CHAPTER 1:

She was seemingly slow yet I was quickly captivated; she was curiously intriguing, with an indefinable air about her which I was to later learn was simply an ambience that many of the generationally uber-wealthy emit wherever they are: Whether in a steaming hot concrete jungle (think: Summer, Mid-town Manhattan) or a much more majestic and opulent setting (think: Princess Di; Buckingham Palace).

She was royalty - pure banking royalty, wrought of  five hundred years of genius, greed and interbreeding.

And while there was no hidden Dodi Fayed, no out-of-sight European lovers, there was a monstrously cruel, double banking heiress mother-in-law between us; herself a long abandoned bride who would never give up her only child to likes of me.

So on the afternoon of July 7, 1994, shortly after moving - yet again - from Los Angeles to New York City in search of anything "show-biz," and on what was perhaps the hottest day of that year (near triple-digit), I met my future-ex second wife: A raven-haired, Paris born Israeli,  near  the corners of 43rd St. and Ninth Avenue in mid-town Manhattan. 

She even had the quasi-British accent, gleaned from three years spent in a super elite Swiss Boarding School where she studied alongside numerous other banking heiresses, various European Royalty Princesses-in-Waiting and the ubiquitous Third-World Dictator's Daughters (with more than one of Osama Bin Laden's daughters being amongst her fellow alumni).

And along with being super sexy she also had the distinction of being one of the very few women who had ever chanced looking directly into my eyes while passing on the then very mean, and viciously violent, streets of Manhattan. 

I was immediately smitten because, after all, everybody dreams of marrying someone super-rich...

...don't they...?

BE CAREFUL WHAT YOU WISH FOR:

I chatted her up then walked her home to her apartment on 72nd street , catty-corner from the infamous Dakota building where the fictional  Rosemary's Baby  took place and where the tragically real John Lennon assassination occurred.  Turned  out my future-ex wife and time-thief (19 years lost) was an Israeli Banking heiress and, low-and-behold, available! 

One year later we moved in together (it wasn't hard for me to give up my six-story walkup on East 95th and 1st Avenue (a place so remote (at least back then) from the rest of Manhattan I used to refer to it as "..the end of the world..."

I'm sure the homeless living on the roof were glad to see me go as I was seemingly the only person who ever attempted to keep them from sleeping inside the building.

One more year later and, still catty-corner from John Lennon's old haunts, she became - secretly - pregnant. Oh, we'd talked about "it" during twice-weekly bouts of  Couples Therapy but, we had jointly decided to wait. 

So later that year when we went to visit her mother in jolly old Israel (my very first time to the "Land of Milk and Honey") I was quite surprised to find out - my very first morning there - that she was, indeed, with child.

I was ecstatic. Having been involved twice before where a long term relationship ended with then my soon to be ex-partner becoming pregnant and opting for a relationship ending abortion, I was exceedingly eager for fatherhood (Please note that I have always totally supported a woman's right to choose but have come to believe that every man who wants it, should have a say-so).

She then said: "I'm going to stay in Israel to raise our child."

I said: "God bless Israel (this is verbatim) but I don't want to live in Israel."

She said:  "You don't have to. You can always come visit."

...and that, was the way of my world back then...

I had no rights whatsoever, at least that I knew of that had been adjudicated. 

We married, twice (once in NYC and once in Tel Aviv (so as to be recognized legally in both America and our new home, Israel)), but not before I mindlessly signed a PRENUPTIAL guaranteeing me NOTHING in the case of divorce (unfortunately, "NOTHING" was in this instance, a zero-sum game ("a situation in which whatever is gained by one side is lost by the other"). And I was destined to lose - big time: Financially, emotionally, socially, environmentally. But I did manage to keep the most important thing:  Regular access to my two sons.

It should come as no surprise that the Uber-wealthy know how to cover their asses legally She was always at least three steps ahead of me in terms of money.

And "Seemingly slow?" ...my ass...

To be fair, my obvious desperation bred foolish accommodation, and when one is ..dying to have children, to just stay home and give them all your time, welll...

..just about anything can happen. 

And did.