Several moments recently have forced me to give a detailed look into the concept of marriage again. And this particular opinion somewhat borders on the definition of shallow, and more than exudes the definition of practical and realistic.

There’s an old saying: Marry the first time for love, and the second time for money

Yes it’s shallow, but if you look at it from a different viewpoint, it actually makes a lot of sense. I feel that all relationships should be based off of stability, which in turn can mean money. No I don’t mean marrying rich or anything like that. And I do want to acknowledge that I am a huge romantic, and I’m all about love conquers all and other such nonsense.

Let me explain.

Back in historical times, there were things considered dowry’s. Essentially the bride’s family was responsible for giving a gift to the groom’s family. Women back then were encouraged to marry wealthy, so that they would be taken care of. Nothing necessarily wrong with that, but a lot of times I’m sure they were dissatisfied with their marriages.

In Africa, I watched a show on Discovery a while back about a tribe that had to fatten up their wives before they could be married off. And the men wanted their women fat, and had to have a good herd of cattle in exchange for his wife. A dowry, but in its opposite form. Essentially it’s about having something to offer for the marriage.

My first marriage, I realize now, was more of a rebellion than anything. There was love there, I’m sure, but I wasn’t ready to be married. Luckily it was only a legal marriage, and not any type of spiritual bonding.

Being single now in the real world with bills and responsibilities, has given me a new outlook on my potential next marriage and step at becoming an adult. And financial stability is a huge HUGE deal with me because of my responsibility to take care of my father. So when I look to get married again, I’m going to be picky about it, that’s my choice. I’m not going to marry someone who isn’t capable of steady employment, or isn’t employed at all. I won’t marry someone who lives off of his parents funds and would prefer to go out to bars and party every night, risking his own status of employment with the inability to keep a standard schedule.

My mom actually dated a guy like that for a few years. He was, I think, 2 or 3 years older than me, and lived with us for a long time, having never had a job. He spent most of his time on the internet and drawing Star Trek ships. He was nice and all, and maybe my mom did have feelings for him, but it was irresponsible for him to be such a loser, and for her to put up with it.

I guess my point is, I’m not going to let a man drag me down. I have fought too hard, and worked too much, to marry a guy that is going to make it harder on me to support myself and my father, whether I love him or not. So yes, money is going to be a big factor in my next marriage. I don’t care if he’s rich, I don’t care if money is tight the rest of my life. But I want to be stable. Stability is key.

It may seem somewhat shallow, yes. I’ll never consider myself a shallow person, but I do consider myself a practical one.

I’m going to be a mother, did you know? Rather, I’m going to be a stepmother. (It sounds so evil…).

The mysterious guy I’ve been seeing, who I purposefully do not talk about much in my journal (since he reads it), has a little girl. I believe she just turned 4 years old, and she’s the most adorable thing.

This particular long distance relationship is very hard, not only from the normal reasons of being lonely, several hundred miles distance, and money for visitations. But because Mr. Right is leaving behind his little girl. Not by choice, but because his ex-wife will be fighting fo full custody, and she’s a good mother, so she most likely will win.

I feel bad for Mr. Right, it’s not easy for me to watch him move far away from his little girl. His ex-wife will be moving far away from where he is now anyway, so he will be an equal distance apart either way, whether he moves up here or not.

But I feel worse because I will also be missing his little girl growing up. I want her to be a part of his life, which means being a part of mine. And in situations like this, it’s inevitable that there will be emotions and energies that, voluntarily or not, will paint us in a bad picture in the little girls eyes. She’s living with her mother, that’s just the way it is. I’ve lived through the situation twice on my own, and a mothers influence is very strong.

I wonder if it’s silly to feel somewhat of a loss knowing that I’m not going to really be able to see his little girl grow up. I hope that she’ll realize when she’s older, that I really do want to give us a chance.

I was sitting with Will and Caryn at their camp last night before the drumming circle, and we got to talkin about wedding rings. I had mentioned that I still had my engagement ring, wedding ring, and Alex gave me back the wedding ring that I gave him, because both of the wedding rings were my parents.

Caryn was going to give her wedding ring to her son, Tegan, who is a very young and foolish boy, and at 18 is already a papa. But instead of giving it to him, so he can give it to a girl that may end up leaving him anyway and taking the ring with her, Caryn thought about selling it and giving the money to Tegan to help support the little baby. Which I thought was a very good idea.

I’ve been trying to figure out what to do with mine for a while. I thought about attempting to sell it and using the money towards my fathers medical bills. His recent surgery especially.

I’m not sure what to do about the wedding bands themselves. They are both yellow gold, and both look like chained links, with the womans having 4 diamonds along the top of the band. They are sentimental to me, my fathers wedding ring especially. But they aren’t something I intend to wear again. One reason being because I don’t like gold, the other being that I wore these in my first marriage. Doesn’t seem right to wear them in a second.

I suppose I could save them for any potential children I might have, so they could perhaps wear their grandparents wedding rings if they wanted. But I think the engagement ring I will probably definitely sell. Unless anyone has any other ideas.

This expensive ring shit is the pits. My next one will not be this expensive.

I called my ex-husband on the way home from work today, because I realized I hadn’t heard back from the judge yet about my divorce. When we had the Divorce Hearing on May 26th, the Master said it would take 10-30 days. When I talked to Alex, he hadn’t seen the paper yet either.

But when I got hooooooooome:

I got my gold star sticker! I -think- this means I am officially divorced. Like all final and stuff. Ugh, now to change everything back over to my maiden name.

I have the gmail notifier installed on my taskbar. I don’t ever use my gmail, but I jumped on the bandwagon when it came out so I at least had one. Today there happened to be a message popup, a spam email that happened to get past the spam filter. So for the first time in I don’t know how long, I opened up my gmail to delete it. While I was going through things in the gmail account, there was a list of past emails I had been sent over a year ago, some of them from Michael.

I noticed when my mouse hovered over these emails, that each gmail account lets you choose an avatar now, and when I had hovered over Michael’s name, there was an avatar of him, and his ex-girlfriend Anna, from Russia. The one he had a fling with while with me, and vice versa, so he could “figure out his feelings.” The only problem was, she was in a wedding dress, and he was in a suit.

My only conclusion was that they had gotten married. After all the drama last spring, where he cut all ties with her to be with me, where she had threatened him, abused him, drove him off, he went and married her because I wouldn’t move away from everything I know to be with him. He had gotten a job as a court reporter in Dodge City, Kansas, and wanted me to go with, but I was not ready to leave my father behind, quit my first decent paying job, to go be with someone I hadn’t even established a serious relationship with.

So he dumped me, through email of course, and only after he wouldn’t talk to me or answer my phone calls for about 3 months.

It hurt, but it didn’t take long to get over. I knew things wouldn’t have worked out anyway, and at that time I had gotten absorbed in CoM, so that took up a lot of my time (thankfully), and probably saved me a lot of brooding.

It shouldn’t bother me now, and I guess it really doesn’t. The guy I’m involved with now has had plenty of time to pull the types of things I have dealt with in the past with my relationships, but he has been nothing but perfect. But perhaps I still feel betrayed by Michael. He never gave me any reason for the break-up, even to this day.

I just don’t know what to think.

The divorce hearing took maybe 20 minutes. “Master Constantinedes” conducted the hearing and recorded it for prosterity. I don’t know if the recording goes to the judge or not, I imagine it does. But he will be submitting the paperwork to him, which should sit for about 10 days, and then in 10-30 days I should receive the “Golden Seal” from the judge, where I will then be divorced and my main name returned.

And here I thought it would take like 6 months and an actual court hearing or something like that. So it’s actually quite simple, and using Legal Zoom for the divorce papers was easy and painless, so no need for a lawyer.

The “Master” mostly asked us questions about when we separated, when we started living together, if it was uncontested, etc. Then he asked my father the same questions, and Alex didn’t actually have to do or say anything hardly. He didn’t even have to raise his hand and make an oath, but my father and I did.

I denied alimony. I don’t like the concept of alimony. I see no point in why a guy has to make payments for the well-being of his ex-wife, if she has a full-time job just the same as him. I like to be independant, and I see no reason to ruin another persons paycheck for more money. I can stand on my own two feet.

The attorney’s office was actually interesting. It was down a long hallway in some old building off of Main Street in Westminster. Once inside, it was extremely small, a waiting room and his office, and what looked like a bathroom. He had classical music playing, so it felt like I was in some regal rich hotel and should be smoking a cigar and drinking a glass of brandy or something. He had a lot of sea paintings on the wall, and the official seal of Maryland, which I’ve actually never seen before.

If only all divorces were so easy

I forked out $247 for the divorce papers through LegalZoom so Alex and I could go through this divorce without the need of an attorney.

In Carroll County Maryland, the court fees to file without an attorney is $105 (Normally $115 with an attorney).

And I just got a document for my hearing (Page 1 and Page 2 which states I have to pay another $125 for the use of a “Master” (which I assume is a fucking lawyer).

Ladies, don’t ever get married.

I suppose it’s still better than hiring lawyers.