Update

Little of my writing muse inhabits me today.

Moving. Furniture, boxes. Son helped me carry stuff, so did daughter, so did a friend of mine because Mrs_C took the kids to the beach with their cousins.

My Mom bought me a mattress and box springs, and bunk beds and mattresses for the kids. It's a two bedroom apartment. In the next couple of months I am looking for a place with 3 bedrooms. The bunk beds are the kind that can be split into two single beds.

My friend has a pile of art he did (he is an artist) in storage. He said he would store in on my walls if he gets it back. I accepted.

I took daughter out horseback riding at a friend's place and son went along - he ended spending the day shooting a BB gun all day. They both had loads of fun. They didn't want to go back to Mrs_C when I took them home, so I let them come with me to the apartment for the last of the evening.

When I picked them up to go out to the farm, daughter said "Hey Dad! Whatever you do, you're not allowed to ask us 'How are you doing? Are you OK? Do you have any feelings you want to talk about?'"

I started to answer her telling her "I don't want to ask you anything you don't feel comfortable in talking about..." when son interupts and says "Yeah, and don't walk up to us and say 'You know, you can hug me if you want... [oh, give meee a huuuug]' (last part said in a simpering soto voice).

They both burst into laughter.

Son says "Yeah, she makes like she's trying to comfort us and what she really wants is us to comfort her."

The time on the farm riding and shooting and eating burgers and pie and ice cream was a wonderful no stress zone.

Mrs_C continues to be REALLY weird. She's kinda falling apart. But that's a story for a different time.

Everything that is really important is out.

I have to rescue my winter clothes and coats, and my computer books and my other books (the ones in the boxes) - and my recipe books, but that's it.

Mrs_C is working a late shift, so I have clear time after work to get it out.

As my head clears I have a pretty good idea that even though my official response is still "I want everything to work out" and "This separation is meant to give us the distance we need to learn how to communicate in a way that doesn't cause problems."

Everybody else seems to see the writing on the wall.

I do to. I'm play-acting until all my stuff is out of the house.

I can see it getting complicated and ugly, but there is equal chance Mrs_C will just collapse on her own.

Me - I'm making sure that I establish myself as solid ground and shelter that my children can seek.

They are already avoiding her weepy tragic, headgame, poor me stuff. They are already being subjected to multi-hour conversations about "how they feel". I said that those conversations were one of the major reasons I left.

Yes - I am documenting it. I will only allow it to continue long enough to document it.

Yesterday the kids told her they wanted the option of making their own choice as to where they lived.

I would like to say that I have been excrutiatingly fair (with the occasional jab) about their mother. I am trying to dissuade them from some of their more bitter comments, by telling them that calling down their Mom will not win me over more - that they have all of my love, and that i will never abandon them or leave them without support.

I have told them that they should beware of bias on both sides - her and I, and to beware of the politics that will inevitably come out of both their mother and I. That they should view some of our statements as attempts to win them over, and that even if I may do it now and again, I am trying not to, but that they should form their own opinions and make their own determinations - not adopt ours.

----

Each day is a new day.