C: Sightings...Sigh...

Well, it is bound to happen. Ours is a mid-sized city--our metropolitan area holding just under 400,000 and, truthfully, most of my "circle" frequents one particular area of the city. So, my sister and her family ran smack-dab into my husband, his honey, her two kids, and their new baby. In Target. Awkward.

She said that she and my hubby had that "deer in the headlights" startle, and both groups bounced off each other like same-pole-magnets, heading quickly in opposite directions wordlessly. Sis says that the babe was in a carrier but she could not tell me whether the blankie was pink or blue, so eager was she to exit the scene.

My youngest niece is eight. She was my husband's particular favorite at the time he left (the youngest always is). She ran to him each time she saw him, and he would scoop her up, carrying her around. My sister went a long time after our separation without saying anything to her kids except that Uncle C was "away," thinking we might reconcile, and she did not want to go through that mending unnecessarily. Finally, however, she sat the kids down and age-appropriately explained just what he had done to quell both their curiosity and their hurt that favorite Uncle had just disappeared.

So, in Target, this little one turned to her mom and said, "Why doesn't Uncle C speak to us anymore?"

Mom answered, "Remember? I explained that to you?"

To which, she asked, "But, Mom, how can you be family and then not be family? I mean how can you love someone (meaning herself, I'm sure) and then all of the sudden not love them?"

How, indeed? Ah, a whole 'nother post from the desk of a divorce lawyer...

I'm actually doing fine with this issue. I still chuckle everytime I think of my near-sixty-year-old husband contending with this:



And then, at nearly 80, contending with this:



See the money bag the Dean is holding? Take it from one who has sent a child through college: that is no joke. I cannot imagine doing that in my late 70's.

And so, the topic of money brings up looming drama (and you thought it could not get any more dramatic!). As an aside, I battle with misplaced guilt in women clients all the time. One of the things wayward husbands like to say to their wives who are holding them to financial obligations is, "It's all about money with you, isn't it?"

I have had wives of reprobates sit in my office and actually cry over this "accusation," until I tell them the stock answer to use. "Look him in the eye," I say, "and tell him 'money is ALL it's about!' because, surely, it's not about anything else with a man of his character" You cannot believe how empowering this is to them.

So, I'm trying to apply the same to myself. He owes me money...I intend to get it. Drama looms large ahead.

Besides, I am feeling very empowered, myself, these days--why, just yesterday I cleaned out the tractor air filter!!! (See appropriate addition to power list on the sidebar!).

As always, thanks for listening. C