I have been answering advertisements like this since they were on paper

I answered my first advertisement of this kind when it was printed on paper and you replied by post, and a fortnight passed between letters. I mention it not out of nostalgia but because it made me a patient correspondent, which is honestly the only advantage I still hold over the men writing to you today, most of whom are thirty years younger and considerably better looking.

Sixty four, Brooklyn, retired from teaching two years ago, widowed once and divorced once, four dynamics across thirty odd years with the longest of them twelve.

What I want now is smaller than what I wanted at forty. A woman who runs things, a set of duties that are genuinely mine and not invented to keep me busy, and a rhythm to the week. I have a great deal of time and very little urgency. Nothing needs to be intense. I would much rather it were reliable.

I should say plainly that I am in good health and expect to be useful for a long while yet, since that is the question everybody is too polite to ask and it is a perfectly fair one.

Not looking for a woman half my age, which I raise because it is what this board assumes and because it holds no interest for me. Not looking for anything that would need me travelling far at night. Not looking for companionship in the general sense, because I have friends and a brother nearby and company is not the thing that is missing.