a night note to J…

Me. We’re talking about how I saw us take the real first fall. It hadn’t been good between us for a while. A long while. But speaking for myself, this is how I saw that last straw break. In half.

What he said that September afternoon was: “I haven’t loved you for the last 15 years.” It wasn’t a thoughtless thing he decided to inform me. I mean, who, during lunch that I made for him, say’s that out of the clear blue sky? After 35 years of marriage?  Without any talking about ‘us’ as a prelude.

Actually, those weren’t his exact words. His exact words were, “I told her I hadn’t loved you for the last 35 years.”

‘Her’ was a marriage counselor assigned to us as a “are you sure you want to divorce” measure. Did we really want to save our marriage? Up to that point, I don’t think so. But what I did think was that with help we could try to save years of surviving “better and worse, richer and poorer, sickness and health …” work. It would take an effort. It would require teamwork. At the very least we could carefully move our marriage off the steep cliff it was hanging on if we both committed ourselves. But that was the problem! Commitment. He had never REALLY wanted to be married. On a warm night in California, after an exciting conversation about getting married, after a great night in bed… he had second thoughts and said, “I don’t think I’m the marrying kind.”   (Red flag!)

On a pretty, blue sky early afternoon it was an extraordinary moment. for me and ever since it was a moment that froze itself into my mind. into my heart. into my life.

i don’t remember reacting. i don’t remember moving out of my chair. honestly, i don’t even remember if i started to cry. what i do remember is how sharp the edges of those words were. how he just sat there like what he had said took little to no effort to say. and how after a few minutes of silence between us, he got up and walked away. i didn’t. i stayed right where i was.

if, as you suggest, they might have been words spoken in the ‘heat of the moment’… well i don’t think so. because there was no ‘heat of the moment.’ it was an ordinary 12-12:30 pm kind of lunch time thing. and even if (in his mind) it WAS a ‘heat of the moment’ moment, if that was it… here’s the point: there has never been an apology. never a “i didn’t mean it.” never a mention of any remorse. so i’m thinking he meant it. like, he really meant it.
and although i never thought he was a good partner, i thought i was.  he was 1st in my life. i was somewhere around #10 in his.
but now i wasn’t understanding… how could he not have loved me for 15 years? and if he didn’t, ok… but how could he wait for 15 years to casually walk into a room to tell me? and WHY be so cruel about it? that’s a BIG ONE! what was his reason for being so cruel. revengeful. a bully. a jerk! a fool. (and i so hate to say that!) and putting the women in his family up there at the #10 level to boot! OMG – had I married the definition of a ‘good ol’e boy’?
did i really deserve all of that? had i been such a lousy wife that i deserved him saying that to me? well, i guess he thought i was all that and more!
in all humility… WOW. another WOW. and a thousand more WOWs.
so Universe – here lies my Goliath – i am NOT that lousy person. And who in the hell does he think he is throwing away a family? How did i marry someone who thought like that?  who taught him that ‘he’ mattered over his family? i’m angry about that!

J… i suppose you’re right. NO. not suppose. you are right. it’s time for me to pick up my sling and take aim at this frozen mess of a moment that just WON’T thaw in my brain. In my heart. maybe if i break it in to pieces… ! (like, you know… “how do you eat an elephant?”) he has a problem, not me.

(calm down… deep breath) i’ll do it that way. i’ll start a narrative from the beginning. face each infected … ummm … damn…! you know,  it didn’t have to look like this. i’m so disappointed – that he didn’t fight for his family. if not for me but for all of us together because we are a family. we need each other. we are… each other. maybe it’s like that scene in the Godfather when Michael and the kids are in the kitchen and Kay, who had come to see the kids was standing on the other side of the door – the outside door, and Kay and Michael see each other, and nothing is said, and he walks over and closes the door in her face.

maybe that’s it and i still don’t see it.

ok… no matter what this narrative will look like… i give the universe my truth.

TRUTH… do what you do best! Set me free…