Partners and Pasts

Ninety-nine percent of the world's lovers are not with their first choice. That's what makes the jukebox play. - Willie Nelson

Relationships are a funny thing. We want them. We need them. They have the ability to enlighten us, to empower us, to deceive us, to manipulate us. Dating and relating, however, takes on many new facets when you reach my age (41 years young!). After all, at this stage, even Prince Charming has a past.

So what do you do? Do you embrace your partner's past, knowing that it has had an impact on who they are today? Do you just accept it, knowing that there is no changing it? Do you ignore it, because after all, the past is the past? Just how much of that past do you allow to influence the present?