My Verbally Abusive Marriage

In the weeks leading up to “the separation day”, I would cry to my sister over the phone and tell her that I was “so fucking lonely” even though Will, our boys, my friends, and she were there for me. I was lonely; it was the first time I’d realized it, and I wondered how I could be so lonely amidst so many people.

I was looking outward for the cause of my loneliness, just as I looked outward, to other people, for a solution to end it. Isn’t that what we’re told to do when we’re depressed and lonely? Volunteer, make friends, … fill your life full of activities and responsibilities to be happy. But that’s bullshit. Those good deeds, the other people, the outward motions, they merely distract from the loneliness. They don’t erase it.

When I drew this picture, I didn’t know that the blackness inside of me was loneliness. I thought it was a flaw within me; that if I could find the source of the flaw, then the blackness would disappear. I was searching the blackness with a flashlight, but looking for the wrong objects. What the flashlight revealed was a great emptiness. A vast, tightly compacted, black hole. Nothing else.

But I missed the blackness because I was looking for THE FLAW.

Realizing I was lonely when I was still with Will was more painful in many ways than the loneliness I now feel. I brought that pain on myself because I EXPECTED him to “make me” not lonely. I thought that if I reached out hard enough, long enough, that he would eventually connect with me, ease my pain.

Expecting him to “make me” feel something caused the flurry of side emotions. Every time he didn’t do as I expected, I felt betrayed, hurt, unloved, crushed…those emotions distracted me from the truth and any possible solutions.

Loneliness is realizing there is a black emptiness within myself. Loneliness is the place where I do not allow the light.

I chose to keep this black hole inside me because searching the blackness with a tiny flashlight is scary; finding NOTHING when I hoped to find THE SOURCE is actually terrifying. (Kind of like in horror movies when the flashlight is darting from corner to corner – you don’t want the heroine to find the monster, but when she does see it then there is a sweet release. At least now she knows from which direction to fight or run.)

But I am changing course. I’m not going to search that blackness with a tiny light. I’m going to flood it with light.

If my loneliness is like a black hole, a dead star, then in time, it will explode outward from the force of its own compaction. When it explodes, it will form a new universe, a new beginning. All new. All me, but re-formed and rejuvenated.

I am unaware of when my black hole’s lifespan will evolve. What is the moment before the explosion going to feel like? Will I notice when it happens? Will I feel the Big Bang?

Is it possible that an infusion of intensive LIGHT, which is both nothing and everything on which our world depends, could hasten a black hole’s end? Is LIGHT the catalyst for the Big Bang?

I am going to concentrate on pushing light into the vast emptiness within me. Whenever I feel the rumblings of discomfort in my gut, I am going to imagine real love as a light source and PUSH that light into that dark space. I am not looking for anything. I know there is nothing there to see because it is too densely compacted to see anything right now. But after the explosion, ALL will come into the light; I will KNOW what I’ve created. And once I know, then I can either do something about it or leave it alone to see how it develops on its own.

I will have a new universe inside of me. A new universe to tend to, love and cherish. I can enjoy it and cease to rely on the external world for manufactured and temporary joy.

Take in the light, black hole. Your lifespan is at its end.

“…Stephen Hawking thinks that once matter falls into a black hole and reaches the Singularity, this Singularity at the quantum scale may actually become a gateway or a spawning ground for a new universe which would exist in some adjacent set of spacetime dimensions. Black holes formed in our universe, according to Lee Smolin, may actually spawn universes beyond our own.” - Ask the Astronomer

I LOVE MY JOB! I am working for a woman who owns a furniture refinishing business. Her shop foreman is teaching me everything I need to know to do a professional refinishing job. I get along really well with them, and they say that I am an easy learner and only need to be told something once. (We’ll see how long I can keep that up – there’s a LOT to remember! LOL)

It is part time, minimum wage right now, but the owner is expanding soon and she wanted me in on the “ground floor”… I think that’s a wonderful thing.

Will and I get along when there are witnesses, but not so much when there are none. That’s okay. I can deal. Especially now that I have my own home to go to at the end of the day. I think if I ever have the opportunity to advise someone in a similar situation, I will tell them to move away from the memories, the pain, and the patterns by physically moving from the home.

I’ve got to tell you, financially I am not “set”. My expenses outweigh my income, and I’m locked into them for at least another year. Well, unless I want to ruin my credit. I’ve also had to charge things to my credit card, and now I have that bill, too. The fortunate thing is that I have enough to cover my rent through the month of August, which means I have until then to make up the difference.

Nevertheless, I am happier and confident that I will be able to overcome the financial situation and move forward with grace. Too many miraculous, magical events have occurred recently for me to believe otherwise.

I’ve worked hard. I’ve overcome much pain. I am able to handle the new pains that come at me as he and I separate from one another. The hardest pain to overcome pertains to our children, the fear that I will not see them as I wish. But this is simply a fear, and I cannot let it stand in my way of creating a life that is joyful, full of love, and fulfilling in every way.

He’s taking me to court to change the visitation. He isn’t happy that he doesn’t get to be with the boys on weekends, yet he’s only asked to see them on a weekend once. I want the boys to be with their dad, too; but Will is unresponsive to my requests to rotate weeks. He’d rather I see them every other weekend.

Of course.

Court next week…I hope I get what I want, but, if I don’t, then I’ll manage the pain. I’m a big girl, and I can take it. I do wish I didn’t have to handle so much of it.

Back in March, I spent a couple of days writing a story for a Memoirs, Ink short-story contest. I didn’t win, but now I can share the story with you.

This story did not factually happen the way it is presented. I drew from my last night with Will and all the other times that were (and are) so vivid in my memory to create a snapshot. Again, this story is a mash-up of times and places, a reorganization of reality, with a knife thrown in because I had only 1500 words to tell this story.

DayBreak

“I don’t believe you,” he said. “You’re calm. You’re calculating your next move … I can see it in your eyes.”

“What?” I asked. I felt my eyes scrunch at their lids, felt my brow knit together into the one wrinkle on my face, off-center between my eyebrows by a fraction of an inch.

He used to smile at me when he saw that wrinkle appear, run his finger along it gently. Now, years later, looking into his whiskey reddened face, I understood why he loved that wrinkle. The subtle line showed my first signs of anger. It was his clue that he was getting to me.

“I can’t trust you when you’re calm,” he continued. I felt my wrinkle deepen. “Why won’ cha you call me an asshole, a bastard? Why won’ cha yell at me no more?” he said, “I’d respect that more than this calm, manipulative thing you’ve been doin’ to me lately.”

He grabbed his drink from my desk. I smelled the sourness of the whiskey as he pulled the glass toward his pinched mouth. He took a sip, looked into his half-empty glass with narrowed eyes, and then finally relaxed his face enough to gulp the rest.

I felt the wrinkle disappear, my face relaxed as if I were his mirror image. Calm for an instant. But then his knuckles whitened on the glass and he brought it down fast, stopping it an inch above the surface of my desk. My hand gripped the computer mouse tighter than a second before. He concentrated on his hand and banged the glass to the desk three times, seeming to need the punctuation of sound. I squeezed the mouse three times harder and felt my ribs clench together in my chest.

My eyes were wide as he slowly defocused from the offending glass and settled his greener-than-sober eyes on me. “What’s that look for? What’s wrong with you?” he whispered, emphasizing the “wrong”.

We looked at each other for a long silent second, me wide open and scared and him white-knuckled and angry. Was he angry because I was frightened? Was he mad because I wasn’t angry?

It would be wise to choose anger. Smart to give him what he wanted. My mind shot five minutes into the future and I saw myself yelling and crying, shouting horrible things I didn’t mean to placate him. I foresaw his muscles relax, envisioned him turning away toward the kitchen. He would be saying, “You’re fucking irrational. I can’t talk to you,” with a sneer on his lips.

I would hear the ice banging into his glass, then hear the Coke fizz briefly before the Jim Beam silenced the fuss.

What he wanted was an excuse to keep drinking.

Spinning out of the vision, looking into his eyes, I realized I was stuck in a tight corner, my only exit through him. If I stood from my seat, I would have to lean into his space. Would he allow me to stand? I decided he wouldn’t.

I blinked my eyes, then pinched my lids together tightly for a moment. Opening them, I saw that he was leaning in closer to me, bending at his waist and eyeing me curiously. I felt like an unknown type of animal the hunter must study before killing. “What are you doing?” I asked.

“Tryin’ to figger out what you’re gonna do,” he said, tilting his head a little and slowly pushing his chin toward my face until he managed to look down at me even though our noses were aligned. I felt his breath on my cheek.Smelled the residual stench of alcohol mixed with sweat as if it were my own. Familiar. Threatening. Vile.

I didn’t move. I thought of how a deer froze in the road as if its stillness guaranteed immunity from the car barreling down on it. The car always won. I saw my carcass in a ditch.

I snapped back in my chair. He startled. I rose up from under him and escaped the corner. I didn’t go far, turning to face him as quickly as I could from a new position near the freedom of the kitchen and its exterior door. Six feet of air stood between him and me, and my purse was three feet beyond him on the table by the front door. Could I exit the kitchen and then round to the front door, re-enter the house to grab my purse and get to the car before he could stop me? I considered his slowed and drunken state, but I doubted my ability to execute the plan. I imagined that once I was out of the house he would lock the doors, and I would be outside in my socks and the cold dark rain.

Or worse, he would chase me outside to subdue me. I would run, but he would tackle me. I would fight, but he would win. What did it mean to win? What did he want from me?

“What do you want from me?” I yelled, knowing he wanted me to yell. “You are scaring the hell out of me!”

He slowly stood erect, a delayed reaction that bought time for his voice to switch to a croon. “You’re scared? Come on, Woman. Have I ever hurt you before?” he said, corners of his lips lifting upward while the centers stayed straight. He slightly lowered his head like you do when you peer at your naughty child over the top of your glasses. I expected him to tsk and shake his head in disappointment.

He may have forgotten holding my face over the lit stove burner and using my neck to swing my head into the wall, but I hadn’t. Five years had passed between that night and this, but I remembered it clearly.

I put my hand to my mouth partly remembering the heat and partly in shame. Why hadn’t I left him then? Why was I still here?

He took a slushy step toward me and I heard the sole of his Ridge Desert Storm boot slide barely over the surface of the wooden floor. At 1 a.m. he was still wearing his uniform and boots. That meant his knife was still attached to his belt, in its case, positioned horizontally not vertically.

I took a step backward, purposefully staring into his eyes so I wouldn’t glance at the knife.

He wore the knife horizontally so he could pull the 5-inch blade from his side with a smooth backward motion before giving a powerful forward thrust. He’d shown me the move, proudly, not long ago. The knife was too long to be regulation, but he’d said “Some of us get to carry what we want,” and I hadn’t doubted him. He was a stellar soldier.

“Why do ya gotta be so different from me, Woman? Why d’ya havta challenge me all the time?” He took another but steadier step my way. My thighs tightened into coiled springs. He subtly rounded his back. My torso twisted slightly facilitating my right arm’s creeping motion toward my own imaginary weapon. I was gonna take my knife and twist it into something raw.

“I only want you to respect me,” he said. His glassy eyes filled with tears. “Why can’t ya respect yur husband, Woman? Why?” He moved toward me, the toe of his boot rubbing the floor somehow wrong. He stumbled and then fell to his knees, putting his hands to his face, shamed. He sobbed. I felt the tension drain from my body. I couldn’t run.

I dropped to my knees and pulled his head to my breast. My eyes welled up with tears and we cried together for a while. He cried until he passed out on my lap and I let him sleep there while my legs grew numb.

I sobbed my goodbyes to the sleeping soldier. He seemed innocent like this, on my lap, in my arms. I smoothed his thick dark hair. I wondered if he would wake to mimic my broken heart, to express grief in the same way I now mourned, realizing we would never grow old together, never see our children, and never once touch one another, ever again.

It was a comforting thought, thinking he may weep for me.

I gently placed his head on the golden wood floor then straightened my legs to get the blood flowing.  I uncased the knife at his side, and carried it with me to our bedroom. Packing, I would stare at the knife at times, reminding myself why I was leaving. It would be easier to pretend he hadn’t wanted to stab me, that I had imagined the whole thing. I wanted to crawl into the bed and sleep away the pain. Instead, I packed.

On this side of daybreak, I stepped over the soldier on the floor. I laid his knife on the table by the front door, took up my purse, and drove away.

I am FINALLY moved into my sweet home. I won’t lie to you – this week has been a roller coaster.

When I started carting things from the old house to the new, I cried quite a bit. I never wanted this marriage to be over. I never wanted to separate so completely, so materially. But I am glad I am the one moving from the marital home. I felt like a stranger there. I felt out of place.

Feeling like a stranger in our marital home was the tough. Why would I feel like this in a home I created with items I loved? Throughout our married life, Will let me decorate the house as I wished. He even let me paint colors on the walls after we moved here in 2003. He never complained about my choice of curtains, rugs, towels, etc. I furnished the house pretty much as I chose.

When I moved out this week, I got to thinking about why I chose the items I was moving. Some things I didn’t want to take but felt that I needed to take “for now”. I struggled with leaving three things:

1. A print I had framed called “La Belle Dame Sans Merci”. I left it because I purchased it while he was deployed last time. The knight in the picture actually looks like Will; I had so wanted him to come home and rescue me from the pain I felt. I so wanted him to come home and be the knight in shining armor. It was an unrealistic expectation, and not one I ever want to repeat. I don’t want to ever think another person can rescue me.

2. A print by Klimt called “The Kiss”. This is another image that I hoped would represent my relationship. Longing for that kind of love, from Will, … it’s a wish, but my heart has no more room for wishes.

3. A family picture taken on the day he returned from the deployment. It’s a snapshot, really, but it is the last picture taken of us as a family. We’re smiling, I have my arm across his shoulder. Again, I was hopeful; I didn’t know what was to come. I wrestled with leaving the picture – I mean, we are our boys’ family. That won’t change. But I couldn’t bring it here. It’s too painful to know that those four people, that family, was about to be torn apart. I couldn’t take it, I couldn’t bring it here.

And now I’m crying again. My heart is broken, my life is new and uncertain. But I am not afraid. I don’t know HOW my life will straighten itself, I only know that it will.

“Things” between Will and I are okay. We’re both fighting for the same things, but against each other. And yet, there is a kind of peace in it. He inspects and plugs my tires, tells me he hopes I find a job that I love (and I believe him). He is going through a similar hell…but separate from my own. I see peace in our future, working to co-parent two wonderful young men.

On Monday, I’m going to social services to see if I qualify for food stamps. If they don’t keep me waiting all day, I’ll then go to a place a friend told me about to apply for work. When I get this new house livable, I will write more often and tell you what I’ve been doing in addition to moving piecemeal, bit by bit in a car.

Until then, if you think of me, think of me optimistically. I truly know in my heart and mind that I will be okay. So many things that once mattered do not, so many things that never mattered now do. I’ll be sorting through it all as I go about setting up my new life.

I am so grateful to the married couple who decided my boys (and cats) and I should be allowed to live in their house! I feel FREE.

And then I panic. But then I feel FREE again.

And then I panic. LOL

I’m hoping the panic subsides. I am sure it will as soon as I find a JOB.

I can’t wait to transplant my lavender and sage into the front flower beds. The woman who owns this house has a yard style kind of like mine – if it grows and it is pretty, then it stays. You can’t see the yellow flowery bush (is it wild dill?) she refused to mow down in the front yard. She told me I could, she left it because she thought it was pretty. I think it is, too, so the wild thing stays.

I paid out the money to the landlords today, and it felt so good. I’m so willing to let the cash flow when the pay-back is going to be worth SO MUCH more than the cost.

Peace. Peace. Peace.

You can’t make it out too well in this picture, but that is MY car under the carport. My car under MY carport.

Happy (then anxious) happy happy day. I can’t wait to sleep there.

I’m not certain what I’m going to write. I haven’t heard back about the house yet, but I’m not expecting to hear anything until the end of this week or beginning of next. I’m not letting myself get my hopes up too high…

Crap. Who am I kidding? I hope with all my heart. I’m hoping so much that I’m trusting a stranger at her (almost) word that I can “stop looking”.

So, I’ve turned my attention to the other thing I’m looking for, namely, a job. I would like to have a job doing something I already love to do. But you know what? I’d be happy doing almost anything so long as I get to come home at the end of the day with enough energy to write.

Really.

I’m PMSing and have been for three days. Today the bomb dropped, so tomorrow I should feel a lot better in the morning.

That brings up something I hadn’t thought of until recently. Since I’ve been separated from Will, I actually pay attention to my period. I know about when it will happen, and I know that for the past three months, I’ve felt overly sad three days before it starts.

Looking back, this pattern IS a pattern. I mean, it’s been happening for years (I’m sure). But I never thought I had PMS. Ever.

I think that now that I’m alone, not thinking about what he’s doing, what he’s going to do, what he may do, what might make him laugh, what might make him mad – anyway, now that my mind isn’t SO preoccupied with what MIGHT be happening inside Will, it is able to pay attention to what is going on inside of me.

Sounds a bit insane, possibly, to people who haven’t walked a mile in my shoes, and yet I know that it is true. I’ve spent so much time and energy focusing on HIM, that I completely neglected to notice the tiniest, most natural things about ME.

But back to Will for a second. I told him about the house and I know he is happy. (He’s been living in an RV for months and can’t wait to get back into this house. He wants back in almost as much as I want out!)

During the conversation, he even laughed at something I said (it was supposed to be funny). I couldn’t remember seeing washer/dryer hook-ups at the house, and he said he would install them and maybe the landlord would take some money off of the deposit. I told him if she wouldn’t let him install them, then I’d have to send my laundry back here with the boys for HIM to do. (No, he didn’t laugh at that! l0l)

Despite our momentary jaunt down “let’s be friends” lane, we go back to court on the 11th. I’m not looking forward to it. I have no idea what is going to happen. All I can do is forge ahead, creating a life for myself, and trust that, in the end, all will be right.

I have faith that all will be right when the dust clears, or possibly after another walk through absolute hell. I’ve been to Hell, and there’s no guarantee I’m completely through it. Maybe I’ve simply passed out from emotional pain, and right now I’m in an unconscious stupor enjoying a little peace while fiery coals burn my non-feeling backside.

I’ll have to wake up for the court date though. Here’s to hoping Hell is behind me!

I started thinking about where I wanted to live about a week after Will was forced to leave this house. I knew I didn’t want to be HERE, but where did I want to live?

After shoving all the other questions out of the way, I came up with my ideal house. It looks like this:

• It’s an old, probably white, farm house.
• There is a lot of land around it, but not much of a yard to maintain.
• It’s got “pocket” rooms – rooms in odd places, more rooms than you think by looking at it.
• It’s got windows and sunlight with a good place for my office, my work area.
• It’s located in a safe place.
• It might have a ghost, a loving one.
• It’s in the boys current school district.
• It’s affordable.

I asked the boys what they wanted in a house. They didn’t care about the inside, they wanted what was outside.

• Eddie wanted trees.
• Marc wanted water, preferably a pond but a stream would be okay, too.

I added their wishes to my list, and started looking for THAT house. I’ve been actively looking for about six weeks, not seeing anything that I liked. Lots of manufactured, run-down homes in my meager price range, or nicer homes in less safe areas.

I started to think that the house I would “end up with” wouldn’t be exactly what I wanted, but if it had a short lease, it would be good enough for now. I came to peace with that idea.

I started calling realtors, started calling people who put ads in the paper. Talked to more than 25 leads in one day, 2 or 3 on most days. The bare bones “price” and “location” search was fruitless.

I went back to my local realtor to remind him I was looking. Then I went back the day after. He told me I’d been on his mind, and he’d seen a friend of his working in the yard of her rental this past weekend. He called her at work, but had to leave a message.

When he told me her name, it rang a bell. Her last name if very common in these parts, but the ringing bell felt different than “familiar”…it felt “hopeful”.

Inspired, I decided to take a drive down some roads out by this current house, along the river. It was a beautiful day, the sun would do me some good. Opened the sunroof, turned on the radio, and drove and looked.

On my way back to this house, on a country road, I saw a little white farmhouse. It had a small front porch painted gray with a small red bench standing in stark but beautiful contrast to the the siding. The face of the house was small, but from the side, I could tell the original house had been added on to…”pocket” rooms to explore based on a family’s needs, not aesthetics.

No sign in the yard, the house was loved. I thought, “No one would want to move from there!” and watched the house leave my rear view mirror.

When I got home, I sent an email to everyone I know here in town. I told them I was looking for a house and a job, and asked them to keep me in mind as they drove about town and conversed with friends. It was a tough email to send, and many of the people on the bcc: list didn’t know me very well.

I left to pick up Eddie from school. We talked about finding a “good enough” house. The drive through lane at BK was long, so I left him to the radio while I went in to get him some slammers.

When I came back out, he said, “A realtor called you.” He didn’t have a name, and the number on my missed calls list didn’t give an ID. I pressed the number and a woman answered the phone. I explained why I didn’t know who I was calling, and she said, “This is [bell ringing name!] and you called in response to my ad in the paper.”

My heart lifted; she was showing the house and asked if I’d like to see it. She gave me the address; it was an unfamiliar address, but she said the house was in the high school district I wanted. When she named landmarks, I knew right where she was.

I had driven down that road earlier today.

I got to the house that evening. It was an old white farm house that had been added on to over the years to contain a growing family. The gray porch was accented with a little red bench.

It was the house I’d seen hours ago, the house I thought no one would want to leave.

I spoke with the lady and her husband. I told them I had no job, but could pay several month’s rent up front. I told her enough of my story so she could understand my situation, but not enough to let on WHY I’d left my husband, or the circumstances surrounding my decision.

She liked me, I could tell. I definitely liked her. She wants to rent to someone who will love her family’s home, who will respect and take care of it like she would.

I am definitely that person.

I took Eddie to see it yesterday. He loves the trees, he loves the land behind the property that stretches all the way back to the River. He senses no foul spirits in the house, only peace (he’s sensitive like that). He kept calling it “our house”.

The landlord told us all about the neighbors, her family, where she placed her Christmas Shoebox (no stockings) on Christmas Eve when she and her siblings were small.

I gave her my application, full-disclosure of course, and reminded her I could pay several months rent upfront. As a landlord, I know she wants to check my references (you can’t be too careful these days!), so she stopped short of saying, “It’s yours.”

But, when I reminded her that I wanted to move relatively soon and was wondering if I should keep looking, she cut me off and said, “Stop looking.”

I think this is going to work. Pray for me, that I get to live in this wonderful house with this wonderful landlord overlooking her family home.

If you want to visualize the house, scroll to the top of the post. The description of the house in my and my boys’ imaginations is the exact description of our (hopefully) new home – well, I don’t know about the ghost…