Dear Annie:

I found a journal from 6 years ago. Forgot I put it away. I wrote about my mother’s death and how unsupportive my (ex)husband was at that time when I needed him most. I also wrote about him and the things that frustrated, angered, hurt and confused me. I know now that I was living in denial, trying to make the best out my marriage and be a good little wife.

My question is, should I keep the pages I filled with angst about him, or should I burn them in effigy and find the closure I long for?

Sadness in revelation

Dear Sadness:

Because you wrote extensively about these frustrations and the fact that he’s now your ‘ex’ indicates to me that you were never able to communicate these feelings in any detail to him and that’s a deal breaker. No long term relationship can withstand one partner dictating terms while the other stuffs their own needs. Needing sympathetic support from a spouse when a parent dies is Marriage 101 so if he couldn’t do that, there were probably plenty of other things he couldn’t do which left you alone to “make the best” of your marriage but since that can only be done by two people you were stranded on an island.

Considering what I just said and what you probably know intrinsically already, keeping the journal filled with anger towards him serves only one good purpose and that’s to remind you of what not to do in future relationships. If you think it would make a nice reference manual, hold on to it for a reminder or future tell-all book on Oprah.

‘Closure’ will not come as a result of any action with this journal but the daily knowledge that you deserve a solid relationship with someone who cares about you as much as you care about them.

- Annie

Dear Annie,

Do I tell a co-worker that she needs to do something about passing gas in the office, or do I just let it hang there like a cloud in the air? I don’t know what this woman eats, but there are days when walking by her work station requires wearing a gas mask and haz-mat suit! Do I risk a rift with this co-worker or do I continue to sneak squirts of lysol into the air while she’s away from her desk?

In a stinky situation

Dear Stinky Situation:

This question has little to do with family environment but because work environments are similar in many ways, I’ll tackle it.

This is a tough one because farts, if they make no sound, can be incredibly sneaky and while you’ve narrowed it down to her work station, if confronted might she pass it off on another co-worker or, perhaps, the cosmos?

This is a supervisory issue so if you feel it’s constant and intrusive enough you’re warranted to approach your supervisor about the problem and then it is up to him or her to notify the co-worker and come up with a solution. Believe it or not, this kind of minutia is what supervisors also have to do and it is appropriate to protect you from direct confrontation and bad feelings.

While I suggest the above approach, your use of Lysol is a nice attempt to mitigate damages although don’t go with a floral scent or she’ll think her farts smell like lilacs.

- Annie

Dear Annie:

hi annie! i AM Annie!
what a great name! saw your advertisement on the back of a vehicle today, thought I would check out the site! CUTE!
especially cause of “Ask ANNIE!!”

anyhoe, how are you?

Annie (I assume)

Dear Annie (I assume):

Well, isn’t that refreshing to have somebody ask me how I am! You can’t imagine how lonely it is just sitting here in cyberspace tending to other folks’ problems and ignoring my own.

Anyhoe, I’m fine, thanks for asking, how are you?

- Annie

Dear Annie,

I’m 31 and been dating for a long time now and I’m just so ready for marriage and desperately want to find someone before I’m in a nursing home.

Send me Love

Dear Send me:

Here’s something that may surprise you but people often find what they’re looking for when they least expect it. The likely reason is that you are not ‘pressing’, trying to make things happen where there is nothing happening or presenting yourself in ways that do not reflect who you are.

You’re 31, not 101, so there’s no real time crunch here. So here’s the formula I would suggest:

Continute to date but think about what makes you happy, in both your personal and professional life, and strive to satisfy that and I guarantee you the ‘right’ person will be attracted to that which is the real you and it will mean a whole lot more when it does happen.

- Annie

Dear Annie:

My husband wants a divorce but after 20 years of raising children and working together in a marriage, He claims to have found someone special and wants to be with her. What I can’t believe is how brusque and dismissive he is of me. What should I do?

Lost in the wilderness

Dear Lost:

The stark motive is that he’s probably found something shiny and new and you represent a trade-in. That may seem harsh but he sounds like someone who lacks perspective in life and has no sense of the value of a long term committment. Being so easily ready to move on to a new releationship says much more about his lack of self-esteem and desperate need for self-gratification than it does about you. Couples who marry should be willing to run the marathon because that’s what it is and the benefits are tremendous while his new thrill is, in most cases, just that, a new thrill that will eventually become the next bore.

These will be emotionally tough times but hang in there and know that the aching loss you’re feeling now will eventually pass and open the door for someone who will truly value you.

- Annie

Annie,

Oh Annie. What should I do? I recently turned 40 and my parents did not remember my big day, or that it was my birthday at all! It is not as if my mother wasn’t there the day I was born! What gives? Can you help? Should I take this personally?

40 and (apparently) forgotten!

Dear 40 and forgotten:

There’s always the chance that your parents simply don’t like you and were trying to drive home the point. However, you seem like a nice enough person to me so I’m giving you the benefit of the doubt and assume that this isn’t the first time they’ve done something like this.

Should you take it personally? It would be hard not to. Parents are supposed to be moderately aware of these milestones. If you wish to make a point of your own, don’t show up for Christmas. It always works for me!

- Annie

Dear Annie:

Why do we need algebra?

(no signature)

Dear NS:

On the surface of things, this might appear to be a mathematically specific question designed solely to annoy me, and yet the intriguing thing is that relationships can often be broken down into simple equations that symbolize our actions.

On the other hand, I slept through all of high school algebra so how would I know?

- Annie