As I don’t live in what my friends consider to be ‘town’, I don’t get many visitors. My friends who live in ‘town’ protest that they cannot possibly be presumed upon to come as far as Balham. For a long time, I used to mind about this and made all sorts of silly attempts to force people to enjoy my suburban hospitality. Once, in an attempt to stage a dinner party, I drove to Chelsea and led a convoy of cars back to my house, swerving and flashing in desperation as they ventured south of Albert Bridge.
When they got to my front door in one piece you would have thought they had made it to a cave in the Hindu Kush. ‘Wow!’ they all exclaimed, ‘it was only ten minutes…I can’t believe it…Did you know it was ten minutes to Balham?…No, it’s incredible!’ They surveyed with expressions of wonderment the realistic-looking plumbing and central-heating systems. ‘Look at that!’ they gasped as they entered the kitchen to find a table and chairs that looked as if they might have been purchased from Oka. ‘Goodness me!’ one of them opined, as she caught sight of the organic smoked salmon in a Partridges’ packet. ‘Do you shop at…?’ ‘Sometimes,’ I said. ‘It’s only ten minutes down the road, remember?’ After a very successful evening they never came again.
The next time I invited them they intimated that the convoy had been altogether too traumatic. Unless I hire a fully air-conditioned coach with onboard entertainment and a tour guide I am unlikely to tempt them to south London again.
Others have tried to find their way on their own. A friend once got himself as far as the station on the understanding that I would be waiting outside to pick him up, as the three-minute trek from there to my house on foot would clearly require the undergrowth hacking skills of Ray Mears. At the end of the evening, he announced that he wanted a lift at least halfway back to Chelsea, whereupon I tried to drop him on Lavender Hill to catch a black cab, but he refused to get out of the car. ‘Do cabs come here?’ he asked with a terrified expression as he gripped the sides of the seat. When a taxi appeared five seconds later my friend nearly killed himself lurching in front of it as he obviously felt this was a miracle that would not be repeated for a hundred years.
I had a girlfriend who nearly managed to drive herself to my house. She started out from South Kensington at 6 p.m. and three hours later telephoned to say that she had passed the Bedford pub, as directed, but was now ‘somewhere called Crystal Palace’. When she next found her way to a bridge could she please have permission to go back to SW7?
Strangely, the advent of sat nav has done nothing to encourage my posh friends southwards. For some reason they all claim not to have a TomTom. I suppose times are hard.
I don’t care. It means I can lead a quiet life unmolested by socialising. It also means I never have to cook anyone a meal. I have owed a friend of mine and her husband dinner for three years but the last opportunity they offered me to reciprocate involved my taking the raw ingredients to their house in west London so that I could cook it for them there.
Anyway, the point I was trying to make is that the only people who ever knock on my door are Jehovah’s Witnesses, whom I eagerly engage in extensive conversations. I like to think I am unique in the achievement of being repeatedly told by such people that they ‘really have to go now’.
But the other day I was treated to an even more exciting cold-caller. I galloped towards my door to find a girl in a red coat with a cut-glass accent announcing that she was from the ‘local’ Labour party. Were there any issues I wanted to discuss? After 15 minutes, I paused for breath and realised that her face had taken on a glazed expression. She said, ‘I’ll certainly raise the problem of obtrusive road signage.’ By which she meant, ‘I’ll certainly forget about it the second I get to the end of your front path.’And she shoved a leaflet at me inviting me to meet Ed Miliband.
‘But I don’t want to discuss climate change. I want to discuss the waste of taxpayers’ money on useless road signs.’ She said she didn’t have time to talk any longer. Nor did she want to come in for a Partridges’ mince pie. I know that look. She was worried about missing her lift back to SW3.
Melissa Kite is deputy political editor of the Sunday Telegraph.
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