Scintillectually Yours

So, as anyone who has been following my blog knows, yesterday was the dreaded 45th birthday. I actually came through it unscathed. As the Mayan Calendar does not stop on December 2, 2009, December 3rd happened inevitably. I was told, and I believe it to be true now, that the anticipation of an event that you aren’t looking forward to is often more traumatic then the event itself. Indeed. I am now officially five years from 50 and far from feeling as though I’ve got one foot in the grave, I actually feel as though my whole life is unfurling in front of me and it is ripe and rich with the promise of something so very exciting.

As you may also know, former HTB and I have had this ongoing thing. I don’t even know what to call it now. Basically, we said we loved each other and we had a lot of sex. Pretty much the equivalent of high school dating where the quarterback tells the head cheerleader he loves her so she’ll give it up but what he really wants is to hang out with the guys most of the time and then get his dick wet whenever he feels like it. Yeah, that’s the thing. Not that I don’t believe he loves me, I’m sure he does. He loved me enough to have proposed to me but he also left me and moved on. I tried to move on but became mired in the desperation that accompanies a middle-aged mom who is afraid she’ll be single forever.

So, early this week, I had a conversation with a friend/sometime lover/date (I don’t know what to call THAT thing either…but it ain’t high school), and she helped me realize that I will never, ever find someone who truly wants to be with me until I let go of the fear that binds me to FHTB. So I wrote him a letter (he doesn’t do verbal communication well—tends to tune out after about 5 minutes—and hates the phone except for text messaging) and basically told him that although I loved him, I couldn’t sit around and wait for him to be the kind of person I wanted him to be. It just wasn’t ever going to happen. I had been clinging to him like a life-raft with a hole in it. It was time for me to set out on my own and sink or swim.

Yesterday he shocked me by texting birthday greetings at 7 a.m. Hell, even my own kid forgot! Then, a bit later, he invited me out to dinner at the Thai restaurant that we used to go to every single month on our anniversary without fail. I dressed up…I did the big shave…I packed a bag. For some reason I assumed that we would probably wind up having sex. Then, during dinner (while we made so little effort at small talk that I kept wondering how we ever would have made it through a lifetime together) he announced that he was going to his Dad’s for the evening. I actually was really kind of shocked and it showed. I told him, half-laughing, that I had packed a bag “just in case.” He told me that he read what I wrote and he respected that. There was a part of me that felt tremendous relief in the “over-ness” of it. There was also  a part of me that held my pompoms to my chest and watched the quarterback walk away. I thanked him for dinner and hugged him, he said it was the least he could do. I walked to my car and came home.

So, I am alone in the house, snow on the way, my Christmas lights twinkling. Dirty dishes and a pile of work call my name but I have all weekend with the spawn at my ex’s. I also have a warm feeling that somewhere out there (cue the Disney soundtrack) there is someone waiting for me. I now have the absolute and utter luxury of time. That and inner peace. Somehow, I was given a cosmic birthday gift of clarity: the realization that I do NOT have to settle and I don’t have to jump into a relationship with someone else just because their resumé fits the job description I’ve set out for a lifelong partner. It’s going to be about more than just total sexual chemistry (been there, done that, have the stack of wet t-shirts to show for it), it’s going to be about a deep, deep connection on an intellectual and spiritual level. Someone I can hope to grow old with. Someone who loves me for me, warts and all, and has been waiting all of her life for me to turn around, take the hand she extends, and walk through the next 45 years with.

So. There are endings and there are beginnings. And in the middle of it all, there is me.