Finding Older Single Men: Part 2

Life in the Boomer Lane has received many responses from her post, Finding Older Single Men Part 1. Some of these have actually been in writing, as opposed to being painted on the front of her house in the middle of the night. She will share a couple of these with you, as well as her own thoughts on the matter.

She will start with the following disclaimer: This post is intended solely for women who have an interest in finding age-compatible men for the purpose of a relationship. It does not include
1. Women who have created amazing, stimulating solo lives with family, friends and high quality vibrators
2. Women who have set-in-stone preconceived notions of what older men are like and are not open to a change of thinking no way no how no siree
3. Women who are committed to entering relationships that only involve men who have been recently toilet trained
4. Women who are already in relationships and are very happy, thank you, or, at the very least, on auto-pilot and are not interested in exploring any other possibilities

If you fit into any of the above groups, you may leave now, go on with your daily activities, and wait patiently until the next Life in the Boomer Lane post pops onto your computer screen. LBL promises that the next post it will have nothing to do with this topic, so you will be safe.

For the rest of you, meaning mostly older boomer women who are interested in finding out where age-compatible men might be hiding, LBL has good news. Contrary to the deluge of articles written about singles, it is not necessary to pack up and relocate to whichever state/city (almost always a place other than where you are living) someone has decided is the “best state/city to meet single men.”

If you are satisfied with the geographic area in which you live, and would, in addition, rather not start hanging out at divorce attorney’s offices or widower’s support groups, LBL throws out the following to chew on:

The men you are looking for are hiding in plain sight. Contrary to what many older single women believe, most single men are not agoraphobic. And, when they do go out in public, they are not disguised as elderly women with walkers or babies in strollers, so as not to be accosted by an eligible woman. They are out there, simply living their lives.
If they are “out there, living their lives,” why you ask have you not seen them? The answer is that as women, we often don’t “see” men.

If you are a woman of a certain age, you may have noticed that it is relatively easy to chat up other women. We meet women in supermarket lines, nail and hair salons, standing in the Return line at TJ Maxx, at the library, seated in theaters waiting for the play or show to start. In no time at all, we are having fun conversations about bra sizes, ex-spouses, the cute shoes that one of us is wearing, and why we shouldn’t be eating whatever snack we are eating as we are talking. LBL doesn’t know about you, but she almost never (scratch the word “almost”) does that with a man. Would most women casually chat up a male standing in the same line or seated next to them in a theater? (We are assuming here that the man in question isn’t in an arm lock or lip lock with a woman next to him). Probably not.

Is LBL making this up? She doesn’t think so. Here is what one male commented in Part 1:

As a male of a certain age, I will point out it is almost impossible to make eye contact with women of that same age because they seem to assume I would not be interested.

The trick here is to see the men we come across as human beings just like us.

LBL remembers many years ago that the happily married mother of a close friend had men talking to her wherever she went, even men decades younger than she was. She wasn’t tall, thin, or with movie star looks. She was the kind of woman who most people wouldn’t notice. Except for one thing. She noticed people. Women, men, babies. She flirted with everyone. She flirted with dogs. It was her way of being. And men responded in droves.

So why don’t we speak to a man, out there in the world?
1. He will think we are flirting with him and make advances
2. Worse, he will think we are flirting with him and not make advances
3. He has recently been released from a maximum security prison
4. Worse, his wife has just been released from a maximum security prison

My friend’s mother didn’t care. She had fun. The men she spoke to had even more fun. Had she not have been happily married, she would have had dates, as well. Men were flattered because she saw them as people, people who got her attention (They didn’t know that everyone and everything got her attention).

You’d think that being in a pre-dating situation (online dating, singles events, first dates) would change things. But many of us bring our blinders with us into situations like that. What happens to us?
1. He is a real prospect so we are thinking more about what he thinks of us than what kind of experience we are creating for both of us
2. He isn’t a real prospect so we fade out, waiting for the time to end

The result of all of this is that we make true what we believe: There are no men out there.

Think about this as you go through the day. Notice the people you don’t notice. Be brave. Smile. Or, if none of this resonates with you, follow the advice that another man offered:

If you want to find a man, find his dog, he will be near by. If you can make friends with his dog – then you are in and the man will come out of hiding.

That would be a win-win. Unless the dog bites you. If that happens, don’t come complaining to LBL. Remember, you didn’t ask for this advice. Or pay for it.