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Dear Bel,
Five years ago, after a somewhat contentious divorce, I went on a date night with my best friend. After a few glasses of wine, I noticed a particularly handsome young man at the bar. We started talking and I couldn’t stop laughing at his humor.
He was smart, funny, and seemed in love, so I ended up spending the night at his seaside apartment. The next day I realized that he was younger than my oldest daughter.
I haven’t stopped watching it, but I always thought about it temporarily. He is now 28 and I am 48. I believe in aging naturally: my hair is now silver. Although he is slim, athletic, and looks younger than me, no one would ever mistake me for his contemporary.
I know he thinks I’m beautiful and is proud to be seen with me. Our age difference has only posed problems with his friends, particularly his wives and girlfriends, who seem to think he is wasting his youth on an older woman.
I have always set strict limits for him and told him that there is no future for us. I don’t allow him to visit me, but I spend three or four days a week with him. I’ve had other relationships during this time, but I haven’t been honest with him about it. I know he has never been unfaithful to me.
He takes care of all my needs and pays for all the dinners and vacations we take together. He is incredibly handsome and very successful.
But something changed last month. On our recent vacation I made friends with a 62-year-old German woman who is everything I want to be at her age.
Beautiful, confident and intelligent, she has lived an interesting life and taken risks I would never have considered.
On our last day on the island, she told me I’m a fool for not marrying the man who obviously adores me.
That moment changed my mindset and now I want to commit to him and for him to commit to me. How do I tell my boyfriend, after five years of telling us we had no future together, that I would now like him to propose to me?
NICOLA
Bel Mooney responds: There will be many women who read this and feel full of envy. “Good for you” is often the response when women find out that a woman has a much younger partner. Others may murmur that the age difference is really too big, and what if he decides later that she really wants to have children?
Some may wonder why you let your hair turn silver because no one has to do that nowadays and “aging naturally” is a mixed blessing, especially when you have a younger lover with friends their own age who might think you look like their mother. Others will admire your mental strength in the whole thing.
You don’t mention your career or your financial situation, but you’re clearly a strong person who knows what’s on his mind. You liked him, you slept with him, and then you controlled the relationship by setting the terms, both emotionally (“temporary”) and practically (“hard boundaries”).
You chose to have ‘other relationships’ while seeing this handsome, successful, caring role model among men, and you didn’t mind lying to him by omission.
But after five years you’ve changed your mind, simply because of a comment from an older woman you admired while on vacation. It may have been interesting and sparkling, but I have to ask you what I could know about you and your boyfriend after knowing you so little.
Observing someone’s romantic behavior during a week-long vacation is a very different thing than deciding that that attentive lover really wants to become a husband.
The questions are obvious: Have you and he ever talked about marriage? Has he ever asked you why you set those firm “boundaries” and said he would like more from you? How do you know he’s “never cheated” when he presumably thinks the same of you?
How do you think he would respond if I admitted to committing two crimes, if you did?
People often say, with cheerful optimism, that “age is just a number.” The problem is, it isn’t. Aging is a process filled with uncertainties and fears that are as natural as graying hair. I happen to be married to a man 17 years my junior (and have known other very successful age-gap marriages, too), but back in 2006 (when he proposed) I was worried that one day he would be sad that I never had a family of my own.
I am afraid that in the future he will become a “caretaker” as well as a loving husband, but we have already talked about all this.
Obviously, the only way to move forward is to start talking about his feelings and yours. I shudder at the thought of you telling him that you ‘want him to propose to you’; that’s too much of a leap. Take it slow. Give him more. Throw away your own boundaries, but be prepared to be hurt.
Unpleasant neighbor drives me crazy
Dear Bel,
We feel sorry for a neighbor. She lives alone with a little dog above us in an apartment block. We cooked meals for him, ran errands, and bought him gifts as gifts.
We have a lovely community garden with a nice green lawn and lots of flowers. We were shocked when brown spots appeared on the grass and flowers were trampled or uprooted. We thought it was the wind or maybe a stray dog.
I installed CCTV and was horrified to see it was the neighbour. He would kick over our garden decorations and tear off flower petals with his cane, as well as uproot plants. He had a look of pure hatred as he did this. He released his dog and he weeded the grass.
I confronted her but she denied it. I said we had proof so don’t lie. She was completely unrepentant and said we can’t stop her and she will go in there with her dog whenever she wants. I reported her to the landlord, the police and the council’s anti-social behaviour unit and I’m waiting for answers.
My problem is that she has shaken our faith in human nature. How can people be so evil when they are treated with nothing but kindness?
MATTHEW
Bel Mooney responds: Since language matters so much, I’ll start by kindly suggesting an amendment to yours. You see, the subject of your email is “Evil Neighbor” and you ask about people who are “evil.”
There are many truly evil people and much real “evil” in this world of ours, but I’m not sure it helps you to think of this lady that way. Her disappointment, justifiable disbelief, annoyance and disillusionment are all very easy to understand. I would feel the same way. But I suggest we all intensify our feelings in a negative way by giving her the wrong names.
How often is what we call “anger” really “sadness”? (Read And finally, on this important topic.) It can help to reframe our thoughts in order to cope with a situation.
You were very kind to this woman and you feel shocked and disappointed that she has this destructive secret life. You felt sorry for someone who turned out to be malicious, angry and a liar. No wonder your “faith in human nature” has been shaken.
All I’m suggesting is that you stop thinking of her as “evil” and start using the term “damaged.” Because by any standard, the antisocial behavior you describe is not normal at all, especially when the garden is communal and the area you live in (which I know) is extremely desirable, pleasant, and safe. Her actions seem pointlessly vindictive, so I’d like to ask why.
Some people feel inferior because they have received help and begin to resent the kind people who help them. Some resent “charity” and think, “Just keep your pity.”
Some envy their neighbors’ happier lives so much that they wish to harm them. After all, some dogs suffer so much damage when they are young that they instinctively bite the hand that feeds them.
The “faith in human nature” you have cherished is a beautiful thing. I had it too, once. But pause to consider (if you can bear it) the appalling world of ‘trolls’ out there, causing pain and even suicidal thoughts in their victims by clicking away on their keyboards/phones to attack people they don’t know. How can they do this? Because it’s human nature. These people are often powerless and/or failing at life, but the Internet has unleashed their vengeful destruction.
In a sense, she is your neighborhood troll. I wonder exactly when the brown spots appeared. Did the garden vandalism occur at the same time as her acts of kindness? If not, if it started happening a little later, then I would wonder what could have triggered it. Was there a little fight? Was the neighbor offended by something you did or didn’t do? Think.
Please understand that I am not asking these questions to defend her behavior. Far from it! And if I suggest that she is damaged rather than evil, I am not trying to make excuses, just to find reasons.
Your complaints may result in a warning to your neighbor. That’s fine, but you’ll still be neighbors.
In your position, I would try talking to her quietly again, maybe offer to walk her dog so she doesn’t have to pee on the grass, ask her what she thinks about what she would like in the shared garden, suggest that she do it. What happened is a thing of the past and that they must work together in the future.
I guess it’s a choice between aggression and some more (just grit your teeth) kindness. It could work.
- Bel answers readers’ questions about emotional and relationship issues each week. Write to Bel Mooney, Daily Mail, 9 Derry Street, London W8 5HY, or email bel.mooney@dailymail.co.uk. Names have been changed to protect identities. Bel reads all the letters, but regrets that she cannot correspond personally.
