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The Midlife Second Wife ™

~ The Real and True Adventures of Remarriage at Life's Midpoint

The Midlife Second Wife ™

Tag Archives: Life

An Adoptive Mother’s Thoughts on ‘Philomena’

28 Monday Apr 2014

Posted by themidlifesecondwife in Inspiring Women, Relationships and Family Life, The Cultured Life, Transitions

≈ 15 Comments

Tags

Adoption, children, families, film, Life, Martin Sixsmith, movies, Philomena, Philomena Lee

Philomena_TheMidlifeSecondWife

Even if you haven’t seen Philomena, the acclaimed 2013 film directed by Stephen Frears, and starring Dame Judi Dench and Steve Coogan, the media attention surrounding it has possibly made you aware of the fraught issue of closed adoption—especially those adoptions arranged and sanctioned by the Catholic Church in Ireland. The heart-wrenching tale of an unwed girl’s loss of her child in 1950’s Ireland, when the nuns at the abbey that took her in adopted him out to an American couple, received many critical accolades and awards—four Academy Award nominations among them, including a Best Picture nod and a seventh Best Actress nomination for Dench. Based on the book The Lost Child of Philomena Lee, by Martin Sixsmith, the British journalist who helped Philomena in her search for her son—50 years after his birth—the film is now available on DVD and Blu-ray, VOD, and Pay-Per-View. If you missed it during its theatrical release, I urge you to see it now—especially if you are an adoptive parent, as I am.

My son is now nearly 33 years old. Because his story overlaps with mine (as each of our narratives intersect with those of others), I asked M if he would be comfortable with my telling my part of our shared story. He assured me he would. (He hasn’t yet seen the film, although he’ll be coming over soon to watch it with me.)

Before I get too far ahead of myself, take a look at the trailer, and note the unexpected moments of humor in this beautifully crafted film:

I’m glad that I was alone when I watched Philomena. Although I was aware of the story and how it develops (I’ll not provide spoilers here, so continue reading without concern)* I viewed it privately not to shield my son from my reactions to the film, but rather to give myself space to have those reactions, and to reflect on what this courageous woman’s story meant to me.

That’s Philomena’s Story. Here’s Mine.
If you’ve read the serialized medical memoir on my blog, you already know the circumstances that led my first husband and me to adopt a child. We don’t get much from Philomena’s story about the way adoption changed and fulfilled the lives of her son’s adoptive parents. (The adoption of three-year-old Anthony Lee, later known as Michael Hess, was almost an afterthought; he was paired at the last-minute with a younger girl whom the St. Louis couple had traveled to adopt.)

So let me tell you, from my experience and perspective, what it felt like the first time M was placed in my arms:

I was overwhelmed by love. I was ridiculously happy to have him in my arms.

M was four-and-a-half months old and crying when we first met him in the agency office. (We discovered, once we got him home, that he had a terrible case of diaper rash.) The first thing I noticed was his full head of beautiful, dark blond hair. When your ability to bear a child is taken from you as emphatically as was mine, you are unquestioningly grateful when you are fortunate to adopt. As thrilled as we were to have an infant, I would not realize until later how much it would have meant—to M and to me—to be able to hold him in the moments after his birth. Did he have an uncanny infant-awareness that a difference existed in the warmth and scent of the body holding him now, compared to that of the foster parent who cared for him in the months since his birth? This was not a thought I articulated then. Then, all I could think to say to him, instinctively and repeatedly, was this: It’s Mommy. You’re home now. It’s mommy. I love you and you’re home now.

Among the charming items we decorated M’s yellow nursery with was a framed poem that I would sometimes read aloud to him:

Not flesh of my flesh,
Nor bone of my bone,
but still miraculously my own.
Never forget for a single minute;
You didn’t grow under my heart
but in it.

It would be a while before my delicious feelings of motherhood could allow room for the fact that there had been someone before me. But as my son grew older, it became clear that if ever in his life he felt he wanted to know his origins, I would move mountains to help him in his search. I did not know—I still do not know—anything about the woman who gave birth to my son other than the fact that she had hay fever and (if memory serves), was of Italian and Irish ancestry. We might have been told that she attended college, but I’m not even sure of that. I know I took notes when we got the call, but those are stored in a box in my first husband’s home. I’m relying on pure, faulty memory here. But I can tell you this with certainty: Whatever powerful reason compelled her to make her decision, I thanked her every day. And each year, on M’s birthday, I say a silent prayer for her.

The heartbreaking difference in Philomena’s situation is that she was not given a choice; Anthony was abruptly taken from her after she had three years—such as they were—with him. (The young girls worked long hours in the laundry at the abbey, permitted only one hour each day with their children). I would like to think that the adoptive parents of Michael Hess, who was born Anthony Lee, said a similar prayer for Philomena.

Open Versus Closed Adoption
Because my first husband and I were Catholic, and because we had heard that the wait time was not as long as with the non-religious affiliated agency in town, the Catholic Charities organization in our local diocese arranged our adoption, which was legalized through our county’s probate court. As far as I know, closed adoption was the only process through which a couple in Ohio could adopt a child in 1981. That’s since changed, of course; today, open adoption is becoming the norm, with birth and adoptive parents often meeting one another and exchanging helpful information.

Lori Holden is a blogger and writer from Colorado whom I met at a blogging conference a couple of years ago. She is also an adoptive parent. With her daughter’s birth mother, Holden co-authored a book called The Open-Hearted Way to Open Adoption. I interviewed her via e-mail, and she confirmed that much has changed since our closed adoption in 1981. Holden shared with me statistics from the Donaldson Adoption Institute:

“Prior to 1990,” she wrote, “fewer than 5% of domestic infant adoptions were open. In 2012, 90% or more of adoption agencies are recommending open adoption.”

According to Holden, “there is no set definition” to what open adoption means; she writes that it is not necessarily the case that birth parents meet the adoptive parents, for example. Open adoption might simply mean an exchange of information; for others, it could entail some agreement about contact or integration between the families. To others it could mean access to original birth records, or some combination of all these factors.

“For years, adoption agencies have been telling adopting parents why to do open adoption,” says Holden. There was, however, often no support or guidance in exactly how to go about doing so. The book she wrote with her daughter’s birth mother is, she says, “the girlfriend’s guide I wished had been available at the start of my journey into adoptive parenting. For all the shame and pain caused by secretive adoptions for women like Philomena and her son, Anthony, openness could have been the antidote. Readers say our book helps heal the split that is created at the moment of placement between a child’s biology—the story he’s born with down to his DNA, and his biography—the life that’s written thereafter.”

The Times They are A-Changin’
In Ohio, where I live and where my son’s adoption took place, Governor John Kasich signed into law a bill that will eventually allow adoptees, upon attaining legal age, access to their birth records. According to reporting by Robert Higgs of the Northeast Ohio Media Group, “the law applies to an estimated 400,000 Ohioans adopted between Jan. 1, 1964, and Sept. 18, 1996.” This would include my son; he was born in June 1981.

According to Holden, many states are beginning “to unseal what was once sealed.” In fact, the day she responded to my e-mail, her own state of Colorado put two bills through the legislature. She shared with me a link to a map, created by the White Oak Foundation, illustrating U.S. adoption statutes.

I’m grateful for this new law in Ohio. If and when my son decides to take the next step and conduct a search, his path will be cleared of many obstructions.

What I realized, watching Philomena, was how excruciatingly painful that separation from Anthony was for her. Even as an adoptive parent, I wanted to reach through the screen and prevent that hopeful St. Louis couple from realizing their dream—I wanted to intervene on Philomena’s behalf, so strongly did I identify with her. In experiencing the joy of raising my son and watching him grow into an accomplished young man, I understand the power of a mother’s love.

I look forward to watching Philomena with him.

 

Postscript
Philomena Lee has become an advocate for adoption rights in Ireland, founding The Philomena Project in conjunction with that country’s  Adoption Rights Alliance. The organization calls upon the Irish government to implement adoption information and tracing legislation. Philomena Lee is taking her fight all the way to the Irish Supreme Court.

The shame and pain that Holden referred to earlier was such that in Ireland, at the abbey where Philomena was sent, the nuns insisted that the girls’ identity be kept hidden—a fact not included in the film. Anne Midgette, writing in the Washington Post, reported that “the girls in the convent were forced to use other names—Philomena went by “Marcella”—and never knew each others’ true identities.”

When I read this, I had to stop and read it again, and then a third time, to make sure I was seeing what I thought I was seeing. Philomena went by ‘Marcella.’

My name is Mari-Marcelle.

* The following articles do contain spoilers, but I provide them for those who would like to explore the story further:

“Searching for Philomena’s Real Son,” by Jacob Bernstein in The New York Times

“Philomena Namesake Doesn’t Blame Catholic Church for her Ordeal,” by Nicole Winfield in The Huffington Post

“The Real Philomena Lee finds Hollywood Ending to Adoption Story,” by Anne Midgette in The Washington Post

Lori Holden blogs at LavenderLuz.com and contributes to the Huffington Post. Her book with Crystal Hass, The Open-Hearted Way to Open Adoption, is available at Amazon.com.

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The Uncertain Certainty of Moving

27 Wednesday Mar 2013

Posted by themidlifesecondwife in House and Garden, LifeStyles, Transitions

≈ 12 Comments

Tags

Changes, houses, Life, moving

RVAtruck2The last time you heard from me (January 23, 2013, if anyone’s keeping track), Downton Abbey’s Sybil Branson (née Lady Sybil Crawley) was still alive. So, for that matter, was Matthew Crawley, heir to the popular British program’s eponymous estate. The last time you heard from me, Pope Benedict XVI was still wearing his famous red shoes. Advance word from Hollywood revealed, however, that due to copyright restrictions, another pair of famous red shoes would not be worn in Oz: The Great and Powerful.

The last time you heard from me I was still living in Richmond, Virginia. That is no longer the case.

Yes, the world will turn. And with every revolution, changes large and small are writ large and small in lives large and small…even in lives fictitious.

Following a nine-week social media sabbatical, I am slowly making my way back to something resembling an online life. Blogging, tweeting, and Facebook-ing all took a back seat to real life, and although I’ve had pangs of guilt about my absence (Would my readers think I’d abandoned them? Would they rush into the arms of another midlife second wife and abandon me?) it was necessary to stay away. I haven’t had a vacation in years, and this hiatus in the real world felt like a vacation, albeit one with considerably more packing involved.

It’s easy to forget just how much work goes into in a cross-country move…how many details, large and small, demand one’s attention. The sheer physicality of moving is exhausting. Just as exhausting are the weeks preceding the move, when your life is in flux and you don’t even know where you’ll land.

In a recent New York Times interview, David Rock, director of the Neuroleadership Institute, talked about the notion of certainty in relation to the brain. Using the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy as an example, he said:

The feeling of uncertainty feels like pain, when you can’t predict when the lights will come back on and you’re holding multiple possible futures in your head. That turns out to be cognitively exhausting.

I cannot begin to compare my own comfortable situation to those displaced by natural, political, or financial disasters. I do think, however, that anyone who has ever moved, for whatever reason, can agree that the months preceding a relocation—with unsettling uncertainties about where one will live, where one will create a life and a home—certainly feels like pain. Certainly it’s every bit as cognitively exhausting as it is physically draining.

House-hunting is fun for about the first week; after that, it’s fraught with existential angst. Where will our new pizza joint be? What neighbors will we have, and what will they be like? What sort of days will fill our daily lives? Where will we dream our nightly dreams?

In The Poetics of Space, the French philosopher Gaston Bachelard writes that “an entire past comes to dwell in a new house,” which is to say that “wherever you go, there you are.”

As I write this, my husband and I have been in our new home for 36 days. We have brought our past lives with us along with our books, dishes, and furniture. We are unpacking and storing, organizing and setting up, making room for all of these things in our new space in Northeast Ohio. The rooms that were bare and strange upon our arrival are starting to take on the look of us, the look of the familiar, as if we’ve lived here longer than 36 days.

And all the while the world is turning, and changes large and small are happening all around us.

Thank you for waiting for me. It’s good to be back.

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Moving to Encourage Good Fortune

23 Wednesday Jan 2013

Posted by themidlifesecondwife in Transitions

≈ 11 Comments

Tags

Good Luck, Life, Life Changes, Love, moving, Poetry, Relationships, William Stafford, Wisdom

MorgueFile Image

MorgueFile Image

You’d be forgiven for thinking I’ve fallen off the map. I haven’t been blogging much lately because my life is about to change in a whopping big way. After two-and-a-half years in the fascinating city of Richmond, Virginia, my husband and I are preparing for our return to Northeast Ohio. Or, as I like to call it, the Land Where I Met the Love of my Life.

You’d be right in thinking: “My goodness! Didn’t she just uproot herself to move from Ohio to Virginia? I remember reading all about it on her blog.”

Well yes. Welcome to life in the 21st-century, where job changes occur with greater frequency than they did in our parents’ generation. My husband’s new job—a really terrific one—is the magnet pulling us back, and it’s a good move for many reasons, although we’ll discuss the frigid climate another time. My son is getting married this fall, John’s oldest son is receiving his doctoral degree in May, and we will be much closer to his younger boy. Our boys, I should say. Our sons. None of this “his” or “mine.” John and I believe that our blended family feels very much like an “ours,” although, sometimes, old speech habits are slow to catch up with the heart.

As for myself and this move? Well, I can write and blog anywhere—from the top of Mount Rainier, if I have to—as long as there’s Internet access and I don’t have to climb to get there.

But for now, I’m here, chipping away at the slow deconstruction of my tiny office in our Richmond townhouse. I’ve just removed the artifacts and “familiars” that adorn my bulletin board, and at present I have on my desk a great treasure. It is a poem, yellowed with age and riddled with pinholes. I will carefully tuck it away in a file for the move to Ohio, where it will resume its rightful place—I want to say like a talisman, but that’s not quite right and you’ll see why in a moment—in my new office. I also want to say I hope it will bring me luck, but again—habits of speech tend not to catch up with the heart. The poem is about anti-luck, or, as the late American poet William Stafford called it,

The Little Ways that Encourage Good Fortune

Wisdom is having things right in your life
and knowing why.
If you do not have things right in your life,
you will simply be overwhelmed.
You may be heroic, but you will not be wise.
If you have things right in your life, and you
do not know why, you are just lucky,
And you will not move in the little ways that
encourage good fortune.
The saddest of all are those who are not right
in their own lives who are acting to make
things right for others.
They act only from the self, and that
self will never be right;
No luck, no help, no wisdom.

—William Stafford
(1914-1993)
©  1960, 1998 The Estate of William Stafford
Used with Permission of the Executor, Kim Stafford

When I emailed the poet’s son, Kim Stafford, asking for permission to reproduce this gem of a poem, I wrote that this is likely to be one of the poems I’d like read at my funeral. His reply?

“Perhaps the poem is more useful in the midst of life, when one can act so as to encourage the little ways …?”

And of course it is, which is why I’m sharing it with you here, thanks to Kim Stafford’s good offices, and why I’ve always kept it close to my heart, where old speech habits—even reflexively wishing someone good luck—sometimes lag behind.

Kim also shared something his father once said: “I must be willingly fallible to deserve a place in the realm where miracles happen.”

So I won’t wish good luck for myself, or for my husband or our boys. I shall will myself—and them—to be fallible in order to reside in the realm where miracles happen.

I wish that for you, too.

Note: Kim Stafford is an associate professor at the Lewis & Clark Graduate School of Education and Counseling in Portland, Oregon, where he directs the Northwest Writing Institute. He tells me that he and his colleagues are at work planning “The William Stafford Centennial, 2014: 100 Years of Poetry and Peace.”

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On Waking to a New Year Without Revelry

01 Tuesday Jan 2013

Posted by themidlifesecondwife in Special Events, Transitions

≈ 9 Comments

Tags

Life, New Year, Poetry, Resolutions

Calendarcropped2

MorgueFile image

Last night at midnight a New Year dawned,
But what did I do? I stretched and yawned.
For I was asleep, warmly snug in my bed
While visions of calendars danced in my head.

It was not a good year, two thousand and twelve,
And I’m glad to leave it behind on the shelf
With all of its storms and horror and grief
That threatened to shake my firmest beliefs.

I awoke to the news—not done in a jiff—
That our Senate averted the dread fiscal cliff.
All that remains is to rally the House.
Will they do the right thing? Or grumble and grouse?

I’m so weary of fussing and fighting, my friends.
Can’t we all get along? Can’t we all make amends?
Let this be the year we do the right thing
For our future, our children, and all living things.

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Viewpoints Product Review: The Panasonic Flash Xpress Toaster Oven

13 Thursday Dec 2012

Posted by themidlifesecondwife in Product Reviews

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

Consumer products, Cooking, Home, Home appliance, Kitchen, Life, toaster ovens, Viewpoints

ToasterOven_TheMidlifeSecondWife_Viewpoints

The Panasonic Flash Xpress Toaster Oven, carefully positioned to do no harm.

Here’s how I roll: I use my traditional stove for cooking, my traditional oven for baking, and my microwave for reheating—usually mugs of coffee. When I want toast, I use my toaster. I never understood the point of a toaster oven just as I never understood the point of a rice cooker: both have always struck me as redundant kitchen appliances. (What? You can’t throw some water, rice, and salt in a covered saucepan and read the instructions on the label? Seriously?)

No, it’s just never made sense to me to dedicate valuable kitchen counter real estate for something that, to my mind, has little real utility. Don’t take away my blender or my mixer, and don’t you dare touch my coffee maker, but to a toaster oven I say, “Meh.”

Such is the preconceived bias with which I approached this product review as a member of the Viewpoints Blogger Panel. (You can read my review on the Viewpoints website, along with those of my colleagues on the panel.) I thought there might be a ghost of a chance that I could be convinced, thus becoming a zealous convert to the joys of toaster-oven-cooking. But after using the thing twice, I’m sorry to have to say no. That didn’t happen—the Panasonic Flash Xpress Toaster Oven has not made me see the light. (Although we’ll get to the oven’s light, and its potential hazards, in a moment.)

Let’s begin with first impressions.

The thing looks like a toy. The Kenner Easy-Bake Oven I played with as a child surely had more heft and substance. The toaster oven is ten-and-a-quarter inches high, thirteen inches deep, and twelve inches wide. It weighs a mere seven-and-a-half pounds. This is all fine if you’re short on space and upper body strength, but as I said in my first paragraph …

I must add that I found the oven’s numerous disclaimers slightly alarming, especially this one:

Do not use the toaster oven near wall or cabinet.…Keep the toaster oven away from flammable materials (wooden wall or cabinet) as follows: Rear: more than 10 cm (4 inches) Top: more than 15 cm (6 inches). Side: More than 10 cm (4 inches).

I carefully (and nervously) measured the area around the oven before I determined it was safe to proceed.

Infrared ray heating elements heat the surface and inside of the food efficiently. But the cautionary bullet points in the owner’s manual include this advice: “Do not stare at the near-infrarde [sic] ray heater for a long time. It could cause injury to your eyes.”

I felt like Carol Anne in The Poltergeist, being warned to STAY AWAY FROM THE LIGHT.

After regaining my composure, I began my test. I purchased all-natural frozen whole-wheat waffles, and decided upon a three-tiered experiment. First, I prepared the waffles in the toaster oven according to the package directions on the waffles. Ten minutes? Really? Okay, Van’s. If you say so.

ToastingWaffles_TheMidlifeSecondWife

The waffles are toasting. Don’t look at the light!

Ten minutes were clearly too long. And I cannot blame the toaster oven for this; I followed the package instructions. The waffles looked like hockey pucks and tasted like shredded twigs.

PreparedWaffles_TheMidlifeSecondWife

A couple of mornings later, I prepared the same breakfast, but this time I followed the toaster oven’s directions instead of relying upon the waffle’s cooking instructions. I placed the waffles on the rack, same as before. (I never did use the oven tray; perhaps one of my colleagues on the Viewpoints panel did.) This time, I pressed the button for “waffles,” stood back (not looking at the light), and let the product do its thing. I had waffles in about four minutes. Nothing could have been simpler. And I have to admit, they were nicely browned, with a nice exterior crispness. My eating experience was as pleasant as one could expect, considering I was eating frozen waffles. (I do own a waffle iron, by the way. Guess I’m old-school.)

The results of test number two? I used less energy by cutting the cooking time in more than half, and I ended up with tastier waffles. So what did I do for my third test?

You guessed it!

I popped two frozen waffles in my toaster, set the dial to a medium setting (I referred to the package instructions for toaster cooking), and in two minutes—two minutes, people—I had delicious waffles. Warmth being a matter of personal preference, I put the plate of waffles in the microwave and zapped them for an additional 15 seconds. Perfection. Lightly crisp on the outside, moist and tender on the inside…

The prosecution rests.

I’m in the midst of preparing for our relocation to Ohio, so unfortunately I had to sit out the discussion with my colleagues on the panel. When Viewpoints posts it I’ll add a link so you can see if I’m all alone on this toaster oven limb. I’m donating the toaster oven (with reservations, given my less-than-stellar review) to the Safe Harbor Shelter of Richmond, Virginia, with the proviso that they give it to a deserving family without small children.

I give the Panasonic Flash Xpress Toaster Oven two gold rings.



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TMSW is Now a Huffington Post Blogger

12 Wednesday Dec 2012

Posted by themidlifesecondwife in The Writing Life, Transitions, What's the Buzz?

≈ 4 Comments

Tags

blogging, BlogHer, Facebook, Huffington Post, HuffPost, HuffPost/50, Katie Couric, Life, Sally Field, Sissy Spacek, Viewpoints, writing

MorgueFile Image

MorgueFile Image

Have you heard the news? I’m now a blogger for the Huffington Post!

My essay about how I met John on Match.com appeared this week on what is known in the trade as HP’s “vertical”—HuffPost/50. The first day it ran, I received nearly 600 visits to the blog. Yowza!

This has been quite a year, friends: blogging for Katie Couric’s new show, joining the Viewpoints Blogger Review panel (look for my next report tomorrow!), interviewing Sissy Spacek and Sally Field for the Richmond Times-Dispatch, being named one of the top seven blogs for those over 50 by the Huffington Post, and now this relationship with them.

As always, I couldn’t do it and I wouldn’t be here it if weren’t for you.

If you have a moment, I’d love it if you could visit the HP site and like the article on Facebook, or tweet it, or leave a comment. In the wonderful world of digital publishing, that sort of activity makes a tremendous difference. Thank you in advance for your extra support!

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‘Thank You for Shopping at the Man Store’

03 Monday Dec 2012

Posted by themidlifesecondwife in Love, Midpoints, Relationships and Family Life, Remarriage, Transitions

≈ 34 Comments

Tags

boomers, Dating, GenFab, Life, Love, Match.com, midlife, Online Dating, Relationships

JOHN AND SANDY_TheMidlifeSecondWife

This is not “Steve.” To find out who this is, please read the entire post.

Let’s call him Steve. After all, that’s what he called himself on Match.com. And who’s to say if that was his real name?

Steve and I have never met, but he’s the reason I decided to step off the Match.com bus, and for that I owe him my gratitude. Why? Because in the world of online-dating algorithms, where any click, keyword, or action is fraught with significance, stumbling across his profile, which he had the cheek to title “Thank You For Shopping at the Man Store,” ricocheted me onto a fateful course.

It was time for me to renew my six-month subscription on Match.com. Or was it? Steve’s headline was a wake-up call of sorts: If what I was doing was “shopping at the man store,” well, in the words of the immortal Bard: “Yuck.”

Four years of on-again, off-again attempts to meet someone in cyber-land had taken their toll. This was clearly a stupid way to meet people, and I was done. Finished.

That weekend I sent Match my notification that I’d not be renewing, and went about my business.

I had taken a few vacation days from work, and the next day, a Monday, was beautiful and bright outside. I was about to go out for a walk. But the siren call of the inbox lured me from my intended rounds.

I still had a couple of days before my Match profile vanished from public view. Now, with the pressure off, it might be fun to log onto my email and see what new horrors awaited me.

Oh. This one sounds promising. “ArtsandSportsLvr” finds me, “1literary_lady,” interesting. At least that’s what the subject header of the Match email indicates: “You Sparked Someone’s Interest!”

Well what do you know? With just a couple of days left to go on Match, I get a nibble.

I click the link that takes me to the Match website, and click again to see what Match has to say about him.

“He’s a 55-year-old man living in Cleveland, OH.”

Okay, age is fine. Geography, manageable.

“You both fancy felines. Like you, he’s not a smoker. He has a graduate degree.”

An intelligent cat-lover who doesn’t have nicotine stains on his teeth. This just keeps getting better and better.

I click on the link to his profile.

Ah. He’s included a picture. That’s always a good sign. There’s nothing creepier than seeing a faded blue head in silhouette accompanied by a wink (or, sometimes, a leer).

Wait. This is a nice picture. Look at those bright, clear blue eyes! And gosh darn it all, he’s got a dog, too! That is, if he didn’t rent the pup for the picture. (Had I grown cynical? Yes, just a little, around the edges.)

I was aware of the cyber-clock ticking. In a couple of days, I’d be lost to ArtsandSportsLvr forever. I had a decision to make. I could let boy-and-his-dog into my life, or let them trot off into the sunset. And live out the rest of my days with my cats.

I close my eyes, take a deep breath, and send a reply:

SUBJECT: The artful, sporting life…
From:        customercare@match.com
Date:        Mon, June 8, 2009 10:06 am

Hello, and thank you for your interest.
I must say that from what I read in your profile, we seem to have much in common. You also have a great smile; it suggests a good, kind soul.

My subscription to Match ends this week, and I’m not renewing it.  If you would like to get to know me off-line, as it were, and wish to send me a note, here’s my e-mail address in the real world:

[excised]

Have a wonderful day!

—Marci

I go out for my walk, and when I return, there’s a message waiting for me:

Marci, thanks for sharing your e-mail address.  I would like to continue chatting until you get comfortable enough to plan a get-to-know-you meeting.  I was introduced to the Oberlin concerts at the gazebo last year and enjoyed two of them.  The theater there is a wonderful bargain as well.  I have been told that the art museum is worth the trip and is on my list of to-do’s this summer.

Now you have my e-mail address and feel free to use it.

John

“Go out and make a difference in the world and it will make a world of difference in you.” – JR

I’m intrigued. A guy who includes a quote from himself in his email signature. That could seem pretentious, but this doesn’t strike me that way. I like the philosophy here. Could this be a man who’s not full of himself? An actual nice guy?

After a few more emails, we agree to speak on the phone.

I like his voice.

We set up a meeting at the museum in the town where I live.

That date, our first, lasts seven hours.

Reader, I married him.

I know I had become cynical about online dating toward the end of my tenure, but with success and the passage of time, it’s clear to me that I really had to give the algorithms time to do their work. John and I would never have met without the nudge from our cyber Dolly Gallagher Levi.

I wrote about this experience, and the online dating phenomenon, for the Richmond Times-Dispatch in an article published September 4, 2011. My research included interviews with Amy Canaday of Match.com’s public relations office, and two experts— Mark Brooks, an online dating consultant, and Dr. Robert Epstein, a contributor to Scientific American Mind.

When I interviewed Canaday by email in 2011, she told me that in the previous five years, the fastest-growing demographic for Match.com was the 50-and-older age group.

Unattached boomers? Are you listening?

Readers, this post is part of a GenFab Blog Hop. To begin reading all of the posts on the subject of “How I Met My Significant Other,” please click here.

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You Can Take the Girl Out of Ohio …

29 Thursday Nov 2012

Posted by themidlifesecondwife in Transitions

≈ 16 Comments

Tags

Life, moving, Ohio

Map of Ohio

Map of Ohio (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

… but you can’t take the girl out of Ohio.

That’s right, folks. After nearly two-and-a-half wonderful years in Richmond, Virginia, my husband and I are returning to the Great State of Ohio—the land where we met and fell in love. The transition has already begun; John has started a terrific new job in the Cleveland/Akron area, and I’m managing operations down here until our townhouse sells and we find a new place to call home. Watch this space for exciting news about house-hunting! house-selling! packing! moving! driving across several states with a dog and a cat in tow! grappling with colder temperatures and honest-to-gosh winters with snow!

Do you have any great moving stories to share? Any great advice? (Any horror stories?) I’d love to hear from you. Leave a comment below, and you’ll be entered for a special drawing.

Talk to you soon!

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From My Home to Yours, Happy Thanksgiving

21 Wednesday Nov 2012

Posted by themidlifesecondwife in Relationships and Family Life, Special Events, Transitions, What's the Buzz?

≈ 4 Comments

Tags

blogs, Family, Life, Thanksgiving

English: Saying grace before carving the turke...

English: Saying grace before carving the turkey at Thanksgiving dinner in the home of Earle Landis in Neffsville, Pennsylvania (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Quite a lot has happened on the home front of late—so much, in fact, that I haven’t had a chance to fully process it all, let alone write about it. But on this Thanksgiving Eve, the most important thing I can share with you right now is to tell you that I’m keenly aware of all that I have to be thankful for this year—my husband’s love and the health of my family foremost. I’m writing this from the home I carry with me in my heart, rather than from our physical home. We’ve traveled again this year—to Ohio again this year—and I’ll have more to share with you about that at a later time. For now, I just want to add one more item to the list of things I’m grateful for: Your readership and support. Knowing that you are there, at the other end of the line, as it were, fills me with joy. Because of you, this little blog has grown beyond my wildest imaginings. A Thanksgiving post that I shared with you last year on this site appears today on Better After 50, a weekly online magazine, curated by Felice Shapiro, that was featured in the Boston Globe last month. So thank you, dear readers. Your support, your visits to this site, make a difference. I wish you and your loved ones a very happy, healthy Thanksgiving.

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The Huffington Post Features the Midlife Second Wife

09 Friday Nov 2012

Posted by themidlifesecondwife in Midpoints, The Writing Life, What's the Buzz?

≈ 3 Comments

Tags

Baby Boomers, Facebook, Huffington Post, HuffPost, Life, midlife, Wisdom, Women

What a week this has been! You might recall that on Monday, I posted an essay called “To Marci, On Your 20th Birthday,” which I wrote as part of a “blog hop” sponsored by Generation Fabulous, an amazing Facebook group to which I’m honored to belong. (We lovingly call it GenFab.) If you haven’t had a chance to read that post yet, please do, and please check out the posts by my GenFab compatriots. There’s a lot of collected wisdom there, and it seems that the Huffington Post agrees. Three Huffington Post sections—HuffPost Women, HuffPost50, and HuffPost Healthy Living—as well as HuffPostLiving’s Facebook page, featured 14 of us in an article about our blog hop. (You can find my quote on the second panel of the Huffington Post slideshow.)

My deepest thanks to the GenFab troika: Chloe Jeffreys of “The Chloe Chronicles,” Sharon Greenthal, who writes “Empty Nest, Full Mind,” and Anne Parris, the voice behind “Not A Supermom.”

The question—”What Advice Would You Give Your 20-Year-old Self?”—is really striking a chord with readers: people all over are sharing and commenting. I’d love to give readers of “The Midlife Second Wife” a chance to weigh in on the topic. So tell me:

What would you say to your 20-year-old self?

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