Love Over 50

Joy in the Present

Photo by Marilia Castelli on Upsplash

I was recently asked what love advice I’d give to women in their twenties and thirties and what love advice I’d give to women over 50.  Until that moment, I hadn’t realized how advantageous it is to love in middle age!

For younger women, dating is often fraught because it’s potentially more consequential. If they want to have children, women approaching thirty or thirty-five hope to find a permanent partner. They may be drawn to the Bad Boy, but now they’re looking for the Good Father (or the Good Mother). They want someone who’s responsible and of good character and financially secure. They’re looking for love and romance, but stability may matter more. And because their quest is marriage and motherhood they can turn to manipulative behavior to achieve their goals.

How will I get him to say I love you? How will I find out if he’s financially sound? How will I get him to pop the question—or will I have to do it?

Now, as a grandmother, I can sympathize with all this: it takes a certain agency to seize what you want when you find it. We are all the prime movers of our lives. A woman who wants children can’t waste years of her life with a man who does not, so she should move on.

But what if they were, otherwise, soul-mates?

My only piece of advice to young women is to try to settle down with someone easy-going. Everything is smoother when your partner is basically calm and agreeable. Minor disagreements don’t become major storms, and laughter can deflect the little tensions.

Women often say they want a man who can make them laugh, but perhaps they should also want a man who laughs easily—especially at their jokes! Either way, people who laugh at the same things often have the same cultural references as well as the same values.

At any age, it’s good to laugh with your boyfriend, but women over 50 are in a completely different situation from the younger ones. Because they are past having children and have no biological impulse toward permanence, they can choose their lovers solely based on who makes them happy, who brings them joy.

In middle and old age, the relationship has greater purity (whether both are single or it’s a clandestine romance). It’s unlikely to be manipulative when all you both want is to make each other happy in the moment. No one is planning or tricking anyone into the next stage toward permanence. Both delight in the sexual, intellectual, and emotional union they enjoy when they are together.

What can be finer and more invigorating than to find a person who excites you in many ways, a person with whom you can merge?  My advice to older women is to . . . go for it. Give that new person a chance, even if he’s very different from your last person. For now, you don’t need to know his net worth or his medical history.

Pleasure in the present is enough.