Dating is never an easy proposition, but putting yourself out there as an older person, with a history, experiences and a mature sense of who you are and what you want might be even more challenging. Dating is especially hard for older women, who may have difficulty finding a potential partner who shares their interests and ideas for the future. In fact, older women often face challenges in the dating arena because older men are generally interested in meeting younger women. Recently, an opinion piece in The Boston Globe described this challenge: As author Karen Stabiner wrote about a 3-month dating site membership, “I was paying literally to be rejected by strangers for being their contemporary.” Her analysis was that older men are choosing women to date based on physical appearance and their goal to find someone to take care of them. Is this always true?

We may find out more when The Golden Bachelorette premieres on television in a few weeks. Beginning Wednesday, Sept 18, ABC will air this new television reality show, which will continue the “golden” franchise that started with The Golden Bachelor last year. You may remember that the show featured 72-year-old Gerry Turner on a quest to find a new love after the death of his wife. With the Golden Bachelorette, the tables will be turned as 61-year-old widow Joan Vassos (hardly “golden”, as Slate points out) will be looking for love. Joan was one of the women Gerry considered before she had to withdraw from that show (her daughter at home who had just given birth needed her). Joan is also dipping her foot back in the dating pool after her long-time husband passed away from cancer.

So what is Joan hoping for? This mother of 4 grown children and 2 grandchildren is hoping to make her family “whole” again by finding a new life partner, though she doesn’t see herself necessarily wanting to get married anytime soon. She also doesn’t see herself moving away from her family in Maryland, which appeared to be one of the sources of tension between Gerry Turner and Theresa Nist, the woman he ultimately proposed to  (but later quickly divorced) in The Golden Bachelor. So, while wanting to find someone new in her life, Joan has no intention of changing her close current relationships with her family. As comedian Rita Rudner once said, “When I meet a man I ask myself, ‘Is this the man I want my children to spend their weekends with?”

What’s interesting is that Joan will be set up with an array of men ranging from their 50s to their 70s. Unlike the experience of Karen Stabiner in Boston, it seems that at least some men may be interested in meeting and dating a single woman in her 60s- or could it just be the chance to be featured on a popular television show? Time will tell, but in the meantime, take a look at the first trailer for the upcoming season of The Golden Bachelorette here.