Columbus Day

Yesterday at noon, on the Columbus day holiday, I had lunch at the Lost Dog Cafe in Westover in Arlington, as I usually do when I am in town on any holiday or special day like the birthday of one of my children.  I had Dog Collars (onion rings) and a Rin Tin Tin pizza pie, a vegetarian's dream of spinach, eggplant, red onions, mushrooms and more in a marinara sauce covered with mozzarella cheese.

I have dined alone at these meals for the past decade, as my three then-minor sons were alienated from me years ago by the actions of their Mother when she unconscionably made them participants in our nuclear divorce.  No Lamberton has heard a single word from these boys (now men) since then.

I'm sad that I was unable to stop the specious forces that used these children to further my ex-wife's selfish, shortsighted goals in toxic divorce litigation from destroying my children's normal childhoods and skewing their future adult associations, perhaps permanently.  For years I have publicly invited these three young men through unanswered letters, unreturned phone calls and unresponded-to Internet invites to join me at one of these lunches so that we can start rebuilding our father-son lives one day at a time, but no one has ever showed.

I am sad that time is running short now (I'm the same age my father was when he died) and they still eschew normal adult and familial relationships.  I regret that their childhoods were destroyed by adults aligned with my ex-wife's shortsighted divorce goals and I was helpless to prevent the terrible damage these "professionals" did to my minor children such that as adults now they seemingly disdain the immutable reality that when the sands of time run out, there's no flipping over the hourglass even one more time.