Two and a half years ago, I wrote one of my last posts on dating. It was a post called Getting Out of the Box. All in all, posts on the subject had been popular, and it was sort of a trip in going out on dates with people who would stumble across the fact beforehand that I would write about my experiences.

The posts had garnered a small readership, getting a couple hundred views or so depending on the day. People seemed to enjoy the exploits of a middle-aged male back in the midst of it. Where possible, I’d find humor, and there was no shortage of places which made it possible.

In the particular post mentioned above, I made a joke, one I thought readers would find funny. It was something about an “old clunker.” It was late in the evening, and I hit post.

It wasn’t perfect. It never is. I find there is something about knowing that someone else has read what you wrote, that makes it flaws stand out in bold neon. A blog post then, isn’t the finished product, it’s simply part of the process.

I woke the next morning, thinking about the other side to that joke. It bothered me. I jumped out of bed to edit it. 75 had already seen it.

I didn’t write a about dating after that. There would be a couple other things that would go with it, pretty well ending my regularly maintaining a blog. It’s hard to believe it was that long ago. It’s hard to believe how time gets away from us.

“How did you guys meet?”

“Match.com”

“I forgot you would write about that. So tell me, did you know right away that it was going to work out?”

“No. I still don’t. She is liable to wise up at any moment.

We had went out once, had a good time, but we weren’t really sure if there was anything there or not. A few months later, out of the blue, we went out again. That time we hit it off.”

“I’m happy for you. It’s good to see people meet the right people.”

“I’m lucky, I guess. But to meet the right people, we need to get ourselves right. Well, we are never going to get ourselves right, but we need to at least get our ass in the right ballpark.”

“How’s that?”

“You wouldn’t believe how us 30 and 40 somethings date. It looks much better in television and the movies than what it is. The idea they present is that we are more mature. Are we really are is more complicated.

Outside of that, we are still teenagers. There’s texting at all hours, hot signals, cold signals, the inability to talk about that we ought to talk about, and intimate conversation is generally the hanging of our heads in the conviction we are broken.

I decided I would try, the best I was able, to do something different and meet those trying to do something different too.”

“Why?”

“Because I found it incredibly depressing to think of living my life incapable of change. The more repetition, the harder it becomes to deny a pattern. The more obvious the pattern, the more depressing it became to think about it continuing.

I figured I would try to simply date people who talked on the phone, and who demonstrated that they could sort their emotions out. People who could talk in depth about who they were, where they came from, and the things real people struggle with. People who weren’t afraid to struggle to get what they wanted from themselves.”

“How did that work?”

“It was terrifying at first. I had this buddy who told me people who decide they want out of a relationship, usually don’t have a real good reason. It’s just a feeling, and it is a feeling that grows. So they pick a reason, any reason, and they grow it themselves until it gets to a point they have to get out or that they can get someone else to tell them it is for the best.”

“You believe that?”

“Absolutely. I’ve done it. I decided no matter how terrified I got, I wasn’t going to do that. I was going to think my way through it.”

“And?”

“I consistently met the people I respected, and still talk to.”

“So Shannon?”

“I felt like I was investing time into the building of relationships. Shannon understood them in a way like no one I had met. I felt like I worked my tail off for it, but for Shannon it was more innate.”

She would talk about her family, and it dawned on me one day that in a large family she was perhaps the most connected. She would talk about her kids, and after a few dates I discovered I was unable to tell who the favorite was. I’m still convinced she doesn’t have one. She let’s them be who they are in a way unlike anyone I have met.

‘Curious interest,’ that is what someone told me once. Curious interest is where we should try to get to in raising kids. As best we can anyhow. I’d know little about it, I guess, but I do remember that. She’s the closest I’ve met to it.”

“You seem to make a good case.”

“As good as I can, for having met someone at 40. Perhaps that makes the case in itself. Mostly what I got was lucky.”