Belabor Day 2010

I made it through another Labor Day weekend this year . . . barely.

Labor Day is my least favorite holiday of the year. It has nothing to do with my confusion over whether it’s permissible to wear white tennis shoes (my usual mode of transport) after Labor Day. You see, I’ve been married four times. I’ve always said that I made excellent choices in my four very different wives; although I’m sure none of my four wives would give me nearly as high a rating as I’ve given them in that regard. 

You’re probably wondering what any of this has to do with Labor Day. It all started thirty years ago, when my second wife left me – twice – on Labor Day weekend in 1980. It had been one of the hottest summers in Dallas history and I’ve always wondered if that had anything to do with her leaving. I’ll never know because she never explained her reasons. Looking back, I don’t think she really wanted to go because she packed her suitcase in the living room while I watched television. I think I watched television because I was hurt and didn’t know what else to do.

After all, my first wife had already left me, and the thought of my second wife leaving may have overloaded my fragile macho circuits. I thought I was doing the right thing by giving her some space. The biggest space that weekend was probably between my ears. Looking back, I can only imagine what must have been going through her mind as she brought armfuls of clothes from the bedroom to the living room to pack in front of me, silently imploring me to say something, anything, to encourage her to stay.

So she left me, but she came back later that night. Naturally, I was glad she came home, but being a knucklehead, I don’t think I told her so. I probably didn’t show her either. Looking back, as I tend to do, I think I was trying to act as if nothing had happened – as if my not saying anything would somehow make whatever reasons she had for leaving me simply go away, never to be spoken of again.

The only thing that went away was her. She left again the next day, this time forever.

I desperately prayed for another chance that never came. The only thing she had left to give me was silence.

After five years of silence, I married my third wife in 1985, but the marriage didn’t survive an unexpected phone call from my second ex-wife on my daughter’s fourth birthday. The phone call offered no additional information as to why wife number two left me; she only wanted me to know that I’d completely ruined her life ten years earlier. I guess I have that effect on women.

My third wife moved out over Labor Day weekend in 1991. One of the most heartbreaking moments of my life was clinging to my small daughter on the back patio while her mother’s family helped move their belongings out of our house. My daughter tearfully told me how she wished things could go back to the way they used to be. Of course, that wasn’t possible in 1991 or the years before then when I had been wishing the same thing about the wife who left without saying why.

So here I am in 2010, still anxious about Labor Days but gradually getting better. Wife number four reminds me that she hasn’t gone anywhere in our fifteen years together. I suppose it’s fair to say that’s much more to her credit than to mine. She probably figures I’m going to grow up one of these days so I hope I don’t disappoint her. Until then, she allows me to take an occasional trip down Memory Lane while she maintains a separate residence in Reality.

You probably gather that since Labor Day was almost a month ago, that this was a very difficult thing for me to write. The truth is it’s taken much more than a month to put these words together. I’ve been working on this for thirty years.