HUNTING FOR LOVE AT 82!

After losing his wife of 55 years, he couldn’t imagine having another ‘chum’. But now, in a hilariously honest new book, HUNTER DAVIES reveals the joys and sorrows of dating again in a romantic adventure offering hope to lonely oldies everywhere

REACHING 80, I found a strange thing happening to me. I started boasting about my age. For most of the early part of my life I was rather embarrassed by being taken for someone much younger. It was one reason I grew a moustache — to make myself appear older. But once I reached 80 — on January 7, 2016 — I found myself constantly bringing it into the conversation: ‘I was talking first — don’t you know how old I am? Certainly I will have another bottle of Beaujolais — don’t you know how old I am?

‘Scuse me, I was at the top of this bus queue — don’t you realise how old I am?’ I will be unbearable if I ever reach 90.

Reaching 80 coincided with the death of my wife, the novelist Margaret Forster, after 55 years of marriage. I suddenly had to cope with being a widower, a single person living on my own, trying to manage all the domestic stuff I had never bothered to learn.

I had to get to grips with being old and on my own, an elderly person, no doubt about to fall to pieces, with all the aches and pains that age brings.

So many decisions I had to make, once my wife died — boring stuff like funerals, probate, wills, and then stuff that was personal and peculiar to me and Margaret. We had, for example, a house in the Lake District near where we grew up, where for 30 years we had lived half of each year.

What was I going to do with that? Could I possibly live there for any length of time on my own?

And my London home — the three-storey Victorian house that we had lived in since 1963 and where our three children were born and grew up. It seemed obscene to contemplate living in this large house full-time all on my own. Yet how could I bear to sell it and move somewhere smaller?

Just as unthinkable — could I possibly tolerate someone else living here with me? A lodger, a stranger, entering through my front door, striding through my house?

And then chums, a companion. What was I going to do without someone to talk to, confide in, shout at, argue with, have meals with, go on holidays with, just be with, at least now and again?

Obviously, I was thinking that a female companion would be most pleasurable, but would I feel guilty, ashamed, embarrassed? And anyway, how would I go about it, at my great age, after 55 years of marriage to the same person? And what would it feel like?

So those were the problems and challenges I faced, and the decisions I had to make, serious and trivial, passing and permanent, personal and yet universal — for there are people in similar situations all over the country, all over the world, going through roughly the same things.

This is how I personally solved them. More or less. ABOUT a year after Margaret died, friends started asking if I would get married again. I said no chance. Nor did I want to live with anybody.

I had my routines and didn’t want to change them. I had finally got into the rhythm of cooking for myself, and clearing up. I almost always remember the dustmen come on Tuesday and that all the rubbish has to be put in three separate bins. Oh, and that the milk gets delivered on Monday, Wednesday and Friday.

Having mastered so many amazingly complicated and technical processes, which I had never had to do before in 55 years of marriage, why would I want to change my life and throw away all these new-found skills?

Answer: it does get a bit lonely on your own.

I tried to analyse how I felt. On the whole I was not lonely in the house. Obviously, I missed someone to share all the trivia and idle chat and banal observations thrown up by the day, but I was fortunate in having my three children popping in all the time and so many good neighbours. I was rarely lonely for long.

YET, as the year went on, I did begin to think that, yes, a companion, a chum — that might be nice. And, of course, I was thinking of a lady chum.

I am male. I am human. I am attracted to women. I would like one to be able to join me when I feel most lonely — which usually happens on holiday. Or in bed.

I did have single women friends who were my age, and I loved them dearly. Jilly Cooper was one — someone I have known for decades and always love having lunch with.

But she made it clear, if not in so many words, that she was no longer interested in what I might be interested in. Her real passion in life appears to be her dogs.

‘But I am still interested in love,’ she said. ‘And if it happens, it happens.’

Another is Joan Bakewell, whom I have known and liked for about 40 years. She is a Dame now. Joan came for lunch, and we got on fine, as we always do, but I picked up that she, too, was not looking for a male companion.

She preferred to go on holiday with women friends. That part of her life was over. Not interested any more. Thanks for asking. In fact, she did not quite say thanks. And I did not actually propose anything. I like to think I was more subtle. Just finding out about her life at present.

I began to tell friends about the sort of person I would ideally like, who I might be looking for. Firstly, age: between 65 and 75, I would have thought — old, but not quite as old as me (I was then 81).

I would want them to have been married, and be either widowed or divorced. And ideally have their own family, their own house, their own interests and concerns, their own activities and pastimes.

When the first year after Margaret’s death was up, in February 2017, a newspaper asked me to write a piece about how it had gone, how I had coped with being on my own.

I wrote about the problems of cooking and trying to run the house, recounting things we had done together in our long married life. Then, at the end, I added one small paragraph saying that now I was thinking of looking for a suitable companion to do things with, listing some of the attributes I had identified.

The result was that in the next three days I got 61 proposals. I replied to a few and then gave up. But as the weeks went on, a surprising number of women whom I already knew, or who were friends of friends, contacted me. Of these, several sounded interesting.

Some were friends from my past, others were people I’d met at parties or social occasions, or at events such as book festivals. I suppose it came to about ten in all. And I found myself getting into the same sort of routine with each of them.

I invited them to have lunch with me, but not at my house. I thought that was not just presumptuous but also a right faff, having to do some proper cooking, which would involve thinking as well as preparing the meal.

What I did was invite them to my house at 12.30 for a drink. I gave them a glass of cheapo white wine and some smoked salmon sandwiches. It was a good, sunny summer so mostly we sat in the summerhouse, admiring my garden, idly chatting and catching up on each other’s lives.

I always hoped our tortoise would appear, which she mostly did. She proved a good talking point and mostly agreed to selfies.

I usually had a couple of soggy strawberries ready, which I would give my lady friend to feed to her.

I wondered what Margaret would have thought, looking down from on high, to see me with these ladies, being charming and entertaining. I like to think she would have been pleased and amused. And desperate to hear what happened next. If anything.

I felt no guilt about having all these women coming into my garden, and possibly into my life. Goodness knows what the neighbours thought. Or my children. But I did not tell them. I was too embarrassed. They might get the wrong impression.

Anyway, I am sure they did not want to know — too uncomfortable for them. I decided to work on the need-to-know principle, and they did not need to know.

After the summerhouse drink, we went out for lunch. I took them across the road, to an amusing bistro on the edge of Hampstead Heath, just five minutes’ walk away.

I know all the waiters and waitresses there as I go there most days for morning coffee. I am sure they were amused and intrigued to see me suddenly bringing a string of different women throughout that lovely summer.

I paid for the meal, refusing to divvy it up. It was my suggestion, my invite, my treat, they were my guests. After lunch, I saw them to the bus, or the Tube or the Overground. Perhaps a quick peck on the cheek or warm handshake. I never invited them back to my house after that lunch, not on a first date.

By the end of that year, I had ended up with about six regular lunch friends whom I met up with every month or so for chats, gossip and a catch-up. It was such fun, such a distraction, having all these nice women in my life. AT THE last count I have two daughters and four granddaughters. Most of my media contacts and friends are female. Surely, I must know a thing or two about women by now? Fat chance.

As the year went on, I could see history starting to repeat itself — or, at least, me being my old self. I could sense one or two of my new friends becoming slightly irritated with me when I was asking the same questions, not listening properly, not taking things in, such as dates and arrangements and phone numbers. Margaret used to shout at me, refusing to answer the same dopey questions, saying I had to think properly, she was not going to tell me again.

But I also came across new features and personal characteristics that were potentially problematic — new, at least, to me, such as vegetarians. While Margaret did not much like meat, she still made it for me, but it turned out that two of my new lady friends were total vegetarians.

I had not been aware of this when we first started meeting, but when they invited me back to their places it was all veg. Now, I do like vegetables, but I like them best when they accompany meat.

I also like salads, which vegetarians make all the time, but not very well. They go for tough, chewy salads, with very minimal salad dressing. Have you ever eaten raw kale? Ugh.

As for animal lovers, dear God! It was often hard to take when I found I had fallen among animal fans. So many women seem besotted with their pets, appearing to love them more than humans.

Margaret and I never had any animals, apart from the tortoise, and neither of us ever wanted any. But on a couple of occasions I went to stay with women whose lives seemed to revolve round their blessed animals, having to get up at five in the morning to feed their pigs, or go out and exercise their ponies, check their chickens had not been eaten.

Then they worried all day about the animals’ state of health, fretting if they appeared off colour or showed signs of some skin complaint, fussing about whether they should ring the vet. The vet was always a dear friend, a treasure, and yummy, and clearly they fancied him much more than they fancied me.

The ones with domestic animals, dogs and cats, allowed indoors, they were worse. Cats have catflaps and go their own way, going in and out, minding their own business, apart from bringing dead and smelly birds to you when you are naked in the shower. But dogs are doted upon, the true love hearts of single ladies of a certain age.

They always maintain at first that they never let their dog into the house or, at least, upstairs, and certainly not into the bedroom. So don’t worry, it won’t happen. All lies.

While I was visiting one animal-loving friend, her old dog took a fancy to me. In the middle of the night he pushed open the bedroom door, came in staggering and wheezing, then got into bed beside me.

I kicked him as hard as I could, forced him out of the bed, hoping the lady of the house did not hear the barks and yelps and the solid thud of his body hitting the floor.

OBSESSIVE

tidiness, that was another new trait that was hard to get to used to. Our house always looked clean, but it wasn’t really, just colourful and attractive. There was dust and still is behind everything, peeling wallpaper, damp patches, all the windows need painting. But did we care? Did we heck.

Margaret was very tidy and clean in herself, but she was as uninterested as I was in having the whole house painted every year, as some of our neighbours do. We told ourselves we had other more important concerns, such as our work.

So going into a house where the first thing you are told is shoes off, coat off, that was a bit of a shock. I once put my rucksack on a chaise longue, in the hall just behind the front door, and my hostess immediately flew down the hall to pick it up, as if I had brought in a bomb.

All weekend I felt scared that I would ruin something, just by my presence — use a towel that wasn’t meant for me, or sit in a chair that was valuable or somehow sacred and not for sitting on.

One woman watched me brush my teeth in her bathroom, then bustled me aside and made a huge palaver of washing the sink as if I had the plague. I was scared to breathe, far less sit down anywhere, least of all on her bed in my outdoor clothes.

But then, I am very untidy. I

always leave clothes lying around, the lavatory seat up — or is it down? I can never remember what you are not supposed to do.

When I had a return match, when she came to stay with me, I dreaded her seeing the state of my carpets and curtains, paintwork and sinks. One of my women friends even put on an apron, after we had been having a very nice quiet afternoon rest, and started scrubbing all the floors. Ye gods! SO WHErE did it all lead? That frantic, hectic, madly social, unexpectedly exciting year? Well, quite a few fell silent. Or I fell silent. I began to think I might not meet the fantasy woman of my waking dreams after all.

And then, tarrah tarrah, hurrah hurrah, oh joy and jubilation, I did. She is a young woman of 70, so spot- on age- wise, with her own house, grandchildren and interests, someone I was first in contact with 30 years ago through work. We used to meet regularly for lunch, just for work reasons, and we always got on well.

She was one of the many who wrote to me after Margaret died. I remembered her name, and remembered liking her, but I could not quite recall what she looked like.

I put off suggesting a meeting with her for several months, as I was so busy, then we met up again, on neutral territory, just to catch up.

It took me a while to gain her confidence, as I stupidly confessed to her I had been meeting several women in the previous few months, all platonic, just looking for a chum. But now I knew she was the one, I was sure of it, and I would see no others.

We now meet each week, either at her house or mine. She has a full life, looking after her grandchildren, and lots of interests and friends.

We get on so well, in every way. She is not a replacement for Margaret, how could she be? She is totally different, but she is exactly what I was hoping for, looking for, longing to happen.

I found her just in time. She recently told me that before we met up again, when she was still aged 69 and a half, she had decided that at the age of 70 she would get a dog. That would be her companion from now on. When we meet up now, I go around saying woof woof.

I like to think I will die happy, with no regrets — well, nothing I can remember or would be worth mentioning if I could. John Betjeman, when asked what he regretted when he was dying, said he wished he had had more sex. At some stages in my life I have thought that, but now, no, I don’t think that will be the case.

I am so happy to have a companion to do occasional things with, share things with. I have got rather carried away with my love, my girlfriend, my companion and my chum, booking up events for up to six months ahead, places we will go, holidays we have booked, plane tickets bought.

What if we fall out — or fall ill? Am I being presumptuous or premature and tempting fate? At my age I feel I can’t mess around, so I want to see her as often as I can. I have too little time left to waste time.

recently, I drew up a list of reasons that I am cheerful — one for each year of my life. The first is that I am here. The last is my late luck — having found a companion to do things with, go places, have meals, holidays — and who will be with me for the rest of my life. However long or short it lasts.