Leaving On A Jet Plane

XBrood Live: Leaving On A Jet Plane

Thursday, June 29, 2006

This is going to be very difficult for me to write about, but it’s weighing so heavily on me that I can’t seem to function normally. Depression has a very heavy streak in my family and I’m not immune so when it hits me I get it pretty hard. I can’t think straight, I don’t clean my house because I’m too busy sleeping, I don’t write and I don’t even want to play video games. I try to, but I just don’t enjoy it. If I play it’s usually to satisfy someone else and well, I prefer to satisfy myself thank you. I feel weighed down and stomped on. My entire back is aching and my shoulders are hurting really badly…as though something is sitting on them. My stomach is churning and turning as though I’m expecting something horrible to happen, but I don’t know what it is. Let me tell you, we’re either going to have a really big earthquake or I’m just freakin’ nuts and I need to relax. Could be cigarette withdrawals, but all that really does is exacerbate current conditions of anxiety and depression which basically still means I’m nuts only all on my own.

So, pretty boring I know, but there’s a method to my madness. My life revolves around my husband. My love for him is so fierce and if you’ve ever felt anything like this you’ll know exactly how I feel. I could stand in front of a bus for him. I’d stick my head in a Tigers mouth if it meant it would save his life. Yet I feel that I’ve done nothing but put him in danger and I don’t seem to be coping well with that. When we fell in love it sort of hit us like a truck. I had been separated from my husband (yes, he still lived with me) and was well on my way to divorce by the time Rigid and I met. The rest of that first year was spent traveling back and forth between England and the US. We visited family in Mexico several times as well, which made the transition between my ex-husband and my husband-to-be very easy. My family readily accepted him into my life. Lucky for me he wasn’t the first white man to marry into the family though he was the first Englishman. Rigid’s quirky sense of humor and charismatic attitude really helped him integrate easily with my family so when it came time to let everyone know that I had another wedding in the works it came as no surprise and he was met with open arms and huge smiles.

Of course, everyone asked the dreaded question, “So are you moving over there or is he moving over here?” It was so early in the relationship though that we weren’t quite ready to make that decision so those inquiries were usually met with a cool, “Oh, he’s probably moving here, but it’s still early.” My family understood if I decided to move to England. There’s a bit of an adventurer in all of us, but Rigid didn’t want me to relocate and leave my family. His family consists of himself, his mother and her dog. He’s got family, but they became estranged after his Grandfathers death. His Grandmothers death a few years back sealed the coffin on the estrangement between his mother and the rest of the family. Rigid likes my family, he loves my family and couldn’t bear the though of taking me away from them. He simply figured it would be easier for him to stay here. His mother was against it from the start though she knew there really wasn’t anything she could do about it. He’s a grown man after all and the authorities at the airport wouldn’t be able to hold him. She threatened him on several of his trips to stop him from flying to the States. Said she would make up a story that he beat her and they would take him to jail. Said she could have her friends (of questionable background) break his legs in two. On one occasion she even went as far as hiding his passport just before his flight here.

She put us through the ringer, but I think that just reinforced his adamant desire to flee the country and find a new life with me. Okay, so he didn’t flee... It just sounded more dramatic. Well, I being the constant voice of reason (if you can believe that) told him that obviously his mother would be devastated if he left her. After all she’s all he’s got and we should be understanding about it. My family will understand and they’ll always be here for me. If I have to move to England then that’s what we’ll do. So the most important thing will be to figure out where we’ll be staying. That’s when she went slightly bonkers. She didn’t want me in the country at all. See, some days she’d pretend that she liked me and that she understood what we wanted and other days she was just evil incarnate. Sound Bi-polar? Yeah, so that said after his 2nd to last trip back to the US he was back in England and working. He gave her every penny he made and wasn’t able to save any money for his next trip thus far. Each time he flew it cost around $400-$600 US Dlls and it was killing us. Not to mention the fact that he was still owed money by his mother because she made him miss a flight. She was not nice…not nice at all.

Because of her we spent our first Christmas as a couple desperately apart. Not only was he in another country far far away from me, she also decided that we shouldn’t have any communications with each other in at all. She took all the Internet connections in the house and hid them like the rat that she is. He wasn’t able to use his Xbox or his PC to communicate with me. There was absolutely nothing she could do about our phones though, but this cost us dearly in phone bills. This behavior continued for weeks. He tried to tell her I’d move there, but she wouldn’t hear it. He tried to tell her that he’d pay extra money monthly if that was her concern (keep in mind he was already giving her all his money and she actually owed him $600 for a plane ticket), but she didn’t care. I’m sure she was trying to teach him a lesson… The only problem was that he wasn’t 12 and I wasn’t either.

Just after New Years Eve she let up and re-connected everything. He told her again that he’d pay her extra for the DSL, but she wouldn’t hear it. I know it was about control. She’d get exactly what she wanted out of him each and every time if she controlled our communication. And she did, that one time. The next time she did it again just two weeks later so we gave her an ultimatum. Either give him the connections or a plane ticket is being purchased the following day. I know what you’re thinking, “Phff. It’s her house. She can do what she wants!” Yeah, she can but the only reason Rigid was there was to help her pay her mortgage, bills and help “fix up” the house that was left to them when his Grandmother passed away. It’s pretty much all they have left of her and he was supposed to help his mom with her mortgage and HER mounting bills. Either that or she’d lose the house and become a destitute homeless wench. Mind you, she wasn’t working half the time!!! THAT’S why we had decided that he stay and I would eventually move once the divorce was through, but she fucked up royally. She threatened to throw me out into the street if I ever went there, threatened to have people do away with me, said that if we ever had children together that he’d better not take them to see her because she’d kill them all…just idiotic things like that so when she took the Internet connections away I had just about had enough of her nonsense. Did I mention she threw him out on his last trip?

I sat here on my desk at work and had to find him a place to stay while he wandered around in the streets at night just 2 days before his trip. So to say I’m bitter towards her is a HUGE understatement. In fact it’s such an understatement I can’t even think of a good enough statement that would allow you to encompass how truly bitter I am towards her. Removing our only form of communication once again was the last straw! With this sort of behavior I knew our relationship didn’t stand a chance. She backed us into a wall and I did the only thing I could do at the time. I got him out of that house. She was absolutely insane and she was hurting him. Maybe not physically, but definitely emotionally and there was no way I could stand for it. Obviously when given the ultimatum she didn’t plan on giving in so the ticket was purchased and plans were made. I hoped that one-week would be enough for him to gather his things. We then prepared for the emotional explosion that was to come. Just as we expected she threw him out into the street again along with what little belongings he had. It was January and bitter cold in Black Pool. We also didn’t have much money, but we had to figure something out. What we did at this point is a little foggy, but she spent his last day in England telling him that he’d better not ever come back home. That he’ll never have a place to stay with her and that she’ll kill me if she ever sees me.

She called me over and over again just to tell me what a whore I was and what was I thinking. That I was ruining his life and any chance he had at a military career just for a fuck. On one occasion she called just to tell me that she was going to save money to buy a plane ticket so she could come knock on my door and kill me where I stood. I told her I’d buy her the ticket whenever she was ready. She hung up on me. I was being nice. I believe he spoke to her once more before he left. He let her know that she wouldn’t have to worry, that she’d never see him again. She tried to be nice to him, but he let her know that the threats she made to me simply crossed the line and she’ll never earn his respect again. She tried to make him understand why she was so upset, but he wouldn’t hear it either. They shut each other out like that all the time. He gets it from her. What a surprise.

We felt such a relief when he was back home. We’d been apart for over 4 months then and we couldn’t have been happier. This was the plan: My divorce paperwork should get there before the end of the end of the month (Jan.). This would leave us free to get married before his 3-month visa expired. We could do a quickie wedding and get all the paperwork together to submit to the INS and then all we’ll have to do is wait for his work permit, travel permit and voile semi-legal status here we come! Can you imagine our horror when what we got in the mail wasn’t my divorce paperwork, but a document that said we had to RESUBMIT our paperwork because my ex-husband wrote the dates down wrong??? Can you imagine our HORROR??? What the fuck were we going to do now? There was no way those documents were going to be ready in time. It could take MONTHS. To say we were shitting our pants is a bit of an exaggeration…no wait it wasn’t an exaggeration at all because there’s still a huge log in my pants about that. I went on a silent rampage and I have no idea what I told my ex-husband. I was so beside myself I couldn’t even deal with it. I couldn’t even talk about it! Rigid and Pumpo had to go and fix the mistakes on their own and all I could do was stew in my own juices. What the hell were we going to do now?

I started to look up anything and everything immigration. I prepared myself with all the documents I’d have to file once we got married. I told him that there was a good chance he’d have to go back home before we got married, but he told me that he had no home to go back to remember? A friend then, but no his friends had children and would be unable to take him in. I didn’t quite understand that, but I wasn’t going to argue either. So we counted down the days and he tried to prepare to face the world as an Illegal Alien. Okay, so that’s dramatic he’s not actually illegal he’s only just “overstayed” his visit, but there is a big fat fine associated with that and if he leaves the country he’ll be banned for 10 yrs. That’s all, but still…we felt awfully illegal. Mostly we felt terribly ashamed that things just didn’t work out the way we planned. Still we struggled on and counted down the days until my eventual divorce and dealt with the fact that he wasn’t going to be able to work for a while. Don’t misunderstand me, we knew he HAD to work and from the beginning I’ve seen a world that my culture has very close ties to, but one which I’ve never quite understood. My family is from Mexico, but my grandmother was born in American waters on a boat and my grandfather worked hard to get his sons and daughters into the country legally. Either that or he let them fend for themselves and they worked it out…legally.

Until Rigid came along I didn’t really know how truly easy it was so get a Social Security card and Fake ID. My younger sister is savvier in the ways of the underground and she took us to one of the seediest parts of Los Angeles: the Alameda Swamp Meet. By the end of the day I knew exactly what type of individual to look for if I ever needed a Social Security Card, ID or any other form of documentation. This is what you do. It’s a very complicated and dangerous procedure so please don’t try this at home or at your local swap meet. You just walk out of the parking lot with your entire family in tow, kids and all, stand on the curb whispering to one another, maybe buy a giant mayo/parmesan cheese covered corn on the cob (What I was hungry!), push your little sister out in front of you and wait until some really brown dude walks by and whispers, “Seguros.” Then let your little sister do all the talking. Okay so that was MUY ILLEGAL, but we didn’t think we’d be able to survive the next few months any other way. It didn’t do us any good anyhow because he never used the damn things…OKAY so he used them a couple of times but we were too freaked out to follow through!!! I told him he should at least save them as a souvenir, but he didn’t think it was funny and burned the evidence. Eventually we just tightened our belts and made do with my earnings.

The next few months were torture as we waited for the divorce to come through. Before you knew it he “overstayed” his visit and we knew we were screwed.
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Posted by Maharet at 2:26 PM