A Midlife Marriage is an Interesting Thing

I never imagined myself getting married at 50. I thought my first husband and I would get old together, but his death prevented that.

In my new and unexpected singleness, I prayed and was specific with God:  I prefer having no partner over a “bad” one, so if there is no good man for me, please help me find contentment in a single life. If you send a man, please make sure he is reliably kind and patient, loving and faithful, sees value in a relationship, loves God, has at least one child of his own (thus knows that love and the commitments it entails – but let them not be too much of a hand-full since mine are stressful enough), is free to marry in the Catholic Church and (since I’m going to the trouble to be specific and I already know that prenups are forbidden in Sacramental Marriage) please ensure in some manner that he is not a threat to the financial well being of me and my kids. Please send him in a way that is clear to me and I’m ready now, so lets get to it (my impatience is something that now causes me some embarrassment).

This prayer ended different than any prayer I had ever made before with a thought something to the effect of “and good luck with THAT!” I am not skeptical of God’s capacity to do great things, but we all have free will and God will not defy anyone’s free will to mold them into something they weren’t just because it suits me and I asked for it. I needed to accept that reality.

There are four widows for every widower in my age range, and although I was open to the idea of a divorced man, I knew I would never want a man who had mistreated his first family. Numerically, it seemed to me that my prospects were bleak and for a time I was fully in despair that I might never love again.

I went on both Catholic and secular dating web sites with mixed results. I met both good and bad men on both (and I warn anyone to not assume that people are truthful or decent just because they are on a Catholic dating site). I was a few months into this process when my phone rang one day.

It was a gentleman I had dated briefly 30 years earlier although we met 40 years earlier as children, a thousand miles from where I now live. We had long since lost track of each other, but my father had remembered him and thought him a fine possibility for me.

Dad set out to do some investigating and found him living just 40 miles from me, single for 13 years, free to marry in the Church, a devoted father to one very pleasant teenage daughter, and (a detail God added to make this all the more fun) we live on streets with the same name.

I have come to learn that he is responsible and financially prudent, patient, kind and loves God. I am very humbled that my beloved was called to singleness for 13 years in order to be in the right place and time for me. I feel foolish for my impatience and I suspect the timing of us finding each other so quickly had more to do with Gods faithfulness to my beloved than to me.

One odd thing about beginning a relationship that starts out like a movie script is that you are both still very flawed and human and still have to figure out if you are genuinely compatible, which takes time. I also had to put foolish modern “romantic comedy” style thoughts aside and really contemplate a life with this man and the sacrifices that a future together would entail.

He did the same, but unlike some couples who discern this together, we each discerned individually. At one point, I knew I loved him and would treasure a life with him, but I was not sure that a gentleman who was (as a long-term bachelor) accustomed to having some degree of control over his life and environment would be willing to accept the chaos and unknowns of marrying a soul-surviving mother with three kids.

I promised myself that if he was reluctant, I would NOT pressure him. We would only marry if he was completely on board. That was harder than it sounds, a few tears were shed and prayers for peace and guidance were made.

Late last year he hit the ball out of the park with a proposal in Mary’s House on the outskirts of Ephesus, Turkey (Efes, Selcuk), which left me surprised to the point of speechless confusion. I literally stumbled around numb for the rest of the day.

My fiance expresses concern when I tell people the story of how God sent me a man with all the traits I had prayed for; he is afraid I am making him out to be a Saint. I assure him that I am fully aware that neither of us are Saints (yet) but he is a good and virtuous man whom I am thankful for.

We’re both amused that we each have traits we never expected a future spouse to have. He has a very serious career, yet there is a childlike wonderment about him (and an ongoing relationship with his inner 12 year old, which is funny since I knew him when he was 12) that allows him to be comfortable being silly. I say that God sent me kindness in a silly box.

He describes me as “really short” (13 inches shorter than he is) and my job caring for dying babies and bereaved families expose him to a whole world he never expected.

Our wedding will be in the city where his widowed mom lives to make it easier for her to attend. One of my sons will give me away and my grandson will be the ring bearer. Our daughters will each stand up for us (I call his daughter the “Best Maid” instead of traditional “Best Man”). We will dispense with wedding traditions that are cute for young people, but would look goofy for us.

As I write, we have our Diocesan “Conference for the Engaged” all day workshop tomorrow morning. Despite a combined 35 years of marriage in our histories, we’re required to prepare for this like a young never married couple and I see it as a joy. The same God who brought us both through the terrible storms that caused us to be single in our 50s is now giving us people to help us to prepare for the next phase.

He is a faithful God, the God of second chances. A God who restores the years the locusts have eaten.

When I read Anabelle Hazard’s column on marriages that were “Meant to Be”  it reminded me of my experience. I see God’s fingerprints all over it, and I’m so thankful!