Keeping the Mt. Lebanon Ladies’ Neighborhood Happy Hour Lively
BlueEyes1962 19 Dec 2007 | : He/She Said That?, Pittsburgh Observations, Strange First Dates
I joke I live in Pleasantville, but it’s only Mt. Lebanon. Everyone seems to know everyone, they all go to the Friday night football games, the moms all stay home and bake cookies and work in the PTA , or seem to. Like in Lake Wobegon, all the kids are above average. This last point is an indisputable, proven by the fact that 80% of the high school student body is on the honor roll, the high honor roll, or the highest honor roll, and the senior class medium QPA is hovering close to 4.0. (I am making this up, but I think it’s true)
One tradition we have on our street is the Ladies’ Neighborhood Happy Hour, recently changed to Ladies’ Neighborhood Respite Hour for reasons unknown to me. We rotate homes and get together every Friday at 5:00 for an hour of socializing.I can’t make them all, but I get to as many as possible.
The ladies on our street range form young mothers in their mid 30′s to grandmas in their 70′s. Most are married, but we have 2 divorced and dating ladies in our group, Shelly and I, and we both like to talk. Luckily the married ladies tolerate our stories and are quick to give us their advice.
A few weeks ago, we were at Shelly’s house. She had a dilemma and wanted advice. Shelly is sharp and intellectual woman in her early 50′s and much more picky about her dates than I am. I’ll have a coffee with anybody – I just don’t see the harm. I have yet to lose control because of a double espresso and allow a man to take advantage of me. But Shelly prefers to vet her dates through long email exchanges (she’s a writer) and will only then move to the telephone, and then, if they are lucky, they get a face-to-face meeting.
A good looking 38-year pediatric oncologist (I’ll call him PEDON) had emailed her, and despite the 17-year age difference, she had decided to email back. He was witty, articulate, and interesting, but made it clear in his emails that he didn’t want an internet pen-pal – he wanted to meet her.
Shelly was torn. She passed around copies of the emails and asked the neighborhood girls what to do.
It’s so much easier to make decisions for others – every single lady, including the very proper wife of a local politician, told Shelly to go for it. They all had dating advice, despite the fact that some hadn’t dated in 50 years or more.
Somehow dating can seem like so much more fun when someone else is doing it.
Shelly took the advice and got together with PEDON. At the next Happy Hour we found out how it had worked out. They had met at Mitchell’s Fish Market at the Galleria for a drink, and had gotten along well. He was genuinely attracted to older women.
But 2 weeks later it was all over. He had ended it because he felt she wasn’t serious enough – he was looking for a long term partner, some one he would settle down with and spend the rest of his life with. Shelly, recently divorced after 30 years of marriage, wasn’t ready for that yet, and he was moving on.
It does make you question conventional wisdom. I always ignored the winks and emails from much younger men because I assumed they were looking for something superficial. Maybe next time I’ll wink back.
That would be the advice of FRIEND who earlier commented on an earlier post:
"I guess I am too old and too tied down for the almost 50 year old playboy set, hmmm, maybe there’s a reason my boyfriend is 35. What do they say about not teaching old dogs new tricks? Always wanted a puppy when I was little…… dreams do come true."