From Illimitable Men: Marriage is the only legal contract in existence that permits a person to violate contractual terms and then subsequently penalize the party who upheld said terms.

From Briffault’s Law: Where the female can derive no benefit from association with the male, no such association takes place.

I had a date with a lady I met online, I’ll call her “Jan” (because I grew up watching the Brady Bunch reruns, and I always thought Jan was “groovy”). Jan and I met for a few drinks at a watering hole near my house. I like this place because it has pool tables and dart boards. The games are good because there’s something to do other than sit there at the bar. They also provide opportunities for kino, and if things work out very well, it’s a short drive to my house.

Jan’s a divorced, decent looking petite blonde, early 30’s. She has one son. She’s a veterinarian who has her own private practice. We live in a farming community, so I’d assume she makes pretty good scratch for her age. Jan drinks draft beer and wears jeans and cowboy (cowgirl?) boots.

We had the typical “why did you divorce” first date conversation. Her story was a routine example of hypergamy in action:

She and her ex-husband met through the sport of “cutting”, which is a competition where a rider and horse work to separate a cow from the herd in front a panel of judges. Like any equestrian sport, it’s an expensive hobby. It's pricey to buy and maintain cutting horses, plus transportation to competitions, etc.

The husband, let’s call him Peter (to keep with the Brady Bunch name theme), worked in IT, while she was studying to be a veterinarian. The also had a small farm where they raised cattle. The farm had been in Peter’s family for generations.

Peter was repairing some fencing on the farm where the cattle had been escaping. He was operating a post-hole-digger tractor attachment and got his foot caught in the auger which mangled and nearly amputated his foot. The accident happened in front of their son, which probably saved him from bleeding to death because the son was able to call for help.

The injury required multiple surgeries and extended rehabilitation to save the foot. While he was off work he exhausted his disability coverage and FMLA, and was released from his good-paying job as a network administrator.

They were able to save his foot, and after it had healed enough, he started looking for work but was unable to find any openings locally. He ended up getting a job at an employer who was a few hours away. Rather than relocate his family and remove his wife and son from their schools, friends, etc., he elected to rent a small apartment in the town where his job was, travel there early Monday morning, and return Friday evening after work. Not an ideal setup, but a man does what he has to do to provide for his family.

Meanwhile Jan was left alone during the week, studying to be a veterinarian, and taking care of their son and the cows. Jan became increasingly resentful of this arrangement, picturing her husband enjoying the solitude of his apartment all week, while she was left to take care of everything.

The tipping point came when Peter surprised her with a very nice new dually truck and horse trailer for use at their cutting competitions. He bought the truck and trailer to try to appease her because she was so unhappy with his work travel. The problem was that he had gotten an equity loan against the family farm to fund the vehicle purchase, and to pay off other debts they had incurred after his foot injury. When Jan found out about the loan, she concluded that Peter was “not an asset, but a liability” (she used those exact terms when telling the story).

Further complicating matters, Jan had made a new “best friend” while at school, I’ll call him Greg. While Peter was away at work all week, earning money to support his family and pay for Jan’s education, Jan and Greg (and Jan’s son) were spending more and more time together. Peter wasn’t very happy with this arrangement and grew increasingly irritated and jealous of their friendship. Jan felt Peter was simply being insecure and controlling.

As soon as Jan graduated from veterinary school and got set up with her own practice, she and Peter separated, and she moved into an apartment near her new office. Peter was actually the one who filed for divorce, but it was a last-ditch act of desperation to bring her back (“move back or we’re getting divorced” kind of thing).

Peter had to liquidate the family farm in the divorce. He now lives full time in his little work apartment. Jan got to keep her veterinary practice intact, along with her nice new dually truck (I’ve seen it, it’s a sweet ride). She’s currently building a new house out in the country.

I have to wonder if Peter had just completely lost his foot in that accident, and went right back to work instead of being off for so long to save the foot, would he have kept his job, and therefore his marriage? So he’d only have one foot, but still be married to Jan, instead of having both feet and being divorced. Is a wife worth one foot? (Fuck no!)

Lastly, it seems Jan’s BFF Greg had his fun and moved on. So now Jan is dating online, shopping around for a replacement husband. She’s actually not a bad catch, just don’t get injured or she’ll be gone.

TLDR: Husband got hurt and lost his job. Wife branch swung as soon as her education was completed.