Dear My Parent's Divorce,

You suck. Don't get me wrong - I am really glad you are happening (you seriously should have happened a LONG time ago), but you are taking too f*cking long. It's been over a year, and you still have my mom's and my dad's lawyers throwing proposals at each other because neither of my parents want to risk getting anything less than half/what they deserve.

My dad is being sneaky (like he has somewhat always been) and keeping things (like lots of money in stocks) from my mom and trying to screw her over with lies so he doesn't have to pay as much. Dad, you've never even had a mortgage to worry about - we lived in a dump while growing up and payed $100 in rent a month. You can afford to lose a bit in this divorce since we lost a lot while growing up. Granted, we didn't have much money, but we also didn't have a bedroom. I know that all that money you made each year is somewhere, and you have good credit so there is no way you can use the excuse that you don't have enough money. No one is believing it. You are living with your parents. They are 92 and 96 years old so they need you, but you don't have to pay anything for housing.

To top it all off, I bought a house for my mom so she could get out of that awful house with the $100/month rent because the propane-gas heating seemed certain to burn the house down any day. People cannot get loans while in divorces so I took the loan out myself because I thought it would be short-term. Instead, I have had a second home for more than a year! Furthermore, I have been paying all of the utilities for the house plus the mortgage payment while only getting reimbursed for the mortgage. AND I still have to pay my own f*cking apartment rent AND utilities (with no roommates to split costs with) in addition to owning my mom's house. I have enough money thanks to receiving too much money for the work I do, but I also don't like my job. Yet, my current situation of paying for someone else's house leaves me no choice but to stay in this shitty job while my only co-worker is a chauvinist pig who thinks that he can tell me what to do even though he has not been here as long as I have been. Plus, I am 10 times smarter than him.

And mom, you are buying all these new appliances on credit, and it's kinda pissing me off. I know you need some of these things (though they don't have to be the newest/fanciest versions!), but you are still digging yourself into a lot of debt and making me wonder if you will ever be able to buy the house back from me. To top it all off, my boyfriend has bought me a ring (but I haven't received it yet:(), and he is now hurting a bit for money. So guess who (ME) gets to pay for most of our dates now. For the above reasons, I have decided to go on a shopping strike for at least 30 days. I would have started earlier, but I had to shop at the Victoria's Secret Semi-Annual Sale or suffer from extreme depression from lack of new, sexy underwear. I've got to keep the T&A looking good so the ring can be given to me and my boy can continue to lust for me all day at work after seeing me in fancy, expensive underwear over the weekend.

I know it's not nice to say hate, but I am going to go ahead and say I hate you, my parent's divorce. Buck up, asshole, and just get finished. I don't have much more patience for trying to be the responsible one while my parents duke it out over IRA's, land and money. I thought I was supposed to be the child.
My mom's in debt to me by more than $5,000 plus a house,
Too nice for my own good

LBJ

p.s. Dear Life rocks!