CYNTHIA RODRIGUEZ loves her man.
Cynthia Rodriguez has no malice.
Cynthia Rodriguez spoke to me yesterday.
A-Rod‘s wife wants no publicity. She does not want to speak out. She wants only to hide from the army of paparazzi camped in front of her.
Ask again, you mean she’s saying she really still loves her womanizing husband and what comes back is, Cynthia Rodriguez is “not out to mutilate him.”
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The handsome, religious, soft-spoken lady simply is of a mind that her husband the big-time Yankee baseball star never believed all this could actually happen.
Ask all WHAT could actually happen and you’re told: He never believed their marriage would blow up.
Ask why she thinks this and you’re told: Because, in her view, he would never, ever believe she would not always be there for him no matter what.
She is also of a mind that he maybe, mistakenly, took her 13 years of dedication as a sign of weakness.
Yes, she still loves him. But, no, she’s not weak.
As far as Mrs. Alex Rodriguez is concerned, this marriage is over. Done. Cooked. Finished.
She has come to the realization he’s changed. He is no longer the same man she grew desperately to love.
So if today, right now, he walked into wherever she was, what would Cynthia say or do? She would say she has no regrets. She would tell herself she’s come to terms. She would be grateful for her daughters. She would be certain God will watch out for her. She would insist she wishes nothing bad for Alex.
Ask why that might be her attitude and you’re told: Last year’s front-page story of his affair with another woman caused her so much “pain” that she simply – the way it’s put is – “refuses to go there again.”
Cynthia’s lawyers, Earle Lilly and John Van Ness, allude to deeper issues where their client’s husband is concerned. They use words like “narcissism” and “ego” and “not healthy.”
They also know that, as they put it: “When you’re married to a person that’s real and this reality falls by the wayside, it ends up being really tough. One day he’ll wake up . . . and he’ll crash . . . but Cynthia will be there for him.”
She does admit to trusted friends she’ll be there for him the day he cracks up because she knows it’s going to be – the words used are – “an ugly thing.”
OK, but having been bruised this badly, why will she be there to pick up those pieces should and if this happens? Because she has a graduate degree in psychology for abused and abandoned children. Because she and Alex have two infants. The eldest, Natasha, is 3. The youngest, Ella, is 11 weeks old.
Because this lady’s passion is children. It was her life’s work before and, despite no plans for the future beyond just taking the high road and keeping her head together for now, should normalcy ever return to her life she’ll probably again work for children.
And because this separation and divorce is searing for their two little ones. A professional in the field, she knows firsthand what destruction of a family does to innocent beings caught in the madness.
Natasha is asking where is her dad. She loves her father. She is saying, “I miss my daddy.”
Natasha’s mother, in Florida with family for the immediate future, also loves New York. It was her home. Where she lived. She and her babies haven’t yet been into the bedrooms in their Manhattan apartment to collect their toys and treasures. She doesn’t even know when that might happen.
With unattractive tales printed about Cynthia trundling off for a grand high time in Paris, accompanied by what press reports call “an entourage,” I pleaded for her to tell me firsthand the truth of what happened there. She resisted at first but the lawyers urged her to at least address these misperceptions. So she said:
“Not one word of those stories is true. I never before in all my married life together ever went away without my husband or family. Not once in 13 years.
“I did not spend one dollar shopping in Paris. I did not go to super-fancy expensive restaurants. I did not go to any spa. I didn’t do one thing. I spent the most innocent four days with my children’s godparents, who are as close to us as family. My husband and I were already into our problems and I didn’t know where to go, what to do. I needed to think. To clear my head.
“Mine’s a close-knit family. Never one divorce on my side. My parents, aunts, uncles are devastated.
“I needed to get away. With clear-headed friends. To breathe. To think how I’m going to handle my kids. I just needed a little time. My husband knew I was going. He encouraged it.”
While she struggles to get peace and work her way through these horrible days, is she hearing from his teammates? No. Is she hearing from his family? No.
More bad Alex habits may yet surface. There are coaches on road trips through whom notes and numbers were passed. Much wildlife may yet creep out from under many a stadium.
Fie on Alex. His Cynthia is a lovely lady.