WHY WE GOT DIVORCED

If a long-standing relationship between two people was cut across and observed as a kind of matter, one could probably see concentric circles, much like the ones one sees when a tree is cut down – layers that have been piled on top of each other or next to each other over the years would show. These were years and years and years of feelings, events, hopes, expectations, plans, surprises, lightness, heaviness, pressures, changes, stagnations, ups, downs, quarrels and reconciliations.

In Why We Got Divorced, a husband and wife take us through their “tree rings” – each from his or her own perspective, leading us through key and incidental points in the history of their cohabitation in order to make sense of what happened to them. Where are all these seemingly petty grievances stored, and why does it matter who said that you didn’t need to take a parking ticket out of a vending machine, or that there was certainly enough milk at home? Who rooted for them to adopt a dog and who is now taking it out for a walk? Who never wipes up wet floors after a shower and who is the only one who knows how to properly put the dishes in the dishwasher? Who said right away that foldable mosquito nets are impossible to clean and who always leaves the drawers open? Who used to want to travel round the world, but now does not even walk from Spodnja Šiška to the Ljubljana city centre? Who used to play hours and hours with their nephews, but now cannot even colour a colouring book with their own child? Who used to devour piles of books, but now just scrolls through Instagram? And why should someone who still knows how to make time for a workout, a beer or a concert have bad conscience, because someone else can’t? Why don’t they talk anymore, and how did they end up in the stereotype of “the days are long and the years are short”? Who has changed and who has shown their true colours? What grandiose dreams did they have and where did they end up? How did they get there in the first place?