In June, 2008, I “retired”, upon my husband’s prompting. This retirement was a culmination of his (and my) desire to spend more time together and do more things together–combined with his assertions since the initial days of our commitment, when he said he would and could provide all the money the two of us needed. Now this wasn’t why I married him, it wasn’t even a substantial factor, but it was a premise that I believed.
In 2009 I had one real goal–to restore my printing press and print Robby’s book of erotic haiku. Seemed a feasible enough goal, and yet here we are launched head-long into 2010 and my press remains languishing in a garage, unusable.
Instead, in 2009, I worked on my husband’s CD, his home and garden, and his company. (I also worked fulltime for six weeks, and stashed all that money in a savings account for us.)
And here I sit today, with a divorce looming in my future.
Does my husband “owe” me anything?
I know that I conducted my life these last three (plus) years as if my husband and I had a mutual future. I know that I would have conducted my life differently if I had known I would be on my own right now.
I would have spent all that time that I gave to his business building up a business of my own. I would have spent all the time and money I invested in his home and garden on something of my own. I would have developed relationships unrelated to him.
Does he owe me anything for that?
Does he owe me anything for having invested my small business experience in teaching him more about his business, in making his business more successful?
Does he owe me anything for having brought my energy into his life, showing him my world, my places, my people?
It is true, we have had only a few years together. It’s not like a forty-year marriage or anything. On the other hand, I don’t have all that many years left–so relatively, a few years is a big chunk of my life. Heck, my mother was only 59 when she died. What if that’s all the more I have? That would mean that I spent one-third of my remaining years in a relationship that has had the plug pulled.
So, what if some majestic court decides that he does owe me? Then what exactly is owed?
Does it matter that I am over here now, living off my dwindling inheritance, trying to be frugal, while he continues a lavish lifestyle–chasing rock concerts, dining out, donning a new wardrobe, making regular salon visits, having frequent ventures to assorted “guru” happenings?
I try not to be touched by any of this. I try not to wallow in pity over the fact that I trusted my husband to be my teammate and found out that he was not. I try not to hate. I try to move on.
But honestly, I do think he owes me. I thought I made his life better; I don’t know that he agrees. I do know that I helped make his life (his business) more prosperous. And I know that I spent the last several years invested in a life that I thought was ours–and his decision to get a divorce means that I must now build a new life for me.
Sure, I can be all cosmic about it–and believe my new life will be even better than the old one–but that doesn’t put food on the table or pay the rent.
