Copyright 1998, 1999 by Jane Urquhart
1-800-DIVORCE
by Jane Urquhart
Author's Note: I don't know why I didn't finish this
one--I just lost interest. I think she was going to go
to bed with her lawyer or something, but I forget.
----------------
Just riding along, coming home this morning from the
airport thinking of nothing much, I was half-listening
to the car radio when a commercial caught my attention.
"1-800-DIVORCE," the man said, "because not all
marriages are made in heaven." Clever. But tacky.
Still. You call that number, get voice-mail, I thought,
and they start giving you choices. "Press One if you
have a touch-tone phone." Click. "If you are a Pro-
testant, press One; if you are a Catholic, press Two;
if you are seriously considering kiling your spouse,
press Three."
My name is Gillian Franklin, and I'm forty-three years
old. Not that that's much of an achievement. My
youngst child, Suzanne, left for college this morning.
Her brother, Charles, a college junior, left last week.
My husband makes $400,000 a year, more or less. This
is handy, because he likes to buy things. Cars, boats,
sky-boxes, Armani suits and call girls come to mind.
I'm used to this, but somehow that commercial just
caught my attention.
Click. "If you want only a civil divorce, press One;
if you wish to obtain an official annulment as well as
a civil divorce, press Two; if you are undecided,
press Three." Oh, yes--"If you have no money of your
own, please hang up." They forgot that one.
I pictured myself reaching for the cellular telephone
that ws lying in the passenger seat and dialing. The
woman in the picture didn't look like me. She was
wearing some kind of jump suit and she weighed at
least ten pounds less than I do. Had a nicer haircut,
too--sort of shaggy and unkempt looking, but nice.
Mine, of course, is not like that. It's more like
something you see in those ads about smart elderly
women trying to tell their stupid husbands about
medicare upgrade policies. It's not gray, but otherwise
it's very like that--I m well-groomed. I was wearing
a wool suit, with a skirt.
Fortunately, about that time someone cut in front of
me and I had to slam on the brakes. That brought me
back to reality. I suppose it was fortunate. I had
put Suzanne on the airplane, left her at the gate,
that is, at an ungodly hour of the morning, walked
half a mile back to the parking lot, gotten in the car
and started home. Then I heard that commercial.
Something had been bothering me ever sinc I left the
gate, but I hadn't been able to pinpoint what it was.
Almost as soon as I finished with my clever little
projection on "1-800-DIVORCE" it came to me. Reality,
I decided, was not terribly pleasant. Another thought
crowded in. I realy had to broaden my vocabulary. So,
out loud, right there in the car with no one there to
hear me, I said, "Reality Sucks." And I found myself
smiling.
Ordinarily if I were riding along in the car, returning
from some errand, I wuold have been thinking about the
next ten items on my list of things to do. I ran
through the list, but found it not terribly stimulat-
ing. In fact, I said (to myself that time), "Reality
sucks big-time!" And smiled again. "Pick up clothes
at the cleaner." Sucks. "Make plans for dinner party
scheduled for three weeks from today." Scuks. I didn't
even bother to go down the rest of the list. "It all
sucks," I thought. "Every single thing on that list
sucks." Perhaps I needed a new list.
I already had a weekly appointment with a psychologist.
I had discussed my family of origin with her at some
length. ("It sucked," I thought as I considered this.
And smiled.) I'd been on Prozac for a while, but I'd
decided that was a bad idea, so I was drug free. I
should talk over with her these new thoughts I was
having. ("That sucks," I thought. And smiled.)
People had told me it would be terribly painful when
my last child went off to college. I carefully
searched for the pain. Apparently it hadn't started
yet, but I was sure my thoughts over the past three
miles would get me classified as depressed as soon as
I told the therapist about them. ("That sucks," I
thought, thereby proving my point. Everthing sucks.)
One of my friends had told me, many years ago, that
when she got totally fed up she simply remembered that
she could always go buy a bus pass. A bus pass,. she
explained, allowed you to travel anywhere you cared to
in the continental United States for 30 days. That
made her calm down and realize that things weren't
quite as bad as she'd thought. I wondered if bus
passes still existed. And, if they did, did I want
to buy one.
By then I ws driving into our long, curved driveway,
past a bank of rhodendrons that had curled themelves
up against the cold a long time ago and didn't look
the least bit interested in uncurling. As I braked
by the back door of the house I started wondering when
I had curled up against the cold, and when I would
decide to uncurl. Or could I? Would I just break into
little pieces like a dry leaf, or would I actually
uncurl?
I went into the house and said hello to Lavitia, who
was putting the breakfast dishes into the dishwasher.
I hng my coat in the back closet, and walked into the
game room, where my desk was. Sitting down at the
desk, I took a pen and a ruled legal pad and started
to write down what I wanted at that moment. My therapst
had told me to do that some months ago and it hadn't
seemed to lead anywhere, but I felt like trying again.
The idea was to fill up the page as quickly as possible
with things I wanted to do. Then I was to look it over
and see what had come up mst often, thereby telling
myself what I *really* wanted to do. The last time I
had tried it the result has looked a good deal like my
"todo" list. Which, I then thought, sucked. I smiled,
but I had no idea what to write. I just sat there, my
pen poised, nothing happening.
I then laid the pen down and reached for the telephone
book. A few minutes later he answered my call. How-
are-you-it's-neem-a-long-time and such things consumed
perhaps two or three minutes, then I began the real
conversation.
"Jack," I said, "I want to ask you something. I was
driving along this morning and I heard a commercial
that said, "Dial; 1-800-DIVORCE." I decided to call
you instead."
------And that's where it stopped--------
E-mail: janey98@hotmail.com