I guess I really don't understand this part of your story. You're reflecting on a valuable relationship that was important in your life, that you learned a lot from. In the beginning of the story, you never even hint that at 25, you weren't mature enough to handle an adult relationship.

So I don't really get why you would choose to not permit such a thing for other people.

I had a relationship with an older man when I was 25. He was a powerful civilian official on the military base where I served in West Berlin. We went out for several months, and I enjoyed the experience and learned from it.

He reported directly to the base commander, and I was a peon junior officer, but it never occurred to me that his relatively more powerful position and greater age would supersede my agency as a free human being.

At 25, I was an adult in charge of my own life, as far as I was concerned.

Not too many years later, I met my first husband, who was 20 years older than me. We stayed together until he passed away, and I have never once regretted entering into a relationship with a man who had more power and money than I did.

I'm glad you had the wonderful experience you had with an older man, but I wish you would grant the same agency to younger men now that you granted to yourself then.