The dark side of the sun

I squoosh you, stupid cheerful sun. 

If there's one thing that the grey, cold drizzle of winter in the UK does, it's that it makes you appreciate springtime.

As I write this, my little corner of southeastern England is basking in balmy(ish) spring temperatures, sunshine and blue sky. People are walking around with a new sense of relaxation and relief. It's not exactly sizzling temperatures, but I can smell barbecues. People are wearing sunglasses and venturing out a few layers lighter than they were a few short weeks ago. Flowers are blooming; trees are blossoming.

Spring comes with the promise of happiness and renewal – yes, all the clichés are true. It just feels smiley. Even if the rest of the summer is a washout (it often is) and/or there's a hosepipe ban (there often is), it's just a wonderful, optimistic time of year.

And so it has that effect on me. But it also has a strangely opposite effect, too, come the weekend especially. It makes me feel a little melancholy; a little lonely. I know – admitting to loneliness is a bit of a taboo, and it makes people feel uncomfortable. And it's not that my life is empty or that I dislike solitude. Far from it, in fact – I have friends, work is busy and I enjoy and actively seek solitude quite often.

As one gets older, though, the nature of friendship changes. Friends pair off, and have children, and move away to areas with good schools or countless other reasons that go hand in hand with being a grown-up. So, just by the way things go, you see less of them. Weekends are for couple stuff. For family stuff. There are few people left who are free for carefree socialising at the weekends.

You can get away with being antisocial in the winter, when you just want to stay indoors in the warm, when nothing appeals less than the thought of a cold wind cutting through you as you wait on an icy platform for a train delayed by snow. But springtime brings with it an urge to crawl out from our caves and reacquaint ourselves with the world.

And I associate sunny warm weekends with good times – lazy, slightly sozzled days in sunbaked beer gardens; country walks; days slipping into night on the seafront.

To underscore those hazy, pleasant associations, my last relationship bloomed with the spring and flourished through the summer of 2010. I think back on our relationship, and it's not through rose-tinted glasses but through the glint of sunglasses. Beer gardens in the sun; walking on Brighton beach; one day we both declared 'perfect' which was nothing more than a long walk followed by collapsing on the grass of a common and talking until the sun went down late. It all seems blissful, carefree, and bathed in sunlight.

Don't get me wrong. Turns out he later cheated on me with his ex and got her pregnant before dumping me, so I don't want him back. What I do miss, though, is that warm haze of companionship tied up inextrictably with sunshine and long days. I can't unpick the weather from its happy memories. Nor would I want to, of course, but the lack of the opportunities to make new summertime memories with friends or a significant other causes the occasional pang.

In this weather, I feel I should be out doing something, and making the most of the weather, but I rapidly run out of ideas of things I'd enjoy for long on my own, so I sometimes end up doing nothing, then getting a bit annoyed about it all.

Not that I resent the weather itself of course. It still brings a smile to my face. The hope for renewal and the optimism still stir, even in this middle-aged, scarred old heart of mine. Who knows what a new summer will bring…besides a hosepipe ban?

Image: freedigitalphotos.net

Running like the wind (or rather, a gentle breeze)

It's funny because it's true.

It started with the most unlikely of sources of inspiration. Most people who read The Guardian or watch Channel 4 will be familiar with Charlie Brooker. Charlie is a scathingly funny and acerbic wit who cuts through the absurdity of television and current affairs with a sarcastic sneer. His columns and television appearances are always a thing of joy. What Charlie isn't, though, is someone you would turn to for inspiration when you want to get fit.

Last November, Charlie wrote a column entitled I have been murdered and replaced with a suspicious facsimile. In running shoes. He writes:

For years, I thought I knew vaguely who I was, and the kind of things I liked. And one thing I'd definitely class myself as is "un-sporty". I've never had a gym membership and have always been profoundly suspicious of anyone who willingly does anything more physically demanding than wiping their arse. So imagine my shock, in recent weeks, to find myself running around a local park. Not once, not while being chased in a waking nightmare, but voluntarily and often.

He goes on to explain how, with the help of an app for his smartphone, he's started to take up running. And enjoying it. Hating himself for enjoying it, because it goes against type, but enjoying it.

I'd been feeling unhealthy and unfit, but unwilling to part yet again with cash for a gym membership I'd use enthusiastically for a month or two before dropping away (and still paying for membership). Something in Brooker's piece chimed with me. If someone like him could take up running and enjoy it, why not give it a go?

I mentioned this to a friend a week or so later. She's a force of nature, and in the face of her enthusiasm I had no choice but to download the app that Brooker had used (Get Running). A few days later, I donned my ancient trainers, a pair of sweatpants and a fleece, and headed out.

And so it began...

Running 1 minute at a time - easy, right? Not so much. I came home from that run feeling like my lungs had been ripped from my chest and scraped raw with a cheese grater before being shoved back in upside-down. I looked ahead to that final run – 30 minutes of running without stopping – and the goal may as well have been "fly to the moon" for how realistic it seemed.

But a funny thing happened. My stubborn streak kicked in. Goddammit, I wasn't going to stop. And so I started working my way through the programme.

There were good days. There were also bad days. Days when it felt like I was running through treacle. Days when the wind was blowing horizontal rain and sleet into my face. Days when the temperature dropped below zero and I worried my extremities would fall off. But my stubborn streak carried me through. I started so I was determined to finish.

I got stuck on some runs. I hit plateaus. My smoking habit, which snaked back into my life after I'd stopped last summer, didn't help. My creaking knees didn't help. Each week a new muscle group would protest at the unaccustomed exercise.

The genius of the Couch to 5k programme, though, is that not only do you start slowly and build up (thus reducing the risk of injury), you can really measure how you're progressing. Each new goal rose up in front of me, a daunting new Everest of running 5 minutes straight, then 8 minutes, then 20 minutes. And even if it took a while, I'd conquer each mountain. The fleece and sweats were replaced with running leggings and a proper running top. The ancient trainers were replaced with a pair of overengineered, garish, bouncy pair of "running shoes". Instead of feeling embarrassed when I crossed the path of another runner, gradually I began to exchange comradely smiles and nods.

Towards the end of the programme, my smoke-damaged lungs cried for mercy and I managed to give up the weed again. I'd stopped before and found it utter hell; this time was much easier. Alarmingly so. And I think it's because my lungs immediately began to reward me on the runs with deeper breaths and less suffering.

The new year came. I knew I wouldn't meet my original goal of running 30 minutes by my January birthday (based on the 9 week duration of the programme) because of the repeated weeks, but I carried on, with a new year resolution of completing a sponsored 5k run.

I signed up for the British Heart Foundation Regent's Park Jog and I was spurred on through the cold winter mornings to carry on running by the support and sponsorship friends and family gave me.

Oh happy day!

On the day finally came that I never quite believed would happen but stubbornly refused to give up on: the final run in Get Running. Thirty minutes of running. Thirty minutes.  It took longer than 9 weeks to get there, but by God, I did it. Stubborness pays.

On March 11th I arrived at Regent's Park, excited but nervous, and, alongside the friend who'd originally pushed me into downloading the app, I ran. I ran for about 40 minutes, and I ran 5 kilometres. I had my doubts at times if I'd make it, especially when I got to the 4th kilometre, but once again my stubborn streak – and the knowledge that I had sponsors who'd donated money to me in good faith and support – pushed me to the finish line, bursting with pride. OK, my time was nothing remarkable but at the advanced age of 40mumblecough"something" I'd done something I'd never thought I was capable of doing.

With my unsporty nature, my creaking knees and torn cartilage, my 20-a-day habit…it never occurred to me that I would ever take up running. It never occurred to me that I would want to, let alone that I could. My astonishment couldn't be any greater than Brooker's. And now, god help me, I've downloaded an app called "Bridge to 10k". I don't even know who I am anymore.

Thanks Charlie.



P.S. My page to collect donations on behalf of The British Foundation for the 5k jog is open until 11th June 2012. Please contact me if you would like the address.

P.P.S. The "What I feel like when I run" image is a meme I've seen all over the internet so can't credit the source. If you know the source, give me a shout.

Don't call me. I won't call you. Probably.

SOMEONE HAD BETTER BE DEAD.

I'm really not one for the telephone.

I know. Women are supposed to spend all their time gassing on the phone, right? Yapping away with friends they've only just seen ("What do you talk about?" stereotypical men in the lives of these stereotypical women ask). Passing idle gossip. Talking about…I don't know – cupcakes? Shoes?

I'm just not like that. I pretty much hate ringing people. Even the people I love most in my life. My parents get a call maybe once a month, if I'm being good. I never ring my siblings. I never ring my friends.

Chances are, if someone rings me on my mobile, I'll glance at the screen, note who it is, and put it back in my bag. I'll probably text later.

If the landline rings during the week, I'll pretend it's not happening. Chances are it's someone I don't want to speak to. A creditor, most likely. Or someone ignoring the fact that I'm registered with the Telephone Preference Service, trying to sell me a new kitchen or insurance. Or kitchen insurance.

If it rings at the weekend, it's probably my mother. I'll usually pick up then because I know it's my mother. And the conversation from my side will be: "Uh huh. Yeah. Yup. Yeah. Yup. Yeah. Haha. Oh really? Yeah. Good. (repeat for 30 minutes.) OK. Love you too. Hi Dad. Yeah, good. OK. Love you too. Bye." It's obviously no reflection on them; of course I love them. But when I speak to them on the phone it's out of a sense of filial duty, not a desire to reconnect. I'd rather see them in person. Of course, I can't see them in person that often – every few years or so. So I should embrace the phone. But my intolerance to Mr Graham Bell's invention gets deeper every year.

If the phone rings after about 7pm, someone had better be dead. I see that clanging ringing sound as an intrusion into the hermit-like world I enjoy when I'm at home.

If I need to cancel something, like insurance (kitchen or otherwise) or a subscription, I much prefer an email or letter. If I ring, I'm fully aware that I'll be put through to "customer retention" and have to endure someone reading a customer retention script before they'll finally let me go. I once spent half an hour on the phone to a woman in India reading a script in broken English while I begged her to just cancel my AOL subscription.

If a friend rings, I'll usually forget to listen to the voicemail for about a week. I'll happily text or email, but my favourite way to interact with my friends is in person. I never ring up for a goss and I tend not to enjoy "goss" conversations. I spend the entire time wondering when I can find an excuse to hang up.

I'm not completely phobic about the phone. I use it to make meetings, appointments and arrangements. Ask for directions. Sort out a query at work. That kind of thing. It's a useful tool. But I just don't use it to communicate.

If I want a chat with someone I care about, like a friend, I do it face to face.I love socialising and I'll talk about pretty much anything. If it's an uncomfortable issue, a complaint or something I'm not happy to talk about, I prefer to get it all into a letter or email, where I can organise my thoughts without interruption or intimidation.I like to be prepared. Have a meeting at work where we can look at spreadsheets or schedules or visual aids. I hate awkward silences. Phone calls can catch you off guard. I've been known to write down what I want to say before making a call.

I'm a regular chatterbox on social media, but there, I have control. I can work out what I want to say. I can edit myself. I'm not going to talk myself into a corner or run out of things to say. I've always been more comfortable writing than communicating in any other way. I think that's why I love the internet so much.

As far as Skype – all the awkwardness of a phone call AND the caller can see if I'm looking at my scruffiest and haven't cleaned the house? Forget it.

I love my iPhone but I hardly ever use it for phone calls. Emails, texts,music, clever and useless apps, games, social media – all brilliant. But actually using it to phone people? Hardly ever.

If a phone call has a purpose, I can deal with it. But the kind of idle chat I love in real life just doesn't translate to the phone. I can't see anyone's face. I can't deal with a pause in conversation by glancing elsewhere, or smiling, or going to the bar, or petting a dog.

I feel a neverending guilt towards my friends and family for never picking up the phone, but I think they're used to it by now. I hope so. As far as the others – the creditors, suppliers and kitchen insurance providers – they can just deal with it.

Don't call me. I'll call you. Maybe.

Image: freedigitalphotos.net

No man's land

You're great, but I'm, um, just refreshing the, er, page.

When I saw the article saying that online dating leaves middle-aged women in the 'wilderness', I wasn't surprised.

I'm a veteran of online dating. I've been trying it off and on since I first divorced in my early 30s (ie, a long time ago).  And I've been single for most of the time since then.

In my early 30s, I found internet dating…well…not bad. This was when internet dating was in relative infancy – people who did it didn't really talk about it. But the guys I met were, generally, not bad. I didn't meet that many guys who lit my fires, but I met plenty of nice guys, so even if there wasn't a spark, I took heart from the fact that there were lots of nice available men out there.

Internet dating now – when I'm in my 40s, and when internet dating is much more mainstream – is a very different experience.

When a long-term boyfriend and I broke up when I was in my late 30s, and I tried internet dating again after being in a relationship for 4 years, I found myself in an entirely different landscape than the one I had explored earlier. I soon realised that I was in a strange place, demographically speaking. And it got worse the further into my 40s I went.

Men my age, I've found, aren't looking for women my age. They're looking for younger women. Now, whether that's because they want children so are looking for someone more…er… fecund, or are looking for a younger woman to validate themselves, or think that women over 40 crumble into decrepitude, I'm not sure. But whatever the reason, the men in my age group just weren't looking for me. They all wanted someone younger.

This left me with two types of men: the younger men, looking for a “Mrs Robinson” experience, and the much older men (and I'm talking pensioner here) who were, just like the men in my age group, looking for a younger woman.

Time after time, I would see a man in his early 40s like me, and his profile would pique my interest. Then I would look at his profile, and his age bracket for an “ideal” partner was, typically, 21–35. I would come up as an “incompatible” match because I had the temerity to be over 40.

In “real life” this isn't an issue. I may not be the spring chicken I'd like to be, but I'm not crumbling just yet, so on the rare occasion when I get chatted up, they don't run screaming from me yelling SHE'S FORTYSOMETHING! SHE HAS CATS! GET AWAY!

Unfortunately, “real life” doesn't turn up many available people, since either they're gay, married or just not out and about, so internet dating seems a natural and brilliant solution. What better way to meet someone with similar interests and desires?

But internet dating forces people into a “shopping list” mentality. If one doesn't fit into a very specific ideal, one won't even turn up in searches.

My last boyfriend was considerably younger than I am. I met him in “real life” and I didn't consider the age a barrier, but it did become one, because I was in a different point in my life. One where I knew I didn't want and wouldn't have children, and he was ready to start a family – which he did, immediately after we broke up. So a man my age would be ideal. But the men my age on dating sites still want that younger woman.

The other night, I idly mused “aloud” (ie I tweeted) that I was considering internet dating again – I've been single for about a year and I'm getting bored of the dating wasteland – but knew I'd find myself in the same old position of being too old for the men I'd be interested in meeting. This tweet met with incredulity. Age doesn't matter, does it? Especially when the men are the same age as I am? But in the strange world of online dating, it seems that it does.

And so I'm in a literal no-man's land. I don't meet men in “real life” and internet dating shuts out women my age.

So “Plankton” didn't surprise me at all. The only thing that surprised me was that it was newsworthy at all. It wasn't news to me.

Image: Ambro at freedigitalphotos.net

Twists in the road

‘Life,’ as the old cliché goes, ‘is what happens when you're making other plans’.

Clichés are clichés for a reason I suppose.

When I was in freshman year of high school (aged 14–15) we did a project called ‘Who Am I?’. I compiled a book documenting my past, my present and what I thought my future would be – right through to an imagined obituary.

My imagined future was as conventional as you'd expect from a girl who grew up in a small town, inexperienced and naive, with a conservative (small ‘c’), traditional upbringing. My dad worked in a white-collar job; my mother was what was then called a housewife and is now called a stay-at-home mom.

If I recall correctly, in my imagined future I married a handsome doctor, and had two beautiful children – one of each, a girl and a boy, of course. We were of course together to the very end. I had a career too (I can't quite remember what career I gave myself – possibly veterinarian, as I was an avid fan of James Herriot at the time). But the main accomplishments in my imagined future were marriage and family. That was the plan.

At around the same age, I tried to imagine what life would be like in the impossibly futuristic Year 2000. I would be 32, I thought, with awe at how OLD I would be, but I still imagined myself married with children, and maybe some career or other. That was the plan.

As I got older, I still imagined marriage and family, though knew I'd have to have a career as…something or other. I abandoned my veterinary aspirations when I realised I wasn't good enough at science. I was good at English, which I went on to study at university, but even as I graduated I had no idea what I wanted to BE. The plan became fuzzy.

I came to London after I graduated. I'd met an English boy on my year abroad and so I'd booked up a return to the UK, with a flight and a visa. That was the plan. But he dumped me months before graduation day. I came over anyway, and thought I'd stay for six months and then return to the US. If I'm honest, I also harboured a hope we'd get back together in the interim. That was the plan.

Of course, we didn't get back together. I lived a miserable few months first in his house, until we had an inevitable screaming row, in which he punched me in the face. I then moved on to youth hostels. After a while I got a part-time job in a bar for £25 a week, and then, at last, a job as a secretary, earning just enough to rent a room. At the bar, I met the man who was eventually to become my husband, and later moved on to a job as an editorial assistant, so thought I'd found both the relationship I wanted and the beginning of a career. Career, marriage, then at some point maybe two beautiful children (one of each). That was the plan.

I didn't go back to the US after six months. I divorced my husband. I don't have the perfect handsome husband or two beautiful children (one of each). Career-wise, I've been fired once, made redundant three times, and been unemployed a further three times due to fixed-term contracts coming to an end. My career in book publishing morphed into online publishing. And as I write, I have no idea what turn my career will take next. That was NOT the plan.

This is absolutely not what I'd imagined, either aged 14 when I did my ‘Who Am I?’ project, or aged 22 when I collected a diploma and boarded a jet to London. When I had to forgo a meal to pay for a youth hostel in London, knowing nobody other than the man who'd just hit me, and with no job, I was terrified. When I divorced my husband, I was terrified. When I first lost a job, I was terrified.

Your P45 is in the post!

Here's the thing though: Each twist in the road has never led me off a cliff, even if it seemed that way at the time. Each time, once I've packed up the baggage and resolved to carry it lightly, I've discovered new scenery and new paths (sorry, I'm beating this metaphor to within an inch of its life – bear with me).

Yeah, the divorce – and much of the relationship leading up to the divorce – was hard. But when I came out of it, I gained a new confidence and appreciation of what I need and deserve. I'm still single, but there's plenty I enjoy about it, and I know that being in a relationship and having a ring on your finger is no guarantee that you'll never be lonely.

I don't have two beautiful children (one of each), or any children for that matter, but as I've aged I've realised I didn't really want them anyway, and thank goodness I didn't have any with my ex-husband. Marriage and children, which used to feature so heavily in the plan, have dwindled in significance to microscopic scale.

I lost some old friends along the way, but I gathered new friends. Those friendships change too, as friends pair off and start families, but I know and value the true friendships. They're friendships I may never have forged if I hadn't escaped the confidence-eroding claustrophobia of my marriage, or left one job to move to the next.

Being out of work sucks, but the move into online publishing injected me with a new enthusiasm, and it's something I never would have found if I hadn't been made redundant. Each loss of a job has always led onto something new and different and the novelty and the opportunity to learn something new keeps me motivated and happy.

Divorced, single, child-free and out of work at my age? Nope, it's not what I ever would have imagined (or chosen). But to quote another cliché, when a door closes a window opens. (When you think about that one literally, it doesn't really make much sense, but go with me here.) And I've chucked the plan out the window. I'm not panicked. I'm curious.

Of proms and poodle perms

I got an email the other day about my 25th high school reunion. Twenty. Five. Years. Whoomp! I'm smacked in the face once again with the stark reality of age.

STOP LAUGHING. We all looked like this in the 80s.

I look back at that wrinkle-free face, surrounded in the poodle haze of a perm, and marvel. That shy, bookish 18 year old had no idea what lay ahead of her. And thank goodness for that. She'd be terrified. She had yet to learn how to cope with real life.

I didn't like high school all that much. I wasn't one of the cool kids – too shy and plain to be a cheerleader; too awkward to be sporty; brainy but not quite one of the brainiest. My high school years weren't the madcap whirl of football games, drama, dates and parties that you see in the movies – although elements of the American high school experience you see on the silver screen certainly were there.

In my high school years I did my homework, I worked part time in a shop (as soon as I was 16 my dad marched me off to get a job), I went to the movies a lot, I got crushes on boys and wondered what kissing felt like but never went on a date. I read Seventeen magazine, experimented with makeup and drank skimmed milk while stuffing myself silly with cookies. I wasn't anywhere near as fat as I thought I was, or as ugly as I thought I was, but that's the folly of youth.

My hometown was small and most of the kids in my class were kids I'd known since the age of 5 or so. By high school, the die of social placing had long been cast. High school social structures are rigid and unforgiving. On the bright side, though, the bullying that plagued me through earlier years had died down; the culprits were bored by then, or perhaps too worried about jostling for their own place in the pecking order.

Even in senior year, I never joined the other seniors in claiming ‘the balcony’, an area of the stairs overlooking the school lobby traditionally monopolised by the seniors – I wasn't ‘in’ enough. Although I was one of the best English students in my year, I didn't get on the yearbook committee, because I wasn't friends with the right people.

I also didn't go to the prom. This event is as much a rite of passage as you'll have been led to believe by the movies. Getting a date, getting a dress, getting a corsage, getting a limo, getting drunk. It MATTERED. But I was below the eyeline of the boys in my class. The night of the prom, my equally below-the-line friend and I went to the movies.

Don't get me wrong – I wasn't miserable. I had friends, and I had fun. I got good grades, enjoyed classes, had some amazing, inspiring teachers. The scaffolding for the more outgoing, sociable and confident adult I would eventually become had begun to be built. I still had an innocence and naiveté that helped prevent me from being bundled into adulthood before I was ready. But there was a sense of being outside, and of waiting for life to begin. And begin it did, when I moved away from my small town life to a large university, where nobody knew me and finally I could start afresh.

I haven't been to previous high school reunions. Part of me is curious – are the cheerleaders still beautiful and supreme? Are the football players still strutting their stuff? Have the brainy kids gone on to forge glittering careers? What happened to the class stoners? And of course, I wonder what they would make of me. Is their recollection of an 18-year-old Trish the same as my own? Would the fact that I live in London be enough to impress them?

And then I think: Why on earth am I still worrying about impressing them anyway? Why go? As you may have gathered, it's not a time I look back on with any particular fondness, and I'm not really in touch with the people I was friends with back then. I might have more wrinkles now, but I also have more confidence and peace with who I am. Not to mention a better haircut.

The cat lady and the cougar

I'm a *coughmumblefortysomething* year old woman, and I'm single. Broadly speaking, in my experience, this means I'm expected to fall into one of two categories: the cat lady, or the cougar.

I like this cardigan, ok?

Ah, the cat lady, in her shabby clothes, filling the loveless void in her life with feline company. Surrounding herself with "furbabies", those whiskery substitutes for actual human babies. Disappointed by the fickle love of men, she opts for the (arguably just as fickle) love of her moggies. She's covered in cat hair, and she doesn't care. Cats on every surface, cupboards full of tins of tuna.

And the cougar. Originally exemplified as Sam Jones from Sex and the City, now with Courtney Cox carrying the torch for the younger man. A sexual predator, intent on luring toyboys into her boudoir, matching her experience with their enthusiasm. The Mrs Robinson for a new generation, rejecting her paunchy peers for the eagerness and firm muscles of youth.

Two very different stereotypes – curiously, with a common feline theme. Both pretty insulting if you think about it.

The cat lady is pretty obvious. Sad, lonely, nothing left in her life but cats.

Cor! Ooh, young man!

The cougar is, on the face of it, perhaps more empowering and liberating. But there's still an underlying current of disdain. Is there a male equivalent of a cougar? Not really, because an older man going for a younger woman is 'normal' (whatever normal is). Sugar Daddy, perhaps, is the closest, but that's not quite the same thing; the implication there is that the man is still the one in power, thanks to his money, and the woman's exchanging sex for a luxurious lifestyle. The cougar is a figure of fascination, and titillation, but there's still a whiff of desperation about her, a frantic fight against time and age, and validation through notches on the bedpost.

Now here's where I have to 'fess up to a couple of things. I have two cats. And I've been out with younger men.

Yeah, I'm fond of the cats. I put photos and videos of them on social media. When Murphy, the older, female cat, had cancer, I was devastated, and threw a lot of money at making her better. Same goes for when Teddy, the younger, male cat, needed serious surgery. (Wait a minute...older female and younger male? I'm beginning to see a pattern.) I even talk to them in a stupid voice. (Look, you try talking to a cat without ending up using a stupid voice. Go on. Try it. Bet you can't.)

I don't, however, consider them baby replacements, or man replacements, or any kind of replacement really. I don't buy them Christmas presents, or knit jumpers for them, or like a catsitter of mine, set up a "wedding ceremony" for them and take photos of them in their finery (yes, really). They're my pets. Beloved pets, but pets.

As for the younger man thing, well, that's been more by accident than design. I've never intentionally gone for younger men. It's just kind of…happened. My date on my 40th birthday was 25 years old. My last boyfriend was 13 years my junior. I didn't go out on the prowl, preying on young flesh. It just so happens that the people I've met when out and about and to whom I've been attracted have been younger (maybe a numbers game; you don't meet many single men my age when out and about, and as for internet dating – well, that's a story for another time). Bizarrely, I've been congratulated sometimes when I've had a younger man on my arm – as though it validates me, that I've "still got it".

I sometimes joke that I'm a cat lady. I sometimes joke about the younger man thing. Why, when arguably I'm perpetuating it by doing so? I guess as a defence – get in there first and make it a joke before someone else does. Maybe then I can send up the labels by confounding expectation.

Both labels are reductive. Labels are easier. Single women – and in particular, single, child-free women of a certain age – can make people uncomfortable. As I'm asked more often than I'd care to recall, why am I still single, after all? Have I given up (cat lady)? Have I chosen sex over relationships (cougar)? Well, neither. Life doesn't fit into neatly labelled (litter)boxes, and neither do I.