A year into the global pandemic, G, my husband, and I went to Sun Valley, Idaho, to end our marriage. It was a place neither of us had ever visited — either as a couple or with our two daughters. It was neutral territory with no nostalgia.
The plane from Los Angeles, sparsely filled with masked passengers and crew, jolted and bumped as we came in for a landing. I hated turbulence — it was a reminder that I had willingly placed myself in a precarious situation. Instinctively I reached for G, my hand hovering over his before I pulled it back. We may have looked like a couple who had been married for 25 years, and legally we were, but we had been living apart for longer than we were together.
Fourteen years earlier, I had asked G to leave our family home. At the time, I had a basic schematic of what divorce should look like: someone moves out, lawyers are called, everything is divided, children get shuffled from house to house, end of story.
Our dissolution did not quite turn out that way.
G and I met when we were 18 years old, living on the same floor of our freshman dorm. He was from Long Island; I was from the Midwest by way of Utah. G was well liked, and we would all pile into his room to hang out. He held space like a magician, captivating us with his sense of humor and lightning quick mind.
We hooked up on a drunken night and started dating. I had only had one boyfriend before him, and this felt different — less fumbling and more electric. We shared a love of reading that was intoxicating. I had never met anyone who devoured 20th century American literature like I did.
I remember the moment we fell in love. I flew to New York City for the first time to visit G and his family. I had seen the city in movies and on television, but nothing prepared me for experiencing it in person: there was the top of the Chrysler Building from “It’s A Hard Knock Life” in “Annie,” the stark towers of the World Trade Center, Lady Liberty holding her torch. G’s…
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