Leaving Salt Lake City

by Matthew Timion

  Matt,

  It seems that you've fallen back into the cycle of not returning phone calls or text messages, so I'll once again reach out via email.

  You had indicated that the money would be paid back to me by the end of January or February at the latest. You stated you had side work monies coming in and with the addition of your tax return you told me that you could pay me back in full.

  I have made it very clear that I can be patient and realistic as long as you would maintain open communication with me.

  That seems to be something you cannot and are unwilling to do considering this is now the second time you have ignored my attempts to collect money and/or information about the money.

  Again, this is your timeline that I'm following for the payment.

  I don't think that it's unreasonable for me to expect you to do one of two things;

  1. If your proposed timeline is no longer an option - communicate that with me.

  2. Set more realistic timelines for payment as I depend upon that money, and considering the move I just made, i was counting on it at the end of last month.

  The way you have been handling (or more to the point, not handling) this money situation is irresponsible at the very least. You're not the only one that needs money, has other financial responsibility, or personal matters that require financial support.

  I'm not going to give up my attempt to recover the money owed to me, nor should I be expected to.

  Please tell me when I can either expect it in full, or what kind of monthly payment plan works for you.

  thanks,

  Courtney

  I knew that I had pushed her to this. She was frustrated because I had cut her off and had not communicated with her about my issues. Regardless, I had had enough. Our friendship had turned into nothing more than her trying to collect a debt from me; a debt that was initially a gift. It was a gift for which I was very grateful.

  Courtney was the only person who had believed in me enough to help me when I needed it most. Then our relationship went sour because I couldn’t do long distance and I was sick of being told constantly what I was doing wrong. I just wanted to be left alone at that point. What was once love had become nothing more than someone I knew constantly asking for money the money I owed her but did not have.

  Courtney,

  Let me start by stating the obvious: You initially GAVE the money to me. Secondly, you make more than twice (annually) than I do. Third, I am still dealing with having to pay for a lawyer to fight for my son, as well as fighting to keep my house.

  You only asked for the money back after any form of a relationship wouldn't work out. I agreed to pay this money.

  It has become extremely clear to me that the extent of our "friendship" has become nothing more than you collecting money from me that was originally a gift.

  Give me a physical address and I'll send you a check every month. I'll do this until it's paid off. Other than that, please stop calling, texting, and emailing about this. You have made yourself, and your take on our friendship very clear.

  I was done with her. I couldn’t take it any more. Looking back I know she was being open and trying to communicate with me about the situation. All that I heard, at the time, was someone hounding me for money. This is why people say to never lend money to friends or family. You should only give it as a gift. My pushing her away ruined what could have been a great friendship.

  I really don’t know if our situation was caused by both of our issues or if the issues were just mine. It didn’t matter. I never sent her the money although I had every intention of doing so. I kept falling behind on my bills and daycare again. It seemed like I was in a cycle that would never stop. For those months I felt like I was just falling and out of control. I was the only one who could fix it but I had no idea where to start.

  Manny’s birthday came and went. He invited some friends over from martial arts, which was turning into our new social outlet. I didn’t see my fellow martial arts enthusiasts much outside of class, but at least I saw them three times a week. They were not constantly hounding me for money. They never called me drunk or asked me to have sex with them. I was moving up in the world.

  The family who came over from our martial arts class lived in the hills of North Salt Lake City, which I should explain is considered the “rich” area of Salt Lake City. Their house was massive. Their entire house was four thousand square feet. Not including the basement, which Manny and I rarely used, we were living in approximately eight hundred square feet. When they came over one of them said, “Oh, this house is quaint,” which is how white Americans say that a house is small.

  Our kids were running around and playing. The adults had a beer and were talking. Suddenly all of the kids, running in a pack, went outside and were playing on the sidewalk. The parents from North Salt Lake City stood up in a panic.

  “Where did my kids go?" They were stressing out.

  “Just outside to play,” I said back.

  “We don’t do that in our neighborhood. No one goes outsides to play." Kids running outside to play was common in my neighborhood. Perhaps that was part of why I liked living in a “bad” neighborhood. My neighborhood was filled with families unable to afford giant televisions and pianos. We could not afford a swimming pool or an exercise room. For fun the kids ran outside and played in the street or played tag. Maybe in 2011 that was how “poor” people lived, but as far as I was concerned it was how I was raised. It wasn’t a bad thing at all.

  Manny’s Spring Break vacation was fast approaching. It was Jessica’s turn. With our custody battle still open and still up in the air, I waited for her to give me notice. As much as I hated her at that moment, I knew if she took Manny for the week she wouldn’t try to repeat her failed attempt of taking Manny. She wouldn’t try to repeat history because it had not worked out for her before. I honestly wanted a vacation from parenting. A vacation from my daily parenting duties would give me a chance to sleep in, maybe go out on a date, or perhaps I could even get the house cleaned while an eight year old tornado wasn’t undoing everything I had just done.

  From: Jessica Jacobs

  To: Matthew Timion

  Sent: Wednesday, March 16, 2011 9:03 PM

  Subject: Spring Break

  Matt,

  Vince and I will be visiting Utah in April. Manny's school break is April 18-22, so I want to coordinate his pickup and drop off with you. We will be staying in Kaysville while we are there.

  Also, has he had his school pictures taken this year? If so, I'd like to have a decent size copy (8x10 or 5x7) and two wallet size. Please let me know the cost of the photos plus shipping, and I'll send that to you.

  Thanks,

  Jessica

  Jessica seemed to have calmed down a bit. She was being cordial. Because she gave me proper notice I had had no choice but to allow Manny's visit with her. Luckily Manny would stay in town so I wouldn’t have to worry about missing a flight again.

  From: Jessica Jacobs

  Subject: My Utah Visit

  To: Matthew Timion

  Date: Tuesday, March 29, 2011, 5:36 AM

  I haven't heard back from you. The dates of our visit will be changing, and we will only be there for a couple of days. My plan is to pick up Manny when he is out of school and spend an evening or two with him.

  Please respond so we can plan this out appropriately.

  I could have, at that moment, told her to buzz off. I could have told her no, you didn’t give me thirty days notice, screw you. Instead I was accommodating. I asked for the dates of her visit. I was told April 4th through April 6th.

  Three days before her visit, plans changed again. I had quit telling Manny that his mom was going to visit. I had learned that lesson from Christmas of 2009. Never tell Manny his mom would do anything because there was a good chance she would not follow through.

  From: Jessica Jacobs

  Subject: RE: My Utah Visit

  To: Matthew Timion

&nb
sp; Date: Friday, April 1, 2011, 9:40 AM

  There's been a change in plans. I won’t be able to go to Utah but Vince will. He'd like to stop by and see Manny, drop some things off, and take him to dinner with the girls either tues or wed night. Which is best?

  I talked to my lawyer. Vince had no visitation rights. Besides, he had had such a major role in the proceedings over the last year. I didn’t trust him alone with my dog, let alone my son. I wrote her back.

  Date: Mon, 4 Apr 2011 09:48:30 -0700

  From: Matthew Timion

  Subject: RE: My Utah Visit

  To: Jessica Jacobs

  I am sorry, but Vince has no visitation rights. If he has something to deliver, please have him mail it or drop it off during the day.

  She replied the next day.

  From: Jessica Jacobs

  Subject: RE: My Utah Visit

  To: Matthew Timion

  Date: Tuesday, April 5, 2011, 7:08 AM

  Listen, I know you and I want nothing to do with each other. But, the issue at hand is Manny and the Girls. The bottom line is that there are people that love Manny, his step-dad and step- sisters, that want to just see him for ONE evening. Are you really so hateful that you are going to prevent family members from getting together one night because I'm not there? There are two other children (Percy and Sarah) to consider and you're just taking your anger out on me and using the power you have at the moment to be hateful. That is wrong and you know it.

  I love it when people tell me what I know. When I was a Mormon, people would routinely come up to me and tell me what I believed and then proceed to tell me why my beliefs were wrong. They never, for a second, asked me if I actually believed what they were saying. They never thought that perhaps my personal beliefs did not always align with the official Mormon doctrine. I hated that.

  I refused to trust Jessica and Vince. I would never trust them considering the hell they had put me through over the past year. There was a time when I would have tried to meet in the middle with them for the benefit of Manny, but when I found out about their true characters my job went from peacemaker to protector of my son.

  Vince dropped off an Easter basket, rang the doorbell, and left. There was no confrontation. I didn’t hear from Jessica for a while after that. Her lack of involvement gave me a sense of peace.

  It was late April of 2011 and a number of tornadoes were hitting the Huntsville, Alabama area, where Jessica and Vince lived. I kept refreshing websites hoping to read about casualties. I didn't want Jessica and Vince to die, but sometimes I thought about how her death would solve all of the nonsense I was going through. I just wanted Jessica to go away.

  | FORTY SEVEN |

  Dorothy?

  April 2011

  Manny knew the rules. He knew his mom was not allowed to talk to me on the phone. I reminded him of this constantly. “Your mom calls to talk to you, not me." These rules were exactly what made what happened next so difficult.

  Manny and I were bored. We didn’t have money for a movie or anything else so we decided to go to an event to see dogs ready to be adopted. Manny loved animals. Just being around animals made him happier. While in the car on the way to see the animals, my phone rang. It was Jessica. I gave Manny the phone.

  Jessica was hysterical. “A tornado hit us!” She was so loud I could hear her. Manny sat in the seat next to me looking worried. He listened. “Everything is destroyed!” she yelled. “Vince was hurt in the tornado!” Manny’s face went from worried to terrified. “Put your dad on the phone!” I told Manny that I couldn’t talk because I was driving. What I told Manny was just an excuse. I didn’t want to talk to her. I had nothing to say to her that she couldn’t say in an email. Manny relayed the message to Jessica. “Tell your dad I’m a tornado survivor!”

  “Dad, she said she’s a tornado survivor." His voice was shaking. I am certain all he wanted was for me to see his pain and talk to Jessica.

  “Manny, I’m driving, keep talking to your mom." By that point her attempt to talk to me had turned into a shell game. I heard her tell Manny to put the phone up against my ear. He tried. I told him to stop. She wailed and cried to Manny about how difficult everything was. A tear formed in Manny’s eye. He was upset. She told him to put the phone up to my ear again. I pushed his hand away. In order to avoid talking to Jessica I kept driving for an hour, hoping they would end their call. I should have just picked up the phone and told her to get lost. I couldn’t do that in front of Manny though. I was trying to consider his feelings. He didn’t need to see me talking like that to his mom.

  “My dad says if you want to talk to him you can send an email." Manny was just repeating what I told him.

  “But I’m a tornado survivor!” She wore the new status of tornado survivor as some sort of badge of honor. Growing up in Illinois, I had lived through tornados myself. When I was in second grade a tornado had knocked down the tree in our backyard and destroyed our jungle gym. It was a sad day for children all over the neighborhood. I had worked at a Boy Scout camp with tornados touching down all around us one summer. We spent the time in our rain gear ready to evacuate campsites into the closest ravine. Despite growing up with weather Jessica had just “survived,” I never considered myself a “tornado survivor." I never thought my experiences allowed me any kind of special privilege.

  Eventually the phone call ended. Manny and I looked at the dogs and did some grocery shopping. I’m sure we mostly bought canned goods. Canned goods were cheap and easy meals.

  “Dad,” Manny said. He said my name like he was asking a question. His face looked worried. “I’m worried about Mom and Vince. Mom said he got really hurt. I just keep imagining Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz in the tornado." Manny loved the Wizard of Oz. He would watch it a few times a week. Now one of his favorite movies had become a reminder of how horrible weather can be.

  I called Jessica’s family to ensure that she was okay. I would have hated for my refusal to talk to her to be unwarranted. I would have hated it if Vince was hurt and in the hospital. Jessica’s family told me that Vince and Jessica were fine. Their house wasn’t destroyed. The worst that had happened was that their power was out for a few days.

  May came and went and there was no word from Jessica. Our lives consisted mostly of school, work, and martial arts. I contacted my lawyer and there was no update on the court case. June came. I still had not heard from Jessica about a summer visit. I sent her an email.

  In the first half of the email to Jessica, I put it all out there for her to see - a detailed timeline of her negative interaction (or just plain lack of interaction) with our son. I hoped that seeing it all in one place would give her perspective, but I knew that was unlikely.

  Towards the end of the email I wrote the following:

  Lately you have been calling again insisting that I talk to you. It upsets Manny, and it especially upsets him when you continue to tell him to do something that I have asked him not to do.

  I know that you do not understand most of what I'm going to say, but your words affect Manny. You tell him things that no child should have to worry about. Why did you tell him last summer he wasn't going to live with me? Why do you burden him with your lack of employment, or lie and say that Vince was hurt by a tornado? You repeatedly tell him to give me the phone, and he is extremely confused. You call him and put him between us, making him your errand boy when all you need to do is send me an email.

  I am left with the decision that you either do not understand that the majority of what you do affects Manny, or that you just do not care about his emotional well-being.

  And just so you know in advance, if you do decide to take Manny for the summer, he will not go without a return ticket. I will not have a repeat of last year, especially since you are legally obligated to pay for his return trip.

  For whatever reason I felt it important to spell out to her all of what she had done. I thought that maybe if she saw the pattern herself, or perhaps acknowledged that yes, she was guilty, t
hat things would change. It never worked. She didn’t reply. A week later she sent me a text message saying that there was a change of plans, and she wouldn’t be able to afford to bring Manny out for the summer. Her disregard meant Manny would be home all summer, and I would have to pay four hundred and fifty dollars per month to his daycare while I worked. Considering the alternative, the cost was worth it.

  | FORTY EIGHT |

  Time for a Cool Change

  End of May 2011

  At the beginning of 2011 I started looking for another job. I loved where I worked. I loved my co-workers. I did not love, however, that I was being paid twenty to thirty thousand dollars less than the going rate for what I did. Most of my co-workers had been with the company longer than I had been and were able to supplement their income with stock options. I had no stock options. My coworkers had big homes, nicer cars, and disposable income. I had a small run-down house and a car that I had to park on a hill so it would start. The battery barely held a charge, and I had to pop the clutch to get it to go. What was once my dream car because of its amazing fuel economy had turned into a nuisance I could not get rid of.

  I received a job offer from a new company located in Sugar House, a small community in Salt Lake City. My new salary would be fifteen thousand dollars more than I was making before, and I would have stock options. I envisioned the company being sold in a few years time and being able to cash out, pay off my house, and perhaps start my own martial arts studio. I loved martial arts. I loved the exercise and the simple nature of it. With my new job offer I talked to my boss.

  “I received a new job offer. It’s for fifteen thousand more.”

  “Did you consider talking to us about a counter offer first? Have you considered the stock options?" I was in line to receive about fifteen hundred worth of stock options if I stuck around for another year.