Life is an Ongoing Experiment

Or "Eventually Love Breaks us all".
When I was young and about 15 years old I felt I was old enough to begin to date girls. Older girls were interested in me then but they kind of scared me because they were "experienced" and I was not. And I wasn't ready to be chopped up like meat and thrown away because of being at a disadvantage. I guess if it was going to be love I was the one that was going to be in control or I just wasn't going to have any of it.

So, from the time I was 15 to 21 I went steady with 5 different girls from the time I was 15 to 21 and I dated for a short time several other girls too in between going steady. So, going steady was from 6 months up to 2 years. The longest two relationships were both two year relationships from age 17 to 19 and from 19 to 21 years of age. However, at the time I didn't know that I was actually in love with both those two girls (two years each) but wasn't mature enough to deal with it because I knew I wouldn't be ready for marriage until I was 25 or so even though back in 1969 when I was 21 many friends had married by ages 16 or 18.

But when I broke up with my girlfriend at age 21 something snapped inside me because I had actually been deeply in love with the girls in my last 2- 2 year relationships and it broke me inside because though I loved them both I wasn't ready to get married to either of them and was wise enough to know that. It was one of those "Inconvenient Truths" that broke me as a person. Because I had planned the next 20 years of my life "or more" around these last two relationships I felt cheated by life at that time and felt broken enough to give up "planning my life" anymore and decided that "Life is an ongoing experiment" and you just have to keep trying things until you find something that actually works.

And that is how I lived my life from then on "Without Plans" because in my experience plans don't ever really work "At least not long term".  So from my point of view this was the practical way to live life. It wasn't "romantic" in the classical sense. It was realistic in the most pragmatic of senses. So I went from 5 basic "steady" relationships to just trying to have someone in my life so I could stay alive one more day and one more week without offing myself from things not working out because I just wasn't grown up enough yet to marry anyone.

And what I have found is that even though from 1969 until 1973 there were many many relationships it was the "right thing" for me to do. Forcing myself to marry even someone I loved would have been a disaster for both of us. I just wasn't really ready or mature enough not to cause whoever I married not to be happy because I wasn't ready yet.

But through all the pain of my late teens and early twenties and all the many girlfriends I loved from age 21 to 25 I kept growing up and trying to avoid women who lived in just too much of a fairy tale out of a romance novel. I looked for women who knew who they were, were getting an education and who had or were about to travel the world. So, by the time I was 25 and met the lady that I eventually married and had a son with I was finally ready to at last, be married and to be a Dad.

I don't think marriage is the best thing ever invented for men or women but it definitely is the best thing invented for their kids!