Fool For a Client

One of my favorite aspects of my genetic heritage is the ability to hustle. It beats the hell out of "likelihood of developing Furby-sized malignancies" and "periodic desire to smear entire eastern seaboard with Nutella and devour it, in order that I might survive the harsh Siberian winter".

My paternal grandfather was by many accounts a cantankerous little bastard. He was stubborn, argumentative and hot-tempered. Had he been French, his ass would've been banished to Elba in a heartbeat. He was, however, Ukrainian, and used his unique form of cantankerous bastardry to help his family survive one of the blackest periods in that nation's history.

The great Ukrainian famine occurred from 1932-1933. It was not the result of natural causes, but rather the Soviet Union's agricultural collectivization campaign ("Together, we shall produce a wealth of grain for the motherland!... just not for you, or your kids, or anyone in your miserable little village"). Under the guidance of everyone's second-favorite insane mustachioed tyrant (ladies and gentlemen, "Genocidin' Joey" STALIIIIIIN!), millions of Ukrainians were displaced, starved or murdered. My grandfather, his wife and two small boys survived, eventually washing up in America (I'm sure dyeda would be immensely proud that his granddaughter is using her family's hard-won freedom primarily to make dick jokes on the Internet).

"How the hell did they survive?" I asked my father. "All those people were wiped out, but this tiny little dude and his entire family managed to make it?" "Your grandfather was... a hustler," my father explained, "He knew how to get things... and he knew people who knew how to get things."

I don't claim that my wiles even approach those of my grandfather. I doubt that I'd be able to single-handedly save my family from the horrors of Stalinist Russia. Hell, I can barely make it out of Target without getting hopelessly lost (and tempted to lure my meatier fellow patrons into sporting goods in order to cannibalize them). But I do see seem to have inherited a glimmer of my wee forebear's craftiness. I connive. I scheme. I fix what's broken. I may not know people who know how to get things ("Erm, excuse me, uh [peers at name tag], Jonathan? Do you happen to know where I might be able to get a jar of pickle spears to accompany Mr. Q-Tips and 12-Pack of Charmin over here?"). However, given sufficient time and Googling, there's very little I myself cannot obtain.

Including a divorce.

The average American divorce costs somewhere in the neighborhood of $5,000. And that's for a simple, uncontested case. For a more contentious split, the figures skyrocket.

My divorce cost about $250. A goodly portion of that was due to the fact that there was a 7-11 right next to the courthouse (Taquitos: official grease-scepter of the hungry litigant!). And how did you manage this, Jul?, you may or may not be asking. How did you sever the bonds of holy matrimony in a fair and expeditious fashion sans counsel? And what flavor were the Taquitos?

Jalapeno cream cheese, my friend. Jalapeno cream cheese.

Your Defensive Terrapin Style Is No Match For My Complaintive Mongoose Style! : Jul's In No Way Advisable Guide to Being Your Own Divorce Lawyer

You've heard the saying "All men want a virgin in the parlor and a whore in the bedroom"? Perhaps this is true. Perhaps it's misogynistic crap. However, when orchestrating one's own divorce, it is necessary to be a spitfire at the negotiating table and a total fucking idiot at the courthouse. Confused? Let me explain:

1. You do not pay a divorce lawyer to ensure an equitable dissolution of your marriage. You do not pay them to look out for your best interests.

You pay them to look stupid on your behalf.

I've ambled down to Family Court approximately 70,000 times over the past few months. I've come totally unprepared, and I've come hauling briefcases full of legal bad-assery.

The only thing which has made a goddamned bit of difference is my willingness to act like a total dipshit.

At first, I tried to play it cool. I had all the right forms. I had them signed, sealed, notarized and copied in quadruplicate. It didn't matter.

Me : "Okay, so I have every form you requested last time, plus every other form available on the court's website, including the really freaking obscure ones, just in case."
Court Employee : "Huh, let's see... motion to blah blah blah... request for blah blah... application for a rhinoceros license... temporary permit for colorful street festival and/or impromptu West Side Story-style "rumble"... okay, we can't accept any of this. You don't have an Amendment to Redact Aforementioned Mentionings."
Me : "There is no such thing! You just made that up."
Court Employee : "Nuh-uh."
Me : "Yuh-huh!"
Court Employee : "Oh, would you look at that, it looks like there's a problem with your affidavit of consent, too."
Me : "No, there -"
Court Employee : [rubs meticulously-prepared affidavit on rear of poly-blend slacks, flings to the ground, walks away chortling]

Desperate times called for desperate measures. I hadn't whipped out The Dumbness for a number of years. Why, I cannot say... it's a marvelously effective technique. The last time I'd done so, it had netted me a replacement fish tank in under five minutes.

Fishamajig Industries Customer Service Rep : "Well, it SHOULD be filtering... are you SURE you've checked the impeller?"

Me : "YES I AM SURE I CHECKED THE IMPALER!"
F.I.C.S.R. : "No you didn't! You just called it the 'impaler'!"
Me : "I'm holding it in my hand right now! It is... uh... tiny! And full of fish poop!"
F.I.C.S.R. : "Oh, christ. You'll have a new tank in 4 - 6 weeks, okay?"

The next time I visited the courthouse, I did so with a twinkle in my eye and a "duh" on my lips.

Me : "Um... so... I can get this done today, right?" [holds out sheet of construction paper with "MOSHUN FOR YOU GUYS TO GIVE ME A DIVORSE THINGY" scrawled across it in "Mango Fandango" lip gloss]
Court Employee: "You poor woman! You poor, stupid woman. Let me see what I can do."

2. However, when dealing with the erstwhile Mr. Thumbscrews, I found it best to scoop up that spare cognitive capability and cram it right back in my cranium.

Me : [deposits immense stack of paperwork at Mr. Thumbscrews' feet via forklift] [beep... beep... beep... beep...]
Mr. Thumbscrews : "What the fuck?!"
Me : "Oh, it's just your standard Complaint in Lieu of Forcible Contusion of Defendant's Testicular Region, a Waiver of All Possible Recourse, Countersuit and Hope of Salvation, Addendum to Complaint Granting Plaintiff Sole Possession of Entire Marital Library (With Supplementary "Except For Tom Clancy; Fuck Him and the Submarine He Rode In On" Clause)... you know, the usual."
Mr. Thumbscrews : "Huhhhhhh... ?"
Me : "Oh, just sign up and shut up."
Mr. Thumbscrews : "These don't give you permission to change J.Q.'s name to Bitey Bodhavista and raise him on an ashram, do they?"
Me : "Not explicitly, no."
Mr. Thumbscrews : "Oh, okay." [whips out pen]

The Artist Formerly Known as Mr. Thumbscrews is not an unintelligent man. He is, in fact, rather bright. However, when confronted with 30,000 pages of legal jargon, most people tend to clam up faster than Mrs. Paul's. As I had exhibited no prior Betty Broderick-style psycho-bitchiness - and, more importantly, seemed to know what I was talking about without charging him $200 an hour for the privilege - Mr. T. deferred to my judgement. Hope you enjoyed your corneas, honey... they're MINE now.

No! Our settlement was entirely fair. Which is the point: I could've attempted to forcibly violate my ex with a long, hard, enormous... court battle. But that was deeply offensive to my pride. Where was the challenge in hiring a pair of lawyers to attack one another like inbred bettas? It was far more unusual - and more satisfying - to finagle a mutually-agreeable split from the materials at hand - a few T-bills, a couple of Taquitos and a healthy helping of shrewdness. When viewed from outside the swirling shitstorm of emotion, our marriage was, at heart, a broken thing. It was a situation which needed to be fixed, and fix it I did. And I didn't even need to check the impaler.