Eleven years ago, when I finally and despairingly walked out of my more than 20-year marriage, I was a 41-year-old housewife. I was tidily, but frumpily dressed, with an untested IQ and my self-confidence flopping somewhere around my ankles.
I knew I could type well, carry on a conversation with a complete stranger at a school fete and was good at making jam. But such skills did not seem like adequate preparation for my new-found single life.
At first, in pain from the break-up, I dated the men around me rather indiscriminately. As I had just started a university course, they were mostly younger than I was, but at the time that seemed less important than my panicky attempts to get back into the dating game.
Perhaps at the back of my mind was the feeling that I could make mistakes with people I never thought I would end up with. Shared interests like university and deadlines for essays overcame other more obvious differences, such as age and previous lifestyles.
In any case, it wasn’t as easy to go out with men of my own age. First, there weren’t many of them around, certainly not at the college; second, most of them were either already married, or divorced and trying to go out with younger women.
It took me a while to realise how very different in outlook the younger men were from men of my age group. These were the men brought up by women of my generation. They see women as equals. They expect me to walk as fast, eat as much and have as much right to decide where to go and what to do. They have been raised to cook and clean. They have been raised to allow women airtime. That’s a whole fight that one doesn’t have to have.
When I started seeing Pete in 1998 it became clear that our relationship was in a different realm from the usual dates we were having with other people. We took things slowly and thought through the various moves towards a commitment that I had half expected never to have again.
He was 17 years younger than me, but we shared a sense of humour, a set of values and a curiosity about each other’s interests. I learned about living on a canal boat and he learned to enjoy pottering around old churches.
On a larger scale, I learned to control my ferocious temper and he learned not to be quite so clammed up with his thoughts.
At first, being together in public was hard for me. I hated the thought that people would see me as a cradle-snatcher or him as a toy boy. However, over time I have become less self-conscious and am now relaxed about public displays of affection.
For Pete, being with an older woman took away any pressure to have children — something he was never keen on. I already have two grown-up daughters — luckily, both younger than him, just — and he has no longing for his own.
So how has our relationship gone down with our friends and families?
Well, they have been equally accepting. There has been the occasional — but hastily suppressed — blurted remark from his side, especially about my having such grown-up children: ”How old are they?”
The dominant reaction seems to be that if we make each other happy, what’s the problem?
With other boyfriends, there was always the problem of wildly differing social habits. With Pete it has been easy. We give each other lots of space to keep up with other friends, and do the things together that we enjoy, like going to the cinema. Luckily, staying up late is not a favourite activity for either of us — unlike Cher’s boyfriend, who walked out on her, complaining that she was too old to go clubbing and stay up late any more. What a little toad. No amount of beautiful youth is worth cruelty like that.
A thorny problem for me has always been how to refer to Pete. He is not too concerned and likes to use the word ”partner”, but that has always seemed too businesslike for me. I’ve tried funny options, like ”the love of my life”, but that is hardly suitable on a day-to-day basis. So we’re back to ”boyfriend”, which is still just about okay as he has a boyish air, but also, appallingly at my age, ”girlfriend”.
I now veer between partner, husband and boyfriend (useful when you want to cause a little ripple in the conversation). But I wish there was a word we could all use without embarrassment.
And sex? My ageing body with his beautiful lean body? Well, he doesn’t seem to mind my flaws and I generously accept his, or will if I ever spot any. Waking up in the mornings dishevelled and bleary next to him was a hard test — about which, as I write, I realise I’ve stopped worrying. When did being with the same patient, kind, sleepy person stop being potentially dull or fraught and become fun? I can’t remember that moment.
Brave women have carved this trail of emancipation from ageism for my generation — Mae West did her best in the United States nearly a century ago; Joan Collins more recently.
Society changes so fast and we can throw in changes and become part of the flow. If we want women to feel freer of constraints, then we have to behave likewise. So what if people sneer? Who’s having all the fun? — (c) Guardian Newspapers 2002