BusterStronghart@Gmail.com

Dear Son,,

You can’t engage May in argument. She is too rigid to see any other side but her own and so it’s a waste of time and energy to try.

All that you can do is point out the benefits that will make Carli's life better. Every child needs their father. Keeping you away from Carli hurts Carli as much as it hurts you. May’s motivation is to hurt you even though she must know that Carli gets bruised at the same time. Doesn’t she care? My guess is that right now she doesn’t care. She is striking out at you because she is hurt. She hasn’t yet been able to disentangle herself from you. She can’t be objective. She is angry. Perhaps she has always been angry. I don’t know—I’m not a psychologist.

The important thing is to fulfill Carli's needs to the greatest extent possible. That is only possible with two cooperating parents. Carli needs the unconditional love that I am sure May gives to her. And Carli needs that unconditional love that you give to her. Carli needs both of you.

My friend “Tiger” had a “cooperating” divorce. Neither parent ever ‘bad-mouthed” the other. They each behaved politely to each other. The children were told only that their parents had the utmost respect for each other. And most important, neither parent was ever disrespected in front of the children. Although any divorce is always a tragedy for the children, in this one damage to the children was kept to the minimum.

On the other hand, another friend, Keith, and his wife were constantly at each other’s throats. The children were kept in a constant state of anxiety and stress. Almost immediately little Peter developed asthma, and the older girl – I can’t think of her name right now, became promiscuous and hugely fat. One of her boyfriends was a black drug dealer with a snake tattooed on his arm. Gross bailed him out once or twice.

I don’t know how things turned out for his daughter and son because I lost touch with Keith, but I can’t imagine that they turned out well. Furthermore, Keith’s wife never got her life on track. Instead of moving on to a new life her bitterness tied her irrevocably to her conception of what a bastard she thought Keith had been. I do not speak for Keith – he may not have been the perfect husband, perhaps a divorce was right for the marriage – but even after the divorce his wife never actually escaped the marriage -- and the children suffered.

I don’t know whether you remember the ex-wife of Harry Sternberg. Remember her? Her arms bent by the weight of too many gold bracelets. Constantly smoking, her face full of lines, her eyebrows always furrowed because all she could think of was hate. She couldn’t let go. She had more money that she could spend in a lifetime, but gave all her energy to hating Harry and she made everyone around her miserable. She died rich, skinny and very, very unhappy. She could have had a new life, she could have re-married, or lived with someone—but she wouldn’t let go of her hatred for Harry. Ironically her children buried her next to Harry and his mistress! I think they resented the miserableness, the hatred, which she forced on everyone around her. So they finally got even by burying her next to the woman who made her husband happy for the last years of his life.


One of the wisest things that Ruben ever said to me was that “no one can ever win an argument with William Fish.” What did he mean by that? Fish is a stubborn man who thinks that only his opinion can be right. To him, there are only his facts and they are never in doubt. No one can ever pierce his certitude. Certainty of that type should be added to the list of the seven deadly sins.

I must digress: here’s the list:

Seven Deadly Sins:

Lust
Envy
Sloth (Laziness)
Pride
Wrath (Anger)
Greed
Gluttony

I admit to each of them… But I’m working on them.

The greatest threat to civility—and ultimately to civilization—is an excess of certitude. The greatest threat to civility—and ultimately to civilization—is an excess of certitude.

Certitude
“One of the most constant characteristics of men of beliefs is their intolerance. The stronger the belief, the greater its intolerance. Men (or women) dominated by a certitude cannot tolerate those who do not accept it.”

Gustave Le Bon

End of digression.

I think that this is what you are dealing with. I don’t know how you will emerge but I have confidence in you. No matter what May thinks I know you to be fair, just, and most important, objective.

Keep bouncing with the blows, and keep your eye on the ball. You don’t have to justify your life to May. Likewise, you don’t have to answer every contention that she makes.

And, dear son, for that matter May doesn’t have to justify her life to you either. You’ve chosen new paths. Take them. Explore them. Don’t look back.

In the end, it’s all about three things: Carli, Carli, and Carli. (And by the way, how does Brenda fit into all of this? You have to excuse her if she is siding with her mother—its only to be expected—and you have to know how hard it must be for her to have lost two Dads. And mark this, Son, you were (are?) her Dad too. It was you who brought her up…I think that time will cure any rift that might have grown between you two.)

The human capacity for self-delusion is limitless. Everyone has seen people who claim to be right and who do evil things in its name. No one is immune from this phenomenon. Understand that whether justified or not, May is hurt and is rationalizing some of her actions by her misperceptions of what she thinks occurred during the time you were together. She’s pathetically striking out blindly. She’s wounded. And the longer she persists, the deeper into her pain she will get. She won’t let the wound heal. She keeps picking at the scab.

Her repeated acts of anger only engender more anger. Her conscience has clouded and her judgment corrupted.

She's trapped. She can't allow herself to let go. She can't move on to better things. Feel sorry for her, my son, —and move on.

Love,


Dad