I don’t need you in my bathroom…

I read an essay recently about dating in your 50s and 60s, and I could understand some of the frustration in it. Dating at this age can be difficult. There are fewer people available, there is more history attached to everybody, and we have all accumulated a certain amount of baggage. Some of us have enough baggage to require an airport carousel.

But then I got to the part about men who don’t make enough room for their partners, and I found myself wondering what exactly they were complaining about. Because some of us have spent the last 20 to 30 years learning how to make room for ourselves. By the time I got to my 50s, I’ve had a few relationships. Been married. Been divorced. And have spent years learning that I can’t always rely on the person beside me and that, eventually, I had to become the person I can rely on.

So I developed a few things. I have hobbies. I have good friends. I found work that matters to me. I make art. I travel. I learned how to cook something other than scrambled eggs or soup. I developed strange little obsessions. And I figured out what makes me happy when nobody else is in the room. Eventually, if I’m lucky, I’ll become a whole person.

And then somebody eventually comes along and says, “You’re not making enough room for me.” …? …,Maybe. Or maybe you’re asking for room that doesn’t belong to you.

I am remarkably fussy about the people I let into my life. I don’t mean that in the sense that I think I’m some kind of prize that everybody is lining up to win. I mean that I have built a life I like. There are things in that life that are mine. My art is mine. My home is my refuge. My friendships are mine. My work is mine. My interests are mine. My time is mine. There are parts of my life that I have spent years building, and I don’t think falling in love means I have to hand over the keys to all of it.

I don’t want you decorating my house, trust me I am not going to like your furniture. I don’t want you involved in my finances. I don’t want to own a house with you. I don’t want to split the rent. I don’t want a joint bank account. And, frankly, I don’t want to share a bathroom everyday. This does not mean I don’t want you. It means I just don’t want everything.

There is a strange idea that once two people become a couple, they are supposed to become a single unit. Everything gets merged. Friends become our friends. Money becomes our money. Hobbies become our hobbies. Vacations become our vacations. Every weekend becomes a negotiation about what “we” are doing. I don’t understand why.

If you like car camping and I like hotels, go car camping. I will be at the hotel. I’ll wave. There is nothing wrong with two people having different interests. In fact, I think it’s probably healthier than pretending to like everything the other person likes, like hiking… because you are in love.

You don’t need to come into my art world. You don’t need to understand every project I’m working on. You don’t need to participate in everything I care about. You don’t need to be sitting beside me for every milestone in my life. But, I want you standing next to me when something important happens. I also want to know what you’re excited about. I want to hear about the thing you’re working on even if I have absolutely no interest in it. I want to see you succeed at something that matters to you.

And if you want to go to Paris, and I want to go to Paris, then let’s go to Paris. We can both pay for our own damn trip. That’s 100 percent from both of us.

I don’t understand the obsession with 50/50 relationships either. Life isn’t an accounting spreadsheet. There will be times when I have more to give and times when you do. The point isn’t that we each contribute exactly half. The point is that we each bring what we have. Sometimes I might give more than 100 percent. Sometimes you might give more than 100 percent. Sometimes one of us is having a terrible week and the other person carries more. That’s what being in a relationship means to me. It doesn’t mean becoming each other’s entire life.

It means becoming an important part of each other’s lives.

There is the difference.

I don’t want someone who needs me to complete them. I’ve spent too much time becoming complete myself to take on that job description. And I don’t want to be responsible for somebody else’s fulfillment either. You have your milestones. I have mine. If I can be there when you reach one of yours, I’ll be fucking delighted. I might even bring flowers, although let’s be realistic about the flowers. But I don’t need to participate in every step you took to get there, and you don’t need to participate in every step I took to get here.

Someday I might buy a motorhome and decide I’m going to drive across the country. If you hate motorhomes, stay home. I’ll send you pictures. You don’t have to come along just because we’re together, and I don’t have to come along when you decide you want to do something that isn’t my thing. This isn’t rejection. It’s respect. It is recognizing that the person you fell in love with was a person before you arrived.

I think this becomes particularly interesting for gay men because we’ve spent a long time being told that there is something wrong with the way we form relationships. We were supposed to fit ourselves into a model that was designed around somebody else’s life. But gay men have spent generations creating families, friendships and communities in ways that don’t always look like the traditional household. We know how to have people in our lives without everybody living under the same roof. We know how to build intimacy outside of marriage. We know that a friend can be family. We know that the person you call when something terrible happens doesn’t necessarily have to be the person sleeping beside you.

So why are we suddenly supposed to believe that romantic love requires us to merge everything?

I am not lonely. That’s probably worth saying because I think people sometimes confuse independence with loneliness. I have family. I have friends. I have people I love and people who love me. I have an extraordinary cohort of people in my professional life. I have things I care about deeply. I have ideas. I have places I want to go. My life is full.

A partner would add something to that life. They wouldn’t be responsible for filling it.

Maybe that’s what makes dating at this age difficult. It’s not necessarily that there aren’t people available. It’s that some of us have become very good at being alone, and we’ve become even better at knowing the difference between being alone and being lonely.

So when someone finally comes into my life, they have to be special. Not perfect. Jesus Christ, I’m not looking for perfection. Seriously… I have met myself. But special enough that I want to make room. Special enough that I want to rearrange something. Special enough that I want to say, “Come with me.”

And if that person never comes along, I’m still going to Paris. I’ll just get the good hotel.