53 & Celibate Again: Tending The Verdant Garden Of My Soul

One of the reasons I am in love with Mr. Right (whom I met on CatholicMatch) is that he is constantly tending my soul.

How can he can pull off such a feat? Easy! You see, his secret is that he lives his faith every day.

He not only lives his faith, but he shares it with everyone he meets. His ultimate goal is to make it to heaven and that’s a whole lot harder than passing a camel through the eye of a needle, or so I’ve been told.

Mr. Right shared with me that he hasn’t always been this way. Many years back he had what I call an ah-ha moment. That is, he saw the light. No, it wasn’t a stop and go light; it was just a realization that we have the one true faith in Catholicism. 

Now I have a beautiful yard with many pretty flowerbeds, but sometimes when I’m a bit on the lazy side, I like to just ignore the weeds and kind of pretend they’re not there, if you know what I mean. 

The problem with that situation is that I then have to spend a whole day outside with a spade in one hand and a garbage can at the ready. Ugh! 

Talk about hot, dirty and disgusting work, just to look at a couple of beautiful flowers.

But if you ask me, the sight of those unencumbered flowers is worth every minute of the work. I love summertime in my yard. The sights, sounds and smells are enough to make my brain spin.

As you may already know, dating is kind of like my garden. For instance, when I’m with Mr. Right, I want to smell him, look at him and taste his kisses. I simply can’t get enough of him.

The problem is that since I was married before, I’ve been around all the bases, including homeruns. So when Mr. Right and I started dating, my body was used to operating at full tilt – kind of like being on autopilot. 

Oh-oh! 

The thing is I’m not married to Mr. Right, so I had to take myself off of autopilot and operate on manual again.

My body’s saying, "Bummer!" And why wouldn’t it? It’s used to the good life!

'Mama said...'

So, where does that leave me?  It’s kind of embarrassing when at age 53 you can’t run the bases, yet you know your own married children are at home doing that very thing. Just like that old song, “Mama said there’d be days like this, there’d be days like this, my mama said!”

Now, back to the enchanting Mr. Right… I’ve known him long enough now to have had the best parts of his faith take root in my own soul. I’ve become a regular in the confessional.  No, not because I’ve been running the bases, but because he cares for my soul and has helped me see the redemption and healing power of reconciliation.

Little by little the weeds in my soul have been picked and discarded, and in their place penance is being offered up in reparation for my sins.

A while back Mr. Right gave me a wonderful rosary CD of the sorrowful mysteries. The narrator on the CD states that “anytime good and evil meet, there will be sin." That line is imprinted in my brain because it seems a whole lot like my garden: When the soil is not monitored, weeds will inevitably spring up.   

I have a little plaque on my bedroom wall that I’ve had since childhood, which reminds me of the faith lessons that Mr. Right has taught me.  It states, “One is nearer God’s heart in a garden than anywhere else on earth.”  

That Mr. Right, he’s a keeper!