She'd never said "we have to talk" before...
... despite being married for over four years. It took me half an hour of conversation to realise her long explanations of The State Of Things boiled down to her running off with someone else.

A couple of weeks later, packing her stuff into boxes, I came alarmingly close to killing myself. [It's OK - the story picks up in a minute.] Some friends talked me out of it, so the next day I ensured I wouldn't be tempted again by embedding the kitchen knives into the living room wall. I wrote (on the wall, in foot-high multi-coloured letters) some slightly cryptic messages to myself reminding me why it was important to stay alive and how I should go about doing this.

Stepping back and admiring my handiwork, I thought, "if anyone saw this, they'd think I was mad. I know it makes sense though."

Remembering that anyone who says this in a film is invariably mentally unsound, I booked an appointment with the doctor. She gave me some quite astounding tablets and three weeks off work to enjoy get used to them. They gave me a whole new multi-sensory appreciation of music, the ability to feel every single fibre of any material my feet were touching, the magical ability girls have to tell which colours go together and some dancing blue triangles on the ceiling that only existed for a few minutes after I woke up.

I sat outside the house grinning like a loon when the missus turned up with her step-dad and a removal van to pick up her stuff. I explained my currently shaky mental state and that they shouldn't take the state of walls personally - it was all aimed at me (not them) so they were quite safe. Also, the doctor's told me to avoid all stress for at least two weeks, so could you just take the stuff I've packed already [mostly her clothes, chick lit, etc] and come back and split our other belongings another time?

She never did though, so I kept it all.
( teedyay, Sun 22 Apr 2007, 23:06, Reply)