It is the second week of November, and your phone is already doing the thing.Text from mom: Are you coming to me for Christmas this year? I just need to know so Ican plan. Text from dad, twenty minutes later: I want you to know she is going to be there. I hopethat is okay. You put your phone face down on the counter. You have your own partner, your...

Everyone prepares you for the big moments of divorce. The signing of papers. The first night alone. Telling the kids. People rally around you for those. They bring food, they check in, they say the right things. Nobody prepares you for the grocery store... You’re standing in the cereal aisle on a Tuesday afternoon, and you reach for the brand you always bought, the one your spouse liked, not you,...