I unfollowed him on Instagram so I wouldn't see his posts in my feed but haven't yet unfriended him. And then sometimes I go to his profile just to see what he has posted lately. I don't know if that is the right thing at this point or not. He doesn't appear to have unfollowed or unfriended me as every once in a while he likes something I post or watches my story. None of our families seem to have unfriended or unfollowed the other (with the exception of me removing people from my Facebook which I keep more private than my other social media).
I don't know what made me look at his account this morning but I wish I hadn't. Yesterday, he went to a botanical garden about 90 miles north of us that we have visited many times. This was the one we visited on our last overnight trip together to watch the bats leave the cave that I wrote about a few days ago.
I wonder if he knew how to access the digital card for our garden membership and used its reciprocal benefit. I hadn't yet taken his name off it because the membership we purchased during the marriage didn't expire until today. If he did figure it out, he will have discovered I purchased another two years - I hope he doesn't think I'm going to keep his name on it anymore now that the previous one has expired. But my gut is he didn't figure it out. I digress, this paragraph isn't really what I want to write about. It's just a distraction.
We went to many gardens during our marriage. It is something I did and still very much enjoy. I could spend hours sitting among the flowers, chasing bees and butterflies with my camera, and breathing in the fresh air. But there was always a little bit of tension in these visits.
He always wanted to do everything together so would insist he come with me but he never seemed to enjoy them. I can remember some trips where he vocally complained the entire time we were there. There was one trip to the Atlanta Botanical Gardens that sticks out in my mind. He complained so much it completely ruined the day and I got very upset at him. He didn't apologize or take any accountability when I brought it up. He just tried to distance himself from it and change the subject as fast as he could. Although he was never quite that bad again on future garden trips.
Other times, he would just impatiently follow me, sitting on benches outside the gardens and cringing if I walked through wet ground that might be even a little muddy.
It used to frustrate me that he would be so impatient and sometimes complain through something I loved, these trips to the gardens yet I figured out how to make a fun day out of the car shows we went to for his benefit despite having absolutely no interest in them.
At this particular garden he visited yesterday, there was this one herb garden that he rarely entered. He would sometimes snap a few photos of me photographing the flowers and butterflies at the entrance but then he would find a bench. I'm sure I'm forgetting some but I don't actually have any memories of him entering this herb garden. Standing inside of it alone looking out over the fence to see him on a bench is what sticks in my mind so vividly. So, I felt like I was punched in the stomach to see that specific garden show up in his Instagram reel.
When I see things like this after the separation, it feels like while we were together he intentionally made life harder for me. If he can enjoy the gardens by himself, including that herb garden, why couldn't he let me enjoy them while we were together? I always thought he was a considerate man but as I truly look back on his actions, I see that he was only considerate when it made him feel good and fed his ego.
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