Moving On

It’s been 16 months since MyEx-odus.  When she left, it wasn’t an e-bomb napalm goodbye. Nope.  It was a planned skirmish with RSVP invitations and Martha Stewart table settings and matching movers. It was so prepared, preplanned, and prehearsed that even the cats knew their moves for each act.

 

“Mew.”

 

Yeah, she gave me a six-month heads-up. We made plans. We made our bed. Now I lie in it, but I knew what hit me. I don’t lie awake surprised, not usually.

 

Then there’s today.  Today is unusual.  Today, 16 months after the fact, something happened in my divorce, and it surprised me.

 

Maybe I should explain. 

 

In every move, every death, and every divorce, you always plan for everything and always forget something. Whether it’s a couch, a cat, or a body, somebody’s leaving something behind.

 

The first time MyEx and I moved, we forgot to pre-pack. Yeah, we boxed everything the day we rented the truck.  You’d be surprised how much stuff you can fit in a small apartment, and how long it takes to pack it.  We were.  That’s the same day MyEx forgot she quit smoking. I remembered enough survival skills not to remind her.

 

When MyEx moved out, she later told me she forgot Band-aids. Of course, she remembered that while bleeding into a towel. Once again, I remembered to sound saddened.

 

“Really?  That’s horrible!”

“Uh-huh, and why are you giggling?”

“It’s the giggle of empathy.”

 

Actually, she didn’t forget them. She left them.  She had planned that she wouldn’t need them—or at least that I would need them first.  Sixteen months later I haven’t found the reason she planned that, but, like I said, I shouldn’t be surprised when I do.  I’ll go and meet her with one hand missing and she’ll say, “Oh, I forgot about that.”  That’s the way divorce works.

 

Maybe I should explain.  Yeah, I know.  I said that once before, but now you’ve bought into this blog for a page, I feel obligated. I know you’re serious.  So am I. I just forget to move on.

 

In my marriage I tried to move on from AOL—several times.  I couldn’t; MyEx is a big fan. I don’t think so much a big fan of AOL as a big fan of her email address.   She was proud. She got a cool one word as a screen name and didn’t want to lose it. I can’t blame her. How often does that happen?  I mean if I spell out the letters of my email, the first three letters out of your mouth are “WTF?”  Then I go into this blog length explanation about emails and screen names that, like most of my blogs, just isn’t worth the time or effort. 

 

You’ve read this far; you know what I mean.

 

What it really means is that when we were duking it out over “I want,” she said, “I want the AOL.” I said, “Okay.” That meant I was being evicted from my email account.  I had 30 days to pack up my things and get out. I had all the time in the world.

 

So I took my time and I did it right.  I gathered all my email addresses and told everybody important that I was moving. The only people left behind were spammers and people I didn’t want to do business with any more—until today.

 

Since I’m going to visit Grunge Pixie over Christmas, I thought it would be a good idea to stop newspaper delivery.  Since I only remember to do this at 1am, I figured I’d use the newspaper’s website. 

 

Email accounts are filled like closets.  You never know what’s in there until you go digging.  When we first moved into the house, we lost the garage door opener.  We had it, and then we didn’t.  To pull into the garage, MyEx used to use the electronic box that was supposed to attach to the side of the house.  This meant that instead of pressing a button to open the door, she had to enter a 4-digit code and press “enter,” while approaching the house.

 

I think she loved the challenge.

 

After she moved out, I threw out all the treasures she didn’t want and I couldn’t use.  The bag of women’s shoes at the bottom of the closet was a great example.  On instinct though, I decided to search the bag before throwing it out.  My search paid off.  $1.57 to be exact.  It also revealed the lost garage remote.  I made sure to call MyEx and gloat. 

 

Email is the same way.  You forget what’s in your email, and what’s attached to your account.  I know I did.   I remembered when I tried to log into my newspaper account that I didn’t even know that I’d opened. Their website said I most definitely had, and they wanted a password.

 

  Password?

 

I don’t remember the password.  You know what’s really cool?  Not only can’t I remember the old one, I can’t ask for a new one.  Oh, they’ll give it to me, but they’ll send it to my AOL account…that I don’t have anymore. 

 

Oh, I want to open the door, but I don’t have the remote code.  It’s something I forgot in the move, and it’s something I found 16 months later.  Yeah, somewhere MyEx is doubling over in the giggle-empahy only granted by Rob-irony.  It’s ok.  At least I got to keep my hand.