American in Spain

I'm getting divorced.

December 28, 2007

I thought this marriage thing was going to be really nice, but it's been almost 11 weeks, and I just can't take it anymore. Things have just spiraled out of control. My lawyer says that the percentage of the house that I can get depends entirely on the paternity test, so we'll know sometime next week. December 28th is the Dí­a de los Inocentes, marking the Christian legend that, a few days after Jesus' birth, King Herrod had all the male infants slaughtered to prevent losing his throne to a newborn "King of the Jews". In the Spanish-speaking world, today is the equivalent of April Fools Day, where people play practical jokes on others and try to get them to believe incredible lies. Exactly how mass infanticide translates to fooling people is unclear to me. Is it a day "not to be fooled into giving your newborn to the jewish police" (the grieving parents are the fools)? Or a day "not to be fooled into thinking you can prevent what is destined to happen" (King Harrod is the fool)? Who knows. Either way, not very funny.

Consequently, the Spanish do not celebrate April 1st in this manner.

So there, now you've learned something today. Just to be clear, nothing about the title or first paragraph is true except for the number of weeks of marital bliss experienced so far.

Go on, fess up in the comments if you were fooled.