Cock of the North
I met Meeester when I was twenty-three. That’s young I suppose, although for me, it felt like I’d waited ages to go out with someone who didn’t turn out to be a complete arse. I won’t go into who each of the aforementioned arses are; some are worthy of a blog post of their own, some have been the subject of a complete blog post of their own, and others I wouldn’t give them the satisfaction of having the steam off a complete blog post.
I don’t know how many women Meeester could write blog posts about, but I suspect it is many. About five years ago we holidayed in Scotland, which is something we don’t normally do, as it rains a lot and we already know the quirks of the locals and do not find them as cute as the quirks of foreigners. And the food is generally garbage and I could make that myself at home.
It was the summer of the birth of my daughter, the baby who was to become Junior Misssy, destroyer of freshly completed decor and devourer of expensive lipsticks. The babe in question, my son Indy, Meeester and I started our journey towards Mull, home of the prototype for the Highland midge, the beast that has seen more foreigners off our premises than the Picts. This was a wholesome family holiday if ever there was one. I’m not ashamed to say we were towing a caravan. One husband, two kids and a caravan- it’s like I had read a manual on how to be average.
It is a long way from Aberdeen to Mull; 154 miles to be exact. Then, if you factor in that we left Mull after three days because we couldn’t leave the caravan after 5.30pm for fear of being eaten alive, and went to Crieff, where the midge does not roam. That’s another 141 miles. Then, if you add the distance from Crieff to St Andrews, where the midge is seen off by the cold North Sea blast and posh ladies in tartan skirts with tearooms to run, and where we went to meet up with my sister and her family, that’s another 41 miles on top of that.
That’s a lot of miles, a lot of Scotland, and a lot of Scottish towns and villages for Meeester to make this comment as we went through them:
“I once saw a lassie from here.”
Aberfeldy: “I once saw a lassie from here…”
Auchtermuchty: “I once saw a lassie from here….”
Oban: “I once saw a lassie from here…..”
Glenrothes: “I once saw a lassie from here…..”
Perth: “I once saw a lassie from here….”
I’m sure we even did a detour north to Braemar just so that Meeester could say: “I once saw a lassie from here.”
The journey’s becoming like a Scottish A to Z of Meeester’s conquests. I’m seven years and two babies into my marriage at this point and town by town the “lassies” that have been before me are stacking up. I feel like I should have one of those clicker machines, but that Lynx deodorant advert won’t be out for another three years, so I don’t think of that. I keep count by carving binary numbers into my thigh with a Swiss Army knife.
On meeting up with my sister and her husband in St Andrews I tell them that we have been on a world tour of the hometowns of lassies that my husband, the newly crowned “Cock of the North” has “seen”, “gone out with” or “known”. All three in a Biblical sense, I’m certain.
I feel slightly like Warren Beatty’s wife.
Poor cow. At least I don’t have Madonna in that number.
Or DO I?? Meeester….!!!!?
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