I was 44-years-old when I went through what I considered to be a painful divorce. It wasn't my choice. I had worked my proverbial fanny off to make that marriage work, but my then-husband forced the issue by having an affair with a woman in his employ, then lying endlessly about it. I finally gave up. My daughter and I then began a life as newly-single women.
As the mother of a "tween" at the time, I was totally aware of what I did NOT want to introduce into our lives. I was not going to parade men in and out of my/our lives just to satisfy my "itch" to feel that someone could love me again. I didn't want to create any competition between my kid and a boyfriend. It was hard enough just to get things done, day to day, with the house, my stressful job, her needs...and mine. I had a kid to raise. I figured there would be time for dating later. Much later. And here's why:
The first fellow that I went out with--maybe twice--was actually named Billy Bob. He was a transplant from the South. (Imagine that!) I met him while in the throes of my divorce. He was going through the same. It's never a good idea to try to carve a relationship out of those circumstances, especially when one has been out of the dating pool for 20 years. And I didn't. We went out to eat twice and talked on the phone some. During one such phone conversation, he told me he was a witch, and I laughed out loud. (I had never heard of Wicca, nor could ever have formed a relationship with someone of that bent, anyway.) He asked why I was laughing. I told him that I was smart enough to know a skunk when I see one, by it's smell and appearance. I wasn't intending to demean him. I simply didn't understand. I thought he was a whacko trying to play with me. But he took offense, and I never heard from him again. That was okay with me!
Another fellow was known to some people in my school district. Don't remember how we connected, but he invited me to dinner at a Greek restaurant that he frequented, complete with belly dancers. He was disabled due to childhood polio. "Wore" crutches and dragged his legs. After dinner, we spent some time talking in my living room, and thereafter on the phone. At the time, he was living with a male friend who helped take care of him. One evening, I called him on the phone. The caretaker intercepted and would not let me talk to him. I tried again later and was, once again, rebuffed. No reasons given. I waited for a call from him but received none. Done. Poof! A few months later, he called to tell me that he had been going through a tough time and hadn't wanted to be social...and could we go out again? No...sorry. He had left me on the lurch with no explanations or reasons to give him another chance. I HAD wanted to be social, or at least have been given an excuse for having been treated badly. That was the end of that!
Then there was another fellow, well-known and respected in Plainfield. He was a fireman in Indy, with a sideline as plumber in Pfield. I had hired him a couple of times to do some plumbing for me. We became occasional friends. Did not date. One time, I was in a horrible pinch. He dropped everything he was doing to give support to my daughter who was trying to help me out of a bad situation. He spent $150 to bail me out of my problem, which I repaid no more than one week later on payday. Months later, he called to tell me that I owed him sexual favors because of what he had done for me. It was bold and brash and totally outrageous to me. I was insulted and gave him a piece of my mind. I told him that I valued his friendship but that I wasn't about to be held captive by the notion that I owed him anything but my undying respect. The only time I saw him after that was a couple of years later when he came to me to ask for help in order to find out the truth about another relationship. He was being reverse-catfished by a woman who claimed she was a Chase heiress....paid for many expensive trips for him...wanted him to father a child with her. Apparently, he obliged, and then the walls started to fall in. She claimed to have a job as a teacher's aide just to keep her father happy, in spite of their wealth...and she had a couple of kids already who both seemed to be unwell all the time. There was no record of her employment in any school district, etc. (I suspected Munchausen's by proxy, but didn't say anything.) Last I heard, he was still close with his ex and children by her, and was trying to get custody of the baby by the fraudulent lady. Glad I wasn't involved in that one!
There was a night custodian at school who came into my classroom to sweep at the end of the day. I was still there finishing up the day, so we talked. He was a nice guy...a tad older than me. He was unhappily married, and his wife was sick. Not long after, she died. I went to the funeral home to pay my respects to him. Thereafter, he and his grown son by another marriage were in the process of finding somewhere to live. He and I didn't date but we did talk on the phone some. I got a sense that he was looking for someone with money to help support him, or so it seemed. We went somewhere together one day. I have no recollection of where we went or why, only that I was driving, and he was insulted when I pulled up to the gas pump and paid for my own gas. Apparently, that was an affront to his masculinity, even though it was MY car and low on gas because of MY travels. In the process of his moving, he gave me a small TV. I had wanted one for my bedroom, so I gratefully accepted it. And that was the last time I heard from him! He no longer appeared in my classroom after school and no longer called. A time or two at school, when we came close enough to almost run into each other, he most noticeably ducked and dodged out of sight. Finally, I asked the Director of Maintenance what was going on. The Director (Randy) liked me and seemed to see for himself that I was being snubbed. His response, in essence, was to tell me to move on because he did not respect what the other dude was doing. I did. I had nothing invested in that relationship anyway. I hardly knew the guy! Not too long after, the custodian in question married the widowed mother of one of the other teachers, who lived on a farm. I think he believed she had money. She didn't. His loss!
There was another radio dude who had listened to me talking to friends on a simplex frequency every night. He decided I was someone he'd like to know better. He knew I was seeking a commercial car radio for my daughter's vehicle, so he invited me to "his" house to look at one he was willing to sell. (He lived with his mother.) We visited that day...talked a little on the phone...and it seemed to me that he wasn't taking the hint that I simply wasn't interested in him in a romantic way. One summer evening, my daughter and I and one of her friends were standing out front. A friend of ours had done a drive-by visit, so I was standing in the street talking to him in his car when another car stopped. It was the dude who liked me, and he seemed none too pleased that I was talking to another man! Understand that I had done NOTHING to lead him to think there was ANY relationship between us. I certainly felt that he was in stalking mode since he had never been to my house, and I went on alert that this dude was someone to avoid at all costs. He did give up, for which I was grateful!
I went out for meals with several of my radio friends. Whether married or not, we all enjoyed each other's company. One single fellow (who shall remain nameless) invited me to dinner at some popular spots in Indiana. We also went to a lot of hamfests together. Stupid me, I never had a clue that he was romantically interested. We spoke on the radio every morning on our way to work. The repeater folks counted on that. Then, one day, he told me that he couldn't go to some hamfest because it would conflict with his honeymoon. Huh? "You're getting married? You've been holding out on me!" His response: "I gave up on you!" I was speechless.
I was quite fond of one radio friend. He was single but living with his ex-wife, which is almost the same as being married. Eventually, his live-in-ex moved out. We had some fun together, but when I needed him most, he zigged while I zagged. Next thing I knew, he was married to a toxic gal that got an order of protection against him and sent him to jail for a few days for supposedly violating it. A divorce ensued. Almost on the heels of that, he remarried yet again. I scolded him for being too quick on the trigger, but the last marriage seemed to "take". Glad he is happy!
Another radio friend, married, was quite attentive. Almost stalking, in the beginning. We did a lot of things together, with his wife's approval. I relied on him for all kinds of handy-man things but got freaked when his attention seemed alarming...and I felt that I was taking advantage of his generosity. He still remains someone of whom I am very fond, but he has his hands full because his spouse has dementia and blindness...and he is just the kind of guy who will take care of her up to the very end.
The longest relationship I had was with a computer friend. He was married, a fact that he didn't bother to mention to me for a long time, and when I figured it out, quite by accident, he asked if I would at least continue to talk to him online. He said he hadn't lied to me...had just simply allowed me to believe a lie. Since I already considered him a friend, I couldn't find a good reason to shut him down. (Warped thinking on my part!) The bad part about the relationship is that, at my advancing age, I wasn't looking for a physical relationship. I needed companionship--someone to go to dinner with or to enjoy a movie with...or sit around a campfire with friends, etc. Because of his marital status, that wasn't possible, even as mere "friends". Eventually, I got weary of not being a priority in his life and cut things off. (It's not all as simple as I make it sound, but the end result was the same. Even if the man were single, he and I clashed in a number of ways and could not have made a go of it.)
There was another fellow that I met online. We chatted quite a bit. He said he was married but was looking for a relationship outside of his marriage because his needs weren't being met at home. Yeah...that's what my husband told me about his marriage before me. And I'd bet my life savings that that's what he told the woman he cheated on me with. It wasn't true! He was a nice guy, if you don't count "cheater" into the criteria...
Oh! I almost forgot about a radio friend up in the Chicago area! He "found" me on Instant Messenger one snowy morning when I was home on a snow day, and so was he. He was an educator, the same as I, and an amateur radio operator, the same as I...and we clicked. I drove up to visit him one weekend, and he came down to visit me one weekend. We did the Dayton Hamvention together. He wasn't exactly the kind of fellow you would expect me to be with, but I was willing to try. One evening, we were on Instant Messenger together online. He was going to call me but got involved in a conversation with the godmother of one of his children. I had been sitting on my fanny for hours and wanted to go change positions for awhile, so I told him, "I'm going to go to the other room. Call me when you get done." That's what I wrote. What he perceived was, "Well! **I** am going to the other room! Call me if and when you think you can tear yourself away from talking to that other woman!" Suddenly, he was irate...blurting out that I had no right to interrupt his talking to his child's godparent. I tried to call him to explain that I didn't mean what he perceived, but he would not answer the phone, and told me online that I shouldn't even bother to try. And that was the end of that!
All of these experiences happened over the span of 25 years. Guess what? I'm still single, and not dating at all. What did I learn about me and relationships, in the meantime?
1. I was damaged by my marriage. I had been cheated on and emotionally abused, although I had done nothing to deserve it, and I wasn't going to let that happen again.
2. Because of #1 above, I was very slow to accept new relationships. If there was anything that didn't suit me, I was done with it. As a liberal, I am prone to giving second (and third and fourth) chances, except where my heart was concerned. That bothered me. People say that old folks are "set in their ways"...which makes us seem inflexible. That's simply not true. I was flexible my entire life, changing myself to fit into whatever situation in which I found myself. For once in my life, I decided that people needed to meet ME where I am. And you know what? They didn't!
3. Somewhere along the line, I determined that my ego did not demand an exciting man, a handsome man, or a rich man. I just wanted someone who genuinely cared about me without demanding more than I had to give. Someone with love and patience. Sex? Couldn't care less! Companionship? Yes, please! No quality sex life in the world can replace companionship!
Is it any wonder that I have totally given up on the notion of having someone in my life? My daughter thinks I don't want to be married and wouldn't be, no matter the circumstances. She may be right, but I'm certainly not adverse to having someone in my life who will take me as I am. Still haven't found that yet!
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