Another Year Goes By…

I just had a birthday and I am getting close to my second anniversary on my blog. I never really though about it before but it was supremely shitty of my ex to leave me two weeks before my birthday two years ago. My Birthday will forever be kind of linked to such a horrible time in my life. Yep – the jerk runs deep with that one. Anyway I guess it is time to do another review and check in on my life….

Last year at this time I had recently moved to a new apartment and was adjusting to that. Hmmmm…no change there – this year I have just moved to a new apartment again and am adjusting (almost unpacked – just a small pile of boxes left). Granted I think this apartment is much better in many ways, but I am still dealing with the fallout of having to move again after just a year in my apartment in LB. The biggest negative impact of this move is the severe hit to my finances. Unfortunately the shortened commuting time and stress reduction that my new apartment provides cannot be filled up with doing more of the fun things that I was missing – like movies and theater and going out with my friends – because I simply don’t have the money to do these things. Hopefully as time goes on and I get more settled I will find I have a bit more discretionary income – but for right now I am really having to juggle both the fun parts of my life (like going out and inviting friends over for dinner parties and buying what I want at the grocery store) and the necessities (like buying prescription drugs, toilet paper and pet food) against the date I get paid. Having to move again so soon after moving last year completely tapped my financial resources – moving is super expensive you guys – and after the moving costs I have to account for increased rent, increased utility bills and increased health insurance costs. Orange County costs me $50 per month more than LA County for the exact same plan and doctors and it is going to go up in January by a predicted 10% putting me very close to $500/month for a bronze plan which covers very little. And while I avoid getting political on this blog – the current administration and congress continue to propose things to make even the expensive, not so great insurance coverage I have even more expensive and harder to get. I lost my husband’s health coverage at a really bad time.

Last year at this time my divorce had just become final. Incidentally, the day we signed the papers was the last time I saw my ex and the last time we spoke to each other. We did have a couple short text exchanges in September and October but since then nothing. He has paid me my tiny spousal support payment early each month, but although he was supposed to get me a “get” (Jewish formal divorce decree) and start the QDRO process to split his 401k by the end of 2017 he has not done either. I am pretty sure the only way I will be able to “make” him do these things is to get a lawyer but as I have no extra money (see above – I have had to move twice in the last 18 months) I can’t afford to do this. He has changed jobs since last year (and maybe moved his 401k?)and is supposedly getting married again in October so I know these things are just going to get more complex but in all honesty this is not something I want to dwell on at this time and I feel a bit powerless to do anything about it right now. I have enough stress in my life right now just dealing with normal stuff – I don’t need to add to it by hitting my head against a brick wall and against his stubbornness about this stuff…

As to my feelings about the ex…am I still sad? It is sort of a dull wistful sadness at this point. I don’t cry over him anymore and little things are not big triggers. But I still miss him (or the idea of him). I miss being married, I miss having someone to laugh with and cry on. I miss all the little moments that a marriage brings. I still sometimes see odd things out in the world (like a train shaped mailbox) and my first thought is “David would like that”. But I also realize that the person that I miss just doesn’t exist anymore. Even if he somehow came back into my life – I would be getting to know a new, completely different person with ideals and morals and dreams that are completely different from the man I met in 2010.

Surprisingly I am not really lonely. I like living alone mostly, but there are many aspects of marriage that I do miss. I miss sex – but even more that that I miss the less sexual, more romantic physical aspects of marriage. I miss holding hands and cuddling on the sofa watching TV. And kissing. I really miss kissing. Intellectually I know I could maybe have those things with someone else eventually, but emotionally I just don’t see that happening for me anytime soon. I have never been good at dating and at this point in my life it seems more and more like a chore than something to look forward to. It is really hard for me to imaging feeling those types of feelings for someone else. Maybe that will change if I meet someone but I feel selfish now – unwilling to give of myself or of my time and energy. It is like my ex killed the giving part of my nature and turned me into someone cold and unfeeling – ironic since he justified leaving me by saying I ‘didn’t care about him at all” when I would have done pretty much anything for him and for us if he had just talked to me about what he was feeling instead of giving me weird “tests” and lying to me for months while he trolled online for new romantic and sexual adventures. He turned me into the unfeeling creature he unfairly claimed I was.

Last year I was taking a pottery class once a week, I was very into bath products and was getting a few beauty subscription boxes to liven up my mailbox. This year I stopped the pottery classes, not because I didn’t enjoy them but they were getting kind of expensive and I wasn’t enjoying the fact that they took up such a big part of my weekend. Now with my seemingly bigger apartment (it is technically smaller but I swear it feels twice as big – I don’t get it) and the fact that I have a dining table to work on – I started a new crafty hobby of diamond painting which I am really enjoying. I stopped getting all the beauty boxes – I still love makeup and skin care products but a year of getting the boxes gave me a healthy supply and that is money that can be spent a little more wisely right now. I still love the baths but need them less as a mind numbing escape now and just occasionally use them to physically relax

I had big plans last year to have friends over all the time for dinner parties but I was only able to do that a few times – the lack of space in my apartment made gathering a bit difficult and the dinky user unfriendly kitchen was not conducive to cooking and planning. My new apartment has a great open kitchen with a dishwasher. I can tell that I am more content in my life simply because I am eager to get back into the kitchen to make stuff. I had friends over for my birthday on the 15th and made Pavlova for dessert which was awesome (I watch too many British cooking shows) and I have small dinner parties planned for the 15th of September and the 20th of October and hopefully I will be able to do something like that at least once a month going forward. I wish I could do it even more often but again I need to schedule them around payday. But it feels nice to be interested again in cooking and entertaining. I also subscribed to a farm box every other week from a company called Imperfect Produce. They are a company that is committed to ending food waste so their boxes are filed with fruits and veggies that are either “ugly” (crooked carrots or misshapen peppers for instance) or farmer’s surplus. All the produce is perfect in quality and taste, it is just stuff that the markets reject because of size or blemishes or shape and it is much cheaper than the stores. Getting this box every other week is kind of fun and stimulates my creative cooking impulses.

So last year, my far reaching plan was to get back to being happy instead of just being okay. I don’t think I am quite there yet, but I am on my way. I am a few steps closer to happy. I am mostly content, definitely have happy times mixed in with the sad and stressful times. I am still a work in progress but the progress is being made.