5 dates in 7 years

February

February Reflections

Nearly 7 years of being single and 5 dates to show for it.

Dates, yes I've had a few, since my marriage ended in July 2012 and divorce was finalized a year later.

Three happened during the year and a half I was on Match.com. All "one and dones".

Then I dated the fourth Match man for 27 months (Oct. 2015- Jan. 2018)
The first year was a middle-aged honeymoon: sailing, cooking, live music, dog walks and watching movies.
The second year was a Greek tragedy: broken bodies and psyches with no return to order.
The last few months were tough on me emotionally, as I felt like I was alone, again, in a relationship.
So I ended it.

That was January 2018. That same month, I started to write a memoir about my time living on a boat between High School and College.

At the end of May, the man I'd loved for 49 years died in his sleep. The man around whom  I'd been writing the memoir of our time together on the cement sailboat. I experienced a concentrated and sharp vertigo upon learning of his death. He had been a touchstone my whole life. His widow and I spent a day together in June, as she was also working on a memoir, we had discussed helping each other and she'd invited me to a surprise 70th birthday (in Colorado) for the man. One which he'd never reach and we'd never celebrate together.

The beginning of July, just when I was embarking on what was supposed to be a week-long writing workshop for my memoir (which I'd been work shopping at  Grubstreet in Boston and with Robert McKee in New York), my dog -- my one constant companion since my divorce, died from renal failure due to Lyme disease. I spent the week working at the workshop, but my writing spirit had fled.

My final date,  was a "date", with an old friend from High School, in July. We'd remained close over time and hadn't seen each other in a few years. At dinner, I felt him to be both fragile and still in love with a mutual friend. We had a nice evening and I let him know that was as far as it was going to go.
We remained close. Then, per my premonition, he died a month ago.

My mantra after this last year became, "Family, Fitness and Fuck Everything Else." My daughter being in college, my son a Senior in High School, my parents aging and myself getting a house ready to sell, while working full-time doesn't leave much time to date.  No time or energy for finding, let alone going on one.