ALL THE MEN ARE ON LOW-DOSE VIAGRA.AND THE WOMEN HAVE BEEN GHOSTED.

Dating After 60 in the Hamptons

- CANDACE BUSHNELL

LIKE MANHATTAN, Aspen, and Palm Beach, the Hamptons are full of single women over 60. Most are divorced women or widows who were once married to one-percenters and are now looking for Mr. Bigger—or Mr. Biggest. There are also women who have small trust funds or are like me: single women in a creative field who made enough money to snap up a small cottage in a downturn. Very few of these women, at least the ones I know, have ever ended up with a proper boyfriend or husband, but not for lack of trying. Of course, everyone can point to one or two exceptions to the rule—a couple who got together in their 70s and are now blissfully happy. But in general, the odds of a woman finding a partner after 60 are not particularly good.

And yet, in this world, if you're single, you are supposed to make an effort to become part of a couple. As a divorced woman in her mid-60s who was married for ten years (from 2002 to 2012) and who had several serious boyfriends before and after that relationship (but none since the end of the pandemic), I am perfectly happy being single. I own an apartment in the city and a house in Sag Harbor, both of which I paid for with the money I earned from my career, and somehow I feel busier with my work than I did 20 years ago. I have two wonderful standard poodles. Still, people always ask me if I'm seeing someone, and I always feel they're disappointed when I say I'm not. “I don't care!” I want to shout. “I'm not interested!” But the reality is that I often wonder if some part of me does care. I'm getting older, and I'm in the middle of figuring out what the rest of my life should look like. The only road maps I have are the classic Hamptons Grey Gardens trope or an older-people romantic comedy where divorcées find a “true love” with whom to live out their sunset years.