Work like you don't need the money.Love like you've never been hurt.Dance like no-one's watching.Sing like no-one's listening.Live like there's no tomorrow.

Sunday 19 September 2010

You never forget how .. it's just like falling off a bike

Due to some administrative glitch or celestial hiccup, I seem to find myself single and kissing forty. Having taken a long,hard look at myself in my (oversize) mirror, I have decided that this cynical, battle scarred woman needs a mate. It is 20 years since I dated and I am even more ill prepared than I was, as a bright eyed and bushy-tailed teen?

I seem to have come full circle and seem only to frequent all female company, with the exception of friends, who frankly don't count as men; having been thoroughly sanitised and emasculated by wedded domesticity. A recent perusal of dating sights made depressing reading. A wise woman pointed out to me that every eligible, single man, has been or is about to be some other woman's Ex. There is bound to be a long list of good reasons for that. Most of the men on these sites list GSOH, which you are going to need, as their introductory gambit is invariably whether you will be interested in phone/virtual sex and what you are wearing? This is like a red rag to a bull as far as I m concerned and I have replied numerous times, that I am wearing a scuba diving suit, marigold gloves and yesterday's makeup. Disturbingly some were still keen....

So what am I looking for and what on earth have I got to offer? Well on the plus side I' m employed, still retain most of my own teeth and have vast...... patience. What am I looking for....well much the same I suppose, as long as it comes in a 6ft + package. Is that shallow? There might be some delightful "shorter" men out there but somehow I predict that any man willing to take me on, is going to require both height and stamina to deal with my enormous... personality!
The key, my delightful friend confided, was selling myself. Not literally you understand, but in a stunning profile, which leaves no one in doubt of your irresistible charms.

So she wrote a disarmingly lovely reference for me for , My Single Friend, and we waited with bated breath. I m sorry to report that terms of growth and interest my stocks have plummeted which goes to prove, that which our female friends love and adore in us, holds very little appeal to the opposite sex.

One of my many failings it appears, is being too honest, simply because that is a quality I seek out and admire in others. It is top of the list on my future partner shopping list. However it is not a quality found readily in those frequenting dating sites. I went to meet a guy who had seemed charming and attentive online, in a country pub, not far from where I worked. I took the usual precautions of ensuring a friend would ring me, ten minutes into the date to check, using a pre arranged code phrase "The guinea pigs have escaped?" to make sure I was OK. Several other friends were similarly employed to text me during the evening in case I was in need of an emergency getaway!

The aforementioned gentleman had not been strictly honest in his reflective account of himself. The man I met was a ginger haired, tattooed hob-goblin, who was unpleasantly touchy-feely and regaled me with tales of shopping trolley theft and his job at Parcel Force (deliveries not a Manager of an Exports Business, as per his dating profile). What was worse though, was that the mercy phone call never came and the minutes dragged by like hours as the leery, cider breathed Bilbo Baggins ogled my frontage. Finally I escaped into the frozen air, gulping like a stranded goldfish and raced into the night, salaaming my car down the dark country lanes until finally, my phone exploded with a torrent of texts and missed calls. Apparently the site of the rendezvous had no mobile signal.

A few more similar experiences was enough to make me decide that husband-less was infinitely preferable to the horrors of the dating market and I slipped far to comfortably, into wallowing deliciously in my own self sufficiency. Except of course that humans are not designed to be alone; One too many Saturday nights watching terrible television and comfort eating leads to navel gazing and self pity. So I have decided the time has come to bite the bullet and see if there is a tall, like minded, kind man out there, otherwise I am in peril of being found dead under a pile of laundry and dog hair, without any one noticing my demise?

So it is time to stop prevaricating and get "A round tuit" as my grandmother would say. So here is my advert, with apologies to Paul McCartney

When I get older losing my hair,
not so long from now,
Will you take me out for dinner
share a cheapo bottle of wine?
If I'd been out till quarter to three
then pass out on the floor,
Will you still love me,
will you still hug me,
When I'm sixty-four.
I can do listening, sharing your views
When the nights are long.
You can read the paper by the fireside
wake up Sunday morning with me by your side.
Doing the garden,
walking the dog,
walk along the shore?
Will you still need me,
will you still heed me,
When I'm sixty-four.
Every summer we can go camping,
in darkest Wales clutching hot cups of tea
Coldplay or Keane on CD
climb a mountain in the pouring rain
as long as its just you and me?
Send me a text, or poke on Facebook
add me as a friend
Message that you love me beyond all hope
lots of xxxx then press “Send”
Give me your answer,
txt, MSN or Yahoo
ask for one date or more?
When will you view me,
‘cos I m getting gloomy?
Come knock on my door.

Sunday 12 September 2010

Ode to Smalls

All things wrinkled and cotton based
all pants of numerous shades
all shirts; school and otherwise,
they leave me in a daze

The ever towering mountain
of clothes to put in drawers,
neglected due to Face book
lie on my bedroom floor

Someone come and save me
and bring domestic bliss
to this exhausted mother
and her Clothing abyss?

The socks conspire against me
in endless hide and seek
school trousers knot like pythons
to ensure vagabond Chic!

All things found in PE bags
all crisp packets, tissues and gum
deeply hidden inside pockets
to guarantee tumble drier fun

The navy rugger shirt
the luminous leotard
sneak into the white cycle
to make my life more hard

Oh Oh oh

All things needed on Monday
last seen two months ago,
and mentioned on Sunday evening
they fill my heart with woe

I know there is a bottom
to the towering laundry pile
but I don't when I last saw it
it has been quite a while.

Oh Oh oh

All things made of silk or wool
have languished there so long
I m sorry I forgot you,
to you I pledge this song.