Relationships at Law and More

Law and More is pleased to announce a new weekly column on relationships written by well-known blogger Ms Robinson. Ms Robinson will be giving us her witty, thoughtful and insightful take on modern relationships.

Ms Robinson is a professional writer and author. At 22 she lived with a man who was 45. She realized she had to leave when they were asked to a sixties party and he said he’d been there. Already. At 32, she met a tall blonde, tanned man on a beach and married him. She has since unmarried him and they are now best friends. While she prefers her own relationships to happen by surprise she understands that some people like their lives a little more certain. Each week she’ll be giving us the benefit of her experience on affairs, dating, the etiquette of threesomes, the perils of texting and more.

He didn't call. And neither should you

A lack of qualifications in digital electronics has not prevented Ms Robinson knowing that staring at your phone will not make someone call. While some women realise this is a good time to slink away with their dignity intact, there are many who see it as a signal to advance further onto what has now become shaky ground. The plan seems to be that if they continue to relentlessly call, text and email they will remind their date how wonderful they are because, somehow, he must have forgotten. How did that happen? Oh yes, he had such a good time he got early onset Alzheimers. See where I’m headed? Don’t make me hit you over the head with it.

One acquaintance of Ms Robinson’s could not believe she was not getting a second date and invoked the Law of What Happens in the Movies as her get out clause insisting that something must have happened to her date for him not to call. The chances that he, like Deborah Kerr in An Affair to Remember, had been knocked over and was now languishing in the corridor of some NHS hospital pining for her were pretty much nil.

There are many reasons why a meeting seemingly packed full of all the essential ingredients –laughter, sex, mutual love of cats - may not result in another. Here are some of them:

He suddenly remembers he’s married
His girlfriend is back from holiday tomorrow
He’s testing the market to see what else is out there before he jumps from his current relationship
He’s trying out women who aren’t his usual type
He went home and realised he had a type and you were not it
You reminded him of his last girlfriend
He thinks it might ruin the friendship
His friends told him not to
He decided you would be too good for him since he is a bastard
He likes you too much already and he’d feel bad going out with other people because you are so nice
He didn’t like you in the first place but he figured he’d get laid. He did and now he’s off to do it again
You said ‘us’

It was one date. Ok maybe two. It wasn't a contract. You can’t – I repeat – can’t control what anyone else thinks or why they think it. Sometimes in life, sh** happens. And frankly at this early stage, this isn’t sh**. It’s just dating.

Ms Robinson 2009.