Rings true for you? SPOILERS

Further, Catherine tries very hard to convince him that things will work out. It goes back and forth and you wonder if he will stay or go. Thing is, if he had stayed with her, the movie would have been just as poignant since it's his struggle with himself that really matters, not so much his ultimate decision.

It's also an interesting plot reversal of the regular scenario where it's the man trying to convince the woman they should be together.

This movie was made in the day when movie makers went out of their way to NOT have happy endings.

Get the facts first - you can distort them later!

OP, yes, I too think it must be a common feeling for a lot of men and women who think they have passed the point of no return relationship-and-family-wise. Of course, this could happen because they deliberately dragged their feet, but in the case of Will and Cath, it's just a consequence of circumstances beyond their control. Will is no starry-eyed dreamer. He knows that he's too old and inexperienced to run even a small farm. Yet he truly loves Cath and the Button. Which makes the ending so realistic and heart-breaking. Great movie, great characters, great acting.

I got married at twenty-six and am still married four decades later. However, if a woman two-thirds my age or younger wanted me to settle down with her, I, pushing seventy, would have reservations. I think I'm too old, and too set in my ways. So yes, Will's dilemma does ring true. That being said, I wish he had stayed with her! I tell myself a story--Will laid awake in his bedroll all that night, staring up at the stars, thinking it over. In the morning, he rode back and rejoined her and the boy.