Editor’s Note: Michele Willens is the co-author of Face It: What Women Really Feel As Their Looks Change (forthcoming from Hay House this February).

I played tournament tennis as a youngster, so perhaps I was a bit more invested in Evert. Ever since she burst into our court consciousness at the age of 16 — with her perfectly pinned ponytail, sculpted body and pixie face — she was and grew into the perfect role model, at least for "my" sport. While her predecessors (and successors) would turn muscular and macho, she was a woman who looked great and had great manners, to boot. (She never quite said "nice shot" but she had this way of uttering "yeah" that meant the same.)

I never really thought about her as being a sexual object, however. She was so tidy, so controlled. But suddenly, she was engaged to Jimmy Connors, the bad boy of the circuit. While the marriage never happened, it was an ominous sign, perhaps: Did Chrissie have an edge? A need to be bullied? A dark side, even?

Then the career pretty much ended and the marriages began. John Lloyd seemed the perfect choice: an English gentleman. Yes! Chris was as clean as we thought and they practically blinded the eye with their golden niceness. Alas, the marriage did not last long and the doubts arose. Was she not as stable as we thought? Somehow, the idea of Chris Evert and divorce just did not seem graspable. Surely, it must have been him.

Then before you could say 30-love, Chris grabbed possibly the only man better-looking than John Lloyd: Andy Mill. Even the sport was different this time. A skier with a body to kill. Together they began making gorgeous little baby boys and schussing the slopes of Aspen together. Chris appeared as tennis commentator now and then, and I was relieved to see she remained as wry and friendly and girl-next-door as ever. She never looked better as she coasted through her 40s. Maybe she lost a tad bit of her sex appeal and maybe I felt just a little bit relieved. Good! She was a long-married, aging (albeit well) lady like the rest of us.

And then the unspeakable happened. She left Andy! For one of his closest friends! For a married man! With children of his own! And a golfer! The emotions were furiously churning through me, and I am sure I was not alone. Could I still cling to my notion of Miss Chrissie being the ultimate Queen of Nice? Was it time to accept the fact that she may be complicated, if not conniving?

Then there was the jealousy. How dare she find a dashing, equally fit and successful athlete at the age of 52! Greg Norman and Chris Evert were so damned handsome — even sexy — together that it was infuriating. But I finally got past that and chose to use her once again as a symbol, the embodiment now of what a 50-something woman could look like and love like. Yes, she was aging a bit and not afraid to show it. But something in her screamed, "I’m not dead yet!" and she and Greg became the picture not of the cause of two fractured families and some blasted friendships, but of hope, health and hormonal happiness. Go for it, guys.

And now. What can I say?