L.O.S (Loss Of Signal)

[Jimbo]

Just some more riffing....

Have you ever had an idea hit you like a bolt from out of the blue that made all the pieces of the puzzle suddenly drop into place?

That bolt hit me a handful of days after reading through my last response above. I've only now just had a chance to make a post about it.

One of the last things that my (now) XW ever said to me was related to her removing all of her things from the marital home. She said something to the effect of, "Now, if you feel I've taken something that I shouldn't have, just let me know". I had always puzzled over that statement for YEARS, since she never once let herself into our place while I was gone and took anything of mine that I could ever tell.

But she did...I just never realized it until many, many years later.

It was the vital records folder.

It not only had my vital records in it, but hers as well.

...and its removal allowed for plausible deniability that it was a "mistake", but that puzzling statement that I had noodled over off and on for all of this time pointed to it being "an accident on purpose".....and a way for her to try to keep tabs on me, and make me maintain contact with her without her contacting me!

Now it all makes sense. Even the bit about her supposedly needing her Social Security card and Birth Certificate back from me, yet never making arrangements to get them. Because she had the folder all the time! It practically screamed the meta-message, "DID YOU CHECK??? DID YOU EVEN NOTICE THAT IT'S GONE??? DID YOU NOTICE THAT I HAVE SOMETHING OF YOURS.....SOMETHING YOU NEED??? AREN'T YOU GOING TO COME OUT OF THE DARK AND CONTACT MEEEEEEEE??????"

I can only imagine the frustration she must've felt when the unintended meta-message came back, "Nope. Didn't check. Because it must still be here since you're telling me you need the folder. You wouldn't do that if you had it. So if you need it, let me know when you want to come and get it".

It was a bittersweet revelation. Sad that she was trying so hard to maintain what little control she felt she had over her life, and it wasn't working how she wanted. But happy, because of the hidden meaning behind the whole chain of events.

I had the great privilege of knowing the legendary Jack3Beans both on and off this board. He was a truly great man and a wise friend. He once shared with me his belief that, unless you've done something extreme to burn the bridge, "....[T]hey always try to come back. When they do, you may not want them anymore, but they always try to come back". He also shared with me that, when they start piecing their lives back together again, they save the relationships and people that mean the most to them for last.

"The mystery of the missing folder" has been solved. Since this whole chain of events started as one of the last contacts I had with my XW, if there was ever a doubt in my mind as to whether I had burned the bridge or not, it shows me definitively that, in her eyes, I had not.

I'm very much looking forward to testing my good friend's theory.