The clocks...

I'm just sitting here tonight.  House is empty, silent.

There's a clock sitting above my TV.  It has caught my eye tonight, as it has many nights. 

I love antiques.  I spend a lot of time antiquing.  There is an energy, an aura around an antique, no matter what it is,  that I've always been drawn to.

It was Sunday, August 30, 2015.  I had been on the hunt for a 1940-50 fan for a while. Hopefully in working order. I live in a very old farm house, almost 200 years old.  Anything too modern doesn't seem to fit, and I've been looking for an old fan that will circulate some air conditioning throughout the bottom floor.  I told my husband I was heading to the antique mall to browse.

He said he wanted to go.  I was taken aback, he never wants to go.  I think he enjoys my decorating, but doesn't quite care where I shop to pull it all together.  I was grinning when we walked out to the car.  It would be just us.  This is extremely rare, we never do this.

I had a blast at the mall.  Browsing through 100's of booths stocked full of the past, it's my thing.  In one, I was admiring an old camera, and as I placed it back on the shelf, this old broken Big Ben clock caught my eye.  It didn't wind up, and the glass was cracked.  I didn't care, I wanted it. Sometimes I wonder if some of the items I simply must have were possibly in this old house at one time.

I showed him the clock, and he even agreed it was pretty cool, even though cracked.  He held up an old cast iron pan and asked me if I wanted it.  I had, at the time, just started cooking in them.  The older the better, they are amazing to cook with.  I was smiling ear to ear as we checked out, and I was kind of feeling silly as I hugged my old pan and broken clock and tucked them safely away in the truck.  He asked if I wanted lunch.  Yes!  We never do this.  

He held my hand  as we drove to the restaurant, and he held my hand on the way in.  What was going on?  I didn't know, and I didn't care.  I was having the best time with him.  Our conversation didn't even involve the kids.  We just talked.  We researched the age of the pan, and looked for the age of the clock.  We found it, it was created sometime between 1928-1935.  It was going to be a very cool shelf piece.

We had a nice lunch, and when we got home we spent the rest of the afternoon wrapped up in each other and really enjoying each other.

I put the clock right above my TV.  I could see it whenever I was in the living room. 

That Thursday, Sept. 3rd, he took me to a movie.  We saw a movie that was from a book we both loved.  It was amazing, really.  We hadn't gone to a movie in a very long time.  This was so nice. It was unusual, and welcomed.  It was needed.

September 10th, he started his affair.

I found out about them on September 20th.

That clock haunted me every time I looked at it.  All through October, as we hashed it out and tore the marriage apart, I would catch a glimpse of that clock and it was like a punch to the gut.  November rolled around, and as I prepared to cook what I thought would be our last Thanksgiving as a family.  There that clock sat... almost taunting me with memories of that rare day we spent together.

How could he go to another woman?  How could he give me such an amazing day, and then go to another woman days later?  I thought we were reconnecting, seeing that we needed to spend some time together, starting to enjoy moments together that didn't involve the kids.

December started, and we had a morning in the house to ourselves.  I was going to get him to talk.  We had torn me, the marriage and the past 20 years to shreds. Most, if not all, the blame falling onto me. Though, at this time, he was still holding onto convincing me that he was not with her,  or talking to her, that it ended before it started on Sept. 20th.... he told me that morning that he wanted to be with her.  That he had never felt that way about someone in his life.

That he loved me, but wanted to be with her.  Wanted to see where it would go, if she was the one that he was supposed to be with.

I couldn't breathe that morning.  My world was spinning out of control.  He wants to be with someone that he's not even talking to?  (God I was stupid). In my hyperventilating mess, I saw that clock sitting there... I didn't even think.  I picked it up, opened the door and sent it flying into a tree.  I stepped back in and closed the door.

Two days later, I went out and picked it up.   The glass was broken now, the side dented.  I felt bad.  I felt good.  I was a mess.  I put it back up on the shelf above the TV.

He saw it, "What the hell?  Why put it back?"  "Because I want to."  "But it's broken."  "So am I."

It stayed there.  Moved only for cleaning.  I was careful of the glass.  It stayed there.  It no longer taunted me of good memories, instead it seemed to comfort me.

13 months later, after Dday, after an ocean of tears has been cried, a million words said to each other, a thousand fights and make-ups... it stayed there.  There was something comforting about the shattered glass, the dented side... why, I don't know.  But it stayed there.

13 months later, he and I were again browsing through an antique mall, when he spotted another one. Same clock.  But in beautiful condition.  It was clean, it worked like it was brand new.  The sound of it ticking away was comforting.   It was beautiful.   He bought it without a word to me. 

It came home, and was placed where the broken clock sat.  I moved the broken one to a shelf not really seen, in a room we don't use that often.

I can see it now.  Sitting there.  Its whole.  It works.  It's in amazing condition. I can wind it up now and listen to it tick away the minutes.  It's a beautiful old clock.

He knew what that old one meant to me.  He saw my excitement the day he bought it for me. He knew I loved it, cracked and all.  He thought I was insane when I sent it flying into a tree. (I was).  I think he thought it would make up for it when he bought the new one.  

There is so much symbolism in those two clocks.  

I strangely miss the old one.  Why.   Why do I miss that one?  Why do I stop when I enter that room and just stare at that old one?  I miss it.  

I miss it.  I'm much more drawn to that broken, sad clock.

I may have had too much wine tonight.

Hope having an affair with a married man was worth inviting a crazy wife into your life

*Warning*  There's A LOT of F bombs in this entry.  I also know that at my age, my interactions with her are immature, they come from anger and pain, I'm lashing out.  I know there are many that don't believe in contacting the affair partner at all, but that person is not me.

I do wonder if I feel a betrayal from her.  I feel like I contacted her TWICE, and both times she lied, and both times she acted like nothing was going on with them.  If she had just turned him away, he wouldn't have had the opportunity to cheat with her.

I feel like I need to get over this part.

I feel like I'm needing my blog NOW, in the present to do a bit of writing, releasing, and trying to figure it all out.  And some venting. Boy, do I need some present day venting.

I can't go out of order though... lol!

I woke up that morning, and while we were having coffee, I asked.  I asked, "Did it just recently end with you two?"

"I don't know"

What do you mean, you don't know??  This answer makes my head spin.  I put it more simple, "Did you still talk to her, or see her, or text with her after Jan. 1st?"
"Yes."

I have to baby step him to answering that they were still communicating through March.  April 3rd is when he came for me.  I asked him if he saw her in person.

"No."    But I know.  I know he's lying.

"It's just texting and talking on the phone?"  "Yes."

I know he's lying.

I'm furious.  I get in the car, and leave.  Take a drive.  He texts me, "I love you, let's get that hot tub you want, come home..."

I pull into a parking lot, and using the Notes app on my phone, I type out a nasty letter to her.  I know she has an android, so I want my text to her to be complete, and not broken up into several different texts.

I'm furious.  At this time in the discovery of his affair, I'm full on blaming her.  I'm full on hating her and totally blaming everything on her.

(Side note:  A year later, I'm definitely still angry at her, but not like I was, and YES... I blame him more.  He did this.)

I don't send it right away.  I'm actually not really planning to send it. It felt a little bit cathartic just to type it out.

We get in the car to head north to pick up our son.  Now I have him...He can't leave, he can't run out the door, he can't avoid me.  He has to sit next to me for almost 3 hours.  He's mine.

On the drive, he admits ONLY to talking and texting.  He continues to hold strong that he was home alone on New Years eve.  I asked four thousand times about New Years Eve. He swears he wasn't with her the two weeks he moved out in December, SWEARS and promises he didn't see her in person at all.

 I ask a million questions about her.  I had seen her social media, before she blocked me, and she very much likes to play a little mousy victim.  I said that to him, "She's a damn mouse."  (I'm more of a velociraptor... mice piss me off)  He mumbled, "She's no mouse.  She's 6 foot tall."  I said, "I meant more of the way she acts." But then it hits me what he said.  I said, "What?  6ft?!  You're 5'6!!  You would never let me wear heels because I would be taller than you!  WTF?!"  He didn't say anything.

I asked about certain dates and days again, asking if he had seen her.  I just don't believe that they didn't see each other in person.  He continues to tell me they only saw each other 2 times, once 5 days into their affair when he went to her house, and 1 time when he had her show up at Taco Bell with our son in the car.

He SWEARS it was only an emotional connection over text and phone. I said, "FINE.  Let me text her and ask her."

He says, "IF YOU TEXT HER, I WILL CANCEL YOUR PHONE THE MINUTE WE GET BACK HOME."  He's screaming like a fool.  We are yelling at each other, fighting hard.  We pull into a McDonald's, and as I was getting out, I was shaking hard.  I told him I had quite a bit to say to her too, and was going to text her.  He yelled, "I just don't give a fuck anymore!!  Go ahead!  I don't care!"

So I did.  I sent my angry letter from that morning.  I was so furious at them, I wanted a divorce right then and there, that moment, that second.  I was insane.

(When I texted her all the way back in September, the first time, she went crying to him that I texted her.)

Yes.  She's looking for her 4th husband.  She's 45 years old.  Her maiden name is our last name.  I asked him if she thought it was some kind of fate that they shared the last name.  He said, "She told me that she would never go back to that name because she has Daddy issues."

I'm so immature.

Anyway... she sends me a nasty reply and then she CALLS him right away.  He doesn't answer, and he doesn't listen to the voicemail she leaves.

I'm shaking.  I can't breathe, I don't even know what I'm saying back to her.  I'm just a mess.  I sort of remember his face, he's driving, he's looking ahead, he's looking worried.  I'm not even saying anything out loud at this point, I'm just texting her and having a mini stroke.  The adrenaline was off the charts.

I don't usually talk like this.  Just saying.

Needless to say, none of that is true.  When she said what she did about me and my kids not being his, and I've cheated on him?  I was dumbfounded.  Did he actually say that to her?  Did he go to her and tell her these horrible lies as some kind of excuse to make himself look like the poor cheated on husband who has done no wrong?  To get her to feel better about what SHE was doing?

Oh...the wife is a whore, poor guy...here, let me make you feel better?

I don't know.  He swears to this day he didn't say any of that to her.  I'm still floored to this day over this.  

Funny how they both told me within minutes of each other how tall she was.  It's not like I have anything against tall women... it's just that he's on the short side, and he's always had a little bit of a complex over it.  To choose a woman that is half a foot taller still leaves me shaking my head.

We arrived early to pick up our son.  I'm dying, sitting next to him.  I'm yelling, I'm crying, I'm laughing... I'm pretty sure I've gone mad.

He listens to the voicemail, I can hear through his phone that she's yelling.

She tells him that he needs to get control of me, and that none of this is her fault.

We picked up our son, and went home.  I was in a strange, strange mood.  I felt like I had circled my wagons around my husband, my kids, my life.  I viewed her as the enemy, I hated her.  She was the enemy.

The sex that night was off the charts.  I'm truly feeling insane at this point, like something inside me has slipped off it's track.

I'm still not back on it.

Her and I are not done.  We have another go at it the next day.