Words’ End

Today, my divorce became final. I have some thoughts about that.

Today doesn’t actually provide any closure; Ethan and I are still forced to communicate with each other by virtue of holding (and paying off) mutual debts. This thing still looming, that requires regular contact and regular payments and accounting and general predictability, I imagine it’s pushing most of his buttons. It doesn’t push my buttons to be paying all these bills and keeping up with communication, but all these things have never been as internally expensive for me as they are for Ethan. Until we are done with the debts, until we no longer have a compelling third-party reason forcing us to stay in touch, I don’t think we have enough space to heal.

It’s possible that I’m thinking in terms of healing because that allows me to hope for, someday, a kind of closeness again. A dangerous thought experiment: experiential evidence suggests that he has cut and run and isn’t coming back, emotionally speaking, ever. I’ve known Ethan for only six years, but they’ve been pretty intensely close years.

But he’s not one-dimensional, and I’ve seen light-filled beauty in him; so the possibility of a new and different closeness exists, and in order to be honest with myself I must acknowledge it. Being a romantic fool, acknowledgment and hope stroll hand in hand into the sunset of possibility.

It seems important to write all this down publicly. If you don’t give it voice, it doesn’t exist. You know how sometimes people say “when you’re married, it just feels different“? Well, it was different, and remains so. The act of getting married changed me at the core in ways I can’t fully quantify. Something about intentionality, a new dimension to commitment, the huge commitment to stay and work when things go badly. It’s a kind of inner stability. This change feels irrevocable; it certainly outlives the marriage.

So I’m giving voice to the official breaking, because I have to, because it’s part of me and remains in my world and needs to be said.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, July 14th, 2009 at 12:25 am and is filed under family, taking it personally. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.