Thinking about these two guys today made me feel lonely,
lonely for the kind of person I married. Not that I’m looking but are all the
good guys in the world just a fond memory? As soon as I typed that last
sentence I realized how unfair that question is to the male population. I know
lots of good guys---my niece’s husbands who are both salt-of-the-earth types,
my brother-in-law who is kindness personified, an ex-neighbor who helped us so much in Don’s post-stroke years, and my nephew just to name
a few of the good guys in my life. I shouldn’t take the good guys for granted
and dwell on the predators, I know that, but they reminded me of how different
Don was from the predators. Once Don and I went to a garage sale of a recent
widow, for example, and he took one look at the prices she had marked her
husband’s tools and he told her that she needed to close her doors and get
someone who knew tools to help her mark the stuff. She had specialized die
maker’s tools marked twenty-five cents each that even used sold for $50 to $100
each back in those days. No predatory instincts in Don. He could have bought
them all and resold the tools to the apprentices he worked with and made a tidy
little sum. I could name a dozen examples of Don going out of his way to be
kind to older widow ladies. My dad was like that, too.
Some would say we have to forgive something like a proposition.
After all, not all widows would classify a proposition the same way that I’m
doing. Some might even find the idea of trading “sexual favors” no strings or
emotions attached to have a great deal of appeal. That’s a question all widows
will eventually have to ponder and decide for themselves because as sure as the
sun rises and sets it will probably happen to each and every one of us. But let
it be known if it ever happens to me again that filter in our brains that keeps
us from blurting out our first thoughts is going to be on vacation and I’m
going to say: “Oh yuck, yuck, YUCK! Sex without love isn’t for old people like
us.” ©
