During her divorce and the ensuing custody battle, Sue Grafton planned a way to kill her husband. But then instead of acting out her plan, she wrote it out.
The result? A best-selling mystery book, " `A' is for Alibi," the first in Grafton's alphabetical series.Because she couldn't find a healing remedy through the legal system, Grafton patched up her heart herself (with a little help from a counselor).
And she didn't commit murder. The point is, had she been waiting for the courts to resolve the custody situation, for the courts to make life OK again and help her adjust to being single - she'd still be furious and she'd still be planning, if not carrying out, her revenge.
If you haven't been through the legal process of getting single, you'll have a hard time comprehending the frustration that accompanies it.
It's like something out of a Kafka novel. Imagine yourself, a law-abiding citizen, suddenly under a court order that controls the very core of your life - money, property and, most importantly, your children.
Once at a party, several divorced people began to talk about how they planned to murder their spouses. There came a time during the divorce, each said, when the court process got too expensive, too painful. Because of the children, they realized, they'd never be free of the ex-spouse. Murder seemed the only answer.
One woman actually encouraged her ex-husband to drink before driving. A man schemed to take his wife fishing and push her out of the boat. She couldn't swim. His alternate plan was to take her cross-country skiing and shoot an avalanche down on her.
He finally gave up his dreams, realizing they didn't like each other enough to go fishing or skiing together and she'd suspect a murder attempt if he even suggested it.
Another woman read about injecting air into the bloodstream. She knew the cops would look for needle marks, so she planned to inject her husband inside his nose. She didn't carry out her scheme because she couldn't figure out how to get him to hold still while she approached his nose with a syringe.
Grafton's plan was crafty, too. If you've read her first mystery, you'll recognize the plot: She would sneak the key to his house out of her child's backpack. Wearing gloves, she'd search his bathroom for his hay fever prescription. She'd empty one capsule, replacing the medicine with ground-up oleander - a poisonous bush that's common as milkweed in Southern California.
Talking about these murders that never happened, the planners tend toward flippancy. They laugh. But underneath the jokes lies the truth: They were never so desperate as when they were getting divorced.
Maybe everyone who is getting single has violent fantasies. Some, it seems, can't help acting them out.
You've recently read about a Utah couple in the middle of an extremely frustrating divorce.
The papers were piling up fast in their ever-escalating legal war. She took out a restraining order against him, saying he beat her. He responded with a restraining order against her. Claiming she was abusive, he sought custody of their baby and got it.
So there they were. One can only imagine how frustrated he must have been when the court agreed she was unfit - then told him to let her take the baby for unsupervised visits. She probably hated being allowed to see her child - only after confronting a man she was afraid of. We can only imagine neither was satisfied with this temporary decree. Both must have been in anguish.
What happened next isn't quite clear. What is clear is that a 16-year-old boy was shot dead entering the man's home, possibly at the woman's prompting.
Now it is for the court, the court that was unable to de-escalate the anger, to assign guilt.
Assigning guilt is what courts do best. They aren't so hot at helping families that are falling apart.
Here in Utah new legislation takes the legal system a few steps toward sanity by setting up a children's legal defense fund for mediation and divorce education for parents.
Meanwhile, help is available if you know where to look. If you are frustrated to the point of madness over getting single, don't look under "C." "C" is for court. Look under "M" in the yellow pages. Not "M" for murder, but "M" for mediation services. Or "M" for mental health clinics.- The Deseret News welcomes comments from readers on this topic or others pertinent to the Single-minded column. Please address letters to Single-minded, c/o Marianne Funk, Deseret News, P.O. Box 1257, Salt Lake City, UT 84110; or contact her or the writer of the column at 237-2100.