Creative writing - 07.03.2021

I was meant to add some material last weekend but an awful migraine on Sunday, doused any intention for having a productive day of writing.  This weekend is much better, but I feel overwhelmed with so much I still need to do before the working week begins again.  Unfortunately, I have only managed one exercise today.  I hope you enjoy.

Chapter 50:  Gift 

Happy birthday to me!  I am fifty today and one of the presents I have received is a six-month pre-paid subscription to a dating website from my ex-wife.  She was the one that broke us up after she said that we had grown apart and were no longer going in the same direction. Even though her direction was more nights out at the pub and taking up raunchy Latin American dancing and cookery courses.  While I moved towards landscaping our garden and joining the Ramblers Association with even less chance of our new paths converging.  So, she asked for a divorce and soon moved out. 

We remain good friends, often talking on the phone about our newfound passions.  I even went for dinner with her new man, who was a younger version of myself; slimmer, with more hair and less grey, his whole aura reeking of a zest for life experiences.  I watched them together and it reminded me of how me and my ex-wife were when we first met in our teens and how we looked forward to our future of exciting possibilities. 

Now, I am looking at the birthday card she sent to me, denoting that I turn 50 today and gifting me a six-month paid subscription to ‘Fifty Something Dating – giving a hope to the hopeless not in love.’  Even adding a written message in her distinct, scrawny handwriting.  “Eduardo has asked me to marry him, and I accepted.  If I can find love, you can too.  Happy Birthday, dear Mervyn.”  I looked at the testimonials on the subscription showing crinkly faces with over eager smiles, awkwardly brought together to avoid spending their twilight years alone.  I gritted my teeth and with great pleasure began to tear the gifted subscription into tiny pieces, dropping them and her birthday card into the wastepaper bin.