To those of you who chose your partner in your twenties (or earlier or slightly later, but definitely before me, aka a person in her forties), I’m very happy for you.
As a forty-something year old woman, I’ve been taking stock of a lot of things in my life lately. Some of them about family, some about living and thriving, and lots about work and career. But I would be lying if I said that I hadn’t thought about the idea of me finding my lobster. As I have intimated before, the fact that I’m single in this stage of my life is more of a reflection of things I’ve tried to avoid over the years than any other factor alone. While I have dated a lot and had relationships, I haven’t found the true partner I’ve been looking for, and so, I remain on the market, as it were. And that’s totally OK!!! I’m not saying that I have marriage or even partnership as a goal, so to speak. I just mean that I’ve come to a place, having lived through the pandemic, having faced terrible and heartbreaking loss, and having picked up the pieces of myself in order to move forward, where I’ve had a lot of time to reflect and contemplate.
And from this contemplation, I’ve discerned that what I want in my life, for my life, is a true partnership. I want to be on a team. I want to build someone, and I want them to build me. I don’t think that’s too much to ask. But I think about the people and couples I know, and how they are true partners to each other (at least on the outside), in the truest sense of the word, and I marvel at how and when they may have made that choice for themselves. You know? I’d like to think it just boils down to a timing thing. That certain people find their lobster early in adulthood. And I am simply not one of those people. And that’s OK. This is not a diatribe of a lonely middle-aged woman lamenting about where it all went wrong. We all have different paths, and our stories are unique. I love that about us.
I envy those of you who have a partner. You have a person with whom to navigate this life, someone to witness you live it, someone to share the intricacies and intimacies of existence with you. I think that’s wonderful. I actually think it’s awesome. But my point is that this feeling you have, this experience you have of being part of a team, one half of a partnership, is something I don’t feel. And frankly, have never felt. Yes, I’ve had relationships, a few that have been years- long, but I’ve never reached this level of integration that I seem to see all around me.
Maybe that means that I’m meant to live out the rest of my life unpartnered. Or maybe it means that because I’ve been living without, waiting so long for a person to complement me and my, that I’ll be rewarded by the universe with the most perfect (for me) partner who gives me everything I’ve ever wanted and more. And I’ll give them the same. Maybe the universe always had this in the works for me, and my patient observance, my personal growth, my work on myself and my mental health, my commitment to self-awareness and learning from my mistakes has paid off. Or it will pay off if I just wait a bit longer.
When my parents met, it seemed unlikely, and in fact almost impossible that a life together was actually in the cards for them. They lived in different countries; they came from two different worlds. My mom had plans to travel overseas (again – she had already had a fantastic trip through England and Spain), and when she met my dad, although she really liked him, she thought she’d never see him again because he lived in Ohio. But, as it turned out, Dad wanted to see her and make it work so badly, that he simply…made it work. They both did. They exchanged letters and talked on the phone once a week, alternating who called because back then calling long distance cost a fortune. And when my dad was back in town for the summer, he made sure they spent every possible moment with one another. They dated every single day for the whole summer. The only time they were apart was when my dad travelled back to Cincinnati to collect his paycheck, with which he turned around and bought an engagement ring.
What I’m saying is that people will go to great lengths to make something work, to have the outcome they desire. And, even though my mom back-burnered her plans to travel overseas again to marry my dad and move to Cincinnati to start a life with him there, she has no regrets. At least, that’s what she tells me.
What am I saying? Well, I guess what I’m saying is that life presents us with challenges and our response to those challenges determines our trajectory. And life is about choices. If my mom hadn’t taken the leap and dove into a life with my dad that was completely foreign to her, far away from her family and everything she knew, then I wouldn’t be here.
So, I return to my initial statement, which is that I envy those of you who had the opportunity to meet your person early in life (or earlier than me), and you recognized that they were indeed your person, and you jumped on that opportunity for partnership when you had the chance. Good for you. I’m very happy for you.
My lobster is out there. Who knows, I may have already met him. But, rest assured, I haven’t waited this long, or done the inner work or, frankly, endured the experiences I have to be disappointed. My person is out there, just waiting for me to make space for them in my life and in my heart.
angeinthecity 