Art Installation #1

Everything is Connected is the title I've chosen for the artwork I've padlocked to Mr. Ex's front door.  Because everything pretty much is.
This is the first in a series.

You will see this house again.

Note: No property damage will occur. No threatening imagery or words will be used. I do, however, intend to get my message across. In this particular piece, while it is true that a large chain with artifacts connected to it is padlocked to the door of his house, if Mr Ex. takes the time to actually look at what is tied, pinned, sewn and stapled to the chain, he will see that I have indeed attached the key.

Divorce Advice: My Half-Dozen Rules

No one's asked, but I think I've learned a few things as my divorce has dragged on through these past three years.

Even if you think you were married to the most upstanding, moral, wise, and essentially kind human being, he has probably changed. At the very least, he's in a crisis and not thinking with the "big head." The head he is thinking with is no longer the least bit concerned with you or your well-being.

1) As you prepare to move out--or as he moves out, be absolutely certain you have made copies of everything--or just take the originals. You can make copies later and see that he has whatever paperwork he needs at some later point if you are feeling generous. You need everything. Bank statements (or access to on line banking--and if you do have online access change those user names and passwords before he does), credit card statements, insurance documents, absolutely everything financial. You need to continue to keep tabs on all financial transactions from the date of  separation until everything is settled. I wish I had taken the entire filing cabinet. Don't forget to take his cell phone records.

2) If separating your finances is going to take some time, consider canceling  all credit cards. If you need the credit until your spousal support kicks in, think about adjusting the credit limit. I now could be liable for  tens of thousands of dollars of credit card debt racked up by  my ex because I didn't take any action. You have to think clearly about what you need and what could happen as an outcome of any choice you might make. I wish I had simply taken half of every liquid asset immediately. It would have been appropriate to my circumstances--30 years of marriage, 20-some years of raising children while not working outside the home, community property state.

3) Don't be overly patient. A reasonable amount of time for Mr. Ex and me to settle our financial affairs might have been 6 months or so. I've now spent so much on attorney fees that I could have gone to trial at the 6 month mark and ended all of this. Go to trial if there's a possibility of things dragging on  and on.

4) If your ex is planning to remarry, use the time pressure inherent in this situation. DO NOT BIFURCATE.  Bifurcation means that the dissolution of the marriage is on a separate timetable from the settlement of financial affairs. Don't let your marriage be dissolved until he has paid up by dividing all joint assets and agreeing to alimony. My attorney suggested bifurcation. It's common. It's what people do. Don't do it.

5) Don't be so damn nice.

6) Don't be nice at all.

More Labors

I hate to invoke the name of Hercules since he had to perform his seemingly impossible labors as atonement for killing his wife and children. As if that isn't bad enough, when all was said and done he became immortal and got a new wife in the bargain. I mean, Holy Zeus!

But I've been working hard--and not because I killed someone.
True,  I haven't removed a ton of horse shit or battled with a hound of hell, but I have affixed my eyes to a lot of paper. All of the paper that my divorce has generated thus far. Every paper.


A grieving brain is a slippery thing. I've looked at these papers before. I've made notes. Such as: May 7th 200,000 into chking. account from invest. acct. Yup, the note's in my handwriting. It explains something that's been nibbling away at the edges of my consciousness for months. Something that I had to find out. A mystery to be solved. Except I already knew it.  Maybe I've even blogged about it. I guess I didn't want to believe it.

Here's the deal, when someone dumps you and you go back over the weeks and months that precede that bad news, you don't want to admit to yourself that when your sweetheart was locking eyes (or other things) with you that it was done out of deception. To throw you off the trail. He takes you out for dinner and smiles and raises his glass so you won't guess that he's done that just a day or two before with someone else--and he's planning to marry her.

So here's what I know. Gosh a blog is a handy place to make lists you don't want to lose.
1) Phone calls:  To her. First thing in the morning, last thing at night for months before he left me.
2) Dinners out near the office: Price tag just right for a party of two. Plenty.
3) Money: Missing. A big fat chunk from a nicely growing investment account. Almost a year and a half untouched. Then poof! Gone six weeks before he is.
4) Therapy: How exactly does one find a therapist so expensive?

Okay. I know what I know. My brain is no longer made of teflon. My heart is no longer broken.
Maybe if I put this list on my sidebar where I can see it regularly I won't forget it.

What I Will Tack to Mr. Ex's Front Door This Weekend.

Dear Mr. Ex,

On this weekend of Labor Day it is fitting, I think, to remind you that I labored to bring our daughters into the world. And once they joined us on this earth, I continued to labor. Hearth. Heart. Home. Strawberry fields--or at least a small rectangle of sweet red fruit in our front yard. Every day for weeks a mixing bowl full I served to us, and to family, friends, and the attorneys you occasionally brought home and propped at our dining room table. Then came grapefruits and oranges. Plums and pomegranates. Loquats and guavas. But you'd tired of our eden by then. Still--I marinated chickens, squeezed lemonade, and with the same hope, I pressed the juice from our our lives. Let it be sweet, I prayed. Not saccharine. For us--only the real.
I planted roses. I planted trees. I planted hope, and I watered it. Kept it alive--in drought years, with carefully rationed tears.  Kept us alive as long as I could.
But you've let so many things die.
My pension was in those plums. My retirement in roses.  My 401-K wrapped round and round a sun that, at present, shines only on the bright planet of you.
What I ask of you is this: Divide what bounty remains.  As the sun tires of its labors this holiday weekend, promise me half of the fools' gold that glitters in the night sky of our lives.