Starting Over

Starting Over

When best efforts have failed

Anyone in this fictitious story who is depicted as engaging in sexual activity is over the age of 18.

She was a good solid 7 -- maybe pushing 8 when she dressed to impress. Using the old percentile terminology that is used to interpret grade school achievement test scores, that means that if a representative cross section of American eligible females were assembled, Barbara, Babs to her friends, was less attractive than about thirty percent of those around her, but more attractive than sixty percent of the female population of her age group.

I was content with that. I considered myself to be a six or a seven. I wasn't an athlete, but I wasn't out of shape. I did physical work to earn my way through college. In high school I was a member of the National Honor Society but wasn't considered to be a nerd or a geek. I was elected to be a class officer. I went to college to get a degree in theology. I wanted to become a pastor of a church.

It was almost a standing joke at the seminary: While at the seminary, professors and denomination executives preferred the seminarians to be single so they could devote all of their attention to theology. Yet, once placed in a congregation, they all acknowledged that it would be much easier for the seminarian and denomination execs if the seminarian were married and had two children.

There were horror stories of a single seminarian being placed in a congregation that had one or more eligible females in the congregation. If there was only one and the seminarian just wasn't attracted to her, but she felt she was attracted to him, this could cause hurt feelings that reverberated throughout the congregation. And if there were more than one eligible female and the seminarian -- now pastor -- chose one over the other, that often also caused hard feelings in the congregation that lasted throughout his ministry there.

In spite of knowing all that, I, Stephen, Steve to my friends, met Babs in my first congregation. It was a small, rural congregation and she was considered to be the only eligible female. She had come to teach in the local elementary school. She was there before I arrived.

I like to think that if there would have been several eligible young women in that congregation, I still would have found myself attracted to Babs and she to me. While I was active in most of the church functions, Babs was quite active in the church as well, so we got to know one another on a working level. Eventually we dated. Things became more serious. We tried to go into it with eyes wide open, and in about a year and a half we were married.

We decided to have children relatively early in the marriage, in part because Babs had a relative who gave birth rather late in life and the resulting child had special needs. After teaching for only three years we had our first child, and we both agreed that Babs would stay home to be a full-time mom at least until such time as this child and any subsequent children were full-time students in school. We had three children in all over a period of ten years.

While Babs had come to this church as I had, without any previous connection to it, she quickly became a beloved member of the congregation. She was active in the congregation. She also had a knack for listening to people. As a result, she also developed a talent for telling people what they wanted to hear.

That did not always carry over into our home life, however. I'm not saying that it should have. But what became shocking to me was that every once in a great while she seemed to go nuclear on me.

I must explain. In my particular denomination, it was understood that the pastor was to live an exemplary life. If a pastor got a divorce for any reason, he was no longer eligible to be a pastor for at least five years. At the end of five years, if a pastor wanted to be reinstated, denominational executives would then look into the circumstances of the divorce. If the investigation revealed that the pastor had not acted in an immoral way leading to a divorce, the committee of executives could choose to reinstate him.

But at the time when the divorce was initiated, it did not matter who was at fault -- if that could even be determined. The pastor could no longer be a pastor for at least five years. So maybe you can understand my shock when one night I came home late at night after a series of late night meetings that were going on at the church due to a special project we were working on, and Babs hit me with: "If you stay out late one more night, I'm filing for divorce."

No, "Honey, we have to talk." Just the ultimatum, "or I'm filing for divorce."

I thought about it. She had my back to the wall. If she got a divorce, I would be, at best, an every other weekend dad and I'd be out of a job. Furthermore, because we lived in a parsonage, we would quickly become homeless. I caved in. I stayed home the following night.

Fortunately for me, she got a number of sympathetic calls the next day asking about me and whether I was sick and could they help and one woman even wanted to bring over a casserole to feed our family because I must be pretty sick to stay away from the previous night's important meeting.

Babs let me go to the next night's meeting. The church was right across the parking lot from the parsonage so I took opportunities to slip away from church to stop in at home for a few minutes. These meetings would only take another ten days and I walked a tight rope trying to fulfill my responsibilities to the church and be home enough to keep my wife from filing. I succeeded. It wasn't fun.

The next time she hit me with an ultimatum like that the children had all been born and the last one was ready to enter kindergarten. Babs got the idea that we should go as a family to Disney World for a week. She had not been working for about ten years and we were pinching pennies. We could not afford that vacation. On the other hand, in two year's time she would be back to teaching and then we have more funds to work with. I suggested we wait for two years. She insisted we go now and put it all on credit cards.

It was Disney or divorce (thanks to no-fault laws). So I wound up borrowing from my life insurance to pay for the vacation. I knew it was stupid -- the sole breadwinner for himself and wife and three children borrowing against his life insurance -- but it was the only way I could see that we could swing it financially.

Then it was about five years later. I had come home and really needed to have sex with my wife. Laws of confidentiality and just good pastoral practice dictate that even if Brenda Big Boobs has been after you all day because it would be a big notch on her bedpost if she could bed the pastor, you don't tell that to your wife. But you do hope that if you explain to your wife that you've had a really, really tense day and a good romp in the hay would be a big help in making it all better, the good wife will cooperate.

While Babs complied with my request, she was lifeless in bed. I did ejaculate in her but it was far from being good sex. The next day I could tell that she was angry about it. She must have stewed about it during the entire day because once the children were all in bed she informed me that because I pressed her to have sex even though she was not eager to do so, I was guilty of marital rape. She told me that we were going to a marriage counselor or else -- you guessed it -- divorce.

The counselor was one of her choosing. By the time we finished six weeks of counseling Babs was convinced that her days of enjoying sex were behind her and I should not plan on having sex with her again. My needs or desires were totally irrelevant. She assured me that for the last several years she had never enjoyed our lovemaking and that she had faked her orgasms. I wasn't so sure of that (do women fake squirting?) but I, on the other hand, had no desire to have sex with a woman who did not want me. I still stayed in the marriage (if you can call it that). I still loved the ministry. I wanted to be a full-time dad. It was the only way I could support my family. There just aren't many jobs out there in the world of work that will hire you because you can read German, Latin, Biblical Hebrew and Koine Greek.

The next time she went for the nuclear option things were slightly different. We were now empty-nesters. Babs got it in her mind that she needed a dog. I had been allergic to furry animals all my life. Something about them triggered my asthma. This was confirmed by skin tests at an allergy clinic. t told her, "No dog." She knew the reason.

She brought one home anyway. I moved toward the dog, saying that I was going to take it to the pound. She pulled it by its leash into her car and backed out of the drive. Eventually I got a phone call. She told me that she was at a daughter's house with the dog and that if she could not bring the dog home with her she would file for divorce.

I had been in the ministry long enough now that I had seen most of what I would see in a career of ministry. I still enjoyed it, but I could live without it. I no longer had any reason to stay married in order to be a full-time dad. The children were all on their own. She, as a teacher, was earning about the same as I was as a pastor. I said, "Go for it," and hung up. I hadn't felt this good since the first year of my marriage. To use a common phrase, I felt for the first time in our marriage that I had grown a pair.

I got the phone call a half hour later. "Maybe you're being a little too hasty," she said.

"Maybe you're being a little too self-centered," I countered. She hung up.

About a half hour later I got another phone call. "Maybe we should try counseling," she said.

"With whom?" I replied. She knew that the counselor to whom we had gone concerning marital rape I considered to be a quack.

"You pick," she said.

I could see that one coming. If I were to pick and the counselor would seem to be on my side she would blame me for picking someone who I knew would be on my side. I countered, "This is your show: your dog or you will divorce me. Therefore it has got to be your counselor or therapist or whatever you want to call him or her. Just let me know when and where."

This was a Wednesday night. On Thursday around supper time she called me to let me know the name and the location of the therapist and the time of our appointment -- next week Tuesday at 4 PM. She and the dog would continue to stay at the daughter's until after the therapy session -- at least.

I called up my congregation president. In our denomination, the business affairs of the congregation are handled by elected members of the congregation. The congregation president was a guy by the name of Harold (Hal). We had become friends over the years. Unfortunately, during that time, his marriage had also gone through a rocky period. His wife came home late at night one night and immediately had to take a shower. Their clothes hamper was kept in the bedroom. So when his wife went in to take a shower, Hal went to the hamper to look at her panties. They were obviously soiled with another man's cum.

He confronted her. She confessed and asked for forgiveness. Hal came to me the next day to talk over what he should do. We looked in the Bible and concluded that if he wanted to divorce his wife, that the Bible would allow him to do so based on her adultery. On the other hand, he did not have to divorce her. If he felt it would be better to forgive her and continue to live with her, he had that option. He chose to forgive her. A couple of years later, he had confided in me that he had probably made the wrong choice, but by that time it was too late to go back and choose his other option.

So I invited Hal over to the parsonage. I felt I would get a fair hearing from him. I handed him a beer and we sat at the kitchen table as I recounted my tale of woe. By the end of the evening Hal understood that I would resign from the ministry at that church at the conclusion of Sunday morning's service. It would be stated simply that the reason was because my wife was going to divorce me and our denomination did not allow a divorced man to be a pastor.

I also worked out a couple of other details with Hal. I had a pickup truck with a camper. I would put everything in that camper that I wanted to take with me. My wife would probably return to the parsonage on Tuesday after visiting with the counselor. I will have explained in a letter that I dropped off to the counselor's office that I was out of there. Babs was encouraged to take whatever she wanted that I left behind. My children would be encouraged to take whatever they wanted. If there was stuff left, the doors to the parsonage would be left open for any and all members of the congregation to come and take what they wanted, and the rest could be taken to the dump.

I would write a letter to denominational authorities informing them of my resignation so that they could set in motion what was necessary to fill my pulpit by the following Sunday. I made sure that all church records were in order and left necessary information for the man who would succeed me.

I hand delivered two copies of my resignation letter to the counselor's office on Friday together with the fee for one session -- the session he would have with my wife when they both opened the letters. I also included a short letter telling her about the arrangements I had made for her closing out the house.

On Sunday I preached a sermon the same as usual and did not announce my departure until after the last hymn. I told the congregation it was because my wife was divorcing me and if they wanted to know why, they would have to ask her.

I left my cell phone with Hal (the church paid for my phone) and bought a burner phone. Only Hal knew the number so that he could get in touch with me in case I had forgotten something that was really important. I left my vestments at the church and got into my truck and was on the road even while a few members of the congregation were still standing in the parking lot asking, "What just happened?"

I had spent some time on Friday and Saturday doing my homework on the internet. Sunday evening I was checking into a room at a YMCA. Monday morning I was at the headquarters of a nationwide trucking company that offered Commercial Drivers License (CDL) classes. The next class would begin in a week. I signed up. I then scooted over to an employment agency that specialized in hiring short-term workers for companies that needed help for just a few days or weeks. I was working by Monday afternoon. I told the agency about my upcoming CDL classes and the agency rep told me that she would find night work for me to do during those three weeks. I wasn't earning top dollar, but I was earning enough to pay for my room, for food, and for gas for my truck.

To make a long story short, after a satisfactory probation time, I began my second career as a long haul truck driver. I eventually got a new cell phone and I also got satellite access to the world wide web and a laptop.

It did not take my wife long to figure out that I had taken her seriously and had left. She couldn't get alimony from me because she was earning more than I was. She was angry with me because she was looking forward to retiring on the earnings we both brought in. She filed for divorce, but could never find me to have me served. I did not want to sign the papers. I didn't want the divorce. The divorce was totally her idea and her way of exercising power over me. We were divorced in a little over a year on the grounds of abandonment -- that I had abandoned her. So be it.

I found this out from my rather infrequent communications with my children. My one daughter was still angry with me. She had taken her mother's side form the start. I sent her a birthday card on her birthday but otherwise steered clear of her. My other two children would email me from time to time. If I was in the area where either one of them lived I would call them up to see if I might be able to pay them a visit for a few hours. Sometimes it worked, sometimes it didn't. I'm pretty sure their mother depicted me to them as being the bad guy. I think they each worked very hard at trying to remain neutral.

I did hear that once the divorce was granted that Babs started to date. She was still a 7, but a 7 in a field of mid-forty year old women. After our third child, I had gotten a vasectomy. After that Babs never had to worry about birth control. Then she shut our sexual activity down, so there was no worry about birth control there, either. Whether she had just grown out of the habit of even thinking about birth control or thought she was beyond child-bearing age, I'll never know. What I do know is that within a year of dating she became pregnant.

I heard about this from our son, and he told me that he received a bare minimum of information. All he knew was that the father was not living with Babs. He did not know whether they got married at any point or not. He did not know whether she was getting any child support. He had heard that the child was healthy and that Babs had moved in with our younger daughter and they were raising their children together. I did not hear how the daughter's husband took to all this. For all I know, my daughter may have threatened to divorce her husband if he would not let his mother-in-law and child live with them. I was happy to be on the road and away from that mess.

I basically lived out of my truck. I did not have a home or an apartment. I had a Post Office Box at the post office in the city that was the headquarters of the trucking company for which I drove. During the time when I was off duty and not sleeping, I would do some sight-seeing. I went to an occasional concert. I read books. Once in a great while I would go to a night club. I liked line dancing as well as conventional dancing. Periodically I stayed in a motel rather than in my truck. A few times I was able to go to a beach. I was not hard-core about getting the absolute most miles in during eleven hours of driving. I had no dependents, so I took time to smell the roses. I was squirreling away some cash each month into a retirement fund, and felt comfortable.

And then --- I had been driving for about two years. I had pulled into a rest area on the Indiana Tollway. I parked for the night. I parked close to the far side of the parking area. When I needed to go to the restaurant to eat or to use the restrooms I would have to walk a fair distance -- or jog. I did that regularly and on purpose. I tried to jog a couple of miles a day, had a few free weights that I used for my arms and chest and some elastic bands I used for exercise as well. I tried to eat healthy and stay fit.

I shut down the truck and walked around it inspecting it. It was a habit. I inspected the truck every time I shut it down and every time I started up. Especially parking so far away from other rigs, as I walked around I would listen for possible air leaks -- either from an air line or from a possible tire puncture.

I was walking on the passenger side of the truck when I first heard a rustling in the bushes, and then saw a woman who appeared to be scared, in pain, and trying to remain hidden as much as possible. She called softly to me, "Sir, sir."

When I acknowledged her she asked, "Can you help me, sir, please?"

At first I thought she was just looking for money. As a clergy person I would sometimes wear my collar when making hospital calls or shut-in calls, and when I stopped at a gas station, it seemed as though that collar became a magnet for people who needed money -- to buy gas -- so that they could go to the next big city -- where their mother was dying and they needed to get to her before she passed away. There was almost always a sob story and it usually involved a dying mother. I knew most of the stories were bogus, but I would give them something anyway because probably, once in a while, the request would be legit. And I would hate to have refuse aid to someone who was truly in need.