"If the timing had been different..."

I keep trying to convince myself that things would be different for the both of us. I would not be married and he would not be recently divorced. Whose to say that he and I would even be a couple? All I know is that if we’d had this chance years ago, things may have turned out differently.

I can actually picture us being happy, comfortable and content. Not letting the outside world get to us, not letting the stresses of the job put up walls in our family life and being one of those couples that people actually envy. Our kids would constantly tease us for always showing affection in public and their friends would always want to spend time at our house. They’d said, “Your parents are so cool.”

We would take family vacations twice a year and then there would be occasions when we would have “grown up time.” The kids would be gone for the summer and we would live freely like two teenagers without a care in the world. We would make love every day and sometimes twice a day. We would forget to eat and clean up and just lay back, laugh and play hooky from work.

But then reality sets in and I open my eyes to see that if the timing had been different, maybe he would have bumped into me; said, " excuse me" and kept right on walking.