Musings of a Wealthy Man: Birthdays and Retirement

Two birthdays, one yesterday, and one to celebrate in 7 weeks and 1 day.

Did you enjoy your weekend of soccer, booze and fried breakfasts? How you have changed! Or, perhaps and more likely, reverted to form.

We had a great weekend - we normally do. Always socializing and always active in so very many ways. Spent Sunday morning sailing, dropped by the cottage on Sanibel (been up there several times in the last week) and later in the day, by the pool...and in it. It's quite private, as you can imagine with a multi million dollar home. Temperatures have been topping out in the high 80's all this month. Just right - and the mornings and evenings have been gorgeous.

You couldn't wait could you, and so you missed all that was on offer... and there was more on offer than you ever knew. You were and aren't capable of checking me out, but I checked you out and it's good job I did...isn't it.

Oh how I have laughed since 2005. I never thought you would be the source of so much amusement. And, .... there was you believing you had stitched me up. I told you that you had to get up early if you were to attempt to run rings round me:) The way you spend your weekends, especially earlier on when I received a running commentary from sources I had employed, the places you shop and your own snobbery about St Andrews and cars. I never thought you subscribed to such overt displays but there's nothing worse than working class snobbery because it has no basis in taste or class...so those things and others kept me amused back then and some of the things you still do amuse me occasionally.

After, what is it, 8 years and two months, perhaps you now believe what I told you. I never lied like you did but, as someone once said, I was economical with the truth. If I committed a sin it was one of omission in that I didn't tell you everything at the outset. To think that after you thought you had left, you warned me not to be too open and too honest about myself, materially. You must have thought I was some sort of fool...of course... I wasn't. Neither was I crazy...just a bit too clever for you. Planting the crazy tag on me was your way of letting yourself off the hook. Despite what you mentioned at least half of your friends/colleagues male and female thought you were the very guilty party. Solid proof is a fine thing to have when winning people over ;-)

So, what do you really think after the time that has elapsed since we were last together...

I am not M or C or T (thank God!) nor am I... J.... or any of the other myriad men that you have had in your life. I was and am that rarity, and I don't mean this immodestly, someone who is very, very successful, warm, faithful and loving. Someone who leads a quite exciting life (unlike yours), who travels widely and enjoys, as you once put it, the fruits of his labors. I don't think any of the many men in your life have ever met all those criteria. I might add my fitness to that list, too. There's a criterion that your latest doesn't fit into!

I think you burnt your bridges in many ways. making do with a disjointed relationship when you could have enjoyed a full life, making do with very second hand poser/hairdressers cars, making do with repetitive holidays, making do with a fat, unfit, self opinionated guy, making do with little boxes as homes and just making do generally. You burned your bridges through your loose behavior, poor judgement, poor decision making and selfishness. A few of your men recognized some of that and moved on, and away. In many ways you have never moved on. Take a look at your life's history, the way you have managed it and your family, the judgement you have exercised and the decisions you have made and then try telling me you did a good job. You failed then and failed yourself in life.

You compromised when you walked away and accepted a lot less than you really wanted from life. You accepted a working class life style, albeit with a few shekels provided by your partner, a life devoid of weekday affection and company, and vacations that show little imagination. That is not what you wanted when I knew you...and I suspect it is not entirely what you want now but.....that is what you have had to accept approaching your 60th birthday. I have met a few fools in my life, but you really do take the number one prize for being such an idiot. You could have had it all and a loving and devoted companion.

I think you have realized that since, and since you stopped deluding yourself that I was spinning you a yarn over my life, it's quality and the full on happiness I enjoy. I had a very good life with my late wife and, apart from the aberration that you constituted, I am enjoying the same with my second wife. Because you were so focused on yourself and your needs, when we were together, you never recognized or acknowledged the obligations I had to my family...just yours....and you. Maybe you deluded yourself into not believing me because you couldn't face having got things so wrong.

Have you ever asked yourself why all your past relationships went wrong or didn't last? You probably know by now, or at least you should. It's partly because you never thought about the needs of others. I told you more than once that the secret of my long marriage was giving and expecting nothing in return. You never, and probably still haven't learnt that lesson or...you don't have it in you.

A few days back I laughed at the graphic you put up on a social website. It indicated to me the only way you know how to react, and yet it also told me that all of that and the other insults you threw 'back aways' were merely your own defense mechanism to having been such a fool. 'Why do I always make the wrong decisions *****' - your own words in 2006. You realized then, and you realize now, what a fool you had been but, through an innate form of cowardice, did nothing about that decision.

Enough of history time you checked out what it's like here right now. No photos of the house though:).

This month in Florida is one of the best. Temperatures in the mid to upper 80's, pretty much everyday. No rain. Few foreign tourists apart from the odd one or two. Pretty darn good all told.

Take a look:

Fort Myers Beach from the plane

Recall this area? The bridge is one we drove over a few times. Weather as you can see from the following photos is great. The proper way to spend Christmas.

Sunrise near Home

You wake in the morning slip on some casual wear and just saunter onto the beach in the warmth of the sun. It's one of the best of feelings....walking with that special person in your life and enjoying all of this. You could have been here instead....once.

Beach Walking

Another shot of FMB from the Plane

Sunset over the Gulf

Just over the Bridge to FMB

Gorgeous Day

Sunset over Sanibel Causeway

Early morning Beach Walking

Christmas

We dress our boat in lights too, over Christmas. This one, above, was an early starter.

Another Gorgeous Day

Coffee and People Watching

I never tire of living here. Every morning is a delight and just getting up and walking outside into the sunshine and that wonderful warmth is great. I am sure you recall it.... vaguely. You were as smitten with this part of the world as I am. But you foolishly decided otherwise...and you had a lot of chances to change your mind.