Last Saturday at Heart’s Desire Beach a South Ender I hardly know said to me, “Your wife  told me once, before she ever met you, that she didn’t do relationships well, that she was always trying to get it right.” The woman who told me this not too surprising revelation—many others have told me similar– is a therapist, and conjectured why this might be the case.  Knowing my wife better than she I thought she was off the mark, though the “not doing relationships well” bit was true to my experience.

A much more enlightening insight came from a swim coach who only knew my wife slightly from holiday dinners. He observed that many perfectionist athletes often fail at relationships, that the relationship, just as their own performance, rarely lives up to their expectations. They keep trying to improve, and improve, and improve; yet are never satisfied.

Little did he even know of her serial approach to sport (as with men.) From ju-jitsu, to technical climbing, to cycling, to swimming, to marathon running, to rowing. Accomplish one and move on. Never satisfied.

There’s a pattern here: many sports/many husbands and lovers. Keep moving on. Never satisfied.

Maybe she’ll get one of them right someday.