Page 4 of Who's Playing You
I don’t care for the latest and greatest iPhone or what the hottest song is on the charts or what new show is streaming. My iPhone 11 works just fine, thank you very much… as long as they don’t force me to make yet another update that is - a girl only has so much storage. Likewise, I don’t even own a TV, let alone watch television. I subscribe tonostreaming networks. That’smy way of sticking it to the man,you won’t get me Netflix or Prime.
Takethat!
But in actuality, I’m not that savage nor cool because it’s less about sticking it to anyone and more about the fact that I just don’t care.
I don’t care for external factors or noise. I’m all about protecting my joy and creativity. I try to cultivate it and for me to be the best artist that I can be, I listen to my inner voice and follow my heart. What works for me, I doubt works for many others. But I’m not a material person and therefore when I divorced my husband Earl just over a year ago, I walked away with a couple of suitcases, some boxes and a few pieces of furniture.
Some might think that pathetic. That after five years of marriage I walked away with just about nothing - nothing to show for anything. Except wasted time, wasted years. He kept the house at first. He kept 95% of the furniture and all theshit- sorry, I meanstuff- that we’d acquired during our relationship, that he had deemed necessary and kept buying. He kept the new SUV while I was happy to walk away with my old Honda Element.
When Earl and I couldn’t conceive, he diverted his focus back to his career, which is where we’d originally met. When I had started grad school, he was one of the professors in the art department. He was never my teacher, not directly, but we were in the same “realm”, if you will. And we had a whirlwind romance. The young professor and the aspiring painter working on her Masters Degree. It wasn’t really scandalous but it may have raised an eyebrow or two.
Not that I cared.
I thought that Earl didn’t care either and that he loved me. So I was living in wedded bliss because within a year we weremarried, and he convinced me to try to start our family as I was finishing up my Masters. Don’t get me wrong, he didn’t have to twist my arm too hard, I’d always dreamt of having a bunch of kids.
Fast forward and after more than a year, I was a failure. I wasn’t getting pregnant. Then after another year, still nothing. That’s when our relationship began changing and Earl refocused his attention on his work. It happened gradually though, so I didn’t really make a big deal of it at first.
For our fifth wedding anniversary, Earl shared his exciting news of a major promotion… at his dream university… on the other side of the country… a position he’d not only applied for but that he’d accepted… all without a word to me.
As I sat at the table, my chin on the floor in shock, just utterly dumbfounded by the news, he slid an envelope across the table.
Divorce papers.
Apparently, I wasn’t invited to accompany him on the cross country trek nor his new life at his “dream” job. I wasn’t part of the dream.
So to say that I wasn’t interested in any of the materialthingsthat had made up our marriage when I walked away, another understatement. Why would I want the constant reminders of my failures? I couldn’t keep the man. I couldn’t make the baby. What good was I?
Fortunately for me, I’d continued to work my way up at Stetson University during our marriage. Initially I had just planned to get my Masters to then move onto my artist’s career. But with Earl being a professor at Stetson U, and the fact that there was an opening in the department as I was getting ready to graduate, and everyone in the art department loved me (and I them), it just sort of happened. Some might argue nepotism, but that wasn’t the intention with how things unfolded. I figuredthat I could teach part-time while continuing to advance my painting career, to hopefully one day just do the damn thing!
To live out my life being a professional artist and painter.
A pipe dream to most, I’m fully aware. But Earl encouraged me to take the teaching position. Now I realize it was because he was trying to fit me into a mold. Apparently my nonchalance and non-conformist attitude towards things like tech and living a life ruled by materialistic things wasn’t cutting it for him any more. Come to find out, I embarrassed him.
And here I thought that he’d found these things endearing about me.
I’d never promoted myself as anything but my true authentic self. I wore old, paint-stained Adidas sneakers, baggy jeans with T-shirts. That was my uniform. My long blond hair was wild and wavy. I was out of my depth with it, to be honest. I couldn’t tame it even if I wanted to. So I’d resorted to messy buns, hair clips, bandanas… whatever I found that day to keep my locks out of my face - which was usually makeup-free with glasses perched on my nose.
This was who I was and had always been.
But somewhere in the timespan of our relationship and the fact that I failed miserably every month at getting pregnant, these things became not enough. So when he slid those papers across the dinner table to me, not only did I know it was over, I also knew that I wanted as few tangible reminders of my failures as possible.
So I walked away with my personal items as well as a few select items that had sentimental value - that weren’t related to Earl. And because I had done well for myself between the teaching job at the college as well as surprisingly selling all of my paintings that I’d list, and then creating a series of artists’ retreats, I’d been able to save a decent amount of money.
Upon seeing the divorce papers and realizing my new reality, I had immediately found a studio apartment in town and moved out. And since Earl would be moving too, we ultimately sold the house. I got what was mine out of the sale, he got his and then he left.
Since then, I’ve been living an even more simple life than I had with Earl. But now it’s just me.
Seems pretty sad, boring and pitiful.
But… I’m happy. Truly.
I have my art, my students, a community I’ve grown very fond of, I have amazing coworkers, a handful of friends that I consider family, the university is just over an hour outside of New York City which is a nice convenience if I want to zip in for a day in the Big Apple while the campus is located in a small, cute, hippy-esque town in the foothills of the Catskill Mountains. I’m only mere steps away from beautiful nature ranging from the Catskill mountain range to the Hudson River, and everything in between. Talk about artistic and poetic inspiration!
In addition to all of that, I also have akillercoffee shop that’s right by my building. Talk about dreams coming true. Eat your heart out Earl, I think I won the dream lottery with that one. Coffee rules the world after all and is my only frivolous thing that I indulge in.
Once I rush through the studio doors where my class is waiting for me, I take a deep breath and try to collect myself. Fake it til you make it, and right now I need to fake this situation to make it seem intentional somehow.
“Good afternoon everyone,” I greet my students as I set my bags down. “Can anyone tell me what my tardiness has to do with our next project?” I go for projecting someone who’s in control, yet act as if it’s all a puzzle piece and 100% intentional.That’s right, all part of the master plan.
