Sunday, March 20, 2011

Sometimes, You Just Need A Good Walk In The Woods

This week we will experience our first wave of court proceedings.  Divorce isn't for the faint of heart.  I received volumes of paper in the mail yesterday forwarded from my estranged's lawyer.  There are lots of invasive financial, personal and sexual questions I have to answer.  Since I have been forthright about everything I have done and who I am, I don't know why this is a necessary part of the process.  It feels like intentional cruelty to me.  It feels like a bright light interrogation.  It feels like a tactic to waste the retainer I have until I run out of resources for court.  I will do what it takes to get to be with my children.  I have to find people who will vouch that I am a good parent.  It is interesting because I never said that he wasn't a good parent.  I never asked for more than joint custody.  My children need both of us in their lives.  It just hurts so damn much.  I miss them.  I love them more than anything.

There are people who have said to me that it was my choice to leave.  Yes, it was my choice  to leave the marriage.  It was never my choice to leave my children.  My elder son is very angry.  I hope one day he can forgive me, but I will never stop fighting for him and his brother to be with me.  I have and always will want them in my life.  I still have some things that are rightfully mine that I can sell.  I will.  I don't care about stuff.  I don't care about property anymore than I want to continue to be someone else's property.

I will never live a life that tells my children, "You don't matter.  You have to do everything for everyone else always.  It doesn't matter if you are miserable, sad, depressed, fill in the blank...  because you don't matter..."  I want my children to know that they matter and that whatever their choices or discoveries are, I will be there behind them.  I want them to know that that is really unconditional love.  Its not the ones who use you for a sounding board or an emotional crutch or even a maid.  Real unconditional love says, "I got your back."  I may be across town, but I got their back.  I didn't drag them into the unknown with me.  I didn't traumatize them by just taking them against their father's wishes.  I have a place for them just has he has kept a place for them.

We have to take pictures for court to prove we have a nice home for the boys.  We did.  We have a nice home.  It is clean and uncluttered.  It is a home.  I have to prove that to strangers.  I will.

Anger disguises itself as so many noble causes.  "I am 'protecting' the children," is sometimes just code for I am going to use them to punish you.  The absence of them will cut a deep pain in your heart just like you have cut in mine.  "I don't agree with your lifestyle, so I am turning away even if you are my own."  That is fear, embarrassment, shame, blame or upset expectations.  "You are having a mid-life crisis, and I reject this about you." I used to believe in the mid-life crisis crutch maybe until I had one?  I don't know... Maybe until I finally came to find myself?  I will never again judge someone because they finally found a direction that is fulfilling or at the very least less miserable.  It is funny that sometimes you come to yourself and like what you see finally and then you turn around and see that people around have discovered that they hate you.  Then you look at all of the others who are loving and accepting...

I don't want my children to live life for me.  I want them to discover themselves and live the life God made them to live.  A friend of mine couldn't be more opposite than me.  He doesn't get it, agree with it or comprehend it, but he still gave me money for a consultation with a lawyer.  He still loaned me the initial fee.  He said it was "because that is what real friends do."  It is good to have good friends.  Sometimes, it is good to have good friends with two-hundred dollars.  (I will pay you back buddy ... I promise).

My partner and I went walking on the beach this morning.  We took the dog with us.  We walked and cried and walk some more.  We made our way to the river.  We talked about how the boys would love it there.  We cried some more.  We then visited a historic cemetery and discovered that things could be worse.  We could be staying there instead of just visiting.  I thought about the pain and shame and blame and sadness and sorrow covering all those souls like so much dirt holding them in place.  I don't think life should hold you in place.  I think it should push you along to a better you -regardless of what other think about it.

One tombstone read, "I'd rather be riding my Harley."  I thought, "sing it brother!  I would too."  Maybe someday soon I will.

Posted by Layla Proudfoot at Sunday, March 20, 2011 0 comments

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