When the American legal system in it's infinite and inscrutable wisdom decreed that my friend M was a kept woman and therefore could not be granted a divorce, they turned her world entirely Kafka-esque.
With her zippy little sports car, the clothes on her back and some loose change life was starting over in the late twenties. When she called me she sounded tranquil "I feel light. Even happy maybe. I can't tell yet." she said.
The next time we spoke it was many months after the event. Unlike many who for better or worse harbor lingering feelings for their ex, M had made an amazingly clean break. She said in a perverse way she felt one up on her "keeper"-husband.
"I can still see his credit card statements online. I figure he didn't remember to change passwords. I see the dreary life he leads. Fast food, Gas, Liquor store, video rentals all within few miles of home. Not even a different zip code. That's got to suck big time." M was at the time basking in warm afterglow of her recent trip to Barbados with some friends, her weekend was booked solid.
"I compare my statement to his. I mark the different places my card has been in the last one month. I count the number of movie and concert tickets, dinners, gifts - you know all the fun stuff. There is so much movement about me. I am not curled up in a shell waiting for the end to come. I am out there living. I feel like I'm having my revenge every day. It makes me want to be outrageously happy."
By the time he got around to changing his password, M was fully over him.
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