According to my divorce attorney, I am her record for fastest divorce. We originally filed 3 months ago, Little Nabi and I were forced to relocate so filed again 2 months ago, and I should be officially divorced in 12 days. Considering the contention and custody issues, this is quite a feat.
Not that divorce is something to be proud of - ask my mother, she sure ain't proud of her divorce-happy daughters - but I couldn't help doing a mental shrug and think, "Hey, what do you expect? I'm Korean; I like to rush things." You can almost hear me yelling, while hovering over my attorney as she drafted my divorce papers, "Ppali*, ppali!" Can't you?
Speaking of rushing...
(* Ppali = "Hurry" in Korean)
One lesson I learned is that I do not want my next relationship to be rushed. There was a commenter on a previous post who seemed concerned that I would turn out to be one of those "too invested" moms who only live vicariously through her daughter... oh, jeez, I sure hope not; there's only so much Dora, Diego, and Little Bear I can take! However, for now, I think I will stay invested in my daughter as she makes her transition from a mommy-daddy house to a mommy-house with daddy-days, at least while she's not even in kindergarten yet. If I have free time, I would rather spend some quality time with friends, especially those who came forward to show me true friendship, than going on dates... not just yet anyway.
So far, the possibility of dating has come up 3 times already.
1. Before LN and I even moved out, before I even served him with divorce papers, we were at a Korean restaurant. After I placed our order, ajumma who took the order asked me if I was teaching LN any Korean. I sighed and said that it was hard, that I had considered even moving to Korea just so that LN could learn Korean with ease. Ajumma asked if my husband would be willing to move to Korea. Again, I sighed and said, Probably not since we're getting a divorce. Initially, she asked, Why? You need to stay married for your daughter's sake. After I mentioned a couple of glaring reasons why I am getting a divorce, she tsked and nodded her head, Better to divorce someone like that, then.
LN and I sat down at a table. Ajumma yelled out to an ajussi in the back, Ajussi, how old are you? Come here for a second. Then I heard snippets, Why not? At your age... she's not bad looking... what, you think a 20 something will look your way? You could do worse than a divorced mom...
AIGO! Without my consent, she was match-making... and I was being rejected!
2. Right after the court approved our divorce decree, I hopped on a bus from downtown back to work. I saw a toddler girl about LN's age across from me and we started to point at things, pretending a conversation. The man sitting next to me asked if I was signing. I laughed and said, "No, I think I'm pretending to know what she's talking about and I'm sure she knows what I am talking about." "You seem to have a way with kids." I poo-pooed that idea with a wave, "No, I also have a little girl about her age - I think kids can sniff out another mommy."
It turned out the man was going to my work place but didn't quite know where the building is. I walked with him to where he needed to go while chatting about his little girl who lives with her mom in North Carolina. I didn't pry about his marital status and didn't share any details about mine.
As I dropped him off, he turned and asked, tentatively, for my phone number.
D'oh! The judge's signature on my divorce papers is barely dry... um, thank you but... no thank you. Granted, I wasn't wearing a wedding ring but... I am wondering if my newly acquired single-hood was radiating. I was pretty happy... did it show?
3. Lastly... and this is funny since some other ladies were talking about dreams and such... my mom apparently called my sister last night. She was curious - she had a dream that I had started dating a Korean-American man, 10 years younger than I. Since her dreams are *always* accurate, she wanted to ask my sister first before she called me to extract the truth.
Moi? Date a younger man? 10 years younger...? And a Korean-American man in this Scandinavia-land? Talk about a wishful thinking... wait, is it MY wishful thinking or is it hers?
Although it wasn't so long ago that I was dating, about 6 years ago, I have never dated as a divorced mom. I suspect that the rules are different. Expectations are different. All I know is that I now know that anyone who has to reconsider me as an option because I have a daughter will not be receiving any consideration from my part.
I guess, that narrows the playing field, right?
In the past I have dated men (white) who later confessed they never had any intentions to take the relationship further; it was a novel experience to date "an Asian chick" but to marry one?
Now that I am a mom, I have a feeling only those who are open to future possibilities will be applying this time.
Not that I've given it more thought than I just did for this post... I do think dating will be nice, especially since I have raised my expectations. Funny that I had lower expectations when I wasn't a divorced mom.
-Mama Nabi