So. What are the first things you do when you find yourself unceremoniously divorced? I tell you what you do. Change your job. We’ve already covered that. Then you drastically change your hairstyle, lose some weight and take up some reckless and possibly life-threatening pursuit.
Ergo, my long brown hair is now a sharp-cut blonde bob. I might as well see if it’s true that blondes have more fun. If I’m honest, I think they just take more selfies. They also spend a lot more time dyeing their hair. On the weight front, I’ve dropped a stone simply due to the inability to eat while crying. I’m thinking of marketing it as the Next Big Thing diet plan. Weight Loss the Weeping Way! Believe me, the pounds drop off. Life-threatening pursuit? I’ve signed up for scuba-diving lessons. I know.
I’m not sure that the opportunity for scuba-diving is that widespread in Milton Keynes, but I tried Zumba and found my musical coordination abilities are seriously lacking. When everyone else was whooping and grapevining to the right, I was shimmying to the left all by myself. Plus they were all wearing tight, multi-coloured Lycra clothing that jingled when they moved. That’s never going to be a good look. To add insult to injury, the instructor was nineteen, size six and shouted a lot. When is that ever going to do anything for your self-esteem? Plus, doing Zumba isn’t exactly a life challenge, is it? Whereas scuba-diving might well be – given, especially, that I’m frightened of water. Particularly going under it.
At this point, I’m thinking that rally driving might have been a better idea. Thought I do already have many points on my licence as another part of my End of Relationship Rehabilitation was to buy a sports car. Don’t get carried away and imagine a Porsche. This is an ancient and well-loved Mazda something or another that has more rust in evidence than polished chrome and smells vaguely of mould. The boot has a bag of those silica crystals in it to extract moisture – put there by the previous owner, I hasten to add. The moisture issue hasn’t just been since I took possession. It’s the sort of car that middle-aged, recently divorced women with no money drive. But it’s my Mazda, rather like my granny annexe. Even though there are dents on every body panel, it shows that it’s seen life and I love it just the same.
I should fill you in a bit more on my marriage, then you’ll understand where I’m at and why. I’d been with Simon for five years. A year of dating, a year of living together in a rented house in downtown Leighton Buzzard before we wed. So we hardly rushed into it. I met him in real life, at a work conference – unusual in these days of Tinder and e-dating, I think you’ll agree. He was in local government too. Traffic Management. It’s more interesting than it sounds. Well, not that much.
We met at a Social Responsibility weekend at a posh hotel. After all the boring presentations about initiatives to assess and take responsibility for the company’s effects on environmental and social well-being, he bought me a drink in the bar afterwards. Three drinks, actually. Then we got a bit socially irresponsible together back in my room which was quite nice. My heart went pitter-patter and everything. All the things it’s supposed to do when it clocks true love. After that, we started seeing each other regularly and I fell in love. I thought he did too.
When we got married, it wasn’t a big do. We had a quickie register office ceremony with a few friends and family. Our wedding breakfast was a finger buffet at my parents’ house afterwards. Maybe that should have told me something. Simon wanted no fuss, the smallest wedding possible. Turns out he may have even preferred it if I hadn’t been there.
I was seeing stability, lasting love, buying a home, a mortgage, joint bank account, pensions, kids. Turns out, Simon was seeing the woman from the local One Stop Shop where he went to buy my roses. The one who wore false eyelashes with little pink crystals on them. I also found out during one of our more heated break-up arguments that she had similar pink crystals on her vajayjay too. Classy. I might have gone to certain somewhat unsavoury lengths to attract a gentleman in the past but, believe me, I’ve never resorted to crystals on my lady parts. Serves me right for asking what she had that I didn’t. TMI. Still, five years down the swanny for that, so what do I know.
I found out about Simon’s infidelity on Christmas Day. He sent one of those heartfelt texts, full of declarations of love and signed with a dozen kisses and sexy emoticons. It just wasn’t for me. I was the one who got the Lakeland spiralizer and a seventy-nine pence card from Card Factory.
The first Christmas we were together, he bought me a box of After Eight mints with a diamond pendant hidden in one of the packets. Cool, eh? Romantic even. It wasn’t exactly the Koh-i-Noor, but it was so unexpected and thoughtful of him that I was bowled over. I find that a solo, surprise jewellery purchase is always a good thing in a man. This year, spiralizer. I think that says all it needs to about how far our relationship had declined in a short space of time. Not that I haven’t used my Lakeland spiralizer quite a lot. It’s great. The number of things you can do with a spiralized courgette is simply amazing. You just don’t want one as a major gift from your loved one, right?
Simon left on Boxing Day. Packed a box – I’m sure it’s not called Boxing Day because of that – and went to live with The One of the Crystalled Vajayjay. I couldn’t bear to stay in that house on my own – the one which we’d shared together. Where we’d loved, laughed and made our plans. Neither, quite frankly, could I afford the rent on my salary.
So I handed the keys back to the landlord and moved away to Milton Keynes without a backward glance. Not a million miles – barely ten miles down the road. And I know what you’re thinking – Milton Keynes! Why not the golden sands of Cornwall or the fabulous hills of Lake District or the heather-strewn borders of Scotland? Somewhere you’d go on holiday and yearn with all of your heart to go back. Why Milton Keynes? No one aspires to live in Milton Keynes. But, you know what, it’s flipping great here and sometimes too much change is unsettling. Everything else was up in the air. I needed somewhere different but familiar, if you know what I mean. Plus I needed a new job and quick. Milton Keynes has everything you’d ever want. Good shopping, good theatre, a surfeit of lakes and more trees than you can shake a stick at. The concrete cows. Don’t mention the cows – everyone does. IKEA is a three-minute drive from my house. What’s not to love? How far do you have to go for your BILLY bookcases? Think about it.