how that could inflict a narcissistic wound.  But how does it become expressed as anger?  Anger against whom?  Against Son 2 for not thinking of something they could do together?  Against me for coming home early and urging Son 2 to get dressed?  Neither of those makes a lot of sense.  And really, if it were indeed true that Son 2 didn't want to go anywhere with her (and not just that he couldn't think of a place), is she going to make that better by shouting at him?  Will that make her more alluring, or will it make more attractive the prospect of time spent with her?  Did she really reserve no anger at all for herself, for being unable to nurture relationships with the boys?  What can she have been thinking?

I stood in front of her and urged her not to yell.  She kept up a steady stream of vitriol -- I don't remember what all she said -- so that it came across as yelling even though her voice was more subdued.  She was carrying her sewing scissors clenched in her right hand, so that if she had suddenly lifted her arm she could have plunged them toward me.  And when she stopped talking she just stood there and stared at me with a slight tremor in her lip and gaze, the way she does when she is about to burst with sudden violence.  This time she didn't do it -- after all, I'm writing this post right now instead of lying dead on our floor -- but I've seen that look often enough to recognize it.

Son 2 made up an errand for us to go do, so we could get out of the house without it looking like we were having fun.  "I'm all out of BBs for my BB gun. I need you to take me to the store to buy more BBs."  I picked up on this and chimed it, "I also need to put gas in the car because it is nearly empty. So I'll tell you what, dear; Son 2 is going to come with me to get BBs and then we are going to get gas in the car."

Like a shot she asked, "And what are you planning to do after that?"  (Wife believes that all action is planned.)  I told her, "No plans," and finally we got away.

So we went to buy BBs and to put gas in the car.  After that I proposed going to a park or somewhere else, but Son 2 wanted to go home.  Actually, he said, he wanted to go out to a park or something, "But then Mom will be all 'Grrr! You went somewhere without me!' And I don't want her to be sad. So let's go home."  And what then?  "Well once we're home then we can go somewhere else again. But we will have come back, like we said. And we can invite her to come along."

I pointed out that strictly speaking this was blackmail -- emotional blackmail -- on Wife's part; but I also drove the car home.

When we arrived, Son 2 announced to Wife that he wanted to go out to a park or something to try target-shooting with the new BBs he had just acquired.  Would she like to come too?  It took her the longest time to answer; finally she said to me (not him), "I think I'm going to stay here. I guess you could say that I had my turn this week and now you get your turn with him. So you two just go and have fun. But I'll also remember this."  It sounded for all the world like a threat.

"Can't you two ...?"

Son 2 is home for a week.  I collected him from school first thing in the morning (Wife was still asleep) and we spent the day doing this and that.

Got home mid-afternoon and I said something to Wife that made her snap back at me and I snapped back at her.  Son 2 advised me sotto voce, "Don't say anything. Just don't respond."  I shut up.

Wife left the room and Son 2 asked, "Can't you two get through a single evening without fighting about something?"

I couldn't think of something suitable to say, so I just stared out the window.  Son 2 finished the thought: "No, you can't. That's why you're leaving."

And then added, "This is why I love Durmstrang so much."

Mutter, mutter

I came home from work and started to make dinner.  Wife was in the dining room with a big sewing project out, fiddling with one of her sewing machines.  And as she fiddled with the thread and the bobbin and such, she started muttering.  I couldn't tell if she was talking to herself, or if she was trying to talk to me while pretending to talk to herself so that I couldn't accuse her of anything overt, like complaining.  So I didn't pay a lot of attention, but as she went on it got more and more distinct.

This isn't threading right.... Now I just re-threaded the whole thing from scratch.... It's all because I have the wrong thread; if I had the right thread it would work the way it's supposed to. If I still had my shelf in the study I could just go get the thread I need. But of course I don't have the right thread because that bitch [this means D] put it all in storage and said I could get it out on a day's notice any time I wanted but of course now I can't. It figures that the thing her interference has prevented me from sewing is a project for my son.  [I have noticed that the boys never qualify as "our sons" in Wife's monologues, but always hers alone.] But of course she had to have her way and get rid of all my things. I hope she rots in the fires of Hell. It would serve her right for making my life a living Hell by putting my things where I can't get at them. And before she gets there I hope she has a long, lingering, painful death. I wish I could tear back her fingernails off of her fingers, and peel off her skin, and see how she likes that. Well at least there's one good thing: when she threw away all of my stuff she didn't make just one enemy -- she made three. The boys don't like her one little bit either. They'll never accept her as a stepmother. I'm sure as soon as you are rid of me... [This part must have been addressed to me -- right? Except she never looked up at me while saying it. So maybe it was addressed to me without her wanting to admit it, or maybe it was like those times when you are planning what you are going to say to someone and rehearsing it in your mind, while alone. Or maybe both at once. Sorry, let me go on.] ... as soon as you are rid of me you'll take right up with her again. But the boys will hate her and never accept her; and if you take up with her they'll reject you too. 

About this time dinner was ready, and I asked her if we could take the sewing project off the table long enough to eat.

Sure, I'll just go ahead and move it even though I have gotten nothing at all accomplished on it today. No problem. 

Whoa.  Hey babe, it's not that big a deal.  There's no law that says we have to eat dinner even, ... I mean, if you don't want to.

But no, she cleared away her project and we ate.  Conversation was desultory.  I tried to find innocuous and entertaining things to chat about, but I couldn't find many and Wife found ways to resent all of them for the troubles they caused her.  She did mutter some more -- not sure if it was to herself or to me -- about how little she had gotten done today.  I guess that means on this sewing project.  And as she described her day, that in turn seems to have been because she didn't actually sit down to work until very late in the day -- almost as if she didn't so much want to do the project as to get credit for doing it.  She has also talked about how she is going to clean the house from top to bottom before Son 2 comes home on his next break (this coming weekend), because the last time he was here for a mere 24 hours his allergies flared up and he says he has no allergic reactions at Durmstrang at all.  So maybe cleaning the place would help.  She asked me to pick up some super-duper carpet cleaning product over the weekend, which I did.  And I set it down in a prominent, highly-visible place.  But she hasn't done anything with it yet, and probably won't before Son 2 comes home. 

Then just before she went to bed she asked me, "How much of your decision to divorce me was based on your conversations with D?"

I oversimplified some and said, "None. Why?"

"Well I just figured with all that time you spent sitting up talking with her, she probably told you how much better off you'd be without me. And I know you've kept in touch with her since then."

"Yeah, well mostly when we've had something to talk about it has been something one or the other of us read and wanted to discuss. Haven't heard from her lately."

"Did she ever get the job in [a nearby big city]?"

"What job?"

"She talked about getting a job teaching teachers for such-and-such an organization."

Well no, in fact, she's not doing anything of the kind.  She's in a different state in fact.  But all I said was, "If she's doing that then I don't know anything about it."  Which is true at a literal level, I guess.

There was some more, though I don't remember quite what.  Wife repeated some of her earlier remarks about flaying D alive and peeling off her fingernails.  (Wife has a very vivid imagination when it is fueled by her hatreds.)  And then she went to bed.  But I couldn't help thinking that it's remarkable her anger hasn't dissipated even a little bit in nearly four years.  It's still there, still coursing around and around and around her head and heart.  It's sad, really.  Here she wants to condemn D to Hell, and she doesn't realize that by indulging and savoring and preserving her anger and resentment she has condemned herself to Hell here and now today.  What an awful way to live.

By now you must have gotten tired of my repeating the point, but listening to her repeat her mutterings compulsively over and over reminds me of nothing so much as reading the speeches of the damned in C. S. Lewis's The Great Divorce....  It's a depressing thought.