The First Few Years of My Marriage Were a Failure
By: Jason Weiland
Tags: Mental Health, Family, Relationships, Ninjabyob, Lifestyle

Eventually, my brother got a job offer and left Gallup for greener pastures, and Linda and I had no place to live. We found a tiny apartment we could afford, but it had problems. Cold air leaked in the windows, and snow blew under the door. There was one gas heater in the bedroom that didn’t come close to heating the whole house.

It was so awful, we named it, “Ye Olde Shithole!” Linda left the theater because we were officially “together” and she couldn’t work at the same place as me. She got a job as a waitress where the tips were okay, and the food she brought home from work was excellent.

We were broke but had some good times. My mom and dad wanted to meet Linda for a long time, so they showed up in Gallup one day. Of course, we made it seem as though Linda was just visiting my apartment because they didn’t know we lived together.

Since Gallup is a boring and hideous place, we loaded in the car and took the drive to Santa Fe for the day.

Linda must have passed the test because as we were walking up to a restaurant for lunch, my dad lifted his leg and farted loudly, and he would only do that in front of people he likes. He does have manners. They also bought me some groceries because the cupboard was bare.

It was a good sign.

It was around that time that Linda peed on a stick and found out she was pregnant. I had no idea how I was going to announce this to my family because up until then, I had done a good job of hiding my sins from them and the Witnesses.

I didn’t want the Witnesses to know because I would have been disfellowshipped and my mom and dad would have been forced to shun me, and I didn’t want to lose them. We vowed to keep the pregnancy a secret for as long as we could.

But, time went on, and working as a manager for the theaters was getting old. Imagine if the former manager you took over for had a history of stealing money. Then imagine the big boss treated him like a son and enabled him. Also, imagine that the big boss let the former manager still have keys to the building and access to the safe.

Finally, imagine overhearing the former manager talking to the big boss and referring to me as a “scapegoat.”

The next time money went missing from the safe, I documented everything, turned in my evidence to the corporate office, and quit my job.

It was the only thing I could do.

One would think with the kind of experience I had, someone would hire me. But, I was young and not a high school graduate, and in a depressed economy where there were more educated workers than jobs, I got left out in the cold.

But I lucked out and someone offered me a free apartment in exchange for being the rental manager/maintenance man, so we didn’t have to worry about rent, and the apartment was much more pleasant and suitable. But I still needed to find something that paid actual money, because Linda and I had to eat.

So what did I do? I sold vacuum cleaners door-to-door. If you know anything about the companies that sell these overpriced hunks of metal, you know that very few people want to spend $1200 on a vacuum, even if they can make small monthly payments.

I sold a total of one my first week, and that was it, but kept cold-calling because that is what the senior salesmen said to do if I wanted to make money.

Then Linda left her job at the cafe, and our food and money quickly ran out.

With the last bit of money, we went and bought a substantial bag of potatoes.

I was severely depressed and anxious about having no money, and it was putting massive stress on our relationship. It also didn’t help that my duties as a rental manager were clashing with my ability to go out and sell vacuums.

And you can imagine what eating only potatoes for two weeks will do to a person.

The depression got so bad that all I did was sleep. I ignored Linda, I didn’t answer the phone when tenants called, and I didn’t sell any more vacuum cleaners.

During the time when I was in a funk but had managed to go out of town for work to cold-call a new territory, Linda started to bleed, and her friend Tina took her to the Indian hospital.

She lost the baby, and even if we still didn’t know how we were going to tell people, it was a huge blow to our relationship and the last straw that broke the camel’s back.

I was a failure again. We had no money, no food, and I was getting fired as the rental manager because all I did was sleep, so we had no place to live either.

I finally called my parents and asked them to send me money. All they had was $100, but it was enough for us to buy more food than we had seen for a long time.

When I was talking to my dad, he suggested I move back to Tucson, where he could help me. He could get me a temporary place to live until I got a job and got back on my feet, and it sounded like the perfect solution.

Things were not going great with Linda, and when I said I was fickle, I meant it. I listened to my friend Paul when he tried to convince me not to stay with Linda. Again, he never liked her. For a while, I listened, and I told Linda I was leaving and would not be taking her with me.

What an asshole, right? But, in my defense, I was young and having second thoughts about getting married when I had my whole life ahead of me. My life was also in turmoil and I was only thinking of myself.

As for Linda, she had no place to go but back with her brother to the reservation. She couldn’t move back in with her estranged mother. I felt terrible that she would be starting from zero, but, I was firm and told her I couldn’t take her. At least for a while.

As time got closer to leave, the more I didn’t want to go without her, so we started talking about what it would be like to go together. We even talked to my parents about it and they thought it was a good idea, but mentioned that if we wanted to stay together in the same house with them, we would have to be married.

In all the excitement, we forgot that part.

In the end, I changed my mind, apologized, and we started making serious plans for both of us to head to Tucson. And when my friend said I was making a mistake, I ignored him.