Flying solo at the defense table...

April 18, 2011.

What do I make of that day in my history now?

Is it just the segue between scenes in the movie of my life, or is it the beginning of a new chapter in my book?

Or is it just a day?

I awoke that morning to a slew of story assignments for the Venice Cornerstone, a monthly newspaper in my old stomping grounds of Ross, Ohio. While needing to be done, it was nothing but busy work. I took no pleasure in it — all it did was distract me from my appearance at the gallows pole later that afternoon.

I finished the assignments — an interview for a high school jazz concert and a photo op — and trudged to the local Half-Price Books, thinking that possibly blowing 50 bucks on Rammstein CD's and Steinbeck's "The Winter of Our Discontent" would soothe me.

That's a big negative, gold leader.

The bells of Hamilton finally tolled three...and I found myself walking to the city government building alongside someone that had shared my hopes, fears, losses and triumphs throughout the last 15 years of my life.

Someone who now resembled a stranger.

Walking with her to finalize the end of a dream.

The Butler County Court of Domestic Relations will forever be an image stained into my mind's eye...a narrow hall lined with benches, a simply way station for those souls traveling towards dissolution or divorce.

The Hall of Heartbreak, I now call it.

Lawyers trolled the hallway, clothed in imitation Brooks Brothers outfits and cubic zirconium cuff links, dispensing last minute legal advice or inane small talk.

Dysfunctional couples filled the seats of despair, allowing the white noise to filter into one eardrum and to exit the other.

One couple even physically manifested the somber tone of the room, becoming combative as their lawyers scrambled last-minute to piece together how the fragile truce went awry so quickly ... and how they could salvage it.

Cases were called, shoulders sagged, and not a single individual held their head high as they proceeded to the lethal injection chamber of marriages — the courtroom.

Finally, our number came up. My companion in this sojourn and I stood up and shuffled to the door, allowing more wreckage to occupy our space on the bench. Eliminate one case and another takes its place.

Her lawyer instructed me to sit at the table on the right side of the room ... the defendant's table.

A place I soon found as the loneliest I've experienced on this earth.

I had no representation. No lawyer that I had doled out greenbacks to in order to contest support amounts or custody issues.

The stranger seated on the left of the room and I had already come to terms on that. Everything was settled between us, it was amicable, and this appearance was simple formality.

Until the judge ran through the standard questions required of such formality.

"Mr. Sprague, do you agree to this dissolution?"

I croaked out a weak yes ... not because I was attempting to salvage something lost, but because it was the most blatant admission of failure in my life.

"Mr. Sprague, you will have to speak up for the recording."

"Yes, your honor."

The interrogative litany continued. I became a automaton, responding yes to everything while my vision narrowed to a pinpoint shrouded in black, with only the court stenographer in my sight.

Soon the act was complete. The mansion of promise and hope was crumbled in a mere five minutes by the legal wrecking ball.

It truly only takes a moment to extinguish a lifetime.

My newly-minted ex-wife and I shuffled again back to our respective vehicles afterwards. Light chatter accompanied apologies, and soon we parted ways.

Her alone. And I alone.

Is it a beginning for me, despite it being an end?

That is the thing that I find myself playing Twister with 10 days later.

Yet even with the end of a life goal, I was reminded that I still had a life. A mere 30 minutes later, I found myself stuck in traffic on the way home through Ross. It seemed there had been an auto accident on the road ahead.

One which included the fatality of a 20-year-old college student. One full of promise, life and dreams. Ones that will never be realized, through a simple moment in time.

A lifetime wiped clean by a single moment, and it was a jarring awakening that in spite of my slate being erased...

I at least still had a slate. One that a new story can be written upon.

And that, in and of itself, is a damn good start.


Regards,
Spragoo