When Life Came Before Love

So I’ve had seven long-term relationships over the last 45 years or so. That surprises some of my friends and frankly I’m a little bit surprised myself when I imagine these seven exes together in one room. These relationships didn’t start because I thought it was time to have a new boyfriend, there was no carefully planned search or anything like that. But when I look back over that period of time I realize that they came into my life while I was busy with other stuff.

The first one arrived when I moved from my provincial town to Amsterdam. Another one started after I had moved to the lights and excitement of New York. Then there were some who became lovers after we had been friends for awhile. And then there were those serendipitous encounters you don’t expect. Basically being in the right place at the right time. Hindsight is 20-20 and you can only see a pattern when you look back. But at the time these relationships happened, I didn’t see any pattern, because I wasn’t looking for one.

When I was young I wanted love, I was desperate for it. I needed companionship, I wanted hot sex, I wanted to be hugged, I wanted to laugh together. Basically I wanted someone whose t-shirts I could wear as if they were my own. So I wanted all that, but I did not rearrange my life for it. Most of my days back then were filled with work, or pretending to work, moving countries, making friends, going to the gym, learning new stuff, and figuring out if I wanted a career or start my own business. Of course I made a lot of mistakes. But I recovered from them and then I made other mistakes. Life happened, and these relationships all entered through a side door.

Unfortunately, my memory is selective. It takes out the bad stuff and the rough edges and then somehow it rearranges the pieces into little narratives that make sense. Sounds familiar? I really don’t want to make my past look more romantic than it is, as it wasn’t always easy to hook up, and gay bars can be quite lonely. Of course I was rejected, and there were months and years where I was single. The relationship timetable was completely unpredictable, because I never treated a conversation with a new boy as the possible start of a new adventure. But something has changed for today’s gen Z.