Norq From Ork

Orkney Beef and I can often be the proverbial ships that pass in the night. He works 12 hour shifts for a week at a time, and in the evenings one of us becomes nominated taxi driver for general ferrying round of teenage son. Then there’s evening meetings, committees, clubs and so on.  So all things considered, there remains little time for conversation,  wWhich is why I was delighted that we were going to be in the same place on Monday for a whole hour in the middle of the day. I suggested we meet for lunch, which never gets turned down with Orkney Beef which gave us a full sixty minutes of attending to nothing else but the company of my beloved. I know the secret to a happy marriage.

The universe had other ideas.

My morning starts running unavoidably late until eventually, I end up phoning Orkney Beef and telling him I’ll be there but could he go ahead and order for me. I’d be about 15 minutes late. Lunch hour conversation is now reduced to 45 minutes, it’s fine, it’s salvageable.  I drive through to the cafe and get stuck behind two buses and a tractor. What is this Orkney rush hour? So I end up arriving half an hour later than planned. Now 30 minutes late, but we can still have thirty minutes conversation. I go in, sit down, apologise for my lateness because, you know, buses, tractors etc and he looks at me and says ‘I have to get this eaten and get out of here. Work has phoned something’s come up, I have to go‘ so he wolfed down his food and left me eating. Grand total of time together. 9 minutes. Total of time conversing whilst he wasn’t mainlining food and giving himself indigestion. 2 minutes.

It cost us twenty quid.

We are now ships that pass in the day. It’s the sign of a happy marriage.  We never argue.  We are never in a room long enough to. And that my friends, is the secret to a happy marriage.