Happily Ever After? The Verdict Is Still Out

Where to start? How to begin? So many thoughts and emotions running through my head.

Of course. They. ALL. Center. Around. Montana Man!

Some days, life is extreme bliss. All my hopes, dreams, wishes come true before my eyes. We are on the same wavelength, striving for the same things, perfectly simpatico.

Then things turn ugly in one moment, one second and causes me to question everything. Do I suffer from severe stupidity??

Extreme Happiness

• Buying the Merc, the sweet beautiful sleek silver Mercedes of the gods
• His bravado at demanding a significant raise AND getting it
• Excelling at his job... Next in line for VP... Motivation and drive that we share
• His gentle, generous heart
• Always wanting to hold hands
• Not afraid to kiss me, shows affection, says 'I love you'
• Understands me
• Can say 'I'm sorry' and mean it
• Wants to take care of me
• Intelligent
• Understanding turmoil, lies, and deceit and the emotional toll
• Wanting to build a life together
• His family likes me
• We get along really well. We finish each other's sentences, blurt out the same sentences at the same time. He is Wanderlust Gyrl in male form!

Moments That Confuse Me

• His 'I want to share my life with you' mantra being derailed by a comment about not wanting to get married until the kids are grown, which was recanted later that evening
• Wondering if he will ever get beyond trying to out do his ex-wife
• * His underlying doubts about me and his children *
• His anger on Sunday evening, not wanting me in his sight
• Wondering if he will ever get over his 9.5 year marriage
• How much more fall out my very presence will create in their lives

Am I being flat-out dumb? Do his underlying doubts about me and his children make everything null and void because let's be perfectly honest too - at the end of the day, the children will always win.

So am I simply fooling myself? Am I holding onto something that is going nowhere? Oh Internet, what's a girl to do?!?!

However, Montana Man is not the only 30-something man out there with an ex-wife and kids. I am fully aware that the obstacles with him will be the same or worse with another man.

There are the following alternatives in the male pool:

• completely self-absorbed men
• still single men who have commitment issues
• clingy men without a backbone
• leeches
• divorced men without children who are still hung up on their ex-wives
• divorced men without children who are now playboys to make all women pay for the past transgressions of the ex-wife
• men who want wilting flowers who wait on them hand and foot, men who are intimated by me
• divorced men with children who are not a part of the kids' lives
• divorced men with children who do the minimum for their kids
• booty call only men - single, divorced, or married

So where does that leave me? I feel like I met Mr. Right in Montana Man. I kissed a lot of frogs and things are different with Montana Man.

I know the Happily Ever After fairy tale does not exist. Those rose color glasses were thrown out a long time ago.

But questions remain. Is that normal? Is it just a result of having been around the Love Block too many times? Is my inner cynic taking over? Or is my heart trying to give me a wake up call?

You decide because so far, I sure as hell haven't been able to!