I met a girl in college and fell in love with her almost immediately. We dated for a while and were young and immature and let petty things get in the way, and we split up. Then I hated her. Then a few years (and some maturity) later, we found each other again and she fell in love with me almost immediately. It took me a couple years to let my heart accept love again, and when I did I was head over heels again. So now we’ve been married over 15 years, but it’s been almost 30 years since I first fell in love with her.
During that gap there were plenty of others, but nothing approaching love (on my part).
The first one I screwed up royally over and over again. I definitely learned how not to treat someone that you love, just hate it was at his expense. He’s happier now and in a committed relationship from what people have told me. He deserves it.
The second one started out wonderfully, but I think karma caught up to me through him. I guess I got what I deserved too.
First time I was 24, and she was still on college, and we fell in love, just after I’d taken a job 1,000 miles away. I tried a long-distance relationship, while she finished her last year-and-a-half in college but it stressed the relationship to it’s breaking point.
Second time, I was 29 and working at an ideal job in the city, and she was just a year out of college working two blocks away and we commuted to work together and fell in love. We talked of getting married, but I talked her into going to grad school first (architecture) since she was so creative and precise. She became a committed 24/7 student (she was brilliant) and we hardly had anytime together. I lost her to another architecture student. I am a moron.
Third time, I was 35, met a young woman of 22 who was bright, funny, crazy and a little unfocused. Learning from my past mistakes I closed the deal in 5 weeks. Almost 25 years later, I’ve gotten used to sleeping with one eye open. She’s worth it.
In retrospect, twice. Got past first date once the first 30 years of my life, with a woman who was desperate to get married but had nothing in common with me. Moved to New York from my small southern town, fell in love for the first time within a year. She decided fairly abruptly she didn’t want a commitment (as of a year or so ago, she hadn’t been married). Less than a year later fell in love again, and we’ll have been married 18 years in August.
None. I love, and have loved, plenty of people, but I’ve never been in love in the way other people describe, where you look at someone and think, “I want us to be the most important relationship in each other’s lives, forever and always.” Hell, I’ve never liked anyone enough to want to share a bedroom with them on an ongoing basis. I’m not opposed to the notion, but it hasn’t happened yet, and I won’t be upset if it never does.
I don’t especially long for it. I used to wonder if that made me broken, but then I realized I was bothered more by not being bothered by it than anything, and that this is one of those areas where other people’s opinions don’t count. Mazel tov to all you who want it and find it, but I’m happiest rooming by myself.