
My Boyfriend Thinks My Dead Mother-In-Law Fixed Us Up…
Shakespeare’s Hamlet suggests that human knowledge is limited: There are more things in heaven and Earth, Horatio, / Than are dreamt of in your philosophy [science].
Maybe after we are gone we can still influence events on Earth. I don’t know, but I do think Shakespeare was onto something when he wrote about “things in heaven and earth” that we don’t understand.
My mother in law passed away in February, 2017. I had known her for 38 years. I married her “favorite” son. She often told people “You don’t know my son” when they suggested he would leave his wife after I became disabled by a severe stroke. It took 16 years, but he did leave. She felt bad for me even though she was more concerned about what was good for her son.
Some years after separating from my husband, I had reached a point in a new relationship where I was spending weekends away with my boyfriend. We connected on OKCupid in May, 2017.
In the fall, we were on our second weekend away together. There is so much to learn about a person when we first get involved. We spent hours talking. In the course of conversation, I mentioned that my mother in law was German and liked to hike at the county park all the time. He said, “Was her name Irma?” I know it’s a small world and all that, but all I could say was “Get the hell out of here, you don’t know my mother in law”. He was also a frequent hiker in the county park in the town where they both lived. Irma was a very friendly, lonely and talkative type.
Over a few years of bumping into one another at the park, they had actually gotten to know each other fairly well. Here I was, in a relationship with a guy who had been friends with my mother in law. Go figure.
As things progressed, Rex liked to suggest that we were fixed up by Irma instead of actually meeting on OKCupid. It sounded more romantic and less common. Maybe she was trying to look out for me from the other side…
Thank you for reading :)