This one is hilarious. I was at the Washington (pub) in Belsize Park last night. Rachel Stevens and Jeremy Edwards were in there. I was sitting outside in the freezing cold (I was with smokers; post smoking ban in London, there is little choice!), when I spotted Ross Kemp (Grant Mitchell in Eastenders) sitting in the back of a Mercedes, just across the road. 
First of all, a confession: I am back on the dating website. Yes, I know I swore I’d never do it again, and I guess I can’t deny that a tiny part of me is looking… but really, I had 2 motivations for doing it:
It turns out, there are no men meeting these requirements. Although at least I am making an effort to move on.
But what is most alarming – and this is moving on from our recent discussions on related matters – is that between the dating website and Facebook, I feel as though my world is closing in on me. I recognise a lot of the people on the site as friends of friends on Facebook, and have not been able to contact some guys, as I know them to be either friends of friends I have dated, or – worse – ex-partners of friends of mine, where I know the history, and would be causing problems by getting involved.
The classic example occurred yesterday. It emerged that a guy I am meeting this afternoon (afternoon tea at Claridges, darling – for that pretentious reason alone, I know it’s never going to happen with him) knows both my sisters, and is completely mortified to have arranged a date with me (charming!). He has begged me not to tell either of them how we met – and even more alarmingly, he actually said to me that “should it become necessary in the future to disclose to them…” Eeek! I only agreed to a date, and I have made it clear I am not looking for anything other than a friend.
I have been going on a flurry of dates in the last 3 weeks in my bid to move on. I have enough material to write a book (and, oh, I probably will – some of the stories are utterly priceless). But honestly, all I want at the moment is to stay single, sociable, happy, fulfilled, and to move on!
I’ll keep you posted...
To follow shortly. My evil new laptop is rebelling against me in that blood-pressure elevating manner that can only be the work of modern technology. I am working on it... we can't let our Tone step down from office without passing comment... and judgment.
I am running down the rain-soaked streets, destroying the bottoms of my Juicy tracksuit (why is it they never drag on the pavement when it’s not raining heavily?). I am late, although thankfully, for the first Sunday in weeks, not hungover. The doormen swing open the heavy doors, and I stumble into the Wolseley and stand at the entrance, dripping wet and trying to catch my breath. From the middle of the room, Evil Bitch Sister No 1 (EBS 1) is glaring disapprovingly at my umbrella (captioned heavily with the words “Groovy Chick”) and looking as though she wants to kill me. We are here to celebrate my mother’s birthday.
“D!” trills my mother. “How lovely of you to finally join us!” The false jollity is a transparent dig at my timekeeping. "Let me look at you – I was beginning to forget what you look like, hahaha." (Note: I recently conducted an experiment to prove that, contrary to her perception, she is the one who never calls me, and if I neglect to call her for a couple of weeks, we will not be in touch at all. It has clearly backfired on me now.)
“You’re looking so much healthier,” she continues. “You were looking very gaunt earlier this year, and I was desperately worried. Now you look more… robust [ie you’re getting fat again] and you’ve got your colour back” [ie sunburned from runs in Regent’s Park]. I knew it! My thighs are ballooning!
EBS 1 smirks triumphantly behind her carrot juice, but says nothing: she is in a rare good mood at the moment, having successfully managed to manipulate and extort money out of my mother to buy a flat in West Hampstead.
I bury my head in the overpriced menu, wondering how – in a macrobiotic-friendly restaurant – I am still unable to find anything suitable to eat. I am already hot with irritation, and I remove my Juicy jacket to reveal a Little Miss Naughty T-Shirt. EBS 1 and EBS 2 squirm with embarrassment. “You look ridiculous,” hisses EBS 1. “You’re far too old to get away with that top,” says EBS 2. My mother looks despairingly at me. “Oh! You have some white hairs!” she exclaims, patting her immaculate blonde bob, as several people on surrounding tables look over to examine the growing visible signs of my aging process.
My mother is one of those irritating people who has never smoked and doesn’t drink, rarely exercises, has a largely stress-free lifestyle, still enjoys biscuits late at night, but has never had cellulite, and with the right make-up, can still pass for 47. She is 62. Unfortunately, I take after my father, who smoked 40 cigarettes a day, was an outrageous workaholic, lived on about 3 hours sleep a night and constantly over-committed himself to different causes. He was once mistaken for a pensioner by a pharmacist when he was still in his 40s.
“Now listen, D,” she continues, and I can tell from her tone that she is on a mission. The object of her last mission broke my heart, and she has been warned repeatedly to abandon her matchmaking attempts.
“I spoke to Auntie D last week, and she couldn’t believe that you live round the corner from her and still haven’t been round to them for dinner! She’d like you to come next Friday night. There’ll be lots of nice young people there!” EBS 2 makes funny faces at me in between bites of pain au chocolat. We all know what “nice young people” means, and she is grateful to have escaped from my mother’s latest matchmaking mission.
The mere mention of Auntie D is enough to induce a panic attack in me. Pushing 80, the woman is a walking warning against surgical intervention. The skin on her face is so tightly stretched, it is a wonder she can still talk; in fact she has such a prohibitive lisp, it is hard to understand a word she says, although her voice is certainly loud enough. Her yellow bouffant hair is more visible than the sun on a clear, bright day, her inch-thick make-up is so exaggerated that I would not be surprised if she were outed as a transvestite, and her intoxicating perfume poses more threat to the environment than any inland carbon footprinted aeroplane journey. My memories of family get-togethers are tainted not only with her presence, but with her insistence on informing me and everyone else present that I was very fat and needed to lose weight. Apparently now I am thin enough to merit a place at her dinner table, where I will inevitably be presented to a panel of (in)eligible Jewish bachelors.
This time, I don’t have the energy to fight my mum on this one. My dating website experiences as well as my mum’s attempts to marry me off make me think of what Jacqueline Rose wrote in the introduction to her brilliant book, States of Fantasy. I often think of this: she referred to the postmodern identity crisis; belonging “everywhere and nowhere at the same time”. This is how I feel. I know on paper I’m a “nice Jewish girl” (as long as I have edited certain details on that paper, hahaha!), but the suburban sell-out dream that will be waiting for me at Auntie D’s Friday night dinner table will just not do it for me.
It’s a funny place to be. I have just fought my way through the most difficult 6 months of my life, and have come through intact: a little bruised and still cynical, but stronger, self-confidence intact, still optimistic and still curious and excited about life, grateful for the many relationships in my life and all the opportunities I am fortunate to have. I have learned an enormous amount about myself over the last 6 months. I am looking forward to starting my new job on Tuesday. Everything is falling into place. I belong everywhere…
…and yet I also belong nowhere.
I keep on changing my mind about older man. This weekend was a pretty full-on older man experience, beginning at five on Friday when we met in the pub. We spent all of Saturday together, and it was really quite pleasant. He wasn't too annoying, and even if I did have to pay for lunch because once again he is skint, he bought a Rioja on the way home, and we sat around, listened to my new Charlotte Gainsbourg CD, played Scrabble, and watched Eric Rohmer movies. A perfectly pleasant way to spend a Saturday evening, and I fell into a state of sleepy relaxtion and felt quite content. I had definitely melted by the time I made us a quiche and allowed myself to have the "what would we name our babies?" conversation (they are keeping my surname, unless they are boys. With boys, I really don't care at all). Basically, I was playacting "being in a relationship" and at certain moments, it suits me - and is nothing really to do with the person who is on the receiving end of my playacting. It is more like I'm still at playgroup and doing let's pretend, with a little boy who is suitable simply because he is there outside my Wendy house (without the sexual dynamics at that age, obviously!) On Sunday, however, I woke up and my mind had shifted. I rushed out for an early brunch with the girls, before meeting older man at three to be picked up by his brother-in-law and go to his sister's house for Sunday tea. I met his Mum, his sister, his brother-in-law, his cousin, his niece (16) and his nephews (7 and 5). It was fine, unremarkable even: I chatted to his Mum about bowls, his sister about Australia (she lived in Sydney), his niece about GCSE coursework and his nephew (who was deadly cute, and asked me straight out if I was going to marry older man, much to our general amusement) about Dr. Who and birthday presents. On the way home, older man lent over to me and said "You should be proud of yourself. You can mix with an ordinary working class Belfast family". What did he think I was going to do?! Anyway, for all that they may be 'working class' in origin, I would question that assessment now - a nice house with a big garden, three kids, two cars... there is a certain 'upward mobility' perhaps? His sister dropped older man and I at Stranmillis roundabout, so I suggested a quick pint at Cutters before home. As I walked along, Bristol J called me to say she had split up from her boyfriend. I handed over my purse to older man, told him to get us a couple of pints, and plonked myself down on a bench in the pub garden to carry on talking to J. I felt a tap on my shoulder. I looked up, and there, smiling at me, was Saab man. "Don't let me interrupt, but come over for a chat when you're done, " he smiled.
So I managed to squeeze in a couple of days in London in between all my marking, and had the opportunity to spend a sunny Friday afternoon at the Southbank. I went to see the Antony Gormley exhibition at the Hayward, and it was absolutely fascinating, to the point where his work pushes one to reconceptualising the relationships between space, place and the body. I will pick out two key installations that I loved
Once upon a time, a little girl was born to two loving parents. They had a nice little home in a little cul-de-sac in the middle of the country, and the little girl played with other children who lived in the cul-de-sac, and rode her bike, and walked to school through wind, and rain, and sunshine. She had lots of dolls to play with, and she called her favourite doll Rosy Primrose. She had lots of books to read, and her Mummy wrote her stories to read when she came home from school. This little girl loved lying in bed, and complained when her Mummy woke her up to go to playgroup, so everybody called her Sleeping Beauty.
I am back in Belfast after a long weekend in London, indulging in the following: attending a hen night; putting the world to rights (and watching an obscure German film) with my friend Marty; catching up with the girls (of which more anon). I flew back from Stansted on Tuesday afternoon. The queue in check-in was atrociously long, and the queue through to the x-ray machines nearly as bad. When I finally made it through, I had merely five minutes to smoke a cig and buy a nice bag at ted baker before hurrying to my gate. When I arrived, stressed and exhausted at my gate, I saw that a chair was free, but covered in coats, bags etc. I asked the young boy sat next to this free chair if he could move his stuff, and he obliged. "Blimy," I said to him, "wasn't that an atrocious wait?" This boy then explained that as he had been out clubbing at G.A.Y. the night before, and had drunk "at least seven" cocktails, before being seduced by the (gasp! black!) night porter at his hotel - the first time he'd had a black man, and, he confided, he'd loved it - something about London "makes you feel dirty" he announced - he'd missed his earlier flight and had been hanging round the airport for hours. Basically, he was a cute, funny, ginger haired gay boy, and we enjoyed camply imitating the air stewards while waiting to board the plane, and making stupid jokes about how high and fast Sleazyjet might take us. When we finally boarded cute ginger gay boy grabbed my hand and asked if I'd sit next to him, as he was scared of flying, and I was "a lovely person who he'd eat up if he wasn't gay" (in fact, I would eat him up, but that's immaterial). I thought of my book in my bag that I was dying to read. I thought of the fact that on flights my ears block and I can never hear anything anyway. And then I thought oh sod it, and plonked myself next to him. He began to excitedly look through the in-flight magazine asking me what perfume I wore.
