St Paul of Tranent

God, I'm not the most prolific blog writer, am I? Thought I should write an update on my progress with The Observer. Paula and I are in touch sporadically, and she gives me things to think about/exercises to do, and I don't do anything about them. Probably too lazy. Or don't want to think about my predicament. Or something. It is meeting Paul that has had more of an effect than my pathetic attempts to think about why I'm alone, or what sort of relationship I want.

Paul is a friend of my brother's who was at my 40th birthday party in January. Since then, I've been seeing him from time to time, and we've done quite a bit of snogging and managed to resist doing more, mainly due to his self-control. The physical contact is great, but it has been the conversations that have had the most impact on my life.

Paul made it clear from the beginning that he wasn't interested in having a relationship at the moment. He's doing an apprenticeship that takes up a lot of his time and energy, and he's getting over a long-term relationship that broke up last year. I don't know how he's done this, but he's got me reassessing my urgency about finding a partner. I no longer feel in a rush. I've more or less abandoned the idea of having more kids, but feel quite at peace with myself about it. I trust that the right man will come along at the right time. Perhaps it's Paul - though not at the moment - perhaps it's not.

What has also happened is that I've stopped obsessing about the break-up of my previous on-off (mostly off, and even when it was on it was never very clear where I stood) relationship. And Paul deserves a sainthood for that alone.

Lighten up

By request of a certain LottieP, I offer a more upbeat selection of tracks than those on the left:

Indeep – Last Night a DJ Saved My Life

Eve feat. Gwen Stefani - Blow Ya Mind

Black Box - Ride On Time

The Source feat. Candi Staton - You Got the Love

B52s - Planet Claire

I continue to be Observed...

Not married yet though. Not that that's my goal. The Observer piece was very fair, although the picture was horrid: I looked fat and miserable. I'm not surprised I haven't been flooded with letters of interest. Not that any man would be that vacuous. I particularly liked that they printed my profound observation on the attraction of 40-something men to women in their 20s with no "baggage" - baggage meaning life experience, kids and more than three decades under their belt. Oh, and the odd wrinkle. And also that I wouldn't regard the year's free counselling as a failure if I'm alone at the end of it.

The discussions with the counsellor, Paula Hall, have made me realise how complicated relationships are. I didn't think they were simple before, but I now see that finding someone who's right for me is almost a lottery. I certainly don't believe in there being one person out there who's perfect for me - and it being a (not very simple) matter of finding them - but it feels like it's going to be terribly difficult not to settle for a sub-standard relationship in order to avoid being alone for the rest of my life. I've lost sight of what is good and bad in relationships, and have put up with a lot of crap, some of it instigated or perpetuated by myself. I said to Paula that I would write a sort of "shopping list" of the qualities I want in a partner, but I now see that it's nowhere near as clear-cut as that. Not only is some compromise inevitable, a prospective partner may have some wonderful qualities that I hadn't even thought of. And it's not like I can simply put my order in on the Tesco website.

Funnily enough, I feel very little envy of anyone else's relationship, or life for that matter. Although I find my life hard at times, I feel quite content in many ways. It's more a case that there are a few things missing than there being things I would like to change. Time for myself and someone to come home to are top of the list.

Observed

Happy new 2007! The year I turn 40 and, with the help of The Observer magazine, possibly even the year I find a partner. I don't really have any say in what goes in the paper, so this is my chance to put my perspective. I'll be posting from time to time on what it says, and what I say, and a whole bunch of other stuff besides. Long live folly!