Years Had Passed

As time went by, I got stronger, my kids got a little older. Still no word from the deadbeat. NY State child supports view was that if I found him, they could process serve him again but they didn't have the manpower to find him. They told me rest assured that if he won the lotto his winnings would be garnished. Are they kidding? They did say that his license would be suspended in the meantime. Oh, great- this is a guy who doesn't even need keys to start a car, even less drive with a license. Needless to say I was not impressed with child support. In the meantime, life went on. I lost my residence to bankruptcy and had to move. My Dad bought a handyman special that in all practicality should have been condemned. Nevertheless, it was our new home. I worked overnight shifts as a waitress commuting about an hour each way to keep my old job. Rockland County was where the money was. Putnam County was more like a dollar or two on the table if they liked you. In Rockland, I had a following at night- bouncers, bartenders, and barbacks getting out of their jobs at about 4 am. I was guaranteed at least 25 dollars at that table alone. Teenagers that came in at night just to have a place to hang out and have a shake and fries would leave me nice 5 dollar tips and even clean the table up for me. I guess they sympathised with me for not having a busboy at night. It was actually a benefit to me. I'd have to clean the tables but I didn't have to give out 15 percent of my earnings to them either.

The commute, taking care of the kids, and reconstructing the house at the same time did take its toll on both me and the kids. Life was hectic, stressful and was aging me fast. I finally retained a lawyer pro bono- even with some income, when you have five children it still deems you below poverty level. The lawyer was on the last stage of the divorce. Publication was the only way to get my divorce since he could not be located. It had to be published in all the local newspapers for a while and then I would have my divorce because of default. To my surprise, the doorbell rang one day. It was a small geeky man with a beard with papers in hand. He was nervous as this process server handed over the papers. I laughed histerically! He was process serving ME for a divorce! How hilarious! I dismissed the nervous little process server that looked like he was best giving a sermon at a temple. I sensed his nervousness went away when I laughed about being served.

I called my lawyer the following day to let him know what was going on. It seems you cannot file for a divorce in Orange County (where he was living) if you have an open case inRockland County already. But surely this meant that we could get this divorce over with either way. I didn't realize it would still be a long, drawn out process just like starting all over again! There was the fact that he was in arrears in child support, there was money from the restaurant that my father and I invested in that we never saw, visitation he insisted on, and more miscelleneous crap that so was so trivial it should have been left out. The next day, Dingbat actually called me. His voice on the line made me feel neausous all over again. He explained how he had 'grown up' as he put it and would like to speak on civil terms. He said his life (as he called it) was made up of lonely nights patying, drinking and waking up in strange places. And now, he had truly found the love of his life- we will call her 'Mary' since he sworeshe had 'saved' him from his life of destruction. He said he needed the divorce as fast as possible because he had already gotten Mary pregnant. Trish had been long gone- I found out that when the new Pathfinder was gone, the money and restaurant was gone, so was the gold digging girlfriend. I guess it must have been true love. I couldn't help but feel some kind of satisfaction in the end result. Hearing about a new baby on the way was like a kick in the teeth. It was his way on cleaning the slate clean with us and starting over fresh and clean. We were just in the way. I didn't hold the torch for him long. I was a woman with emotional, physical and financial needs. There were a couple relationships after he left. Most of them were on the serious side, but none of them ready to take on the responsability of a new house that needed more than TLC and five children who needed a father to look up to. The guy that I was with now was divorced with two children of his own in Mexico that he hadn't seen in years. The story he gave me was that his wife took of with the kids and just up all left him. I must have been a slow learner because I believed him. He was living with us for the most part, but when times got tough, he would haul ass and go back to living with his brothers for a few days. He would ususally come back crying days later, would apologize to me and the kids and would be as good as pie til the next tantrum. He said his self worth was being compromised because although he was helping me with the kids and the bills, he had nothing to show for it. He wanted to get married and be an official part of the family. ( This is where another red flag should have gone up)

When the divorce was finalized, I got a check for four thousand dollars for the buyout of his shares in the restaurant, a far cry from what was put into the restaurant. The other partners didn't want anything to do with him after I got the lawyer to open the books on the restaurant to show inconsistencies in what they were recording as income. My father even tried to get his money back in court. Although he had an IOU for 15,000 dollars from Dingbat, it was faxed down to Florida and the original had stayed in his possesion. The fax was deemed inadmissable and either way he claimed that the money was a gift and that the fax was forged somehow. He was awarded visitation a couple days a week with some time during the summer school vacations and holidays. I guess his motives were to show his soon to be wife how good he was as a father. The first visit after a couple years was stressful for both me and the kids. They didn't remember him much and didn't reallt want to go. David, the oldest of the three seemed to want to go but was nervous about it. I assured him that he would be back in a little while as I kissed them all goodbye. My oldest daughter, Gail (from a previous marriage) brought them out to the car since I was not ready to mentally deal with the whole situation. I did not feel like meeting the next Mrs. K. The only contact we had ever had was a note I sent to her with my friend Sandy that I met in singles support group a couple years before. It was a note that I had sent to her, not in animosity, but as a warning about his ways and the fact that I had no intention of letting the child support arrears go. Despite my warnings, they were married. Supposedly it was a lovely honeymoon because my kids missed out on their second day of visitation with their Daddy. It didn't seem to phase the twins much since they really never had a chance to develop any type of attachment with him but David sobbed for hours, waiting by the window with his bookbag of toys on. What a piece of shit! How dare he hurt my children! I was livid! He actually had the audacity to call a day later to say hi to the kids. He wanted to tell them that he couldn't make it because he was on his honeymoon in Disneyworld! I told him to go to hell and told him about David crying over him the day before. It didn't seem to bother him at all. After ripping into him for about fifteen minutes or so I hung up on him. I was a big girl and could take it. The kids couldn't and shouldn't have had to!