somebody to kiss, kiss me in the morning

I had picked up the 6-month-old issue of WebMD while waiting for my mammogram earlier this afternoon.
(Shout out to Tiara for making it a pleasant experience!)
I was caught by this quote from Sharon Stone:
"I feel like this is the third act of my life. To come to the true core of my being and not be pulled by the fancy of others? That, in fact, is true wellness."
Those words grant me a kinship with this 60-year-old woman.

I have felt that I was in the third act of my life since I turned 55.
No, let's make that when I was 54 years old, back in 2012.
That was when I first felt older. A much younger man (the bfe) was the focus of my attention and Troy Wandzel had just painted my portrait... with gray in my hair. I had become so consumed with keeping close to the physicist that I had even volunteered to drive him home to Ohio for the summer! Of course, I hadn't wanted him to know that I was so obsessed with him, so I had passed the trip off as a desire to see The Field of Dreams... which I did see, so that was good.
So were all of my adventures along the road that summer of 2012.
(smile)
But I couldn't shake off that feeling of my age catching up with me.
I had to wonder if the potential of a dalliance with a younger man was an attempt to hold onto my youth for just a while longer.
I had to wonder that again these last two years. This time, the man was much younger than me, like ridiculously so. Fortunately, the psychiatrist was very kind and was able to help me get past that infatuation with him. I think our friendship has finally recovered from that misstep on my part.
What is the lesson learned?
I am not ready for a relationship with someone else. I keep deliberately steering toward men who are too much younger.
Why do I do that?
Perhaps I've been having a midlife crisis.
I wake up and my mind believes it's still eighteen, but one look in the mirror and I know that to not be true.
Even though my hair is as long as it was when I was a senior in high school, there are streaks of gray that are there to stay, mostly because I like them.
Even though my arms are as tanned as they were in that summer of 1976, my upper arms are flabby and the skin is dry and wrinkled.
I should feel older... and some days, I do.
Some days I also feel lonely, but I acknowledge that I am not seeking to do the work that would be needed to support a relationship, especially a new relationship, one built from scratch with someone I have never known.
That said, I do miss being kissed.

That has been with me, off and on, for the last few years. Now, though, it seems to invade my thoughts often.
In fact, ever since the Christmas party at Erica's, I've especially missed being kissed.
Please note that I did not say that I have missed osculation with the bfe. In truth, that experience was quite awkward for me, as if I was making out with one of my brothers.
I definitely am not wanting a repeat of that.
No, what I want, as I told the physicist at lunch yesterday, is to be kissed like I had been in my dream.

In the dream, I had met a man on a blind date. Neither of us expected anything of each other or from the date. He was tall, slim, with shaggy graying hair, a fairly-neat full beard, and a few scars and tattoos.
He also had a wry sense of humor, which I appreciated. We shared a few laughs over the situation, had a drink at whatever place it was, then parted amicably with a handshake and no future plans to meet again.
Later in the dream, I was again on a blind date, with a different guy. That date turned ugly, in every sense of the word, and I fled the bar into the night, sobbing... straight into the arms of the bearded man. He held me close and spoke soothingly, waiting for me to calm down... and the next thing, I knew, we were out dancing, him twirling me under his arm, smiling down at me as we moved across the floor! Then, at the song's end, he dipped me... and brought me up and to his mouth for a perfectly orchestrated kiss, soft and caressing.
After that, the dream fast forwarded through our travels together, always within reach of each other, but not crowding or controlling...
just exactly what I want.

However, even I, who operate so much in an imagined world, know that such a relationship could not exist.
He and I would both be grown and have so much baggage...
but who says all of those bags are needed?
Could they not be left, unpacked, in the attic, stored as part of a past and kept only for the sake of one's history?
Perhaps a bag or two could even be jettisoned, its contents destroyed and forgotten?
Of those two options, I would select the first. Wouldn't it be better to accept all which has made me who I am? Even mistakes and poor choices have helped as much as successes and good fortune to shape me into the woman I now am.
That is true for every person ever born.

A relationship requires each person accepting that the other has baggage.
That also means that each person has to be willing to not try to change the other.
That's where a lot of relationships go south.
Me? I'm not interested in changing anyone...
I just want to be kissed...
and held...
and twirled under an arm and then pulled in close...
and danced with all night long.
A girl can certainly dream...
can't she?