sashinka | observation orientated, with a twist of lime | a blog

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Fun night at Rani's. It's like a glatt vegetarian Indian restaurant, full of Jewish people who don't really like spicy food. There ended up only being six of us, and conversation ranged from Designers at Debenhams to work-life-balance. And lots of stuff either side and in between. I really must stop saying stuff. Sorry.

Don't you hate it when you talking to someone and they say "that reminds me of an incident in my own life" and you know they're not really listening, they're just waiting for their chance to tell their tale. Not that anyone did tonight, but the evening reminded me of something that happened a few years ago.

I was going out with G. I'd run into him at a party, and we'd been at school together - he'd been at the boy's school, and not seen each other for like ten years. He was smart and entertaining and an accountant - you can't have everything - but I did find him attractive. My mum always asks me why I like those slightly overweight, balding, often shorter men, and I just think thank god I do, because that's how a lot of Jewish men look. So G was fun, and great company, and a laugh a minute, and had more personality than me. Which is hard, allegedly.

We'd been seeing each other for a few months, and he was into it, and I was quite into it. Not not into it, just less than him. Relationships rarely have equilibrium. Anyway, I was going away on holiday, and thought it would be a great time to decide how I felt, and although I was getting back on a Friday, I told him that I was back on the Monday, as I thought it would give me some extra time. I was mostly worried about how to end it without upsetting him.

When I get back on Friday morning, there's an answerphone message from J saying it's her birthday, and a bunch of people are going out for dinner. I figured, G's a good friend of hers, I'll just stick with my story, and make my apologies to J after the weekend.

Saturday night, A calls me, we're both at a loose end, do I want to go out for dinner. I say great. He drives, and doubtless because of his serious Sefardi roots, takes me to Rani's. It's Saturday night. Party night. Loud, raucous even, lots of large groups. As our waiter shows us to a table, we walk past a large group of: my friends. G. J. Eighteen other people who've presumably just been told I'm not back from my trip till Monday.

G comes over to our table; it's civil, but I can see from his perspective his girlfriend's just turned up with "another man" albeit one who wouldn't know what to do even if he was given a chance. It's awkward, to say the least. I wanted the ground to open up but those things rarely happen to order. A and I rush our meal, as I just wanted to get the hell out of there, and I spent Sunday worrying about what to say to G; I called first thing, but he didn't pick up.

Sunday night, he comes over to my house. I try the whole... "it's not you it's me" shtick, but I can see that I have, inadvertently hurt him more than I ever wanted to. He tells me he never likes me anyway. Our relationship ends. Six weeks later he gets engaged to the flatmate of a friend of mine.

Funny how places remind you of stories. Z says I have a proof text for everything, though I'm not sure this proves very much apart from my inability to handle relationships.