Living Happily Ever After
test123

Blog Articles

“Yours Mine And Ours”

Date: March 17, 2011  Author: Andrea Merriman

“I don’t answer the phone.  I get the feeling whenever I do that there will be someone on the other end.” (Fred Couples)

The phone call came at the end of the work day Monday afternoon. It was from the ice arena. Our sons, the boys we’d disagreed about and had broken our engagement off over just the night before, had gotten into a public brawl on the ice. Supposedly, his son bumped my son while they were skating and hitting pucks (that’s hockey.) But my son didn’t like that and hit his son. His son hit mine back for hitting him. And then my son took his hockey stick to his son, swung it like a baseball bat and hit his son across the back!

My oldest son witnessed it, ejected my middle son from the ice, and the offender was MAD. He called me, wanted me to pick him up from the ice rink so he wouldn’t have to wait there and watch the other boys having fun. Unfortunately, I work in another city so that wasn’t possible. (I also thought it wouldn’t hurt him to cool off, to sit and watch the other boys having fun on the ice, so I told him we’d talk about it when we got home.)

I hung up the phone and shook my head. WhoEVER would have thought I’d be the mother of a son who got in a brawl, in public? Certainly not me! (Yet here I am, delighting in all kinds of unexpected experiences I’m continually blessed with.)

Then I called #5 and left him a message. ”I don’t know if you’ve heard yet, but there was a physical altercation on the ice today. I’m calm, I’m not upset; I hope you are too. While I don’t know if you have other plans for this evening, I don’t think we can let this go any longer. We need to sit down and talk to the boys, together, tonight.”

It’s funny how life prepares you for…life. How certain things (people, places, events, experiences) can prepare you for other things–even when you don’t realize you’re going to need them. Like how we’d had our disagreement about our boys just the night before. At the time, I’d thought it was a terrible thing–to fight and then break up–yet in reality, it allowed us to work through our issue, separate the issue from us, get it together and present a united front to our children.

When #5 walked into my home that night, he looked at me with a smile and joked, “What would Mike and Carol Brady do?”

There was only one answer to that. I’d learned it from my wise Colorado friend when I mistakenly expected to make my remarriage/blended family situation like The Brady Bunch and it wasn’t working, and I’d thought I was disappointed–until she straightened me out. I shared it with #5.  I said, “PLEASE! It doesn’t matter what Mike and Carol would do. We aren’t the Brady Bunch, never will be, and I’m ok with that.” I added, “Mike was gay; Carol was depressed; Greg kissed his step-sister Marcia; Alice couldn’t get her love, Sam-the-meat-man to commit…I don’t want or need to be The Brady Bunch!”

And in that moment I realized, again, I really feel that way. What #5 and I have, with our children, is right for us. It’s actually very, very good. We need to help a couple of our children learn to appreciate each other a little more–however biological siblings sometimes need to work on that, too.

But it was a good opportunity to tell #5 what I DID want: ”If we’re going to be like anyone, I want to be ‘Yours Mine & Ours!’” I exclaimed.

He looked at me strangely, couldn’t figure that one out, I guess, because he asked, “‘Yours Mine & Ours?’ Why that? They had way more kids than we do and besides, I’m not in the armed forces.”

“Yes, I know!” I explained. “But Rene Russo is WAY hotter. If I’m going to be like anyone, let alone any stepmother, let it be her!”

We laughed, went in together and had a great talk with our sons. I have to say, I think that challenge made us better; stronger than ever. The challenges of life, the unexpected life itself, have a way of doing that, you know.

“Troubles are often the tools by which God fashions us for better things.” (Henry Ward Beecher)

He Said, She Said

Date: March 16, 2011  Author: Andrea Merriman
“Bed is the poor man’s opera.” (Italian proverb)

We went to my room.

He sat on my bed.

I didn’t know what to do, so I walked to the other side of the room and sat on the far edge of the bed, well away from him and prepared myself for the worst. Unexpectedly, he scooted to the middle of the bed and reached for my hand. (I love that about him, by the way. Even though he had broken up with me, and in the middle of an intense discussion, he chose not to be cold or distant!)

“Andrea, I don’t know what to tell you. I really don’t know what to say,” he said.

I solved that for him. I said, “I do. I’ll tell you what you did and what you said: you dumped me. You dumped me before you even married me. I can’t believe it!”

He looked at me in surprise and said, “Dumped you? I did not!”

“Yes, you did, ” I replied. “You dumped me. You said you couldn’t do it anymore, that the timing was bad, you were going to leave…”

He corrected, “Yes, I said that but I was talking about THAT discussion. I meant that I couldn’t do that fight, right then, in that moment; that the timing for that discussion was bad–my family was arriving for dinner any moment.”

I stopped. Stunned. ”Wait. You didn’t dump me?” I asked.

“No, I didn’t dump you! I would never ‘dump’ you! I love you, our marriage is a very good thing, I KNOW it,” he replied.

There was only one thing to say to that.

“Then you mean to tell me I’ve been up here in my bathroom, throwing up, all night…for NOTHING?” I asked.

It was his turn to be stunned. ”Is THAT where you were and what you were doing all night?”

Long story short, we worked it out. After a minute or two of “apologizing” he stopped and said, “Wait a second. If you were throwing up all night, what am I doing making up with you?”

I assured him it was fine to continue making up with me, that I’d brushed my teeth after my reaction to our break up and that he’d never have known what I’d been up to if I hadn’t told him. He didn’t argue with me about that, only about one thing:

He says he never dumped me.

I say he did.

But thankfully, whatever the case, we got it together again–and just in time! Because the next afternoon, Monday afternoon, I got a phone call that would have ended things for sure.

“Expect a phone call before lunch from the teacher informing you that your child has been launching hot dogs by compressing them inside a small Thermos and then removing the lid quickly.” (Erma Bombeck)

Or something like that.

Our Break Up

Date: March 15, 2011  Author: Andrea Merriman

“Eyes that do not cry, do not see.” (Swedish Proverb)

I’d come to the realization of how I truly felt too late. I think maybe I’d found #5 so quickly, so “easily”, and had healed so thoroughly and completely during our engagement, that maybe a small part of me began to take the miracle of #5 a little bit for granted.

SHAME ON ME.

Could even a tiny part of me also have begun to think I might be doing him a little bit of a favor by marrying him? (Ludicrous, I know! I mean, look at me! Look at my life! WHO would want to take my unexpected life on? Probably no one BUT #5, yet when there was an issue to be resolved I seemed to ask myself, “Wait. Is this really what I want? Is this going to be good for me, for my children? Should I really do this?”)

In fact, one time I’d told #5 that’s what engagements are for–to try the relationship out, see if it works for us, see if it’s what we want, knowing we don’t have to follow through with it and can back out if it’s not right or not working for us. He, however, was appalled at that rationale. He said that is NOT what engagements are, in his eyes. That he would never have proposed to me had he not been fully committed to me and marrying me. To #5, engagements were very similar to marriage (except for the living together aspect.)

Very different philosophies. But we’d hung in there together, for a long time, until THAT night. The night he dumped me.

And then suddenly, dinner and dessert were over, everyone left, and it was just us standing alone in the kitchen again. I braced myself for his departure. I thought, “Ok, here is where he actually does leave. I guess we’ll figure the details of the break-up out later. I just don’t want to be home when he gets his stuff.”

But instead of turning and leaving, he said something very unexpected. He looked at me and asked, “Would you like to go to your room and talk?”

That’s when I REALLY knew it was over. He never set foot in the upstairs of my house, especially my bedroom (to set a good example for our kids.) But in that moment, that night, he went there willingly.  To talk about our break up.

I walked up the stairs to my room so nervous I could hardly breathe.

I dreaded the conversation.

We walked into my room, he shut and locked the door behind him, and turned around to face me.

“Next time I see you, remind me not to talk to you.” (Groucho Marx)

Too Late

Date: March 14, 2011  Author: Andrea Merriman

“At a formal dinner party, the person nearest death should always be seated closest to the bathroom.” (George Carlin)

Or the person who got dumped. Just in case she needs to throw up.

While everyone dished food onto their plates and sat down to eat dinner, I discreetly went up to my bathroom and threw up! I did not want to go down to dinner, but I also didn’t want anyone to know anything was amiss. So I returned to the table, put a small amount of food on my plate, took one bite, tried to swallow and was quickly back upstairs for a second time.

As I lay on my bathroom floor, willing myself to feel better so I could rejoin the group and pretend everything was normal, I only had one thought: How am I going to live without him?

I couldn’t remember ever thinking that about a man before.

When I got engaged for the first time (in 1989) my aunt called to congratulate me and asked, “Tell me, can you live without him?” and my arrogant, youthful pride led me to respond, “Absolutely. I survived my dad dying. I can live without anyone.” And I thought I could. I married, and was happily married, for 20 years until Shawn Merriman revealed his Ponzi scheme, crimes and other betrayals which resulted in our divorce. But honestly, looking back at the time my life was collapsing in 2009, I remember being appalled at what my former husband had done, being terrified of government agents and prison for him and wondering how my children and I would live, but I don’t remember wondering how I would live without HIM. (Maybe His misdeeds, betrayals, and the selfishness, pride and greed that led to such overwhelming destruction took care of any feelings like that? Or maybe it’s because I feel differently about #5 than any other man I’ve ever known?)

Regardless, I lay on my bathroom floor crying, wondering how I was going to live without #5, knowing I’d come to the realization of how I truly felt about him WAY TOO LATE. He had dumped me. And I couldn’t even bear to think about what it was going to do to my kids, especially my youngest, who had just lost another “daddy” before he even started kindergarten.

“In kindergarten that used to be my job, to tell them fairytales. I liked Hans Christian Andersen, and the Grimm fairy tales, all the classic fairy tales.” (Francis Ford Coppola)

No Dynamite

Date: March 11, 2011  Author: Andrea Merriman

“In the 1950s in Columbia, South Carolina, it was considered OK for kids to play with weird things. We could go to the hardware store and buy 100 feet of dynamite fuse.” (Kary Mullis)

Thank goodness it’s not the 1950s, huh? That seems like a little too much unexpected potential–even for the queen of The Unexpected Life, Andrea Merriman.

But here is something unexpectedly refreshing. I’ve learned, during November 2009-February 2011 as I’ve dated and been engaged to #5, that he is all he has professed to be. Although when we got engaged we never expected to be engaged 9 1/2 months, it has been a great opportunity to REALLY get to know one another; to resolve any issues prior to marriage and especially (for me) to see if #5 is as genuine, real and honest as he seems. (Why would that even be a concern in my world? But it was, especially in the beginning of our relationship–something about 15 years of deception, lies, betrayal and a big Ponzi scheme that can do that to a gal, I guess.)

A highlight of our engagement, for me, that really demonstrated this was a road trip #5 and I took our children on last summer–and the flat tire in the middle of the desert one of the cars got. (You see, we have so many children we don’t own a car we can all fit in (yet.) Everywhere we go, we have to drive at least two cars!) So we’re driving in the middle of nowhere last July and we get a flat tire. The cars were packed with two adults, 7 children, suitcases, sleeping bags, bikes, and all kinds of other stuff. We unloaded the trunk to get the spare tire and jack out; couldn’t get the flat tire off; unloaded the entire cargo area of the OTHER car, too, to find a jack that worked better; and after working on the tire for awhile, we still couldn’t get the flat tire off. So we had to call a tow truck for help.

While waiting for the tow truck, I apologized to #5 several times for the inconvenience. It was my car and the tire was an older one I’d planned to save money on by not replacing until the fall. But #5 just looked at me, smiled, and calmly said, “It’s ok, Andrea. These things happen. They’re minor inconveniences. This, too, shall pass.”

An hour or so later and $100 poorer, we had the old flat tire off, the spare tire on, had repacked everything back into two cars, had loaded the 7 children back in, and were driving down the road again. And #5 was still as patient and calm as he always had been–despite the fact we were trying to get back in town by a certain time because #5 had a meeting he was in charge of.

This, and many other situations and experiences the past 16 months, continued to demonstrate to me that #5 is the real deal. Honest, true, genuine, not perfect (but has never represented himself to be so)–what you see is what you get. Couple that with humility, patience, kindness, thoughtfulness, spirituality, caring and love for his fellow man, brains, talent, work ethic, a sense of humor, good looks and a host of other things (including dance moves!) and you can see why I’m with him!

WHAT a relief.

There is no unexpected dynamite or surprise revelation from the man in my life that I love that is going to gut my world anymore.

“A good way to threaten somebody is to light a stick of dynamite. Then you call the guy and hold the burning fuse up to the phone. ‘Hear that?’ you say. ‘That’s dynamite, baby.’” (Jack Handy)

Natural Born Espionage Agents

Date: February 15, 2011  Author: Andrea Merriman

“All women are natural born espionage agents.” (Eddy Cantor)

I wish that were true. If I were a natural born espionage agent, I’d like to think I might have at least seen my unexpected life coming! But I didn’t. Because I’m not.

And I also have to say I think becoming single again in my 40s, following 20 years of being happily married, might have been a little less confusing if I’d possessed a bit more cunning and stealth. I guess I’m just not shady enough, and never was very good at (or interested in) playing games.

Or, maybe it’s just me, and a deficiency I possess, because my 5th grader walked in the door last week and announced, “Mom, NEVER reveal your secrets to a woman!”

Barely 11 years old, and he’s already being schooled in the ways of spies, I mean, girls.

I knew exactly what was going on. “Uh-oh, what happened?” I asked. “Did you make the mistake of telling a girl which girls you like and now you have a…situation?”

He confirmed his dilemma. And although I didn’t want to lecture him, I let him know secrets and girls can be a problem. I told him it was wise to never reveal his crushes–especially to the competition! He said, “But Mom, she asked! She really needed to know.”

Yes, I bet she did. “Of course I can keep secrets. It’s the people I tell them to that can’t keep them.” (Anthony Haden-Guest) Especially with Valentine’s Day coming. It had an interesting result, too.

The secret that wasn’t a secret anymore resulted in my son returning home from school yesterday with several cans of a variety of soda pop–gifts from different girls for the holiday. He was absolutely smitten with each flavor of soda pop bequeathed to him by female admirers!

“I have always been an admirer. I regard the gift of admiration as indispensable if one is to amount to something; I don’t know where I would be without it.” (Francois de la Rochefoucauld)

What Women Want

Date: January 22, 2011  Author: Andrea Merriman

“Women don’t want to hear what you think. Women want to hear what THEY think, in a deeper voice.” (Bill Cosby)

I had the privilege of seeing Bill Cosby, live, years ago and I’ve appreciated his wisdom ever since. Sometimes I think he’s slightly right. But that’s not what I want most from a man.

“After about 20 years of marriage, I’m finally starting to scratch the surface of that one [what women want.] And I think the answer lies somewhere between conversation and chocolate.” (Mel Gibson)

Nope, that’s not what I want most from a man either.

I want a man who can wrestle.

“I had to weave and play around with a honey bear, you know, and I could wrestle with him a little bit, but there’s no way you can even wrestle a honey bear, let alone a grizzly bear that’s standing ten feet to eleven feet tall! Can you imagine? But it was fascinating to work that close to that kind of animal.”  (Leslie Nielsen)

Seriously.

Junk Vs. Joan

Date: January 21, 2011  Author: Andrea Merriman

“Buy, buy, says the sign in the shop window; Why, why, says the junk in the yard.” (Paul McCartney)

My life, my focus, has never been about “things.” In fact, if I’ve ever been consumed by a quest to acquire anything, it’s memories. Making good memories with my loved ones. Because I’ve never believed you can take “it” with you. I believe the only thing I’ll leave this life with is my spirit–some would call it my soul, my memories, my intelligence, the things I have learned and the knowledge I’ve acquired.

However, I was married to a man who looked at “things” differently than I did. He talked all the right talk, of course. He would nod his head and look sorrowful (I thought, in agreement with me) when we’d talk about how sad it was that some people chose to sell their soul for things. He was generous with his means (although now I know he was generous with what was never actually his.) And he acquired a lot of “stuff” in the process, though I never actually knew exactly what, or how much, because he stored it all in the building behind our home, where his “office” was, and I rarely went back there. It was his “manspace;” really cluttered and filled with all manner of junk and disorganized chaos, not the way I lived or operated, so I stayed out of it!

When my unexpected life began, there were things that needed serious purging. Namely, contents of a household that was downsizing. As featured on news reports about the Ponzi scheme my former husband perpetrated, I had ties to some material things. (I don’t know if those broadcasts are still around, but feel free to check them out if you’re curious: watch the motor home driving away towing the boat; see the “mansion” nestled in the trees; hear about the cabin in Idaho and the fine art; learn about the trailer loads of “things” that were hauled away over several days when the asset seizure began.)

In criminal/fraud situations, the government seizes everything of value from the criminal (my former husband) so victims can receive some compensation for their losses, which is all as it should be. The hard part, however, is what to do with everything that has no value. Everything the government doesn’t want.

Like the 9 crockpots–four from my home and four  my cabin (we frequently hosted large group gatherings) and one from the motorhome.

A yard sale wasn’t an option. I had seen my home and property featured on the news enough; my neighbors were stalking us with cameras as my children and I came and went, when we were outside, if we left the garage door open, and through the un-curtained windows of our home. Our neighbors gathered in front of our home to talk and trade notes of what was going on, what they had seen or heard, and they sometimes made it difficult to get to my home if they weren’t in the mood to allow anyone to pass their human barricade.

Case in point. One day a pastor attempted to go to our home to retrieve a set of scriptures from inside. Our neighbors were standing in the cul-de-sac we lived on, our driveway and all around the property and refused to let the pastor through. He explained who he was and the one simple thing he wanted from the house but they wouldn’t let him pass. Their crowd mentality, their hostily and venom, made him apprehensive so he called another neighbor, a mutual friend of his and the neighborhood crowd, and asked that friend to vouch for him so the neighbors would let him pass. The friend refused.

Those were crazy times, but a reason why a yard sale wasn’t an option–I didn’t think neighbors would allow anyone to participate in a yard sale at my home, IF anyone even tried to show up or buy anything!

So the crockpots met me in Utah and now sit on a shelf in my garage awaiting the someday I host a large group gathering again (if that day ever comes) or, alas, finally part with them in a yard sale!

Junk, leftover from my previous life, taking up space in my unexpected new one.

I’m hoping it’s true that, “Junk is the ideal product… the ultimate merchandise. No sales talk necessary. The client will crawl through a sewer and beg to buy.” (William S. Burroughs) Someday.

Or maybe I’ll become an inventor. “To invent, you need a good imagination and a pile of junk.” (Thomas A. Edison) If that’s the case, I may qualify for a patent yet.

Regardless, I try not to worry about it too much. (A key to living an unexpected life: don’t worry, be happy.) Because, “You sometimes see a woman who would have made a Joan of Arc in another century and climate, threshing herself to pieces over all the mean worry of housekeeping.” (Rudyard Kipling)

Junk vs. Joan.

I’m going with Joan.

Phone Calls and Boys, I Mean, Men

Date: January 20, 2011  Author: Andrea Merriman

“America’s best buy is a telephone call to the right man.” (Ilka Chase)

The right man calling me on the phone has been sort of a struggle for me.

I was about 12 when the phone became a nuisance in my life. A boy I didn’t “like” called me several times each week after school. Each time he’d call, I’d tell my mom to tell him I wasn’t home. She’d look at me, say, “I’m not going to lie—YOU tell him!” and hand me the phone. Then the awkward conversation would begin until I’d make up an excuse and hurriedly hang up.

It was that same pattern for years: Joe, Joestes, Espada, Rick, Wes, a young man in college who called before I was even old enough to date…I can’t remember the names of all the “wrong” boys who called me during my youth. It seemed like the right one never would. But then, when I was 15 years old and the boy I “liked” actually liked me at the same time, the phone began to mean something new! The history of my relationship with phones was pretty good from that time on through college, especially when the young man I  loved moved to Bolivia for two years when I was 20 and 21 years old and I lived for his twice-yearly telephone calls! In 1989, I married (someone else), and for 20 years, took calls from a husband. I’ll probably never get phone calls like his again in my life–from his “office” where he was “working;” and from unique destinations via satellite phone connections all around the world as he traveled “for business”–England, Tanzania, Etheopia, South Africa, Zambia, Cameroon, Zimbabwe, Austria, Russia, Armenia, Germany, Switzerland, Belgium and more. And then I got divorced.

After that much time had passed, though, dating, romance, phones, EVERYTHING about being single, had changed! Communication was an entirely different scene. There was even a phenomenon known as “Love Language” that had been invented. Most men didn’t call me on the phone, they emailed, instant messaged and texted me. All of the time. Morning, noon and night. I woke up to “Good Morning” texts, I went to sleep to “Goodnight” texts and everything in between. I got some interesting and unsolicited photo texts. I got some stalker texts. I even got one marriage proposal text. (Really. I promise, I don’t make this stuff up—it is 100% my unexpected life!)

Apparently, “Texting is a way to remind your partner that you’re thinking about him or her throughout the day…Send them whenever you please!” (Cellphones, “Good To Know”)

I didn’t have a lot of time to talk on the phone anyway. I worked all day, so in the evenings I needed to be free to talk to my children. I didn’t have time to talk to men on the phone for hours. I realized that early into my return to the singles scene, when a man called me a lot and wanted to talk on the phone…every night…for hours…and I just couldn’t take it. I suggested he email or text instead as I didn’t have time for telephone chit chat because I needed to spend time with my children, and that was pretty much the last I heard from him!

Now you have the 411 on phones and the singles scene today.

Eventually I narrowed the texts down to one man, Bachelor #5 (sometimes known as Agent M.)

Although, “Easy is to occupy a place in a telephone book. Difficult is to occupy someone’s heart; know that you’re really loved,” (Carlos Drummond de Andrade) let’s just say #5 doesn’t only occupy a spot in my contact lists, he occupies my heart! But even he doesn’t call that much–he texts, emails and talks to me in person—the perfect man for a woman who doesn’t like to waste time talking to men on the phone when she’d rather be with them in person!

We’ve been engaged for 8 1/2 months now and I have to say things were pretty quiet on the phone/texting front the first four months of my engagement. And then unexpectedly one night, I heard from the Stalker. Again. Out of the blue he contacted me, I told him I was engaged, and things were silent. From that moment on. Until the other night.

I love phones! (Not.) Their connections are so unexpected.

I received a mystery text, “Are you married yet?” Followed one hour later by, “Hi,” questions about where I was (home), was I going to bed (nope, too much housework), and an invitation to meet for a drink! I thanked him for asking, but told him I was still engaged. He said, “Oh, I did not know you were engaged,” (guess he forgot about the previous 9 months), then “When are you getting married?”

Isn’t THAT the million dollar question? And it came to me, courtesy of a phone. And my Stalker!

“I’m not just any stalker, I’m YOUR stalker.” (Unknown)

Every four months. Like clockwork. In my unexpected life.

What wasn’t unexpected, however, was #5′s response to the following question: “So, when you’re engaged, does that mean it’s inappropriate to meet a stalker for a drink?” He shook his head and smiled at me, made a joke about my “friendly” dating past, and we both laughed as he said, “Andrea, you’re NOT going!”

I sort of expected that.

Their Phone Never Stopped Ringing

Date: January 19, 2011  Author: Andrea Merriman

“I refused David Letterman’s proposal of marriage for obvious reasons, but thanks for asking.” (Teri Garr)

Nana’s youngest son, my dad, utilized the telephone as an integral part of his first marriage proposal to my mom, Sandra Jorgensen. (Although my parents had dated, fallen in love and decided to get married “someday” when they were only 15 years old, they both fell in and out of love with several other people before finally marrying each other at 25 years old.) One night, as my mom was entertaining a date at her home my dad called.

He had been drafted into the Army during the Berlin call-up and was undergoing his basic training in what he always referred to as “the armpit of America,” Fort Ord. Apparently, my dad was calling to propose marriage to my mom! And she had a date waiting for her in the living room.

When she asked if they could talk about it later, my dad asked, “What’s the matter? You don’t have a date do you?” My mom admitted that she had a date waiting for her and that she probably shouldn’t keep him waiting any longer. My parents weren’t dating exclusively, but my dad said, “Well, forget I asked!” and hung up on her!

“But I felt all the more bound to make this proposal, because it at once turns to a reproach.” (Ferdinand Lassalle)

I’m not sure how he eventually proposed marriage and my mom agreed to marry him, but he did. And they were very happy (and busy) their entire marriage. They raised 5 children…and I can vouch for the fact that their phone never stopped ringing!

“My phone has been ringing off the hook. I have like 17 cell phones and pagers.” (Steven Cojocaru)

My parents’ oldest daughter is an entirely different matter. Me. My phone. My experiences. ”A woman is a person who reaches for a chair when she answers the telephone.”  (Milton Wright) I do that. I guess I’m all woman.