Pancakes Taste Like Poverty: And Other Post-Divorce Revelations (14 page)

My psycho nostalgia phase wouldn't have been
complete without you.

A complete disregard for reality, statistics,
experience, evidence and logic is what keeps the Nostalgia phase
active and also helps with the next crucial stage of Loneliness:

The Rom-Com Stage

I have never been a romantic comedy girl. In 9th
grade,
Natural Born Killers
was my favorite movie. I can still
recite it. After that, indie character studies and documentaries
became my go-to types. I refused to watch the Notebook. It took years
and a handful of guys telling me "no for real, this one's good"
for me to finally watch.

Yet during the Rom-Com stage, I devoured every
Meg Ryan, Sandra Bullock, Julia Roberts, Katherine Heigl, Jennifer
Lopez-starring nonsense I could get my hands on.

Falling in love in three days?

Yup,
totally
possible.

Last minute chases where hot guys steal mopeds or
run through airports to boldly declare their love in sappy monologues
in front of hushed onlookers so the heroine, taken completely by
surprise, can swoon with dewy tear-filled eyes?

Sign. Me. Up.

I even found the unintentionally romantic movies
exceptionally romantic.

Anyone else cry at the end of
Zack and Miri
Make a Porno
?

Anyone?

No, just me in my Rom-Com Stage.

I still can't get through the first 15 minutes of
Up
. I have no idea what that movie is about. I started
watching The Bachelor and The Bachelorette during this time.

But as I said before, one would have to suspend
disbelief for a long time for the Rom-Com stage to last. Eventually,
reality, statistics, evidence, experience and logic come crashing
down in your lap and you realize that men don't typically run through
airports to recite monologues to you. And you realize that every
Rom-Com is about how the couple
meets,
but no Rom-Com dares
show you what happens seven years later because you
know
what
happens seven years later and it sucks and that's when the next stage
hits.

Repulsion

I became repulsed - completely
repulsed
-
by the idea of sharing my space, my life, my bed, my words, my ideas,
my opinions with another man ever, ever, ever. Everything every man
ever did annoyed the living shit out of me. I was
not
the girl
to vent to.

If you said, "Ugh, my boyfriend is
always
leaving dishes in the sink," I would answer with "You know
what? He doesn't have any respect and let me tell you something, it
gets
worse
. First, it's dishes. Then the sorry motherfucker
starts leaving his
socks
everywhere. Then the next thing you
know you're married and he's telling you a woman's place is in the
kitchen. Then he'll try to beat you and then you gotta run away. Dump
his sorry ass now before it's too late!"

cricket,
cricket, cricket

I frowned upon all your marriages despite my
well-wishing. The statistics were constantly in my mind. Half of all
first marriages and two-thirds of all second marriages fail. Why
date? Why bother? What's the point? It won't work. It's just going to
fail. I'll just raise my kids and then just be alone. Maybe I'll get
a dog. But dogs die. Nah, alone is better.

But alone is
not
better and I couldn't
completely hate men because of one nagging problem.

The Sex Brain Stage

In the last two months, I've watched the movie
300
at least twenty times and it ain't for the plot.

It's for Fassbender and Butler in loincloths
growling and shirtless and sweaty for a full two hours.

Sex.

Is on the brain.

All the time.

I don't want to give away all my dirty thoughts,
but I have a constant running list of exactly where and how I'd want
to have sex with every man on my “hot guys” themed
Pinterest board circulating in my mind as soon as my brain has an
idle minute.
But, month after month of near-constant parenting
and cleaning and disciplining and looking frumpy has led me to my
current stage of loneliness

Paralysis

There is this strange dueling that goes on when
you reach this stage of simultaneously feeling ready to date again,
but also complete terror of even speaking to the opposite sex ever
again.

Maybe that's a little melodramatic. My landlord
is a dude and I can speak to him just fine.

No, but seriously, it's really scary. Especially
if you take the time to do a bunch of emotional archeology and detect
your flaws and examine them and change them or accept them. You start
to feel like a big ball o'flaws. And you're so out of practice. And
there are so many better options out there. Why would anyone choose
you?

And then you have those well-meaning friends who
say that their cousin's mother-in-law is married to a guy who married
her even though she had seven kids and he treats her like a princess
so I shouldn't give up.

And then you have those
other
well-meaning
friends who say that the only men who would want to date woman with
three kids are clearly either pedophiles or gay men trying to appease
their conservative parents, so I'd better invest in a good vibrator
and a Costco pack of AA batteries because it's the long dirt nap for
my love life.

And then I think men my age who have never had
kids or been married must be either a) perpetually frat-boying b) a
reclusive gamer or c) not interested in having a wife and kids
anyway. So I guess the pool is dry.

But this is where my unscientific study ends.

I do not know what is beyond Paralysis because I
am, in fact, paralyzed.

I'd like to project that some sort of
"Acceptance" is beyond this and I'll be one of those people
who just don't care either way. Let's all meditate on that because I
could use an extra dose of peace of mind.
Things
Not to Say to Your Ex Wife
If
you abandon your wife and kids by neglecting to take any financial or
emotional responsibility, your parenting opinions no longer matter to
the now single, exhausted, mother of said kids.

If
your kids are acting like normal, butt-head kids, and your exhausted
ex-wife puts them to bed and you hear one of them whining through the
phone do
not
say: "Aw, they sound so unhappy. Was putting them to bed really
necessary?" and instead say absolutely nothing.
You chose
the life and existence you have now. You no longer have a vote.
Later that
Night...
My
7 year old son, Jack, is singing "Goodbye Yellow Brick Road"
to the girls to help them sleep. Happening now. Cuteness overload. I
might vomit from the sweetness.

Blondie Claus

“What's
something your kids want or need for Christmas?” CBL asked me
over the phone.
“Uh, I dunno?”
“Well, like
do they read a lot? Do they need some books? See 'cause my husband
and I always like to do some Christmas for my mamas because we know
things are tight and the babies need something under the
tree.”
Holy shit.
I don't know what kind of
magical, magic karma is making this happen...
Thank
You 2012 – December 2012
Despite feeling
that humans, as a whole, have lost their humanity and despite my
ex-husband being the absolute worst recently, 2012 has proved to be
the best year of my life.

This time last year I was living a sullen, lonely
life in a dark two-bedroom apartment in Tampa, Florida. I wrote about
feeling punished around that time.

I read it now and I am glad to say that I don't
even know that girl. It happened that quickly.

My moving home was exactly the right thing to do
and in a creepy, law-of-attraction-like way by just making a few
correct decisions, the Universe aligned me with the
right
people and the
right
circumstances and my life is so
substantially different that my chest and heart swell. I can
feel
my heart swell, like when the Grinch's heart grew.

Oddly, though, the statistics of my life are
actually slightly worse.

I have even less of a job than I had in Tampa. I
spend even less time away from my kids. I've had two nights away from
them so far since April. I get even less child support from my ex -
close to nothing now.

But I have so much love that the technicalities
simply don't burn the way they used to.

In Tampa, I was swinging on the trapeze with no
net and no one to catch me. I was surrounded by people who
communicated in contempt, condescension, bitterness, self-pity and
self-absorption. With exception of Kelley, Bridget and my ex's one
cool sister everything was black.

Since moving home I have crossed paths with some
of the most fearless, uplifting, supportive women I have ever known.
I learned more this year than I did in the 29 years before it -
guaranteed.

Here's an overview:

The past is as relevant
as you allow it to be -
On my 31st birthday, I will have
gone a full year without sex. As sad as it sounds, it is a huge
accomplishment for me.
My life and identity were really separated
into two parts: Before Marriage and Kids and After Marriage and Kids.
I have not done anything else. Before marriage I was your textbook
insecure girl using sex and male attention for validation. That
insecurity is exactly what led me into the arms of my ex-husband.
He
was a terrible boyfriend and an even worse husband but, to me, it was
the punishment I
deserved
for being a careless slut. I was the
ultimate slut-shamer but I only shamed myself. Even years of faithful
servitude as a mother and wife couldn't cleanse me of my guilt. I
felt like it was written all over me. That it was part of who I
was,
and that it would eventually creep back out and swallow me whole.
I
actually felt
bad
for my cheating, drinking ex because it was
my
slutty ways that forced him into a life of domesticity in
the first place. I
deserved
his anger, resentment, blame, and
avoidance.

When I got divorced and moved to Mobile, my lack
of childcare created a life of celibacy. I do not have the freedom
for an active sex life. But the opportunity has presented itself a
few times and I have declined. My best friend, Chris, even applauded
me after I decided not to sleep with a former classmate:
"Jessica!
You've grown standards!"

Yes, I have grown standards. I had none before,
obviously. But this proved to me that my choices and actions are not
"me." And those choices and actions are completely
irrelevant now anyway. I'm not sure how it served me, subconsciously,
to believe that I was unworthy of respect, love or effort but that
twisted thought pattern is gone.

I'm worth the wait and the effort.

The only reason any of my past choices were
affecting me was because I was allowing them to.

If someone shows you who
they are, believe them.
I
believe this is a Maya Angelou quote and it sure is the truth.

Things change. But one thing that has never
changed is my ex-husband. Sure, he has more tattoos than when I met
him and he drinks less, but he is still the person I met when we were
19 and 24, only now I can see him with my "reality" eyes.

I never had any reason to believe he could be a
good father or partner. He's done such an excellent job of keeping
everyone's expectations low that the tiniest showings of tenderness
get blown out of proportion.

He spent two days in our house this month and, in
the words of my oldest child, "it felt like a week." He has
not paid even 1/5 of the minimum child support ordered despite being
an able bodied, single, good looking white male who does not have to
pay for childcare and has 24 free hours in the day.

I was hoping, by talking to him in person, I
could understand why he is unable to take responsibility for the
kids. Maybe there is an illness I don't know about, or some remorse,
or maybe I can motivate him?

Nope. None of the above.

He showed up with no Christmas gifts. He
contributed an entire $60 for the care of his three children this
month. He wanted to discuss, seriously, his idea to move to New York
to pursue dance at age thirty-five with no professional dance
background. He ate my food and used my car and did not offer a penny
for gas or groceries. He threw no less than three temper tantrums a
day - raising his voice to me in front of my kids while staying in
my
house. He learned almost nothing about the kids. I watched as one of
them would start telling him about their life and he would interrupt
and word-vomit about chakras, yoga, stretching, essential oils, and
the like. His son wrote him a letter begging him to grow up, get a
real job and be a man. His response? Absolutely none.

Bottom line: This guy is a deadbeat. Period.

No amount of negotiating, discussion,
threatening, begging, placating or ass-kissing will change it. And
here's the kicker:

He's always been. I just didn't want to believe
it.

In the two days he was in my home I felt like
there was a vice on my chest. We had always been able to get along
before, but that was when I was just
in
the shit. I didn't
know there was another way to live.

This time I just couldn't stand to be around him.
I swallowed my words so many times in 48 hours while he went off like
a toddler because I didn't want my kids to think I was bullying their
dad.

I don't want to influence their feelings.