'The One'
I think its fair to say that everyone wants to find 'The One'. We have an idea who the one is to us, is he a tall and dark stranger amongst the crowd? Is he the guy who opens the door for us when are hands are full, or is he the friend who has been hopelessly in love with you since you can remember. Many people meet the one when there a teenager, many of us don't find it until we're middle aged. In many of the books I read its usually the guy who teases the woman and flirts with her endlessly like Jack in Rumour Has It by Jill Mansell. A great love story is what we all seek even if we don't care to admit it. The single people amongst us are told over and over again that 'it will happen one day' and that there are, wait for it.... 'Plenty of fish in the sea." Gotta love that one. However, this is like a kick in the teeth for many of us who have tried to find the one but has only found the wrong one. The search for love has got way out of hand. The dating websites must make a fortune each year promising to help you and don't forget the TV shows, First Dates, The Undateables, Love Island. How much money do these people make just to 'fall in love' on screen when if fact they probably don't even like each other when there off screen.
I sound like a cynic and I don't care because love sucks. It consumes our lives and drives many of us insane. Love has become something that I no longer recognise, people mix love with lust which is very two different things. Whatever happened to meeting someone in the real world, unexpectedly and completely by surprise? Instead many of us swipe left and right in the hopes that this time it will work.
Tomorrow my Grandparent's will of been married for 49 years. They married when they were 20 and were each other's first love. They met in 1967 I believe that was the right year. My Nan was 17 and was walking out of the chip shop with a tray of chips that cost her 2 pence. That was when my Grandad pulled up in his white van, she'd seen him around the village and thought him handsome. He asked her, "Do your parent's let you drink?" and my Nan looked at him and replied, "Yes." and he said, "What are you waiting for? Get in." and so she dropped her chips in the bin and got into the van with him and they went to the pub. My Grandad didn't earn a lot of money, being one of 14 and having to pay his mum board he asked my Nan what she wanted to drink, "I'll have a large sherry and a packet of fags please." My Grandad paid the man and spent his wages on her, afterwards he turned to her and said, "Right Hil, from now on you'll be drinking smalls and no more fags." He looked at her adoringly, "It's either me or the fags." Apparently, according to my Nan she looked him up and down, he looked scruffy and unloved, and she thought, I could clean this handsome chap up. So she took a sip and said, "Okay Graham I'll stop for you." And she never touched a fag ever again and when they do go out she always drinks halves which still makes me laugh. In three years they saved up for a house, they had a wedding locally in which my Nan bought a dress off her friend for 8 pounds and adjusted it where it needed and by the time she was 23 she already had her first child, another after that. They have been through real tough times but they still love each other.
Imagine if this happened in today's world. If a guy picked you up in a van you would certainly not get in would you? Instead you'd tell him where to shove it. But this is their story, a brilliant story. One that happened in real life and not through the internet.
After all, if they had never met the Yorkshire Bookworm wouldn't be here.
Till next time,
Phoebe x