Lunzie

The worst thing about going through this divorce isn’t the divorce itself. For Christ’s sake, my husband hasn’t even filed yet. I’m not even IN it. I already KNOW HE’S AN ASSHOLE.

The worst part is watching my parents do nothing. My mother, specifically.

She has been supportive with words, and phone calls (sometimes), etc. But she hasn’t really DONE anything. You’d think that if your ONLY child was going through something horrible like this, and had nowhere to go after her husband tells her that he doesn’t want to be married to her any more, that you’d want to help her, maybe help her pack or something like that…

She’s given me boxes, and when I go visit her, she makes me dinner.

BUT THAT’S IT.

I’ve packed ALL MY SHIT MYSELF SO FAR. WHAT THE FUCK??!!

It’s like I have no parents.

Sure, they send me a token email every so often with their concerns, and a suggestion or two, but other than that (and handing me money every so often), NOTHING.

I told my Aunt Mary this (I’m at her house again this weekend), and she said she doesn’t understand that. She said that if it were her daughter, she would have moved her out into an apartment or SOMEWHERE that was OUT of that environment RIGHT AWAY. It really is unpleasant to live at that house.

Well that would be nice. Why hasn’t my mother DONE anything? She hasn’t even helped me pack!!

She took me out to dinner the other night and told me how frustrated she was that I couldn’t come live with her and her husband. Sure, I could come by myself. They told me I could come live with them if I didn’t bring Sumo. How could I not bring Sumo, I said???

Unlike my soon-to-be-ex-husband, I don’t lightly make commitments and then just abandon them. I made a commitment to that dog, to take care of him, and he has taken care of me for FOUR YEARS. How could I just leave him?

I can’t. And because of that, my stepdad doesn’t want me at his house.

So my mom cries about it, and says she doesn’t want me to move away (my aunt offered me a house here in Iowa), that she’s sorry, and I kindof feel bad for her, but really I’m just seething inside, wondering where MY mother went. When did she get like this? And how did I not notice it over the years? I sure notice it now.

When my husband was in Iraq, she came over every Thursday and helped me with stuff. Once he came home, she stopped, and for the next three years, she came over maybe a half-dozen times a year, didn’t really pay much attention to what was going on. I went to her house all the time.

So really the only time she saw me on a regular basis was when I went to HER house.

So why is she so mad that I want to move to Iowa? Oh, that’s right, because I won’t be coming to HER house any more. She’ll actually have to make an effort to come see me. I told her the other night that what I need right now is a place to LIVE. You know, the hierarchy of needs–food, housing, clothing–HOUSING is part of that! When someone offers me a place to live, I’M GOING TO ACCEPT IT, YOU JERK. No matter where it is!

Also, I would totally love to live closer to the bulk of my family. I love my aunts and uncles, and my cousins. My cousin Jennifer just found out that she’s prego with her third child. I told her that I would move to her city and be her nanny. That would be awesome. Not for my mom, though. Maybe she should have thought of that before she left her daughter to her own devices during the most horrible time of her life…

Dear Baby Jesus, What the Fuck is wrong with my parents? Are they going nutty-foo-foo? Check yes or no. Thanks. Me.

I got the teaching job at the private school, which is awesome.

They’ve asked me to teach Pre-Algebra, Algebra I, and Computers (I mentioned that I had taken several courses in Microsoft programs in college). They need a teacher for Algebra II and Pre-Calc, so I may end up teaching those classes as well if they can’t find someone.

Four/five classes is a daunting, but I think I can handle it. I love a challenge. I am nervous, though.

I have noticed that the small private schools tend to be kindof “fly by the seat of your pants” types. My mom also teaches at a smaller private school, and sometimes they seem very unorganized. This school I will be at is no different. Classes start on August 25th, and they still haven’t finalized their course schedule yet, which means that I don’t know what days I will be teaching, etc.

I went in yesterday to pick up some of the textbooks and they don’t have teacher’s editions for some of them. The only reason I went in yesterday was because I called them because I HADN’T HEARD FROM THEM YET. For crying out loud. School starts in like THREE WEEKS.

My first Transition to Teaching class is this Saturday. I am very excited about starting the program. The classes are master-level (graduate) courses, and they let me know that if I want to continue on to get my Master’s, I can keep up with the coursework and in theory, finish my Master’s over the next year. Awesome.

My DH got his orders to deploy to Afghanistan in March of 2009. He’ll probably be gone in January for schools, and then down to Atterbury for mobilization, organization, etc.

Our marriage has been shitty lately. He seems so distant and angry all the time. I wrote him a very honest letter a few weeks ago, about how bad I’ve been feeling lately, and he seemed so shell-shocked by it. He can’t have been oblivious to the fact that things were crumbling around him. I am not sure what is going on.

I have felt like leaving several times before this, but decided to stick it out even though I feel like an empty shadow of my normal self. Taking care of things around here has felt almost robotic, like I am doing them out of habit any more.

So my DH said he would go see a counselor. He is dragging his feet, which means that day after day I sit here and wonder what the hell is going on while I check off another day on the calendar and we march toward another 15 months apart.

The deployment really wasn’t an issue for me. I did it once before. I can handle it. But our marriage was new then. He still wrote me poems about how he would stand outside his room in Iraq, and look at the moon, and think of me. Now I’m lucky if I can get him to acknowledge my presence in the house.

Our fourth anniversary is a week from tomorrow. I can’t help but think that I’ll probably spend the whole night home alone because he has band practice or some shit like that. Not even important enough to plan something for our anniversary.

This is bullshit.

For Mother’s Day, I suggested to my DH that we take our respective mothers out to lunch.

His mother was ok with it, but my mother had, for some unknown reason, scheduled a picnic at her house for some people from her church ON Mother’s Day, for LUNCH. I have no clue why she would do that, knowing that it was Mother’s Day, and knowing that her daughter would probably want to do something special for her…

She’s so weird lately.

Anyways, I still wanted to take the moms out, so I attempted to reschedule. My mom was available for dinner that evening (still Mother’s Day!! ) so I had my DH call his mother and see if she was available.

Sure, she says, but she doesn’t want to go unless my DH’s dad can go too.

*sigh* WTF??

I don’t understand that. I really don’t. It was MOTHER’S Day, and my DH and I were trying to do something nice for our moms. She KNOWS we don’t have a whole lot of disposable income (she’s part of the reason, unfortunately), and yet she insists on a fifth person coming with us to dinner, meaning WE will have to pay for a fifth person at the not-very-cheap-restaurant that we were taking our moms to.

Because if we refuse to pay for my FIL, we look like stingy stooges who invite people to dinner and won’t pay for their spouses, even though we didn’t invite the spouse to dinner in the first place.

It’s not that I don’t like the guy–he’s a great guy! I guess it was the principle of the thing…why did my DH’s mom HAVE to have my DH’s dad with her? Did she think we were going to ignore her the whole time?

She’s always been a bit quirky. I just chalk it up to one of those quirks of hers…

Other than that, it really was a nice dinner. My mom seemed to have a good time, and my DH was very attentive (he even kissed me in front of everyone). The restaurant was nice and the food was excellent. On the expensive side, but for our moms, it was worth it. (yeah, I just put “moms” in there. I’m evil)

I put together some gift bags for the moms with some candles and goodies in them, and bought each mom a nice plant. My MIL got a Gerbera Daisy, and my mom got a Hydrangea. Both were very pretty, and I think the moms liked them.

Hope everyone else had a nice Mother’s Day, and didn’t have to pay for unnecessary people at any upscale restaurants.