Correcting Vision

He sat at the table full of hatred. Directed at me. His eyes never opened onto his heart and soul the way my father's always did. This was the creep I had married! And I'd just found out about his affair

How could I have been that stupid? I'd been thinking I was a married woman. What I really was, though, was the butt of a joke. Now all these years into this wrong way tunnel it hit me with that childlike clarity I barely remembered in myself. This guy is no prize!

He says he loves me but then he hits me in the face. So what will it be? Love? It isn't love. I don't know what it is, but certainly not love.

Then a verse from the Bible came straight out of childhood and said directly to me, "Know the truth. The truth will set you free."

Which it did. In that instant, though, when I took off my own shackles and looed at truth, I saw freedom. And at the same time I felt absolutely lost. All illusions missing, what was I doing in this strange relationship? Or how to redirect my life? Those turned out to be unanswered for years. Yet I moved towards something better for myself and for my children.

I kicked him out of the house that night. It was easier than expected. He refused to leave. So I said, "Don't fall asleep in this house tonight." And he just looked at me. But he really heard me. So he took off into the night.

It was about 1 o'clock in the morning. The showdown was shorter than expected. The house was quiet. The children slept peacefully for once. They wouldn't wake up to the sound of his screaming at me to get up out of my sleep and go scrub kitchen counters or something. My children had their first experience of sleeping all through the night.

My response was to sit in a rocking chair in my squeaky clean living room and watch the night turn into day. I felt nothing.

I simply rocked in that chair. Slowly strands of color lit up the horizon. Little by little the front yard came into full view. I loved that perfectly kept yard. And at the same time I felt all the aches in my body that it took to make the yard look like that.

Facade. That's all it was. Not a convincing one, at that. But it took a lot of work to keep that appearance.

I had to work early next morning. The babysitter came. I went to work before the children were up. I didn't talk to them until the afternoon after work. By that time I had the words for it. Words to share information in a way that comforted instead of confused.

I simply said, "Children, your dad doesn't live here anymore. But he's still your dad. You will still see him about as much as ever. You and I will still live here and do pretty much whatever we please."

Anything beyond that would have been unusable information. They need not try to process anything else. To my surprise, they understood it completely. They expressed relief for all of us. They also talked about me staying home to play with them instead of going to work. And my youngest daughter cried because she imagined her dad having to sleep at work.

I explained that I would still have to go to work. My son took that hard. But without a source of income we wouldn't be able to go about our merry way. And knowing how cheap the guy was, I expected a long fight over child support.

He was in fact a very cruel man. I'd been so busy obeying his orders that I didn't even fight back when he struck out. Stupid, right? But that's what I did. Just accepted the blows as what I deserved.

I did notice his cruelty to the children but I also never stopped him. That is something I will always be ashamed of.

From that moment forward the divorce was just a matter of paperwork. Eventually it came to an end. We ended up moving into an apartment where there were no ghosties to deal with. I picked up a little part time job to cover what child support might have been, and once in a while there was a check from him. Rarely, though, and always short of the amount the judge had ordered.

Sometimes I had an extra payday in the month. Plus a full day off. So we would take a road trip on those days. We went to Chicago and saw the sights. We saw museum. And street signs. The children were excited to see those signs because they could all read by that time.

Once we went to House on the Rock. If there wasn't time or money for a day trip we would do free things around town. We fed ducks at the lake. We walked the trails in the dunes. We went to parades on holidays. Most days there was something decent to eat.

I struggled with rent and groceries. My training from childhood had been about how to work. But I never handled money. The husband did that part. Little did I know that's how he was able to afford his dating and drinking hobbies. But I began to learn about money. In my 30s.

Through it all I never cried. There was a lot of anger in me, which came as quite a surprise. Maybe the anger blocked the tears. Anyway, I'd already cried plenty before the break-up.

Then finally, about 10 years into single motherhood I went to bed one night so exhausted from work that I fell into a deep sleep. The kind that also includes dreams, which I hadn't had in a long time.

I dreamed of that man and me as it never was but still it felt very real. I saw his pleasure in making other people sad. Not just us, but really everyone he could influence that way. And in my dream I cried.

As it happened, in my bed and in my sleep, without my permission, I was also crying. I woke myself up with deep racking sobs that shook my whole self. When I wished to stop, the tears wouldn't stop. Then it became scary. What if I could never again stop crying? But some while later I did stop crying. And went to work with a swollen face as a result.

My heart wasn't broken at all. But there was never another chance to end up in that position. I wouldn't allow that.

My children lived to grow up. They each have someone to walk with them through life. I'm happy to say they've each outdone me in their success in all areas of their lives.

I just had my vision corrected, that's all.