Finding the Box

My ex-husband went through a cleansing process at the time of our divorce. Even though he initiated the divorce and insisted on going through with it in the face of my tearful pleas, he must have felt some degree of conflict. I don’t know if he felt badly about the end of our 25 year marriage for what it meant to him or if he merely felt badly about the devastating effect it had on me. At any rate, someone must have told him that the best way to put your past behind you is to put it in a box and put the box away. I can only guess this since this is what I was told by a well meaning counselor when I stumbled into her office begging for help. I was unable to do this successfully. The closest I got was to eventually wake up in the morning and not have the end of my marriage be the first thing that popped into my mind. For me, this was progress!

It’s been fifteen years since my divorce and not a day goes by that I don’t think about my marriage in some capacity. I have moved along in my life (“Get over it” said all my friends, especially those who have never been divorced) and I have in many ways. But I never put my marriage into a box and put the box away. My ex-husband and I met when we were still teenagers and had 4 children during our 25 year span as husband and wife. There were things that were not so good but there were certainly many things that were very good. Those memories are worth preserving. I will never banish those years to a place where I cannot peruse them. Yes, sometimes it makes me feel sad, but it’s still worth thinking about the time in my life when my children were young and so was I.

I guess my ex found that box where you put the things you don’t want to remember. He’s remarried (he did that immediately) and has totally reestablished a new life with his second wife. As for me, well for him I don’t exist. He doesn’t have a single picture of me (I’ve been told this by many people) and the few times we have spoken since our divorce he affects a sunny, overly friendly tone that is reserved for old friends one hasn’t seen for a while. I almost expect him to say “My dear, we must do lunch!” at some point.

Perhaps he’s better off having found that box, but that’s not my style. No matter where my life has gone since my divorce and no matter where it goes from this point onward, for me there will never be a box large enough to hold those 25 years.