January 3, 2007 marked the second anniversary of my divorce hearing. I once regretted my willing compliance with that ritual of matrimonial annihilation. I thought I should have protested, refused to play along. But I remind myself that the battle was lost. She had turned away to some other man, some other life, another identity. There was nothing better to do than appear in court to disavow my wife as she wished.
Some of the women I took up with after my wife have moved on, the ones who kept in touch. One has a boyfriend and is much happier than when we met, both of us recently abandoned by our spouses at the time. Another is engaged and bought a house with her beau. These two women were lovers and close friends. Now they drift away with their own lives, our relationship diminishing as their lives turn inward toward their romantic relationships.
All I know about my ex-wife is that she moved out of state. I have no idea where or why or with whom. That person completely abandoned her previous life, including all relations with me, pets, and belongings. Her identity change was symbolized by reverting her surname to her maiden name. Her attitude toward me altered considerably. We haven't spoken for, I don't know, two years or so, though it wasn't that long ago that I still wished I could speak to her. As far as I have been concerned, I have considered my ex-wife to be as irretrievable and non-existent as if she were dead. For all intents and purposes, there is no friction between that belief and my reality. Legally, Catherine Stirling no longer exists. The world acted accordingly and I complied, altering my life as if she no longer existed. It is a strange, painful experience and process: the legal abnegation and dissolution of two identities; one person freed to a new identity by another person being forced to relinquish theirs. But changing one's true identity is not as easy as uttering the speech act to declare it.
I am currently romantically unattached. I could be, but I am not ready yet. I am barely divorced, in the sense that "divorced" is a new identity that I have just barely established for myself. For the past two years I spent most of my time dealing with the end of my "married" and "husband" identities and beliefs and feelings and then establishing a new identity and set of beliefs as, you could say, "a man in his mid-30s with an established career, divorced by his college sweetheart a few years ago."
I think I have fully absorbed and yes, even recovered, from the drenching grief and stress and shock that comes from having one's identity forcibly and radically altered and a beloved spouse suddenly absented from one's life. But I have just barely realized benefits from my new freedom, which seemed a burden and a thing to escape at first. Along the way I discovered and learned ways to turn freedom into possibility and I have worked on "progressing" in various areas of my life such as financial, professional and physical. After all, what else is there to do but make oneself busy with life?
It's amazing how memories can be unlocked in great richness by investigating things, by smelling, feeling, seeing things one has not handled or seen for some time. I took my time sorting through papers and other things from my marriage. Gradually and sometimes abruptly over two years I threw away things that belonged to her or us, or I donated them to charity. I still have (why, I'm not sure, maybe in case I never marry again) a small collection of mementos -- my wedding band, the poem she gave me on our first anniversary, some pictures. Other than that, nothing remains. I went through the last pile of miscellaneous clothing a few months ago, pulling out napkins to throw out that we'd used during several family holidays, piling up hats and scarves to donate, separating out a few old socks that I could match for myself from a wicker basket neglected since I moved it from my marital house to my townhouse.
Divorce teaches one about the lack of intrinsic value in things, the variable identities of things as well as people, that value depends on relationship. What were once meaningful symbols and valued artifacts become disused tokens signifying nothing, as words in the lexicon of a dead language from a lost world. Their value can be remembered, even desired, but it's gone.
My ex-wife left pretty much all her and all what you'd call "our" stuff with me at our house when she left. From my perspective, she seemed really irresponsible. I was working full time, like always, and she had the summer off, like usual. She could have helped out a bit but she was, I later learned, suddenly wrapped up in a new relationship (which she never, to me, admitted or discussed at all, which shows how much a person's identity can chage -- i.e., to such an extent that they no longer recognize or respect any personal connection with you). She asked me to store all her and our things indefinitely. I said no. She said she didn't care what happened to any of it. There was a mountain of stuff. As far as selling the house, taking care of the two cats, paying bills -- all me too. She skipped out on a life, which is what happens when one's identity is changed radically. It was really weird. I thought she'd had a psychotic break. Her skin broke out something fierce. She lost weight and looked emaciated. She started a new relationship immediately, as I mentioned, months before the actual divorce. She expressed seething anger and contempt for me, which seemed, to me at the time, fool that I was still living in a world that no longer existed, irrational! I watched my loving wife of 6 years transform into a vicious, uncompromising, ruthless adversary in a matter of months, maybe weeks. That experience changed how I view many things (I'd be a complete fool if it didn't!).
Its been two and a half years since she left and I finally feel OK, like normal, like I have established the foundation I need to go forward from here as a fully functioning, happy and healthy individual and not just some wounded victim of love.
Time is an undeniably important factor in getting over the end of a relationship. I won't say it heals all. But it is important. There is no magic cure, no drug, no philosophy, no affirmation, no practice that can shortcut you past the suffering and work required to get back on your own two feet. Suffering and work both take time.
I think I am lucky to be able to say that I have dabbled in relationships since my divorce, but I have spent most of my time single, especially the past 7 or 8 months. I have accomplished a lot since she left me. One finds ways to turn water into wine, spin essence out of existence, watch what happens and learn as one goes. That's all there is to do.
