Saturday, September 10, 2016

Strangers

As my soon-to-be-ex-wife prepares to move out in a couple days, I've come to the realization that I am living with a complete stranger. Gone is the person who used to talk to me about happenings in the world, about movies, about family, and about life in general. I now stare back at a person whose interests and perspectives make zero sense to me.


Once upon a time, we used to talk about everything...anything. We would talk about my family, her family, her work, our dreams and hopes, and more. Now, we have become the scene from Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. We sit and no one talks. Worse, if we do talk to each other, if we make eye contact, it turns into an awkward silence or into an argument. It makes for an unpleasant house, and it scares the heck out of my kids. That's the worst part: if there were no kids, this wouldn't be so hard. The children have to be thought about when you're ending a marriage. Both their mother and I are guilty of not doing that. We acted poorly.

The first moment I saw her as a stranger came with the death decree of our marriage. I've said it before: this has been a long time coming. We stopped being a team years ago. We worked very well on problems when people needed the Leab Team, but as a marriage, the work ethic was lax. I won't disparage her here, and I won't talk about her failures here yet, but I will say that effort was not made. As I sat in a hotel room chair furious over her behavior, I could see the wheels spinning. Instead of admitting any wrong-doing or introspecting about why her partner was upset, she admitted something we both knew: "I haven't loved you in years." Those words hurt to hear, but also weren't a surprise. Her behavior had already admitted that. And even after my father basically said goodbye to me and began his race to death, here was this woman that didn't ask me if I was ok, but was angry that I expected to be checked in with. Maybe I'm naive, but I always believed (hell, I still do) that if your life partner says, "I am in crisis right now....Please help me," you, as their partner ask, "How can I help?" When she stopped doing that, I knew we were in trouble. Her responses became, "You're an adult. Get over it."

Since the day she admitted she didn't love me, I have seen actions that made no sense. Toxic interactions between two people in flux. A lack of emotions that many people around us find puzzling. One friend told me she is going to crash, and that I have to be ready to help the kids when she does. Part of me wants to make sure that doesn't happen, but part of me also says, "This stranger is not worth being saved. She wouldn't help me, so why should I?" I hate feeling that bitter. Hate it. Yes, using the very strong word here.

As I watch this shell of my former best friend and confidant move through the world, I become angry at myself that I ever trusted her. And that's where Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind resonates with me even more. I have memories of this person I fell in love with once upon a time, but that person is long dead and gone. And to be fair, the person she fell in love with is also long dead and gone. As a friend of mine once asked me: "Think long and hard about who you think you are now. Would YOU want to come home to that?"

My soon-to-be-ex-wife is not a person I want to come home to anymore. For the last few years, I have found that my kids and I function better and feel better without her around. I would place good money she feels the same. The hard part is that I want her to be reasonable and hear me, but she can't. She absolutely can't hear me because that would mean getting in touch with emotions that I think frighten her right now. There's a great line in one of my all-time favorite movies: The Cutting Edge. 

"I keep thinking...If I just keep moving and checking...I'll get clear."

I truly believe that's where she is right now. If she runs and keeps moving, she'll be fine. My fear is that eventually the emotions will catch up to her, and she'll crumble. God help my kids if she does.


So now what? Now I move on. I rebuild with a person who cares about me emotionally and wants me in her life. A person who will let me love her. I also have to learn who this new person is that is caring for my children part of the time. I don't have to like this person, but I have to learn to trust her with the two most important people in my life.

I mean, look at them...how do you not love them?




So what is my point? My point, dear reader, is that people we love or loved will change. Sometimes they will go from bonded to complete stranger hanging at the fringes of your life. Know that it can happen. Know that you will lose someone very important to you, but that you can survive and bounce back. I am...so I know you can too. 

Namaste.

Saturday, August 27, 2016

Tidying Up a Bit


Ok, I haven't been taking care of this blog much. So, dear reader, I could use a little help. Who should I link to now? Who do you care to read about that maybe others who stop through here want to read?

Give me some ideas, please.

The Untethered Dad


Life...changes. That's not anything that you, dear reader, don't already know, but it is fascinating to me how it changes and why.

This year, 2016, has been one of the worst of my life. So much has happened that has pushed me down. Over the last few months, the following has happened:

My father is dying
My marriage is ending
My job was cut

As I sit here trying to figure out how to write about this, I feel like I'm drifting away. I have become untethered in space, grasping at anything to keep me. I know, I KNOW, this feeling is wrong. I'm not alone, and I'm not without a safety line, but at first, when it all piles up, it feels that way.

So, let's address each of my issues, shall we?

My job was cut.

In looking at the last few years of my life, this is not anything surprising. I don't talk about it much, but in conversing with a new colleague yesterday, I realized that since 2013, I have had 5 jobs. I left the first because of issues. I mourned that job. I believed it was everything, and it was like a part of me died leaving it. Even harder, I thought the people I worked with would miss me and try to contact me. When they didn't, I took it so personally and let it cut me deep.
The next 3 were all one and done due to budget cuts. I really liked my CIS class at Andover. In my career, those classes may have been the best I ever taught from both my abilities and my students. Yet, as I experience my kids getting older, I realize that my best friend is right: it's a job. It makes money. It is NOT my life. It's part of my life, but it is not the reason I live. When I left my first teaching job, I would have disagreed with her, but now I see she is right.
The current one is just starting, and while I'm nervous, I'm hopeful it will work for a while. However, I'm a teacher with a Master's Degree and now 12 full years of experience. More and more I'm hearing that I am too expensive, so I won't get interviewed. This past summer, from June through August, I applied for around 400 jobs, both in and out of the education field. 400. In that time, I had exactly 10 interviews. That's 2.5%. It's very discouraging.
However, I'm very lucky. I found another job. It might lead to something...or it might not.


My father is dying.

Alzheimer's and old age are a terrible combination. The person does know where he or she is and doesn't understand why he or she is they way they are. This past week was my parents' 52nd wedding anniversary (more on that later). My father couldn't remember the date. Why would he? Growing up, my father was always an absent-minded professor...literally. He couldn't tell you the day's date, but he could tell you who was at the Magna Carta signing and why it was important. Now, there are days he doesn't remember I have kids...or at one point that I had graduated college. Now, my father and I have a very...difficult relationship. However, watching your father go from the most powerful man in the world to a mewling kitten is very hard. His balance is gone. His strength and fire are gone. As he prepares to turn 80, the man who told me stories about surviving the Holocaust has been replaced by the man who tells me how hard it is to walk 20 feet. His color has changed. Slowly, over the last few years, he has stopped being...himself. The shell left is going quickly and will soon be gone. This will be the first major death in my children's lives, and I will have a lot to explain.
I spent years being angry at this man for how he treated me instead of understanding why he treated me the way he did. In taking a step back and seeing how hurt and broken my father is, I learned that he did the best he could. It wasn't honestly great, but he tried, and he taught me how to raise my kids by showing me what not to do.

My marriage is ending.

THIS has been a long time coming. My marriage of 15, almost 16 years, is ending. My wife is moving out soon. It has been...a long time coming. It's very hard to write those words, but it's true. We have two beautiful children, but those children need to see what love and happiness look like, but the last few years of our marriage have not been that...at all. I wish I could say it is all her fault, but that's not how it works. It's both of us. That doesn't make the toxic nature of our end any better, mind you. Without really going into details (as I really can't yet), the major issues were cliche: lack of communication, lack of trust, and lack of trying. I am more upset for my children than myself. If you have been through divorce as a child, then you know how hard it can be. My daughter constantly asks if I am going to stop loving her the way her mom and I have stopped loving each other. No matter how much we tell her we won't, she struggles. My son, on the other hand, has shut his feelings down so he won't be upset. The internal struggle he has breaks my heart, because I am aware that it is partially my fault.
Here's the thing: they will be fine eventually. I will be too...and so will their mother. I think she'll be ok. She has shut down and shut others out, so it's hard to know. I mentioned my parents' anniversary earlier. 52 years. When I got married, I honestly thought that 50 years later, my soon-to-be-ex wife and I would be dancing to our song. I pictured us as that couple who holds hands as one of them dies...only to have the other die a few minutes later out of sadness. It's a beautiful and wonderful dream, but to make it true is a whole different beast.

I will not comment on where my wife failed just yet, however, I know where I failed. I built rules of what love and marriage are and held fast to them too tightly. When she didn't follow those rules, I got angry. I didn't introspect...not until it was too late and the marriage was already dead...we just didn't know it yet. I would expect her to respond in a certain way, and when she didn't, I got mad. I didn't look at why she responded the way she did, I just got mad. So what were these rules?

1. If your partner says I love you, you acknowledge it.
2. You give your partner as much love and time as they give you.
3. You demonstrate your love to your partner.
4. If your partner is struggling, you help them overcome that struggle and you fight for them.
5. You can fight with your partner, but you have to make sure get to a point you can reconcile.
6. Your partner is the number 1 person in your life.

By holding her to these rules, I doomed our relationship. Again, I want to be clear: I am in NO WAY saying all of the breakdown of my marriage is my fault. It is certainly not. I am just saying that I am aware of where *I* went wrong. There are many things that my wife, soon to be ex, did and is still doing wrong.

The key thing is a very big cliche: Relationships only last if both people do the work. I love the Beatles lyric "and in the end, the love you take is equal to the love you make." You get back what you put in. To me, that's the truth. If you both work hard on loving each other, it will go well. If one of you falters, the whole machine breaks. One person cannot carry the load of love and marriage alone...and honestly, nor should they.

The thing about divorce, someone dying, losing your job, or any trauma is that it forces you to hold up a mirror and ask why do you feel this way? What are you going to do about it? I look at my reactions, and I see how I contributed. It means I will come out the other side a better person. For me, for the people I love, and for my kids. I hope my kids' mother will eventually introspect and look at who she is and why this marriage failed. She is so closed right now...and it's both sad and maddening.

I also hope that you, dear reader, are able to really look at yourself and understand why you feel the way you do. I believe that better things are coming for me. Right now, life feels hard and there is a part of me that wants to just crawl under the covers and hide the way I did when I thought a monster was in my closet (It was just my sister being a little drunk, but that's a story for another time). I know I can't. I have two amazing children who need their dad to be on the ball, to be a good father. In time, they will come to see that I can love and be loved. They will come to see that I can be more than just their dad, and that was another failing of mine: I spent years being their dad and caring for them more than myself. They are the top of the rope I am grabbing on to pull myself back to Earth. Tether achieved...so now to add weight and be here now.

So, dear reader, I will be writing more. I will be talking about where I am going next and how I am. You may be interested in my stories...or you may not, but they'll be here. So will I.

Namaste.




Friday, August 26, 2016

Maulrats; or I Found a Killer Deal: A Fiasco Playset













Dude! Welcome to the Shoppes of the USA. The Largest and most visited collection of theatres,
restaurants, stores, hotels, and casinos, and all under one roof! Sometimes you find a great deal, and
every once in a while, you find a killer. So, strap on that fanny pack, mall walker; wipe down that
table, food court worker; and check those cameras, security guard, because tonight, there will be…
A FIASCO!

Going to the Pictures
Dawn of the Dead (1979), Police Story (1985), Mallrats (1995), Jackie Brown (1997), Paul Blart: Mall Cop (2009)

Curl Up with a Book
Catherine O’Flynn: What Was Lost
Michael Galinsky: Malls Across America
SL Grey: The Mall

Real Life Inspiration
The Mall of America (Bloomington, MN)
The Palisades Center (Nyack, NY)

CREDITS
Written by Marcus Leab under a Creative Commons (CC BY 2.0) license.

BOILERPLATE
This playset is an accessory for the Fiasco role-playing game by Bully Pulpit Games.
This playset is copyright 2016 by Marcus Leab.
Fiasco is copyright 2009 by Jason Morningstar. All rights are reserved.
For more information about Fiasco or to download other playsets and materials, visit www.bullypulpitgames.com


Relationships                                                                  Needs
1. Family                                                                        1. To Get Out
    1 Parent/ Child                                                                1 … of This Job
    2 Aunt/Uncle & Niece/Nephew                           2 … of This Relationship
    3 Siblings                                                                          3 … of This Gang/Group/Crew
    4 Happy/ Estranged Couple                                           4 … of The House
    5 Fake Family/ Cover                                                      5 … of This Family
    6 Cousins (Kissing or not)                                              6 … of This Psychotic State
2. Romantic                                                                     2. To Get Even/Survive
    1 Stalker/ Obsession                                                        1 … with Her/ Him
    2 Spouses                                                                           2 … with Parents/ Kids
    3 Lovers                                                                              3 … with Rival Stores/Theatres/
                                                                                                     Casinos/Restaurants/Hotels
    4 Hated exes or are they?                                                 4 … Black Friday
    5 Once upon a time….                                                     5 … Layoffs/ Store Closings
    6 It is forbidden!                                                                6 … Natural Disaster/Fire/
                                                                                                          Zombie Apocalypse
3. Criminal/ Law Enforcement                                        3. To Get Rich/ Gain
    1 Security Guard                                                                  1 … Freedom
    2 Bank Robber                                                                     2 … The Store/ Theatre/ Casino/
                                                                                                         Restaurant/ Hotel
    3 Mob Boss/ Underling                                                      3 … His/ Her Love/ Respect
    4 FBI Informant/ Agent                                                       4 … From Embezzlement/ Robbery
    5 Shoplifter                                                                           5 … From a Fantastic Promotion
    6 Disgraced Ex-Cop Looking for Hope                           6 … From One Lucky Night at the
                                                                                                     Casino
4. Professional/ Work                                                       4. To Prove…
   1 Casino                                                                                 1 …Our Cause is Right/ Their Cause
                                                                                                     is Wrong!
   2 Retail Clerk/ Manager                                                     2 … To Be Manager/ Leadership      
      Material
   3 Kiosk Clerk/ Manager                                                     3 … Our Gang/ Group/ Crew is the best
   4 Food Court Worker/ Manager                                         4 … This Place Sucks/ Rocks!
   5 Movie Theatre                                                                   5 … Love is Real!
   6 Hotel Clerk/ Manager                                                       6 … The Store/ Restaurant/ Theatre is
                                                                                                              the Best/Worst!
5. Embarrassing/ Trouble                                                 5. To Win Back…/ Get Some Answers…
   1 Rival Gangs/ Schools                                                      1 … His/ Her Heart
   2 Rival Stores                                                                     2 … His/ Her Respect
   3 Rivals for Same Love                                                      3 … Your/ His/ Her Job
   4 Bored Teenagers                                                              4 … About Their Plans
   5 Loving Parent/ Difficult Child                                         5 … About The Money
   6 Cop/ Thief                                                                        6 … About Yourself/ Them
6. Controversial/ Outsiders                                              6. To Destroy/ Hide…
   1 Protesters                                                                         1 … Your Rival(s)
   2 Health Inspector                                                              2 … Her/ His Heart/ New Lover
   3 Teens on a Mission                                                          3 … This Place
   4 Rival Casino Owners Looking to Do Harm                    4 … Your Past (Good or Bad)
   5 Tourists                                                                            5 … Your Allegiances/ Connections
   6 Surly Customer/ Clerk at Frustrating                              6 … Your Money
      Swedish Furniture Emporium

Locations                                                                          Objects
1. 1st Floor                                                                       1. Quotidian (Every Day Items)
    1 Needful Things Kiosk                                                   1 Soda Cup from Food Court
    2 Jed’s Roadkill CafĂ©                                                       2 A Flyer/ Coupon
    3 The Square Rotunda                                                      3 Makeup
    4 Loose Bricks Sink Ships                                               4 Bottle of Siracha
    5 Wasted Fish Taqueria                                                    5 Sunglasses
    6 Kids Pop Boutique                                                        6 A Baseball Cap
2. 2nd Floor                                                                      2. Weapons
    1 Bottom of the Sea Bookstore                                        1 A Knife
    2 Grandma Mabel’s Fried Chicken                                  2 A Sawed-Off Shotgun
    3 Cockadoodle Do Eat Our Chicken Restaurant             3 A Bomb/ Bombs
    4 Back of Santa’s Sleigh Toy Store                                 4 A Bottle of Poison
    5 The Missing Piece Puzzle Store                                   5 A Silenced 9mm Pistol
    6 Fine Licker Sex Shop                                                   6 A Broken Beer Bottle
3. 3rd Floor                                                                       3. Illegal
    1 Rear Window Camera Repair and Sales                       1 Fake Casino Chips
    2 Yubechaoui Bank                                                          2 Money Plates
    3 Forever Size 21                                                             3 A Briefcase with Cocaine
    4 Gills, Gills, Gills Fish Shop                                          4 Knockoff Toy/ Clothes
    5 CT Yankee Food Court                                                 5 Plans to the Casino
    6 The Gilded Ascot                                                          6 Keys to the Mall
4. Hotel                                                                             4. Expensive
    1 The Hotel                                                                       1 Rare Bottle of Scotch
    2 The Dining Room/ Kitchen                                           2 Tommy Falcon’s First Skateboard
    3 Room 403                                                                      3 A Rare 1st Edition by
                                                                                                “What’s His Name.”
    4 Suite 617                                                                       4 The Last of the Holiday’s Hottest Toy
    5 Presidential Suite 3                                                       5 Presidential Suite Key
    6 The Conference Room                                                  6 This Month’s Payroll
5. Casino                                                                           5. Nostalgic
    1 The Floor                                                                       1 A Picture from Youth
    2 VIP Area                                                                        2 A Letter from a Lost Lover/ Priest
    3 Manager’s Office                                                           3 The First Dollar Made
    4 The Vault                                                                       4 A Baby’s Toy/Blanket
    5 The Kitchen                                                                   5 A Ring
    6 The Ballroom/ Stage                                                      6 A Yearbook
6. Outside the Mall                                                            6. WTF?
    1 Frustrating Swedish Furniture Emporium                     1 A Box of Frozen Chicken Wings
    2 Mom and/or Dad’s House                                              2 A Defective Product from Frustrating
                                                                                                 Swedish Furniture….
    3 Military Base/ Federal Building                                    3 Thirty Boxes of Straws?
    4 The Curb                                                                        4 A Beta Fish
    5 The Airport                                                                    5 An Incomplete Bank Slip

    6 The Pump and Gulp                                                      6 A Bullhorn Covered in Bumper Stickers