The reality of dating at 50

By opting not to date older women, I wonder what fascinating and wonderful people I missed out on meeting.

By opting not to date older women, I wonder what fascinating and wonderful people I missed out on meeting Picture: iStock

She broke her first rule of dating: never get into a strange man’s car. We’d left the noisy venue and stopped to talk when I spotted her hand-hewn necklace; she removed it, with a kind of intimacy, so I could look at it.

Her movements were calibrated. Contented with her life, she’d sworn off marriage; a week later, she would agree to one with me.

Before we met, I had been online dating for more than a year. At 53, the fear and hurt ­tumbled: I didn’t want to be old and lonely. Isn’t that what drives the middle-aged dater?

I like being alone but my needs were potent: to be heard, stroked, validated and praised. A ­serial killer of relationships both good and bad, I seemed to lack the skills for an enduring partnership while others navigated the couple space with ease.

One date lasted three minutes and one lasted three months. The rejection. Repetitive and needling, each one stung like metho on broken skin. I never got used to it.

I went on 60 dates that year, not including the many women I had contact with but did not meet. One woman wouldn’t meet with me ­because I hadn’t read enough female authors.

There was another, with two expensive degrees, who sent me a detailed questionnaire on my politics then rejected me because of my white privilege. Then, there was the writer. I wanted her so badly that I blew it through my arrogant emails.

I rejected contact with some deadly-smart women. If I didn’t think I’d find them beautiful, then I wouldn’t meet them. I felt bad for them and I feel bad about it now, because it’s shallow and cruel and I want to be better than that.

Yann Moix is a 51-year-old French writer who claimed he could not love a 50-year-old woman, as her body “is not extraordinary at all”.

In Australia, we have various words for blokes like you, mate.

After lifting my age preference by a couple of years, I wondered why most men online wouldn’t date even a slightly older woman. It ­became clear to me what I’d missed out on.

I thought about how many great artists had produced brilliant works towards the end of their careers: those late Rothkos in the fuchsia and crimson hues. Mahler’s last songs and Matisse’s paper cut-outs. The last Beethoven quartets.

Now, I’ve been with my wife for two years without a harsh word. I married, at 56, for the first time.

An old mate used to say he was in love with someone he hadn’t met yet.

I walked at night, that year, my trusted hound along for the ride, calling out into the black: I’ve been waiting for you all my life.

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