- My divorce took 24 months, and my 28-year-long marriage ended in UPS with a rubber stamp.
- He told me over the phone he wanted to get a divorce.
- I administered some first aid, looked back, and look forward
The woman in front of me at the UPS line was holding a collapsed box. Her impatience was fueled by the heat. I wanted the time on the line that day since I wasn’t returning something. I was waiting for the notary and a rubber stamp. The almost 24 months of vertigo-inducing moments of my divorce were done. My 28-year marriage was about to end in a UPS store.
I wish I were at another place for this, but it was the only option that day. After a skinny-arm swing and a thud, that was that. Stamped, I left. Was that a smirk I saw on his face as I left? I didn’t know whether I should laugh or cry.
I wasn’t easily shocked by anything anymore. The dystopian world we all experienced mirrored my divorce. It was eerily an undoing like that show I had watched — each layer of my life unraveling with newly discovered revelations. After washing groceries and coloring my hair at home together, I thought we were OK. Any of my own separation thoughts were now pushed away. Daughter home from college, check. Cabinets of toilet paper and huge cans of soup, check. We’re all safe, or so I thought.
I crashed before he proposed
There were good years and then not. In 1991 he planned to propose, but I crashed my sister’s car that day. I remember his hushed phone call with my father to rearrange plans, or so I learned later. With stitches in my head, the proposal went forward days later. I sometimes wonder if it was prophetic to the eventual demise of our relationship.
When the call came, it was a sunny October day in the middle of the pandemic. He tried calling a few times. This midday call was strange — almost alien. “It’s time to pull off the Band-Aid,” he said, a day or two after a nice dinner outside with two of our good friends. “You’re telling me this on the phone?” I asked incredulously.
That is how it went down. And, just like that, the divorce machine started its engine. I think he said I had some “good qualities” — like a car — but at that point, my dog was floating in the sky, and I couldn’t hear anything because I was still waiting for a vaccine. He packed his toothbrush. I packed up 30 years of memories. Later I tried to be grateful it didn’t end with a post-it note.
Life gets in the way: aging parents, spawn leaving the nest, and the same stories. For many, it’s the cycle of life: An “it’s us-against-the-world” mentality. For some, when one can’t see the future or hasn’t tackled the past, a reason to rip and run.
Drive slowly
So how do you find peace in it all? It comes in between all the stuff and after the bandage is pulled off. You find your sea legs. You make lists — legal to-dos, self-maintenance appointments, and spend time with good friends who have your back. You go easy on yourself, drive slowly and put your seatbelt on because going too fast has consequences.
Staying out of the proverbial rabbit hole, here’s my look back after some first aid: I remind myself every kugel had a purpose. Every memory was real. Every eye-roll was called for. Trust your gut, especially if the last years of your marriage made your gut hang over your jeans.
A big crash can be an ending or an exciting beginning. In my case, it was both. Make new memories and never let your gut go unless you’re eating pastries in France.
Karen Amster-Young is a strategic advisor for communications agencies, author, and journalist. The author of the nonfiction book “The 52 Weeks” (Skyhorse), she shares stories and gives back to various causes. She paints, she worries, and works tirelessly to mentor many. She lives with her dog Lucy and works every day to be a great mom, friend, and storyteller.