a date. What about even a minor undercurrent of seething sexual tension?
Hold out for it, Jon Boy. I want you in there batting for us. For the guys who hold out for dates the way they used to be when we were young. Or even partly young. That moment of date competence that hung there for a second or two between adolescent dysfunction and the mid-thirties photo-swap lunch.
But I donât even want that either. And Iâm pretty sure I never had the moment of competence. Look, Iâm not in the market for dates. Iâm so not in the market for dates that I donât know how itâd be if I was. If I was, I wouldnât want the photo-swap date because itâs just not a date, and I wouldnât want the eighties date, either. I do
not
have fond memories of eighties dates, even beyond the first half of the decade when I didnât get any. Eighties dates â and maybe this was just me â seemed to be about hanging around uninteresting people long enough to have sex with them a few times. They didnât necessarily know that, of course, and I might have pissed one or two of them off. So Iâm hoping thatâs not the competence youâve got in mind. It doesnât sound great now.
Sylvia appears next to George, holding files.
You both have dates,
she says.
And quite loud voices. Nigelâs got everything ready to go, Jon. And I donât know if youâre interested in my opinion, but I think youâre probably a nicer man than you used to be. So Iâm sure itâll be all right in the end.
At least George waits till heâs back in his room to laugh.
His mid-thirties date concept preoccupies me most of the rest of the afternoon. It shouldnât, of course. I should be doing much more to take into account where these opinions are coming from.
I remember George had a crush on a girl at uni for months because she used an asterisk when she wanted to add something to the bottom of her lecture notes, but a cross of Lorraine if she wanted to add something else. The asterisk was an obvious choice, but the cross of Lorraine spoke to George. I remember him telling me,
Jon Boy, she uses a cross of Lorraine to mark something in notes. Like, how smart is that?
Fortunately, this was one of those rare crushes that you have the luxury of bringing to a close yourself. After a couple of months of sitting nearby hoping to be noticed, and a snatched second here and there of tense casual conversation, he actually dealt with it head on and asked her how she came to be using the cross of Lorraine in notes. She had no idea what he was talking about. So he pointed to one, and she said,
Oh, that. I guess I got it from somewhere.
And then he could get over her.
And in the end he was glad heâd never quite got round to showing her his own system (cross of Jerusalem, papal cross, cross of Saint Catherine). But George always footnoted far too much for his own good.
After work, we swim. Nigelâs a regular, and George decided he should get into some kind of exercise, so he told Nigel weâd join him. How it became a âweâ issue Iâm not sure, but my parents said theyâd be happy to have Lily a bit longer this afternoon, so it looks as though Iâm in.
Nigel takes his shirt off to reveal a swimmerâs kind of body, and one of those mystical, new-age tatts on his arm. George takes his shirt off, too, but itâs not the same. The swimmerâs body is lost somewhere deep inside George. Plus, heâs a pretty hairy guy. For George, skin is just the biological equivalent of underlay, and he could hide a lot of tatts in there beneath all that fuzz. In fact, there was a time when he won a hairy-chest competition without having to show the judges anything more than his back.
We hit the water, and itâs harder on my arms than Iâd expected. Nigel turns over lap after lap without visible effort. George swims one length, then part of another, then manoeuvres
Hold out for it, Jon Boy. I want you in there batting for us. For the guys who hold out for dates the way they used to be when we were young. Or even partly young. That moment of date competence that hung there for a second or two between adolescent dysfunction and the mid-thirties photo-swap lunch.
But I donât even want that either. And Iâm pretty sure I never had the moment of competence. Look, Iâm not in the market for dates. Iâm so not in the market for dates that I donât know how itâd be if I was. If I was, I wouldnât want the photo-swap date because itâs just not a date, and I wouldnât want the eighties date, either. I do
not
have fond memories of eighties dates, even beyond the first half of the decade when I didnât get any. Eighties dates â and maybe this was just me â seemed to be about hanging around uninteresting people long enough to have sex with them a few times. They didnât necessarily know that, of course, and I might have pissed one or two of them off. So Iâm hoping thatâs not the competence youâve got in mind. It doesnât sound great now.
Sylvia appears next to George, holding files.
You both have dates,
she says.
And quite loud voices. Nigelâs got everything ready to go, Jon. And I donât know if youâre interested in my opinion, but I think youâre probably a nicer man than you used to be. So Iâm sure itâll be all right in the end.
At least George waits till heâs back in his room to laugh.
His mid-thirties date concept preoccupies me most of the rest of the afternoon. It shouldnât, of course. I should be doing much more to take into account where these opinions are coming from.
I remember George had a crush on a girl at uni for months because she used an asterisk when she wanted to add something to the bottom of her lecture notes, but a cross of Lorraine if she wanted to add something else. The asterisk was an obvious choice, but the cross of Lorraine spoke to George. I remember him telling me,
Jon Boy, she uses a cross of Lorraine to mark something in notes. Like, how smart is that?
Fortunately, this was one of those rare crushes that you have the luxury of bringing to a close yourself. After a couple of months of sitting nearby hoping to be noticed, and a snatched second here and there of tense casual conversation, he actually dealt with it head on and asked her how she came to be using the cross of Lorraine in notes. She had no idea what he was talking about. So he pointed to one, and she said,
Oh, that. I guess I got it from somewhere.
And then he could get over her.
And in the end he was glad heâd never quite got round to showing her his own system (cross of Jerusalem, papal cross, cross of Saint Catherine). But George always footnoted far too much for his own good.
After work, we swim. Nigelâs a regular, and George decided he should get into some kind of exercise, so he told Nigel weâd join him. How it became a âweâ issue Iâm not sure, but my parents said theyâd be happy to have Lily a bit longer this afternoon, so it looks as though Iâm in.
Nigel takes his shirt off to reveal a swimmerâs kind of body, and one of those mystical, new-age tatts on his arm. George takes his shirt off, too, but itâs not the same. The swimmerâs body is lost somewhere deep inside George. Plus, heâs a pretty hairy guy. For George, skin is just the biological equivalent of underlay, and he could hide a lot of tatts in there beneath all that fuzz. In fact, there was a time when he won a hairy-chest competition without having to show the judges anything more than his back.
We hit the water, and itâs harder on my arms than Iâd expected. Nigel turns over lap after lap without visible effort. George swims one length, then part of another, then manoeuvres
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