Renewed faith in family and marriage
One prime advantage of having no strings attached is that nobody relies on you for anything. I have no one expecting me home at a certain hour and no one relying on me for buying groceries, assistance in cooking dinners , nappies changed or even bedtime stories read. My mother, of course, thinks this is totally tragic, and in one way it could be just that. A sad and unhinged isolated existence in a sprawling lonely city. But living with flatmates shelters me from domestic loneliness, and I often go stir crazy from the lack of lone time.
I had a cappuccino with a gorgeous 30-year-old divorcée last Friday afternoon at SouthBank and she told me, without any prompting, all the bad things about marriage. I warned her not to. I’m already turned off by the whole institution after so many horror stories. This is slightly baffling, as my family’s relationship histories for many generations have produced happy marriages and cheerful healthy offspring. I am the emotional black sheep of the fluffy fleeced flock.
The divorcée further entrenched my fear. She described that dreaded feeling of being “obliged” not to go out, or to come home at certain times. The way she put it sounded pretty awful, and no matter how much you love your family, wife or husband there will always come a time when that obligation niggles a bit too hard.
Being a naturally combative person, I told her it was good to feel obliged to do something for someone else at times, otherwise your existence ends up being completely selfish - and pointless. She roared with laughter and told me to wait and see.
On Saturday morning I was invited by Sean, asking if I wanted to come around for lunch that afternoon. And so, being unencumbered and unobliged to do anything else, I gratefully accepted.
Strangely, unlike most marrieds with kids, their house didn’t hint of tiny people at all. They must have scrubbed hard to remove all traces of toddlers. I glanced around the crowded bookshelves, which were bursting with heavy encyclopaedias and thick volumes on Stalin and Churchill. I searched in vain among the photo frames for cherubic faces smiling from windswept beaches. Not one toy or dummy littered any of the crazily clean surfaces.
I took my self to a self-exploration walk through the house. Everything looked to be emaculate, well planned and designed. Danish art meets Sri Lankan casual elegance in rich teak wood furniture around long sprawling white walls. I returned to the lunch table and got lost in stories from other guests of exciting times spent in Central Asia. The host became obsessed with toasting everyone with indescribably strong vodka – a way of honouring his guests. It was a fantasy of a Borat movie crossed with Casino Royale.
It was a beautiful exerience, tender yet racy. I finally stumbled home, with my faith in the joys of family life repaired and the possibility of a happy married future a real prospect.