Being Amber Rhea

In honor of the fourth anniversary of my divorce:

(And, honestly… I won’t always post Liz Phair songs!)

I thought today was the one year anniversary (or anti-anniversary?) of my divorce, but my blog archives have proven me wrong - it was yesterday. Oh well, so much for doing a comtemplative post The Day Of. As a matter of fact, I’m not sure I feel like doing a comtemplative post at all - or at least, not something lengthy. Insert here the obligatory observations about how much can change in one year’s time, and how we can never really anticipate what the future (even just a year in the future) will bring.

You know how it goes. When I was 18, I never imagined I’d be married at 21. When I was 21, I never imagined I’d be divorced at 24. And so on and so forth.

Last year I had a trip to Boston (and a Red Sox penant) for my birthday - and the concomitant ruminations about the quarter of a century milestone. This year I’ll have a new job*, presumably some sort of celebration with the GDBF and (hopefully) other ATL friends I’ve met in the last year, and some ruminations on the “quarter of a century, plus one” milestone.

* Ed. note: More on this later. But not too much more - dooce factor, you know.

SB 25 is the “Divorce Bill” which is working its way through the Georgia General Assembly. I was prepared to write a big rant about it. Then I read it (well, first I read a post about it at Good Intentions and then clicked the link to the bill itself) and I’m not quite as outraged as this AJC article lead me to believe I would be. However, I still have my concerns. Any restriction of freedom concerns me. And what mainly concerns me in this situation is how this will affect spouses who have been abused by their spouse. Yes, the bill says the education classes and/or the waiting period are waived in such a situation; but it’s never that simple, and I am concerned. We don’t need more cases like this absolutely horrible and unbelievable situation.

I’m not one of those people who likes to stand on their soap box and proclaim that divorce is wrong, always, plain and simple. (Obviously — especially considering that I got divorced in September!) I am wary of any such broad, sweeping generalizations, and this one in particular. I don’t necessarily think it’s a bad thing that divorce is more common now than in the past. Sure, it means some people are “giving up easily” — but really, who are we to tell them that they can’t or shouldn’t? It’s their marriage after all, not ours; plus, what may appear as “giving up easily” to the outside observer may be in fact much more complicated. Only the two parties of the marriage can know for sure. -But I digress. It also means that more people are no longer just sitting back and taking abuse from their spouse. If a man beats his wife then the best thing is for that marriage to end and for her to get as far away from him as she can (and hopefully for him to end up in jail, too). Especially if there are children involved.

Which brings me to another point. The bill states:

The General Assembly finds that children are the innocent victims of legal separation and divorce and that, when two parties separate or divorce, there is a devastating impact on their children who have had no voice in the decision to disrupt the family. Oftentimes, these children of divorce are negatively affected academically, socially, emotionally, and psychologically as a result of the stress and trauma placed on the family by the separation or divorce and by the associated discord between their parents occasioned by the process.

I am not saying that children are not negatively affected by divorce. I can’t speak with any authority on the topic since my parents are still married. But, I will tell you this. When I was growing up, I often wished my parents would get a divorce. I think we all would have been happier and more peaceful for it. I’m not going to tell you all the details of my home life growing up — some of you already know, and if you don’t, I’m probably not going to tell you. And that’s precisely the point — you don’t know. So it’s not fair for outsiders to make judgements about “what’s best for the kids” when they don’t have all the facts. Divorce can screw kids up, but so can a turbulent and emotionally twisted household with both parents in it. I would much rather have my child grow up in a household with one parent who is consistent and emotionally stable, rather than a dysfunctional two-parent household.

Lastly, this bill rubs me the wrong way simply because of the fact that it restricts freedom. I got divorced in September, and that was the business of myself and Chris, no one else. It was our choice to make, and that’s that. (Some of you know why we got divorced, some don’t. Again, if you don’t know now, you might find out later, if either of us decides to tell you. Or you might not find out. In which case you have no place to pass judgement.) From the appearance of the bill in its current state, there is no restriction, limitation, or extending of the waiting period for no-fault divorce when there are no children. But it’s still making the rounds in the General Assembly, so who knows what could get tacked on. Let’s be watchful.

So in conclusion (har har), I was actually kind of relieved to see the wording of SB 25 — because it’s not as bad as what I expected from this Republican-controlled General Assembly. But “sucking not as bad as I thought” doesn’t automatically lift all my concerns about it. There are other issues about which I am far more concerned at the moment; but this will remain on my radar screen.