70 Plus

When you are seventy years of age, stranded in a foreign country, never knowing when you will be able to get back home and, six months into your exile your ‘wife’ of eight plus years dumps you. You are then, basically, in the shit.

While your ‘ex’ turns their deaf ear to your entreaties and tells you to move on, after making it quite clear that she no longer wishes you to touch her, life loses its gloss, its sparkle. Darkness beckons.

Being unceremoniously dumped (by your now Ex partner, twenty two years younger than you) is one thing, but this happening when you are stranded and at an age when it is very difficult to move on, is beyond tragic.

To paraphrase, seventy is a difficult age for a man (Cynthia). He is neither dead nor in his prime, but lingering, endlessly lingering on in an undead state. Bits, which had been in good working order only ten years previously, now require chemical assistance, or a lot of good will.

Dating at seventy is beyond ridiculous.

While the septuagenarian continues to live, and continues to be interested in a relationship, he is frequently told that the object of his (admittedly waning) desire, does not want one. Doesn’t want the fuss and fighting of a partnership. To be over seventy, means continuing to have feelings and getting used to sighing a lot. It also means the distinct possibility of living out your remaining years alone, partner-less and without the soothing intimacy of cuddles and hand holding.

Loneliness is a bit of a bugger.

When you have no idea when, or even if, you are able to return to the country where you had been living (prior to being stuck), life is entirely provisional and impermanent. Those conditions do not aid the search for companionship. 

There is also that nagging feeling, somewhere at the back of your mind, that it can all happen again. There are no guarantees. When someone says ‘I Love You’, they tend to mean ‘now’, at this minute in time. The future has to fend for itself. And so do you.

When you are up against it, constantly fending off depression, well meaning individuals offer sage advice. There are a thousand and one programs for ‘Mindfulness’ Meditation’ and ‘Being Here Now, which may or may not involve lotus positions and maybe saying ‘Om’ a lot.

There is much to gain from a more spiritual life. At least there would be if, at the back of your mind, you didn’t remember the last few words that your now ex wrote. They were “I want to be more spiritual”. More spiritual in this instance meant to be free to be without you.

At the end of the day…. is another day. Or so it seems, despite entreaties to higher powers.

Seven months later and I get on with it, life that is. I’m not moving on. I literally have nowhere to move on to. 

So I need to say this.

Be gentle with those whom you have chosen to partner with. Keep your promises to each other. Remember that we are all struggling through life, especially those of us whom are displaced. None of us are easy people. Remember your parents and grandparents who stayed together through worse adversity, some of them for fifty or sixty years. Be patient with each other and learn to both talk and listen. 

Communicate. 

Being alone after seventy is not a joke.