When I got engaged in 2002, I was 33. Somehow, after growing up on a self-sufficient farm in the 1970s, I had bolted to London at 17 and ended up in the fast lane as a freelance journalist, writing about sex, parties and cars. My 20s were full of stop-start love affairs and crazy jobs. I was unsure of who I was, scared, fun-seeking, defensively cynical and desperate to write, and I suspect I wasn’t entirely lovable or reliable. But after meeting my fiance I thought I was on the home straight to a wedding and kids.
About a year into our engagement, I pitched an idea to a women’s magazine. What if I hosted a dinner party for 12 single people to “see what happens”? The magazine agreed, saying they’d confirm the details later in the summer.
My fiance was now living in Jerusalem, reporting on Middle East affairs. For months I had been flying out to see him, but things were getting tricky. Much as we loved each other, it seemed we argued more than we had fun: a terrible equation for a future marriage. At Easter I flew out to try to save our relationship, but we had to face facts. I was devastated by our split, crying for days until my flight home.
My brother and best friend collected me at Heathrow to try to cheer me up. Frightened for my lonely and potentially childless future, I wailed that at 34 my time was running out. “I’ve got to start all over again, on the singles bandwagon.” My brother corrected me. “Don’t get on that wagon,” he said. “Forget about love. Concentrate on work. Do something different.” So I did. I worked hard, got fit, joined a burlesque troupe and forgot about love.
Around this time I was commissioned for an article that meant dealing with various publishers. One particular publicist went out of his way to help. Colin put me in touch with some of Britain’s best writers, and reminded me we’d once met at a book festival a few years before. I dimly remembered talking to him, but a lot had happened since.
We started emailing about other stuff. He revealed he’d recently come to the end of a relationship. I told him about my failed engagement. And I found myself telling him strange secrets. I explained, for instance, how my mum and I often spoke to each other in the voice of a fictional, overly saccharine West Country author called Lamorna, who wrote books such as A Swansong at Sunset and Where My Pig Goes So Go I. Lamorna made Colin laugh a lot.
In August, my editor confirmed they needed the dinner-party piece, so I contacted a variety of single people who might fancy it. The deal was that they’d have makeup and photographs done, then food and champagne, and we could let our hair down once the photographer left. I’d interview them the following week to see how everyone got on: snogs etc? Friends and strangers agreed, including Colin, whom I had yet to meet.
I didn’t have enough chairs, plates or cutlery for 12 people. Also, not only was I a rotten cook, but I was now one of the 12 singles. I’d had to fill the last place myself. I ran around town, borrowing what I needed, terrified about cooking. But when the first guests arrived at 6pm, everything was ready. After seeing the makeup artist, and having their photographs taken, guests began gulping down champagne. Soon, it was my turn.
I was having bronzer applied when a man walked into the room in a well-tailored three-piece vintage suit and open-neck shirt. His sideburns were good. He was carrying a bottle of champagne, a handful of loose flowers and had gorgeous blue eyes. Everything stopped, the world falling away while something peaceful fluttered into the room.
I know that sounds like something Lamorna might have written, but that’s exactly how it felt. His presence was beautiful to me. Peace is the operative word. There wasn’t that sense of danger that usually attracted me to someone. It was a door opening to a happier, saner, more loving world.
Everything sped up again. The evening kicked off and I rushed around. When the photographer left I announced we could now relax and have fun. Colin looked at me, gesturing to the seat beside him. He was so easy to be with, and hilarious. We talked and laughed all night.
The irony, of course, was that no one at the singles party got together except us. In the article I wrote some cheesy line about how “I felt like I was a winner because I met Colin”, but that still holds true 21 years later. We can still talk and laugh all night and I’m forever grateful we met.
The volatility of my other relationships, followed by that summer on my own, all led to meeting him. Somehow I had finally learned – and was ready – to recognise the peaceful presence of someone who saw as much good in me as I saw in them.
