Keep Your Hands Offa My Mojo

[SmileysPerson]

Still no real follow-up -- I was out of the area all weekend. Couple items:

* Sent an email along the lines of what @robx suggested after responding cordially but not eagerly to the initial. Her response was essentially "I can do that [name some places], but the real problem is date/time" -- I think that she's referring to the same babysitter problems I've referred to in the past, coupled with my upcoming business trip.

* She texted about a Girl-Child issue last nite and I responded. Called to speak with the Girl-Child while I was driving back from Distant Place, and STBXMRSSP asked if I wanted "to talk after"? I said gosh that would be nice but I'm almost out of cell-phone battery, so next time. Didn't mention the car charger. Received a mildly disappointed "oh, okay."

* I don't think it's about renegotiating the settlement because of the lack of time constraint. Here's STBXMRSSP's original email, sanitized for the protection of the innocent (and her too) (and it will have the rest of the backstory for @hoosiermama):

We had had the Refreshing exchange I mentioned up-thread, and she'd written something about changing a custody date, just a one-day switch because she has jury duty [and even if the trial goes over a day, the following days are my custody days anyway].

I replied "Will check when get back to house ok? Dont foresee problem -- my social secretary Jeeves is very good -- not like he overbooks my time or anything" [referring to Jeeves and Wooster because I'd pulled a Bertie Wooster earlier in the week and she remembered how much I like those stories and said one thing she'd learned about separation and divorce was just how much one needs a Jeeves).

Then came the pee-kooler reply:

"Me neither, no matter what you might think or want to think. Anyway I kind of can't believe I'm saying this because it's a pretty risky proposition, but if you ever want to go to dinner or something just say so. I don't mean this as a pressure thing -- I'm just going to put it out there. No expiration date."

So that's your backstory, @hoosiermama.

My initial reply was a simple "Well that's a very thing to say, and I appreciate it. If it's okay I'll think on it a bit and get back to you."

* She texted this morning at school drop-off time about a clothing crisis for Girl-Child. [The Rancho de Smiley's Person is across the street from the kids' school.]

I went over to where she parked in front of the school, knocked on the window, stuck my head in, offered a couple items of clothes, and noticed how completely frazzled she was, with that distressed turn of the mouth she gets when she's, well, distressed. So being the Mojolicious fellow I am, I smiled and looked her in the eyes and asked, "Everything okay?" Got the flustered, "No, yeah, no, well, it's just work."

Ah, none of my business then. Well, if there's anything I can do, let me know. Have a pleasant day. Smiled, closed the door, walked back across the street to the house, chortling to myself chortlingly: Yeah, it seemed pretty easy when it was all about Being Free and running off to Signore didn't it? Single parenthood not all it's cracked up to be, eh? Chortle, chortle, chortle.

* That about covers it so far. I'm just mojolating along, going to be visiting with Miss Someone for a couple days and try to get caught up on work.

[hoosiermama]

When we last left our hero, he was fixin' to mojolate re: some pee-koolar behavior by the Mrs. Perhaps some version of the original Mrs. peeking out. Always a concerning turn of events to those who have Been Here before.

Any news on the plight of our hero and his perilous prospect of Return to Batchittville?

[Puppy Dog Tails]

I'm figurin' he died o' sex injuries, Hoozh.

[SmileysPerson]

Nothing significant to report, and certainly no fatal sex injuries (though not for lack of the old college try!).

The Boy Himself has been REALLY acting-out at school. STBXMRSSP, who had custody on the week, wigged out because he was uncooperative t'other morning and called me to demand "talk to your son."

Mojolated. Didn't pick up the she's-not-doing-her-job/I'm-rescuing rope, just talked to Himself, got him realigned and off and going. STBXMRSSP took the opportunity to obliquely insult me during her ranting about The Boy, which I likewise deployed my mojo against and simply ignored. She knew from the cool tone of my responses to later texts and e-mails that she was busted, though she didn't come right out and apologize, which is Textbook Herself.

She's done this in the past and written it off to "I was upset," but I would suggest (at the risk of bastardizing some bastardized Latin) that, like vino, in ira veritas as well: in anger there is truthfulness.

It's always useful to be reminded of what she really seems to think of me, rather than what she seems to want to think of me in moments of higher-consciousness and (loneliness?) (guilt-feeling?) (nostalgia?) and out-on-date-asking, so as to avoid falling into any potential traps. Just keeping that wisdom from Two on friends and enemies in the front of my mind.

I'm just continuing to work the mojo. Cool opportunity arose the other day -- a long long-shot, but at least they're out there.

[hoosiermama]

I'm figurin' he died o' sex injuries, Hoozh.

can you do that with a nurse, tho? I mean, not that we aren't collectively hot enough to cause damage, but there's that whole assessment thing. I mean, for example, if I was, uh, with someone "intensely" enough to cause potential lethal sex injuries, I'd kinda feel bad about having lost my assessment skills. I'm jus' sayin' here. Altho, on 2nd thought, it's been quite awhile and I'd probably be somewhat distracted by the heat of the moment and all. But I digress. Miss Someone could probably put someone in danger of such but have the skills to do some preventative (oops, almost said "prophylactic" but thought better of it) measures to ensure the safety of her patient partner, know what I mean?!

[hoosiermama]

Wow, she's really twisting in the wind, that Mrs.SP. No idea which way is up or where the ground is. The complete unpredictability would get on my nerves.

at least my xH had the peculiar grace to be consistently a jerk.

[SmileysPerson]

@hoosiermama: The complete unpredictability would get on my nerves. It's nerve-grating, that's for sure.

After several days of reflection, I elected to work my mojo and call her out on this nonsense. No validation of feelings; no "hearing;" no presumptive understanding -- I just laid it out, step-wise, in harsh clear bright light.

I wrote a longish e-mail, carefully proofed and edited to meet the @Gypsy Paradigm of "impeccable" words and basically said, "Thanks for letting me see exactly what your true evaluations of me are. I know you're going to try to write it off as 'I was upset' but that's when the truth is revealed -- when your natural defenses are down and the inhibitions that might otherwise lead you to rephrase or cushion what you say aren't present."

I didn't appreciate -- and wasn't going to stand for -- the 3 insults she made and gave her examples of how the bitchy things she said were completely consistent with what she'd said on D-Day and in various batsh*t-crazy-a-thons since and suggested that in my point-of-view the only logical conclusion is that her words are, in fact, reflections of her true beliefs about me.

I also made clear that though I wasn't going to stand for that level of disrespect ever again, I was not going to let it compromise my mojo, that I wasn't going to meet force with force, and that I was going to continue to cooperate in the interest of raising Themselves.

That being said, I committed to leaving the communication channels open but only on mechanical issues relating to the children. I wrote that her phone call was quite helpful in its way and that it taught me to be even more cautious of her and her words than I have been thus far -- that despite the nice things she occasionally says to me, and the nice things about me she occasionally says to me, the soundest course-of-action for me is simply to treat them as de facto lies.

Borrowing a line from Schnarch, I told her that, in my point-of-view, the truth is not something that comes out of her mouth, at least not in my experience of her since D-Day, and that I was going to base all of my evaluations and interactions of and with her on experience only, because she reveals at best Truth-Lite, and even then only under duress and quite begrudgingly.

I reminded her, for example, that it took my spying, my hectoring her for 5 months, and her moving out before there was an admission there'd actually been intercourse with Signore and that even then she concocted this ridiculous story that she barely even remembered it the affair was so trivial -- but that months after concocting that story she was still enthusing to her friends (and me!) about it being the Greatest Ever.

To add presumptive insult to injury (okay, I wasn't that "impeccable") I pointed out that one very likely source for The Boy's troubles this week -- the thing that prompted her snotty phone call -- is the fact that she was mis-dosing him with his medication, and that I had confirmed this fact with his physician. I then cut-and-pasted into my e-mail the SMS text exchange in which I clearly laid out the instructions and which she acknowledged receiving at that time.

In other words, I wrote, all the trouble that led you to make that nasty phone call was very likely of your own making. Yet when the chips were down, and you didn't know what to do, you called me. Maybe having to admit your weakness was too hard, so you put on your Dominatrix Persona -- whereas a normal person might have said, "Hi, I'm having trouble with The Boy, can you help?" you opted for the imperative, "Talk to The Boy. Now!" And to be sure I understood just where I rank, apparently, you took it upon yourself to trot out the Old Reliables. Well, as Wilbur Wright once said to his brother, "That just ain't gonna fly, Orville." You-Called-Me. And you will again -- you know it, and I know it. And you WILL speak to me with respect, if for no other reason than you screwed up, and I bailed you out. And if you can't do that, if you despise me that much, then so be it -- you can bloody well figure out how to fix the problem yourself. Your parenting is Not...My...Job.

Not surprisingly, there was no reply. Down the memory hole. 'Twas ever thus.

Now how does this square with her odd date-asking-out-on? Obviously I can't read her mind, and I can't say for sure, but if I had to hypothesize it would go like this: The guilt she feels at breaking apart the family -- and she claims to feel guilt -- also induces her to try (or, perhaps, to want to try) to salvage some kind of positive affect for me.

As if maintaining a positive, even caring (of a kind), relationship with me post-divorce will assuage the guilt and justify the decision -- "see, it wasn't so bad!" But when she's in crisis, when the hot line is jangling between Washington and Moscow, that notional "get along" veneer is ripped away and her true -- and truly negative -- feelings about me are given free reign.

Just a guess, of course, but an informed one and (I suspect) not one that's far off the mark.

[Puppy Dog Tails]

SP,

So which came first, her asking you on the date, or you sending her that e-mail?

I'm confused, what with all the great prose and all (but enjoyed the read, as always, nonetheless).

Puppy

[SmileysPerson]

The oblique asking-out-on was 1/22.

The Boy's troubles were Sat, Mon, Tues of this week.

The nasty phone call was this past Wed.

My e-mail was today.

[orangedog]

Now how does this square with her odd date-asking-out-on? Obviously I can't read her mind, and I can't say for sure, but if I had to hypothesize it would go like this: The guilt she feels at breaking apart the family -- and she claims to feel guilt -- also induces her to try (or, perhaps, to want to try) to salvage some kind of positive affect for me.

As if maintaining a positive, even caring (of a kind), relationship with me post-divorce will assuage the guilt and justify the decision -- "see, it wasn't so bad!" But when she's in crisis, when the hot line is jangling between Washington and Moscow, that notional "get along" veneer is ripped away and her true -- and truly negative -- feelings about me are given free reign.

Just a guess, of course, but an informed one and (I suspect) not one that's far off the mark.

Dog thinks likely.