Sixty months

Sunday, 8 February 2004

I'm just back from a lovely weekend in Co. Leitrim with Paradise, where we celebrated (today) our fifth anniversary. Yes, it was in 1999 - a miserable, sleety Monday morning in 1999, to be precise - that we acknowledged to each other that we appeared to be falling in love. (Be it noted that a February anniversary, although it does - in these latitudes - make for a rather chilly line in Romantic Strolls, is a gift when it comes to off-season hotel deals.)

I wrote in my Filofax that day: "9:30am - Fundamental and irrevocable alteration to the fabric of existence."

I don't buy into the Hollywood myth of The One - apart from anything else, it's way too monotheistic for my liking - but Paradise is without doubt a person with whom I will cheerfully spend the rest of my life, if such luck is granted me. He combines all the traits I've ever looked for in a partner, and manages to avoid all of the nasty elements to which I was more or less resigned before we got together.

Five reasons I'm proud to be associated with Paradise

1. He is sincere in his commitment to a creative and intellectual life.

2. He is warm and tolerant, and he gives the best hugs in the business.

3. He is one of the least boastful people you'll ever meet, despite having an enviable collection of achievements about which he could boast if he felt like it.

4. He has come through some very hard experiences without being hardened by them.

5. He has an unrivalled capacity to create a space in which it is safe to be me.

The last five years have been the best of my life. Here's to the next five!

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