I Cried

For the 7th possibly the 8th time since I was 7 years old, I cried yesterday.

Mrs_C came to drop daughter off - who had stayed for an extra day at her mother's. They were doing some artsy crafty stuff.

I had said I would pick daughter up. So I was a little surprised when the intercom buzzed and it was them. I accepted daughter in. The two of them were babbling happily about the puppy daughter is getting. I said thank-you and good-bye to Mrs_C who said "Ok, well, I guess I'll be going now, unless you want to invite me in...[pause] I was enjoying talking about the puppy." Daughter was effervescent in her enthusiasm about the puppy - she looked at me with big happy eyes, and even though I have no desire to see Mrs_C I said OK. I wanted daughter's happiness to continue, and Mrs_C had caught with just the right moment of guilt about being inhospitable.

So I invited her in. I made her some Chai. She made small talk about the apartment getting in order, and asking about how my life was coming along.

Then she moved seamlessly from that into my exercise and changes to life. Then she moved equally seamlessly into changes she was making. She starts talking about some of the stuff that went wrong in our marriage and points we had substantive differences.

We were in the tiny kitchen and the kids were just beside us in the living room. They could hear most of what was being said. Daughter kept popping around the corner to say something or get something or just come there for any excuse. She was obviously anxious. I didn't think we should be having such a conversation in front of the kids and said so. She said - "Well, let's go for a walk just outside."

Stupidity - guilt - patterning - ego - stubbornness - gullibility - the fact that I just can't let a conversation go until the person I am talking to understands what I am saying.

I went outside. It was miserably fucking cold and fucking raining. That super shitty cold winter is coming September rain. She keeps yapping about all the changes she's made.

We walked, I go to turn back to the apartment she said "No, this way." I was "Whatever" I realised shortly after she was aiming to go back to the house - remember, it's about 3 blocks from the apartment. It was cold and that would be better than outside. We got to the house and the outside door on the garage was open. It needs some adjustment every fall to have it close properly because of shifting. I usually fixed it each year. I had been waiting for her to fix it this year. When it doesn't close it makes the whole property less secure, especially when the kids are home alone.

We go in, she's still in this litany of changes. I start fixing the door - it will give me something useful to do instead of just listening.

Then, she said something to the effect of - if we're doing so well at changing she thinks that proves she could change enough to make our marriage work. I said that I didn't think so. She just kept burrowing in on that spot.

Sparing you all the details, she used a different tack. The same one that had worked the year before to get me to stay after I first announced I was leaving.

Guilt.

guilt and obligation.

Guilt and obligation and duty and marriage vows before god - vows made "until death do us part" - and undying love.

She said how she was making all these changes and how she could be the wife I wanted her to be. Just give her the chance to prove it.

All through this time I just kept repeating my lines:

"I'm not coming home. I'm not coming back."

I had realised it was pointless to engage on any details, so I stuck to the simplest set of lines. Ones I didn't need to explain.

She wore me down. She asked why one more time. She said "If you still care and if there's still love, why can't it work?"

I broke from the lines "Because I am afraid of you. Because I can't live in a state of constant fear. Because I am so angry I can't stand to be around you because of all the fear and anger and pain that wells up within me. And it won't be gone for years. I can't live like that."

She said that if I had enough love - if we had enough love - we could make it work. That if I just loved her enough it wouldn't matter, That I would be able to consider that all that pain belonged to someone in the past - a different Cadbury, and she could be a different Mrs_C - someone who wasn't the one in the past who had done all those things.

I'm not capturing it well, but I think you get the idea. You have some idea of the kind of person I am, and you understand the pain this point of entry would cause. I tried so hard. I loved that woman with everything I had. And in my mind, now she's saying one more time that it just isn't good enough. That on top of all the other times I just didn't make the mark, now the amount of love that I had/have isn't enough either. That if I just loved her a little more it would work. In my mind she's pointing out one more deficiency and one more shortcoming - just like the last 18 years of never quite making the mark.

I said "I'm not coming home. I'm not coming back." I said I was leaving and got up to leave. She had left her car at my apartment so she followed along - all the way clawing and scrabbling for one more idea or persuasive statement that would cause me to change my mind. She said we have a year (waiting period for divorce) - we could make it work. We could still try. I said we had already had a year and she hadn't changed then. That I wasn't spending another year when I didn't believe that she would ever change - and that I wasn't coming back.

She kept on stinging that one spot - if I just loved her a little more I could find a way to make it work and to accept her and to forgive her.

I got to the apartment - said good-bye - and walked away.