I am a mature bi woman. I hope you enjoy my stories and comment on what you liked and perhaps didn't like to help me improve my writing. Be warned, I sometimes, to better frame the scene, include passages from stories I have previously published here.
In this series I write as Doris Sweeney, a widowed, bisexual, 53 year old woman.
A little background......
"Over Fifty Housing" the ad read. What the hell does that even mean?
I'm sorry. I've noticed that I am using the word "Hell" a lot more these days. My grandchildren seem to use it in every sentence, well they actually use worse words, but I didn't until recently. I never use it out loud but it is always in my thoughts. I'm just getting old and grumpy I guess.
Now what the hell was I saying? Concentrate Doris, concentrate. Oh yeah, about this Over Fifty Housing, how am I supposed to know what they are selling if they can't even use correct English? Are the houses over fifty years old? Are all the people living in the houses over fifty years old? The old farts who live here even call the place OFH like everyone knows that stands for Over Fifty Housing.
On my first drive thru it appears that it is really neither of my guesses. I'm told by friends that it is a neighborhood exclusively for people over fifty but that would mean those children on bicycles are really very young looking old people. The houses are all new with many still under construction. I later learned that those were grandchildren visiting.
I took the walking tour and it turns out they are lovely, moderately priced, new homes on small lots designed to have little or no landscape maintenance. Did I mention how much I detest landscape maintenance and gardening?
I have lived in my home in a neighboring town for over thirty five years now. John and I raised our four children in that house and today it's just too damn big, too damn empty, and too damn expensive. Now there is another word I have started to use a lot.
I learn that I can buy a new two bedroom two bath home in OFH for three hundred thousand dollars. I can sell the big house, a realtor tells me, for seven hundred and fifty thousand dollars. Realtor lady mumbles something about location, location, location. Who would have thought when we bought it that one day it would be worth three quarters of a million dollars?
With the money from the sale of the old house, my pension from teaching, Johns residual pension, social security and Johns life insurance I can easily live comfortably for the rest of my life and travel, something John never wanted to do. It's time to move on. The children will go ballistic but with the right planning it can be done before they know and can object.
I have lived here for three years now and love it. OFH has opened my eyes to many aspects of getting older that people seldom talk about and I hope to explore many of them in this in this series.
My part time job in the sales/leasing office at OFH has made my social life interesting and allowed me to meet people I would otherwise have never known.
Over Fifty Housing - Carole
I met Carole when she first looked at homes in OFH as a place to move to after her husband died. Nice enough person, curiously short, perhaps five foot one, with a large bust and a perpetual smile, but buttoned up and very reserved and shy. Nothing ever came of our meeting until she called me a several months after she moved in. "Just some questions about OFH and your experience here," she said. Lunch and she'll buy. I'm in!
At lunch I'm a little surprised by Carole's appearance. She seems to have, and I hate cliches, 'let her hair down.' Much more casual and relaxed than I remember. Don't know why but I remembered her as matronly, very modest and reserved. Today she is dressed in stylish navy blue skirt and a cream colored button blouse with rather tall heels. We meet at the golf club dining room so she fits right in. Although I personally date both men and women it seems these days that I'm more easily distracted by women than men and Carole is unexpectedly distracting. Oh well.
As I sit across from her I notice that accidentally or deliberately her blouse is buttoned up just one button too low exposing a lot of cleavage, almost flaunting he breasts. Her chest below her neck has freckles that end where the flesh of her creamy white breasts begins. I am very distracted. Did she do this deliberately as a test? No, she could not know my turn on's. I'm just being silly.
All our initial conversation is about the usual things, moving in, getting settled, the weather, nothing important. Carole seems nervous. She asks if I am dating anyone. She knows I'm a widow so where is this question coming from? I kiddingly ask her if she is asking if I'm available. She says, "Well, no, it's kind of about that but..... look, I heard when I first moved in that you were living with a woman but had been married to a man and if that is not true I need to start this whole lunch over."
Not knowing where this is going I answer as honestly as I'm comfortable with. "Carole, I was married for thirty years to the only person I had ever had sex with, my man, when he died and I moved here. Shortly after arriving I met a woman and we became friends. She challenged me and opened my eyes to what she called the 'soft side' of sex. We became lovers and lived together for a while. She is gone now. Since then I have had brief relationships with both men and women, nothing that lasted, no one right now."
Carole look relieved, "Doris, that is exactly what I hoped you would say. I hope you don't think I am 'coming on' to you. I just hope you can give me some advice."
I had not heard the phrase 'coming on to you' in a long time and just smiled and asked, "Carole, I'm not someone who assumes much especially when it comes to relationships. Tell me what is going on and I'll help if I can."
Carole took a deep breath and started, "OK, so here goes. When I first moved here a neighbor invited me to join the OFH Social Club."
I stopped her, "It wasn't what you expected was it?"
Carole continued, "No it wasn't. It's a group of people who get together for sex. No feelings, no romance, no chemistry just sex. It wasn't at all what I was looking for."