Not So Full Disclosure

In which I call a time out.

Devoted Readers, I can't go on.  *holds hand to brow, slumps shoulders*

Suitably melodramatic ... but really, I can't.  All this bile and old old old stuff.  It's a toxic place for me to live.  I spent Wednesday evening and part of yesterday trying to write the last two chapters, and felt physically ill.

Chapter the next was going to describe how I decided to attend the Oakland hearing with Athena, how another friend came along for further moral support, and the fun of imagining the ex's face when he saw us.

Chapter the one after that (may have needed a few installments) was going to describe the hearing itself.  As it concerned the specific case, it was anticlimactic.  No guns or swordplay, a quick resolution, Athena presented the case brilliantly, again, and the ex waffled inepty, again.  The judgment was rendered swiftly, and Athena won.  Again.  It is now final and incapable of any further appeal.

The courtroom experience itself was open for great comedic literary expansion, as we had to sit through the first two appeals, each of which was a landlord-tenant dispute, each of which took an hour, each of which was defended by a succession of "Dumb and Dumber" landlords, all heard by a very senior (80+, is my guess) judge who was severely hard of hearing and kept mislaying papers and files.  As time dragged on, it took on the absurd dimensions of a Monty Python skit.  

But it's over and done.

The tale of the ex's exes continues. While there is some residual satisfaction in knowing that we could all write each other's stories, and that women as bright and capable as myself (brighter and more capable, even) fell prey to the same con job, were fed the same lies, were subject to the same betrayals and sponging, and have been similiarly besmirched to future exes, you know, it gets old.

We can't change him.  We can't change our past, singly or collectively.  I wish we could prevent future harm, but the more energy we expend on this the more power we give him in our heads.

There's enough else in my life that this has become a time sink.

So I apologize to my Devoted Readers for leaving them in the lurch. 

Corporate note: Fragile Industries has divested its holdings in the business of exes and is investing in the future.

Comments

[lwc]

I was looking forward to reading your rendition, which no doubt would have been entertaining and poignant. However, the story will be told, complete with the multi-media of notes, pics, emails, IMs, texts... a true 21st century scrapbook - or case file, however one wants to look at it - for anyone who wants or needs the story.

And, chapters are added all the time, as history keep popping up; you know the old adage - for every girlfriend you see in the room, there are at least 5 others behind the door.

Thanks for coming so far. We all need a break for a while.

[Peter]

"The more energy we expend on this the more power we give him in our heads."

Very true. Somewhere I read - probably it isn't a quote as much as a generic truism - generals are always fighting the last war. Must be true in marriage as well. Sounds like in some way he is his own worst enemy.