Is It Just Me? (30 page)

Well, thanking you very muchly. But please don’t be.

Why? What happened?

After about half an hour in the cupboard, I realised he probably wasn’t going to join me after all. So I sat there on my own in the dark, with the coats for company. And I could hear people saying ‘Where’s Miranda?’ but I didn’t want to open the cupboard door as it would look really weird. And the longer I was in there the weirder my appearance from it was going to look. So I just stayed there, until everyone had left the party, and the hosts had gone to bed. At about 4 a.m. I escaped, just as Dave, the host, came past to go to the loo. We stared at each other for a moment. What does one do in that scenario? Again, where’s the life manual on this one? So I said, ‘Lovely cupboard. Really lovely. One of the best. Thank you.’ And left.

^*
head in hands
^*
You’re useless. What do I do now?

Well, you know. It doesn’t really matter all that much.

Yes, it does! Love and sex and relationships are the most important things in the world. Everybody knows that. Even MISS HANDEL knows that.

I’m not sure that’s entirely true.

What would YOU know?

Quite a lot, as it happens. I’ve been unattached for long periods in my twenties and thirties. And it’s been fine. I’ve got to know myself, made some wonderful friends, worked, had fun, and learned to enjoy my own company. Most importantly, I get the bed to myself so I can sleep in the ‘starfish’ position at all times. I just live the life I want to live. And it’s jolly nice.

If you’re genuinely happy, maybe I shouldn’t go on my date.

No, you must go. Enjoy all that life has to offer. Gorge yourself on the buffet of existence. Just . . . don’t get your hopes up. Not just yet.

^*
sits down on a netball
(you can’t get pregnant from those)
^*
I suppose I did always sort of hope I’d be spared all this dating and courting business. I knew it would never suit me. I just hoped that one day I’ll meet someone, and we’ll know instantly that we were meant to be together. Maybe someone famous; one of my crushes. Maybe I’ll go to a Wham concert, be in the front row and George Michael will take one look at me and –

Right, need to tell you something about George. One word: gay. Remember this. It’ll spare you a lot of heartache.

Noooo! No WAY! I could never have seen that one coming! OK, well, maybe I’ll be at another Band Aid and somehow get backstage passes and as Elton John comes off stage he’ll look at me and –

Need to stop you there again.

SHUT UP. Oh. I know, I’ll go to a studio recording of Fry and Laurie and . . .

Which one are you going for?

Fry.

Nope.

Oh.

Step away from the quirky creatives, Little M. We learn eventually (thanks to Will Young).

So, forget actors and musicians then –

Oh, definitely. Please do.

Goran Ivanisevic. Safe?

Safe. Good choice.

Whoever it is, I just hope I meet them at a party, or on the bus, and we lock eyes and maybe have a cup of tea. And that we . . . belong together. There’ll be no embarrassment. It will be easy, natural, right. No stress.

That does happen. It’s happened to friends of mine. It could well happen to us.

Do you really think it could?

I think that it almost definitely will. Because I for one will not be partaking in any formal nuanced dating dance.
^*
takes Little Miranda’s hand, as they both stare into the middle distance
^*
The Universe has greater things planned for us, Little M. Now! Off you go! You’re going to be late for this terrible date with the awful awkward boy, albeit with those Hasselhoff eyes.

OK, I’m off. Deep breath. Byeeee!

Bye! Have fun. And if he brings a rugby ball with him, FOR GOODNESS’ SAKE DON’T SIT ON IT.

Phew. I think we dealt with that one very nicely, MDRC.

How are we all feeling? Tired? Emotional? Or more-than-ready to bound on together to the next stage? Time for an energy boost, methinks. How about this: whatever your relationship status – married, single, muddled, lonely, happy, thrilled, bored, or just plain gagging-for-it – I now invite you to put on the most romantic piece of music you can find (I personally favour Lionel Ritchie’s ‘Hello’), hold yourself, your partner, your dog, a cushion or a broom close, and dance. Be wooed (good word, ‘woo’) into a loved-up stupor.

Until there’s something good on the telly, at which point JUST SAY ‘NO’.

A
s I understand it, sitting here in my writing chair replete with sandwich (not plural – remember the diet book), if you’re not careful, getting married can be the end result of dating. (Don’t say you don’t learn from me.)

Having put the dating world to rights, it would seem frankly remiss not to give at least a passing nod to the World of Weddings. Particularly as, for a lot of folk, the point of dating is indeed to end up wed. To have their ‘Big Day’. And marriage is, as I see it, a fine and noble institution, leading to such wonderful things as homes, families and lifelong companionship. Yes, I am a huge fan o’ marriage, even though I have yet to partake of it myself.

But as much as I think the notion of having a husband, and being a wife, is truly lovely-sounding – even, dare I say it, romantic – I am not sure I am ready. And I know it’s not just me who hears themselves uttering that phrase, ‘I’m just not ready.’ But what is it, precisely, that we’re not ready
for
? Well, MDRC, I can sum up all feelings of non-readiness for one’s nuptials in three short points. Are you ready? Then please observe my points thus:

Firstly, we are not ready for conversations that go: ‘Where are the keys, darling?’

‘In the place they always are.’

‘Where’s that, then?’

‘If you don’t know, then I’m not going to tell you.’

‘Fine, we’ll just have to miss the John Lewis sale then, won’t we?’

‘Yes, that’s right, we’ll have to just miss it.’

‘Fine.’

‘Fine.’

‘Fine.’

Secondly, we are not ready for a ‘present cupboard’.

And thirdly, we are not ready to hold a really quite serious conversation, nay summit meeting, about the pluses and minuses of getting an estate car.

That sums it all up for me. If one is not able to entertain the notion of these really quite simple things, one is not ready for the married life. This is perhaps also a test of whether one has passed officially into adulthood or not (one, by the way, is currently enjoying the use of the word ‘one’). One believes there should be a grading system, with badges, of the whole shebang. This would make it much easier when meeting people because if one of you has the ‘I am an adult and ready for marriage’ badge and the other one doesn’t – STEP AWAY: it’s never going to work. I know that might lead to a line of late-thirtysomething women in a bar with massive glittering badges, and only the odd older gay gentlemen with his, but at least we wouldn’t run the risk of wasting five years with a man who was actually only ever masquerading as an adult. It can sometimes take that long to realise he never had the badge. (Bitter? Me?)

However,
I
wouldn’t have the badge either. I’m not quite there yet (for which read ‘still a child’). Well, who wouldn’t rather try and beat their ski-jump Wii score than compare the prices of a Skoda and VW Estate?

But marriage has been on my mind lately. You see, I am at the stage in life where every other weekend seems to involve pouring myself into the car wearing an unnecessary hat, and driving to some obscure church/registry office/Buddhist Centre/field in order to watch a couple of friends tie the knot. Now, delighted as I am for all these friends, is it just me who, having been to thirteen weddings a year for the last three years, would rather spend every weekend for the rest of my life locked in a caravan with Jedward than go to another bollocking wedding? That’s not just me, is it? Tell me I’m not a mad, mean-spirited old hag.

For those of you who think I might be, please know that I have given this some serious thought and have noted below for your pleasure and perusal my reasons as to why weddings can get, shall we say, a little bit trying:

Yes, I’m kicking off with hats. What’s that you say? ‘That’s a very petty thing to start your fine list with, Miranda. What’s not to love about hats?’ And quite right you’d be too; no sane person really hates hats. But I begrudge anyone who thinks their wedding day is so important that it forces me to look like a dowager duchess from the 1940s. You might say, ‘Get a nicer hat, you’re clearly not very good at shopping for hats, Miranda.’ True, because
why
would I want to be good at shopping for hats? The only people who should be good at shopping for hats are people who wear them professionally, like Beefeaters, builders, cyclists and aristocratic ladies of yesteryear. Bobble-hats aside, hats simply don’t feature in a normal, run-of-the-mill twenty-first century life. FACT.

The only alternative to a hat at a wedding seems to be a fascinator. Which is like a sort of embryonic hat. A thing that is so flimsy and feeble it doesn’t have the energy to turn itself into a full-on hat. Fascinators are indeed fascinating. Mainly because they appear to be just as expensive as a full-sized hat. Hats and their fascinator embryos get a big thumbs-down from me. Indeed, death to hats.

Now, I don’t begrudge a friend a present; I assure you, I am no Scrooge. I adore present buying, actually. You know that thrill of giving someone you love something really well chosen and personal, something that truly reflects the depth and joy of your relationship. But you can’t do that at weddings, can you? Because the WEDDING LIST kicks in. In no other scenario would it be acceptable to assume someone wants to buy you a gift and to specify exactly what to purchase from a very expensive website: present lists should begin and end with Santa.

Usually, the only thing that is vaguely affordable (no, I will NOT buy you a £350 coffee machine) is something called a sauce boat. You’re buying your oldest friend a
sauce boat
. You have no idea what this woman is going to do with a sauce boat. She can’t even cook a microwave pizza and regularly drinks condensed milk from the tin. But, suddenly, she’s ‘a bride’, and she’s decided that brides need sauce boats. Death to wedding lists.

Yes, the Hen Night. Where for one night only we are to find willies absolutely hilarious. Chocolate willies, willies on sticks, willies on hats which also, inexplicably, have boobs on them. We’re expected to
shriek
with laughter at the hilarity of it all. But seriously – if any woman, in her day-to-day life, found willies as hilarious as people on hen nights are supposed to find them, then surely that would be noted down as a pretty serious problem? Symptomatic of some deep-rooted sexual dysfunction that would cause Freud himself to double-over in consternation. But on a hen night, fake male genitalia plus sambuca apparently equals the funniest thing you’ve ever seen in your life.

Still, at least the shrieking-and-sambuca hen nights have the advantage of being cheap. These days, we’re subject to a far more monstrous phenomenon: the Destination Hen Night. This is where you pay £800 to go to Spain with a group of women you’ve only met vaguely twice before. There to pay homage to a woman who you were sort of friends with during your university Fresher’s Week, who guilt-tripped you into coming by saying that ‘No-one back at Bangor liked me very much – but you were always different. You
understood
.’ Death to hen nights.

Why are weddings only ever in Suffolk, Devon, Northumberland or France. WHY? During the course of a ‘wedding weekend’ you will drive – scientists have proven – approximately four times the distance that a long-distance lorry driver travels in the course of a year. (All statistics and science facts contained in this book are entirely made up.) As a Londoner – Death to all weddings outside the M25.

Uniformly horrendous. And brides, with your hat-wearing insistence, extreme wedding location and present list madness – what’s with the asking someone over thirty-five to be a bridesmaid? What happened to you? Really? May I tell you this: it is NOT an honour to stand in the same outfits with a three year old, a nine year old and a fourteen-year-old supermodel. We, well,
I
, look RIDICULOUS. Why voluminous pink tulle? What’s happened to your taste? Sure, on a three year old – adorable. On anyone vaguely ‘strapping’ you take on the proportions of a small gazebo. Death to older bridesmaids. Particularly as I end up with a crippling envy towards the proper bridesmaids, the adorable little child bridesmaids who get away with all the fun.

I’ll explain this with a little ‘list within a list’ list. (Don’t say I don’t treat you right, MDRC.) Here we go:

i.
Run up and down the aisle of the church singing songs of your choice in a high soprano voice whilst the bride and groom take their vows.