GESENHUES: Divorce on a state level

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June 10, 2009

BY AMY GESENHUES The News and Tribune Wed Jun 10, 2009, 12:46 PM EDT

What's a child of divorce to do (besides therapy)?

They get pulled from side-to-side. They bite their tongue and do their best to make peace; or, they act out trying to grab a single-morsel of attention from two parents who are too self-absorbed to see what is going on around them. Either way, it's usually the child who suffers longer and more intensely when divorce happens.

I do have divorced family members with children that make it work. They are cordial and open their homes to each other for joint-family events. I don't know if it was like that from the start. I have to assume that there was some adjustment time needed before they could share drinks out of the same cooler.

I am a child of divorce (two times over, actually). My parent's divorce did not go as sunny. It's not my place to lay blame here; or, should I say, I have spent way too much money on therapy to re-enter that conversation. But, it's still very difficult for me to be in the same room with both of my parents. It's more than uncomfortable. There is a constant, irrational twinge of fear that the room will implode at any second from the pressure sustained by the two people who once lived every day in a 2200 square-foot home. Fortunately, most times this happens — both of them in the same room — the room is huge (think reception halls and gymnasiums). The bigger the room the easier it is for me to breath.

This idea of large, airy rooms has me wondering how big our state house is. I'm referring to the Indiana Statehouse located at North Capitol Avenue in Indy where our state Legislature meets to legislate. At least, they are supposed to legislate. Unfortunately, our House Democrats walked out of budget negotiations last week because the pre-session hearing on the subject did not go their way.

One democratic representative from Crothersville called the special meeting a, “sham.” Apparently, in true divorcé fashion, our republican governor, Mitch Daniels, went behind his fellow democratic representatives' backs and sent an email asking his supporters to testify in favor of the bill. Probably not the best idea when trying to hold a pre-session hearing that was meant to facilitate a bi-partisan budget negotiation.

But for our democratic leaders, my favored party (parent?) if you will, to walk out because things were not going their way hurt no one but the very people everyone wants to help — Indiana public school children. It probably has miffed republicans a bit since more of their time must now be given to an extended legislative session for the budget. And not all democrats walked out. Rep. Steve Stemler, a democrat from Jeffersonville said that he jumped in his car and came to the statehouse to sit through the rest of the hearing when he saw that many of his party were exiting the premises (of course, this begs the question why he wasn't there in the first place).

I'm sure our state reps would say, “It's complicated. You don't understand these proceedings. You have to make a stand if you want to negotiate on a state level.”

My response: it's not complicated when it comes to the welfare of our children. What they need now more than ever before, with the circumstances of our current global-economic conditions, is more education. And what our state legislatures need to do, on both sides, is suck it up. Leave your egos with your constituents and show up at the statehouse ready to take whatever the other party is going to toss your way and then make it work.

So what if the pre-session hearings were not what you thought they were going to be. Is anything? How much more effective and admirable would it have been to stay seated, listened to whatever “sham” you thought the Republicans were pulling, and then rolled your sleeves up to make these budget negotiations work? Someone has to be an adult; turning your back and stomping out of the room is only hurting your children.

According to media reports, if our lawmakers cannot find a middle ground and vote a new budget into effect by July 1, “ ... Democrats will likely have to shoulder some of the blame, even as they try to put the responsibility on Daniels.”

That sounds just like a divorce gone badly to me ... two parties ripping the other to shreds (or the paper their bills are written on) because they can't see eye-to-eye and forgetting, or avoiding, the fact that the people who are going to suffer the most are the kids.

Amy Gesenhues is a freelance writer in Floyd County. You can read her daily commentaries at www.AmyWroteIt.Wordpress.com or email her at amy@amywroteit.com.

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