The Blame Game

I really do not want to become THAT person. You know who I mean. We all have one in our lives. She - or he - is the person to whom everything happens. Bad luck befalls them wherever they go. The people in their lives all turn into lice.  They've been tricked, wronged, hornswoggled at every turn.  And nothing, nothing is ever their fault.

I am sure I played a starring role in all of my failed endeavors. I could garner awards for the roles I played in my failed relationships.  I guess I still have to figure out how I was cast in the Shakespearean play that was me and Scott. And is it more Romeo and Juliet or Much Ado About Nothing? Something to ponder. (The unemployed tend to ponder...)

So where Lars and I are concerned, in retrospect it is safe to say that it was an  "OK" marriage that came unraveled when Fate yanked on the loose thread on the sweater that kept his Psyche safe and warm.  We became parents and his identity blew to smithereens. 

And while I tried like Hell to keep all the plates in the air and put one foot in front of the other and keep refilling the leaking bucket - all while raising two kids and maintaining a full time job and trying to figure out what the Hell to do with Dad - eventually the bottom dropped out of the whole thing.

Lars kept unraveling. I kept trying to keep him warm. I lost ground. I couldn't light up his darkness. He couldn't light up his darkness. Even pharmaceutically.

And then I stopped trying.

And then I stopped caring.

Lars became one of the most consistently pissed off people I have ever known. Suspicious. Confrontational. Argumentative. Combative. Contrary. Mean.

I tried to appease him for a while. Fall in line. Carry the flag.

And then I ignored him.  So what if he insulted me in public? Who cared if he disparaged me?  People who know me will just take it as confirmation that I married A Complete Ass.

And then I began to do things that I knew would send him sailing over the very edge of reason, but that were important enough to me to suffer the consequences.

And that is the slippery slope I set foot upon. The one that leads to being a Bad Spouse.

Not that I did anything morally reprehensible. I would not compromise myself. I just became a crappy partner.

You don't want to go out with friends on Friday?  Fine, stay home. I'm going.
You don't like what I've made for dinner? Don't eat it. There are takeout menus in the hall drawer.
You don't like the way I do laundry? You are perfectly welcome to wash your own fucking socks, asshole.
You don't like my outfit?  Well no one asked you to wear it, and by the way, pleats make you look like Humpty Dumpty.  Lose the pants or lose a few pounds, Chub-O.
You don't like my friends?  They are not fans of yours either. Let's not mingle, okay?

So while Lars certainly has a few big ticket items in the Blame Column for our divorce, I don't think anyone would exactly label me a Saint either.

I just had the good sense to get out before I threw every sense of discretion out the window to scrounge up a little happiness.