Divorce for Dummies
Dangerous Blogging Territory
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JoeUser Forums
So I'm sitting here at my parents house who live less than a mile from my work so I usually hang out here on my breaks when I don't have enough time/energy to bike all the way back to my apartment. Anyway, walking through the kitchen I see a stack of library books whose titles don't jump out at me except for one near the bottom Divorce for Dummies.
Now in any other household you may think this was a weird joke or something, but I know there are some genuine feelings behind the borrowing of book titled as such.
It would probably be pointless to give the entire background of my parents marriage that didn't so much recede like a balding man as much as it was like a man born bald that knew he didn't have any hair but figured there was nothing he could do about it but live with a cold head for the rest of his life.
At this time I should probably point out that I'm prone to analogies that make little sense.
My siblings (who may be reading this) and I have long thought our parents would be better off separate. It's not like there was any violence, cheating, or other soap opera-esque circumstances that made us feel this way. It was moreso that my parents never seemed to dig each other. We were all raised in a household where any physical displays of affection between them were very rare and playful flirting even rarer.
Our parents genuinely love their kids, but this love did not stem from a loving marriage. Rather my parents ran their family like a co-managed business. They divided out responsibilities between them that left little wiggle room for variation. This is not a rare thing of course...many heard "just wait until your father comes home," or "go ask your mother."
My parents marriage (over 25 years) can be characterized by lack of emotion and a communal sense of stubbornness. I don't want to place "blame," if that's even an appropriate word since I think all my siblings would agree that we've wished for them to be divorced for a long time, but neither of my parents have taken very good care of themselves. They fell into a trap of guilt dragging each other further and further down into a hole of despair blaming each other and themselves for not figuring out how to make their marriage blissful. But I'm not sure if they've ever even thought it was blissful.
In this way it's not like they suddenly got bored or just "couldn't work it out," but maybe a different sense of responsibility to their family that blinded their personal aspirations of happiness outside of their home.
Hopefully as their youngest child (my lil' bro) grows up they'll realize their lives aren't over and get be much better than they are. I think that's been the most difficult thing to get either of them to accept in the 100s of conversations I've had with both of them on the subject. They're really scared of feeling good about themselves again because they fear it will come at the expense of their obligations to their family.
Well if either of them stumble across this blog entry I hope they can appreciate that, at least this child of theirs has always hoped to make it their obligation to picturing a better life for themselves.
I don't know if my parents will announce a divorce tomorrow, next year, or never. And a divorce will not bring about an instant remedy to the personal issues they both need to face. But it will provide them with an opportunity to focus on what they feel is important in their own lives separate from the burdens they have placed upon each other.
SuspeckTed
PS - Divorce for Dummies? I mean come on! I think I might put my copy of Mixed Drinks for Dummies on top of it. They should be required to be checked out together.
Now in any other household you may think this was a weird joke or something, but I know there are some genuine feelings behind the borrowing of book titled as such.
It would probably be pointless to give the entire background of my parents marriage that didn't so much recede like a balding man as much as it was like a man born bald that knew he didn't have any hair but figured there was nothing he could do about it but live with a cold head for the rest of his life.
At this time I should probably point out that I'm prone to analogies that make little sense.
My siblings (who may be reading this) and I have long thought our parents would be better off separate. It's not like there was any violence, cheating, or other soap opera-esque circumstances that made us feel this way. It was moreso that my parents never seemed to dig each other. We were all raised in a household where any physical displays of affection between them were very rare and playful flirting even rarer.
Our parents genuinely love their kids, but this love did not stem from a loving marriage. Rather my parents ran their family like a co-managed business. They divided out responsibilities between them that left little wiggle room for variation. This is not a rare thing of course...many heard "just wait until your father comes home," or "go ask your mother."
My parents marriage (over 25 years) can be characterized by lack of emotion and a communal sense of stubbornness. I don't want to place "blame," if that's even an appropriate word since I think all my siblings would agree that we've wished for them to be divorced for a long time, but neither of my parents have taken very good care of themselves. They fell into a trap of guilt dragging each other further and further down into a hole of despair blaming each other and themselves for not figuring out how to make their marriage blissful. But I'm not sure if they've ever even thought it was blissful.
In this way it's not like they suddenly got bored or just "couldn't work it out," but maybe a different sense of responsibility to their family that blinded their personal aspirations of happiness outside of their home.
Hopefully as their youngest child (my lil' bro) grows up they'll realize their lives aren't over and get be much better than they are. I think that's been the most difficult thing to get either of them to accept in the 100s of conversations I've had with both of them on the subject. They're really scared of feeling good about themselves again because they fear it will come at the expense of their obligations to their family.
Well if either of them stumble across this blog entry I hope they can appreciate that, at least this child of theirs has always hoped to make it their obligation to picturing a better life for themselves.
I don't know if my parents will announce a divorce tomorrow, next year, or never. And a divorce will not bring about an instant remedy to the personal issues they both need to face. But it will provide them with an opportunity to focus on what they feel is important in their own lives separate from the burdens they have placed upon each other.
SuspeckTed
PS - Divorce for Dummies? I mean come on! I think I might put my copy of Mixed Drinks for Dummies on top of it. They should be required to be checked out together.
