“A partner is not a village,” my friend reminded me the morning after yet another of my white picket fences fell. I was suffering from the vestiges of my date-to-mate days, when a person’s wink would send my imagination to a fenced-in back yard where a tall man tossed a ball to my children, his wedding band glistening in the sun (he was left-handed). I wanted the type of family that fits neatly on one piece…