Blather

On the right is the anvil my big son bought for me a few years ago. You don't go to your friendly, neighborhood anvil storer, so the one he found had quite a bit of damage- the sides were chipped and broken. I heated it with my acetylene torch, then cranked up the heat on my Lincoln AC welder and built up the sides with good rod from Airgas. I ground the edges close to where I wanted them with my little 4-1/2" Makita grinder and finished with my old Craftsman belt sander. The tired, re-tuned anvil turned out pretty good.

I had the ball-peen hammer head laying around in my toolbox for a decade or two before I got around to shaping a piece of tree limb from my back yard into a slightly longer-than-store-bought hammer handle. Note the last few inches that still have bark on the handle. The stump under the anvil came from a heavy branch of my avocado tree.

What does this picture have to do with the Never-Ending Divorce? Well, after I got back from family court today, I changed clothes and began to fix the door to the Buck Stove that my son got from Craigslist. But before I began, I walked by this stump-anvil-hammer piece of domestic and intensely personal art and was overwhelmed by a sense of self-imaging gestalt.

I worked on the Buck Stove doors with only half my mind. The other half was still re-winding the events of this afternoon. Family court is stressful. I made an offer to my ex-wife about child support and spousal support that wouldn't leave me broke from the job I'll take in Iraq. Nothing is yet 100% certain, but the possibility is getting better that I'll go to Georgia next week, then on to Iraq.

My attorney said that it's unusual for a wife to get twice the spousal support that the court ordered, but such is the case- I go to Iraq and carry two guns, she gets twice the money plus she gets to spend the extra money that I have to give her for child support. And she gets to keep her share of my retirement and the SSA that my son gets because I retired. All in all, she'll have $4500 each month and won't have to work for a living. The sardonic bounce leaves a bad taste in my mouth, but I'm glad that it won't be worse.

California believes that divorce isn't final; divorce just keeps on lingering, like a fart in a space suit. Don't like that comparison? Yeah, neither do I. But California believes that, because I was married for a long time, she merits support for the rest of her life. And if I stick my neck out in Iraq, she's entitled to more money from me. Sure, I merit support from her, but the operative yet missing element here is any sort of productive income on her part. She hasn't worked since 2001, so my chances of getting support from her are slim to none.

Though this Never-Ending Divorce keeps benefiting her, I can bask in the consolation that it's not worse.

Good environmental photo of me up there- my anvil, my hammer, even my stump. When the next year is over, I'll polish up the anvil and hammer.