While you are warming your feet in front of a fire somewhere tonight, listening to the crackle of the wood, have a laugh on this. I have told you how I have an irrepressible humor about all things sacred. Here is proof of the lengths I will go to bring a smile. Of course in 1981, I would party at a drop of the hat. After all,  it was only eight years and eight months since I’d arrived home from sunny Southeast Asia. It was five years and eight months ’til death of marriage did us part. Apparently it had something to do with my PTSD and it rained too much in Washington.

This little catered black tie get together for 100 with the champagne fountain, Swedish meatballs in cognac,  Dungeness oysters on the half shell and three-tiered Divorce cake was quite the event of the season. It (the divorce cake) made the local papers. A photographer from the Seattle Times happened into the bakery at the wrong time and spotted the bridegroom standing alone with the crudely hacksawed remains of the bride’s arm still visible. I forbid pictures at the reception so as to avoid their getting back to Constance Louise. No need to drive up the animosity factor or increase the support payments, n’est pas?

In my defense, I would point out that I was taught to be excruciatingly correct in my dress and deportment. To divorce without a suitable announcement would have been socially awkward. How else could I announce my new marital status to all those women waiting in the wings?  Relax. I ran it by Miss Manners first.