Category Archives: Teddy Bear

Short Story, Teddy Bear

Ch. 20-Dark and Stormy Times

Leave a comment

Here I was unemployed, trying to learn a new technology, my unemployment checks were running out and I was trying to work odd jobs as a technical writer here and there. I wrote a couple of safety manuals for a construction firm, I wrote some signs for stores and printed them, I wrote brochures for law firms. I wrote whenever I could. I searched the want ads day and night.

Finally, someone online asked who was making all these chat rooms that were popping up.  You see, AOL had chatrooms that people could go to and visit with friends, but you could also go to other websites and visit via AOL.  I decided to do a little investing and started netdancer.com.  My own domain,  this was only two years after the world-wide web became the internet I really didn’t have the money to spare, but I saw the future and wanted to claim it. I started creating themed chat rooms on netdancer.com.  There were fantasy chat rooms with castles and dragons, there were Star Trek themed chat rooms, there were Western cowboy themed chat rooms.  But unlike the AOL chat rooms, mine had music.  You could go to my chat rooms and select any songs that you wanted to hear to play while you were chatting with your friends.  My chat rooms became very popular and after a while, some of my patrons started asking who created them and if the creator would be available to help them create a website for their business.  Ta-da! I was in business.  Still a starving artist, but in business.  I had never done graphics before, my mother had been the artist in the family, I never considered myself an artist, but I learned.

It was funny, the more I tried, the more support I got online.  I started creating things in “Paint” and Excel and got the notice of an artist, who then encouraged me to start using PhotoShop.  In fact, he started mentoring me in PhotoShop and sent me a copy of the software in the mail.  I was astonished.  I was building a friendship with strangers online that I had never even dreamed of doing in real life.  Later, another artist saw my work and sent me Illustrator and began mentoring me in that software.  My passion for this work was burning and I continued to work frantically to learn everything I could, but I was running out of money.

Then I get a phone call, it was from my father’s best friend. They told me to come home, my father was dying. He hadn’t spoken to me in years.  I drove home and found my father in the hospital. He’d never been ill a day in his life.  He was a teacher and never missed a day and now he was dying?  My father, a tall, handsome man who looked like Clark Gable, was lying in a hospital bed looking weak and vulnerable.  But he didn’t want me in his room.  So I waited in the waiting room. I talked to the doctors and his friends.  They say he collapsed the other day at home and they rushed him to the hospital to find out that he had liver cancer and that he had four months to live.  The doctors tell me all the details.  I waited in the waiting room to see my father and he didn’t want to see me, I waited in the waiting room for 24 hours a day for 3 days. Finally, at the end of the third day, my father’s best friend’s son came to the hospital at midnight and tells me that I need a break.  He takes me out for a drink and a drive.  We talked a long time about the situation.  He brings me back to the hospital and then my father notices me. He not only notices me, he screams at me “Why did you leave me? Why weren’t you here?” I try to explain to him that I was there for days and he didn’t want to see me.  His friend’s son explained that he took me out for a break, that I’d been there non-stop. My father was furious.  There was no pleasing him.  He wasn’t dying today.  I had to leave. I went home.

The next four months were painful, I never heard from my father, I kept in touch with his friends, they were friends of the family and they kept me abreast of the situation.  My father had written me out of the will, sold the house to them, given everything that he didn’t sell to my brother, including my mother’s diamond rings. When I got the news from his friends that dad was in his last days, I did go back home.  He had sold the home to his best friends under the provision that he could die at home.

He had hired a hospice nurse to take care of him.  I remember that day clearly.  He had chosen my bedroom, not his marriage bedroom to die in.  I thought that was odd at the time.  I still wonder about it now.  I walked back into my old room and found him there, a shell of his former self.  A small little man, not the 6’4″, virile, intimidating man that he had been. The nurse said he couldn’t speak, that he didn’t have long. There was no one else in the room except her, me and Dad.  Everyone else, including my brother and his wife, were all in the living room, no one came to check in.  Why not?  The nurse and I were the only ones there when Dad took his last breath. He kept staring at me the whole time.  I just held his hand and sat with him, silent.

He had already made all the funeral arrangements, so there was nothing for us to do. His friends said that he did get religion a few days before he died and that he did leave me a little something.  A few stocks, they were California utilities, that weren’t too profitable then, but they did help me get through my unemployment.

I admit I felt guilty when I got home.  I felt guilty for not being sad about his death. I felt guilty for being relieved.  I felt guilty for feeling like a burden was off my chest. I saw a psychiatrist about it and then realized that it really wasn’t all that abnormal to feel that way.  I did have to forgive him, though, not for any other reason except for myself. I figured he didn’t know better, he didn’t know how to handle things any better. I looked and sounded like my mother. It upset him, I was independent, he liked control.  He couldn’t control me.  I am my own person. I will always be my own person. I don’t submit anymore. I have nothing to be sorry about anymore, and he was who he was and it’s over.

Short Story, Teddy Bear

Ch. 19 The Hiatus

Leave a comment

Leaving the second husband was probably the easiest decision I’ve ever made and the best. I had gotten the job, finally, in the laboratory as a technician to do research and development on air bag initiator propellant.  It paid decently, but the house that I rented to leave the husband was way too expensive, but I wanted to keep the girls in the school that they were attending. I didn’t want to uproot them again. So I managed to stay as long as I could. I finally found a small condo that I could buy much closer to work and invested my money in that. My daughters got special permission to finish out school in the district they were in and I finally got stable.

Work was difficult at times, I wasn’t one of the most liked employees, I was the only woman doing this kind of work.  The men gave me a hard time. If I complained about any sexual harassment, they counter complained.  I was given more responsibilities without pay or promotion.  But I did finally learn about computers during this time. I had been a little intimidated by them previously, however, it was now that my company decided that I did not need an oscilloscope to gather data from my high-pressure testing and instead bought a computer and told me to make it work like an oscilloscope. I had no clue what do to do.  I had my HAM radio electronics to fall back on, a good education that had taught me to reason things out, and good research skills. I figured it out- alone. I made it work! My test equipment impressed the managers and bosses.  The results were phenomenal.  I had actually created a black box that translated the high-pressure results from systems that were not digital to a digital computerized system.  The results of the tests then started producing better and more efficient igniter propellant for the company.  But my pay was not increased nor was I was acknowledged for any achievements, in fact, after a chemist that had left the company to go work for a competitor wanted to come back, I was told that my position was being replaced by him. He had sold company secrets but was forgiven and rehired.  I was offered a position with the company as a machine operator with a pay cut or take a layoff.

I took the layoff. I’m sorry, I felt it was an insult and degrading to my profession and gender. I tried to sue, but the unemployment office said I had no case. So here I was once again unemployed, a single mother, frustrated and with no family to support me emotionally.  This time, at least my children weren’t babies. They were teenagers.  One just graduated high school and the other was going to graduate in a couple of years.  The teenage years. Oh, MY Gawd!

It’s a good thing I took a hiatus from men after the second husband, all my energies and stamina were needed for this time in my life.

Because I had conquered my fear of the computer during the oscilloscope incident, I now immersed myself in this new technology. I literally had this vision of “knowing” where this Internet “fad” was heading.  I stayed up all hours of the night teaching myself HTML and web design. I often forgot to eat. I did make one friend working at the igniter plant and she did call me to ask if I’d eaten that day.  If it weren’t for her I probably would have missed a lot more meals.  As it was it did get to the point where I was making myself more ill each day, my body was starting to feel the effects of the stress of unemployment and teenage angst

Sending my eldest daughter off to college also started my into that depression of the empty nest syndrome and that didn’t help much.  The child support was now cut in half because she had reached 18 and was “legal-age”.  The ex now gave her the other half to help out with college.  Later she came to me and said, “how did you manage, this doesn’t even pay for books, Mom?”  Thank goodness, my daughter got scholarships and student loans, there was no way, I could afford to help pay for their education and their father didn’t contribute either, except for that “child-support”.  I felt terribly insufficient and lacking as a mother, but there just wasn’t anything else I could do. I was doing the best I could do, I had always done the best I could do for the girls. Every home I moved to was better and every situation had turned out better.  I was just hoping this one would turn out the same way.

 

Short Story, Teddy Bear

Ch. 18- Temporary Insanity

Leave a comment

I was broken hearted. My life torn to pieces once more. Dreams of any future once again, gone. I managed to work, but I felt like a zombie just going through the motions, holding back the tears in public and crying myself to sleep every night. His mother came to the house to pick up the box of his belongings, she knew that he had made a mistake, she didn’t know all the circumstances and I didn’t tell her.

I still had my job but wanted to just run away. A few months later I get a call from my father telling me that my mother was in the hospital and to fly home right away, she was in a coma.  She had a terminal illness that had gone into remission, so they had gone on vacation and when she came back her back was feeling bad and she went to a chiropractor.   She had called me that day, I remember telling her,“Oh Mom, don’t go to that ‘Quack-o-practor'”. She just laughed.  Those were the last words she and I ever exchanged.

The girls and I flew home to Kansas, my flight arrived close to midnight, I dropped the girls off at the house and immediately went to the hospital. There she was, lying there.  My father said she had been unresponsive to anyone for the last week.  I went to her bedside and took her hand, leaned down, kissed her on the cheek and told her I was there, it was okay now.  Tears fell from her eyes. She knew I was there, she had waited for me. It surprised my father and the doctors. I stayed and spoke to her.  We had finally made our peace with each other five years earlier.  We had always argued before, but finally, she told me she loved me and that she was proud of how I was raising the girls. We finally had become close and now we had a connection. I knew in my heart this was the end for her. I told her it was okay if she was tired and wanted to cross over, I was here now and all the children in heaven were waiting for a teacher like her.  I sat by her bedside for awhile longer and my father came in and insisted I go home, actually told me to go home, he didn’t want me there anymore.  I kissed Mom goodbye.  She died early that morning.

When Dad came back to the house after Mother died that morning, he immediately started cleaning out all her clothing and belongings. I supposed that was his way of dealing. But he took one look at me and told me that if I wanted anything of my mothers, I had to try it on right then and there. I told him in no uncertain terms “NO”.  He followed behind me, everywhere I went in the house, not leaving me alone for hours, insisting I try on the clothes, because I was “fat” and Mom was not. I showed him the labels of our clothing being the same. But I was not going to try them on the morning she died. He ranted and raved. He stalked me throughout the house, hovering like a monster.  I finally had enough and told him to “FUCK OFF!” I had never used those words in my life.  It was a first for me and a first for him to hear it from me. I got disowned that day.  Everything went to my brother.

I went back home to Maryland, broken-hearted about my love, broken hearted about my Mother, and broken because of my father. A couple of months later  I went out dancing to distract myself ( I love to dance) and met a man from Colorado. We won a dance contest that night, we were good! He was on a business trip and had family in Maryland, he asked if he could see me.  I agreed. He was a smooth talker and said all the right things. He went back to Colorado and sent me a ticket to go out and visit him. Colorado was beautiful, absolutely the most peaceful and gorgeous place I’d ever seen. I hated to leave. He asked me to marry him. We married only six weeks after meeting. Temporary Insanity!

I should have known when he was three hours late to the wedding, that it wasn’t meant to be. I guess I was just desperate to run away from Maryland, desperate for love, desperate for change, desperate to be needed.

Results of Temporary Insanity:

  • Kids knew it was wrong
  • Loss of a good job
  • Lose profit on selling home
  • Need to find new home, when you leave the jerk after only a year of marriage
  • Need to find a new job and they have never heard of a woman chemist in the west
  • Starting all over from scratch, again
  • No friends
  • No Support

After about four weeks of marriage, the new husband calls me a financial burden, even though I pay my way and pay for all my children’s expenses.  I even split the household bills.  I desperately look for a job and take a horrible job as a chemist analyzing human urine for toxic chemicals.  YUCK!

I cry every day going back and forth the work because the boss is abusive and the job is horrible. I finally quit after four months and the husband screams at me.

My husband kicks my dog for no apparent reason, except to say he thought the dog was going to bite him.  She never even looked at him.  I’m thinking, who is he going to kick next.  We have no love life anymore, he has ignored me since the first month we were married.  I hear through the vents of the house that he is talking to old girlfriends and that he wants to “evict” me? Okay, it’s time for me to leave.  But I have to get a better job.

I finally do, it takes me an hour to get to work, but I’m back to making explosives and igniters for airbags, and for strategic defense.  It took some doing and persistence but I got the job. I’m leaving. He goes on a business trip, I pack up our things and I leave.  I am getting my sanity back.

I had fallen in love with Colorado, but not the man.

 

Short Story, Teddy Bear

Ch.17 – Growth and Loss

Leave a comment

I loved my job with aerospace and strategic defense.  It was perfect for me, I actually got to use my chemistry education and felt that I was making a difference in the world. I found out that the company had originally planned to hire a man for the job, but he had taken a better position somewhere else and to meet their government quota for women hires I was next on the list.  I was told this at my ninety-day review when my boss also told me he was pleasingly surprised at my performance and the skill that I performed my work.

I found my niche, I found where I belonged and knew I was good at what I did.  I only got better at the job as time went by.  All in all, I helped launch about 24 space missions and the Magellan explorer and did research and development of numerous other programs. I had my secret and top secret clearance when needed. I loved this job.

I was thrilled.  We did have our heart breaks when missions failed and my company was blamed for the o-rings. But we did warn NASA not to launch. We watched the launch from the lab that day. I was supposed to visit my daughter’s school and tell them what I did for a living.  That didn’t happen.

I wish I could say my love life during this time had improved. I did have my suitors and boyfriends.  I think, however, that maybe I was supposed to come into other’s lives, not for myself, but to help them through the difficult times and I was there to guide them. I had been through the same experience or similar and was there to advise. It just got confused with romance.  There was the one relationship with one gentleman that was going through a difficult time with his ex-wife and the custody trial and visitation problems regarding his young son. His young son was being physical, sexually and emotionally abused by the ex-wife and her boyfriend. Being left alone in the middle of the street late at night, coming back to his father with cigarette burns on his hands and legs.  The man didn’t know what to do.  Finally, he got full custody, he had to forcibly take it.  We had to take the child to a psychologist for counseling to overcome some of the other abuses.  But all this drama also took its toll on the father and his temper became shorter and shorter. I had to end the relationship.  It just wasn’t good for me or my girls to be exposed to this sort of environment.

Later, I did actually fall in love with someone. He was much younger. But he had his share of problems too. When I met him, he was clean—a recovering alcoholic and substance abuser.  He was a hard worker and he loved me too. I had never felt that way about anyone, except maybe for Teddy Bear, who still managed to show up every now and then and have coffee with me.  But this man, I was ready to take the plunge for, my children were now teenagers.  I had never lived with anyone before. I loved this man. I felt the children were old enough to understand that I needed someone now, after all, their father had someone. I had that right too. He moved in. We got engaged. We only had one person who was not happy about our relationship, his brother.  He thought I was too old, I was 39.

My love told me every day how much he loved me, he worked with me at the same company. I saw him all day, every day, I knew he was staying clean. He told me that if her ever “fell off the wagon, he loved me too much to put me through the hell that it would entail and that he would leave and I would never see him again”.  One day he got laid off from work, his brother was getting married and ask him to be his best man.  To be the best man, he spent a lot of time with his brother.  He planned his brother’s bachelor party. He fell off the wagon and I never saw him again after the wedding.

 

Teddy Bear

Ch.16 – Survival

Leave a comment

For three years I had no job of any substance. I worked a weekend job at a jewelry store, I worked a part-time job as a secretary in a custom home builder that wouldn’t pay his contractors. I searched for jobs and was denied because I was over qualified by education but under qualified by experience.  If it hadn’t been for small miracles along the way I would never have been able to feed my children. We ate a lot of chicken liver.  The girls hated it.  But it was cheap. As these small miracles continued to happen at the most unexpected times in my life, my faith in God grew and doubts about his existence started to wane.  I did have doubts. I had major doubts, how could someone who claimed to be a father figure to us let such terrible things happen to me, let me suffer so much, leave me alone and without true love? Why would HE make me so sick and cry so much? I had so many questions.

One day after a dark night of depression and tears, I went to church. I sat in the pew alone.  I had been celibate for so long, but I needed a hug so badly. The congregation was not friendly to this divorced woman, I didn’t understand it.  But I sat there alone, suddenly I felt a very warm and strong physical hug. I looked around me in that pew to see who did this. No one was there.  I felt His presence or the presence of His messenger to let me know I was NOT alone.  I no longer had doubt that there was a greater being in charge. I knew, I just knew then that things would eventually turn around for me.

It was after this I became a lay minister and started speaking to others that were going through similar experiences that I was going through. We were going to survive this together. Eventually, I had to leave this church. I found out that although I had tried to contribute to the church and be the best Christian I could be, I discovered that a gathering within a congregation is not necessarily the most Christian behaving group of people. There are many hypocrites within churches and I decided it’s better for me to have my personal relationship with God and go my own way. You might say I’m a little more liberal in beliefs than organized religion.

I did a lot of soul-searching and growing during these difficult times. I had anonymous benefactors, friends like Teddy Bear that made it possible for me to eat and for my children to have Christmas presents when I couldn’t afford anything.

The numerous little jobs I had taught me more lessons that I didn’t expect. I sold women’s lingerie in home shows.  I learned about another form of “partying” then too.  Sex parties! oh, my.  Another culture shock.  That one made me choke.  I told the wife I didn’t do drugs, and she said “oh no, not that kind of partying”, okay!

Finally, I qualified for a loan, the first step to the light at the end of the tunnel. Fortunately, it wasn’t a train.  I was the first woman to learn how to drive a tractor trailer.  I got a displaced homemaker’s loan with the government and got my CDL. I learned how to drive. Today when they talk about feminism and sexist language, they have no idea how hard it is to be the only woman tractor trailer driver looking for a full-time job. I had the skills and the license, but the innuendo and the language that I had to hear were something else. Fortunately, I also had learned to ignore. It was all part of survival, I had to earn a living and this was going to do it. I finally did get a job driving a 10-wheeler dump truck. The company was reluctant to hire me, but they did. At first, they put me on ancient 1949 truck with 13 gears in a graveyard.  I had to haul dirt out of steep inclines and prove myself. Later they put me hauling gravel out of the local quarry. Then disaster happens, one day, the quarry loads my truck with pea gravel, it’s a very round smooth stone about the size of a pea. They load my truck, however, incorrectly—on only one size of the dump bed.  I pull out onto the road heading out to the highway. As I go down the hill and the curve, suddenly my truck starts to sway, it actually lifts off the tires on one side.  I attempt to recover and think I do. It doesn’t. The truck rolls over with 20 ton of gravel. The driver’s seat is not bolted down and falls on me. This all happens in seconds, but to me, it happens in slow motion and all I can think is “Oh crap!”  I crawl out the passenger side window and out the truck in shock and stand in the middle of the road. A police car comes and the officer asks if I’m okay.  I’m in such shock I want to cry but tears don’t come, I think I’m okay, I only have a scratch on my right hand. The officer calls a friend for me to come and get me, he notifies the company I work for and as we wait and fill out all the necessary paperwork he tells me that usually, he would ticket me and fine me for this accident and for spilling 20 ton of gravel on the road, but seven trucks had done the same thing in the same spot in the previous six months.  The road was cambered wrong and my gravel was loaded incorrectly.  Needless to say, I was fired from my job. Needless to say, I was not unhappy and that’s when another door opened for me. Aerospace and Strategic Defense called my name and my dream of space was within reach. Three years of starving were finally coming to an end.

 

Short Story, Teddy Bear

Ch. 15 – The Pendulum of the Lost and Lonely

Leave a comment

When I was a child I was a very submissive child, I was the child to be seen and not heard. I was the child who never disagreed with her parents. I never even looked like I wanted to disagree or I would get slapped or spanked.  I had very strict parents.  I stayed a very quiet and agreeable girl.  I tried desperately to please them to get their love.  I strived to be the best in everything, to make the grades, to be the best daughter.  This attitude continued through my courtship, I was the good girlfriend, I was the proper girlfriend, I was a virgin when I married.  Then when I married I was the proper wife, the obedient wife, the good executive wife.  Breakfast on the table before he went to work, dinner on the table when he got home, the house clean, the children clean.  I made all our clothing and his shirts and ties and even his suit jackets.  I kept the finances that I knew of.  I didn’t question him.  I accepted his excuses for a long time, I was ready on the spot when we had to entertain without notice.  I tried everything to keep the spice in our marriage.  I took belly dancing lessons, I danced for him.  I learned electronics so we would have hobbies in common. I got him interested in Ham Radio.  I tried kidnapping him for a romantic getaway.  Nothing worked.  But in all, I was a very reserved and submissive wife.

I still am an introvert, basically shy among strangers, but that period after the divorce, those months of unemployment and indecisiveness in my future and feeling of betrayal and unworthiness took its toll on my personality.  The pendulum from submissive, shy, sexually inexperienced began to swing to the other extreme.  I began to trade sex for comfort, for attention, were hoping for just the holding involved — the human touch.  I know it probably wasn’t very smart of me, but I was lost and climbing my way back out of hell. I needed someone to love me. I deluded myself sometimes that they cared, now that I look back on it.  I only took a lover when my children had visitation with their father.  I tried carefully not to let my “love life ” come into contact with my young children who were already coping enough with a new young step-mother.

It was during this time, that the doctors told me I was pregnant. I was horrified!  I couldn’t be, I had been having regular periods, but I was in miserable pain, so I went to the doctor. He didn’t do a blood test, just a palpitation. The doctor did say however, I was in the process of a miscarriage.  My emotions ran wild. My pain was tremendous, my depression was increasing.  Fortunately it was during this time, my girls were with their father in Kansas visiting their grandparents and my parents.  I was alone for two weeks, to panic in private.  I wanted to die.  I prayed for death, I wanted to never wake up, I was too chicken to consider suicide.

I had wanted a third child but the ex had said no. A new baby, my heart clenched at the thought and at the thought I was losing it too. If by any chance I didn’t lose it would I lose my girls and then losing it just killed me.  There was no good outcome.

I had been studying for my GRE in psychology and scheduled to take my exams. During the exams I started feeling very ill, starting hemorrhaging, a migraine suddenly erupted during the second half of the exam. I had to go home. I “miscarried”.  You might wonder why now I have the word miscarry in italics. You see that experience was enough to bring me to religion.  Yes, the pendulum began to swing in that direction.  I got religion, I went celibate.

A year later, the doctors say I’m pregnant again. Not on your life! They say I’m four months pregnant. Not unless it is an immaculate conception, doc!  Come to find out I have a tumor the size of a four month fetus.  Again, I’m in extreme pain and bleeding. Again, my children are in Kansas on vacation with their father.

This time, I go to the hospital alone, I have no one, no family, no friends to support me. The doctors say they will try to save my uterus, I am only 34 years old after all, I still want to marry again and have more children.  I lie there in the hospital room and I wake to the doctor telling me, “I’m sorry, we could not save the uterus, we had to take it.  The tumor was embedded.”

I go home the next day, barely moving to an empty house with an empty heart only full of tears. I now know I really probably wasn’t pregnant before, it was the tumor then. Now I will never have another child.

Short Story, Teddy Bear

Ch.14 – Turmoil

Leave a comment

I just can’t figure life out anymore. I finally think things are starting to settle down, I win custody of the girls, I buy a house, move to Maryland, have a good job, am dating someone. I go back to my maiden name.  I still am friends with Teddy Bear and others from the CB and BAM! The world drops out from under me. I get laid off, the man I’m seeing becomes possessive and wants to marry me, but I don’t love him. I want to have passionate, in love feelings and I don’t have them for him. I know that I may be asking for too much, but I’m not settling for less. I’ve had that once, never again. There’s not a day I don’t think of Teddy Bear, I desperately want to be with him.  I have to refuse his marriage proposal. It just wouldn’t work.  He starts stalking me, calling me every hour on the hour in the middle of the night, he slashes my tires and then leaves flowers at my door begging me to take him back!  He steals my bible out of my truck and then of all things, he throws a gallon of urine on the seats of my van.  It’s totaled.  The insurance adjustor never saw such an act taken on a vehicle before.  And I have no money to buy another car, even with the insurance money for the totaled vehicle.  The van is too old.  I try desperately to clean out the truck.

The calls at night keep me awake constantly, but I don’t dare NOT answer, for fear it’s my mother.  She has a terminal illness and I’m afraid the call may be from home.  I have to do something.  After a month of calls and I log each call, I notify the phone company.  They finally trace them. I take him to court for the stalking.  All the court does is slap his hands and tell him if he continues then they will press charges.  On the way out of the courthouse he asks me to marry him again.  Are you kidding me!?

I’m surviving this layoff on unemployment checks and the ex’s child support, it pays the mortgage.  I’ve been looking for work all over town.  It’s been so hard. I feel like I want so much and have so little right now. I hate to say this I’m getting home sick too, I want to go back to Kansas, but I can’t afford it. I’ve been unemployed now for five months and feel totally worthless.  I haven’t seen Teddy Bear in so long and really need him.  I miss him so much.  Worthless and unlovable.

Finally, the ex has decided to make a reappearance. He finally came to pick up the children at the new house, now, however, with a new wife at his side. Yes, he remarried. He married the girl he was having an affair with, and when I say girl, she was just that a 17-year-old girl and she was very pregnant. Surprise! Visitation has resumed, my motto kills them with kindness.  I was happy, to tell the truth, he’s her problem now and hopefully it will take some of the chaos away from me. But if glares and wicked looks could kill I wouldn’t be here writing this.  At least there was no screaming this time.  Once more I was left alone.  This time after being a single mother 24/7, unemployed, broke and dealing with everything; I needed some time to myself. I needed a break.

 

Short Story, Teddy Bear

Ch. 13 – The Verdict

Leave a comment

Finally, the verdict came in from the judge, a judge who normally gave joint custody.  He awarded me full custody of my girls.  He saw through the lies and deceit.  Someone finally understood what I went through with this man. He also ordered him to pay all legal fees and court costs.  He did award him every other weekend visitation and Wednesday visits, which I thought was fair.  I finally got the weekends to enjoy my children too.  However, he did not raise the child support of $500 per month for the two girls.  It was barely enough, maybe he thought it would be raised later? I didn’t care, the trial was over, I had my children, I could finally breath easy and I was ecstatic! Now maybe I could settle down and get down to living a normal life again.

The first Visitation Friday came and I thought since everything was settled we didn’t need the church steps tonight. Boy, was I wrong? The scene returned in full force.  He was furious, agitated, absolutely in a state of rage.  He pulled at the children while calling me every name in the book in the middle of the street.  This time, however, I stopped it. No, this was not going to happen again, I didn’t trust his mood or want the girls to go with him in this state.  I told the girls to go inside. They were crying and upset but they did go inside.  I told him to go home and when he could calm down, he could come and pick up the girls for visitation.  He turned around and sped off.  I didn’t hear from him the rest of the night—or the weekend.

I tried calling his house to see if he was coming many times that night and all weekend, but he never picked up his phone.  It just rang and rang.  I figured he was ignoring me. Fine, it’s his problem.  Him being childish is only hurting himself, but I hated trying to explain this behavior to my children. Why their father was not coming to see them.  I had no answers.

Monday, I called his office and his secretary answered. I asked to speak to him. She informed that he had left for California Friday night and was planning to be gone for several weeks. Then it hit me! He had planned to kidnap my children. Planned to take them away from me last Friday night and I had thwarted his plans.

Neither I nor the children saw him for about six months after that.  That doesn’t mean to say we didn’t have our issues.  He fought the courts about the fees, he tried to appeal the judgment but failed.  He had his parents try for custody of the children but failed. So my life was in constant turmoil. But all this time, Teddy Bear was there to calm me down and act as my sounding board when I was upset. He was my rock when I needed a shoulder to cry on.  He was my best friend.  I’d been working in the railyard now for over a year and was doing fairly well and felt stable enough to start looking for houses.  I wanted a more stable environment for the kids and one that they felt more like home.

I found a little house in Maryland, it was only five miles from their fathers if he decided to ever see them again, so he couldn’t complain about that. It was 168 years old and it was affordable for me.  I put in an offer and it was accepted.  But as fortune smiled on me so did misfortune.  The day I signed for the house, I got laid off from work.

 

 

Short Story, Teddy Bear

Ch 12. Not Exactly Kramer vs. Kramer

Leave a comment

Custody battles I’ve heard can be civil, I’ve heard.  Even Kramer vs. Kramer was more civil than mine.

One day I come home, and my babysitter tells me she has to quit, family matters have come up that are preventing her from sitting for me. Now I have to find another sitter that can come to watch the children early in the morning and get them on the bus for school and be there when they come home. I have to be at work too early and don’t get home in time for the bus in the afternoon.  So my search begins. I interview a dozen different women, finally, the “perfect” girl comes and sits down in my living room.  I interview her and she answers all the questions “perfectly”.  I am delighted.  She seemed just the right person for the job and I hire her.

However, within a couple of weeks she tells me that she lost my check and if I could pay her in cash, she needs to pay her rent, she’ll bring back the other check when she finds it.  I don’t want her missing her rent, so I give her cash, but I make her sign a piece of paper for it.  I did that at least.  Then I notice that all my food in the cabinets is missing on a daily basis.  This is odd.

I confront her at the end of the week and ask her what’s going on and if she could please pick up the house because it’s messier when I get home than when I left it. She just frowns at me.  My cabinets are becoming bare, my house is a mess.

Then my daughter at two years old is outside playing one weekend and casually calls my neighbor a “bitch”.  I am in shock!  I don’t use profanity, ever!  I run to my little girl and tell her this is not a word we use, and tell her to go over to the neighbor and apologize.  As I’m talking to my neighbor I learn some other distressing news.  My neighbor has seen pictures of me naked.

What!  I haven’t taken pictures of me naked! The only pictures I ever had of me naked were the ones my ex took of me when we were married.  How did she see them?  Evidently, my babysitter had them, she had them from my husband.My ex hired her to be my babysitter, he knew what I would ask her, her told her how to answer my questions, he knew I would hire her.  She also invited my neighbor into my house to show her how bad of a mother I was to have no food in the house and how bad of housekeeper I was. I began to tremble. I wondered about the check, I called the bank and found out she had cashed the check.

I called Teddy Bear and we discussed what I should do. I called the police and asked if there was anything I could do, even if I was the one that was stupid enough to give her the money twice.  They said it had been fraud on her part and I could have her arrested. I decided that was exactly what I was going to do. I was adamant about it. I filed the report.  They went to arrest her on her wedding day but was too late, so we got her the day she got back from her honeymoon.  Her husband offered to make good the amount of money she frauded me out of, but I knew I had to have a conviction if for no other reason it was the principle of the matter.  I had to have it legal, I had to do this! We went to court, the judge asked me why I didn’t settle out of court and I gave her this same reason. The babysitter was found guilty of fraud and I got my paltry $125 back.  You may ask why this is important.  Custody trials have witnesses. Some are called as volunteers and some are subpoenaed, in other words, you have to pay to have them come and testify on your behalf.

My ex subpoenaed 10 witnesses against me, I had 10 volunteer witnesses on my behalf. He paid $100 per witness to tell terrible and horrible things against me. I had 10 wonderful friends support me. The only thing was because this girl that came up to the witness stand who said all these terrible and horrible things had committed fraud against me and had been legally guilty by a judge; the judge upon hearing this impeached her as a witness.  In other words, she was NO witness against me, her word was false and misleading.  No one was to believe anything she said.

The other thing about subpoenaed witnesses, sometimes they don’t really benefit your case. Although you might want them to say mean and terrible things, like how emotionally unstable the wife is or how terrible she may dress in those jeans and flannel shirts.  Those witnesses always seem to be more logical than the ex wants them to be.

“Yes, she may be emotional, but emotions are good when raising children, you have to be sensitive to their needs and feelings”, the psychologist says.  “She’s a good mother that knows their needs and know what’s best for the welfare of her children”

He even subpoenaed the man from work that I had dated and asked about my work habits about my clothing.  “Yes, she has to dress that way to keep warm, it’s typical work attire for the work she does.  She’s a diligent chemist and good, and as the secretary of the union, we depend on her to keep the welders safe when working in confined spaces.  We would go on strike if she weren’t there.” Little did the ex, realize this same man had volunteered to witness on my behalf as well.

The trial lasted all afternoon, it was tiring and emotional. By the end of the day, I was exhausted.  My lawyer had done an excellent job and was very positive about the results. He had asked for his fees and court costs as well so I would not have any out of pocket expenses.  Now I had to wait for the judge’s decision.  I said I was willing for joint custody.  The judge was known to give joint custody.  I wanted to be fair.

 

Short Story, Teddy Bear

Ch. 11 – Teddy Bear Series

Leave a comment

My divorce was finally final that spring, I had been married exactly 11 years. The divorce was final on my 11th anniversary. Custody, however, was not determined during these proceedings. It was yet to be. I had been naive when the ex had moved me out of the home, and I had agreed to share the family lawyer for the divorce. I was so naive.  I was also ignorant of my ex’s income. I had kept the finances while we were married, but found out during the tax audit that he was making a six-figure income.  I had believed he only made $30,000 per year.  I had made all of our clothing, the children’s and stayed home to scrimp and save.  He took everything but did give me $500 per month in child support for the girls.  Needless to say, I desperately looked for another lawyer for my custody hearing. I couldn’t afford one, so went to family court to find one that would take my case and found just the right one. We had a battle on our hands.

Teddy Bear continued to visit me and cheer me up when times seemed their darkest.  He even introduced me to his brother thinking that if I couldn’t date him, maybe I would be interested in Jimmy.  But as much as I appreciated the idea, and thought it was a little funny. No, that wasn’t an option either.  Jimmy was sweet and Teddy Bear and he would come over for coffee and keep me company on the weekends when the kids were gone. We’d talk about things and work. We’d talk about me seeing other people.  I had started seeing the secretary of the union at work, but it wasn’t really that serious.  I did have a date Saturday night and that was going to be interesting, I thought.  It was going to be a party.  I hadn’t been to a party in a long time.

Teddy Bear looked curiously at me and said “party?”  I said, “yes, he invited me to a party, he asked me if I liked to party, and I said I like to go to parties.  So I’m going.”  Teddy Bear got this grin on his face.

That Saturday night I learned why he had that shit eating grin on his face.  I just got my first education on what “kind of party” it was.  I went to the guy’s house and there they all were, sitting in the living room passing around a joint and then passed me one.  I said, “No, thank you, I don’t do drugs, I’ve never smoked a joint”.  He said, “I thought, you liked to party?” Well, not this kind.  I am getting an education and culture shock is setting in.

I left the party early, ran a stop light, realizing what I did, I pulled over to contain myself and a cop immediately pulled in behind me.  I was so upset.  I was crying and rolled down my window to him as I fumbled for my license.  Apologizing like a crazy woman.  He said, “What’s wrong?”  I told him, “I just got my divorce, went to a party where they were doing things I’ve never done before, I’m not doing those things, I don’t have my children with me, I’m just very upset.  I know what I did.  I will be very careful driving the rest of the way home. I’m sorry.”  He just looks at me and smiles gently as he hands me back my license, “Do you need me to help you home?  I’m not going to give you a ticket, and it’s late, you need to be more careful.  I’ll help you if you want.”  I look at him with tears in my eyes, no one except Teddy Bear has offered to help. “Thank you, it’s not far, I’ll be careful, I promise, I’ll compose myself for a moment and go”

My entry into another life has started with more tears.