Reading the Fine Print

Somehow I always seem to draw the short straw when it comes to ex-wife negotiations. Like when I thought that I was going to get every Monday holiday with my daughter. The Parenting Plan said that my daughter could spend the Monday holiday with whomever she was with on that weekend. And it looked like that would be me for almost every holiday in 2008. I called my friends and told them that I finally had good news.

Then I looked closer at my little computer calendar and realized that I had the weekends reversed. I didn't get every Monday holiday after all. I got none of them. Oh well.

But things went differently when my wife told me she would pick up our daughter on Saturday morning. "Wait," I said. "I think the Plan says that all transfers are made in the evening."

She paused, not quite believing me. "Yes," I said, pulling out a piece of paper. "Here it is. You can pick her up on Saturday evening. Why don't we say six O'Clock?"

"That can't be right," she said, frowning.

"No, it's right. Here it is. You can have this copy," I told her, being ever so helpful.

You see, this means that I have my daughter every Saturday (day), and she spends the night every other Saturday night.

Now, we had agonized over this agreement for months. We went to a mediator, who wrote most of this with my wife's input. How could she not have read it? She argued over the time thing over and over. She insisted on more time and slowly the 50/50 time split shifted in her favor. So I do not feel guilty at all about Saturdays. My daughter still sees her father less than her mother despite having equal rights to both.

But the look on my ex-wife's face was priceless. Score one for me.


Recently she brought it up again. She says it isn't fair. I almost agreed, but then I thought about how I miss every holiday, have fewer days with my daughter overall, and have to pay too much money to my ex-wife when she owes me thousands for withholding household money when we were married. So I told her that she should have looked at the agreement more closely. (Of course I would certainly accommodate her occasional requests for Saturdays.)

She said Fine, and I know what that means. It means that she will go to the court house and fill out another motion for the family court to have the Parenting Plan changed. Then I will have to go there and convince the judge that I am right. She is comfortable with this process. I don't think I like it. But over time, maybe I will start to feel better about it.