In my living room a few minutes ago, I did an athlete’s recovery flow on the Nike App. I stretched my shoulders, and then my hips. At the end, I lay still and took deep breaths. When I got up, I looked at my mantlepiece, and saw vases filled with greenery from my garden. I started laughing. I’m wearing a button down pinstripe shirt. After I write this, I’m going to work on the syllabus for the new art history class I’m teaching in the fall. I’m a complete fucking character from a Nancy Meyer film about a divorced woman.
It’s an identity that feels cliched, but also comfortable. Two weeks ago, I was struck with an incredible, overwhelming loneliness. It seemed to come out of nowhere. I began to dread the nights when the kids weren’t sleeping at my house. I missed them with an acute longing. The first Thursday in August, I drove four hours from Savannah to Columbus, Georgia, for a state championship tennis tournament. I was reluctant to leave; I delayed it as much as I could because I was afraid to be alone with myself in the car.
The loneliness stemmed from not just being alone, without my children, but also, feeling so alone in my thoughts and conversations with other people. For most of my adult life, I’ve fit into neat categories. In my twenties, I was a wild party girl dating in New York until she found “the one.” Then I was an engaged woman planning a wedding; a newlywed; a new (and very angry) mother. I struggled in those roles; the women I was friends with also struggled in the exact same ways, and it was easy to to find friends to talk to.
Everyone knows the story of, “He didn’t respond to my text, I’m devastated.”
And, “I’m happy 90% of the time, and unhappy 10% of the time, and that’s a good ratio for a marriage, right?”
Or, “I’m doing all of the housework, and he doesn’t even seem to notice.”
Or, "He called watching his own kids ‘babysitting.’”
People also know the story of, “The marriage isn’t working anymore, and I want out.”
Many people feel it, but not many people want to confront it. I find that sometimes, when I talk to other women about why I left, or what I’m struggling with as a newly single woman, they literally shut down. I can see the shades go down in their eyes between what I’m saying, and what they want to process. They’ve made the decision to stay in their marriages; the marriages we once both disparaged. I’ve made the decision to go. We both can see the validity of each option, but acknowledging them makes our own paths more difficult.
Talking to married women about divorce is largely an isolating experience.
“I couldn’t just be on my phone in my marriage, and sit on the couch, and relax,” I told my friends at the AirBnB we were renting together in Columbus. All day long, we played tennis matches, and cheered each other on. I want to gush, but all I’ll say is that it is incredibly empowering and fun to play sports with a team of women you love. Then, we had an early dinner, and went back to the house. On the television, we turned on the Tennis channel. We sat on the couches, wrapped in blankets, in our pajamas, and hung out for hours. Talking, looking at our phones, laughing. Critiquing tennis players’ outfits. Resting. Comfortable. It was my ideal social situation. I love my friends. That whole weekend, I felt so happy.
“Why not?” my friend Tracy asked in regards to me not sitting on my phone in my marriage.
“It would make my ex mad if I was on my phone, and not paying attention to him.”
And then I changed the subject because it’s not always the case that people think that is enough of a reason to end a marriage. And to know that makes me feel so lonely.
My mom called me earlier this week. “I am so upset about something, and I want to talk about it,” she told me. She had just read The New York Times article about Jeffrey Epstein’s mansion. “He was glorifying Lolita, a 12-year-old girl in a sexual relationship with a middle aged man,” she said.
“There were pictures all over of famous men, like Bill Clinton, and the Pope,” she continued.
“Why do we continue to worship and respect these disgusting men that do such horrible things to women?” she said. “To young girls!”
My relationship with my mom has not always been easy. But in the moments when I’ve had to fight for my independence and worth, she has been my biggest champion. She was a housewife who raised six kids. She is brilliant; she is strong. She is 100% feminist.
“You have absolutely nothing to feel guilty about,” she told me over the phone that day. I told her that the divorce was moving forward, and I felt bad about keeping our house.
On the way to Columbus, during my lonely car ride, I had called my ex. My divorce lawyer wanted to talk. I had been ignoring her emails for a month. “We could stay married,” I said to him. “You could stay on my health care, and we could live separately.”
He told me, that for him, the relationship was over. That he couldn’t see any repair that was possible. And that he wanted to move forward with the divorce.
When my divorce lawyer called me soon afterwards, I told her we could finalize a separation agreement.
Weirdly, I haven’t felt lonely since.
I have felt pity, and sadness, and fear. The financial untangling of a marriage is dirty business. I felt guilty not only staying in our house, but also taking money for child support and alimony.
But I don’t feel lonely. Because I’m not the only one that is ready to move on.
And there is a whole new identity that’s waiting for me to inhabit her. I’m seeing long dog walks. Restorative yoga. Reading the New Yorker in my special chair. Weeks with my kids where we feel calm and happy. Weekends with friends where I’m not rushing home. And what else? It’s exciting not to know.