Have you ever been on a diet?
I know, ridiculous, of course you have…
I mean, even if it isn’t for weight loss,
sometimes there are things you can’t eat or other things you are compelled to eat. So we all know the feeling of having to
avoid certain foods, and eat others we don’t like, because it’s good for us.
Remember that feeling of reluctance you
might have for, say, liver or kale or smoked eel (the last is my personal hate)
and forget for a second the melting desire you have for Reblochon, or hollandaise
sauce, or boiled eggs with buttery soldiers.
And then go to a Japanese restaurant. Wield your chopsticks there for a
second, and hold that thought.
Now I’m British. Despite being raised on ground gristle (or perhaps because
of it) I like Japanese food now and again. I even love it and look forward to it, dream of it on
occasion. But essentially I’m a
Brit, raised on the notion of having everything I like – meat, two veg, maybe a
bit of salad – arranged together on the same dish. I’m a one plate, main meal kind of woman.
When it comes to love, I have the same
model. I’m a one-man, get more or
less everything from a single relationship woman. I want a partner; a husband; the love of my life. Someone who’s funny, supportive, solid,
exciting and helpful – a meat and potatoes man; rare fillet steak with a dollop
of zingy horseradish, maybe a serving of rich béarnaise with potatoes
dauphinoise or parmentier and a sensible, good-for-you green vegetable. A man who can put up shelves, help with
my taxes, discuss the Congolese Civil War, soothe my worries, rub my back and
bang me senseless more than twice a week.
A person whose personality will compliment mine, and who will be my one
and only. In short – like the old
Barry White song – ‘my everything’.
Yeah, but it’s a lot easier to buy a microwave dinner than it is to get true love on a plate. I can cook up the perfect meal whenever, and chose whatever
I fancy, but I can’t find that single, do-it-all-for-me man. The one I had let me think I was funny
by laughing at my jokes and so I didn’t realize he was about as humorous as a
Tory Conference. Nor could he do
anything remotely ‘handy’, and the banging was more of a whimper. Nevertheless he could explain the
failure of the Euro, massage my cares, my shoulders and my ego and carry heavy
luggage. He was as close to a
balanced relationship diet as I’ve ever had and though, of course, I longed,
occasionally for mustard and sauce, apparently so did he. Eventually he forked off to be the main
course in someone else’s life, leaving me plateless.
And the table of conjugal feasts has since
remained resoundingly bare.
So now I’m back in the Japanese
restaurant. The lovely Jorlando on my left
and Vee, oh she who must be obeyed, opposite, and we’ve ordered the set lunch. Jorlando is young, tweedy, handsome (I
think if I may so say without sounding like I’m about to shop at the Toyboy
Warehouse which, I would not consider -even
for the equivalent of a McDonald's – very, very fast). He’s smart.
He’s funny. He’s
bearded. He’s ginger. He’s Posh. He got his first suit aged 13 for school at Aquascutum,
where apparently “Sir didn’t have very much room in the seat”. He is, you see, called Sir. He has a best friend called Inigo (who
of course does not come from Souf’ Landan and wear his trousers round the cusp
of his arse, nor does Jorlando, whose ‘twill slacks’ are firmly belted two inches
under his arms).
The meal arrives. It’s in a little lacquered box. With compartments. None seems significantly larger than any of the others. In one there are two breaded prawns with little feathery tails poking poignantly out at the end – pigs in blankets, Japanese style. In another there’s a cloud of shredded white radish bearing two slabs of tuna, painful like a bruise, and another two of fleshy salmon. In a smaller one there are five slivers of what I think at first are lemon slices, but on closer inspection are half moons of pickled turnip. There’s a slightly larger rectangle with four different kinds of sushi, each on an oval of rice, and one wide mouth stuffed with salmon which the bowing waitress tells us is an Arctic roll, though confusingly, it’s hot. And delicious. Another tiny tray holds three pieces of chicken teriyaki, yet another has two cucumber maki rolls, and the last in the north-west corner has a slice of orange, melon, apple and a single little, rather squashed, raspberry.
We are poised, chopsticks at the ready –
the rounded slippery Japanese ones harder to manage than their Chinese
take-away wooden sisters. The
waitress also brings us some pickled ginger and a dollop of wasabi, and a bowl
of miso soup.
We sip, we slurp, we dip and dab, a
mouthful of radish here, a slice of raw fish, then a nibble of prawn, a bit of
chicken, more radish, a maki roll, a wincing shudder after a particularly
strong hit of wasabi, a swallow of soothing broth. And listening to Jorlando talk wittily about the art world,
and Vee’s sharp and pointed retorts which make me laugh out loud, it occurs to
me that maybe I have the wrong model for relationships. Maybe I should be less British about
it.
Maybe instead of one man who’s all that; later
in life when all the best men are either dead or married to someone else; you
have compromise and compartmentalize.
And substitue and borrow. So the one who
bangs in nails may not be the one who bangs you. And the one who makes you laugh may be the guy, old enough
to be your son in tweed who sits opposite you at the office, or indeed, the
girl who dispenses advice with sternness. The soother of worries and
listener to problems might also be the person who also explains the intricacies
of the Arab Spring who four years sprung himself from your marriage but remains your
friend, or it might be a woman you pay £50 an hour to be professionally sympathetic, or even the man you pay £50
an hour who also cuts your hair.
And is gay.
At this stage in life when I can’t find
just one man who can satisfy my relationship hunger, I need to forget the whole
idea of having love on a plate and have it neatly set out in a Bento Box instead. A little bit of sex, a little bit of
friendship, a little bit of companionship.
But then there’s that sad, forlorn, crushed
little raspberry sitting there on top of the fruit slices - this dear thrill seekers is the pay-off, the Japanese money shot - that and a mint by the cash register - and tr as I might its just doesn't flood
me with hope, excitement or delight.
And so there I am muttering smoked eel to myself. I’m back to pushing cabbage round my
plate because it’s good for me, but I still can’t be totally convinced that
it’s gorgeous even if it is cavolo nero with garlic and pancetta, and choosing
the salad instead of the fries with the omelette in Ciao Bella when I’d rather
have the spag in a bag but I say non grazie because I'm dieting and avoiding carbs. I'm fully aware that I ought to want to eat my five a day but frankly, oh god, I still want a packet of hobnobs. Yeah, I know, I know – the Bento Box
makes perfect relationship sense.
I should be delighted with my companionable old slipper friend, banging boyfriend and my empathetic ex; my
office-mate repartee and friendly handyman, but…
Ach, I still yearn for that Sunday roast,
with all the trimmings. Heck I’d
even settle for the Marks & Spencer main course and vegetable, £10 and a full dinner
for two; the one thing I'm not.
