looming ever closer

Last Wednesday, the 25th, marked 13 months exactly until the wedding.


Last night I had a wedding-related nightmare.

Ugh, I know. I feel ridiculous even saying it. I feel even more ridiculous that it wasn't even my first wedding-related dream, although to be fair the first one was months ago and nowhere near as upsetting. That just involved my slow realisation that my dress was not my dress as I was wearing it, and also forgetting to put my makeup on before leaving the house, so trying to frantically do it in the car outside the church, but discovering I'd left my makeup bag at home.


You may notice a theme, as the dream I had last night involved us - and that's everyone at the wedding - forgetting to go to the reception. That's right. In my dream we got married, and were having a party in this blank, soulless room, and I found myself thinking "Why is the atmosphere so flat? Why is no-one more excited?"

And then I rationalised with myself, in my pragmatic dream way. "It must just be because you've been building it up in your head for so long, expecting it to be this amazing event, and it's to be expected that it isn't going to live up to all that in reality." So I was a little disappointed, but soldiered on.

But! On the drive home, I realised exactly why everything had felt so lame. Somehow all of us - every single person there - had forgotten to go to our reception venue. I got very upset, insisted that we try and go back and actually use the venue. But it was too late, the day was over, and no-one would let us go and do it again. I was somewhat distraught.

I think I must have woken up slightly at this point and gone back to sleep again, because the next thing I knew we were at our actual venue and having an amazing reception, and not only that but they'd laid on this amazing entertainment for us that involved acrobats and clowns and glitter confetti. I think my subconscious was trying to apologise for upsetting me.


But yes, my knowledge of myself and my family has built into me this innate belief that something, something integral will be forgotten and we'll have to turn around to go get it, or we'll realise way too late and just have to carry on. Obviously this has swelled in my mind to express itself in forgetting to even attend the wedding, but that perhaps just demonstrates exactly how sure my subconscious is that I'll forget something on the day, despite my Spreadsheet Of Doom, and despite whatever ghastly checklist I'll set up for myself for the week before. All I can really hope to do is liberally distribute copies of this list to my nearest and dearest and hope that they're paying attention, which is not, in reality, their strong suit when it comes to organising things. I appear to be something of an aberration in my immediate family in terms of my desire to have clear plans well in advance. (okay yes I don't necessarily manage to follow them super well, but that is just another reason for my subconscious to flail until the day arrives).

I can only hope these dreams don't get more frequent, and more involved as we get closer to the date!



Did any of you have wedding nightmares? Did they come true?

12 Months Served

So, yesterday marked 1 year since Jon proposed to me. I'm a little shocked by how quickly it's gone, which I'm fully aware sounds trite and cliched, but in my defence, we did move house over the Summer, so that basically knocked about three months straight out of the Calendar.

Of course, when I say 'yesterday', I actually mean Sunday 15th, which from where I'm sitting as I'm writing now (Wednesday 11th) is four days away. I'm telling you this, and thus removing the air of mystery from my blog posts, because I know I'm going to get my timelines all muddled up at some point, so I figured full disclosure from the outset was probably best.

(I've also been up since 4:30am to drop Jon at the airport, and so I've been up for like 5 hours and it's not even 10am, and I've been in work for three hours, except I couldn't get into the building until 7:00am so I sat in the car park for an hour before that, and I hurt my foot opening a door like an hour and a half ago and it's still sore, so this might not be very coherent at all. But let's just have fun with it.)

Now, I spend a lot of time skulking around over on the forums at Weddingbee, which are nice and active. (I actually found them because Jon spent time lurking on there trying to get tips on engagement rings in the run up to our engagement - ever the academic, putting hours of research in!) There is a huge subsection of this forum dedicated to people who are 'waiting' to be engaged. This is not a concept that I had ever come across prior to Weddingbee, and I will admit I'm still not sure on what people mean when they say they've been "waiting for x number of years". Is that how long it's been since they and their partner talked about getting married one day? Or is it the length of the whole relationship? And if it's the length of the whole relationship, does that mean that they've literally been waiting for their partner to propose since their first date? What about just enjoying the relationship? Does it not count in its own right? Is it literally all about getting married?

I'd rather hoped society had moved past the idea that all women need is a husband, doesn't matter who, by now. And that relationships were all equally valid whether they were legally certified or not, so 'waiting' was a redundant concept, that was demeaning to both parties involved, and seemed to be tragically reminiscent of eras long gone.


But I'm getting off-topic. My point is that I wasn't one of those girls who was constantly expecting a proposal. In fact, to say that the proposal was unexpected feels too mild, too understated to describe exactly the state of mind I was in when it happened. I was so set and comfortable in my life and relationship as was, and I don't take surprises very well at all, so my reaction was definitely less-than-dignified.

 

Fortunately Jon knows me well enough not to take my reactions personally, and also to know that I am easily distracted by shiny things so the beautiful ring he chose helped very much to take my mind off my anxieties from time-to-time.

Because by god I was anxious. I'd had this sudden change in status thrust upon me with no preparation, no warning! Jon had been planning for months, he had some idea, but me? I was entirely passive in this situation - a victim of a drive-by proposing! Shell-shocked and unbalanced, and utterly panicked.

How can I explain it? There were multiple issues at play. Firstly anxieties about this sudden 'change' in our relationship. It was silly because I knew I was committed to this man and had no desire to leave him, but suddenly getting a ring made it all seem very official and public. Another cause of anxiety was that I dreaded people commenting on it - I wasn't expecting bad comments at all, but we've kept our relationship very low-key and downplay it a lot. We're totally different people in private, honestly we're obnoxious, but in public we're much more reserved - which is how I think it should be! The private parts of my relationship are like my underwear: essential, always there, supportive and something that I'll invest in, but just as I'll never be comfortable showing my lovely matching bra-and-knickers off in public, the idea of making this part of our relationship public property for however long it took for the excitement to blow over made me want to squirm. Whilst I'm certain I'd probably get some compliments on my underwear (set I'm wearing provided - I have, if I may say so, excellent taste, but not necessarily the money to indulge it), I'm not about to run it up the flagpole and see who salutes; so knowing that we'd only get good reactions to our engagement didn't make me any keener to shout it from the rooftops.

Another issue was perhaps this inbuilt fear of aging and that getting married required a level of maturity I did not possess. The 'reasons I'm not mature enough to get married' strips are only the tip of the iceberg. Marriage has always felt like a 'some time in the future' sort of thing, when I felt like I'd achieved the fabled status of 'Grown Up'. I still feel like I don't know what's happening half the time. I struggle to keep on top of my laundry. I like pick-and-mix way too much, and I get frustrated at museums when little kids hog all the interactive displays and I can't have a go. Jon can always tell when I've been watching TV during the day because he comes home and it's set to a cartoon channel. I got annoyed when kids pushed in front of me in the queue at Disneyland so I didn't get to meet Belle, because when I got to the front of the queue they swapped her out for Beast - if I have to queue, why don't they? (I'm also compiling a lengthy list on why I'm not mature enough to ever reproduce, but we'll get to that later)

 But also the terrifying thing about 'some day' becoming 'today' means that all the things that previously followed 'some day' in a vague way are now in front of me in an inevitable timeline that has made me staggeringly aware of my own mortality and how quick life disappears in front of us, something which I had been comfortably denying to myself for years. Basically, now I'm going to grow old and die and it's all Jon's fault.

Part of my motivation for starting The W Word in the first place was because I felt frustrated that in the midst of this anxiety, all I could find were posts about how wonderful and amazing it was to be engaged (which yes, it is nice) and women who were giddy and happy and laughed and shrieked and danced. Not women who swore and got drunk and hid their ring in their bag when they first went back to work after the proposal because they didn't want people to see and say something. I know there are other girls out there who have felt engagement anxiety and GUYS: YOU'RE NOT ALONE. Wedding culture can easily make anyone with doubts and nerves feel like an alien or an outsider (unless you're a man, in which case it seems to be expected and nigh on encouraged) I wanted to do this post because I'd felt a bit like my initial reason for this had been lost in the year since the engagement, because my anxieties about being engaged have settled, but my motivation was to help other people facing this.


I perhaps didn't deal with my anxieties in the healthiest way. I acknowledged them, and then I forced myself to push out of my comfort zone, anxieties be damned. Like tearing off a plaster. What helped though was the realisation that nothing had changed between Jon and I. We didn't have to start treating each other differently, we didn't magically feel different because suddenly I had some bling. Nor, fundamentally, did my relationship with the world at large change. And continuity is a lovely calming thing.

Now, I know myself, and I know that the closer we get to the big day the more likely I am to have a bit of an anxiety flare-up. And not in a cute, demure blushing bride sort of way. More like in a climbing out of the bathroom window and running for the hills sort of way.

But I'm talking about it - and talking helps, even if I'm just cracking jokes. Because that means I'm not just bottling it all up and letting the pressure build and build until I pop.


This post ended up in a totally different place from what I had initially, vaguely planned in my sleep-deprived brain.

Did anyone else suffer from Engagement Anxiety? If you have, how did you overcome it? Have you overcome it yet? This is a safe space!

literary couples with healthy relationships

After the drama and depression of my last three posts, I felt a nice epilogue would be to celebrate the couples in literature who it would actually be super to have a relationship like.

Claire's Guide to Awesome Fictional Relationships which Get It Right

 Jane Bennet and Mr Bingley (Pride and Prejudice)

Okay, so Elizabeth and Mr Darcy are of course my OTP4EVA, and also not too bad in the healthly relationship stakes really, but Bingley and Jane get it so right all the time and are just about the loveliest and fluffiest of all couples ever that they need to be appreciated.

In that gif right there, see that? See the size of Mr Bingley's grin? How it even makes grumpy Mr Darcy smile a bit? That is because Bingley is the HAPPIEST MAN ON THE PLANET. He has so much love and joy in him that he is basically the closest a human being will ever come to being a puppy. And he falls in love, from the very beginning, with Jane, because she is sweet and beautiful and ladylike, and he falls even more in love with her because she is so kind and gentle. And she falls in love with him because he's kind and generous and enthusiastic and happy and gentlemanly, and all those good things.

And rather than trying to force things or rush things so she can 'trap' a rich man into marriage, Jane instead lets things progress naturally, doesn't fake anything, and Bingley isn't discouraged at all - not even having met her disaster of a family. Until everyone else tells him she obviously doesn't like him. But does he kill himself? Does he lollop about the place? Nope, he continues to be very much as he is, polite and lovely. He even manages to still be polite and happy to see Jane again, even though he's hurt. 

And the same for Jane - all she does is wish him well, and all she does is look for good in the people around her.

The thing that makes them even happier as well, is how much happiness their relationship gives other people. It's like a feedback loop of love and happiness, and it's wonderful. Look at them sneaking peeks at each other during their wedding. It's the cutest thing ever. (And yes we are only considering gifs from the BBC adaptation because the 2005 movie is so many kinds of wrong I can't even start)

See also: Elinor and Edward, from Sense and Sensibility.

See also also: this gif is making me laugh so much.

Noddy and Henrietta Boffin (Our Mutual Friend)

Ah the Boffins. Noddy and Henrietta. When we meet them, they've been married for many years. They were poor, worked on the dust heaps - piles of poo and rubbish, to you and I - as servants to a miser who dies at the start of the book. When his son, John Harmon, is found dead, they inherit all his money. And it's a fair amount of money. But their ambitions?

"...a good house in a good neighbourhood, good things about us, good living, and good society. I say, live like our means, without extravagance, and be happy."

And a desire to adopt an orphan boy to raise as their own, to benefit from their new wealth and to care for, as they have no children. And to make amends to Bella Wilfer - John Harmon's bethrothed, who they have never met, but whose money they now have. These are good people, starkly aware of their good fortune and wishing to share it with others, and begrudge nothing.

They move out of the dust heap. The night before they leave, Henrietta becomes scared by visions she's having of Ex-Mr Harmon, and his son who they cared for as a boy. Noddy comforts her, takes her around the whole place with a lantern until she is satisfied. But even though she can still see the ghosts, she takes comfort from her husband.

"Opening her eyes again, and seeing her husband's face across the table, she leaned forward to give it a pat on the cheek, and sat down to supper, declaring it to be the best face in the world."

The whole story is filled with relationships built on deception, disapproval and violence. It's easy, particularly when watching adaptations, to become cynical about romance and anyone living happily ever after when, in Dickens' trademark style, all the characters are so flawed! But, as a constant through the whole novel, the Boffins are there to remind you that happy marriages do exist, and are so generous and happy and giving in every way that it's a relief when they appear.

See also: Mr and Mrs Micawber in David Copperfield.



Benedick and Beatrice (Much Ado About Nothing)

If we must go Shakespearean, how about a couple that have a relationship that lasts more than a total of 96 hours, and who have both completed puberty?

Beatrice and Benedick have known each other for years, we're given to understand, and match wits every chance they get in their "merry war". Both eschew marriage and love, but despite professing to hate each other seem to seek each other out to bicker with whenever they get the chance. They're friends in their own funny little way.

It takes their friends manufacturing situations where they each hear the other is in love with them to get them to realise their feelings, but when they do it's clear they've been building for a while.

Benedick tells her, "I love nothing in the world so much as you, is that not strange?", and Beatrice replies "I love you with so much of my heart that none is left to protest." Compare that to Tristan, who even under a love potion still had space in him to complain about loving Isolde. And much like Elizabeth and Mr Darcy, once all confusions are cleared up they leap right in there.

To me this story is perfect - ignoring the ridiculous sexism and mistrust which come from the Hero-Claudio aspect of the play, Benedick and Beatrice to me are a wonderful romance. Matched in belief and wit, and knowing each other as well as they do. Just looking for gifs from various productions of this play has given me all sorts of warm, squirmy, fuzzy feelings inside. It's wonderful.

See also: I don't know, Shakespeare didn't have many un-messed up relationships. I'm a sucker for The Taming of the Shrew, but even I know that that's not particularly healthy.

So there you go, every time someone mentions a stupid literary relationship, you can now counter with a ready-prepared selection of wonderful literary relationships.

a love that will go down in history - part 3

For previous parts, go here:
Part one: Romeo and Juliet, Cathy and Heathcliffe, and Bonnie and Clyde
Part two: Anthony and Cleopatra, Samson and Delilah, and Lancelot and Guinevere

And now...

Claire's Guide to Bad Fictional and Historical Relationships 

(Part the Third)

Helen and Paris

Ah, the face that launched a thousand ships and that other guy. 

This continues quite nicely from the last set of relationships as, yes that's right kids, one of them was married to someone else, and by getting it on they started a war. 

Oh, but let's not get overly sentimental here. Let's look at the REASON they got together. 

So, the Gods go to this wedding, right, and there's a massive feast, and Eris, Goddess of Spite, decides that she wants to mess with the other girls, because she's not been invited - largely because she's a total buzzkill. So she chucks this golden apple onto the middle of the table, inscribed 'to the fairest'. It's like the extreme version of the bouquet toss. Three Goddesses reach for it - Athena, Aphrodite and Hera. You can imagine that none of these women is the type to just back down. 

They turn to Zeus, king of the Gods, and demand that he decide. Now, he might be a jerk but he's not stupid - he's not going to pick between his wife, his daughter, and his daughter-in-law-who-he-wants-to-bone - so he tells them to go ask Paris. Paris was hanging out on a mountain being a shepherd, because a priest had told his parents that he would be the downfall of Troy, and that he should be killed. But they couldn't do that. So he got dumped on this mountain.

So they go. And of course they all try to bribe their way to victory - Hera offers Paris the chance to be king of Europe and Asia; Athena offers him wisdom and skill in war; and Aphrodite, clearly knowing her audience, offers him the love of the most beautiful woman in the world. Which Paris takes, because you know, why go for something practical when you could be having sex?

Paris decides that he wants Helen without ever having met her, just knowing she's mega-hot. Helen gets NO SAY IN THIS AT ALL.

Here's the thing that Aphrodite didn't mention, or probably care that much about. The most beautiful woman in the world is Helen, Zeus' daughter (conceived whilst he was a swan, with the Queen of another country, yeah myths are fun). And she is married. To the King of Sparta. 

Yes, that's right, Sparta. You know.

 Interesting point: You'll notice that Sparta is landlocked. In the film 'Troy', amongst its other crimes against cinema, Helen and Paris escape by boat. So they are not good at Geography, along with History, Mythology and scriptwriting.

So Paris decides to kidnap her - whilst visiting Sparta on a diplomatic mission no less! - and takes her back to Troy (maybe using a boat at some point, but not climbing out of a window and down cliffs directly into a boat like in the movie because COME ON). And naturally, Menelaus, her husband, is a bit narked about all this. 

Oh, but here's the kicker. Because Helen was so beautiful, and all her suitors were so powerful, her (adoptive) Father made all her suitors swear loyalty to whomever he chose as her husband. So not only did he upset SPARTA, but he also had basically every army in Greece coming after him because of this oath.

Thus begins the Iliad. At first, Paris tries to fight it out with Menelaus because he realises he's made a bit of a cockup, politically speaking, but Menelaus hands his ass to him and Aphrodite whisks him away before he gets turned into a Paris of a different gender. Transported back to his bedroom where Helen is, Aphrodite then forces - that's right forces - Helen to be with him, after she is shot by one of Eros' arrows.

Things suck a bit for Helen - she's gone from being Queen of a country that was pretty stellar for Women's Rights, to being forced to shack up with a rubbishy little prince who spent his entire life living on a mountain and staging bullfights for money.

And this war? Lasted like 9 years. And it was a siege, so she couldn't even exactly go on day trips, she was trapped in the city with this little oik for 9 years. And over the course of it basically everybody died. It was a mess.

And then Paris gets killed towards the end of the war, but does that end it? Oh no! Can't let Helen go back to her husband now, it's a matter of principle! Nope, instead they marry her off to one of Paris' brothers instead. Just, y'know, whatever.

After all this, the Greeks pull the Trojan Horse thing, get inside, and just wreck the place. Like murdering and raping basically everyone, and chucking babies off the city walls and everything. It's not nice. Not nice at all. There are mixed stories as to where Helen stood during this - The Odyssey says she tortured the Greek soldiers by mimicking the voices of their wives back home; The Iliad says she performed Bacchic rites with the Trojan women. The Aeneid says that she hides her new husband's sword (Paris' brother, remember), so that he gets hacked to bits by her actual husband and is unable to defend himself, which is terribly Spartan of her. 

Menelaus finds her, and is about to kill her, but instead she drops her clothes and he realises that she's too beautiful to kill. So back to Sparta she goes! 

The lesson here: Consent is important, kids! Or it could get messy!

Alternative lesson: When all else fails, just get your boobs out and it will probably be fine.

Body Count: Easily in the hundreds of thousands, plus lots of rapes and other such funtimes.

Gatsby and Daisy

Wow, okay, so, I'm hoping - like seriously hoping - that most people who have read 'The Great Gatsby' know that it really isn't a romance. Like really really. The only reason I'm including this is because I saw it on one of those stupid keepsake wedding frames with the lists of names, I mentioned in post 1 and I was so horrified that I felt it needed to be addressed.

So, Gatsby is this mysterious and extremely wealthy guy who throws all these really hedonistic parties in his huge manor house. And who is totally obsessed with this woman who he dated for a bit in 1917. Who is married to another man and has a kid.

And I mean like SUPER obsessed. Creepy stalker obsessed. His whole lifestyle, his money and his parties are all just to get her to pay attention to him - he followed her to where she lived and bought the house across the bay from her so he could stare creepily at her house from his garden.

THAT IS NOT WHAT NORMAL PEOPLE DO WHEN THEY LIKE SOMEONE, GATSBY.

Anyway, Gatsby gets his new neighbour, Nick, handily Daisy's cousin, to invite Daisy over so they can 'meet by chance'. Lo and behold, they start having an affair. Marvellous! But it's okay, because Daisy's husband, Tom, is also having an affair. So, tit for tat and their child is going to grow up with no issues whatsoever because it's not like either of them is actually near it for long enough to influence it in any way at all.

And then Daisy and Tom and Gatsby and Nick and this woman called Jordan, who Nick is supposed to be dating but doesn't seem to like all that much, all have tea together and Tom realises Daisy and Gatsby are having an affair. So he forces them all to drive to New York, and rents out a really expensive hotel suite and insists they get drunk and it's all super awkward when he confronts Gatsby, claiming that he and Daisy have a history, and also that Gatsby is a criminal who made his money through bootlegging. And Nick and Jordan are just like wuuuuut.

Suddenly Daisy realises that maybe actually her loyalties lie with her husband after all, but Tom sends her and Gatsby packing to prove that Gatsby can't do anything to him, because Daisy doesn't really love him. Except of course they're all drunk, so this can only end badly. And it does! With Tom's mistress getting run over by Gatsby's car as she attempts to leave her own husband and come and see Tom.

(from the 1949 movie of the book, which is clearly the best movie ever)

Well, that's kinda shitty, right? It get worse. Daisy was driving the car that hit poor old Myrtle up there, but Gatsby takes the fall for her. Tom, still narked at Gatsby, tells Myrtle's husband that Gatsby killed her, and Mr Myrtle promptly marches up to Gatsby's house and shoots him whilst he's chillaxing in his pool, because he also thinks that Gatsby was the one schtupping his wife, rather than Tom. Mr Myrtle kills himself too.

No-one turns up for Gatsby's funeral, and Daisy goes back to Tom where they can now concentrate their joint efforts on wrecking their child.

Body Count: 3. Which for a novel that's only 218 pages is pretty high.



Tristan and Isolde

You knew this relationship was going to end badly from the very start - Wagner wrote an opera about it, so clearly it wasn't going to end in hundreds of sprogs and fluffy bunnies ever after. And also being that it was Wagner and not any other composer, you kind of knew that it was just going to be an awful lot of Not Very Good Bad Awful Things right up until the death as well. Because, you know, Wagner.

This whole shebang starts when Isolde's fiance goes off and gets himself killed by Tristan. Isolde is naturally a bit upset about this. Then she stumbles over this guy who's been mortally wounded and cares for him, until she discovers that it's Tristan. She tries to kill him, but can't actually do it, so instead sends him packing with a flea in his ear, and makes him swear he'll never come back.

So obviously he comes back. And kidnaps her to take to Cornwall so his Uncle, King Marke, can marry her. Because some people just don't know how to return a favour.

Needless to say, Isolde is a bit narked about the whole thing, and makes a fuss the whole journey from Ireland to Cornwall. She keeps demanding that Tristan come see her and apologise, and he keeps sending snotty messages back. In the end, she refuses to get off the ship until Tristan comes to "drink atonement to her". Whilst she's passing this message on via her maid, Brangäne, she also discloses that she reason she wants Tristan to drink with her is so she can slip him a large dose of some nasty poison she brought along with her for just such an occasion, which her maid is more than a little shocked about.

Brangäne convinces Tristan to come down, and prepares the drinks for them. Both Isolde and Tristan drink, Isolde taking half of the potion as well, intending to kill herself. But uh-oh, what's this? Brangäne, redefining drink spiking in her own special way, has switched the poison with a potion that causes immediate and relentless love.

And then they arrive in Cornwall! Where Isolde is to be married! To Tristan's Uncle!

Naturally, of course, Tristan and Isolde sneak around behind everyone's backs and have their affair. Tristan spends a lot of time moping about daytime being awful because they can't be together, and melodramatically declares that because they can only be together at night then they should both kill themselves to enjoy the longest night ever. Then he makes them both dye their hair black and listen to Evanescence for a bit.

They try to hide the way they feel about each other, but Tristan's friend Melot is starting to suspect them anyway.

Melot, of course, shops them to King Marke and then tries to fight Tristan. Tristan refuses to explain why he has betrayed his Uncle, because in the immortal words of every teenager ever, he wouldn't understand! So instead he dives right into this fight, and then chucks away his sword and lets Melot stab him. That's right, he intentionally gets himself all stabbed to pieces.

Tristan's whisked away to France basically before anyone else has a chance to say anything, and Isolde has to trail along behind to try and catch up. Tristan wakes up, and is extremely narked that he is alive, and still in love with Isolde. Considering this is all only happening because he was roofied by Isolde's maid, I think he has a fair right to be miffed. In fact, he gets so upset about this love potion that he drives himself into exhausted delirium, and dies just as Isolde finally makes it to him.

Then King Marke arrives with Melot and Brangäne, and Melot immediately gets killed in a fight with Tristan's servant, who also dies. Marke rocks up, and explains to Isolde that actually he'd come to tell Tristan and Isolde they could get married, because Brangäne explained everything to him, thus making Tristan's melodrama even more daft because if he had just explained himself instead of stomping around like an angry 14-year-old then he'd still be alive.

And then, for no readily apparent reason at all, Isolde also dies. Possibly from all the melodrama.

So, I suppose in theory you could look at it as a happy ending of sorts because Isolde and Tristan end up dead, which had been Isolde's master plan in the beginning. As relationships go, however, murdering a girl's fiance, then kidnapping her for your Uncle, and then only falling in love with her because of some epic date-rape drugging, don't exactly provide the strongest foundations for a healthy future together. Especially when you're in love with someone, and you're angry that you've been drugged to be in love with this person.

Yeah guys, let's keep that in mind. Tristan was pretty angry about the whole thing.

What was that lesson we learned whilst we were at Troy? That's right kids - Consent is good!

Body Count:  5, counting Isolde's fiance, 4 if we don't count him. From a cast of 6 named characters.



Here endeth the lesson in Epic Relationships Which Aren't Really Epic. And to be fair, most of these issues could have been avoided by following three simple rules.

1) Don't cheat
2) Don't kill people
3) Consent consent consent!

All these guys could easily have lived much healthier lives if they'd just said

Honestly though, guys. Seriously. I hope that we have now learned that these are lists of people who we don't want to be associated with, unless it is a list of "people who have the correct number of limbs", or "people who might have eaten cheese once".

And if anyone, anyone tries to tell you that these are romantic stories, and that the only appropriate and correct response is this:

a love that will go down in history - part 2

Claire's Guide to Bad Fictional and Historical Relationships 
(Part the Second)

Previously we covered Romeo and Juliet, Cathy and Heathcliffe, and Bonnie and Clyde!

Anthony and Cleopatra

Okay, so a bit of background. Before she got with Mark Anthony, Cleopatra was pretty hot-and-heavy with Julius Caesar, and had even had a son with him: Caesarion (no, really). He got bumped off, and the Second Triumvirate was formed out of Mark Anthony, Octavian and Lepidus. Now, whilst Cleopatra was busy bumping uglies with Caesar, Egypt was pretty safe from being stomped on by the Romans in any particularly brutal way (See: The Gauls, the Druids, the Carthaginians...) With Caesar dead, suddenly Egypt was vulnerable again, unless Cleopatra could wangle her way into the good graces of any of the three new rulers of the Empire.

Mark Anthony summoned her to visit him, they formed an alliance and sealed the deal as it were. He moved in with her in her love palace in Egypt for a spell and all seemed fine and dandy.

Except, whilst he was busy having fun in the sun with the Queen of the Nile, his wife, Fulvia, was left back in Rome, handling all his political problems for him, particularly with Octavius. Finally, after spending the winter with the other woman, he heads back to Italy to try and help out his wife - who has been exiled during this time - but she dies before he gets there.

This is clearly very unfortunate for Fulvia, but Mark Anthony has just managed to be relieved of his husbandly duties before being caught getting his end away elsewhere. You'd think this might encourage him to be faithful to Cleopatra.

No. Instead whilst he's back in Rome, he married Octavian's little sister, Octavia Minor (no I'm not making this up). 

Then, in the midst of a war with Parthia, Anthony and his new wife go on a jolly to Greece and basically orgy it up in the name of Dionysus. He and Octavian have another little bit of a barney, and in a huff he leaves his pregnant wife (Octavian's little sister, remember, so super-helping his cause here), to go and see Cleopatra again, with whom he's had three kids.

It gets much more complicated than that, and there's a lot of in-fighting, but basically Anthony gets the tar kicked out of him by Octavian, who has forced Lepidus to hand over his third of the power to him, so it was 2:1 odds against Mark Anthony.This squabble continued, with Anthony conquering land and giving bits of it to Cleopatra's children, and Octavian coming along and kicking them about a bit. Octavian eventually got fed up of the whole thing and stomped into Egypt, so Anthony was left with no safe place to hide any more. 

Being a Roman, he felt it best to die with dignity rather than have Octavian give him the monster tactical wedgie he was clearly aiming for. So, assuming that Cleopatra was of a similar mindset, he stabbed himself.

Except. Cleopatra, being as she was, NOT a Roman, (nor, technically speaking, Egyptian, since her family came from Macedonia, but apples and oranges) the idea hadn't occurred to her to top herself. Possibly she'd suddenly become aware that in terms of sexy politics she'd backed the wrong horse, and was hoping Octavian might accept a late entry. Who knows. But Anthony was delivered to her by his friends, and died in her arms.

Cleopatra was then captured by Octavian, who wanted to trot her back to Rome to show off his victory. Apparently she tried to kill herself several times before succeeding, as he had instructed her to be guarded against it. Although she was apparently allowed to conduct the funeral rites on Anthony after her capture, it is stretching it to assume she killed herself in his name.

Oh, and just to round this off, did we mention that prior to becoming sole ruler of Egypt, and her nookie-time with Caesar, she was married to her brother? They got married when he was 10 and she was 18. This was pretty common in Egyptian royal families. She only became Queen because, after being ousted from power in a sibling squabble, her brother-husband Ptolemy pissed off Caesar by decapitating his son-in-law, and then Cleopatra capitalised on this situation by using her sexy 21-year-old wiles to seduce 52-year-old Caesar.

Romantic? Really?

Samson and Delilah

So, Samson and Delilah were a little bit like Romeo and Juliet, except that they were on two different sides of a war rather than a family feud, and she was a spy sent to seduce Samson and find out his weakness, because every time he showed up to battle it was basically like the Hulk taking out a cardboard fort.

The first time she asked him, he lied and said if he was tied up with 7 new bow strings, then he'd be powerless. So she did it, and it didn't work.

The second time she asked him, he lied and said that it would work if she tied him up with 7 ropes. So she did it, and it didn't work.

The third time she asked him, he lied and said that he would be powerless if she plaited the 7 locks of hair on his head. So she did it, and it didn't work.

So she asked him a fourth time. And for some reason this stupid man didn't think that if he told her then, as she had done the previous occasions, she'd actually do it. So he told her the truth. 

GUYS. IF YOU KEEP TELLING A WOMAN HOW TO DEFEAT YOU AND SHE KEEPS TRYING TO DO IT, MAYBE YOU SHOULD STOP TELLING HER STUFF.

And delighted, she called in some of her mates to shave off his hair. Oh, and then when he was weak and helpless they blinded him and threw him in a dungeon to rot.Then a few years later, they trotted him out to show him off and his hair had all grown back, and he knocks down the temple with hundreds of people inside it, killing himself in the process.

So, to summarise. She never loved him, she betrayed him and his entire people, and then got him blinded and thrown into the dungeon until he killed himself.

Guinevere and Lancelot

To be honest, integrally this one reads pretty similar to Anthony and Cleopatra in terms of the tick list of bad behaviours. 

Was one of them married to someone else? Check.

Did this affair break an agreement with a close ally? Check.

Did someone end up dead because of it? Check.

We all know that Guinevere was married to King Arthur. Lancelot was King Arthur's most trusted knight. His right hand man. His bro, if you will. So the very fact that the affair happens is pretty crappy to begin with. And it goes on for years. It's only eventually discovered when a feast happens and neither Guinevere or Lancelot bothers to turn up.

But Arthur doesn't take rejection well, and Guinevere is sentenced to burn at the stake (y'know, treason and all). Lancelot isn't super-keen on that idea, rounds up a posse and rides in to save her, and in the process manages to kill the two brothers of Gawain, who'd been the one guy who'd refused to get involved in the whole mess. Gawain, stepping up to Lancelot's position as Right-Hand Knight, and narked that Lancelot had killed his brothers, persuaded Arthur to go to war, because Lancelot broke the cardinal rule of knighthood, Bros before Hos.

Guinevere, left behind with Arthur after Lancelot came along and stomped on everything, is then ditched by just about everyone as the boys go off to have their pissing contest in France, and left in the care of Arthur's illegitimate son Mordred. Who then decides that he wants to marry Guinevere and become king. 

There are then a couple of different versions of how this goes. In one version, Guinevere sees this as a bad deal and locks herself in the Tower of London - followed by hiding out in a convent; in another she decides that Mordred's not quite that bad and agrees to marry him. Arthur gets wind of this, charges back to England and kills Mordred, and then dies himself. Guinevere gets one last meeting with Lancelot, then heads back to her convent. In another version, Guinevere actually decides that Mordred seems like quite a good deal, becomes his consort and has two kids with him.

On the one hand, this is comparatively positive compared to the other relationships listed, because neither of the couple end up dead. On the other, given as there are conflicting views as to whether it ended in a convent or with Guinevere having another man's children, and also a civil war, it can't really be called a romantic success story.

Part three to come, where we will explore the giddying relationships of Helen and Paris, Gatsby and Daisy, and Tristan and Isolde!

a love that will go down in history - part 1

I see a LOT of things around the internet offering couples personalised items that put their names amongst the 'greatest couples' from history and literature.

(from notonthehighstreet.com)

But guys. Most of these relationships, these super famous ones (aside from Hansel and Gretel who were a poor inclusion on the basis of their being SIBLINGS)? Were not really the height of the relationship ladder. Honestly, they are not things I would aim for. In fact I would use most of them as solid examples of How Not To Do Relationships.

Claire's Guide to Bad Fictional and Historical Relationships

Romeo and Juliet

I'm going to start with the most obvious one first because really. Really.

Okay, firstly, it is understood that Romeo is supposed to be about 17 in the play. Juliet is only 13. Immediately, things start to look a hell of a lot less romantic.

At the start of the play, Romeo is pining deeply and tragically after Rosaline. He waxes lyrical about her, her beauty, her wit - blind men, he claims, will only regret being blind because they won't be able to see Rosaline any more. Rosaline isn't quite so keen on him, given as all he seems to do is lollop about the place and pine in that tragically romantic way.

But then! He sees Juliet!

I bet you say that to all the girls. Because he certainly claimed like two scenes before that he thought Rosaline was the niftiest thing since sliced bread, and embraced wholeheartedly the trend of Romantic Pining that so wound up Olivia in Twelfth Night, all posing and posturing. People have argued that this means that he wasn't really in love with Rosaline, and what he had with Juliet was true. I argue that this means he is fickle, and whilst his passions sweep him up intensely, they are then dropped when the next shiny thing distracts him.

And then, in their crash-course relationship that lasts a span of four days, I mean I've got a longer-standing relationship with the guy at my local Subway - two of which he is exiled for, we have this fantastic display:

- Her cousin kills his best friend.
- So obviously he kills her cousin.

This is clearly a man with a broken logic button.

Day one - daytime: Romeo pines over another woman all day. Evening: Romeo meets Juliet whilst gatecrashing.
Day two - they get married, Tybalt kills Mercutio, Romeo kills Tybalt, Romeo is exiled, but first pops by to consummate his marriage.
Day three - Juliet's parents try to marry her off to someone else, so she gets together with the Apothecary and knocks herself out for 42 hours.
Day four - Romeo manages to kill someone else whilst rushing to go see dead!Juliet.

Oh yes, and the crowning glory? The absolute biggest reason ever that this is not a healthy relationship to use as an example? They KILL THEMSELVES.

"But they kill themselves for love! It's romantic!"

Catherine and Heathcliffe

I actually find it a little bit scary that some people read this book and think it is romantic. I mean, honestly. I will admit to never having read it myself, but I've seen adaptations, I've read the Wikipedia page, and I got a running commentary from my bemused and horrified fiance whilst he read it for his PhD.


From everything he'd heard about it, he'd expected it to be a romance. And then when he read it it was basically like this:

This isn't even one that takes close reading. You can bullet point this sucker.

• Catherine won't marry Heathcliffe because even though she loves him she thinks he's not good enough for her.
• Heathcliffe runs off with Cathy's sister-in-law Isabella, even though he hates her, to enact revenge on just about everyone because he is super butthurt that Cathy correctly observed that he was poor and uncouth. He also hangs Isabella's puppy the night they elope. That's right, he's just that kinda guy.
• Cathy dies and Heathcliffe gets really upset.
• Oh and then his wife dies years later, but Heathcliffe doesn't really care about that because she's not Cathy, and he doesn't really give a crap about his son either.
• Heathcliffe also plays cruel mind games with Cathy's brother and reduces him to poverty. Again with revenge.
• He then holds Cathy's daughter - Cathy Mark 2 - hostage while her father dies so that she will marry his son, and her father will never see her again.
• And then he kidnaps Cathy Jr again, after she escapes to go and see her father, and tries to lock her up in Wuthering Heights, instead of the lovely manor house that he now owns, and she becomes a recluse. Oh and his son dies, but that's no big deal really 'cause he wasn't that attached to the little wimp anyway.
• And then he goes a bit (more) mental and dies. And Cathy Jr ends up marrying her cousin, which is actually the least bizarre relationship in this whole book.

 How is this romantic? Never mind that one half of this couple is dead for most of the book. Nowadays, this sort of behaviour would warrant a restraining order fairly early on, and not least a cross visit from the RSPCA.

"Heathcliffe's just so passionate, nothing will stop his love for her!"

 Bonnie and Clyde

So... a pair of killers who made a career out of robbing a dozen banks and more rural gas stations? Who many historians believe viewed their violent deaths as inevitable, so it didn't matter how awful their crimes were? And they were gunned down by police with the deaths of at least 9 officers and several more civilians to their names?

Some historians believe now the Bonnie may even have had a mental disorder that caused her to be attracted to seriously violent men - by the time of her death at 23, she was still married to her husband of 7 years Ray Thornton, who was in prison when she was killed. And when he heard his estranged wife had died, what was his comment? 

"I'm glad they went out like they did. It's much better than being caught."

Not to be a downer here guys, but are we noticing a pattern?  PEOPLE KEEP ENDING UP DEAD.

Are you in a relationship that resembles anything you see above?

Don't see anything for you there? Well that means you could either a) be in a totally normal and healthy relationship, or b) be in a relationship like the ones I haven't covered yet. Oh yes!

Coming up in Part 2 - Anthony and Cleopatra, Samson and Delilah, and Lancelot and Guinevere!