Romance at Any Age

 By Courtney Pierce

Romantic gestures change over time. It’s only through living long enough that I appreciate the layers of their importance to our health and development. But make no mistake, romance is alive and well at every stage of our growth.

When I was in high school in the early seventies, a time of first boyfriends, self-conscious gestures bloomed on wobbly training wheels. Everything felt awkward and new: a heart race at a glance in class, a passed note with a crudely drawn heart, and fingers laced in mine to walk the halls at the ring of the bell. It’s a wonder that I learned anything at all from my teachers. Romance was all about me and what I felt within myself. What should I do?  What should I say?

Having grown up with only sisters, I had to learn about how man-boys functioned.

First loves came with rules: boyfriends had to pick me up and deliver me back home at a designated time. He had to pay for expenses of the entire date. Per my parents, dressing had to fall below a threshold of suggestiveness, including a ban on dangling earrings.

When I turned twenty in 1979, the world changed. I met a man at a music club in San Francisco. I was a classical music student at San Jose State, so dancing at rock concerts was like my “Rumspringa.” I lived in two worlds of music. I taught him, and he taught me. We fell in love and lust and were married six months later. A great time was had in the 1980s. I didn’t have a lot of experience in what it took to invest in a long-term relationship, not many people do at that age, but we thought we did. He loved me and I loved him, and that was all that mattered.

My thirties and forties held a different kind of romance with my husband. We both fell in love with having careers, moving up the corporate ladder, and saving money.  We established a solid foundation of owning homes, taking care of pets, and acquiring “stuff.”  Up, up, up. It became a false love drug. We moved to three different states to follow the American Dream. When my career eclipsed his, a bruised ego took us on opposing tracks. That was a romance killer.

In my fifties, life took an unexpected hooked turn. My parents and younger sister were in dire straights with illness. My husband wanted me to give up my career, which I did. My family needed me, and I thought I’d earned some time off to write. I wrote six books over five years while I took care of my family. There was little romance in that period of time, but I certainly learned a lot about myself and my husband. We divorced after 37 years. I never would have guessed that would happen, since I believed in “death due us part.” In the romance department, I starved for validation that I’d done the right thing for my family. What the heck do I do to start over? My marriage was in my DNA footprint.

The world had drastically changed since I’d first been a bride in 1979. As a post-menopausal woman who was starting from scratch with a load of baggage, I lived a solitary life for three months. I’d gone back to my career in entertainment, purely to pay the bills, keep up the house, and spoil my cat. Romance became fantasies of how I wanted to spend the rest of my life. I had to re-learn how to be open and to accept new people in my life. Long-time friends didn’t know me without my ex-husband. I had no idea how to not be identified as a couple, to start from scratch with so much history, or how to maneuver through the health concerns that I’d never had to deal with.  

Then, by chance, I met a man who had gone through so much more than me. We were meant to be together, to help each other, to move into the next stage of life together. We both craved safety, companionship, and commitment. It was a meeting by divine provenance. Our first date sealed the deal.

We brought each other back to life with romance.  We’d race to my house during the day for clandestine meet-ups and go back to work. On weekends we backpacked and made life plans under a view of a million stars. He took me to new heights. At night we wrap ourselves around each other while he stroked my fingers slow and meaningful, as if to verify I was really there beside him.

Romance in our sixties is about setting aside selfishness. When I lost it for a period of time, I appreciate anew  when it came back into my life. It’s important to think about my partner and to anticipate what we each want and need. He'll look in my eyes and tell me that I look especially beautiful today. Out of nowhere he’ll say, “I’m so lucky to have you as my wife. My wife. I like the sound of that.” Romance pours into me when he shares it openly with me.

Then I look at his handsome face, wrap my arms around him, and give him a kiss like it’s the last one I’ll ever have.

Special note: It is poignant that this will be my last post with Romancing the Genres. I will be focusing on my new book, BIG SKY TALK. It's long overdue. I've enjoyed writing my posts over the years, and I send much love to the Genre-istas.

Courtney Pierce is a fiction writer living in Kalispell, Montana with her husband and stepdaughter. She writes for the baby boomer audience. She spent 28 years as an executive in the entertainment industry and used her time in a theater seat to create stories that are filled with heart, humor, and mystery. She studied craft and storytelling at the Attic Institute and has completed the Hawthorne Fellows Program for writing and publishing. Active in the writing community, Courtney is a board member of the Northwest Independent Writers Association and on the Advisory Council of the Independent Publishing Resource Center. She is a member of Willamette Writers, Pacific Northwest Writers Association, and Authors of the Flathead. The Executrix received the Library Journal Self-E recommendation seal.

Print and E-books are available through most major online retailers, including Amazon.com.

Check out all of Courtney's books: 

courtney-pierce.com and windtreepress.com 

New York Times best-selling author Karen Karbo says, "Courtney Pierce spins a madcap tale of family grudges, sisterly love, unexpected romance, mysterious mobsters and dog love. Reading Indigo Lake is like drinking champagne with a chaser of Mountain Dew. Pure Delight."

 

Coming in 2022!

When Aubrey Cenderon moves to Montana after the death of her father, the peace and quiet of Big Sky Country becomes complicated with a knock on the door from the sheriff. An injured grizzly bear is on the loose and it must be eliminated before it kills again. The sheriff's insistence that she buy a gun for protection will present Aubrey with some serious soul-searching, because the grizzly-on-the-run is hunting her too . . . for a different reason.

The Pandemic—A Test of Relationships

According to recent articles, the pandemic has been extremely hard on relationships.  Divorce in America hit a record low in 2019, but there are signs that statistic is on the rise. A leading British law firm reported a 122% increase in divorce filings (the Brits call it enquires) between July and October compared with the same period last year. In the U.S., sales of online self-help divorce agreements rose by 34%.

Pre-COVID, a University of Washington study demonstrated divorces usually increased after holidays, when couples are together for longer periods. Magnify that by 14+ months and you have what psychologists say was “the perfect storm” for couples. Common sense will tell you that if there are problems in a relationship, a lack of distraction will exacerbate those issues. Throw in the stress of the pandemic, the economic impact, and even the inability to go to the gym and you have people throwing in the towel. Even something as simple as taking away the daily routine can tear at the ties that bind.

I have personal experience; one of my longest, most intimate relationships suffered severely during the pandemic, was stressed to the point where things will never be the same.  I never realized how important other people were to keeping my relationship fresh, how very vital being able to publicly flaunt this pairing was to its existence.

I am, of course, referring to my relationship with shoes. Oh, come on. You didn’t really think I could do a humorless blog, did you?

And while this subject matter might amuse you, my condition is actually quite serious. The tarnish on this relationship has affected my very sole. I “loved” my shoes.  Now, I see them and think—eh. They line my shoe rack, waiting to be touched, to be the pair of the day, but I just close the closet door to my heart. Amazon sends me daily emails, desperate to create a match for me, but my broken psyche just can’t find that loving feeling. 

So what happened?

While I worked from home, my footwear had nothing to do. We (my shoes and I) had nowhere to go, nothing to do. Other people no longer cared that we made a cute couple.  I didn’t have the pleasure of pairing  those cute espadrilles with a merlot-colored top, or get to take my cork-soled wedgies to the wine bar.

We all long for normal, but sometimes I’d just want a sassy pair of sneakers to once again add bounce to my step.  Silliness aside, I hope all of you are recovering and once again getting the most out of life.

Happy shopping,

Robin