Hey birthday boy! Sorry I missed your birthday earlier this month, but I was busy driving around towns in North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Tennessee and Virginia on a big car trip for my vacation.
I forgive you for almost backing over me years ago, if that was you dating my ex-wife last decade, in your big jeep with its ever present Life Is Good spare tire cover. After all, you are now married to her and I wish you all the luck in the world; if the scales ever fall from your eyes you will need it.
There is one psychological condition you should research, that of the covert narcissist. Just sayin'.
But I am sorry to say that you revealed to me a hard, inhuman side to your character, in my opinion, that puts you in proper company in your latest marriage. You see, I haven't had a word of communication from any of my three children in over a decade and have repeatedly tried to ascertain if they are well or indeed, even alive.
The last time I saw the mother of my children on a public street in Arlington, very near where I live, I happened to drive by while coming home from work and you, an adult man and woman, some teenagers and a German Shepherd were on a walk with her on the public sidewalk and I parked and walked past the large group and asked her, regarding each of my three children, five questions for each that represent the bare minimum that any parent would tell another parent, no matter how estranged or outlandishly inimical that person was to the other. After all, I love my children and worry about their wellbeing and you, since you were there, could have at any time during that single minute, allayed my fears by interjecting, as any human being would to another, that my three children are well, or not well because of [this happenstance].
After all, you obviously know them all; my youngest son speciously referred to you as "Dad" in his marriage book, my middle child has used your address as his address, I believe, and my oldest son has parked his vehicle for extended periods outside your abode and does or has, I think, lived there or caretaken your dwelling. The five basic questions of anxious parents?
Is he alive. Is he well. Is he married. Does he have children. Where does he live.
Your current wife has had this pressed-lip, fallacious and self-serving (to feed her implacable, absurdly oversized rage against the father of her children) narrative to answer my former written inquiries about my children, limited though they were, of: The children will give you any information they see fit to. This is an outlandish wild-eyed attitude of parenthood that represents the fringe far end of the PAS (Parental Alienation Syndrome) spectrum, a Western phenomenon fueled by the Mother Knows Best bias of domestic law courts that Sharon played masterfully with her coterie of divorce lawyers and "professionals" until the Arlington court and Appellate courts woke up to her harassing litigiousness, using our minor children as her lawsuit cut-outs, and penalized her almost $50,000 for it.
I don't agree with her parenthood-wrecking attitude and actions but I understand them because she is, in my opinion, a covert narcissist and they only think of themselves. Your attitude I don't understand, unless you are a terribly cowed husband or you didn't want to, in fact, impart terrible, distressing information to me in a brief interlude.
Indeed, are they all alive? Well?
There was no answer from her to any of my five simple questions about each one's current well-being (see above). Nor from you.
A belated happy birthday, Jim. Life is good, eh?
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2 comments:
I have been reading your blog for years. The years where you sat waiting for your sons to show for dinner for their birthday. It's sad. I can go on and on about it, but it's plain sad.
I am sorry.
I wish they had contacted at this point. Gotten over whatever, grown to be themselves.
I am now divorced and I have struggled to keep a good relationship with my ex for the sake of my kids, not mine. I have succeeded.
Thanks for your kind words, Myriam. I need to get over to your blog more often, I have always enjoyed your writing.
It's sad what happened to my 3 children, now adults and responsible for their own actions as they're all over 30 and fully mature. I think of it as that their mother, with her paid minions, murdered the childhoods of my children. PAS is real, prevalent and unfathomable. It is also child abuse.
I have forgiven her, and them, as the Christian notion of forgiveness is the only thing that freed me to move on from my grief and loss. I understand that she professes to be a Christian, or cites Christian platitudes to homeless people, so I am sorry for her because someday soon enough she will have an accounting to do (she's older than me).
I am glad you cooperate with your ex on the issue of your children. It's only the humane thing to do.
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