email to Jem

Hi Jem,

it is kind of prescient that you should express your hope that my trip in July comes off. There was last week no particular reason it shouldn’t but on Tuesday my wife emailed me to say she wanted to split up. The next day I was retrenched. The trip has severe doubts now!

The combination of the job and relationship ending at the same time is confusing and annoying. It is hard to focus on one without thinking about the other. The clear path forward is that I need a new job in any event. I was working as a Flash programmer but Flash is on the decline. I guess my other skills are in website creation but those skills are not nearly so high as the redundant Flash skills. We shall have to see what happens.

As far as the future of the relationship goes, I suggested that we go to marriage counselling but I don’t hold out great hopes of turning my wife’s ambitions around as her stated position is that once our relationship changed it is impossible to change it back. I think with that attitude the counselling will be a waste of breath. I think you have to go into counselling with more willingness to put work into the relationship and desiring a positive outcome.

If I had to predict what will happen, I would say we will split and then sell the house and share the proceeds and go our separate ways. My wife talks about remaining friends and perhaps one possibility is to rent together and live our separate lives under one roof, kind of just for convenience. I think that is madness. I would be spending my time wondering what went wrong instead of moving on.

Any way wish me luck with the job hunt!

peace,