In everyone's life, they can look back and see where the
major crossroads of choice met and decided their fate. It's funny how in some
people's lives these crossroads can seem like a delicate walk down a country
road with choices so subtle that it's hard to decide exactly where the new path
began, and in other lives those crossroads are lived like an eighty-eight mile
an hour thoroughfare crossing, leaving little doubt as to where the change of
course exploded into existence. The current crossroad in my life began with a
head on collision in the middle of a major intersection in my sleepy, little,
mountain town. As with so many things in my life, change came with a crash, a
slight loss of consciousness, and a distinct feeling that something major
happened, but I couldn't quite tell what. God, why can't I be one of those
country road people?
It was a typical, crazy day in suburbia. I had woke up to the
usual bickering of my daughters trying to both get ready for school in the one
bathroom they share.
“Who took my brush” Paisley yells from the bathroom.
“Nobody took anything of yours. Have you looked in your room
under your piles of stuff?” Lorelei sasses back.
“Come on girls. Nobody took anything. Paisley, take a better
look, and stop yelling” I say trying to keep the peace, but Paisley stomps off
letting us all know she is irritated with the inconvenience.
My husband, who likes
to remind us that he is "practically perfect in every way" thanks to
one too many viewings of Mary Poppins when the girls were little, sits ignoring
the chaos at the table. He eats the same eggs, oatmeal and coffee he has had
for breakfast every day for six years. "How does he do that every day?"
I wonder to myself. Oblivious to everything going on around him including the
girls arguing, the TV news in the background, or my asking about his schedule, he
sits completely absorbed in his e-mail and Facebook page with his back to it
all. I have always admired how he can keep in complete control in almost every
situation; never reacting until he has thought his options through completely.
How does he do that?
"Eric, are you listening to me?" I say for the
second time. "Yeah, what?" he
mumbles between bites while staring into his computer screen. "Do you plan
on being home by 4:00 or 4:30?" I ask. "I have classes all day and
have to go to my internship today. Lorelei
can walk home with Stephanie today after school and hang out with her for a
little while, but I don't want her alone all afternoon by herself," I try
explaining once again to Eric. It just never seems to dawn on him to give me
his full attention anymore. More and more he is zoned into some sort of
different reality without me or the kids. He doesn't even seem to notice he’s
gone. Whatever; I tell myself more and more lately that this is how marriage is
after ten years. Everyone seems to have something to complain about when they’ve
been together with children as long as we have, right? At least Eric's only
problem seems to be his inability to pull himself out of technology. It wasn't
like he was out drinking or doing drugs all night like some of the deadbeats I
hear about. I get the kids out the door, tell Eric good bye for the day,
and finally have time to get myself into the shower and ready for school.
As the steam and hot water begin to wash over my body I can finally think for a minute. Sometimes the salvation of white tile in a room I can lock and enough soap to eventually feel clean is all I need to clear my mind and help me start putting my life back into perspective. I stay for the girls I tell myself as I wash my hair. I work to make it better for us all, so I can't ever give up, I tell myself as I run soap across my body and make sure I smell only of ivory soap. If I could just get myself back into some kind of work situation like you had back home, he wouldn't matter anymore, I promise myself as I shave, making sure to have myself presentable just in case Eric decided to touch me, which he never did.
I’d been making a decent living as a data
processor when Eric lost his contract with Adobe Computer Systems. At the time, we were still living in our home
town of Portland, Oregon, and it had never dawned on me to move. Eric and I hadn't been getting along very well since I got pregnant with Lorelei. It was
like the pressure of being a parent was something he didn't realize he wouldn't
be able to handle, but he hadn't realized that until after were were married and I was pregnant. I did some research and was finding that it wasn't exactly unusual for men to react
like this to their first child, so I brushed it off. Once Lorelei was born, he
seemed to say and do all the typical things a new dad says, so even though our
marriage was still very strained, I thought it would pass and life would go
back to normal. I thought as soon as some of the initial pressure was off Eric
would adjust to his new normal. I mean, after all, I was a single mom when we
met. I came with a lot of baggage and responsibility of my own, so of course
having two children to care for is going to be a lot for any man to handle; however, once Eric lost his contract with Adobe, everything came to a head.
We moved to Colorado Springs, a sleepy little
mountain town, to start over; to save our marriage; so Eric could have the best
chance at building a career, and a million other reasons he could think of to
move the girls and I a thousand miles away from all of our family, friends, and my very stable job.
I was going to back to school, because despite trying to find employment here,
four years later I was nowhere near having a job like the one I left behind.
It wasn't as if I had woke up that morning saying to myself it
was time to completely change my life, but in looking back I suppose everything
in my life was screaming that this couldn't last much longer. I was only a few
weeks away from finishing up an associate's degree that would help me find a
decent job. I was beginning to day-dreamed about what it would be like to
graduate, get back to work and tell Eric I was leaving.
I’m not sure how he’d arranged it, but in the twelve years we'd been together, everything he wanted or needed seemed to work out just fine. My attempts at a career seemed to always end in failure or roadblocks. Eric seemed
to always have money or resources for anything he wanted: new computers, software, games, clothes, haircuts, or vacations with his family. But
when it came to anything for the family home, or the girls, we were always be
broke. "That's why you need to get to work" he would say. I guess
that's true, I would think to myself. But when I did have a job, Eric always
seemed to have a laundry list of things that were supposed to come out of my
paycheck. It seemed like no matter what I did, Eric would always have money to play
with, and I was always trying to figure out how to pull the resources together
that the girls and I needed to the chorus of, "we’re just so broke"
coming from Eric.
I really thought finishing up my degree would finally
alleviate the financial pressure that seemed to keep Eric and I from being
equals. Or maybe my degree would just give me the ability to escape. Either
way, I’m pretty sure that’s what I was thinking about as I noticed the car
barreling down the road, the wrong direction down a one way street right toward
the intersection I was entering with my green light.
