I’ve noticed that if you date someone and there is an age difference it makes people uncomfortable. In turn, that makes me uncomfortable simply because I don’t like to make people uncomfortable. I’ve noticed that people will bark out things impulsively or nervously … “you know he’s older than you” just happened to me. My response after that one was, with a dead-pan, serious face, “WHAT!? For real? He’s older than me?”. Inside I am thinking smartassedly …I guess my mirror is broken and I hadn’t noticed how much younger that I was than my current love interest.
What I did notice is that he’s kind, responsible, has manners, enjoys fine dining, will try anything at least once, opens doors, doesn’t drink, dresses nicely, pays his bills, volunteers civically, smiles a lot, loves and respects many people, is respected by many people and so on and so forth. He’s also hilarious and all I do is laugh all the time. The list of the up side to dating someone because of their good character points outweighs their age, their color, their whatever – just fill in the blank of how other people judge who should or shouldn’t date whom.
Last week someone said to me in casual conversation, “So, I heard you’re a gold digger”. I don’t think I could have been more shocked and disturbed by another human. Honestly, I consider myself a unicorn. I make my own money, pay my own bills, own my own house, don’t need to be married, I’m not looking to find a man to have a baby, I’m not looking for marriage. I’m a unicorn. The fact that I am not dating someone my age doesn’t make me a gold digger, it makes me smart enough to not settle for someone with lesser quality personality traits. Gold digger. Pfft.
Truth be told, despite a few judgey people saying stupid crap about age related dating issues this has actually been one of the best times of my life and I’m glad I didn’t let a little thing like an age difference get in the way of a great life experience.