The Storm Before the Storm

Here’s a tip: if you’re going to file for divorce, try not to do so a few days before a hurricane makes landfall and submerges your entire city. Being confined to the house with the weight of that announcement swirling around in the floodwaters can be awkward. More than awkward, really.

The silver lining of that singularly dark storm cloud, however, was that friends from around the country began checking in to make sure I was on high ground. Little did they know.

My favorite call, on Friday night just as the storm came ashore, went like this:

Friend: Hey, figured we hadn’t talked since May, so I’d reach out. What’s up?

Me: I’m just sitting here, listening to the wind, waiting for the hurricane to make landfall. And I filed for divorce Tuesday.

Friend, incredulous: There’s a hurricane?

Me: Dude, that’s really not the story here.

I have a few friends who are more oblivious than I am, it turns out.

It’s weird to navigate living together after revealing you don’t want to live together. On the other hand, having everyone else thrown into actual life-and-limb-threatening chaos gives you the opportunity to set your own aside and focus on other people’s more immediate needs.

While filing for divorce right before a natural disaster isn’t a best practice, having the chance to help out in the aftermath of one, when you are already feeling like you would like to slam a bunch of things with a sledgehammer, works out pretty well. You can take out your anger, sadness, hostility, and frustration on soggy sheetrock instead of each other. It’s a win-win. In a way.