Ah, does the title intrigue you? Well, it should do. It’s all to do with a dinner I went last saturday. Nothing special about that. The dinner was organized by a social club I recently joined. I turned up at the restaurant at 7.30pm on the dot, as agreed. Only to walk in and find that all by one of the diners had already taken position at the table, chosen the menu’ and ordered the drinks. I was received with a sniffy expression of ‘oh, she has finally arrived!’. I looked around and for a moment I thought I got it all wrong. In fact, that was the restaurant, those were the people and I did get it spectacularly wrong in deciding to join in that particular meal. The problems? Apart from the fact that the restaurant resembled a stage set 1980’s style (gerish colours, outdated furniture, you get the drift), the other diners were, well, a bit old…I am not a spring chicken at 39, but I mean, the others were in their 60s, 70s and yes – wait for it – 80s! I am NOT kidding you. I don’t normally discriminate on the ground of age, but you see, I was expecting a younger age group. That’s not all. Having arrived almost last, the only seat left for me to take was opposite the older member of the gang, a retired professor, aged 83 and counting. I sat down thinking: do I leave now or do I give this man a chance and see what happens? Since these days I am challenging myself with new things, I decided to stay. What a good decision that was, too. Apart from all other diners (two women were yawning the all time, I swear), the old professor proved to be one of the most intelligent individual I have ever met. And so we spent an entire evening chatting and giggling and cracking jokes. We spent hours telling each others stories about our travels, funny anedoctes, foreign languages (he speaks a few of those, like me); I must admit I was taken back by the fact that the evening flew by. The others were left commenting and wondering what we had to say to each other and more importantly, what was oh-so-funny! Needless to say, there wasn’t any clubbing afterwards; everyone went home at 11.00. But I must say, I found myself sitting on a bus going home and giggling at some of the jokes me and The Professor had made over dinner. Will I see him again? I don’t think so. I don’t think I am his type
Was he my perfect man? Well, 50 years ago, my dear, quite possibly. Today? Noaaa. Somehow I think that’s a pity.