Low life | 8 January 2011

The registrar opened a screen and clicked and typed her way down a list of questions. I was ‘giving notice’ of our intention to be married after a statutory 15 days had passed. It was the day before Christmas Eve.

‘Has either of you been married before?’ she said. (She was tired and distracted. So many elderly people had died in this recent cold snap, she’d told me earlier, she was run off her feet.)

‘No,’ I said.

‘Your partner’s full name?’ she said, fingering her mouse. For a split second, before it came to me, my mind was a blank. The registrar eyed me speculatively as she touch-typed.

‘And her date of birth?’

Cow Girl was Pisces, I knew that much. I knew because I’d checked in an astrology book to see whether Pisces women are compatible with Aquarian men. (It’s a recipe for disaster, apparently.) I picked a date in March at random.

‘And do you have £33.50 with you?’ she said. ‘I do,’ I said.

She oscillated the mouse and settled the cursor on the completion button. Before she made the final click, she looked at me, her face wearied by death, and said kindly, ‘You’re both sure you want to go ahead with this?’

I stared at the carpet.

Nearly 600 emails had passed between us, 400 before we’d seen each other. We’d met three times, each time at the same spa hotel. Before our first meeting, I’d told her to feel free to straighten me out with criticism. I’d been on my own for too long, I said, and might not be entirely fit for purpose. But I hadn’t expected the litany of complaint and derision which followed, and which intensified on each subsequent occasion.

Bed was fine.