Tag Archives: relationships

The Cougar Pack

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Brenda and I are standing on the edge of the dance floor, close to the band.  Our friends are gathered in a knot around a table, off to the side of the bar.  They’re the senior citizen contingent in The Rec Room, this group of 55 – 70-year-olds eating the cake Ellen brought to celebrate her husband Gary’s  birthday.  They want to chat with each other, rehash the old days and catch up on the new.  We’re all here because Gary
loves music, especially the blues, and a good local blues band is playing.

 But Brenda and I want to dance.  We always want to dance.  I’m thinking opportunities tonight are bleak.  None of our old codger friends want to do anything more active than move their mouths to talk and lift their plastic cups to their lips to drink beer.

Everyone else in the place looks to be well under 30.  They’re playing drinking games that involve flipping empty plastic cups or passing full ones boy to girl, girl to boy, without using any hands.

So here we stand, nodding our heads and shaking our hips to the rhythms of these young musicians.  I can’t read Brenda’s mind, but I’m guessing she expects some young blade to ask her to dance.  After all, she’s light-bulb-bright charismatic, confidant and has a history of affairs with younger men.  Guess that makes her a cougar.

How I hate that word.  Makes her sound like a predator.  She’s not.  She’s attractive, successful and fun.

Brenda and me, just hanging out around the dance floor.

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On the Operating Table

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Ryan lay on the operating table, partially sedated and dazed from rushing across
town in an ambulance.  His problem was heart failure brought on by a congenital heart defect.  The surgeon touched him gently on the arm and said, deep compassion in her voice, “I never operate on anyone I don’t know.  My name is Mary.  Pleased to meet you.”

Ryan looked in her warm, caring eyes and said, “We’ve already met.  I’ve held you in my arms.”

The expression on her face shifted, the compassion replaced with distaste.

He added, “We’ve danced together.  At the
Arthur Murray studio. My best dance is the mambo.”

 

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Another French Take on Exercise

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One sunny morning in Paris, as my ex-husband Alan waited on the landing outside our apartment for the elevator, our neighbor, Mariele, joined him.  He was dressed in a t-shirt, running shorts and running shoes, so she said the obvious.  “You’re going running, aren’t you?”

He said, “Yes.”  That was that.

A week later, they shared the elevator as he headed upstairs after his run, all
sweaty and stinky.

“You run a lot, don’t you?” she said.

“Almost every day,” he answered.

This was in the late 1980’s and we were spending 4 years living in the French
capitol, thanks to Alan’s employer.

The next week, out on the landing, she said, “My husband Gérard runs, too.  Almost daily.”

The following week she said, “You and Gérard should run together.  He doesn’t get as sweaty as you do.  Maybe you could get him to work harder.”

Alan running the streets of our quartier of Paris.

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Vixen Divorcee’s First Blind Date

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My friend, Marlys, set me up on my first blind date.  Her description of the guy sounded intriguing and I was ripe to test the waters of the dating world, so I said, “Give him my phone number.”

Our first contact should have prepared me for what followed.

He suggested dinner and a movie.  Okay by me.

He suggested The King’s Speech.  Again, okay by me.

Then he suggested that we meet at the theater and go out to dinner afterwards.

Not okay by me.

I suggested, tactfully as I could, that since we’d never met, I’d be more comfortable dining first, then going to the movie.

He wouldn’t budge.

That’s how I found myself in the lobby of a movie theater, walking up to a strange man, hoping he was my date.

Try finding your blind date in this crowd

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On My Own

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Anna wore protective armor her first night out without her husband.

Since she’s a woman of means and position in my town, by the time the Fine Arts Ball rolled around, everyone knew the messy story of how Pat dumped her for his secretary. Who would get the Tuscan villa, which top divorce lawyer would have the guts to incur Pat’s wrath by taking her case, how big would the settlement be; these were the questions occupying the minds of the Vanity Fair folks that night. Would she even show, wondered the men and women gathered in the ballroom.

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Solace for a Grieving Heart

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The Last Day of Our  Acquaintance

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Sinead O’Connor from her album I Do Not Want What I Haven’t Got

 

 

 

 

Alan kept this CD in his car. When we drove long distances, he’d slip  it in the  player.  We’d sing along,  loudly and off key, glorying in the passionate imagery of the lyrics and the  pain and purity of Sinead O’Connor’s voice.   We’d sing happily, united in our love of the song.  Her pain wasn’t ours and would never touch  us.  Or so we thought.

Until the day arrived when we sat together in  the office of a marriage counselor.  The
day when I knew our marriage was beyond repair.  The day when he was still in denial.

We were living apart, hadn’t seen each other  for a week.  I turned to him and said,
“This is the last day of our acquaintance.  I’ll meet you later in somebody’s office.”

That was it.  We met later in somebody’s office to finalize the details, but those two
sentences marked the death of our marriage.

I never imagined until that afternoon how  perfectly Sinead O’Connor expressed the end of my love, or what solace I would  get from blasting out those lyrics in the home where I now live alone.

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Where There’s Smoke

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When Alan, my ex-husband, fell off the roof, I called 911. What happened next  planted the seeds for my first vixen divorcee fantasy.

 He struggled into the house as far as the living room, where he collapsed on the couch. There he stayed, unmoving, complaining of pain, for the next three hours, refusing to let me do anything, until I took matters in my own hands and made that call.

Within minutes, fifteen at most, our living room burst with big, muscular, handsome men.  All sporting the uniform of our local fire department.  All take-charge men who knew just how to shift my suffering husband off the couch, onto a stretcher, down
the steps of our house and into their emergency vehicle.

All the while flashing me magnetic smiles, reassuring me that everything was going to be just fine, charming me with their masculine confidence.  Of course I was worried  about Alan, but a corner of my psyche reeled with enchantment for these men.

Here they are, the firemen converging on our front door. Well, in my dreams this is how they looked as they converged on our front door.

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The Birth of the Vixen Divorcee

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My first vacation as a divorced woman.  A woman, I’ll put this kindly, of mature middle age.  A woman, mind you, of reserve and discretion, the furthest from a vixen you could imagine, whose dear friends invited her to join them on their annual winter trek to Zihuatenejo, Mexico.  A little sun, good cheap drinks and food, beach and ocean time, laughs and fun.  Tonic for a grieving heart.

My legs are long and my hair is blonde. Is this me?

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