Here is a sentence I never thought I would write: I am in New Jersey sitting on the couch with my boyfriend, who is watching football.

The two words that leap out at me are boyfriend and football. (I was going to make a crack about New Jersey, but that’s so cliche at this point, plus it’s really not that funny. It’s just a place where people live–some of my favorite people, in fact, so I say let them live in peace.)

And I know I’ve already mentioned S-the-boyfriend, so maybe that’s old news. But I still find it kind of a bug-out that a) omg, I have a boyfriend; how did that happen?, and b) I can say it openly, especially given that, technically, I still have a husband.  I have a husband and a boyfriend! Look at how far we’ve come that I can say that on a public forum without fearing that I’m going to be burned at the stake or forced to parade around with a scarlet A on my chest. To add to the excitement, my husband has a girlfriend, whose husband has a girlfriend, etc. We are all so out-of-the-box evolved, aren’t we? Why, it’s just a matter of time before we’re all vacationing together on cruise ships for the amicably divorced.

But I digress–because what’s most remarkable here is the football thing. I know: Guy who watches football describes 97 percent of men in this country–yet I have never had a boyfriend who was into football. Nev. Er. I’ve had boyfriends who wore eye make-up and/or trendy hats, and I had a husband who watched the Superbowl–but he’s of the breed who is in it for the commercials and the snacks.

Not only is S into watching football in the can’t-miss way that some of us watch, oh, Mad Men, but, because he has a Y chromosome, he actually understands what’s going on. He insists that no, it’s not just a bunch of over-sized brutes running into each other and knocking each other down until they become brain-damaged. He talks about it as if it’s a chess game, using words like strategizing and premise and intelligent. Yet, try as I might, I cannot see anything but a bunch of big lugs randomly bumping into each other–and from an informal poll, it seems most women are equally perplexed by the appeal of this sport. Are there women who really get football? If you’re out there, please reveal yourselves. (And, btw, I don’t want to hear about how you like soccer, baseball, basketball or tennis. I’m only interested if you’re a woman who actively enjoys watching football and can explain why.)

Usually this is the point at which I reach a pithy, often touching conclusion, but I don’t have one for this post.  All I can say is that I don’t get football, but I do like sitting on a couch in New Jersey with a certain guy who does.

Feeling devilish

I abandoned costume-wearing on Halloween when I was around 16 and remained completely uninterested in the holiday until my older daughter turned two; at that point, my urge to dress her as the world’s cutest pumpkin overcame my vague disdain for October 31.

But we were never one of those zany families where the whole gang gets in on the act—mom and dad as Princess Leah and Luke Skywalker, the kids as Yoda and R2D2—or everyone as a different-colored M & M. In fact, I’ve always rolled my eyes a little at adults who go all out on Halloween. (I’m not sure why, but there it is.) As parents, our role was merely to provide the ordinary, everyday backdrop against which our adorably-clad little darlings could stand out.

And then, last year, on my first post-separation Halloween, I felt an overwhelming urge to dress up. But I wasn’t going to wear just any costume–no fat suits or cardboard boxes for me. Inventiveness was the last thing on my mind. I just wanted an excuse to parade around in public looking sexy.

I’ve been tsk-tsking for years over how girls use Halloween for this purpose at increasingly young ages. I was not at all happy to see my 13-year-old strut out of here on Saturday evening looking like Minnie “She Works Hard for the Money” Mouse. And I would never wear those truly slutty costumes sold at Ricky’s—you know, like Nurse Kandi or Pocahottie. (Well, I might, but not in public.)

So at the last minute, I was trying to throw together a costume. Since we had an assortment of ears and tails left over from Halloweens past, I decided to go as a cat (look, I told you I was not trying to win an originality contest.) This would require me to wear black leggings tucked into my black pointy boots and lots of eye makeup. Perfecto!

In retrospect, Halloween ’08 was a pivotal moment in my midlife makeover, one in which I started to shed my somewhat-neutered married persona and began to embrace a somewhat-sexier, available one. Maybe donning kitty-cat ears and a tail wasn’t the most liberated way to get my groove back, but it worked. I felt a resurgence of a side of me I had lost touch with. Whether it was the cat costume that brought it on, or vice versa, I don’t know–but, curiously, just around a week later, I had embarked on my rebound fling.

I hadn’t planned to dress up again this year, but by the time the trick-or-treaters got going at around 4pm, I was infected with Halloween spirit. I ran to my closet, remembering a long red dress I’d forgotten about, grabbed the extra set of devil horns and the pitchfork we had lying around, and turned myself into a rather elegant devil.

I felt less invested in how I looked than I did last year, but maybe that’s a good sign. Maybe it means I’ve gotten used to having my groove back.

R and I have been seeing a mediator. Mediation is divorce lite for conflict-averse couples who don’t want to drag each other to court or traumatize their kids with custody battles. It’s for the amicable divorcing, oxymoronic as that sounds.

R and I are the poster pair for mediation. We get along, have the same basic values, try to put the children first, and donate to WNYC when we can.

So if it’s all supposed to be so downright pleasant, why would I rather stick pins in my eyes than endure another hour in that office?

Oh, wait. Here’s why:

• Because when the mediator asked for our wedding date and who officiated, I flashed back to early 1992, when R&I discussed our vows with the Dutch Reformed minister (don’t ask) who ultimately pronounced us husband and wife. I’m pretty sure and we promise to use a mediator when we divorce was not among them.
• Because the financial news is definitely not “all good” when you’re a freelance writer divorcing a magazine editor just as the publishing world is imploding and the country is experiencing the worst economic crisis in recent history. It’s all bad.
• Because, unlike after other traumatic surgical procedures, no one makes sure you have someone to escort you home after two hours of the emotional and financial evisceration that is mediation.
• Because it seems so annoyingly PC to mediate a divorce when it would probably be more exciting, satisfying and just plain fun to kick some ass in a court of law. But for PLUs (People Like Us), that would be like hitting our kids. We just don’t do it even though we secretly want to.

On the other hand, I have been thoroughly enjoying one of the major benefits of my marital disintegration. S currently stands for Strong, Sensitive and Swoon. Oh, and let’s throw in some Shoulders and a Sweetheart.

Yesterday I attended school with my 8th grader; it was “open school day,” the one chance to see what your kids actually do all day.

Parents were asked to sit in the back of the room during the classes. At one point, I noticed an attractive, stylish couple sitting side-by-side. Later, as we were milling about prior to the start of math class, I realized I was about to sit down next to the male half of the attractive, stylish couple. I gestured to his wife, who was seating herself on the other side of me, and asked if she wanted to switch seats with me so that they could sit together.

“No. We’re divorced,” she replied.

I found it funny that a) she would offer that information at all, b) she seemed blatantly relieved not to have to sit next to her ex and, c) she assumed it’s a given that divorced couples don’t sit together.

And then she asked me: “Are you married or divorced?” Just like that.

I found her directness curious. Typically, when you’re thrown together with the parents of your child’s classmates, one of the first things you say is “Whose mother are you?” or “Hi, my name is Cassandra. I’m Sam’s mom.”

After a few beats, I answered “I’m in-between. I’m separated.”

For one terrifying moment, I thought this bold woman was going to try to fix me up with her ex, but then math class began and suddenly everything became a blur. Algebra? Calculus? Why was the teacher writing random letters and numbers on the board and then, like a lunatic, adding parentheses and brackets? I wanted to stand up and say “Excuse me, kids, but you do not need to learn this. Sure, try to get a good grade in math so you’ll get into a decent college, but, really, don’t sweat it because there are no real-life situations in which you are required to write {} a, x , y and 5 in the same line. None.”

I wanted to share this insight with my kooky, blunt new divorced friend, but since there were 32 minutes left to class, I decided to look around and think interesting thoughts instead.

Needless to say, what I saw was a room full of 13- year-olds. Oh, the horror.

I flashed back to my own 8th grade year–the all-important Frye boots, Stan Smith sneakers, Huk-A-Poo shirts and Shetland sweaters. My size 27AAA “bra” and the stupid boys who made stupider jokes about ironing their shirts on my chest.

The whole dating/sex/relationship thing was a complete mystery to me at that point. I could not imagine how on earth I would get a boy to like me or ask me on a date. And to think that one might kiss me? Forget it. That stuff happened to other girls, usually the ones with real bra sizes. (Still, I kept my Dr.Pepper-flavored Bonne Bell Lip Smacker handy just in case.)

I looked at my lovely daughter, in the throes of thirteen-ness herself, and got a little lump in my throat, followed by a feeling of certainty that no guy will ever be good enough for her because she’s exceptional in every way (ahem–now’s when you politely say “the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree, Christina.”) But maybe I was being a bit harsh, given that the pool of men available to her at this juncture are a bunch of doofy 13-year old boys and nothing like the fine assortment of gentlemen who will pursue her when she grows up and gets to join match.com.

I awoke from my reverie to the sound of math textbooks gleefully slamming shut. I guess a lot has happened in the 33 years since I was in 8th grade (wait, did I just write thirty-three years?? Dear god.) At some point, I got a boy to kiss me. I imagine my daughter will figure that one out too, though I doubt she spends much time picturing her separated self sitting in the back of her daughter’s classroom chatting with a stylish, blunt divorced woman. I mean, she still lives in a world where it’s important to learn algebra (or was it trigonometry?)

I’ve always been a bit arrogant about my vision, which was as perfect as it gets for most of my life. I was the one who could see which bus was coming from 6 blocks away and I could read the tiny print on over-the-counter medications. I sort of understood that those who couldn’t read without glasses couldn’t help it, but secretly I felt they just weren’t trying hard enough.

Simply put, I did not get what it means to have your eyes fail you.
And now I do. Dammit.

Why must my blurry vision join the unwieldy mattresses, sides of trees, and petulant automobiles in their metaphorical mission? My eyes seem to be saying ha, ha, get it, Christina? You can’t see clearly anymore now that your future is blurry.

Duh. Really clever of you, eyes. Like, could you be more obvious?

But it isn’t just me who can’t see (though it IS just me whose car spontaneously combusts). My previously un-bespectacled friends have started holding newspapers six feet from their faces, and on every date I’ve been on since separating, there was a menu moment, where the man pulled out a pair of reading glasses and gallantly offered them to me when he saw me squinting in an attempt to distinguish steak from salmon. (Me: “It must be the light, but, thank you, I’ll use the glasses just this once. I’m sure my eyesight will return to normal any day now…”)

Once I accepted that ocular decline was just another non-negotiable midlife perk (and reading glasses the skinny jeans of my age group), I broke down and bought a pair. But I keep going through cycles of denial and acceptance. I lose the glasses, pretend I don’t need them anymore, then grudgingly buy more when I realize I can’t see jack. I recently purchased three pairs from the dollar store and sprinkled them here and there–anywhere where reading matter and I might converge.

I was really taken aback when I saw R toss on a pair, because his vision was possibly more perfect than mine (I said possibly, not definitely). Since I don’t see him every day anymore, the small physical proofs that time is passing as we soldier on in our separate lives tend to jump out at me. He wears clothes I don’t recognize, and more and more gray seems to sneak into his hair when I’m not looking. And now the glasses.

I’m starting to think that my sudden need for glasses suggests that I, too, am aging–a fact that hits me right between the eyes.

I was so busted this weekend.

I went to a delightful gathering of a few of my writer pals at the Jersey shore, which was great fun. We all seem to agree that the English language is increasingly abused and disrespected, that journalism is the new blacksmithing, and that anyone who thinks it’s ok to use a lower-case I to refer to one’s self probably has a personality disorder–because there is no other satisfactory explanation.

The five of us literary ladies were strolling along the beach, ranting about how hard life has become for we who still respect the rules of grammar, spelling and punctuation. (Also, we tried to pretend that we were down at the shore or down by the shore, rather than just down the shore, which is the vexing phrase people on the East Coast use when they visit New Jersey beach towns.)

I chimed in with my horror stories about the many incoherent online-dating profiles I’ve faced, and my friends agreed that poorly-written profiles are unacceptable. (Turns out we’re not the only ones who feel this way. Check it out: Do the Typos in Your Profile Spell Disaster?)

Later, during cocktail hour at Gwen’s house, my four very-married friends wanted to read my one very-unmarried online dating profile. So I brought it up on Gwen’s laptop–which was nestled on the table between the Chex mix and the guacamole– and the girls gathered ‘round.

I fear I shall never forget what happened next.

“You forgot an apostrophe,” said Jen casually.
“Ha ha–nice try, Jen. Good one. You’re funny,” I responded.
“You really did,” she repeated drily.

That’s when I turned into an over-tired four-year-old.

“No WAY! I did not! I did NOT!” I shouted.

“Um, yep–you did. See?”

And that’s when I realized that she was right. The word “let’s” was staring back at me on the screen, naked and un-apostrophized. I felt like a sham.

“I can’t believe I did that! I cannot believe I did that! How could I do that? How? I mean, I am so fanatical about not making those kinds of errors and look–I made one. I made one!”

The girls helped me over to a chair, forced a glass of wine into my fist, and pretended that we all make typos sometimes, that it’s not a big deal, and that of course they know I don’t really think you write “let’s” without the apostrophe. Silly me.

Now I can’t decide if I should fix the mistake in my profile, or leave it there and wait, fairy-tale-style, for my Prince Charming to come along and correct it.

On Saturday, my friend L and I spent the day walking around the breathtakingly beautiful Ft. Tryon Park, which is right near The Cloisters, a branch of the MET museum that is built to resemble a convent and houses their medieval art collection.

Strolling with L — one of those forever friends who feels like a sister–was so peaceful. So, so, so peaceful, in a high-class psychiatric-institute sort of way, especially when we stopped yakking about our tedious worldly problems and just took in the surroundings.

I know. Most women make a crack about joining a convent at some point in their lives. I hate being so predictable.

But, um, is it too late for me to join a convent? It would offer the freedom from shopping and the outside world that I so enjoyed while at camp in Maine. Mirrors are probably not plentiful and so I could age without having to notice it constantly (plus, those habits offer exceptional coverage of bodily decline–better, even, than a maxi dress.) Money wouldn’t be necessary, so I could abandon my fruitless job search. And I assume dating would be forbidden, making that a no-brainer.

Plus, I have a great aunt who was a nun, so I should be a shoo-in.

I’m the perfect candidate for a nunnery, except for a few minor issues. There’s my agnosticism, which might not sit well with the sisters. It would be tricky to pull off my half of the parenting responsibilities, and most convents don’t serve Sauvignon Blanc with dinner (or even bad Chardonnay, I’m guessing.) And–shoot--I bet they don’t have wireless.

So, yeah, scratch that idea. Maybe instead I’ll buy a membership to The Cloisters, which will allow me to wander and contemplate at my leisure and get me a discount off medieval-style goodies at the gift shop.

If you’ve sensed that I’m feeling a little negative these days, you sensed correctly. I know that negativity doesn’t help one overcome adversity–and I’m not proud of my currently cranky attitude. But it feels good to be honest and I have faith that you can take it. Plus, it’s therapeutic for me to vent and this is all about me. Hopefully, getting it out will allow some positivity back in.

Here is why I’m fed up:

1. Because it’s really hard to find a job during a recession and applying via those huge job boards has gotten me nowhere so far (Check out WNYC’s recent Brian Lehrer segment on job boards to learn why.)
2. Because I want a wonderful boyfriend, but I am sick of trying to find one online (and no, I don’t know anyone who knows someone, as far as I know.)

Let me expand on number two, which offers more opportunities for me to shoot the snark.

You might recall that my online-dating site subscription expired in late June. Well, apparently I get six additional months free as a reward for not having snagged “someone special” during the paid 6 months. So my membership extends through the end of December. Because that feels like more of a punishment than a perk, I recently clicked on “visibility settings” and made my profile invisible. Given my super-bad attitude, I think it’s for the best.

I’ve become like the characters on Seinfeld, who dismissed members of the opposite sex for being low-talkers or close-talkers, for having a big nose, an annoying laugh, “man-hands,” or any other human flaw imaginable.

I haven’t even had the chance to be hyper-critical of anyone in person, because I’ve been ruling out guys after an email or two. I’ve avoided getting back to some of them to stop myself from responding with:

• You signed your email “Barry,” which means that is probably your name and I hate that name, so forget it.
• You seemed appealing until I clicked through your photos and found one of you wearing a Speedo. It’s rarely OK to wear a Speedo and it is never OK to post a photo of yourself in one. If you don’t know that, I’m not your girl.
• You wrote that you never drink alcohol, which makes me worry that you’re either an alcoholic or no fun–and I’m truly sorry, but I can’t deal with either.
• You signed off with “be well” and that expression bugs me. I fear that if we meet, you might say something like “it’s all about the journey,” and then I’d have to end it for sure.
• Yes, yes, I wrote in my profile that I like lakes. But you’ve now sent me three emails asking me how much I do or don’t like oceans and rivers in comparison and it’s making me think that bodies of water are weirdly important to you.

See what I mean? I wouldn’t want to date me at the moment, so I’m going to give the male population a break until I can be a nicer, more accepting person.

(Did I just hear you snicker “good luck with that?”)

I remember how thrilled I was the first time I referred out loud to R as “my husband.” It was on our honeymoon, which took place in the Pacific Northwest. We took a red-eye flight to Seattle the day after our wedding and arrived early in the morning, completely exhausted. Our reserved room at the B&B wasn’t available until the afternoon and we were simply too tired to function, so we checked into a motel for a four-hour nap.

I was at the front desk, drowsily arranging for the room, and couldn’t resist mentioning that my husband was parking the car, even though the desk clerk hadn’t asked and didn’t care. When R entered the lobby, I announced “oh, look, here’s my husband now. Why, I guess he parked the car successfully, that husband of mine.”

I may as well have been wearing a Cinderella costume, such a dorky Disney princess was I, so out-of-my-mind delighted to have become a wife, and before the age-30 deadline too! Sure, I was raised in the 1970s, but Gloria Steinem could eat my veil. I had married for love, but I was also proud in a weird 1950s kind of way. My childhood had been difficult and sad and I’d always felt on the outside, always envied the “normal” families. Marriage made me part of the status quo, legitimate and safe.

Fast forward to the present: I’m sitting on a bar stool drinking Sauvignon Blanc with my friend, recounting my latest dating adventure and secretly feeling sorry for her because she’s a wife with a husband and a long marriage. This was during my BDF (brief dating frenzy), when I crossed over to the other side and became convinced that long term marriage was an insane idea, a bogus concept, an anthropological abnormality.

Suddenly, instead of envying my cozily-married friends and longing for my old life with R, I pitied my pals, who, I noticed, had a kind of glazed, trapped look in their eyes. How tragic that they couldn’t flirt and date and pursue reckless abandon like I could! Hell, I was the lucky one, the one to envy. I had to stop myself from blurting, “Do yourself a favor and get out now, before the chin hairs start to multiply.”

My married friends were fascinated by me and hungry for updates. The morning after a date, I’d wake up to emails asking  “SO??” “Did you have fun? Where’d you go, what did you do?”  There was frequent use of the word “vicarious.”

But then we already knew that–right?–that the single grass seems greener to the married sometimes and that most people in long exclusive relationships ache for a break from that exclusivity.

I don’t know what the answer is. My BDF died down– to the great disappointment of my friends–and I’m confused all over again. I still believe that long term marriage is, in general, a dicey proposition, but I am not at all convinced that it’s a gift to be a single gal in her mid 40s.  Sometimes I’d kill to be able to say “oh, look, here’s my husband, home for dinner.”

Fortunately, the demise of my 8-week affair with D didn’t leave me shattered like the end of my 16-year marriage did; in fact, it had a galvanizing effect. My fling with D successfully re-routed me, at least in terms of re-introducing me to my feminine power and that kind of thing. You could say I was suddenly man-hungry (but please don’t say it because it sounds dumb.) I definitely craved male attention and used it to soothe my still-smarting separated ego.

Dating became an all-consuming hobby, the dating website a Netflix queue of constant, ever-renewing possibility. I didn’t actually go on that many dates–maybe 7 over the course of 4 or 5 months–but I engaged in a bunch of email exchanges and a few phone calls. Call it armchair dating, if you will (will you?)

Some days my inbox overflowed with messages from interested men and some I found interesting. At first, I thought it was only polite to respond to anyone who emailed me, but over time I became more selective and clicked “delete” with impunity.

I deleted anyone who didn’t provide a photo or whose photo depicted a grossly muscular and/or heavily tattooed guy, usually shirtless, washing or leaning against a Trans Am. I tried not to instantly write off guys from Staten Island or Parsippany, but my ingrained snobbery won out.

A few men were clearly too good to be true, like a surgeon who spoke 5 languages, wrote children’s books and looked like Javier Bardem. Delete. Too many exclamation points in one email? Delete. Eighteen photos of his King Charles spaniel? Delete. Picture of himself wearing a goofy hat or costume of any sort? Delete. Delete. Delete.

There seemed to be no way around the word easygoing, however, so I let that one go; I was taken with one guy for a few weeks, but I lost interest because he ended every email with “Happy Wednesday, March the 11th!!” or “Have a great Saturday April 3rd!” (I don’t know, was I too harsh?) Another guy was funny and charming via email, but freaked me out when he started to suggest names for the children he saw in our future.

I graduated to the phone-call stage with a few men and met a handful in person. One-third of those I mentally ruled out within five minutes (one looked a little like Hugh Jackman in his photos, and a lot like Eugene Levy in Best in Show in person; another wore a Pink Floyd t-shirt to dinner and when I asked him if he was a fan of that band, he flatly answered “No.” He also ordered himself two Coca-Colas at once–what is that about?)

And two notes to self:

1. It’s a bummer, but sometimes a guy who seems fascinating on paper is actually achingly dull in person. Stop trying to convince yourself otherwise.
2. Don’t be outraged when someone essentially stalks you after one date, considering that you behaved like a tramp/tart/floozy/ho. What were you thinking, Christina?

But the dating endeavor wasn’t a total bust. I met some smart, interesting men and I went on some thoroughly fun dates; for one reason or another, though, the requisite chemistry has thus far proven elusive.

So that takes us roughly from February to the present, as far as my dating life is concerned. My subscription to the website expires in about two weeks. I assume I will revisit man-hungriness at some point. For now, blogging is my new all-consuming hobby.