Final Anniversary

May used to be my favorite month. April always seems like it's going to be warm enough, sunny enough, but it never is. It's usually rainy and chilly, only when it isn't (still) snowing, and even when it is sunny, it's that kind of sunny weather where people in the Northeast say, "Well, at least the sun is out!" and hug the winter coat they are still wearing around their bodies to block the freezing cold. In May we finally get the weather we deserve after such a shitty season. May used to be my favorite month, but now, and probably for a while, it is going to be The Month My Marriage Ended. I'm coming up on the 23rd, which is, if memory serves, the date that my husband finally came clean and told me that this thing we had been trying so hard to keep going was dead. I remember very clearly that it was on a Wednesday, and that week, just three days before, I had posted on Facebook, "What we got on our hands here is a dead shark," referring, of course, to our relationship. I knew the end was coming, I just, I suppose, never really expected that the end would actually come. I thought we would keep avoiding it, dancing around it, that we'd both be too chickenshit to actually say out loud that we were married, but that this was no longer a marriage.

He used to make fun of me for celebrating both of our anniversaries after we got married- the anniversary of when we got together, which was July 1st, and our wedding anniversary on April 19th. He would tease me for being sentimental, for wanting to mark the occasion of when we became a couple and I would take it, and not argue, because I knew it was silly. Last summer, July 1st came and went, and I was too busy being depressed to even notice. Now, July 1st is just another day, and April 19th is just another day. I texted him on what would have been our fifth anniversary with, "Happy non-iversary, weirdo" and the next day, he shot one back, "Yeah, happy non-iversary weirdo".
This approaching day is the final "anniversary" we will have. The day our divorce becomes official and we are irreversibly not married anymore won't matter. We stopped being married over a year ago, so receiving a judgment stating the same from a judge won't have any effect on how I feel about it. That's why I'm not in a hurry to get it over and done with. At this point, because we are so copacetic with each other and neither of us "needs" a divorce so we can marry someone else or leave the country or, I don't know, something else interesting, I could honestly give a shit.

Nearly a full year has gone by since he let the cat out of the bag, and of course I've changed since then. Losing your first real, big love has to change you, or else it wasn't worth your time. I'm already seeing that I am a little more cautious than I used to be. I used to take more risks. Of course, this caution came about more from being involved with someone else than it did from my ex asking me for a divorce. Right after we broke up, I was so obviously desperate and needy, I might as well have had a target on my back. It was stupid and typical and I still don't like myself much because of it. It taught me something, though, which is that just because a man shows up at the right time, and quotes a Hall and Oates song and really seems to like going down on you, that does not mean anything more than that he showed up at the right time and knows one line from a song and has had a lot of practice doing that one specific thing and is just showing off.
I'm interested in someone right now, which is fun for the moment, and reassuring because that has not happened in a while. The rules are different, though. I used to just go running after boys, practically screaming, "I like you! I LIKE you! I like YOU!" but I can't do that anymore. Now, if I am interested in someone, it comes with a caveat attached. Before I can even allow myself the luxury of thinking this guy is cute and funny, my subconscious smacks me back down to Earth and says, "Okay, now let's find out what the catch is."
It's not that I think I'm only attracted to weirdos or that if I like him, there must be something wrong with him because I'm just so hopeless (Cathy comic, Sex and the City, blah blah blah shoes). I'm just assuming that there is a catch, based on my recent history, and I am also preparing myself for that moment when I learn, either directly from him or through a third party, what the deal-breaker is. I have a strong aversion to being humiliated, as do most people. I was humiliated by my marriage failing and I was humiliated by the fact that Mike was splitting his time between two girls and I was not the better of the two. Humiliation can stiffen your spine, which is good, but I think my spine is stiff enough as it is and I would like to not put the cart before the horse before I know what, or rather, who, I'm dealing with here. I know it's inevitable that I will do something stupid and make an ass of myself eventually, because that's just how I roll, but I guess I'm just trying to not make such an ass of myself in such a spectacular way. I think that's an achievable goal.