Monday, Monday

Read Hell Weekend parts 1 through 5 first

[Addendum added - look for marked section]

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My son calls after school. Goes to computer gaming centre with friend.

On my way home I call Mrs_C to see if he's home, otherwise I will go pick them up. I do so with Mrs_C's concurrence.

We get home. Mrs_C's sister and one of the nieces are there visiting. I begin supper - it is already heading toward 6pm. I have things well underway by the time sister and niece leave. Mrs_C comes into the kitchen and makes some comment about this holding me up from going to exercise and that she should have kicked her sister out earlier and done more supper prep work because she knows how important my exercise is to me.

Yep.

Can you smell it coming?

I can.

Well, I ignore it - maybe I can get through things and keep it from erupting until after I'm back and deal with it then.

The kids' meal is ready and my stuff is still grilling on the barbeque. Mrs_C comes out and offers to let me go eat while she finishes the last of the stuff I was doing - enough of my food was ready that I could eat (along with stuff in fridge). She said she wanted to give me the gift of the time to eat and go exercise. So I went to eat. She was acting weird, but whatever...

I went out when I was done and happened to offer a technique thought to her (having done more vegetable grilling with this particular grilling rack than her). She countered with her idea and then said "No, no, you're right. Why would I argue with anything you say - you're right. You know these things."

I say that its not what i meant and leave to change into my exercise clothes.

I am leaving and the last of the grilling is just done. She rips into me that if I really cared about her I would have called her to come eat, and would have said I would finish it.

I pointed out that contradicted her claim that she was doing the finishing as a loving act toward me. We get into a bit of a dispute over this. I say "Whatever, I'm leaving"

She comes back with some comment or other and it escalates further back and forth.
[editted section]
She was trashing me about not being considerate of her ever. I said it wasn't true. She said "Yeah, well, it was like last night when I wanted to make love in a gentle giving and loving way and you just used me. All you did was bend me over the bed. I snapped "No, were done. We're finished. It's over."

She said "Fine!"

I turned and walked away. I went to exercise.

She phoned on my cell phone. She asked if I really meant it.

I said "You ambushed me! You ambushed me completely with all your stuff about doing things for me and making it easy to go exercise - and then you attack me. How can I live like this? I can't live like that"

I said I was going to come home. She told me to stay and finish my exercise and think about it, whether I really meant it or not.

She phoned after about an hour and asked me if I had made a decision, because if I meant it she needed to go talk to her sister and would need the support of her family. I said that yes, I meant it. I said that I had wanted to say it to her face and not over the phone.

We talked for a few minutes and I said I would be home in a few minutes.

When I got home she had already talked to daughter and said that daughter was in her room very upset.

We talked.

Talk, talk, talk, talk.

She was more honest this time. She said she had no idea of why she did some of the shit she does, and that she actually meant to be nice but that something just came over her and she couldn't believe that she had pulled the stunt she had. She said that the whole thing on the weekend was all game playing as well, and that at various times in our marriage she had been consciously game playing as well (she cited a few instances of egregious behaviour). She pointed to her recent behaviour as being similar to the stupid stunts she played before we were married to get me to say i loved her - the breaking up stuff and all that.

We discussed some of the logistics of splitting. She tried really hard to get me to forgive her and say it's all ok. That I should let it go and she would try to be better. She said that it was because she wasn't reassured that I really loved her. She said that's why she had been playing all the games. That if I only showed her that I loved her she wouldn't feel the need to do what she did.

I said that I had already done that a lot. I also said that if in 18 years I hadn't been able to get it right (making her feel special - showing that I love her), the likelihood of me doing it at this point was low. So she would just be mad at me again, and we'd be back to the same place.

We went for a walk around the neighbourhood - it was a beautiful night. We talked. We talked about some of the things we were going to do and accomplish together that we didn't do. The traveling that never happened. We cried about the loss we were experiencing. We mourned.

We went back to the house and sat in the backyard. I cried when I saw all the stuff I had built for her and the kids in the yard. I cried when I saw the neatly tended rows of her garden. The playhouse and tree fort - the shed we had built together.

We cried.

There was a lot of holding each other, soft kissing, and crying.

She kept working me to get me to say I'd stay.

I didn't.

We went inside and finished cleaning up the kitchen. She asked how we would do this. Would we sleep in the same bed? Would we still hold each other?

It was awful. Even she said "I always thought there'd be a lot more anger". It was so very sad.

It was even sadder that it was the lucid Mrs_C that I had to arrange the initial elements of our break-up with. The lucid Mrs_C - the one I loved. It was her I was leaving late last night. Not the bizarre crazy one.

Why?

I loved the woman I am leaving.