So I spilled the beans a little bit in the prior post. The "best" (actually worst) came out of my wife's lawyer on this seventh day.
My wife's lawyer is feeling some heat:
- She has huge fees outstanding
- My wife can't pay them, even with a generous settlement
- She can't justify the high fees
- It's becoming abundantly clear that she has been the cause of the delay
- She's running out of tricks
- She's running out of time because of the judges mandate to dispose of the case
So now in their role as "officers of the court" they are trying to jam a settlement down our throats. The frenetic horse trading begins in earnest. So her lawyer wants to take the lead (as usual) and wants to demonstrate how powerful she is to her client but doesn't want me to see my lawyer buckling under her heavy handed tactics.
So she asked my lawyer to send me out of the room, he says to me, "Could you step out?" I respond, "what the fuck", he makes a "sh" sign and then says, "yeah he's out" (lying to her).
She starts yelling at him, and he yells back in what I'm sure was a well choreographed script. She yelled that his client (me) was unreasonable. So he said, lets see where we have disagreements and named almost a dozen, then as they argued he said, well that's another one we gave in on, if we're keeping score. Several sarcastic barbs like that from my lawyer provoked more screaming by her.
My lawyer pointed out that valuations were done on a variety of dates so they all favored my wife. "I can't take that back to him, Give me something to take to him", Now she has to convince my stubborn wife to give up something she promised and has difficulty explaining the concept of consistent valuation dates since both she and my wife are mathematically challenged. She uses her usual yelling method and intimidation methods on her own clients.
She was yelling in front of my wife, at my wife so my lawyer could hear, criticizing my wife for not understanding her, and yelling at her staff for a legal pad (apparently she doesn't keep a supply in her desk drawer).
When I say screaming what do I mean? I mean that I could hear her (including some specific words) while sitting at my lawyer's conference table over 15 feet away.
Of course when she got to the court house she acted calm and professional.
I guess there is a pattern, acting like a nut outside the court to everyone, pretending to be Ms. Innocent Dummy inside the courtroom. She is so much like my wife, except my wife is on her best behavior outside my presence, and shows her true nutty self to me and so rarely to anyone else.
I haven't figured out if they just act nuts to intimate people or really are? Only their psychiatrists would know for sure.
Status: First Draft, I'll have to see if I can extract more details from my lawyer
2 comments:
this case has gone past ridiculous already - courtesy of your stbx wife.
I liked the part where you acknowledged that the lawyers were acting out a scene - the "well choreographed script".
You and I know that that's exactly what it is. They are so full of it.
The "act" that even the guilty spouse plays is so transparent - you sort of just get used to it after a while. No point in even questioning it or else we'll drive ourselves mad.
I've told my lawyer, don't bother with the charades, I can see through it and I find it irritating. But I guess it is so deeply entrenched they can't turn it off.
Your last paragraph may be very true, but then I have deeply entrenched traits too. Perfectionism (from my tag line) can cause you to question things that might be better left alone. It's a balance I struggle with. It serves me well in technical analysis, in moving data centers, because those problems are just technical, therefore solvable. But when applied to people, it is almost enough to drive you mad, since people are a more complex enigma.
Interestingly enough, my wife had my parents fooled by her act. Even when I told them details from behind the scenes and predicted the kidnapping, they thought it was me who was over reacting.
Then on that fateful night and the weeks that followed, it became clear to them, without another word from me.
I remember my mild mannered father saying, "I wouldn't believe her if she had a bible in her mouth".
Leigh, talked of the mask that people wear to protect themselves, but there are masks that some people use to abuse others and those are so much more insidious.
I often wonder how to raise my boy in this day and age to be of strong moral fiber, but not naive of the world's cruel tricks and abusive people. Now that dichotomy is enough to drive someone mad!
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