Divorce Balance

Negotiation > Recovery > Enhancement

Saturday, April 30, 2005
"The Most Important Thing Here Is..."

It happened again just this week.

One of the divorce lawyers stepped back up to the podium to address the court after a series of alternating arguments presented by counsel for each party. Ostensibly, he was going to bottom-line this case for the judge.

"Your Honor, the most important thing here is to get these two people divorced."

Really—?

According to whom?

I've heard this statement a lot over the years in divorce courts. Spoken purposefully by so many attorneys in so many different venues, so many times. I'm struck by the near memorized consistency of their phraseology.

It must be driven by some real need that I'm not aware of.

Is it possible that judges may be taking to the bench to hear divorce motion dockets without actually realizing that these matters involve "divorce"? Or is there some concern that the husband and wife may have inadvertently failed to realize that the very purpose of divorce court is to get divorced?

Maybe it's an esoteric response to Michigan's so-called "secret marriage" option (MCL 551.201). Gotta put this on the record — as required by divorce law!

Otherwise, it strikes me as a gratuitous statement. And if you figure (as I have) that a motion hearing in divorce court typically costs you nine hundred bucks apiece, that's a lot of money to spend on boilerplate.

Moreover, anything said in divorce court without serving your clear goals will surely move you backwards.

Why is it so important to "get these two people divorced"?

If it's a money shortfall, do you think getting them into two households will be less expensive to operate than one? If they're uncooperative in parenting, do you think that severing martial bonds will motivate them to play together more nicely?

Bottom-line statements tantalize us because they seem to suggest order out of chaos. They imply that somebody knows where we're going in all this — and that we should follow them.

Blindly?

"Anywhere but here," is what you're signing up for.

"Couldn't be worse," you say.

Wanna bet?

Remember this dialogue exchanged during Alice's Adventures in Wonderland?

"Mr. Cat," Alice asks, "which of these paths should I take?"

"Well, my dear, where do you want to go?" inquires the Cheshire Cat.

"I don't suppose it really matters."

"Then, my dear, any path will do."

Silicon Snake Oil enhances this by arguing process.

"Answers are less important than the process of discovery. What else did I uncover in the search? Could I recast my question and run off in a different direction? What are the fallacies in my original assumptions?"

As a divorce mediator, let me tell you that one of the most valuable things that can come from the divorce process is in learning how to be divorced. And that is far from obvious or boilerplate.

Maybe we should propose legislation for "secret divorces" to encourage such processing.

In the meantime, "the most important thing" is figuring out where you will "go to" after divorce. Positively.

—posted by Dell Deaton @6:00 PM EST 4/30/2005 [500]

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