Last May, I sent an email to Gwen, my former girlfriend (for want of a better term, we are senior citizens, after all), suggesting that perhaps, at some point, we might want to stop considering ourselves enemies. Our parting had been painfully conflict-ridden, but now, nearly three years later, I thought my overture might be met with some degree of receptivity. To be clear: I wasn’t proposing another attempt at being a couple; no, no, no, we had never quite managed that. We had spent approximately five years investigating the possibility, with results I have already documented here. Nor was I even asking to become friends. I was suggesting that someday, “some year,” we might arrive at a detente. This all seemed reasonable enough while I was sitting alone at my computer on Memorial Day.
I had some basis for optimism, or so I told myself. Leigh and Katrina have remained in my life after our relationships ended, and those connections still matter to me. Why couldn’t something similar eventually happen with Gwen? I also mentioned that I wasn’t getting any younger, and that leaving the planet without a proper goodbye seemed tragic. Yes, boomer-aged individual that I am, I brought death into it. I guess I couldn’t just say hello without mentioning the possibility of a final farewell.
After several months of silence, she texted back in late October to suggest getting together at a neutral site. We settled on a coffee shop across town and met last Sunday. For fifty minutes or so, we caught up, mostly about health issues. Two people in their seventies can cover considerable ground without ever getting beyond their aches and pains. Eventually, though, I turned to my email. I clarified that I hadn’t actually suggested getting together, only the possibility of someday not being enemies. By this point, of course, I had been sitting at the meeting I hadn’t suggested for almost an hour.
I won’t attempt to reconstruct the rest of our conversation. I sensed considerable lingering hostility on her part and grew uneasy, unwilling to revisit arguments that had exhausted me long ago. I do recall, though, that, at one point, she mentioned an op-ed of mine published in a local newspaper, saying it sounded like an AI-generated submission from one of her students. She knows how much my writing matters to me; the comment stung, as I suspect she knew it would. I replied that whatever editorial help I seek, the experiences, feelings, and questions I write about are entirely my own. I left feeling decidedly yucky about myself, a sensation oh so familiar from our years together. The impact of her words can still sock me in the gut.
Looking back, I know I wanted to find that enough time had passed for us to acknowledge having mattered to each other, without revisiting all the painful parts. I thought we might manage a sincere smile and recognize that some tenderness was still there. I didn’t think that was an unreasonable wish, but I’m certainly questioning my judgment in acting on it now. I had plenty of information about how difficult a meeting such as this might unfold. Still, I went. There is something familiar about my ability to recognize a minefield and then step in it anyway.
There was no smile. And I didn’t detect any residual tenderness. Ah, so.
Soundtrack Suggestion