I Need a New Uniform

Last week, The Ex and I took the girls to the book fair. You know, that thing where the school uses guilt and 2 freakin' weeks of kid window shopping to force you to spend a fortune, because it's books and you can't say no? Yeah, that thing.

Anyway, we took them and went together and were all co-parenty. Because we strive to be good parents, even if we aren't married. Because we want to present a united front. Because something-something about that class on divorced parenting we took.

And it was fine. You know, mostly fine. There were books and we each bought some for our kids and yes, he bought them both books that I said I wouldn't buy because they needed to get things that were enjoyable beyond once. Because I'm a curmudgeon. Always.

But, here's the thing. We've done this co-parenty gig a couple of times now, and what always strikes me as terribly uncomfortable is running into people. We ran into this guy with whom we graduated high school and he was all chatty and friendly and there we stood, near each other, nodding and smiling and then he left and we left and no one ever said anything about the fact that we were divorced.

Because why would we?

It didn't come up. And it seems overly bizarre to say, "Hey, yo. I know we are both standing right here in front of you and all, but we are no longer of the married type. We dissolved our matrimonial union and now we are just here together because we are both parenting these kids. That is all."

But it also seems bizarre to me that at the end of this little convo - off he walked assuming that we are still together.

And, I don't know how to explain why this is a thing that I care about. I barely know this guy now. Beyond we once took Bio together and he tortured the craziest teacher in the school for fun and now has a kid that goes to the same school as my kid - I got nothing. His opinion or knowledge of my relationship status (to parlay a FB term) has no bearing on my life whatsoever.

In fact, with relation to Facebook and it's personal questions of doom... I turned off my relationship status completely. It doesn't say that I'm married, divorced, separated or considering moving to Ireland because the guys there are probably still jerks, but at least they talk all pretty. I turned it off, because it occurs to me now after years of happily proclaiming myself married, that it's none of anyone's pantsing business. (Says the woman with a blog. Well, you know, if you want to know the intimate details of my life, you should probably just click that link in my timeline and come read said blog.

So, why, oh why do I want people I run into to know what's going on in my life?

I think it's just because it seems disingenuous. I feel like a big ole liar standing there next to someone I used to be married to and letting someone think I still am. It's not that I want to share every detail with the world. It's just that I don't want to lie to anyone either.

I need a t-shirt. Maybe one that says, "Marriage is for suckers," or "Lovin' Livin' Alone."

In the meantime, I'll be at every school event, over there, rolling my eyes and looking uncomfortable.