When I met Luis, I’d been divorced for two years. I’d been married for over 20. I’d spent the last quarter of my marriage trying to stitch together a relationship that had clearly torn beyond repair. The scars from a failed pregnancy, challenges with my children, my spouse’s affairs, two careers that didn’t turn out as I’d planned, and a lifetime of triumphs and failures were etched across my face. When I first agreed to go out with Luis, I wondered if he, too, could feel his life story in his aching joints and if he also had gained confidence from the silent wisdom that comes from experience, survival and time.
I may have seemed a bit worse for wear, but the truth is that when I started dating the man who would become the second love of my life, I was in my prime. I’d never been better positioned to love myself, and as a result, accept another person for who they are.
Luis is five years older than me. He was married twice. His first marriage lasted only a year, and his second wife passed away at too young an age. He has no children, something he regrets, and like me, he never thought he’d find love again after age 50. Remember that 1986 report in Newsweek that said an older, single woman had a better chance of dying in a terrorist attack than ever getting married again? You’d be amazed how many of us do. I never saw Luis coming, and I was a total surprise to him, too.
When I was dating my husband in my early 20s, I remember trying to be the woman he wanted me to be, and not hesitating to ask him to make major changes. I grew my hair long. I stopped traveling for work. I sometimes stayed quiet when his work buddies made misogynistic comments. He became a vegetarian for me and quit smoking. He watched less football, and he spent less time with certain family members who I didn’t gel with.
This time around, I didn’t consider changing anything about myself. The first time I went on a date after divorce, I wouldn’t let my daughter help me with my hair because I didn’t want to have to try to impress a new man. “He’s going to have to take me as I am, warts and all,” I told her. Eventually I was able to see that getting dressed up for a man isn’t the same thing as changing the core of your being (lucky for Luis!).
I talk a lot. I’m a neat freak. I am still struggling with trying to understand my own religion, and I tend to fiercely defend my children even when they are in the wrong. I know these things about myself. They’re just a few of my most challenging qualities that have been a part of me my whole adult life. I have enough self-awareness to keep these qualities in check, but I either cannot or will not take steps to change them. I like being outgoing. I have no intention of stopping my never-ending spiritual journey. And I will defend those little monsters of mine to the end of the earth and back because I am a fierce, loving mama bear.