Has this elderberries missive already convinced you that I’m a hopeless romantic? This one should. It will be all about love, of every kind - and at every age and stage.
Wedding With Kids
Yesterday we went to a very English country wedding in Somerset. Our neighbours, who live in the beautifully converted cow barn next door, were tying the knot after a 5-year trial period. We’ve watched the whole tale evolve from over the back wall of our garden. The husband who we met when we first moved in, and then left before we really got a chance to know him, leaving behind a wife and young son. The new man who moved in five days before the Covid lockdown in March 2020 with his young two kids in tow - and never left.
We’ve watched them build a relationship, a family, a house and a garden in the years since then. The three kids merging into a tightly knit unit who’s joyous, trilling voices we regularly hear splashing through our cherry tree boundary. Around them, the garden has grown flowers and fruits, the house has been painstakingly renovated, and the pots around the place are overflowing with colourful energy. You can often gauge the happiness inside a house, I’ve found, by the flowers outside it. Love always seems to ripple out in multiple waves, directions and media.
So we were delighted to see them ‘put a ring’ on the rest of it. The wedding was held in the picture perfect village church (photo above), its pocket size stuffed to the gills with delighted friends and family, completed by half-a-dozen villagers who came in to make the bells carol their congratulations to the new bride and groom. The children doubled as best men and ring-bearers, and the two young boys gave a smooth and confident double-handed reception speech, after some research on ‘best man’ on YouTube (lawyer-mom vetted the result).
It was heart-warming to see so much love on display. Not just between the couple, but from so many people who had watched them love and stumble, then risk loving some more and finding their way. I found myself admiring the web of family tightening its embrace on this little group of children and adults, and the young mother thanking everyone for their support after an unexpectedly challenging chapter of life. She’d made it through, and thanks to this new love, her kids will grow up surrounded by love. New half-brothers and sisters, mums and dads, aunts and uncles, cousins and friends.
They came from all over the world to witness the transformation. From two divorced people thrown together by sudden pandemics, to an entire village brought together by love and a commitment to nest and nurture their small brood sustainably, à deux.
I’m partial, of course, to a good love story. And know just how special it is to find your soul mate - especially if it takes you time, heartache and struggle to find. The powerful arc of the average romcom, the narrative of many a marriage. I wrote a book about Late Love. I interviewed lots of couples who had gotten together after 50, and was inspired by mature love that grew from younger shoots that couldn’t blossom fully. The adults who extract the teaching of the first half of life to grow and stretch and learn to love better and bigger in the second half. First themselves, and then others. And how so often that love rippled out into a much broader community and ability to be generous with the world.
Beyond Trad Couples
Of course, one of the joys of later life is that there are so many options and new opportunities. For love and friends and communities that you haven’t had time for or access to before. Many midlifers I work with are delighted with the new people they fall in love with, personally, professionally or in ways wild and wonderful.
In the EMEA Modern Elder Academy alumni network I’m a part of, someone posted this wonderful quote in our WhatsApp chat. It is a pretty perfect summary of the excitement and energy I feel when I meet the kind of people I now choose to work and play with.
“Have you ever crossed paths with someone and felt an instant, inexplicable bond? Not the fleeting thrill of attraction, nor a superficial admiration of their exterior, but a deep, resonant connection that seems to echo in the chambers of your soul.
This is the magic of soul connections, moments when you meet someone and it feels like the universe has orchestrated this meeting for centuries. It's not about what meets the eye; it's about the energy, the essence, the unspoken understanding that flows between you. It's a recognition that goes beyond words, where you find a piece of yourself in another.
These connections are rare gems in the hustle of life, illuminating our journey with the light of genuine understanding and mutual respect. They remind us that amidst the myriad of interactions, there are those that can touch us profoundly, altering our course and enriching our lives with the beauty of shared spirits.
Soul connections are not bound by time or place. They can happen anywhere, with anyone - a stranger met in passing, a friend who feels like they've been with you in past lives, or even someone whose presence you feel across distances, connected by the invisible threads of the universe.
So, here's to those we meet who resonate with the very core of our being, to the ones who make us feel seen, heard, and understood without a word. May we cherish these connections, nurture them, and allow them to grow, for they are the truest form of wealth, adding layers of richness to the tapestry of our lives.
In a world that often values the external, let's not forget the beauty of connecting soul to soul, vibe to vibe. These connections are reminders that at the deepest level, we are all woven from the same cosmic fabric, endlessly seeking to find, recognise, and celebrate one another.”
Become a Weekender?
Remember columnist Lucy Kellaway from the Financial Times? She did the mother of all career pivots from being an FT columnist to a high school teacher, and then set up a charity to drag other executives along in her teacherly wake. She also wrote a very funny and touching book about the process, wonderfully titled Re-educated: How I changed my job, my home, my husband and my hair. She set up Now Teach which has since converted hundreds of Q3ers into new careers in education.
Now, she’s turning her sights on a different sort of educational outreach: love. The sister organisation is called Now Foster and wants to up-end the dynamics of who loves kids, how and why. The current foster system is broken and overloaded, and carers are too often the less educated the less wealthy. More often than not, their motivation is money more than mentoring and love. So Now Foster would like to hugely broaden the pool of people willing to foster our parent-deprived young. Just for a weekend a month. Would you do it?
I’m going to try - and I’ll share what I learn in the process. It’s a 6-month training/ selection process. And I feel because my own grand-daughter is 1) far away and 2) overwhelmed with love by so many, we have more than enough love on tap to spread around. It also nourishes a need on our part for love, intimacy and connection to future generations.
Longevity Leadership Programme
Finally, this is exactly the kind of people I’ve brought together for the first edition of our Longevity Leadership Programme that starts tomorrow in Lisbon at Portugal’s top business school. Many of them have appeared on my 4-Quarter Lives podcast, or been interviewed for my FORBES column. But now, we will all be in the same business school amphi for a week - of lectures, exchanges and learning on all things longevity.
It’s a first-of-its kind in the world. A week-long deep dive into the multiple impacts of the new demographics on our world: on countries, companies, careers, couples and consumers. The speakers are flying in from all over the world, and will share their expertise with the group and each other. I’m very excited. And will, of course, share a full account with you… next Sunday.
Right now, I need to board my flight!
What a lovely story!
Thank you for the lovely story of a wedding and later in life happiness. Good luck with fostering. We adopted and it has been a long journey. I love the idea of giving love and support to the kids in care, but worry that they need more consistent care. Kids in care need stability and an understanding of their unique needs. Of course, I know nothing about the programme and I presume this has been considered. It is a very worthwhile initiative.