Chapter Afterstand up, dust off, and get moving

Flipped the utilities over to my name today. Bought a small dining room table and chairs.

K__’s still out at “pilates,” which ended about an hour ago. It’s not the first time I’ve been unable to control having a train of thought that runs something like:

She’s with him.

You don’t know that.

SuuUuure.

Sure you’re sure?

No.

…

You know if you’re wrong, that makes you the asshole.

I don’t care.

Don’t care if you’re wrong, or don’t care if it makes you an asshole?

Neither. Don’t care if she’s with him or not.

Liar.

Touche.

…

You think she knows it makes me think this crazy, second-guess-myself loopy stuff?

Hard to say, but she’d probably start doing it on purpose if she found out.

Wait. So she hasn’t been filling her evenings with as many extra-curricular activities as possible? Like, that was just accidental? Or my imagination?

I might deserve it–might need that to get my head straight.

So you’re a masochist now?

That’s a prerequisite to marriage, right?

Note: If you’re keeping score, this time (and not the first), I’m the asshole. Reasonable story with corroborating evidence.

When I sat down to write this I had some other train of thought. Something about the attitude I got when I came home and revealed I’d paid actual money for dining room furniture, something about being made to feel like I should make do without or with craigslist castaways (that still cost actual money, but aren’t nearly as modern). Or that $650 is too much to pay for a bed, even though the one we bought when we got married was probably close to $3000. Fucking money.

We had a nice (?) conversation until about 1:30 am about finances and moving logistics and not-involving-any-lawyers.

As we count closer to my Dec 1st move-in (out) date K__’s had the charm cranked to eleven. It’s alternately effective and infuriating with vast plateaus of indifference. I don’t know whether it’s meant to grease the wheels for the remaining high-risk time to keep us from killing each other or whether it’s meant to somehow win me back. Probably like so much else, a bit of each. And (also) like so much else, none of the above — maybe the person K__ wants to be now is charming, nothing to do with me in the first place.

We discussed the holidays, and quickly agreed that I would spend Thanksgiving with her and her Mom (who now lives nearby) as usual. What’s unusual (besides us separating) are a few extra relatives attending. Relatives no longer in the dark about “what’s up.”

I’m normally one to stick to my initial commitments — no matter how ill-considered, but as the big day approached I panicked, called my folks, gave them the short version, and invited myself down for an overdue visit. I’m pretty sure she’s not been completely honest with her family about the circumstances, and since I’m the one moving out, any outside observer would easily conclude any problem must be mine; and what kind of asshole abandons his four-year-old anyway. I could see the whole thing going very poorly. I felt outnumbered days before any of them actually arrived, and while I’ll gladly take the underdog role, with that comes a lot of snarling and barking and (occasionally) biting fucking faces off.

Why subject any of us to that? I’d much, much rather spend four or five hours alone in a car. My family might not be my favorite people in the whole world, but they proved themselves supportive as ever. Dad served up a helping of patriarchal, steeped-in-that-old-religion bullshit, but I know he was just trying to help.

I knew I wouldn’t be able to avoid the in-laws completely — they’d be in town for the whole weekend. Sure enough, we spent the evening together Friday and, of course, everything went fine. The anticipation of the thing is always a bigger deal than the thing itself.

I’ve never been much for polite conversation and the cliched “How-are-you?” “Fine. You?” exchange. At the very least, I’d rather be creative about how I go about lying when the truth is obviously unwelcome or inappropriate.

While this personal quirk might lead to a too-much-information moment, I find myself actually thinking about “how I am,” sometimes pausing for a second to mull it over.

“Good question, actually. How am I? How do I feel?”

The old noggin stirs around in its vocabulary and offers up a nice soup of possible answers. Tired. Pathetic. Guilty. Angry. Numb. Like guessing at the ingredients in an unfamiliar dish going by the smell alone.

- -

I know that one of the reasons relationships fail is purely chemical. The routine of the everyday becomes boring and we go into dopamine withdrawal. We take each other for granted, we stop flirting, courting, trying new things together. The addict in our skull cries out for a hit and finds none forthcoming. We go into deep funks and start looking around for a cause. And what are we likely to see? The person we spend the most time with. Oh, must be their fault. Surely, it couldn’t be me. I hang out with other people and I feel great (i.e. I get plenty of dopamine.) Even the scientific method absolves me and convicts you.

Knowing all of this doesn’t seem to change any of the chemistry of it (i.e. we still feel like shit). The self-help du jour says moods are a choice and we can (nay must) learn to control them. Now, I suppose I can agree with the gist of this–the spirit of the law if not the letter. But it comes off as self-esteem / positive-thinking / law of attraction in a different guise. The common flaw is too much emphasis on feelings and not nearly enough on behavior.

Patient: “Hey, doc, it hurts when I do this.”

Doctor: “Well stop doing that.”

And, I’d have to add, go do something else.

I’m feeling all self-congratulatory because I just walked up to this gorgeous woman I’ve seen in the neighborhood 100 times and introduced myself. I even managed to give her a card without coming off like a complete douche — at least that’s the story I’m telling on my blog. If she disagrees she can make her own damn post.

I came across this a couple months ago, and it kicked my fucking ass.

I’m always really excited to come across a new song by a band I’m not familiar with — especially recently as I’ve been feeling artistically stagnant. So I immediately fired up iTunes to see what else these guys had done and (of course) couldn’t really dig the rest of it.

The lease signing went ahead as planned, and in its wake, K__ and I had several surprisingly coherent, detailed, and civil discussions about logistics. Furniture, money, child custody, the upcoming holidays, etc. Things continued to progress so smoothly, in fact, that a speck of doubt crept in. Is separation really inevitable? Are our differences truly so unresolvable?

The inertia of movement being every bit as powerful as the inertia of sitting still, and having an extreme deficit of motivation to change course at this point, I (for my part) have been sticking to the plan.

Sunday evening, we discovered that the water heater had a minor (but nonetheless very wet) leak. It’s been ruining the subfloor and creeping beyond the bathroom closet and at least as far as the hallway. This would be stressful in the best of times, and now is definitely not those times.

Nine PM on a Sunday night is an awful time to call anyone — especially when that someone will eventually be sending you a bill, so we decided not to call the plumber until morning. Instead, we turned off the valve at the heater and when that didn’t work, shut off water at the main.

Someone famous is said to have muttered something clever about people showing their true selves during moments of crisis. I can’t remember enough of it to google the correct quote, but I’m sure you know more-or-less what I’m referring to. I won’t bore you with the minutia of it, but suffice it to say I have been reminded of exactly why it is that I know it’s time to go.

Today, a friend opined (and I think I agree) that perhaps what I’m seeing is not only the inherent and natural frustration that results when a normal American is denied the necessity of running water. There is also the dawning realization that however disappointing she may find my participation in this particular crisis, it is clear that in the future there’ll be even less. To admit as much would require acknowledging that my current assistance is non-zero, in turn decreasing the validity of her complaints. Ergo: massive frustration and drama.

Last night I told my wife I’d made the appointment to sign a lease. She repeated the same questions she’s asked before, “Are you sure that’s what you want to do?” Not wanting to treat the situation lightly, I try to take the time to think about my answers before speaking, but I don’t come up with anything new, “No, I’m not sure.”

The long silence between us as we take turns speaking is a heavy punctuation. I keep expecting the echo of it to drown out what’s said after.

“Do you still love me?”

“I’m so disinvested now, I don’t even know how to answer that.”

“Are we still friends?”

“We’re barely business partners. We’re roommates.”

On it went through the night. Suddenly she’s finding the courage and intelligence to ask all the right questions.

“If I ended my ‘friendship’ with T__, would you stay?” (scare quote emphasis is mine)

“I don’t know. I didn’t honestly think that was on the table.”

It rained all yesterday, last night, and it’s still going strong. This morning she cried and asked for a hug as I left for work.

Goddamn, human beings are so stupid; by which I mean they’re perfectly capable of figuring out what’s important once it’s being lifted off their fingertips, but not one fraction of a moment before.

By this time tomorrow, I will have put a deposit down on “a little two bedroom place” and begun the baby-steps towards moving out — separation. I’m extremely fortunate to be in a financial position that allows for such an option. I literally would not know what to do were that not the case.

About a month ago, one of my few remaining single friends lent me a key to his place (he’s got a spare bed and bathroom in the basement). At the time, my plan was to crash there while hunting down something more permanent, but I haven’t used it in awhile. For one, the fastest way to burn a friendship is to stay a houseguest too long. I didn’t know what kind of timeline I’d be on, and it didn’t seem polite to leave things so open-ended. Then there’s the boy. Having a job means (on weekdays) I’m limited to the breakfast hour and the few hours around dinner and bedtime. My wife and I have agreed to joint custody, so he’ll stay with me half the time once I have my own place (and furniture). Until then, I’m either stuck where I am, or doing a ridiculous amount of driving.

Let me reiterate how lucky I know I am. It’s actually possible for me to juggle all this, probably with several scheduling options. The vast majority of people don’t have such luxuries.

So, I’ve been biting my tongue and sleeping on the couch. Last night, I told my son I was going to get my own house and he’d have his own room there to sleep in sometimes — like how he stays in “his” bed at grandma’s house when he has a sleepover. He’s been taking all of it so well, I’m not very confident he understands. If not, he’ll figure it out soon enough. I’m not sure I’m capable of explaining it in a way he can understand, and I’d rather use the emotional energy on bedtime stories.

I first imagined this site six months ago, but hoping I wouldn’t need it, and not wanting to help make it necessary, I waited. But, despite it all, here I am.

My relationship with my wife has always been a roller coaster. Dating, breakups, engagement, before kids, after — no phase has been completely sheltered from the storm. The last couple years have been especially rough, and about six months ago I started snooping about her email sensing something … out of the ordinary. It wasn’t long before I found “what I was looking for.” Nothing definitive, nothing that’d stand up in court, but troubling all the same.

If you’d asked me whether I’d be willing to hang around in that kind of shadow, I’d have assured you, “absolutely not.” But, months later, I type this from the same couch in the same house. I’m still not sure what’s going to happen. When I initially conceived this site, it was to chronicle my path to freedom and happiness. As I realized just how conflicted I would be, I noted that the site could just as easily follow our journey to reconciliation and true love.