Use It Or Lose It Club (dot com)

Making a second marriage a success

Husband David and me at our wedding with my children Anthony and Louise

A year has passed since my husband and I said “I do” for the second time in our lives and we still haven’t killed each other, or our love, but there have been some close calls.

Having become statistics in our first marriage breakdowns, we are determined not to go down that path again, although there was more to lose in our children’s well-being in our first marriage failures.

In hindsight, we both concede that we could have done things better to prevent our first marriages from breaking down. But there is no going back, even if we were free and our first spouses were as well.

So here we are in our autumn years, seeking out a permanent monogamous relationship as we did when we were younger – knowing that the statistics for second marriages surviving are worse than for first marriages.

In the western world, 40-50 per cent of first marriages fail and something like 60-70 per cent of second marriages end in divorce. Marriage is one thing that experience and maturity does not improve, it seems.

So, why do we bother – especially when we are beyond childbearing years and likely to be less healthy and crankier?!

Well, speaking for my husband and me, it could be because when things are good, they are very good. We still have reasonably active libidos but, also, just cuddling up to a loved one at night is comforting.

It also gives us someone to care about, other than our adult children who prefer we don’t fuss over them too much. I know I would be a much more obsessive mum to my grown children, even though they are not at home, if I didn’t have a husband to care for. I would be bugging them to see them more and would begin to sound a little needy to them.

I am the sort of person who needs to care for someone and to have someone care for me. So is my husband. It is precisely this sort of person who is suited to live-in companionship, with all its ups and downs.

You would have to heed lessons of the past to make a second marriage work. We know how to avoid arguments, how not to get het up too much over trivial matters. That is not to say we don’t argue or annoy each other, by any means.

But, with maturity, we know how to apologise without being too proud, to admit if we are wrong (most of the time) and to know that life is too short to be in a huff. Life is getting shorter for us and we want to enjoy the time we have left.

No matter what your age, you should retain some of the good features of youth – such as playfulness, optimism, and living day to day.

That is the philosophy of my dear old man and me. Now, just let me check to see if he’s done the washing up . . . . . .

Biker chook lives to tell the tale

Biker chook and her biker man after a weekend run

Amazing how I have gone from being too scared to open my eyes when riding pillion on my biker husband’s bike to pestering him for a ride.

He doesn’t know whether to be thrilled or scared now! After the recent long ride with a bunch of charitable bikers doing the “blanket run” to benefit the homeless, I have become more comfortable on the back of a bike, sitting upright, opening my eyes and not even clinging madly to my man.

So, on a recent weekend, with the sun shining, I was into my biker gear and jumping up and down for my man to get going. It was only a total of 100kms round trip – to a place called Wiseman’s Ferry, on the outskirts of Sydney but not too far from our home.

The ride to the old-style pub where we were to have our lunch was trouble-free – the only problem was the ungracious way I dismounted, falling on my bum into the dirt as I slid off. Great amusement to the young fellers who thought it was hilarious to see two fat old farts zooming up, with the old chook then falling in a heap.

After I picked myself up, holding on to what dignity I had left, we strode into the pub like two cool dudes, causing further amusement, or bemusement, among the patrons of all ages.

The older ones probably envied us while the youngsters were mostly pitying us. All I could think of was how my children were going to love the story, another one to tell their friends who love their mad mama tales. Am I really the only crazy woman over the age of 50? It is not as if I jumped out of a plane. That might be next year’s adventure on my quest to use it or lose it. It really is about paying back your children for all the angst they have caused you. Or maybe just to give them a good laugh.

Anyway, I’m glad I hooked up with a man who also wants to give things ago, although bike riding is not new to him as he has ridden since he was a young man, albeit a bit more sensibly now.

He does frighten me with his tales of how he roared around in his twenties, taking risks and loving it. Still, he is relatively gentle with me, happy to have his chook on the back of his bike without getting into too much of a flap.

Now he has to calm me down so I don’t want to ride more than he does! What a turn-up for the books.

Who knows, I might get my own bike one day, as other latter-day biker chicks have told me happened to them. Not likely, mind you, but watch this space!

I have a new name now – Revmama. Vroom vroom.