April Memoir of the Month: But You Seemed So Happy

This month's pick by Kimberly Harrington is among my all-time favorite memoirs.

But You Seemed So Happy (2021)

by Kimberly Harrington

If there was a way to make divorce funny, Kimberly Harrington has done it in But You Seemed So Happy. She writes about marrying (and divorcing) her husband Jon. About falling in love and moving across the country. About buying a farmhouse in Vermont with so much extra room Harrington roller skates around the first floor. She remembers fondly those carefree years before children.

But eventually, the children arrive. Harrington captures this jolt to her marriage in a laugh-out-loud chapter “My Terms and Conditions Have Changed,” written in the form of a revised contract with her husband.

There are many hilarious lines, one about the time Harrington decides to read Jon’s texts:

If you think you will find something good, something rewarding, by snooping on your partner’s phone I think we all — you, me, your neighbor, your God, an actual houseplant, a cat — know you will not.

She and Jon continue to live together in the farmhouse — for the children — even after they decide to get divorced. Jon sets up a bed for her in a spare room, and they remain friends. Harrington wonders what right she has to feel unfulfilled when her life is, by all accounts, good enough. She wonders how harshly she should judge herself for ending a marriage with someone she loves but is not in love with. She suspects something is not quite right with her marriage, but then again, maybe this is simply the inevitable (boring, unfulfilling) future state of all long-term relationships.

Harrington shows us how to let our expectations go and stay true to ourselves. She shows us how to honor the good that can come from a marriage, even when that marriage doesn’t last forever.

Check out last month’s memoirs here and here. Happy reading!