20 years ago, the beginning of the end

I was 90 minutes late to a job interview and two hours later was offered the great opportunity I’d prayed for.  It was the weirdest thing to call the men who were interviewing me to explain I’d arrived in the right street but in the wrong suburb, to hear that they still wanted me to front up.  They asked one crucial question and it was my response to that question that won me the job.  I was to become the State health, safety, security, and environment coordinator for a global oil company.

And it was one of the worst decisions of my life.

I traded ambition for the real prize of life, family, without ever realising it.  Not two years later, having received the news that I’d missed out on the national manager position, that same day, my marriage was over.  Overnight.  I hadn’t seen it coming but I should have seen it coming.

I’d been in a job role that saw me have so much autonomy that I could travel our large State at will, needing to visit each site twice yearly.  Within 9 months I had the gold frequent flyer card.  I could book flights, hotel rooms, and hire cars and plan a trip in 10 minutes.  One week I’d been to Kununurra, Esperance, and Melbourne.  That’s six flights and about 12,000 kilometres.  It was nothing for an incident to occur and for me to be on the next flight or travelling regionally in my company four wheel drive within an hour.

When I was home, I was wired up to work emails and phone calls, and on one infamous occasion I took my then-wife out to a work function and left her with strangers while I dealt with a facility break-in in South Australia and a collision of two fuel tank trailers in the Great Southern.

I was so far out of my comfort zone, still so sure and certain in my competence, that I found a way to cope—through the escapism of alcohol consumption to destress, mostly on the weekends.

Being a pastor and counsellor these days, I had a faith back then, but I’d backslid into a place of a faith that simply didn’t work, the material world had taken over, I was doing my whole life in my own pitiful strength.

I knew it wasn’t working but I kept that secret to myself as I faked it until I could make it.  My life was imploding, and I didn’t know how to reverse it.

I’d staked my life on my career, but in overbalancing I lost everything.

The 17 months between April 2002 and September 2003 was a mirage.  Nearly one hundred flights and over 70,000 kilometres on the road later, none of it meant a scrap compared with losing it all—my wife, 24/7 access to my three children, my home, and ultimately I had to leave my job for another position that required no travel because I couldn’t bear to be more than 50 kilometres from my kids.

I don’t care what anyone says, you never truly recover from an investment in marriage and family of 15 years that ends in separation and divorce.  You are, however, forced to accept what you cannot change.  It still saddens me 20 years down the track how there is NO space made for me to be able to talk about my daughters’ younger lives and our time as a family back then.  It’s as if it didn’t happen.  I dearly love the connection I have with each of my three daughters, but I sincerely feel they missed out and continue to miss out.  They may not see it that way, but that’s the way I see it.

I’ll never forget sitting in some of those early AA meetings bewildered, thinking “How on earth did I get here?”  And I still have those thoughts in my life today.  20 years later.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m very thankful for my life, but realistically, part of me died 20 years ago, and if I’m honest it still hurts.  Even that’s okay, because I know the ingenuity of the gospel that makes all things new of even the darkest lament.

I know I’ve crammed a lot into the last 20 years, and all my daughters have grown up.  There are so many things to be thankful for.  But there’s still room for sober reflection, and to honour what was my life, however wrong it was at the time.

I never shy away from those periods of my life that some might shun because they were part of the making of me, however hard they were to live at the time.

I’ll always make time to reflect over the darker times of my life.

20 years ago, and the beginning of the end was nigh.  I had no idea.  I also had no idea of what it would produce in me.  It became the catalyst in a life dedicated to serving God.

Picture taken of double road train leaving Albany Terminal and my Holden Frontera partially in view.