The View from a Drawbridge

The beauty of getting into a relationship later in life is that your character is already well established, so there should be no confusion as to who you are. The older you are, the more apt you will be to know your goals and dreams, and if you properly articulate them to your partner, you should be able to quickly determine if the two of you are heading in the same direction.

That’s the theory, anyway. The problem with that theory, it turns out, is that not everyone is honest. I didn’t get that memo.

Many, many years ago I got into a relationship and told him my lifelong goal was to relocate to the mountains of North Carolina. “Great idea!” he said. “Let’s do that,” he said. He even started going to college so he’d be more likely to be employable when the time came. I was thrilled.

About 3 semesters in he decided to change his major. No problem. Everyone has a right to change his mind. A semester after that, he “forgot” to register for the next semester by the deadline. I marked my calendar so that wouldn’t happen again, believe you me.

After one semester off, back he went. The following semester he told me he was quitting because they were requiring him to buy some expensive equipment. “How expensive?” I asked. $99.

The hell???

He had pretty much painted himself into a corner by that point. He had to admit that he didn’t want to go to North Carolina. In fact, he never wanted to leave Jacksonville. He just went to school to stall me in hopes that I’d change my mind. He had no real hopes and dreams of his own. He was just status quo guy. Our relationship ended after 16 years for a whole host of reasons, but lying to me and sabotaging my dreams just to keep me was a huge one.

After that I met a roofer who had so many dreams that it was hard to keep up with him. What a wonderful, wild ride that was. Too bad it was cut short. It’s impossible to know where it would have gone, but at least it was going somewhere.

[Image credit: successfulworkplace.org]