*Names have been changed to hide identities …obviously.
Audio Quack (SKIP INTRO 2:00)
“Dating is a contact sport, expect to get hurt.”
When you come off the field a little bruised and confused, there is only one place to go – the locker room. There your friends will be waiting, equipped with advice for your next game play.
Friday night, the girl’s locker room was in Soho and was made up of Sausage and Iceberg Lettuce*. The topic was paying for dates, and Iceberg Lettuce had a story to tell on this matter. She had been invited on a dinner date with a lawyer and it was going very well…until the bill came. (See post here about bill splitting). The usual dance took place where she offered to spilt, and that’s when the lawyer gave her a choice;
If she wanted to see him again he’ll pay for dinner. If she didn’t want to see him again, then they will split.
“What an absolute arse,” Iceberg Lettuce said to the locker room. “Of course I was going to tell him I’ll see him again.”
Sausage then chipped in with some advice. “MUTE AND ARCHIVE!”
Sausage was referring to the action on WhatsApp; where you mute a person, and then hide them away in the archive folder. It’s less dramatic than blocking a person, but it’s ghosting all the same. Any time I come into the locker room with a boy issue, Sausage would yell, ‘MUTE AND ARCHIVE!”
Sometimes, all it takes is for the guy to send a bad emoticon.
🐩
“MUTE AND ARCHIVE!”
I’m not as feisty as Sausage, I have as much fight in me as an angry Little Mix song, so the idea of muting and archiving a human seems like an overly harsh game play.
“What happens if there is an emergency?” I said.
“Yeh, right. He’s fallen off a ladder, and the first person he’ll call is that chatterbox he had ONE date with,” Sausage said. Then, in a deliberate tone, repeated. “Mute…and…archive.”
Coming into the locker room from the field, is like someone shaking your shoulders, slapping you around the face, and telling you to ‘Wake the hell up!’
They’re not under any illusion of the guy you like. They don’t see what you see in Hot Henry. To them, he’s just Henry Smith – a bang-average bloke who works in Reading. This means they can have a practical opinion on the matter.
Once, a friend described a man I liked as ‘a derelict house that would take ten years to do up before it’s even liveable.’ She then added, “you don’t have ten years, Mary.”
Sometimes, the advice is given without any words. All they have to do is glare and their thoughts are crystal clear.
“You don’t understand. He does really like me, but he finds it hard to open up.”
*Glare*
“It was just a lunch…we’re just friends now, and that’s ok.”
*Glare*
“No, they have definitely broken up, they’re just living together because of financial reasons.”
*Glare*
The locker room is not always a productive space. We like to go round and round the same scenario, analysing it to its bone; How exactly did he say it – was it like a hello (casual), or a hello (delighted)? Who do you think he was texting? He posted a story at 23:24. Found his LinkedIn! What do you think he meant by, see you soon?
Meanwhile, the guy is happily munching toast on his sofa, unaware he’s being scrutinised and background checked by a group of women in All Bar One.
There comes a time in the locker room where one of the friends becomes deluded or ‘delulu’. She’s choosing the colour palette for her wedding, he doesn’t know the colour of her eyes. The job of the locker room is to bring the friend back down; like catching the string of a balloon before it floats off into crazy town.
Of course, the locker room won’t be fully honest. “He doesn’t want a second date because it’s terribly obvious that you’re ten years older than your photos Pippa.”
No, that won’t go well.
Instead the locker room will overload the self-esteem; “Katherine, you’re like the most beautiful person who has ever walked in Slough. You’re an independent woman with your very own job. #BOSSWOMAN. You can do waaaaaaay better than Rupert Balfour III. (Everyone knows that Katherine can’t do better than Rupert. Rupert is incredible).
And if that fails, and Katherine still thinks she can make Rupert fall in love with her, the anti-campaign is launched. Rupert owns an estate is a model/charity worker/firefighter and STILL, the locker room will find a weakness.
“He eats Weetabix for breakfast every single morning? What a psycho. Katherine, I think it’s time to MUTE….AND…. ARCHIVE….”
And then we send little Katherine back out onto the field.
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