Oh Honey...My Thoughts on True Love

I’ve talked here so much about my romance and my escapades with my lovah. It is really odd to have a love affair when you are pushing 50. It’s also really awesome. But I will admit that I’m still a bit of a skeptic where love is concerned.

I had been unappreciated, unromanced, and largely ignored in my marriage. So, since 1998, basically, nobody had told me I was pretty or made me feel special. Come to think about it, our courtship was only slightly better, so since 1997, I have been in a dry spell. That’s a long damn time.

My heart and soul were so devoid of romance I was like a dried up apple doll.

(Have y’all ever seen one? Creepy.)

Then came Al. Romantic, sappy, sayer of beautiful things, twinkly-eyed, just an absolute Don Juan of a man. He calls me his,

One True Love.

and says things like this.

Yes, he says those words.

They come out of his mouth.

And he looks at me like that.

And I look at him like this.

Because I’m lame.

But this whole ‘true love’ thing has thrown me for a loop. I’m even more loopy because it’s been 3 weeks since I’ve seen Westley Al and we have almost 2 weeks to go. I’m doing my normal I-hate-this-long-distance-relationship-crap and I have the fade baaad.I told him yesterday that we would have to get to know each other all over again because I don’t remember him anymore and I don’t remember that it is special and true love and worth it.

(Oh yes, I did.)

His response was to reassure me that it is just as important as it was and that he knows that as soon as we are together next week that it will come flooding back and he has no worries because he knows that this is true love. He told me he has been saying this since 1981 and he hasn’t changed his mind since then. (I didn’t bring up his 20 year marriage because that would have been rude. HA.) So, I went to bed thinking of true love and is this true love? Is there such a thing of true love? What if he gets off the airplane and I don’t like him anymore? What if he doesn’t like me? What if I want him to leave early? What if he says he isn’t interested and wants to leave early?

Then the universe happened.

I saw a patient today that I’ve never seen before. I received a referral to initiate psych services because this woman, who is 94 y.o, lost her son last week. He was 59 y.o. and her primary support person. He was very involved with her and checked on her every day. When I saw her birthday on the referral form I thought there had been a mistake. She was a delightful, perfectly splendid 94 y.o. who was Alert & Oriented X 3. She was tearful and clearly grieving her son. I provided support and let her tell her story of his death and her fears of not being able to go on without him. We talked about her family, she is a widow, and then she started talking about her sadness when he died and she said,

“It was true love.”

She said, “I thought I was going to die when he died. I was never with another man. We had promised each other we would never be with anyone else if the other one died, and I never did. I miss him every day. He was the love of my life.”

sigh.

I’m all like, “That is so sweet. I can’t imagine. How long were you married?”

She said,

“Oh Honey, that man was not MY HUSBAND! Oh No! He was terrible, I was glad when he died. He was nothing but trouble.”