Freedom Day? No, too obvious

AYOUNG single guy I work with met this girl in a bar in January, through mutual friends. He was excited about it. He said she was smart, pretty and funny, she seemed to get him, and she gave him her phone number. Plus, she bought him tequila; what’s not to like?

So I couldn’t understand why he didn’t phone her. At first I thought he was just playing the old three-day game, where you wait some bizarre period that a group of mythical people called “they” have decided is appropriate, before calling someone you’re actually really keen on, just to prove that you’re not all that keen on them. Why you wouldn’t want someone you like to know you like them is maths that goes over my head, but perhaps that’s why I’m still single.

Anyway, when three days and then four, five and six passed, and he still hadn’t called her, I got curious. Finally he admitted he hadn’t called because it was the end of January and he felt too much pressure getting into a relationship so close to Valentine’s Day. It was a minefield he was unwilling to cross. He’d rather remain single.

In my experience, there are lots of tiny windows of opportunity when you’re getting into or out of a relationship, and if you don’t take them when you see them, you’re screwed.

Anyone who breaks up on Valentine’s Day must be the most heartless beast in all the land. Seriously, a pox on your family. It’s equally monstrous to do it the day before, and doing it the day after or even during the month of, simply makes the day itself highly stressful. It’s unacceptable to be mean to your love on the most romantic day of the year. And if you’re too nice to them, then when you eventually do the deed it will be like a brick in the face, they won’t have seen it coming and you’ll look an awful lot like Pol Pot’s doppelgänger.

If you make it through February in one piece, the break-up window opens a crack in March, but you’d better get a move on because you absolutely can’t do it around Easter. Chances are you planned your Easter weekend away well in advance, and you’ll never get your deposit back now, so you may as well just man up and bear it.

You also can’t do it on or around April 1. Any break-up delivered then will be treated as a joke, and your partner will only like you more, because you have such a great sense of humour.

After that we’re into winter, and if ever one needed someone to snuggle up to it’s then. So hang tight until summer. Although people who do their breaking up at this time of year are as transparent as cling wrap. It’s obvious they’re just doing it so they can get out there and look for something better, in shorter shorts, or with a fatter wallet and a hotter tan. And that’s douche-baggery of the highest order.

And now that the world has shrunk into a global village, we also celebrate Guy Fawkes, Halloween, Thanksgiving and a host of other foreign holidays with such passion you’d think they were our birthright, which rules out October and November. Which leads us neatly into the holiday formerly known as Christmas, and now referred to as the festive season.

Nobody wants to be the person who spoils Christmas for someone forever, but the danger is, if you don’t get in before then, we roll back round to January, which is once again dangerously close to Valentine’s Day.

But be warned, holidays aren’t the only spanners in the breaker-upper’s works. Statistically, there’s likely to be a big event of some kind at least once a month in any couple’s calendar.

You can’t break up with someone before a wedding. The invites always go out months in advance, while things in your relationship are still awesome. So you plan your outfits, accommodation and the gift, and then there’s really no ducking out of it. Do you know what they charge per head at those things?

And if your recently ditched partner goes to the Hava Nagila without you, you don’t want to know the kind of bad press you’ll get. Guaranteed your ex will get tipsy on 12 glasses of cheap sparkly and bad-mouth you loudly through snot and tears. And because everybody loves the underdog, your friends and family will take your ex’s side. It’s really not the kind of dating PR any newly single person needs.

Also everyone has a birthday at some point, so there goes that month, and then there’s Mother’s Day and Father’s Day to navigate, and God help you if there’s a sudden death in the family, or if there’s a big parental anniversary coming up, then you’re out of luck too. Especially if it’s a 40-yearer and up. Those close the break-up window for at least a month on either side. Which will probably leave you staring down your anniversary month, and that’s a break-up no-go zone.

So choose your timing carefully, lovers. Because the world of dating is fraught with danger. Or perhaps my friend was right, and we’re better off steering clear of it altogether. Even if it does mean turning down free tequila.