2) Newspaper Lonely Hearts
June 23, 2006
Poor lonely hearts, sad lungs, grumpy kidneys and those weary livers.
I’ve chosen the Observer Soulmates mainly because a friend claims to know two happily married couples who met through it. That same friend has herself tried to find love this way, but I refuse to be scared off by her stories of the date with the hairy neck man and the child-porn ring allegations. Also, Soulmates is free, and JLo insists that ‘love don’t cost a thing.'
Just reading through the ads page is fearsome. I had no idea the unattached were so cocky. They describe themselves as “intelig”, “sexy”, “very attract”, “thoughtful”. You have to worry what flaws and deformeties have rendered them single.
The Lonely Hearts page teaches you quickly that age is a valuable commodity. Age is vital. Age is offered. Age is specified. I’ve always felt happy to get older. If I was not getting older I would be dead. Suddenly I feel aware of my mortality and the fact that, generally, in a man’s eyes younger is better.
There seems to be a large amount of short, single men from the North of England. Some use frightening terms such as “doncha wanna” or “bombastic”, clearly thinking that impersonating Shaggy is am asset in the dating game. Many specify that they want someone intelligent. I fear some sort of written exam. Many are very keen to go abroad with you, especially to the Greek Islands. I fear being dismembered far away from the British judicial system. Many describe themselves as happy and well-balanced. I imagine the years of therapy.
One stands out, “Okay so you want young, entertaining, can put up shelves & good in bed?” Problem solved; I can do 75%. Early 50’s writer, slim, witty, passionate.”
He sounds nice doesn’t he?............................ Probably mad.
I like him because
a) he starts with what I want not what he wants
b) he doesn’t say he wants a 19 year old nymphette with big breasts and a high IQ who’s sensual, caring, kind to animals etc
c) he mentions sex, which is quite refreshing.
Shame he’s far too old.
Now for my ad.
“ Do you want someone young, funny, who can cook and likes being frisky? Problem solved; I can do 75%. Nearly 30, actress (not famous), slim-ish, witty, passionate”
The 50’s writer won’t press charges of plagiarism over a lonely hearts column. I hope.
I place my ad. There is no sympathetic voice on the end of the phone line. Just automated responses and 'press 1 to confirm's'. I’ve had warmer experiences paying the council tax. Then I have to leave a voice mail, so that men reading the Observer who are moved by my two lines can call a number and hear me talking about myself.
Normally I am quite good at speaking. The nuns at the convent were very particular about elocution. Also I went to Drama School. I can recite a whole rhyme about Betty Botter buying some bitter butter on one breath. I bloody well do speaking for a living. Suddenly all I can manage are random words coming out of one long eeeeeerrrrrrrrrrrrr sound, interspersed with about 63 ums. It takes me 26 minutes to record. I listen back to what sounds like a speech therapist's case study. I think about re-recording but 26 minutes is a long time and the sun is shining and I have a life to be living. If I was to re-record the message, I would have spent 52 minutes talking to an automated response system. That's the same amount of time it would take to make a cup of tea and watch an episode of 24.
Time is precious and we are all of us dying. The Soulmates page is making me morbid. Paul Simon’s lyrics ‘Time, time, time see what’s become of me’ keep going round and round in my head. I don’t re-record. I want to be me. If me is someone who says ‘um err hello…. well…er’ when recording a message for strange men then so be it.
Sunday. My ad is a hit. It appears at the top of the page. I am featured in the Observer. Despite it being with a plagiarised Lonely Hearts column, I am silently smug.
I get lots of text messages telling me to call a number and hear the messages these lovely men have for left me. I don’t actually remember asking for this text message service as each text costs me 50p. But what the hey! Piss off JLo! Prince says "money didn't matter yesterday and it sure don't matter today" I feel wanton and wanted. Excitedly I dial the number they give me to retrieve these messages.
It is barred from my mobile phone. it also appears to be barred from my land line. I use a pay phone. I put a pound in the slot and before the automated greeting is over, my pound is spent and I am cut off. I stand for a moment incredulous in a phone box. There is something perversely compelling about witnessing money being spent at such a rate.
Day 4. I am £76 down and the texts are still coming. It would be quite nice to relax and listen to these men properly. Sitting at home with a gin and tonic perhaps, making notes about Mark's unusually high voice and Jason's phlegm. After all they have taken the time to listen to my stuttering catastrophe of a message and respond to it. Without exception they are intelligent, articulate men. But I have to be ruthless. Time, I am learning, is money. Listening to entire message could set me back £7.80. There is an Alan Sugar in me, firing men if they are too short, too old or I just don’t like the sound of them. I didn’t expect to meet my inner Alan Sugar in my quest for love. I hadn’t expected things to get quite so cut-throat. I need to do some yoga and meditation. I don’t have time. I need to go to the bank and get some change.
Looking for unvandalised phone boxes to retrieve costly messages from men I’ve never met before is yet another waste of my ever-decreasing time on this planet. I realize with sadness that when you are young, people want your body. As you get older they just want your money.
I vow to stop listening to these messages. I must meet some of these men.
I call one man because
a) he likes going to the theatre (a rarity amongst straight men)
b) he sounds like Jack Bauer
We chat. He’s nice. But I need to unload. I go on and on and on about automated phone systems and expense. I can’t stop. I’ve been damaged. I scare him. It’s not sexy. I don’t expect to hear from him. However,after we speak he texts me listing all the evenings he’s free, saying we could maybe do something on one of them.
I call another because
a) he sounded really relaxed and chatty in his message
b) I am drunk after an all day lunch party without the lunch.
I really enjoy chatting. I can’t entirely remember what we said. I fear I kept telling him he was old. He said he was in his early 40s. I guessed correctly he was 44. I think I thought I was funny. I think in actual fact I was merciless. At the end he says to call again and tell him when I want to go out.
After the automated messages, the searches for phone boxes, the waiting outside phone boxes, the trips to the bank, the queues in the bank, the pockets full of pound coins, I am disappointed.
I want to be taken in hand. I want a man to say
‘You poor thing! Let me buy you dinner on Thursday at this lovely little fish restaurant I know by the river. You can have a good old whinge about nasty old Soulmates. No pressure we’ll just get to know each other. You might not like the look of me, by the way I look a bit like Kiefer Sutherland. You might hate my sense of humour, people say I’m a lot like Jonathn Ross. Oh and I wrote that song, the JCB song- do you know it? We might just become friends. But you never know, what is it Robert Browning says ‘Grow old along with me, the best is yet to be.’
Oh well as Kylie always says,
'I should be so lucky'
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25) Guardian Soulmates Online