I was at 8:32 this morning still in a fog from making lunch, doing the dishes, and taking the kids to school, which is all I do on weeks when my daughter is with me. My phone rang with a message: “Who would have thought? The golden couple has already separated. I didn’t think they would stay together forever, but I would have guessed they would be too embarrassed to leave so soon.” “I forgot; this is reality TV.”
The incoming was from my friend and mentor Ann, who had become addicted to golden bachelor At the suggestion of Slate (and wrote this great article about being 67 and single when the show’s finale aired last November). It took me a second: What was she talking about? Ah, Gerry Turner and Theresa Nist, the senior citizen-turned-veteran lovebirds who emerged victorious at the end of Gerry’s turn as the seventy-year-old Bachelor. Officially Donejo. Talk out of sight, out of mind. As Scott Nover wrote in Slate on Friday about the end of the pair’s three-month marriage, “American attention for Gerry and Theresa’s brief love story was gone.”
Well, I guess I have a little more room for personal attention because I spent most of the day figuring out why these headlines about the Golden Couple’s divorce were bothering me so much. Yes, I admit, I kept track of the ins and outs of the entire season. In the end, his match gave me peace. But I found their wedding—broadcast live on TV—both boring and boring. And, when they gave follow-up interviews about their future together, I kept wondering: Were these two really going to move away from their respective grandchildren in Indiana and New Jersey… charleston, South Carolina, As they claimed they would?
Now we know the answer is no. According to their rehearsal announcement good Morning America On Friday morning, they’re Splitsville. But I refuse to call it divorce. At best, it is a “divorce”, just as their relationship was a “marriage”. Divorce involves division of property. Discussing family vacations and time spent with children. Decisions around who will get how much retirement fund, or a shared compact car. Divorce requires difficult decisions—specifically, ending a marriage! There’s no way Gerry and Theresa would have had enough time together to put together anything that would require a divorce the way we usually think about it. And even if they’ve had to have some big conversations about the breakup – it may take a few years before they decide to get a divorce! – How many discussions could have actually taken place? They got married in January!
Now, it is possible that there is a debate between them on this golden bachelor Money, but I doubt it. It looks like this sort of thing was worked into the paperwork with ABC a few months ago. Of course they didn’t have a shared bank account when they got married, so presumably each of them got paid directly into their own treasury via ACH – no stress there!
If it’s not obvious by now, I’m speaking from experience. I am divorced. And I probably have one of the best divorce stories you’ll ever hear, in that my ex-husband and I are incredibly close, devoted co-parents, and a forever family. We have keys to each other’s houses, and we see each other all the time. Last weekend, our daughter stayed home with my (second) husband while I went to see a concert with my first husband. Can you follow him? This confuses people all the time!
But reaching here was not easy. This was hard, because divorce is really hard! Even if, like us, you don’t have a home and things are relatively simple, it’s hard to analyze years of shared life and things and feelings. In the best case scenario, you can become just like us. But often, the end of life together brings with it so much stuff that we try to push to the back of the proverbial closet that the mess can never be completely cleaned out. I know every divorced person tries their best. But there is a specific kind of enduring grief—and often much worse—even when things are as amicable as humanly possible.
I’m not sorry Gerry and Theresa will be saved from this permanent wreck. But let’s just call the end of their “marriage”: the breakup. They couldn’t decide where to live, and things didn’t work out. Legally it may be a divorce, but it is little more than a short-term, broken divorce. Engagement.
