Reflections from the Distance Counselor

Observations From the Back Line:
Dating Over Forty
Maggie Yankov
Marriage and Family Therapist
Greenville, North Carolina
2008
A few of you may know my husband died early in the life of our marriage. My
husband had flown in many dangerous arenas but in 1992 he was smarting from
missing the first Gulf War due to an assignment at Command and Staff training in
Quantico, Virginia. We were thankfully re-assigned to Fleet Marine Corps, New River,
North Carolina and he was again doing what pilots are meant to do. But, on a clear
beautiful day while on a cross country training flight with new pilots, overnight in
Jacksonville, Florida, his CH53 helicopter came tumbling out of the sky.
It took a long time to recover from that. At first I naively hoped one of his faithful
band of brothers would step in on the white horse and my life would continue on
without too many interruptions. When I finally woke up from the haze, I realized that
as much as I missed the family of the military, it was no longer mine to claim. I moved
away, trying to find stability for my children and eventually settled in my husband’s
hometown of Chicago. I finished my graduate degree, helped my children adjust, and
at some point decided I was ready to be in a real relationship, not just the fantasy of
one. So, too old to meet men in traditional social settings, at an age when almost
everyone was married, working in a field dominated by women, I eventually decided to
turn to on-line dating.
On-line dating in the early 1990’s wasn’t actually on-line. My first experience in
Chicago was at “Great Expectations”, one of the early match making services. For
several hundred dollars, one went downtown, spent an afternoon filming a VHS
interview, and then became part of a video library. Potential mates would visit the
downtown office and look through the video library and, if interested, would send a
hand written note that Great Expectation would forward. There was no computer
involved. The VCR’s were chronically broken and the tapes sliced in all the wrong
places. It took hours to visit, to review, to consider “selections”. I did actually meet a
nice man that I dated for several years. But, our children hated each other, and I
finally just couldn’t imagine enjoying day-to-day life with his ex, the children’s
disputes, and our lack of agreement regarding family life. I didn’t think I could
manage it all. We had each of us been hurt enough in different ways. I was afraid our
relationship would only bring more harm. So, I walked away and it was a good
decision.
Over the years I have off and on indulged again in on-line dating. I have had a few
relationships that started on-line. But, I have had many, many more first and last
dates. I have a somewhat absurd humor that gets me through most situations. When
I was out with the New Age vegetarian, strolling the Botanic Gardens, I kept
visualizing him leaning over the nearby specimen plant, picking a leaf, and calling it
lunch! I can’t say my children ever made dating easy either. My daughter was mostly
interested in what I might wear, but my son could be counted on for an emergency of
some sort, or his own brand of monkey tricks. From the back seat, they both would
complicate any fast food order until my date was red in the face, drooling, and
twitching with frustration. Easy pickin’s for my children, who normally didn’t get
along but became fierce allies on these occasions.
A few years ago, all grown up with decidedly more compassion, I remember my
daughter saying, “It’s Ok Mom, someday there will be some old guys that have lost
their wife, like you.” Hmmmm, a whole new crop of normal, nice guys? Should I
leave on-line dating to scour the obituaries? Not a pleasant thought. Fast forward to
2008. There are no VHS tapes. No office to go to. Only the internet, and a high speed
connection and selection process. It is really no fun at all. Would any of us have
selected our first mates just by looking at a picture or reading a summary? Attraction
is much more complicated; a subtle blend of chemistry, similar interests, friendship,
admiration, mutual friends. So many people are looking for the mate as their first
choice was “supposed to be”: Perfection. “ My mate will be a woman comfortable with
herself, whether in ballroom dress or jeans, she will take care of her body, be fit, open
to new adventures, physically affectionate, have her own interests, earn her own
income, a full partner.” Is anyone gagging? I already know we’re not going to
connect. I live in reality. The kids who aren’t perfect. The body that really needs
exercise. The dinners that rarely get made. The hair that even after 54 years of
wishing otherwise, is still not doing anything but curling in all the wrong places.
Sometimes I just feel like saying, “Single, frequently disheartened, just browsing”.
Isn’t that attractive? What to do?
I think I may have given up long ago except that I really want to live my life with a nice
guy, and I actually know other people who have found “their person” through the
Internet. I recently listened to someone say, “It only takes one, the right one”. So,
when I get deluged with matches, I try to remind myself , “It only takes one. You have
to kiss some frogs to find the prince!” In the meantime, I am letting all of you know,
I’m not kissing any frogs, but I am still looking: I am a kind and sweet woman.
Overweight, frizzy hair, zany humor. Crazy kids – who, yes, (Thank you Lord), “Don’t
live at home”. Flexible, open minded. I mean, I am a therapist! Nobody understands
the human condition like a therapist.
And to my fellow travelers on the Internet road, each of you has the absolute right to
search for a lifelong partner – without apology, without embarrassment. You may
find the right person at the wrong time, or deal with the wrong person at your right
time. As human beings, we are made to connect, to share our days, to create
intimacy. We can live without that, we can try and substitute through other supports,
but at the end of the day, we still crave that partner that will really know us and still
like what they see. So, stay in the game. It can happen or at least that’s what I hear

July, 2009
Reflections from the Fence
If you ever take a psychology course you will learn about Sigmund Freud and his view of development. According to his theories, children go through a period of latency in late childhood and before puberty, when children’s sexual interests become dormant. I have come to believe that children enter a very fanciful and romanticized version of sexuality during what was called the latency period, where children routinely play out themes of attraction and admiration. Since this development time period is very much tied to the development of competence, it is no surprise to me, that perceived competency in the opposite sex is an important element of romance that develops in these years. As girls, we become attracted to boys who outshine their peers! This is also the same time period most girls develop a change in their experience of the complicated dynamics of empowerment, connection, and power. At the same time many boys are feeling better about themselves, many girls are feeling worse.
When I was young I couldn’t wait for school to let out! I knew I would be able to sleep late, visit my grandmother, swim, ride my bike, and have a lot of fun in my semi-rural neighborhood. In my neighborhood there were a series of quiet middle class homes that surrounded a large parcel of land that the developer hadn’t been able to purchase. That land parcel was right in the middle of the neighborhood, and included a huge area of pasture and grazing horses. There was an old wooden fence that surrounded part of the area, and I suppose the owners were fairly magnanimous as they never complained about children sitting on the fence, dangling legs, and stroking the manes of horses who would visit the peripheral property hoping for treats.
As if attracted to the bullrings in Spain, the boys of the neighborhood would take turns hopping off the fence and running to a diagonal point of property where they would hoist themselves back onto the fence, flushed with the victory of surviving the inner circle of imagined danger. Occasionally a particularly brave young man would hop into the arena and hide for awhile behind a rocky burg, and come out charging and yelling as if he was Geronimo himself. I think I pretty much idolized those brave boys of the pasture, never for a minute realizing that none of those horses had a bit of territoriality or aggression in their nature. If anything, they would gaze at our antics in quiet disregard, more interested in a morsel of grass, than the row of bicycles casually tossed by the fence.
That same summer our small community opened a community pool. I didn’t know how to swim, but I enrolled in swimming lessons and before I knew it I was staying afloat in a reliable fashion, never adept at any stylized stroke, but very accomplished at treading water for long periods of time. The place I chose to tread water was in the deep end, with a privileged view of the diving board and those courageous boys of summer. No surprise, the same cavaliers of the pasture were the brave souls who would cannonball off the diving board, and later develop more sophisticated abilities to perform a near perfect swan dive .
You know, I don’t remember any girls my age learning to dive that summer. Maybe off the side of the pool, but I don’t remember even one girl diving off that spring loaded diving board. I think I was eleven. That was the same year I developed my menses and left the” anything’s possible” world of childhood, to feeling embarrassed, private, and cautious. After all, how could a young girl’s identity exist in both the world of menstrual blood, pain, and “God forbid” pregnancy, and the world of freedom of conquest, exploration, and “lions and tigers and bears”. It was dashing to feel vulnerable and incompetent as a young girl. The more you admire a flock of hearty young boys, you are left feeling like you can’t measure up, except through traditional paths of sexuality, which become forefront within a few short years. No wonder sexuality is a common way adolescent females regain personal power.
It has been decades, and the complete transition beyond the vulnerability of menstrual cycles to post-menopausal life, to realize that boys and girls, men and women, face different types of fears and develop different types of courage. Men are made for the battle, women for the long haul. I don’t think one is better than the other. I don’t think this is something we need to attempt to change. I think it is just one more reminder to me that we are all part of this perfect design that reflects the dual nature of God, the Universe, or whatever you believe in. The Yin and the Yang. It is only much later that women step into their own shoes. By middle age, many women are feeling far more competent and comfortable in their lives than their husbands. This reverse in role identity can cause much marital discord. After all, what happens to a man when there is no more battle to fight – often times the slow descent into depression.
Over the course of a life time, in many relationships with those of the opposite sex, we will have times when we idolize a young boy’s courage, feel characterized by our sexual desirability, feel subjected by our husband’s willfulness, and feel disappointed our husband is no longer the image of vigor or competence. We are all largely influenced by sexual scripts out of our conscious awareness and part of the very preservation of our species. As women, it is important to know that each stage of life will bring different feelings toward the opposite sex, and that these feelings and our ability to engage with men will change over time. We will interact since our early years with issues of power and attraction in a delicate balance that is influenced by development, individual temperament, the inexplicable differences of the sexes, the society we live within, and our own values and beliefs.
None of it is easy. All of it is worth it. In my belief system , we are meant to live out Gods’ differences between men and women, so that we balance change and acceptance. Women grow into courage, men grow into compassion. We neither one have the goal to become the other, but realize that the union of these dualities creates a necessary harmony to raise children, to make a difference in our communities, and to sustain bonds that grow in stability over time. This of course is marriage, and that is a different discussion.
Ms. Yankov invites you to comment on this article to her email: maggieyankov@aol.com.