Relationship Bonding.

Another Thanksgiving gone. Some Thanksgiving are bonding holidays, some are Bond holidays: shaken not stirred. This was a Bond holiday. Bond never had to deal with divorce. Oh he got married once. Once. They killed her off. Was it the machine gun fire or the exploding car? I can't remember. I do remember she was done in by some maniacal villain holding a tranquilized cat. The cat had nothing to do with the murder. Just a prop. Every villain needs a prop. MyUnwife has cats. I've mentioned them before. Maybe I could give her a cool Bond name. Maybe not, she'd hunt me down with an exploding car.

"No Rob, I want you to die…."

So far she hasn't wanted to do that since moving out. At least not so she's willing to admit it in front of my recorder (the tape type, not the little woodwind—nevermind). Probably why I haven't heard from her in months: deniability. Maybe that's the difference between the bitter divorce and the friendly one. A bitter divorce is her Power Puff coffee mug rebounding off my forehead; a friendly divorce is breathing my last gasp through my favorite pillow. Stop kicking and relax...

I think it's part of her nefarious plan. Lay low and then pounce. I'm not sure what good prolonged pouncing is to a divorce, but she's probably discussed strategy with the cats, what they lack in plan diversity, they more than make up for in attack tenacity.

Cat: "Pounce, I say! If that doesn't work, then roll on your back, claws in the air. He'll impale himself."

MyUnwife: "Deeevioussss…"

Cat (licking himself with glee): I know. Now leave me to bathe.

She listens to cats, I listen to voices. As time passes it gets so easy to blame MyUnwife. She's not here to defend herself, or throw a cat at me in contempt. It's just silence and the dog. The dog agrees to everything: he likes the attention. But time and silence ruin my perspective. All I remember is how I saw things when she left, so my perspective is a little bitter and skewed, like orange juice and toothpaste. That’s the only thing I have to remember MyUnwife by: the faces I made before she left.

See? That's where Bond had it made: He'll always remember his wife by the sunny memories, and how some outsider ruined them. He never saw her throw a jealous fit over Ms. Moneypenny, or gripe over how his tux always had singed collars, or why he needed to save the world on their anniversary. They had no time. Me? I'll always remember how things decayed from within over time. I've lost the sunny drive in the Aston Martin. I'm blinded by the orb of gall. All I see are shadows: corrupt silhouettes, misshapen by passing time.