Suburban Goddess

Last night, I received an email with a link in it. The title said, “I think you should see this.”

I knew what it was before I clicked on it. It’s like passing a car wreck; you know that if you catch a glimpse of something, it will disturb you for life, yet the morbid curiosity gets the best of you and you can’t help it…. you look.

First of all, let me preface this by saying that the person who sent me this link is not my friend. That’s clue number one that I shouldn’t be looking. Any one who was my friend would not send me this link; they would file it away in their minds under “Stuff Kristie Really Doesn’t Need To Know, Because I Know It Will Upset Her.”

So I struggled, the internal struggle of temptation that all of us struggle with every day in one form or another…. and I lost. I clicked the link and was immediately whisked off to an online photo gallery.

It wasn’t the picture of Chip with his scantily clad girlfriend that bothered me; that mental picture is one that played over and over in my mind until something snapped. What bothered me is looking at the house I used to live in, and the things that I saw there.

Money has been very tight for me of late. Every month is a lesson in prayer; please God, just get me through this month, because Chip will get me the last of the money from our divorce settlement. It’s not an outrageous amount, paltry in comparison to his overall salary. I’ve been saying this prayer for the past four months now; every month it’s the same excuse. No explanations, just an excuse.

Looking into these pictures paints a completely different story.

A beautiful hardwood floor where the carpet used to lay. I know how much that cost; we’d priced it out together. We had talked of putting it in from the moment we moved into the house.

In the enclave, a custom entertainment center; I know how much that cost, too. It was exactly as we’d imagined it when we looked into the empty enclave everyday, me hating the fact that our television sat on an old table, the wires exposed.

Next to the enclave, above the fireplace, a brand new flat-screen TV. I don’t know how much that cost, but I know the ball-park figure. There were pictures of my ex-neighbors, gathered around it singing karaoke. Another slap in the face; these people that I thought were my friends, these people who condemned Chip for his betrayal, all standing there arm-in-inebriated-arm.

They were laid out everywhere on the brand-new sofas. Cream colored, accenting the new deep brown paint on the walls that was also new. I don’t know how much that cost. For all I know, they could have been a gift, or they could be the cheap furniture that you buy on the side of I-45. Another picture revealed a brand-new dinette set as well.

In the driveway, an old Camaro; a beautifully restored muscle car. Now, I know he flips cars on a friend’s car lot and this was probably just a car for the evening, but it costs money to buy these cars at auction.

Everywhere I looked there was something new. Everywhere I looked I saw why he doesn’t have the money to give me. And I grew furious. I live each month in pure anxiety; I have no financial back-up plan at the moment. I have no emergency credit cards. I have a very, very small savings account. I don’t have anyone that I can call if I get in a financial bind. I have been counting on that money for peace-of-mind. I need it in my savings account; I need it there to reassure me if something happens to my house, my daughter, or me that I have enough in the bank to cover it and not throw my monthly bills and my sanity into a state of panic.

I’ve explained this to him. He has reassured me that if something like that ever happened, he would never allow me to suffer. But how can I be expected to believe any other promises from this man when he continuously proves that his promises are hollow?

I know a portion of this home improvement spree was funded by money he received for his birthday. The rest of it could have very well been bought on credit; he could be maxed out, living for the next bonus. It’s not such a stretch; we did it every year. If that’s the case, I could quell the fury; things are easy to get on credit, but cash advances aren’t so forgiving.

I fought the horrible urge to call and rail on him; I know he’s in the middle of a personal crisis because two of his friends died this past week. It was not the time to approach what I’d seen. But to me, I feel like when you have an obligation, you should honor that before going on a home-improvement spree.

It’s just one more slap in the face to me. “You weren’t good enough to make this changes for. You weren’t a good enough wife, so I replaced you. Hardwood floors are more important to me than your peace-of-mind. If anything happens, I’ll take care of our daughter, but you are left to fend for yourself because I have a happy new life without you in it. And my girlfriend is prettier than you.” This is what I hear in my head when I look at these pictures.

Which is exactly why I should have just hit the delete button the moment that I saw who they were from.  But I didn’t, and now there are just more unanswered questions…

Who is this person that I thought I knew so well?