Human emotions, a Penske rental truck, divorce and a new outlook on life

      Human emotions are so fickle and difficult. I have no idea how you people live with them.  A short while ago, a longtime friend who I married, and suffered a much too prolonged relationship, pulled away in a Penske rental truck with more than half of what I thought was mine.  My marriage has ended.

     There were no dishes thrown or vile name calling; only a solemn parting of ways.  This ending started and stopped too many times to count, but this time it is for real and permanent.  She wants to live near her children, and there was not enough of a relationship left for her to want to stay here with me, or for me to go there with her.

     So we parted as friends with a momentary, passionless hug that would have been more appropriate for a casual friend met in a public forum.

     Our marriage, that can now be pronounced dead, (the Death Certificate will read 8:10 a.m., November 19, 2013) has never been anything great.  There were too many lies, mutual indiscretions, horrible misunderstandings, and in the case of her daughters that I helped raise, the failure to ever consummate a true family unit. 

     Still all in all, that big yellow truck headed south is taking my regular dinner companion, half of my daily conversations, my housekeeping partner, and financial confederate.  Not counting the years of pre-marital relations, we shared 32 years and two months as a couple, with likes and dislikes, common experiences both good and bad, and varied uncommon friendships, she with hers and me with mine.  Part of me left in that truck.  All of those memories we shared have now been ripped from our communal book to be separated from now on.  Okay, it’s over, and although my life won’t and can’t be the same, it can be better.

     This marriage taught me the difference between love and being in love.  I discovered that it is possible to love someone without being in love, and that may be the best way to sum this up.  I have tasted being in love, and this wasn’t it.  None-the-less, for whatever it was, there is now a void in my daily life that will have to be dealt with (not to mention a whole bunch of voids where things were that are now gone).  I know this separation is right; it is way overdue, and it will be better for both of us.  At the same time, I also know we will likely never see each other ever again.  That has my eyes a tad weepy. 

     I think I would be doing better if I was mad, but I’m not.  I am only sad.  Sad that I failed, that we both failed.  Sad that it came apart so late.  Sad she took one of the dogs and left the other, and both will miss their other master.  Sad, because that is all that’s left to feel. 

     I’m back to how you ordinary people do this.  I am beginning to have a little more respect for you humans.

     Email has friends chiming in from all over with well-meaning advice to go party, or bury myself in any activity that avails itself.  Some are pleading that I go back and do all the things I didn’t do while married.  Then one, who always seems to have the right words, is telling me that if I didn’t feel this conflicted sadness mixed with a gladdened relief, then my humanity would come into question.  Me?  Human?  Plffffthz!  (Sorry, you have a tiny bit of spittle on your cheek.)

     So now I am back to wondering how you mere mortal beings deal with this emotional crap in your day-to-day lives.  There must be some intoxicant or antidote you use to ease the turmoil.  Is there anything more than trite Hallmark sayings?  I remember in the movie version of John Berendt’s true crime novel Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, one of the many real life personalities, Lady Chablis (a drag queen), who was a part of the social scene, wherein the renown antique dealer Jim Williams murdered his gay lover in the Mercer House in old Savannah.  She (he) expressed her (his) feigned mourning over the slain male prostitute and former roommate by declaring, "Two tears in a bucket, Mother Fuck it."  That is certainly not Hallmark card quality (or even American Greetings), but it might be the best thing I’ve heard all day.

     That may be a little coarse, but it is time for me to shake off the dirt and dust of the past three decades and begin a new life.  I resolve right now that I am going to dry out these tear ducts so I can see clearer and formulate a plan to make this new part of my life better; not to ignore the past, but to concentrate on the future.

     I don’t need a lot of feedback on this post, but you are welcome to if you feel motivated.  I debated with my business partner whether I even needed to say something.  It was decided that I needed the cathartic cleansing, and as usual, she was right (damn, you’d think just once she’d get something wrong).  I do feel better now than when I wrote the starting sentence, and I guess that IS THE START!  All that is left now is to shed this pathetic public perception of me being human and get back to being the divine me.