The REAL reason older men proposition later life women - and no it ISN'T ... trends now
Nadine Dorries wrote in her column on Tuesday of the men who have suddenly started to proposition her, at the age of 66. Four men in six weeks, with one whispering how sexy he found her over lunch!
They sense she is emerging from the grief which struck after the death of her beloved husband Paul in 2019, she concludes, and that she is radiating a new kind of openness and optimism.
Well, good for her.
But a word of warning, too. Far be it from me to rain on Nadine's parade, but she's not the only one to attract a proposition or two at a later stage of life. And they are not always a cause for unmitigated celebration.
To my continuing surprise, at the age of 79, I too receive frequent, and often very bold, propositions from older men. Why not, you might ask? I am single and unattached (I divorced my husband 35 years ago) in good health and reasonable shape from working out every day. But while they may be after me for my looks and personality, I believe the truth is rather more mercenary.
'To my continuing surprise, at the age of 79, I too receive frequent, and often very bold, propositions from older men,' says Liz Hodgkinson
I am convinced that what they want from me, at least in part, is not my scintillating company, but my money.
I don't mean that they are out-and-out scammers of the kind who reel women in online with lies about who they are.
No, these are real men, our age or older, who see a well-off wife as a ticket not only to fun, but to a very comfortable old age with their feet beneath our well-laden tables.
I have often written about the nice home I've lived in for 14 years, with its three bathrooms, and about my long career as a writer, and it's my firm belief that a section of the male population sees me as a catch because of it.
It's not just me and Nadine. My best girlfriend, a busy interior designer in her late 70s, is also always being propositioned. Another friend, 84, who recently published her first book to much acclaim, says she has an admirer who wants to marry her.
'And he won't take no for an answer,' she told me, even though she repeats it often enough.
Therein, of course, lies the problem. They see us as a catch, but also as women of a certain age who will fall at their feet once shown some attention – hence their confidence (and, as Nadine has discovered, some of these men can be very forthright indeed).
Yet rarely do we see them in the same light.
A few years ago, for example, a complete stranger sent me a message on social media. He said he was an Oxford graduate, had worked in international finance and now ran a publishing company. He wondered whether I might collaborate with him on a book about an interesting subject, so I arranged to meet him for a drink in a London wine bar.
The moment he walked in it became apparent that, where I had looked after myself and my money, he had not.
Dressed in old jeans and a scruffy jacket, aged about 70, within minutes of our meeting, he asked whether I'd ever consider getting married again. The 'date', if that's what it was, did not last much longer. Later I discovered that this international financier and publisher was living in
