Our plan was that Andy would remain living with us (in our rented apartment) for a period. Once we’d told Leo, Andy moved into the spare room, creating the first ‘separation’.
What we attempted to do throughout the process was to minimize any risk that Leo would feel like it was his fault or like he was in any way responsible for our separating. We did things ‘as a family’, including meals and school functions, and we behaved (for him) like his Mummy and Daddy which we are.
Meanwhile, we worked out Andy’s living arrangements. He would eventually move to an apartment in Bondi, which we had both looked at and jointly decided would be a good place for Leo also. Leo got to check out his new room and have a say in how it would be decorated. We divided the furniture, art, and mutual collected possessions of a life together, with a minimum of fuss. The allocation of who got what really was the least of it. We were both generous – whatever was needed to ease the pain and burden of what we were really doing, we tried to make allowances for. He got the TV and stereo (and bought me a new one of each); I got the lounge suite. We divided the rugs (not with scissors). We shopped for kitchen appliances for his new place. A toaster here, a kettle there. Ooh, look at those great Global Knives… and… you’ll definitely need a garlic press… It was all so weirdly domestic.
Andy’s apartment block had a pool, so it already had that in its favour from Leo’s perspective. It was a gradual teasing apart of one home to create two whilst maintaining a definite thread weaving them together.
He finally relocated in September. Our privately and mutually agreed upon custody arrangement was that Leo would stay with his dad four nights out of every two weeks. At the time, this was one of the easiest separation decisions to make because Andy’s work schedule was more pressing and less flexible than mine, so it made sense that I be the primary caregiver and that was definitely what I wanted. To further ease the separation for Leo, we agreed to continue having weekly family dinners – who Leo was with at the time would determine where. That Christmas, we spent the day together. We cooked and had X-mas lunch at Leo’s dad’s new place. We all swam in the pool. Leo was the happiest I’d seen him in ages. (Let’s face it, when your mum and dad aren’t actually screaming at each other, or you, it’s pretty easy to be happy if you’re a kid.)
Andy and I were happy, too – certainly for appearance’s sake if not on the inside – but it mattered not, as we were doing this for Leo, and from all the signs, we were managing it well, so that gave us cause to feel good about at least that. Unlike many families that have extended family close by, we were on our own in Sydney. My extended family lives inter-state and Andy’s overseas, so navigating that part of the situation was simple. For us, it didn’t exist. The bitter irony is, of course, that with the trauma of the separation behind us, Andy and I actually enjoyed each other’s company. But we’d been down this road before, and we both knew that this time there was no turning back.
Spoils of War.
Neither Andy nor I had been particularly great with money during our marriage. With both of us having worked in the arts, our income structure was definitely of the ‘feast or famine’ variety. We were either planning grand adventures and enjoying life or scratching the rent together and bickering.
We had attempted to harness the power of the good times by getting into the property market – doing the right thing, getting a mortgage to get ahead. But we always seemed to buy at the wrong time, and sell at an even worse one. Our final disastrous push to get into the Sydney property market took six months for us to get the finance finalized. As a result of the delay, prices had gone through the roof by the time we bought. We were presented with a tiny 2-bedroom apartment (too small to live in with a child) attached to a mortgage repayment of $3,700 per month! This led to more bickering and recriminations. All around me, my friends seemed to have done everything right. They were buying houses, renovating them, selling them on, making money, and moving up in the world. I felt like we were spiralling in exactly the opposite direction.
In the end, I walked away with a miniscule pool (puddle) of cash, the lease on our rented apartment, some furniture and appliances, and little prospects of a regular income. The grossly overpriced investment-property apartment we had purchased was sold off in a fire sale, barely covering the loan we had managed to take out for it. So, we carved up our money, assets, and interests, of which there was precious little. A small apartment, bank accounts, cars, and debt (along with the human capital of family and friends).
My strategy to avoid a tough, painful fight after the tough, painful decision to separate was simple: if I demanded nothing, there’d simply be nothing to fight over.
Detachment – Stage 2 (The Ugly Truth)
The show must go on…
Anonymous with show business, this saying actually originated in the 19th century in circuses. The understanding being that, if during a performance a wild beast got loose or an acrobat plummeted to an unfortunate end, the band would play merrily on so as to distract the audience from any potential disaster and prevent panic. And it goes even further, as…
“It is a point of honor not to let the other players down by deserting them when no understudy is available.” (Cambridge Idioms Dictionary. 2006)
All showbiz people also know this edict to be true.
My first professional role out of acting school (which is a huge deal) was in 1984. I was twenty years old and performing in a production of Love for Love – a Restoration comedy by William Congreve – for the Royal Queensland Theatre Company. This was when I first experienced the true meaning of that later statement.
I was playing Miss Prue – a silly, awkward country girl with an ample bosom and an amply bawdy personality to match. I came complete with a corset so tight I could rest my chin in my cleavage and red frizzy hair reminiscent of Nicole Kidman in BMX Bandits, and it happened partway through the first act in a scene with the character of Tattle – the aptly named, gossiping, vain philanderer – when he was lustfully wrestling me on a chaise lounge in an attempt to gain access to my bountiful bust. In the rough and tumble of our romantic encounter, while doing my best to resist his ardent advances, I snagged a fingernail on a screwhead sticking out of the lounge, ripping off my entire nail.
Whilst I was aware of the searing pain, the thespian’s mantra played on in my subconscious – The show must go on! – and the expectant and delighted faces I could see in the front few rows of the audience, who in that moment were relying on me to keep them suspended in disbelief, kept me focused on the task at hand. Shrieking while the amorous Tattle ravaged my plump bosom,
I dared to peek down momentarily at my finger to check out the damage, only to see blood covering my hand and dripping all over the satin upholstery.
Thank god for our self-administering wonder-drug, Adrenalin! No sooner did I spot the blood than I shoved my hand into the folds of my costume and finished the scene one-handed (and white-faced). Having witnessed the unscripted bloodletting from the wings, the stage manager was standing by to assist me once I rushed offstage at the end of the scene, where I promptly fainted into his arms. Diva moment complete.
There is something heroic about continuing on with a course of action when all about you is in chaos and ruin, and following my marriage break-up, I was digging really deep to ‘get to the end of the scene’ (in this case, the separation and ‘what comes next’ phase).
And whilst I wasn’t bleeding like a stuck pig or losing fingernails, I was haemorrhaging money (I didn’t have).
As an actor, I knew my chosen profession (although whether it chose me, I cannot be sure, given that she was a fickle mistress at best) was not one you went into for the love of a regular income stream.
It’s no surprise that, away from the glamour of red carpets and photo shoots, the vast majority of working Australian actors struggle to make ends meet. According