the uber driver and I had an interesting conversation. She was telling me how her 25-year old son grew up with Toy Story and that they enjoyed the latest one. Have I seen it?
"No. Not yet."
"You should! Prepare for the tears, though. Although I do not know if you cry because you are a man."
“Oh I cry, like, a lot these days.”
She laughs.
Then she says that she just recently moved to Lubbock, like me. And that she is working at the education sector, like me. and that she wishes educators get higher salaries....girl, same sentiment. She needs the extra money, that's why she is driving the uber, because she has only 2500 USD left in the bank and that her husband has stopped depositing money for her and for their autistic son.
Then she revealed that her husband of 27 years left her for a younger woman. Mind you, when she was telling the story of her heartbreak with a sincere unshakeable mirth in her singsong voice, but there are quakings here and there. Her eyes started glistening.
"To think, he did this a few days after our anniversary which is February 14th, of all days! We even flew to Egypt for our anniversary....then he texts a few weeks later....and then I see him and his new girl back in Egypt going to the places we went!"
*gasp*
"He was my high school sweetheart, you know? He told me that because I grew fat, he no longer feels any desire for me!"
THAT ASSHOLE!!!
"I knew something was up between him and his coworker. Look, she's very pretty. Here I will show you."
At this point, we have reached my destination. She whips out her phone and scrolls.
"That's me and husband in Alexandria, Egypt."
"you look so happy there."
"I know. Then this is my husband and this woman in the same place a few weeks later!"
Then she opens the new girl's instagram page....how the hell is this healthy, I think to myself....but then I recall she was just recently dumped, and that sting can make people go crazy, believe me, I KNOW. and uber driver shows me the photos. The young lady is like a broke copy of Kim Kardashian, with the "thicc" poses and the pouts.
I told her this: "I am not an expert in these matters. But it seems to me that your husband had a midlife crisis of growing old with the same woman and he decided to act stupidly. This stupidity has made him cast aside you and his son. You know that the days ahead will be really tough. I know your friends have already told you that you deserve better. But what you're doing right now?...this ubering?....is part of that slow, painful recovery....and I really wish you will overcome this."
She was not asking for money. She was just looking for somebody to listen. and, truly, among the saddest sounds I have heard in my life is that of heartbreak and betrayal.
I told her what I always tell my friends about misery having weight. Now, it feels like it is crushing you (I remember having a hard time breathing when my dad died) but the weight changes....it becomes manageable...it becomes small, but it will never leave us. However, it WILL get better. It HAS to be. Or....as I have seen many of my friends who have dealt with shattering losses, you have to make it better.