Fifty one, back after two years away, and honestly quite nervous

I had two years of being unwell and then a year of being told I was better, and somewhere inside all that I stopped being a person who did this. I have been to two socials since the spring. Both times I stood near the edge of the room feeling like somebody's aunt who had come to collect them.

Fifty one, west London, twelve years in before any of that happened. My body is not what it was and neither is my nerve, and the second one is by far the bigger obstacle. I know roughly what has changed physically. What I do not know yet is whether I still want the things I used to want, or whether I only remember wanting them.

So I am after somebody unhurried. Genuinely unhurried, not somebody performing patience for three weeks and then getting restless. I would like to spend an evening talking first, and probably a second one, and I would like to be allowed to change my mind about something halfway through without it becoming a whole conversation about my confidence.

I am not fragile and I am not asking to be handled. I ran a department through two reorganisations and I have buried both my parents. I am simply out of practice at being looked at.

Not looking for anyone who wants to hear about the illness in any detail, because it is dull and I have told it enough times. Not looking for a rescue. And not looking for somebody who will treat fifty one as either an obstacle or a novelty.