A New Life Journey…
So off I went to Austria and Italy, and had a fabulous time. While in Austria we attended lectures at the University of Innsbruck and I found I loved being back in the classroom. That combined with all the workshops and programs I had been taking back home with other women, solidified the desire that had been lurking in the back of my mind, under my grief, the idea of going back to school.
I had been thinking about becoming a grief counselor, someone who could help younger women with children still living at home, as was my case. Shortly after my husband died, I had tried in vain to find such a support group. This was in the pre-Internet days, and all I found were groups held in cold, clinical settings. I wanted a warm, cozy and informal living room-type arrangement where we could come together and work out the issues of our new lives. If I needed that, then I thought other women might too.
I felt that if I could go off to Europe on my own, then I could go back to school too! So, in the fall of 1996, at age 51, I took another big step and entered Cambridge College, an exciting , non-traditional, evenings and weekends-only college for working adults. What an environment! It was stimulating, invigorating, almost a fountain-of-youth for me, and it literally turned my life around. I emerged six semesters later, in 1998, with a Masters of Education degree. I had studied adult education and psychology, but I did not graduate as a grief counselor.
Instead, over those six semesters I had come to realize what being back in school was doing for me as an older adult, and I began looking at the power of adult education. Along with that, the passage of time was moving me beyond the grief stage of my life. I slowly realized that what I really wanted was to work in some kind of venue that promoted adult education, especially for older adults. What that venue was, however, still eluded me, and I continued with my job as the Assistant to the President of an old, historic Boston-area institution, while trying to sort things out.
One very unexpected and wonderful thing, however, did come out of that job. I met a gentle, caring man and we became great friends. We found our initial common ground thanks to yet another step I took. I had become a fan of the TV program – Star Trek: The Next Generation, and for Valentine’s Day in 1995, my kids had given me a huge poster about the show with a Valentine theme. Deciding to put it up on my office wall was not easy. Would people think I was nuts? But I did it anyway, and that led to the connection with my co-worker as he too was a fan of the same program.
From there our friendship developed and when in 1999 I decided to leave that job, he made his intentions clear. We were married on a hill top overlooking Boston in September of 2000. I was 55 years old.
The thought of getting married again was something I had never considered. I knew the statistics as a single woman were stacked against me, and I didn’t even date. My entire focus was on working with and being surrounded by women. So walking down the aisle never entered into my new life equation. But surprise, there’s that old maxim again – Life is what happens when you’re making other plans. How true!
Next – A New Job
So off I went to Austria and Italy, and had a fabulous time. While in Austria we attended lectures at the University of Innsbruck and I found I loved being back in the classroom. That combined with all the workshops and programs I had been taking back home with other women, solidified the desire that had been lurking in the back of my mind, under my grief, the idea of going back to school.
I had been thinking about becoming a grief counselor, someone who could help younger women with children still living at home, as was my case. Shortly after my husband died, I had tried in vain to find such a support group. This was in the pre-Internet days, and all I found were groups held in cold, clinical settings. I wanted a warm, cozy and informal living room-type arrangement where we could come together and work out the issues of our new lives. If I needed that, then I thought other women might too.
I felt that if I could go off to Europe on my own, then I could go back to school too! So, in the fall of 1996, at age 51, I took another big step and entered Cambridge College, an exciting , non-traditional, evenings and weekends-only college for working adults. What an environment! It was stimulating, invigorating, almost a fountain-of-youth for me, and it literally turned my life around. I emerged six semesters later, in 1998, with a Masters of Education degree. I had studied adult education and psychology, but I did not graduate as a grief counselor.
Instead, over those six semesters I had come to realize what being back in school was doing for me as an older adult, and I began looking at the power of adult education. Along with that, the passage of time was moving me beyond the grief stage of my life. I slowly realized that what I really wanted was to work in some kind of venue that promoted adult education, especially for older adults. What that venue was, however, still eluded me, and I continued with my job as the Assistant to the President of an old, historic Boston-area institution, while trying to sort things out.
One very unexpected and wonderful thing, however, did come out of that job. I met a gentle, caring man and we became great friends. We found our initial common ground thanks to yet another step I took. I had become a fan of the TV program – Star Trek: The Next Generation, and for Valentine’s Day in 1995, my kids had given me a huge poster about the show with a Valentine theme. Deciding to put it up on my office wall was not easy. Would people think I was nuts? But I did it anyway, and that led to the connection with my co-worker as he too was a fan of the same program.
From there our friendship developed and when in 1999 I decided to leave that job, he made his intentions clear. We were married on a hill top overlooking Boston in September of 2000. I was 55 years old.
The thought of getting married again was something I had never considered. I knew the statistics as a single woman were stacked against me, and I didn’t even date. My entire focus was on working with and being surrounded by women. So walking down the aisle never entered into my new life equation. But surprise, there’s that old maxim again – Life is what happens when you’re making other plans. How true!
Next – A New Job
posted by Nancy Merz Nordstrom at 4:05 PM
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