A Quick Single

In which The Author bowls a maiden over

As I told you in Half My Age Plus Seven, I've been single (apart from the abortive Jenny situation and a few dalliances with fucked-up born again God Botherers) since the Oz Girl heartbreak in 2001. Fifteen years and a bit later, I'm happy that way. I think my Facebook relationship status currently says something like 'Single, Not Looking, Really Can't Be Arsed With The Whole Fucking Thing'.

A couple of days I had a late lunch with Alwyn and Chris D., while we were putting the final pieces of Alwyn's website together. We were in Servini's in Aberdare, which is our registered office for meetings and things. While Helen O. was preparing my hot chocolate, she asked me if I ever go to the New Inn in Ystradfellte.

As a matter of fact, I have been there fairly recently, as I recounted in Further Up the River. But – as I explained in that earlier entry – it's not a journey to undertake lightly. I'm unlikely to be adding the New Inn to my regular Sunday walkabout any time soon.

Anyway, it turned out that Helen's casual enquiry was anything but casual. Here's one of those Six Degrees things that often feature in this blog, so hold on to your hats. There's a student named Lauren who works part-time in Servini's. Lauren's boyfriend is the son of the New Inn's landlady. And the New Inn's landlady – apparently – thinks I'm just her cup of hot chocolate.

I asked Helen and Lauren how she even knows of my existence. Since I've only been in the pub once this millennium, it seemed a bit unlikely that I made a massive impression. Helen was baffled as well, so we took our drinks to the Spying Table and sat down to look through Chris's design ideas.

A few minutes later Helen came over to talk to us. Lauren had helped her to solve the mystery. The landlady in question had seen me in Servini's one day, and overheard me telling Helen and Marino about the latest book I was working on. As she's into books and arts and crafts (according to Helen, anyway), she decided to put some feelers out to find out more about me. Where better place to start than in the place where her son's girlfriend works?

Now, Alwyn has only just reasserted his independence, after spending some time in a relationship with a woman who seemed determined to take his life over completely. I called on him to second my (almost identical) case in favour of the single life. (Chris and his girlfriend are well settled, so the three of us left him to his coffee and had a bit of a conflab.) We convinced Helen that I really didn't want to pursue any sort of investigations down that route, she went back to the counter, and we carried on chatting about the website.

That's not the end of the story, though.

As we were leaving in search of WiFi (a quest which led us to the Cambrian), Helen slipped me a piece of paper with this lady's name on it. It was in Lauren's writing.

'She's on Facebook,' Helen explained. 'Why don't you check out her profile and send her a message?'

'Because I'm really not interested in meeting any women,' I said, for the hundredth time. 'Anyway, it's been a very long time since any woman found me even remotely attractive. I've just checked the calendar to make sure it isn't April Fool's Day.'

And we made our excuses and left.

A little bit later, while we were in the Cambrian, Chris asked me why I didn't look up her on Facebook anyway. So I did.

Now, I've never met her (to my knowledge), so I'm having to base my decision purely on the customary unflattering Facebook profile pic. But if her face popped up on Tindr (which I've never used, by the way – I just know the general principles), my first thought, however cruel it might sound, would be 'Next!'

Apart from Lisa, when we were both doing our A levels, I've never gone out with anyone close to my own age. Sam is nine years younger than me; Michelle is about ten years younger; Gema and Oz Girl are sixteen years younger; my recent narrow escapes had a similar age gap. This lady is about my age. After all, she's got a son more or less the same age as my niece. I'm absolutely not interested in acquiring a ready-made family by default, even on a temporary basis.

And there has to be a degree of physical attraction as a basis for a relationship, doesn't there? If you simply don't fancy the other person, it's doomed to fall at the first fence.

Yesterday I popped into Servini's again, this time with Clare E. We had to go to Treorchy to sort out some passport photos, because the photo booth in Aberdare Post Office is fucked again. With time to kill before the train, we decided to grab some breakfast. Needless to say, Helen asked me if I'd followed up on her tip-off. I told her I had, but wasn't going to pursue it any further.

Then Helen had the cheek to launch into a passionate defence of her own continued singledom. You know the sort of thing: keeping your own schedule; being able to stay up all night and watch DVDs if you want to; booking last-minute day trips without having to consider what anyone else is doing; choosing what to watch or listen to, entirely free of interference. And so on.

On the other hand, Clare seems to go from boyfriend to boyfriend almost on a fortnightly basis, and then spends the rest of her time moaning about her ongoing run of bad luck. So does Chazza. So do half the young people I know, in fact.

Haven't been there; haven't done that; seen other people wearing the t-shirt and decided it doesn't suit me.

If I am in Servini's and this lady is there, I expect Helen and/or Lauren will point her out to me, and possibly contrive a meeting. If it happens, I'll say hello and maybe we'll have a chat. But that's almost certainly as far as it'll go. She'll have to be pretty fucking special (unique, in fact) to wrench me off course and set me sailing into unknown territory. I just think it's important to state my case – of which I'm certain – before Helen gets any daft ideas about launching a dating agency from our registered office.