Looking for Mr. Good Enough

Blair Glaser

Word Count 2097

I don’t normally read self-help books on vacation. They tend to reveal what’s wrong with you, and who wants to end up sunbathing in a shame spiral? But I was alone at forty, at a beautiful adult-only resort in Mexico, on a vacation that had been intended for two. In order to avoid watching woozy couples slather suntan lotion on each other, I buried my nose in Lori Gottlieb’s Marry Him, The Case for Settling for Mr. Good Enough, which promised answers as to why I still had not found lifelong partnership, and why I was reeling from another break-up — again.

Marry Him suggests that the online dating culture of unlimited choice, in tandem with women’s programming that the ONE — the perfect match — is out there, traps single women into rejecting suitable partners for the promise of something better and lamenting their own loneliness. I wondered: had I cut good men out of my life for bad reasons?

Until the trip, I’d been sure all my break-ups, including my most recent, were warranted. While the ocean sparkled on the other side of the never-ending pool, I replayed relationship endings in my mind, starting with the last fight with my ex. When the three-pound Chihuahua I was dog-sitting left a few Tootsie Roll-poops on my ex’s pristine carpet, he reacted as if I’d intentionally set his house on fire.

My ex and I had known each other for years as friends, but our romance lasted barely three months before we blew things up. I loved his humor and art. Had I focused on his temper, his flaws, as Marry Him suggested, to keep myself safe from commitment?

Then there was the boyfriend who broke my heart by deciding he wasn’t ready for marriage and moving to the other side of the country. Nothing I could do about that one. The man I’d find drinking alone at 3 a.m., who left me for my best friend. And the sexy screenwriter who, even after we started living together, could be found in dark corners at parties, seducing a woman who, once I showed up on the scene, was clearly surprised that I was in the picture. There were many men I hardly gave a chance to, for one reason or another. Had I made a mistake in breaking things off? Had I been holding out for a perfect Mr. Right, or was I upholding standards for how I wanted to live?

The book was driving me nuts. Some “vacation.” I got up from the chair and headed to the beach. On my way, I exchanged glances with a cute guy dressed in khaki pants and a white polo, the uniform of the hotel staff. At the ocean’s edge, I kicked the sea foam with my big toe.

I didn’t miss my ex. I was too relieved to miss him. But I did miss the possibility of building a future with someone, and I was trying to fill that gaping hole with my cyclical thoughts. Futile. They weren’t going to fix the past, help me find a mate, or keep the ferry of my fertility from leaving the dock. Please, in an act of desperation, I prayed to the mythical goddess Aphrodite — literally born of sea foam, the semen of the ocean god Uranus — send me a sign that I'm on the right track.

I dove into the warm turquoise water to cleanse myself of all I couldn’t see that had barred me from satisfying partnership and starting a family.

Stop reading that stupid book, I told myself when I emerged, dripping, and headed towards my chair. Enjoy the vacation. But as soon as I was wrapped in towels and snuggled back on the lounge, a Caribbean breeze ruffled the book’s pages, and I pawed at it to hold my place: smack in the middle of one of Gottlieb’s all-too-relatable personal stories. She’d hired a matchmaker who set her up with a good fit: an artistic man who loved kids, had a good job, and personality. But Gottlieb wasn’t interested because of his name: Sheldon. I had to agree; it’s not the sexiest name. Would I have given bow-tie-wearing Sheldon a shot? Probably not. I felt called out. Stop reading! I yelled in my head.

This time, to curb the self-torture, I went to the hotel library to check my email since there was no resort-wide Wi-Fi.

The cute guy was there, sitting cross-legged in a comfy white chair, across from a tanned couple sitting in comfy white chairs, flanked by walls of rattan bookshelves filled with ratty paperbacks. He was speaking English. His eyes registered my entrance. I sat at the desktop, hit “compose,” and emailed my best friend: I think I’m spinning. The only thing that could save this vacation is a good rebound. Send.

I looked up to find the cute guy standing by the computer.

“Hi,” he said.

“Hi,” I said back.

After an awkward pause, he asked where I was from. He was originally from New York, too. He also was a healer and worked at the hotel in “wellness,” helping guests chart out a yearly agenda for healthy living.

We smiled awkwardly at one another. “I have another appointment,” he said. “But maybe we can find each other later on?”

“Sounds good,” I said, logging out of my email. “What’s your name?”

“Sheldon,” he said.

I folded my lips inside my mouth. I almost laughed. I almost said how crazy I was just reading this book about a woman who ... and then, mercifully, did not.

“Hi Sheldon, I’m Blair.”

I got up and walked out, my flip-flops narrating my exit with horse-hoof clacks on the tile floor. I had received a sign that my fate was indeed turning. Universe, Aphrodite, Whoever, thank you, I said to myself. Yes. Sheldon. Yes.

I’m not sure exactly when my friends and I started calling out the Universe’s apparent investment in our well-being, and the mysterious ways it guided us via signs. On one level it seemed ridiculous that the incomprehensibly vast Universe was so keyed-in to our lives. “You were thinking about running a workshop, looked up, and saw a hawk? It’s a sign.” “He forgot about your date, but while you were waiting another guy hit on you? Total sign.” “You were thinking about your upcoming job interview and saw a license plate that said UGOTTHS? What a sign!”

The “sign” thing might have started when I lived in a spiritual community in my twenties, or when the book “The Secret” was all the rage, but it really took hold when I trained to be a therapist and learned about Carl Jung’s idea of the collective unconscious, a state beyond our daily, personal awareness. It was difficult for Jung to prove, but after years of analyzing patients and exploring sacred traditions in indigenous cultures, he believed that synchronicity — the phenomena that happen when events line up or circumstances collide at significant moments — was evidence of a universal order underneath the randomness of life. Synchronicity points us to the collective unconscious, which lends healing, meaning, and purpose to one’s journey.

Some days I believed fully in signs and delighted in their evidence of a higher order, and other days I considered them New Age bunk. But that night, stunned and delighted to be having dinner with a man named Sheldon, my “sign” incarnate, I was a full-on believer.

Sheldon warned that although there were some regulations about cavorting with guests, having dinner with me could simply be perceived as work, so there really was no problem, but I took it as a hint not to flirt too overtly. In the candlelit pavilion over a dish he picked since he knew the menu so well, we discovered he had dated a woman in my therapist referral group back in New York. A therapist I knew! In New York! Another sign rendering Sheldon real and accessible. He asked why I was alone and I told him about the break-up. He, too, was in his early forties and single, but didn’t necessarily want to be, although he acknowledged the difficulty in finding someone suitable with his current work situation. The connections strengthened the current between us.

That night, Sheldon carefully made his way to my room, and we giggled when he entered without being caught. When he pressed his body on top of mine, I turned my face away. I always cried the first time I was with someone new. It meant the prior relationship — with all its tenderness and potential — was really, truly over.

By the time he left, I was giddy. Sheldon really is an unfortunate name. But he was awfully cute. And the coincidence was … too much. Could Sheldon be my guy?

In order to hang out, we had to leave the resort. The next day, the one before I was scheduled to return home, Sheldon instructed me to take a cab to the end of the long road that led to the hotel entrance at midday, and he’d meet me there. We headed for the small town, where we held hands, waded through the aromas of Mexican street food, and wandered among tourists by the shops with colorful piles of mariachi hats. I looked over at him to catch his gaze but his eyes were on the ground and stayed there.

“You okay?” I asked.

“Yeah,” he said, unconvincingly. We strolled. His hand turned clammy and lifeless. The frisson between us had soured. “I guess I’m a little sad,” he said. “This all feels so normal.”

“Normal” is not what you want to hear when you’re embarking on a fated love affair. I had been thinking more along the lines of “magical.” But he meant it in a sort of good way. There was a comfort between us. In strolling the village with me, he realized how isolating his glamorous life as a resort healer was. He wanted a girlfriend that he could build a life with, and we both knew in 24 hours I’d be returning to “real” life.

I felt bad for Sheldon. But I wanted my spectacular vacation date back.

We struggled to find the right place to eat; some places had too long a wait. We ended up settling for an American diner chain, which had a free table that neither of us really wanted, but perhaps there was something normal — or at the very least, familiar — about it. A waitress brought us menus. I read mine like I was going to be tested on it.

As I settled on a chicken caesar, I realized with mounting distress that Sheldon would not provide the quick turnaround of what I viewed as my life’s biggest failure. He wasn’t going to invite me back to Mexico in a month. We would not fall in love and create a fabulous new adventure, or a family in the nick of time. We could not save each other.

I struggled to find a neutral topic to discuss. Out the window, a brown stray dog bopped down the street. Silverware clattered in a nearby bin. In the tinny echo, I could have sworn I heard the gods chuckling. I thought back to a book I had read by Lakota author Lewis Mehl-Madrona: “Coyote Medicine,” which is when life pulls a fast one on you so you stay humble, laugh at yourself, experience folly. Part of me was laughing at myself for believing that my “sign,” the healer named Sheldon, was “the answer.” Part of me wanted to cry that he wasn’t. I was going to have to find a way to accept that by mid-life, I was still the therapist who healed people of intimacy issues but could not sustain her own intimate relationship. If one of my past loves had indeed been Mr. Good Enough, he was gone, and I was leaving.

The next day, I looked in the mirror before checking out. There were bags under my puffy eyes, but the sun’s kiss made my skin sparkle — all the grief and magic one face could hold.

As I stood at the hotel entrance and waited for the airport shuttle, Sheldon appeared on the other end of the lobby. He waved, but as I stepped inside the van, holding my straw hat on my head with one hand and my carry-on with the other, I could not wave back. By the time I’d settled and looked out the van window, he was but a mirage.

Blair is a leadership consultant and writer whose essays have appeared in Longreads, Oldster, Quartz, HuffPost, Inside Higher Ed, and others, as well as in literary magazines such as Brevity, Scoop, In Short, and The Mantlepiece. She’s read stories live at events such as Writer’s Read, Generation Women, and The Woodstock Bookfest. Her debut memoir, This Incredible Longing, will be published by Heliotrope in February 2026. She lives with her husband and dog-ter, Vanna White, in Venice Beach, CA. More can be found at www.blairglaser.com.