On the last Saturday of August 2005 I was in a nightclub called Chicago Rock, on my own, I liked going on my own. The reality was that it was a bit sad but I liked to think I could cultivate an air of mystery and I found it much easier to talk to females if I was on my own. If I was in a group I was far too worried, about being rejected, in front of a crowd. It has always been the case with me, one to one I am comfortable talking to anybody, in a group the narrative that plays in my head constantly tells me I am inferior, I am paralysed by feelings of doubt and worthlessness.
The previous month I had taken three weeks off work ten days before the date of my 40th birthday and ten days after. I did not want anyone celebrating my birthday. For me there was nothing to celebrate I was 40 single and in my eyes a total failure. Sadly for me, despite, making it quite clear I wanted no acknowledgement of my birthday on my last day at work...a full ten day before the date of my birth. I got into work early to find my desk decorated with streamers, balloons and shit. I handled the situation in a very mature manner I ripped down the streamers, burst all the balloons threw the other shit in the bin and cleared off down by the river for an hour. I worked flexi-time so it wasn't a problem.
When I went back to work my female colleagues were very disappointed by my actions, stuff em I thought I had made it quite clear i had nothing to celebrate, in my eyes they were drawing attention to the fact i was a useless sad singleton. Then they told me a chap called Brendan had thought I would like it. If I had been bigger, stronger and braver I would have just wandered around to his office and knocked the twat out. I didn't like Brendan he was a sly bastard who genuinely made politicians appear honest, if his lips were moving he was lying in addition he was the most prolific shagger in the office. So I guess i was a bit envious but he had stitched me up with two women I had previously got along very well with. He told them lies about me and then he moved in.
I then found out my lodger Barry, who also worked at the Land Registry with me, had organised a surprise party at the Bowling Alley. Once word got to him about my destruction of my decorations, balloons and shit he quickly set about cancelling the gathering. That evening I headed home, incredibly grumpy and with three weeks to kill.
People say life begins at 40 and i have to say for me personally things changed a lot when I hit that millstone, I know the term is milestone but i reckon millstone fits better. Ageing is rubbish.
Anyway where was I, oh yea Chicago Rock although I always go on about how useless I was and am with women Chicago Rock was quite a happy hunting ground for me, I had a modicum of success but I find it sad that I never really found a human being I was compatible with. It is very sad for those of us who don't, it feels like a waste of a big chunk of life. This particular night in August i was stood by the dance floor leering, well when I say leering I was admiring the females on the dancefloor. One woman in particular seemed to be making eye contact and bouncing her ample bosom, in my direction. I watched her as she jigged about and thought to myself 'big boobs (well i probably thought tits) small hands, small feet... She'd do' As she left the dancefloor I watched her walk away and was a tad disappointed as I observed she had an arse like an ironing board. 'Oh well'I thought 'beggers cant be choosers' I sound very shallow don't I? when it comes to looks I am, always have been and always will be (most people are aren't they?) hence I have spent the vast majority of my life alone.
In fairness though and I often wonder if women realise this, there is very little nuance involved when a man looks at a woman. A woman might ask if you like her hair, her smile, her outfit "does my bum look big in this?" that kinda thing.. The only question a man asks himself is 'would i or wouldn't i?' With the woman I had just been watching shake her considerable stuff on the dancefloor...I would. Later that evening I got talking to her and got her number and found out she was a single mum her name was Jo and she was a hairdresser. I had always wanted to go out with a hairdresser I thought it was quite a glamorous profession which I likened to strippers... I really did!? (I would have loved to date a stripper or a porn star but hairdressers were high on my list too) I also found out she lived in Whittlesey I spent many happy times as a child in Whittlesey when me and my sister used to spend weekends at my grandparents, so there were lots of positives. In fairness the only negative was the ironing board.
Well it wasn't really a match made in heaven but we were two kinda desperate people and two weeks later we were engaged to be married. Seriously I am not messing about. It wasn't till after we got engaged that I first saw Jo without make-up, at the time I thought to myself 'her face is actually a bit like my work colleague's' a guy called Steve Bold but what could I do we had already purchased the engagement rings. Not great in my case as I mentioned in chapter one I have odd spindly alien type fingers that don't lend themselves to the wearing of rings. Obviously many people thought we were rushing things. Obviously we were rushing things. Me and Jo had been going out for a month engaged for two weeks, when my lodger had a serious chat with me telling me he thought it was all going a bit quick. When he had finished I had to tell him that I was putting the house on the market and was gonna be buying a property in Whittlsey with Jo and her daughter. Barry was quite shocked by this as I was a wonderful landlord and also he realised he could be made homeless. As it turned out Barry was able to raise the money to buy the house off me but he was very pissed off about it.
On the work front I had recently started working with Elaine who was in charge of training at the Land Registry, she had a big office on the top floor next to the staff gym. My staff officer was forever moving me about from team to team, which was annoying as it reduced my chances of promotion. I really liked Elaine though and it was cool being up on the top floor, me and Elaine went on to be good friends.
I had not been up there long when I started getting strange sensations when going to the toilet. As someone who has been criminally rationed when it comes to physical contact with women whenever i did get a chance i really went for it and me and Jo were having a lot of sex. I was really enjoying myself, looking back I am not sure Jo found it quite so fulfilling not sure I was ever really her type. Like I say though I was having a great time. However I now had a real problem pissing.
Jo and I were spending every weekend together between her house in Whittlesey and mine in Woodston on the Saturdays I would look after her daughter, G, while Jo was at work. I think we actually purchased a house around November time, coincidentally from a woman who also worked at the Land Registry (as they say it is a small world) Oh yea and when Jo introduced me to her best friend Sarah I realised that I had had a blind date with Sarah around 6 months previous, so that was a tad awkward. Sarah had, had a few drinks when Jo first introduced us and was keen to tell me she would break my legs if i hurt her friend. I clearly had not made a good impression on our blind date!
As things turned out I did end up in hospital but not through broken legs. My problems with pissing got progressively worse and i was starting to get quite a lot of pain in my lower back. One Friday night in October I think. I was driving back to Woodston after spending the evening with Jo, when I started to get severe pain in my back around the kidney area. Obviously I have never been stabbed but it felt like a knife going through me, I thought i was gonna throw up. I staggered into my house and rang for an ambulance. I thought I was dying. The ambulance arrived and the paramedics were initially a tad dismissive "Where is the patient?" they asked. I informed them it was me and explained my symptoms. They drove me to hospital and gave me something for the pain but it wasn't really touching it. I arrived at hospital and was put on a trolley and there I stayed for thirty minutes writhing around groaning and generally acting quite pathetic. I had contacted Jo and she was on her way to be with me. In my head i was hoping she got there in time for us to say our final goodbye's! (I have always been a tad melodramtic.) Like I say after around 30 mins a doctor came in and asked me "On a scale of 1-10 where is the pain at?" "TEN" I cried and then added for extra impact "TEN TEN" The doctor must have thought I was a proper wuss. I was given some strong medication and the pain eased. Jo arrived looking very worried and that encouraged me to act with a little more courage. I was put on a drip and kept in for the weekend. On the Saturday a porter came and collected me and wheeled me down for an x-ray the silly sod nearly killed me as he neglected to clip off my drip. When we got to the theatre a nurse on seeing me let out an exasperated cry and ran over the drip was full of my blood and whatever was in the drip was all in me. I was as high as a kite!! By Sunday the doctors concluded I had had a kidney stone which they believed I must have passed at some point. On the Monday Jo drove me home. I was the resurrection!
Anyway, we got a moving in date for the end of January 2006 and around that time I honestly think it was Jo who suggested we get a dog. I was all for that, as a kid I had, had a dog called Scamp who i got on my 12th birthday and she lived to be around 18 years old she was a lovely dog, very independent, full of fun and tough as nails. I have always loved animals especially dogs and was often finding strays and taking them home as a youngster. Although at the time me and Jo got together as well as having a lodger called Barry I also had a cat called Michael who had kind of set up home in my garden. Well actually there were two cats that hung around one called Nuisance had started hanging around first then Michael came along. I initially called him Mike Parr cuz he was ginger and when he first started loitering around I found him very annoying. So i named him Mike Parr, after the staff officer at the Land Registry who was also ginger and annoying. Where they differed was Mike Parr detested me, while Michael the cat had taken a real shine to me.
Me and Jo decided that we were gonna get a dog. I persuaded her that we should have a beagle, i had always loved beagles. The idea of having a wife a step daughter, a house in Whittlesey and most importantly a beagle puppy would have seemed a million miles away for the soon to be 40 year old version of myself who had, during a tantrum, been pulling down decorations, bursting balloons and filling bins with other celebratory shit only a couple of months earlier... but it was all actually happening. We contacted a breeder in Grantham and put our names down for a puppy. When we started talking about names G who was around 10 wanted to call it something like Fang!? There was no way I was gonna go along with that i wanted a boy and I wanted to call him Eddie. Eddie the Beagle.
Eddie was born in November 2005 and the breeder sent us a picture of the litter all the pups were feeding except one puppy who was all black at the time and was looking back at the camera. I rang the breeder straight away and after finding out he was a boy I said i want him. So in early December me Jo and G went off to Grantham to have our first meeting with Eddie. It was a joy going into the house with all those gorgeous puppies running about yapping excitedly, I was in heaven. Which one is ours I asked. He is over there said the woman selling the pups...and that was the first time I saw Eddie he was laying down and was twice the size of all the other pups. In fact at the time he seemed too heavy for his legs, hence he was lying down and kinda crawling about rather than walking. he was beautiful though, even though he did look a bit like a draft excluder. I picked him up and fussed him and had to pinch myself as to how much my life had changed in such a short space of time.
At that point it was too early to take Ed home with us, as it turned out we would be collecting Eddie two days before we moved into our new house and start a new life together, a hurriedly cobbled together brand new family. As I have mentioned previously I am a proper worrier but everytime I had doubts I thought about Ed and I knew there was no way I would be backing out.
As you can imagine those last few days of January 2006 were hectic to say the least. I was moving out of my house Jo was moving out of hers and along with moving into our new home we first had to go and collect Eddie from Grantham. I was so excited. I am a person who, thankfully for me as things turned out was never really into children. I never had any desire at all to have one of my own ... but puppies, very cliched but it was a dream come true when I carried Eddie from that house in Grantham back to the car, ready for the journey home. He stayed on my knee the whole time and was really good until we got a mile from Jo's house and he threw up all over me.
That night we all stayed at Jo's, we went to bed leaving little Ed in his cage but not long after 12 the little chap started crying and I went downstairs and slept on the floor next to his cage. The next day Saturday, Jo was working so I stayed home. I think G was at her Dad's that weekend. I spent all day playing with my new puppy in the garden. He was absolutely adorable, he was exactly the son i had always wanted.
The following Monday was moving day. God it was stressful looking back i have no idea how we did it, there was me my mate Steve from work my Dad and his mate Pete who had hired a van we had to empty Jo's house and my own, it was helpful that Barry had brought my old house so I did not have to take everything on the same day but Barry was adamant Michael was not welcome to stay so I had to take him with us, which i didn't really mind. Jo was taking Ambrose her old cat also, so along with Ed we had our own little zoo...all this had happened in five months! We loaded the van and the last thing we put in was Eddie in his cage. The new house was lovely, without a doubt the best place I have ever lived. we pulled up at around 12 lifted the back of the van and there sat Eddie, excitedly wagging his tail, welcome to your new home mate I said. It is gonna be an adventure for all of us.
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