Ok-this might / will get long. First I should clarify, he owns a farm but does not actively farm it himself. He used to raise livestock on a small scale, but no longer does that. He leases the land to other farmers, while he himself works for another company. His home is located on the "farm", complete with barns, tractors etc that belong to him.

He says he is VERY lonely, and does want to get married, and doesn't know if we ever will. I do understand the loneliness and have told him I will marry him whenever he wants BUT, since we have both been married before and have children and grandchildren from previous marriages, we need to address the legal and financial implications first. (I work in finance and am very familiar with estate and asset planning). Those implications include taking steps to preserve his farm and land for his children, my remaining assets for mine, as well as preserving our individual assets in the event one of us becomes seriously ill or incompacitated so the other one is not left unable to care or support themselves. (Not a pleasant topic in terms of love / romance but necessary to protect each and both of us. Our individual assets are about equal). At the time (last fall) we discussed this in more detail he agreed, but no action was ever taken. Unfortunately we had the " perfect storm of busyness", right after that talk so it got put on hold. One of those "busyness" activities, was going away for a long weekend and then spending several weekends shopping for new furniture (we never bought any, just getting ideas for what we both liked). Another weekend he bought a small fishing boat to leave at my lake house, specifically for my grandsons to play with. At the same time my "maiden" aunt was also seriously injured (age late 80's) and not expected to survive, she was hospitalized for 8 weeks. I spent a few weekends taking my 85 yr old mother back and forth to care for her sister, 350 miles away. (We are the only family). There was also some weekend traveling to see his children who live out of state. On top of the additional chaos, my son who lives on the opposite coast from me was coming home for 2 weeks at Christmas for the first time since moving away about 7 years ago, I was more than excited! I had reserved vacation time to have as much time as possible to spend with "my boyfriend" and family at the end of the year. In spite of my plans..because I do work in finance and investment's, the extreme volatility of the stock markets at the end of the year, resulted in my bosses calling and asking if I could / would come into the office the last few days of the year rather than take my scheduled vacation time, which I did do.

When we were breaking up he said his primary reason was that I was too busy for him this past Christmas which, per the above, I admit to being extra busy. However, in my defense, I made sure to take the time and participate in whatever he wanted to do, even went so far as to have it scheduled on my calendar, such as spending a day looking for the perfect live Christmas tree, cutting it down, taking it back to his home to put up and decorate; (even before I put up my tree, which I did myself) do the planning and getting his house ready for hosting his immediate and extended family for their annual Christmas get-together which is always at his house, AND I attended the get together and helped host it in spite of the fact that my son was arriving home that day. I also made sure we had time to complete his Christmas shopping and spending time together....In order to get my stuff done many nights I stayed up until 3:00-4:00a (even when I had to go to work) cleaning, decorating, baking... Unfortunately for us, this busyness does / did not end until mid March because of family birthdays, mine included, Valentine's Day... This year his mother was also turning 90, and still lives independently in her own home. Her family was planning a surprise 90th birthday "open house", and expected about 100 people to attend. Because my "boyfriend" lives about 2 miles from his mom and the rest of the family is out of town, the responsibility of making everything coordinate fell on him. I was not involved, in the planning, but did "help" him to the extent I could. We broke up the following weekend, primarily because I (??) was too busy.

During the week when he is home from work in the evening, pretty much all he does is watch TV (In the winter he plays ice hockey one night a week and occasionally plays racquetball with a cousin.) In the summer, the hockey is replaced with golf, again 1 night a week, but the racquetball is dropped. He has no hobbies or volunteer activities that he is involved with to stay busy. He doesn't even really clean his house or take care of it, for example he will regularly do his laundry, but he has never folded, hung or put any of it away, he lives out of laundry baskets, lots of laundry baskets. (I have offered to clean and organize, and have on occasion, but he generally says no, so that we can do other things.) He was dx with diabetes a yr ago and also acknowledges that this has thrown him for a loop. (Because he didn't go to a Dr regularly, it appears from the permanent damage he already has, that he has been diabetic for a number of years). He admitted when we were breaking up that he is depressed from the diagnosis as well as the dark winter nights.

As far as asking to "be friends", I had emailed him within a few days of our break-up asking him the same thing, hoping that it would result in our being more than just friends. That was one of 2 emails I sent him, that I never got a response to. It was about 3 weeks later, that HE texted me asking if we could be friends and saying he was sorry for hurting me. The "liking" on my FB is / was not normal behavior for him, until the last few weeks. I had also texted him a couple of times during the first 2 weeks of the break-up and didn't get any responses from those as well. There has been very little communication from him outside of the FB activity and text. (He has been out of town for about a week visiting his daughter and her family). I have also not posted anything on FB in about a week, but the next time I do, if he "Likes", it or he does send me a text, I do plan on asking him what he wants. In answer to a question that was asked by one of the moderators, No, at this point I don't think we can be friends, it is too painful for me, (my whole family does like him) and makes my family uncomfortable when they know how much I am hurting, and they also don't necessarily agree that I was "too busy" for him under the circumstances. In fact, when I did get called into work unexpectedly, he spent time with my son, even going ice skating a few times with my son and his friends (my son and his friends played varsity hockey in HS and college).

The other email I sent him was just explaining in writing why I could not quit working yet. I have seen too many examples of women being left in vulnerable positions because they depended on their partner to be around to help support them, but life happened instead and unexpectedly. I told my "fiance" that if he died before I turned 67, (retirement for me) I am left with no income, no job, spousal benefits only from SS and no pension because it goes to his former spouse. I also suggested that since I can't make that drive every day that we compromise, I make the drive to his home 1 night a week, and he make the drive to my house 1 night a week. We then spend about 2 nights a week alone in our own homes. As usual on weekends we are generally together anyway. I thought we were adults and could handle 2 days a week without each other until I could retire. I did not get a response to that suggestion either.

To the moderator, who asked if I did not like farm life, no that is not the issue. I have no real problem, with living on the farm, just means I need to be more organized in terms of not running out of sugar and being able to get to the grocery store easily. I would like to decorate the house to my taste (and his) but I have no problem living out there. But to be honest, if something did happen to him (pass away), I would likely move back closer to where I live now since there are conveniences that I am familiar with. Example, he heats alot of the house by a wood stove. I have never even started a chain saw and don't see myself cutting wood from the woods (on his property) when I am in my 70's-80's to heat the house.

Yes, I would consider retiring early, if provisions can be made to take care of me in the event he were to pass away. I am not willing to place that burden on my children, if I deplete my retirement savings 7-10 years earlier than what had been planned for.

Thanks for the responses, I hope this gives you more clarity and answers some of the back ground questions.