Pushing Past Seventy and Looking for Love

  The Ever So Human Infatuation With Beauty   Is this infatuation a design flaw or planned obsolescence?   Does beauty truly serve as a deciding factor in positively moving the species forward, is Mother Nature actually that shallow? Or is our fascination just a huge evolutionary mistake? After all, physical characteristics denote nothing about capabilities or inner qualities. So if natural selection is selecting the wrong traits, what does this say about us as a species?   Many people get stuck in thinking they are not good looking enough, some people get stuck in thinking their looks will open any door, regardless of skill or effort. Thoughts and feelings about physical appearance have ripple effects. One woman I know pushed her adopted daughter into modeling because she, herself, had never felt pretty or popular and wanted to experience these through her daughter. My friend was smart, funny, and a talented writer and business woman, but still her early teena...

DOES YOUR DAUGHTER KNOW YOU ARE GOING OUT DRESSED LIKE THAT Out and about pandemic style, I’m wearing a four layer mask (two coffee filters squished into a double cloth mask). My eyes are extravagantly made up, as in false eyelashes and liquid eyeliner. Meg, my voluptuous two dates per weekend friend and I are visiting the local watering hole. As we pull up to the destination, we noticed that snow is slowly accumulating. Getting out of the car and heading inside, we think safety, not sexy. Meg’s arm was in a sling, thanks to a recent fall.   And I was using a cane, having had a fall two weeks ago that gave me a concussion. We walked, holding onto each other for dear life, and cackled. Cackled, not laughed or giggled.   None of our children or grandchildren would be happy with what we were up to, but they also would not be surprised. Once inside we commandeered a socially distanced high top and ordered drinks. I ordered a Mom-Tini, a weak martini in a very tall glass with lot...

PUSHING SEVENTY AND LOOKING FOR LOVE I am not yet 70 (68), but am close enough to being 70 that I want to start practicing at owning my new decade. Love is the one “thing” I have yet to figure out in life, despite having had two marriages and a passel of boyfriends.   Maybe at this point in life, I can learn to bypass my preconceived notions that I am no longer pretty, smart, or funny enough to warrant a good relationship. Apologies to all those wonderful men that I tried and failed with,” it really was me and not you”.   My “Taking Dating Seriously” to do list has homework expectations. In the name of research I enter “finding love over age 70” into the google machine. According to one unreplicated study in a British tabloid (the Daily Mail), people in the age 65-74 bracket have a one in 304 chance of finding love, whereas the 18-24 year olds have a one in 1024 chance.   These strange numbers fly in the face of conventional wisdom. They challenge my melancholic si...