I. Set In Motion

It's been 10 years since my creative peak. At that time, I had just recorded a set of songs on a four-track and handed them out to friends and other local musicians, mostly to apathy, but I was still proud of them and, to this day, listen to them every now and again. I laugh at the warts and mistakes and general shoddy musicianship on them. Voluptuosity had its flaws, but there were moments when it felt like a real record with real songs and everything.

To that end, I'm going to try some creative writing. My songwriting is tapped out, so I turn to the only other thing I know how to do with my mind.

The below and subsequent installments (if any will exist, and several friends can attest to how awesome I am at first chapters, only to peter out starting around chapter 2) is an attempt to re-tap that creative vein that had long lay dormant. Any resemblance to actual people or events is purely coincidental, for the most part.

I don't know the destination; I just feel the need to embark on the journey.



I. Set In Motion

It was dinnertime when my phone vibrated with the proclamation of a new text message. She said she wanted a divorce.

Most certainly, this wasn’t the way I was looking for the weekend to end. And in my self-centered worldview, I can't say I was expecting it. She had given all of the warning signs, saying things like "when I get my divorce" and "when I'm single" and whatnot. I had figured her to be blowing off steam instead of meaning it. But, just like everything else she had ever told me, she was true to her word; I don't know why I expected any different.

I excused myself and stepped away to the restroom. "K - Do what you need to do," I hastily tapped out on my phone, then did my business while I was in there and washed up.

I never was any good in situations like this, always failing to strike the proper balance between unqualified support and flat indifference. In my defense, I didn't figure this to be the proper time to be passionate. The last thing she needed was to have me shadowing her, suffocating her. I loved and respected her too much to cling to her.

Still, I regretted my words as soon as I hit "send," knowing in my heart that the sentiment I conveyed was exactly the incorrect note to hit at this time. She had fallen in love with my ardor, and here I was, in her time of most dire need, being the polar opposite, being aloof.

Being the very thing I despised the most in a love relationship.

What an ass I am.

Really, it's not that I haven't been at least secretly rooting for a divorce, but deep down, I had hoped for the marriage to work out. And not just for me, as this announcement (like announcements of this type tend to do) changed in a moment the dynamic of our relationship.

Honest: I wanted it to work out for her also, just because it had worked out for so long – true happiness be damned - and I died a little bit inside when I would think of the possibility of her starting over. Starting over without me? Yeah, that might have been gnawing in the back of my head also.

Throughout my 11 years of marriage to Cindy, we'd weathered any number of storms that might have sunk a lesser couple, from my alcoholism and infidelities to her health issues and our career changes, emerging stronger once we were in calm waters again. She was cancer-free now – five years last month! - and my cheating days, which ran concurrent, were as small in the rearview.

My drinking days, however, were again becoming increasingly common.

The reaffirmation of our love wasn't the cure-all I'd hoped it would be. With the threat of her loss now diminished – her oncologist has said every year since that she would outlive me – my feelings each passing day ebbed. (I did learn, however, that jibing "Is that a promise or a threat?" wasn’t good form.)

It saddened me a bit, though, that the little things that our forbears would soldier through – my leaving the lights on indiscriminately, her leaving towels on the bathroom floor, the fact that neither of us could fully agree on a proper thermostat setting - were combining to tear us asunder. I've seen marriages last for decades on less - on nothing more than the fact that they honored their vows in those days.

Yet, with a single vibration of my phone, our endgame was set in motion.

I took a deep breath and returned to our table. "Everything OK?" she asked me.

"Of course," I reassured her. "How's your tilapia?"

"Underdone," Cindy replied. I can't say I really heard her. My mind was with Katherine, as it tended to be most nights anymore.