Cast of Characters--"The Ex"

There are several characters that populate my life that I feel compelled to explain.  They will pop up now & again in posts.  I'll leave it to you to decide which definition of character each one falls into ......either the 9b. A person, esp. one who is peculiar or eccentric category, or simply, 10a. A person portrayed in an artistic piece, such as a novel .........or a blog!  Trust me, it will be obvious who falls into which category.

First character up is "The Ex", or simply "Ex".  He is who you're probably assuming already even if you don't know me--my ex husband.  I promise not to make this blog the place for slamming The Ex even though when I mentioned to him I was starting a blog, he did his customary staring-right-through-me-as-if-I-don't-exist routine.  In his defense, he doesn't even know he's doing it when he does it.  In his in-defense (is that a word?) he should know better cause I'm cool enough & interesting enough that he should pay more attention to what I'm saying and doing.  (Note I'm not saying "I'm the coolest ever!" or "I'm the most interesting ever!" .....I'm just saying I'm cool-ish and interesting-ish and deserve a little bit of anybody's time & energy .....ESPECIALLY MY HUSBAND'S!!!!!!!)

So there you go.  In a nutshell, that's my relationship with The Ex after three years of dating and a twenty-year marriage.  We've been divorced for three years now which equals twenty-six years all told of knowing The Ex.

Even the word "divorce" is ugly.  It may sound like I'm making light, but I'm not--it's, well, ugly.  At best, divorce can be considered a "set-back" for awhile.  At worst, it's simply devastating.  I still cringe when I have to utter the word, and I just realized, I cringe too, when I type it.  I shall not belabor this point but if it ever seems like I'm happy-go-lucky and pleased-as-punch about having a divorce in my past, make no mistake I'm not. 

Now that I have that off my chest, I will say that raw wounds eventually heal into ugly, but healthy scars, and somehow a certain peace about the whole mess eventually and quietly descends, invisibly wrapping you up when you least expect it.

A few other points to cover: The Ex and I have two children, two boys aged 18 and almost 16 (who shall be the subjects of a future blog).  We live 7 minutes apart from each other.  He still lives in the house we spent most of our marriage living in--that would be the big house on the golf course--and I live in a small but cute condo that frankly is plenty for me to handle.  The Ex and I talk to or see each other almost every day mostly due to the kid-situation.  Between you and me, in our case, I think that helped the agony of the split.  I'm thinking for some couples, joint custody is a nightmare.  For us, joint custody has made the nighmare easier.  (Of course it goes without saying that it's been better for the boys too.....of course!)  Plus it's made Ex a much better father--old story, new verse.  Finally, Ex is a very successful, very driven lawyer.  Not even a slimeball lawyer, just a workaholic, control-freak lawyer.  You will hear it from me officially first, if you need a good, honest, hard working lawyer Ex is your man!! 

Oh, I did say "Finally" already ......but finally, finally ......there isn't a chance in hell that we will ever get back together again so don't waste any time wondering about that over the coming months on the occasional occasion when I say something nice about Ex.  And that doesn't make me cringe at all .........