Life Story

It was a liberated marriage
We shared the household chores of course
We understood each others feelings
Right down to the day of our sensible divorce.

I didn't ask him for a penny
I had my liberated training.

So off he went with his hair of bronze
To find a life like Khalil Gibrans
I got my rest from the drugs he did
He got his quest
I got the kid.

But oh
I'm not complaining.

So I set off to be a writer
A modern mother on her own
I wrote up happenings at galleries
Turned down jobs with salaries
Stayed freelance and alone.

I fought the battles of the sixties
Which you recall were rather draining
When men were thick, I hit the hay
Became a prick
Got equal pay
I faced down chauvinistic slobs
I won the fights
Improved the jobs.

But oh
I'm not complaining.

My husband found himself his ashram
Lost forty pounds and went through hell
Then one day he came back from limbo
Found himself some bimbo
And moved to New Rochelle.

I raised my son and I had lovers
My choices sometimes take explaining
I'd meet some jock
My friends would scoff
He'd stay a while
I'd drive him off
I kept my space
Preserved my turf
Six months I'd send him back to surf.

And oooh
I was not complaining.

And now my sons half way through college
I pay tuition like a fine
I'm still this feisty freelance writer
Resume well honed
At a well toned forty-nine.

I find that getting work is harder
Each job I want takes more campaigning
And those sweet young things who hire me now
Those MBA's making fifty thou
Who smile and ask what I have done
When they got their jobs from the fights I won.

Ah, they should all stay home and have babies
But I'm not complaining.

And in the evening at my window
As I watch Jersey growing dim
I feel this troubling emotion
Summed up in this notion
I wished I'd stayed with him.

Lord knows each day with him was madness
As I have spent my life maintaining.

But more and more I recall the joy
My golden dreamer
My lost boy
Our life was life in the twightlight zone
But no worse then a life alone.

But oh
Well I chose my way
And I'm not complaining.