The new rescue horse arrived. She’s a Mini Me of Swirly: dark brown, but with two white socks. The woman driving the horse box, a volunteer for the Blue Cross, let down the ramp and I saw Beauty for the first time: huge dark eyes looking around, deeply worried. ‘Where am I? What’s going to happen to me?’
I feel so sorry for horses, their lives entirely dependent on who owns them. She tiptoed down the ramp while Swirly, in her stable, eyes on stalks, was craning her elegant neck for a sniff. They spent the night in the stables, just to settle, before Nic and I turned them out on our 26 hilly acres the next morning, along with Quincy, Nic’s boy horse. Swirly was a star: she kept herding Beauty away from Quincy, getting in between the excited, bucking hooves. I’ve had Swirly for ten years and in that one day she grew up: she knew she had to look after everyone, be in charge, the matriarch.
I sent my new pen friend a short video of them galloping. When I had sent a video of Swirly whinnying to the B*****d, this was his response: ‘Nice.’
Nice? Nice?
My pen friend’s response?
‘That all looks gorgeous. The beautiful Yorkshire countryside with your horses scampering about. Ruined abbeys are pure Brontë country. You would never have known Beauty once broke her foot, but adversity has worked in her favour: she has a nicer life now. I think it’s laudable you treat the horses just like family pets, like your dogs. That they don’t have to do anything. There’s a lot to be said for not having to do anything.’
He tells me he has taken early retirement, has access to a trust fund and drives a new car. He goes to see plays, films, all the new exhibitions. He is sympathetic towards my PTSD: ‘Without that, The Catcher in the Rye would never have been written.’
I have no idea what he looks like, though he has sent me a photo of his cat (also in the shot are piles of books. I zoom in: many of the titles sit on my shelf) and what he calls his art nouveau immersive: a painting, the Dancer Alexander Sacharoff by his favourite expressionist, Marianne von Werefkin. ‘Werefkin was the most androgynous of the artists. Gender fluid, she considered herself to be of no particular sex, or of both sexes simultaneously. This is in 1909. She neatly anticipated what is happening now, 100 years ahead of her time.’
I’ve been invited to see a friend not far from where he lives, so ask if he would like to come along, as I know it’s someone he has already told me he deeply admires. You see, I’m already arranging things, when no one sets up anything for me. It’s like a disease.
Him: ‘This is incredibly exciting. I’ve been in a head spin, but I’m old enough to know now how to ground myself. Thanks for this. The only day I can’t do is 9 April. You’re the girl!
‘PS, I’ve just seen Anora. Not for me. Demi was robbed!’
He says he’s planning numerous gallery visits, just to have interesting stuff to say to my famous friend. ‘Don’t worry,’ I tell him. ‘We mainly talk about men and cats.’
To prove I’m not a fantasist, I send him a photo of her and me together at a party. I look OK, even before the new Turkey teeth: I’m in Victoria Beckham bodycon under an Alexander McQueen jacket. He replies, ‘That’s a gorgeous picture. Can I ask how tall you are? I may have to buy platform shoes.’
That’s quite forward, isn’t it?
Would he ask a potential friend, someone he finds intellectually stimulating (though if I sent him a photo of my bookshelf, I’d have to blot out all the Jill Has Two Ponies, Jill Enjoys Her Ponies and David Cassidy biogs), how tall they are? There is no guarantee a man won’t flirt, despite being old, bald and fat. I know from bitter experience men are unafraid to aim high, while the whole time dating the German I’d been thinking, ‘How can he possibly be interested in me? He’s so handsome! I need a six-foot Christmas tree in my hotel suite to make him fancy me!’
Anyway, I tell my pen friend how tall I am. ‘Phew,’ he replies. ‘Ditto*.’
*He knows I love Patrick Swayze