Chilean author, Isabel Allende just released her 23rd book, “In The Midst of Winter” which she wrote as she was getting divorced from her husband of 28 years. She expected to spend the rest of her life alone, but at 75 she’s found love once again.
“I sold the big house I had with my ex-husband and I bought a small house where I planned to live with my dog and my computer,” she explains to People En Español. But to her surprise, an NPR listener who heard an interview of Allende wrote to her because he didn’t like what she said. She soon became friends with the New York lawyer who would write to her every morning and every night.
“I got so used to his messages that as soon as I would wake up I would run to check my phone to see if I had received a message from him, and for five months this took place without us talking or seeing each other,” she says.
She finally met him in a gala in New York and asked him what his intentions were because she was a 74-year-old woman who had no time to waste.
“People ask me about what it is to fall in love at 75 and I tell them that it’s the same as falling in love at 17, but with a sense of urgency because you don’t have time,” says the 75-year-old.
“At 75-years-old, I’ve found love because the person that fell in love with me was open to that possibility.” She says that at this moment in her life there’s no room for fighting, for jealousy, or things that are not worth your time.
“People want things, but they don’t want to take a risk,” she says. But “you cannot lie at 75. You cannot play games. You don’t have time.