LOVE AT CHRISTMAS TIME: HELP WANTED

by Nelsie Petersen

It was the holiday season of 1996. My daughters were busy with their own activities, and I faced being alone on Christmas Day. Having been widowed for a number of years, I finally made the leap and placed an advertisement in the Green Sheet: “Husband Wanted.” It didn’t actually say that, but that’s what it meant! Don Petersen, who had recently been widowed and was tired of living in a large house alone with his late wife's cat, responded to my ad.

On Thanksgiving night I found two messages on my voice mail. The first sounded like someone I would have a lot in common with. The second, from the same person in a slightly irritated voice, said he had left me a message and wondered why I hadn’t responded. After checking the football games scheduled for Friday, I thoughtfully waited until that evening to call him. I explained that I could only retrieve responses once a week via telephone on Thursdays.

Don and I had a good conversation, and he invited me to meet him for lunch. One cannot be too careful when meeting men through advertisements, so I told him I would like to exchange photographs before meeting. He gave me his address in Grand Prairie, and I quickly drove over to see his house, which appeared to be a well-kept middle-class home. I returned to Dallas and then mailed him my photo.

He called to set up our date, but unfortunately I could not see him Monday (my hair was a mess), or Tuesday (hair appointment), or Wednesday (previous lunch engagement), so I had to put Don off until the following Thursday.

We met for lunch at an Italian restaurant and talked for three hours. Don checked off every one of my boxes. This was a relationship I would like to pursue. I hoped I had checked off his as well.

A few days later he called me, asking me to meet him to help him write an ad for himself, to be placed in the Green Sheet. Now what did that mean? If he was interested in meeting other women, that meant he wasn’t interested in me, right? But I kind of liked him. If I refused to help him compose an ad, I knew I would never see him again. Rejected and insulted as I felt, I thus agreed to a second meeting. We wrote his ad, which he placed. I insisted on vetting his responses.

When he asked me out a third time, for dinner, I began to realize that he was indeed attracted to me but, inexperienced in senior dating, he felt he had to invent a reason to ask me out again. This Christmas season I was thrilled not to be alone and to have an escort to several parties my friends were giving. One date was for a sing-along, and I discovered Don could sing and also read music so he could turn my pages when I was at the piano. Another evening we went shopping for gifts for his five adult sons and their wives and families. We were seeing each other frequently.

Three weeks after we met, as we were heading from Dallas to his son’s home in Grand Prairie for the family’s annual Christmas party, I was furiously trying to memorize the names of all his sons and their wives and children. Don had told them he was bringing a guest. They were expecting a male buddy. It was a surprise when he walked in with a date.

The house was beautifully decorated. Christmas cheer abounded. The large tree was surrounded by piles of presents. Dinner was traditional and very good. All the wives were busy in the kitchen, and children were running in and out, excited about opening all the gifts. Although everyone was welcoming to me, I felt a bit uncomfortable, unable to recall which son went with which daughter-in-law. Then one of the little boys asked his dad, “What is the name of the kid who lives here?” If little Matt was confused about his own cousin Michael, I shouldn’t feel too stressed by not remembering 18 individuals at the first attempt.

More than twenty-eight years of happy marriage later, I’ve gotten all of them down pat, plus five additional grandchildren and five great-grandchildren with another on the way. We heartily recommend taking steps to find love and companionship in our senior years.