the french rejection

‘Bonjour’, said the rough looking man as I stepped into the shed hidden deep in the woods. ‘You must be the new gamekeeper’, I said tentatively. He shrugged, not taking his eyes away from hanging the freshly caught ferrero rochers from a game hook. I felt a little frisson as his big rough hands worked amongst all his big rough gamekeeper stuff in his big rough shed. ‘Oui’, he said. ‘I 'ave downshifted from France’ . Crikey, I thought, that must be the first time anyone retired from the Dordogne to buy a cottage in Barnsley. ‘So how did you come to get this job?’ I asked. ‘I played ze garde-chasse in ze French version of Lady Chatterley,' he answered, ‘and I discovered I liked being an English gamekeeper’. I nodded in understanding. ‘It was very brave, a French actor playing a northern working class englishman’, I said. ‘Well’, he thought for a moment, ‘I thought if Juliette Binoche can get away wiz playing Catherine Earnshaw, 'ow bad can I be compared to her?' ‘

'I suppose it was the fresh air, being in the country, living with nature that made you become a gamekeeper’, I proffered. He shook his head. ‘Non’, he said, correcting me (translation: no), ‘it was shagging the landowners wife of course’. Well, I reflected, he was French after all. ‘All upper class English women are desperate for it, n’est pas?’ ‘Well, I’m sure I couldn’t possibly comment!’ I said, trying to sound convincing. I really didn't want to shed my inhibitions innan actual shed. He shrugged again. ‘so err’, I began, ‘has their been anyone special?’ He looked up. ‘Zer was a woman’, he said, ‘but she broke my urt’. I looked down, embarrassed. ‘Did she tell you she loved you then go back to her husband, is that how she broke your heart?’ He looked at me strangely. ‘No, she broke my urt, she put her foot right through ze floor of my urt over zer’, and he pointed across the room. ‘Mon dieu!’ he sighed, 'I mean, who goes in an urt wearing high heels?’ I kicked off my shoes quietly.

‘So, what can I do for you Madame Super?’ he asked. ‘Have you got any eggs, say half a dozen?’ He shrugged, again, and I thought he really should improve his repertoire of stereotypical French gestures if he wanted to be in my blog again. ‘I ‘ave only got one egg left’, he told me. ‘Oh well, I shall try somewhere else then’, I replied. ‘Oh, so one egg is not un ouef then, eh?’ he snapped with a huff. ‘Look’, I said, annoyed, ‘Just tell me where I can get some eggs’. he raised his eyebrows. ‘You could try Sean Bean next door’, he said. ‘Sean never has any trouble getting ze birds to lay for him...hello?...Rilly?...oh...where did she go..?’

色，戒 (short story, long film)

The secret police chief wore a grave and serious expression. It was the troubled look of a man who could have still been doing kung fu movies if he hadn’t fallen out of a bamboo tree whilst defeating the forces of evil in his last film. It was clear there had been words with the director about having a flying part in this film, the insurers insisting on giving his character a chauffeur instead, and making him a baddy. Milly leaned over her popcorn. 'Mummy', she whispered. It had seemed a good idea to take the children to the cinema, less so when we got there and found we couldn’t get into Enchanted but the children were interested in the far east after their cousin had told them she was going to China this summer to spend a couple of weeks lounging by a pool over there, and very proud we all were too that she had got into the british Olympic swimming team, so getting tickets for Lust, Caution instead had seemed a good idea at the time.

'Mummy!' whispered Milly (woman moaning), ‘what is that man doing to that lady?’ I sighed. (sigh). ‘Look darling’, I explained, ‘You really must try and get used to reading subtitles for when you grow up and become an intellectual so please try and follow the plot dear’. Milly raised her eyebrows. ‘I didn’t mean the man on the screen mummy, I meant the man in the front row’. Well, I suppose I should have anticipated some awkward questions. (man sitting in next row behind going Shuush!) ‘I think his girlfriend lapsed into a coma during the last mahjong scene and he’s reviving her dear’, I ventured. Milly looked uncertain. ‘Mummy’, she continued, ‘yes dear?’ I replied. 'Why is this film so long?' Ah, the poor innocent child. She has so much to learn. 'It's character building dear', I explained, 'maintaining the same position for hours on end is part of kung fu training'. My daughter had the expression that told me her curiosity was not satisfied. ‘How can Tilly and I get in to see an 18 film when we’re only 7 anyway?’ she asked. ‘Because’, I began, trying not to sound like it the answer was really obvious to me as a grown up, ‘This is an Ang Lee film so you’ll probably turn 18 before the end, so it’s OK darling’. ‘Oh’ said Milly, clearly still not satisfied. ‘So Mummy..’I tried to remain patient. ‘Is that what men and ladies really do to each other?’ ‘Look’ I said, wishing to draw this conversation to a close, ‘It’s nearly eight years since you were conceived', (hotdog going limp), 'How am I supposed to remember?’

My daughter opened her fizzy drink (pop) and went back to eating her popcorn (crackle). 'Milly!' I snapped (snap), a little irritated, 'use your chopsticks or you'll show us all up!' Now I began to think that perhaps I had been mistaken to bring the children to the cinema at all. It’s not that I don’t encourage the girls to ask questions; Is crouching tiger a sexual position? Is Lust, Caution hailed for it’s realism because it actually lasts as long as the Japanese occupation of China? Is it true that the resistance leader did actually say listen very carefully I shall say ziz only once but this was edited out of the subtitles? Why was it necessary to subtitle the sound effects and English dialogue? But sometimes I just want to watch the film. My attention returned to the screen. I didn't think the heroine could keep her secret much longer. I just hoped my daughters would hold out a bit longer when questioned by my London friends as to whether foreign films were shown in the North. I had my reputation to think of and I hadn't even confessed to my chums back home that there was television north of Watford yet. Returning my attention to the film the sinister secret police chief was clearly planning to have his wicked way with the heroine again. He took off his shirt and undid his belt ( things looking up). I looked across to Milly and Tilly to check they were not too shocked by a naked man in the bedroom but they were both sleeping soundly. They grow up so fast nowadays, sigh

new year's lay

It was New Year's Day . My husband appeared in the doorway of the lounge. ‘I say’, he said, ‘awfully quiet around here’. ‘The children have gone to Basil and Coriander’s house’, I explained. My husband thought for a moment. ‘Well’, he began, ‘this year I’m going to pay more attention to some important things I’ve been neglecting rather terribly in the past’. I looked up. He stretched out his arms. ‘Yes, I need to give some parts of this old body a bit more exercise than they've been getting of late’. I raised my eyebrows and moved to get up. ‘You stay there darling’, he told me, ever so authoritatively. ‘I just need to pop upstairs, get out of these things, you know…’ and he disappeared. Of course I knew what was coming. I quickly undressed, arranged myself in a seductive pose across the chaise longue, and awaited my man...

The door opened. 'Oh gosh darling’ said my husband, observing my classical repose ‘you really have acclimatised while I've been away haven't you !’ I looked up at my husband. ‘Darling’ I said softly, ‘has anyone ever told you how sexy you are in those running shoes?’ He smiled. ‘Yes, actually, well, just Fabio’, he replied, ‘but then he’s my secretary so I suppose he doesn’t really count, sigh’. I gave a come hither shrug of my goosebumped shoulders. ‘Anyway, just off for a once around the village, blow the cobwebs away, you know!' ‘What about my bloody cobwebs?’ I thought, but said ‘you won’t get lost will you dear?’ He smiled nervously. 'Oh, err, what’s our house number again?' I told him.‘And the errr…’ I told him the name of our street. ‘And just in case I should stray outside the houses…’ I told him the name of the village. ‘Don’t worry’, I assured him, 'if you end up at the wrong house at least you’ll know when you don’t recognise the children!’. He laughed. ‘Oh yes’, he said, peering at a photo on the mantlepiece. ‘Of course, who could forget the children?’ . ‘That’s your nephew’, I corrected. ‘You have daughters’. He blushed. ‘Ha ha’ he said, ‘well, you can’t tell them apart at that age can you!’ ‘That’s his graduation photo darling’. ‘Oh, well,’ he said, turning to leave, ‘if I’m not back by dark call out those big strapping chaps from the fell rescue team for me!’ although of course he really didn’t need to tell me that. As the door slammed behind him I was already dialling their number.

café au lit

Sunday morning. ‘Do you mind if I…’ he says, doing something French with a cigarette. ‘Well’, I hesitate, ‘I’m not sure if that’s allowed’. ‘Because of the smoking ban you would stop me having a little post coital gauloise?’ he asks. ‘No, but because you haven’t actually done anything coital’, I say. ‘You French are all mouth and no trousers’, I add. ‘Well, you English women', He retorts, 'you do not understand the ways of lurve, and shaving your armpits is enough to put any french man off, so I don't even know why you helped me out of the water and back onto the boat last night Rilly'. ‘Because if you had drowned I would have had to have slept with your twin brother to keep this tenuous and already perilously stretched and basically uneventful story going, and that might have seemed contrived’, I explain. He shrugs his shoulders. ‘And anyway’, I continue, ‘It just doesn’t seem right to do it in black and white’. ‘Colour doesn’t really suit French women’, he explains. ‘but I think it was the subtitles that really put me off, trying to read them the wrong way round like that’, I sigh. ‘Yes, sorry about that’, he shrugs. ‘And another thing’, I continue, ‘please give the tutoiement a rest darling; we’ve only just been introduced’. ‘But we are speaking in English now’, he protests. Well, you jolly well look to me like you're being familiar, I think to myself, but don't say anything.

‘Well, anyway’, he says changing the subject, ‘I hope you have had a nice holiday’. I sigh. ‘Things were rather getting on top of me’, I explain. ‘Although not your husband, evidently’, he replies. 'What about your children, are they not on holiday now too?' he asks. 'They'll be fine' I assure him, 'at home they can walk to the beach on their own'. 'You live near the coast?' 'About thirty five miles', I inform him. ‘Now, why don’t you make yourself useful and put the kettle on?’ I suggest. He gets out of bed and goes to make the coffee. Soon I will be going back to The North. I sigh, again. I can’t remember if I mentioned it but it’s grim up north and I will have to leave behind my brief dream of becoming the next Petite Anglaise as well. I realise I just have to make the most of my last morning on the shores of the Mediterranean so I reach for the radio and begin fumbling on the dial for Desert Island Discs and hoping he's got some english tea in.

running on reminiscence

I only had to look at the expression on my husband's face to know that the little pointers on all the dials had dropped below the red and were heading rapidly for zero. I’d like to say this was the first time this had happened. He did actually say he was sure that this was the first time it had happened, but we both knew it wasn’t. running on empty once more, the story of our lives. Out of juice again, how could I forgive him, all he'd had to do was point the damned thing in the right direction and fire away, how hard could it be? I sighed as we coasted to a halt. There weren’t many tasks I expected of my husband but he couldn’t even manage his few male responsibilities nowadays. There was an awkward silence as we both sat looking out of the window. He leaned over and turned on the radio and the cricket commentary filled the gulf between us. 'Freddie's out' he said, as someone whose name ended in 'off' traipesed sullenly from the field of play. 'You don't say?' I muttered. ‘Hmmm, oh well’, he reflected further, ‘I think perhaps a little stroll on my part might be called for too’. I didn’t even turn to him to give my reply. ‘Yes, I think that might be a good idea’ I said, ‘and while you’re up you can go and check the bloody car’s got petrol in it as well before I go out to collect the children.’ I pulled the bed clothes over my head and listened to his footsteps grow quieter as they went down the stairs and out into the garage, just as the memories of our first kiss became feinter as they sailed away towards the distant sunset on the misty horizon of my rememberance, sigh

about last night

I shaded my eyes from the sun as he set down the coffee by the bed and opened the blinds to let the bright London sunshine flood into his apartment. ‘I suppose you have to be getting back to your husband’, he said, sitting on the edge of the bed. Staring down into the still swirling coffee I nodded. ‘I know you must miss him, having to come away on your own like this’ he said. ‘yes’ I replied quietly, adding with a girlish grin ‘but you could say there are compensations.’ He smiled. ‘I got a couple of good woe-is-me-I’m-so-lonely blog entries out of it’ I said and his expression became more serious and understanding. ‘Oh, yes of course’ he said. ‘Just one question though Rilly...’ he began. I looked up from my coffee. ‘What’s with the always keeping one foot on the floor deal ? Is that a northern thing?’ 'No, silly’, I said, 'it’s just because my blog only alludes to that kind of thing , in a way that’s just enough to cause a knowing nod from the reader but firmly leaves them at the bedroom door. I have a question too', I said, pulling a pair of knickers out from under the bedclothes. ‘Whose are these?’ 'Oh', he said, 'I had girl with a one track mind over the other night.’ Oh, I said ‘you’re not…’ ‘In her book?’ ‘You are?’ ‘Page 74.’ ‘Crikey’, I said, ‘I think I’d better get dressed now.’ ‘You are dressed’ he said. ‘You told me it was because in the north it’s so cold and damp you have to sleep with all your clothes on or else you’ll get consumption.’ I got out of bed and as I looked at my slightly crumpled self in the mirror I realised that, for want of any original material coming my way in the forseeable future, my hope of getting a sex blog to turn into a companion volume for Strife in the North was just another aspiration that I abandoned when I moved to the north, left behind in my lovely house in Islington along with the light fittings, the carpets, and my dreams, sigh.

downsizing damp

I wandered down to the cottage with Tilly today for a site meeting with the builders, an ancient ritual which all us brave restorers will have experienced. Sometimes I think it's taking longer to knock the place down than it took to build all those centuries ago. The walls may be coming down but the costs just keep going up. I got so exasperated last week I even let off steam to the district nurse when I saw she was in her office when I visited the surgery with Tilly one day. 'Oh!' I cried, 'Everything takes ages around here and sometimes I think it's just impossible to get anything done on your house for under a quarter of a million up here in the north'. She looked at me in what I could see was her shared annoyance at such high building costs and I knew she was thinking exactly the same thoughts as me. It was obviously a common problem. 'Hold this while I get the scissors' she said, handing me the umbilical cord. 'I mean, my God,' I said turning to Mrs Arkwright from number 14 down there on the delivery table 'You obviously can't even get a ceasarian around here, how bloody dark ages is that!?'

I had, however, resolved to remain calm this morning down at the cottage. In the kitchen our guide, our builder's new young assistant, reached up and placed his hand on the wall, shaking his head. I noticed how his muscles were so wirey you could certainly supply all the electricity to the new reproduction period swimming pool through them. Not only that, his thighs encased in those tight jeans were so thick and strong they could easily replace the oak beams that held up the authentic venacular wet room and sauna. He was as tall as the old yew we chopped down to build the double garage, his eyes were the colour of the blue mediterranean tiles in the third ensuite bathroom and his jaw was chiselled out of the very same ancient rock from which the cottage was built before we got started on it. Suddenly I felt a childs elbow in my side. 'Mummy!' nudged Tilly. 'Yes dear' emerged I from my day dream. Tilly raised her eyebrows at mummy's lack of attention. 'The man says you've got a damp patch'. Glaring at our builder and pulling Tilly in front of me I exclaimed indignantly 'Well actually, I said, I left my bicycle out in the rain, not that it's any concern of your's, mister!' and I took Tilly by the hand and we stormed home.

sunday morning

In my husband's London flat I sat in the bed, my husband next to me. ‘I’m sorry’, he said, ‘I think I’ve just been working too hard’. I confess that he introduced into the conversation an adjective which had not occurred to me in respect of the man at my side at that precise moment. He almost unconsciously raised his arm and pointed the remote at the VCR and as Meet me in St Louis flickered onto to the screen I wondered why even my reading aloud from the colour charts in my best seductive tones and dressing only in come hither fabric swatches didn’t seem to turn him on today. I just couldn’t think what could be the problem although I wracked my brains for what seemed like an age. ‘What are you thinking about?’ He asked, noticing my pensiveness. ‘Oh, nothing’, I replied evasively, ‘just the cottage’. ‘And what’s that supposed to mean!?’ he snapped. I’m sure I didn’t know what he was talking about so I felt around on the floor beside the bed and grasped one of his body building magazines. As I began to flick through it, trying to take myself away from this awkward situation, I wondered why despite subscribing to all these fitness magazines he had not yet got around to buying any weights himself but I reasoned it was because he didn’t want to have to transport them up north when he came to live with me and our daughters in the near future and he was just committing all those exercises and poses on the well thumbed pages for when he started his new healthy regime in the north. Yes, that must be it. Suddenly I realised he was crying. I snuggled up to him and softly told him he mustn’t get so upset, that these things happen to every man from time to time. ‘Sorry’, he said, ‘this number always gets to me’, as have yourself a merry little christmas began and he turned up the volume to allow Judy Garland to drown out his sobbing, and leave me none the wiser regarding his reluctance to come and live with me. I began fumbling around on the floor again. ‘What are you looking for now?’ He asked. ‘Somewhere to plug in my laptop’, I said. ‘I haven’t written anything on my blog for hours. I can’t just sit around here all day, my readers need me’. I had pencilled in the diary to write about sex this weekend but it looked like now I might have to make something up and I hoped that the readers of my hitherto truthful blog wouldn't notice. I felt very alone, even my friends had only rubbed salt in the wound when I'd talked about this problem. ‘All relationships have sticky patches’, said one, not realising I would give my right arm for a sticky patch in my own relationship. As I tapped on my keyboard, oh how I wished for just a simple sign from my husband, just one, to give me a single clue, to let me into that locked closet where he kept his feelings. While his attention was diverted I slipped some of his muscle mags into my handbag. I knew he wouldn't mind, what is marriage all about, after all, if not sharing? I knew though that when he moved north everything would be alright, from now on our troubles will be miles away...

southern sojourn

This weekend I’m off to London to visit the queen, well, ok, not really, just my husband for a weekend of gay abandon. It will be so nice to go home for a couple of days and indulge in those little pleasures, a cappuccino, people whose accent I can understand, colour television. When I come back I shall bring coffee and chocolate and nylon tights to sell on the black market. I’m leaving the children with my parents who, thank goodness, crashed the car again this week so the darlings won’t be going anywhere with my father behind the wheel. He is so keen to blend in I think he has found that exchanging insurance details is a good way to meet people. When I speak with him he often begins with ‘you’ll never guess who I bumped into the other day’. I think the locals have all grown rather fond of him and often speak about how much they love to come across that old chap who’s retired up north coming towards them in his car on the wrong side of the road at walking speed because it gives them an amusing story to tell when they eventually get to work. Of course we both find it a little awkward sometimes, my husband and I, when we sleep together for the first time in a few weeks, he seems a little forgetful of the procedure, but I find that if I whisper Farrow and Ball paint colours into his ear that soon gets him in the mood so wish me luck! This does mean that Strife in the North will also be having the weekend off but I do hope you’ll come back next week. It’s been great fun this week and lovely that people have come to read about how grim it is up north and I promise you that next week, I’ll be back. Have a jolly good weekend won’t you. Tootle pip!

lonesome pining

Some people reading this blog must think rather poorly of my husband. How can he leave that poor girl, so educated and metropolitan, so beautiful and charming, so talented and yet so self effacing, up there in the cultural wasteland that is the north whilst he carries on working down in swinging London?' How, they ask, yes, how can I be sure of our marriage when he is living the bachelor life in a city of four million women? Well I tell them that my husband is not like other men and they should keep their personal opinions on relationships to themselves and not post them on the internet every day for the world to read. They say there is no such thing as love at first sight, but when I first laid eyes on those matinee idol looks, those tight Levis, and those cowboy boots I knew right then and there that he was the one to carry me off into the sunset on his white charger and yet also go shopping for shoes with. All he needs is a ten gallon hat and a cheroot and he could have walked right out of the screen during a showing of Blazing Saddles. He’s my lone ranger, my man with no name, my east, my north, my deep south and my wild west and I know that every fourth weekend he’ll walk in through that door with arrows in his hat, a six shooter in his pocket and bunch of Texaco flowers and sweep me off my feet with his lasso of love. But in between those weekends of steamed up windows, sitting in bed taking it in turns reading aloud from the Laura Ashley catalogue until we can no longer keep our hands off one another, when I’m all alone up here in the north with my Black Lace novels, My period home magazines and my printed out posts by Wife in the North, wistfully waiting for his call, my phone in my lap and set on maximum vibrate wondering oh when, oh when will I see my love again, he’s spending his evenings in his flat in London watching Brokeback Mountain with the red Indian from the Village People and thinking only of me.