Not Quite Sure WHAT is Happening...

Almost two months without an update (shakes head in disbelief). Bet you've been wondering what happened to me. Besides being sicker-n-a-dog for the last couple of weeks (flu+UTI. WAY bad juju. I'm still achy), here's what's been happening...

We went to Lehman's as I said in my last post. And met the internet friend. And that's where everything went...odd? crazy? weird? Anyway, whatever synonym your particular thesaurus favors, that's what it went.

I'd been talking to said internet friend for several months. He was into prepping, didn't watch TV, wanted to move to the country and live on a farm, loved animals, had a son that he had custody of that was slightly older than my two girls: Basically, he sounded perfect. I REALLY wanted to meet him.

Met him at Lehman's. Went to dinner with him, his son, and my girls. He was good looking, well-spoken, fairly educated, didn't give off any "serial killer" vibes. I talked to him about Victor and that disaster. He told me about his wife who had left him over a year ago. We ended up spending the weekend in Ohio with him. By the end of the weekend, he had declared he wanted to marry me and intended to buy me a ring asap. And we had made arrangements for me to come back down a week and a half later and spend his birthday with him. Complete whirlwind.

I spent the next week+ running up my phone bill talking to him, internet shopping for a ring, and being all giggly in luv. Settled between three different rings, but wanted to see them in person before I made a decision. Decided on a gorgeous 2 1/2 carat diamond engagement ring. He asked me to marry him on bended knee. We started making plans to get married sometime in the summer.

It was then the niggles started (You knew this part was coming, didn't you?) Turns out he CAN'T marry me this summer. He and his wife have been separated for over a year, but no papers at all have been filed. None. When I asked WHEN papers were going to filed, he came up with excuses (he wanted to read a couple books on divorce he had bought and he wanted to talk to a friend about how to file. I don't know why he couldn't have read the books or talked to his friend during the last 15 months that his wife was gone. I'm being pissy about this issue because I've been down this road before, and it ended badly. And it is beginning to look badly again: he wants to keep custody of his son, his wife wants son to stay in Ohio, he's making noises about living in OH until son turns 18, THEN moving to KY. I say, "No way, no sir. That dog don't hunt.") He spent the morning of his birthday at his wife's apartment, eating the birthday breakfast she had made him. He has a decent job, but his house is in foreclosure, his car is slated for repossession, and all his bills are past due (he tried to talk me into putting his gas bill into my name so he didn't have to pay the past due amount. I said I wasn't comfortable with that. He wasn't happy with that response.) He gave me thousands of dollars in preps to move down to my house, then came down to do an inventory and got pissy when I asked, "Why?" Now he's started asking for some of the preps back to take to another friend's place. Things are just enough "off" to make me go, "Hmmmm" and step back slightly. Attempted discussions never seem to go well...at least, I never feel like the issues have been resolved. One of my friends thinks he's a con artist (and I'm the 'desperate middle-aged female.' [snark]Thanx, JG) and another friend thinks he's trying to hide assets from his wife. I don't know WHAT to think.

So that is where things stand right now. I'm engaged to a man who can't marry me, and alarm bells are going off in my head loud enough to give me a headache. Basically, I'm not sure WHAT is going on, but whatever happens, I will be taking things v-e-r-y s-l-o-w-l-y from here on out.