I've written about what a cruel and mean spirited woman my ex-wife was, and probably still is, unless she has received some intense therapy or undergone some spritual transformation. Tonight I'm feeling generous, feeling like I might identify some of the positive attributes that she had and some of the lessons I learned from her.

I've mentioned how she trained me to be "a perfectly unhappy gentleman". The sarcasm, I hoped, was not misunderstood. To be berated at a restaurant table for walking in front of her to the table, or to be reprimanded like a child for not remembering other examples of etiquette or protocol was to be diminished to the status of uncooperative student in Madame X's finishing school. Granted, these lessons have served me well in that the women I date now tell me I'm a perfect gentleman, but I did not marry the woman to be trained by her. And although she might have presented an air of sophistication, in the trenches she behaved like an ill-bred floozie. Her life was a drama based on attracting men and showing up women. She needed to attract most of my friends to her, and when each responded in kind, she told me that all of my friends came onto her. I was supposed to reject numerous friend because they couldn't be trusted. I knew who I couldn't trust.

I had seen her in action. From wearing a skin tight spandex dress with no panties, so my "male colleagues would be jealous" she told me after a visit to my school (I would have preferred modesty) to running up to my dear friend C and jumping into his arms, wrapping her legs about him. This display embarrassed him, he later told me, and he did not know how to respond. Oh my trophy girl was a real work of art.

She was an expert at networking and self-promotion. From her I learned how to make contacts who could help me at some other time and place. Shmooz with them, make them know how interested you are in what they do, share your number and email with them and get theirs. Organize this, categorize it. And use them as the resource you thought they might be when you need to. And certainly don't deny yourself any opportunity. I learned that from her. I watched her operate. And she did operate. Unfortunately, I was just another person who could be used and manipulated, until I was driven away by her raving madness.