My ex and I went to see a show together recently. We do that. We date, we see each other, and then we each go to our respective homes. We had a great time, too.

While we were at the show, we met a friend of ours — and he had a new girlfriend with him. She couldn't have been more than 20, and he was in his late 30s. More power to him, I say.

The next day, though, my ex and I were discussing how young the girl was and how we felt about people who date younger people. I expressed a little bit of surprise at the difference in ages between our friend and his girlfriend. My ex pointed out there was 10 years' difference between us. Nothing wrong with that.

Then he said, "The problem isn't that people date younger people. The problem is that no one seems to be able to keep a girlfriend. Why is that?"

He was right. Men in our area who divorce do try to find new relationships. None of them stick. They find a woman and a few months later, they're with someone new. They can't seem to find a stable relationship that lasts.

"I admire us, you know," he went on thoughtfully. He said that despite our history, our breakup, and the fact that we don't live together any more, we're mature enough to work at keeping our relationship alive because we love each other.

We talk. We find ways around our differences. We're learning what works and what doesn't. We're each trying to find a way to be a couple, no matter how hard it is sometimes.

Being a couple is work. A relationship isn't a discardable commodity when people have differences. They find solutions if they want to be together. They work out their issues. They talk. They resolve the problems.

There's nothing wrong with playing the field, either. But to me, that just shows someone isn't serious about commitment or hasn't figured out what's important to them.

Somebody made a comment on one of my blog posts yesterday that said, "Faith, can you please make up your mind...Are you in or out of this whole thing? Get a life and move on or stay in the blog and be miserable."

Of course, this comment was meant to be nasty and hurtful, and of course just like every other comment of its kind, it was signed by a "guest." I have a feeling said "guest" is Levi, or his other ex, or one of his other minions. In any case, that doesn't matter. What got me thinking was the subject line of the comment: "Making me dizzy."

Exactly.

I feel dizzy, all the time. I feel like I've been running in circles for the last year and a half. I feel dizzy with stress, dizzy with anger, dizzy with sadness, and dizzy with disappointment.

I don't want any of this.

I would love for things to be normal, for things to be better. I would be overjoyed if Levi would take responsibility as far as his son is concerned. I would love it if we didn't have to go to court. Hey, maybe then I could even get one of those "lives" you speak of!

And I did run circles around that decision. I actually have quite a few issues with the family court system that make me not want to take any part in it.

To start with, I don't agree with pumping my money into a system that doesn't have my best interest in mind. I feel that they actually hope that people won't do the right thing. Why? Because if we all did the right thing, they wouldn't have jobs. If everyone paid their child support there would be no need for child support enforcement. There would be no need for family court judges, family court lawyers, etc.

Getting a settlement is handy. Since Jake owns a company, since the company is lucrative, since we were married for 10 years, and since he's not an asshole, mine is a decent one. More than decent, really. Because giving me what we determined is "my share" all at once would effectively close his company down, our arrangement is spread over the next five years.

This means that I can afford to stay in San Francisco. This means that I have some money to invest against the day the payments stop. This means I don't have to panic about money for the next little bit.

This also means that he and I are tied for the next five years.

I didn't want any money from him when we split. It felt wrong, somehow. It felt icky. I didn't want the tie. I'm rational enough to take it, but we're still in a relationship this way. This necessitates communication. There's a monthly reminder. It's a connection I don't like having.

Sometimes I wonder if the complete and absolute freedom would be worth it. But this money means that I am having a far, far, far easier time of it than other women in the same situation. With all I have to worry about, paying my bills is not, for the moment, one of them. So I feel enormously guilty for the bad feelings I have.

How do I not feel guilty for resenting this? How do I accept this help while hating the ties it makes and keeps?

Sometimes I wonder if I still have feelings for Levi. There, I said it. I suppose this makes me even more human.

Intellectually, I'm sure that I don't. I know that I literally despise what he's done to my son, and I know that I do not have any respect for him, whatsoever, anymore.

But there are moments that I'll reminisce about things he and I did together, and I'll smile. But there are moments where I still miss him. But there are moments when we are SCREAMING at each other, where I'm like, wow. You can't scream at an ex you don't care about, right? You can't scream because you're indifferent, right?

I've had breakups in the past — one big one — and I recall going through these same motions; the pain and devastation, the crying, the name calling and yelling, and then the indifference, which carries you to where you can see each other on the street and stop to say hello.

I recall going through those motions, and I extract comfort from that from time to time in a this-to-shall-pass kind of way. Problem is, these motions went much faster the first time around.

And truthfully, it's really not even me. I mean, I get it that it takes two to tango, but I don't scream at Levi. I try not to engage in arguments with him. I try not to stoop to childish name calling. He, on the other hand, can not control himself. He is incapable of a civil conversation. I cannot understand it.

I have done nothing to warrant this behavior. I have done nothing to deserve his constant verbal abuse. Yet, it happens. Yet, he acts like he hates me.

I am reminded of the boy in grade school that used to pull my hair and make me cry. Later, he told me that he had a crush on me.

No, I don't have feelings for Levi. But maybe he still has them for me?

I've been listening to Ingrid Michaelson all week. One particular CD — it's like she's crawled into my head and is digging about it in, only in a catchy/lovely/song lyrical kind of way. My past two years are there in their entirety, neatly, in 10 tracks or so.

This one song — "Corner of Your Heart" — I can't stop listening to it. I can't stop because it upsets me so much, like a bruise you can't stop pressing. It's beautiful and haunting and infinitely disturbing. I can't turn it off.

"There's a corner of your heart just for me," it goes. "I will pack my bags just to stay in the corner of your heart. Just to sleep underneath your bed. Just to occupy one minute of your day."

Now, I don't know if this intended to be a love song. Maybe it is. Maybe to other people there is romance in it.

But to me, it's horrifying. It's everything that was wrong about my relationship: me just wanting something, something, anything that would tell me I was loved back. It's me being offered only a corner, being willing to take that. Being happy with that. Giving up so much in hopes of that one minute.

I can't stop listening to it because I want to know if that's what it's meant to mean. Because I recognize myself in it. And because I'm so far away from that place now and don't want to go anywhere near it again.

Also, it's a really pretty song.

I wrote about a couple facing a breakup because of an affair, and it seems that affairs are hot topics on divorce sites — um, as they should be.

I don't think having an affair is a "right" thing to do. I think it is a surmountable obstacle and one that couples can overcome. I don't believe that an affair is a henchman's axe dropping down to sever relationships completely. An affair doesn't always mean that someone doesn't love you and wanted to hurt you.

I thought over how I felt about sex and love. I think the two are related, yes. When I love someone, I tend to have sex with that person. The act is enhanced by the feelings I have.

But I can have sex with someone I don't love. There is no hard and fast rule that says you must have sex with people you love or that sex is symbolic of the love you feel. I think that twining the emotion of love into the act of sex is the problem involved in how we feel about affairs.

I think that an affair is surmountable if you treat it for what it is: a physical act that truly doesn't mean anything unless you make it mean something.

People have sex all the time. People have sex with people they don't love (and sometimes even don't know) every day around the world. Having sex is just an action. It doesn't mean that you feel something for the person you're engaging with. You're just...having sex.

I agree that an affair breaches trust and damages confident that you feel toward the other person. I do think that a couple dealing with the issues of an affair have some serious questions to ask themselves about their relationship.

But I don't think that an affair is a deal-breaker. If you're facing the question of divorce because of an affair, I think that you should treat the affair as a symptom of a problem, not a problem in itself.

Lindsay knows exactly what to do when a friend is getting divorced. She doesn't press. She doesn't pester with questions. She doesn't fill the space with reassurances or aspersions - she allows silence. She allows time. She knows that what's needed is normality.

At the same time, she'll let you that, anytime you need, it, you can call her and she'll drive out and spend the day with you, or the afternoon, or the hour. She'll take you to lunch, she'll go to a movie, she'll just sit with you so you're not alone.

When you move to a new place, she's the one that will spend the first night with you so you're not alone, making the weekend into a party instead of a chore, keeping any of it from being sad. She'll unpack boxes. She'll organize your closet and your kitchen.  

She is, in short, an invaluable friend. 

The other reason to look to Lindsay is that she has a marriage that makes me rethink my certainty that relationships can't last. Years in, she and her husband are still in love, still happy, still right for each other. They make room for each other's lives while still sharing them. They compromise. They talk. They are each other's best friends, and they still make out.  

There are people like this in the world. There are relationships like that out there. This is good to remember. 

"Rake over there!" My ex pointed to a patch about 100 feet from where I'd decided to amuse myself with old leaves. I bristled almost immediately.

"I'll rake where I please," I answered, lifting my chin a little.

It's a backlash effect, a reaction to the way things used to be. There was no reason for me to be upset. My daughter and I had come to the country to have a nice day in the sun with Dad, and we were all in a good mood. My ex hadn't meant for it to sound like an order; he was just telling me which area needed raking the most.

But I can't stand being told what to do. The last eight years of our relationship were full of control and possession, and I'm afraid I wasn't the one running the show.

My ex was extremely controlling. He told me who I could see and when. He would time my outings down to the last minute and explode if I was home late — even when it was just a grocery run or I'd been held up by a slow tractor on the road.

I don't blame him. He operated out of fear of losing control. He knew things were rocky. He loved me, I loved him, but we were so mentally separated from each other that he felt he had no other way to hang onto me.

So he'd rule with an iron fist (thank god not literally) and I would comply to his every wish in the hopes of accomplishing peace and affection. I dropped all my friends. I did what he wanted. I went where he told me. After a while, it became too much trouble to even go out.

For a long time, I lived in fear. He scared me. I felt worn down and beaten. I was tired. I was afraid to leave and needed to leave like the desert needs rain. I thought if I told him I wanted out that he would hurt me.

But I did it and he didn't do it.

Now, we live apart and love together. We're a couple under two roofs. We have our bad times still, but we have good times more often — enough to make it worth it.