Measuring Intelligence

One evening in early November 2005, Morgan walked into my bathroom. I was sitting on the floor of my closet packing for my annual Christmas-shopping trip with my sister to the Mall of America in Minneapolis. Morgan was wearing an Abercrombie t-shirt with the words “Dependently Wealthy” on it. She crossed her arms over her chest, leaned against the doorframe, and with her eyebrows arched as high as they could possibly get, said, “Mom, I need to know one thing. Are you and dad planning on having any more kids?”

I laughed. “Why are you asking me that?”

“Just answer the question, Mom.” She cocked her head to the side and waited for my answer.

“Sweetie, you know the answer to that. Of course we’re not planning on any more children. Now tell me why you’re asking.”

My children were fifteen, twelve, and ten at the time. All three were in school, straight-A students, and could take themselves to the potty. A baby was definitely not in the picture.

Morgan had been using her father’s computer. She said, “I hit Dad’s favorites page, and you know what popped up? A vasectomy reversal site.”

Shit.

But I didn’t say a word. I just sat there looking up at my daughter and letting the tears well up in my eyes.

Then she said, “Mom, how much more are you going to take?”

She left the room, and I sat there feeling like a limp dishrag. I couldn’t cry because that would mean I would have to explain to my husband what was upsetting me. Finally, I moved to the bathroom sink and was washing my face as my husband walked in. Now a budding developer who had applied for zoning permits to build a community of ranch-style condos in our town, he commented, “The county is giving me problems again. The Water Authority wants to put more conditions on the zoning approval I’ve already gotten.”

“You may have to sue them,” I said, and he agreed.

I continued the lather in order to hide my face from him, and after a moment, he left the room. Seconds later, he stomped back into the bathroom, threw his hands up in the air, and with his face twisted in fury, yelled, “You don’t give a rat’s ass, do you?”

“Huh?” I answered, looking up from the towel I was using to dry my face. Honestly, I thought I’d given him at least a rat’s ass worth of concern when I’d said he might have to sue the county. What, did he want me to go buy a posterboard and make a sign and picket the next Commission Zoning Meeting? The man was making it extremely difficult for me to keep my cool.

“My businesses are going bankrupt, and you don’t even care. But you’re going to care in about two months when I file for bankruptcy. And that’s when I’m going to know that you’re only married to me for the money.”

He turned and left the room. I heard the alarm beep, meaning he had left the house, and I knew that, just like every other night for the past several months, he would not return.

The next morning, I called a lawyer, and that afternoon I was seated in his office. I needed a divorce; of that I was certain. But he needed to know what I was seeking in the divorce, and I said, “Everything I deserve.” The problem was that if we were in the financial trouble my husband was claiming, I had no idea what to ask for. We left that section blank, my attorney assuring me I was entitled to half and that we would find out, in the process of discovery, just how much half was. He promised to have the petition for divorce filed and ready to serve him within one week. Fortunately, I would be at the Mall of America when he was served, and my children would be at their grandparents’ home, where they would be sheltered from seeing a sheriff at the door.

On the flight to Minneapolis, I remembered that he had always used his birthdate as his email password. When we landed, I went straight to the tiny business center in the Minneapolis Airport Hilton and logged onto his email, something I could have easily done all along. I spent the next two hours and $75 printing out emails. It may have been the best money I’ve ever spent.

There was an AdultFriendFinder alert. “You have three new flirts.” I clicked onto his profile to discover that my husband of eighteen years and the father of my children was single with no kids. Not only that, he was also a young professional in his early thirties (lie) who had never had time to commit to a relationship (a lie unless marriage doesn’t count as a relationship) because he was extremely busy in his professional life (half true). No children (lie). 195 pounds (huge lie). Additionally, he liked all things Latin – music, food, and women. In fact, he was looking for a Latin girl, and this is the God-honest truth, intelligence was only “moderately” important to him.

Another email contained pictures of what must have been the girl of his dreams. She was Latina, and, as proof that she was, indeed, “moderately intelligent,” she was gainfully employed as a shot girl in a strip club. In the picture, she was baring her boobies, and the pictures were courtesy of a professional photographer who was courting my husband’s investment dollars. Basically, the asshole paid for her Glamour Shots!

Hey, Einstein, you’re considering a vasectomy reversal so that you can have a child with a moderately intelligent woman. Did you know that vasectomy reversals are rarely successful ten years after the vasectomy? They’re going to have to stick a needle into your scrotum to suck your semen out. And they’re going to mix it in a little Petri dish with the eggs from a woman with the intelligence of blue-footed booby bird. Just for the fun of it, I took your picture and hers and put them into one of those cool computer programs that shows you what your children will look like. Your kid is going to look like your scrotum.

As crazy as it sounds, I felt a wave of relief in that moment. Knowing that the divorce was inevitable and that I’d only beaten him to the attorney’s office was absolution for a woman still trying to do everything exactly right. I felt better knowing I wasn’t the bad guy. But as I digested all what I had just found, I began to feel like the moderately intelligent one for not seeing what had been right under my nose for so very long.