Why Can't We Be Friends?

A couple of years ago, when I was first separated and starting the process of becoming divorced, I was at my youngest daughter’s basketball game. Everybody’s parents were there, cheering for the team. There was one couple in particular, though, that caught my eye. They had come to the game in separate cars. When the mother arrived, she greeted the father with a big hello hug. They sat together, and while they watched the came, they laughed and joked and enjoyed each other’s company.

My children’s father and I, by contrast, sat on opposite sides of the gym. We were like two opposing magnets that couldn’t be brought together. No matter how hard we, or anyone else tried, the invisible force field couldn’t be broken. But this is how we wanted it. At that point, even knowing that the air I was inhaling may have mingled with the exact same air that he was exhaling was akin to breathing noxious gasses.

I watched the happy couple and thought back to a time when I was part of a happy couple.

Patrick and I met at a basketball game. He was a player, I was a fan. We had mutual friends in common, and after the game we all went out to celebrate their victory. Some good conversation and a few beers were all it took for the spark to ignite between Patrick and me.
We started dating, fell in love and got married.
We continued to go to basketball games, he, as a player, me, as his greatest fan.
When we had children, they joined us at the games. The hot sweaty smell of the gym wrapped my babies in warmth and the steady dribble of the ball down the court lulled them to sleep. Nothing, not even the buzzer, could disturb the peace my babies felt at a basketball game.
My children loved watching their father play, and, when they got old enough, he taught them the game.
Over time, Patrick began to spend less time as a player and more time as a fan. We would sit together and cheer for our children. Sometimes, we would hold hands
Basketball was woven into the fiber of our marriage, the first thread in the tapestry of our lives together.


At halftime of my daughter’s game, I started talking with the woman I had been watching. It turned out that the reason she had hugged the man when she arrived was that she hadn’t seen him for a couple of weeks. She hadn’t seen him for a couple of weeks because they were divorced!

I glanced over at Patrick and, holding back the urge to vomit, I asked the woman how she did it.
“My husband and I are going through a divorce,” I explained, “and we can’t stand to even look at each other.”

“Yeah, we were like that,” she nodded. “It gets better.”
“How? When?” I pleaded.
“I don’t know,” she shrugged. “We’ve been divorced for almost five years. It just kind of gradually happened.”

This Christmas, I thought it was finally happening. I took Patrick shopping to help him buy gifts for the children. It went well. We talked. I gave him gift ideas, he listened and actually took my advice. Together, we chose a gift for my oldest daughter’s boyfriend. I tried on clothes to see if they would be the right size for our youngest daughter. I explained to him what Uggs are and took him to Nordstrom so that he could buy some for his mother. I even went halves with my oldest daughter and we gave Patrick tickets to a Blazer basketball game for Christmas.

Last week, our youngest daughter had her first basketball game since Christmas. I arrived first. When Patrick got there, he saw me and took a seat on the opposite side of the gym. Afterwards, he left without talking to me.

And I am left wondering if I dreamed Christmas.