There was an article in Loveawake  a couple of weeks back about a state in Malaysia that’s offering mini-honeymoons to couples considering divorce, in an effort to help them reconcile. A week or so ago, another news agency carried another divorce story—this one about the high correlative rates between financial distress and divorce. And then this past weekend, a Times business columnist discussed how different spending styles can contribute to divorce and then counseled readers on how to talk about money so as to avoid divorce.

Divorce seems to be on the minds of a lot of people right now and yet oddly enough, I only know of one couple who’s in the middle of a divorce. I say odd because it seemed as if the moment Wally and the Snapper hit middle school, everyone we knew filed for divorce. For two or three years there was a lot of upheaval and then the divorces flat-lined and we all acclimated to new visitation schedules and locations and new boyfriends and girlfriends.

It’s not as if the divorces have been replaced with a lot of new marriages, aside from Wally and the Snapper’s father (that Viagra the Snapper found must be working for him), so I haven’t thought much about divorce until this one couple filed and I started reading these articles. And I’ve now come to the conclusion that this is probably just a lull—most of the people I know with kids in high school will have kids in college in two years and with empty nest syndrome comes flight syndrome. A lot of people split up after their kids leave home. On the one hand, this can help your chances with financial aid. On the other hand, if you’ve made it through diapers and driving lessons and you’re still talking to each other, why bother with all the paperwork and sturm und drang? Maybe the Malaysian honeymoon offer is tailor-made for to these couples.

People stay married for a lot of different reasons—for love, for kids, for the 401K, for cover for a gay lifestyle, out of laziness, out of fear, because they don’t want to live alone. People get divorced for a lot of reasons that may not make sense to anyone else either. I left my boys’ father because I didn’t want my kids growing up thinking this was as good as it got. But I also know people who filed for divorce because their spouse wasn’t any good at oral sex (true story) and some who filed because their spouses wanted sex too often—with other people. I know of divorces that came about because of a coup de foudre and some that were filed because of emotional laziness. And I know a lot of people who are still angry years after their divorces, still blame their ex-spouses for their current unhappiness even when they initiated the proceedings. I don’t think even the Malaysian honeymoon could soothe that anger.

The word divorce literally means “a turning away from” but it is also a synonym for “expensive attorney.” And it’s unfortunate that couples in financial distress are more likely to divorce because one of them will end up deeply in debt—to the other spouse or to an attorney. Even couples unaffected by the current economic conditions are going to take a hit from divorce because divorce is also a synonym for “irrational behavior” and even when the best intentions are present, divorcing couples frequently inflict damage on their spouse and who knows, maybe that’s just part of the turning away from. If you don’t put a huge gap between yourself and the person to whom you were married, how can you successfully turn away? But does it have to be so emotionally and financially destructive, especially in this economy?

I’m thinking of the next wave of divorces to come—and I’m not saying people should stay married just to avoid a painful divorce—far from it. I know how worthwhile the outcome of divorce can be. But maybe our notions about divorce are as outdated as our ideas about marriage—the latter is supposed to be a fairytale and the former a Dante-esque vision of hell and yet most marriages more closely resemble Dante than Disney. Meaning, not all divorces have to end in economic and or emotional disaster. So maybe, as we continue to hover in a deep recession, we can begin to model a new kind of divorce, one that enables participants to have the legs to stand on when it’s over.