Transitions

There are several things that have surprised me about the process of suddenly becoming single or at least not-fully-married.

The first is how fast everything went. From the time we decided to separate until we selected and bought my ex-wife's house and moved her, only 3 weeks elapsed. Although we were planning things, it seemed like events took on a life of their own.

Then there was the almost complete lack of any real negative emotions: we were just getting stuff done, executing the plan. There were a few sad moments, but very little acrimony or anger. This is a good thing. I could sense the ease with which things could have gotten bad quickly, but we both worked to avoid that, and succeeded.

I was surprised at how differently my wife and I have reacted to the end of our marriage. While I "dove into" my new life, accepting the permanence and reality of the end of my marriage and trying use this as a chance to become a better me, my ex has somewhat belatedly decided she really cares about our marriage and seems to want it to continue. She seems to be having a hard time dealing with the consequences of her completely deliberate and intentional choices, a contradiction I find more than a little perplexing.

I was pleasantly surprised at how quickly I was able to "let go" of my hurt (for the most part) and in many ways forgive my wife, even as I recognized the wrongness of what she did and the pain it caused me. I didn't really forget, but the immediacy and unrelenting nature of the pain receded very quickly. I went from being nearly insanely obsessed with the situation to being able to at least function in society within a week. Through no effort of my own, I could suddenly walk away from the pain, as least for a while, just let it go.

Nothing surprises me more though than the absolute abruptness of our transition from "spouse" to "just friend". I fully expected that transition to take weeks, months. Given the freakishly amicable nature of our separation, I honestly even expected there to continue being a sexual aspect to our relationship or hint of such. Even though our sex life was nearly non-existent while we were married, it always existed at least in theory. I could not have been more wrong. Within 48 hours of her moving out, any feelings of being "married" disappeared (for me). She also instantly became a really good friend: someone close, but not so close that you take them for granted. It suddenly became natural to hold doors open for her, thank her for getting back to me, or taking my phone call. I stopped calling her several times a day. We started making lunch appointments where one person invites the other and pays for the meal. Our interactions became much more formal and distant. We stopped telling each other how or what we should do. All of this happened in a few days. In some ways, it is as thought the last 20 years never happened. It is as though we were never married nor romantically involved. Even as this change was happening, it seemed strange, surreal. I don't really have an explanation for this, except that the physical intimacy of living together, sharing the same roof fundamentally changes the nature of how people interact, it drives an emotional intimacy and interdependence (which can be good or bad). Take away that physical proximity, the forced intimacy, and the relationship snaps back to what it naturally would be.

As I said in my last post, I hope our friendship can continue. Friends are good, I don't have too many of them, fewer yet who have known me for 25 years.

So here's to friends... making new ones, but even more so keeping the ones you have.