Envy Was Just The Tax You Paid

No Matter How Predictable, Banal And Listless The Rest Of My Life Might Be, You Can Guarantee That There'll Always Be Something Interesting Going On With My Skin.

There's Something Unnatural About A Woman Finding Babies Or, More Specifically, Conversation About Babies, Boring. They'll Think She's Bitter, Jealous, Lonely. But She's Also Bored Of Everybody Telling Her How Lucky She Is, What With All That Sleep And All That Freedom And Spare Time, The Ability To Go On Dates Or Head Off To Paris At A Moments Notice. It Sounds Like They're Consoling Her, And She Resents This And Feels Patronized By It.

But How Can You Not Like Music? That's The Same As Not Liking Food! Or Sex!

You Know What I Can't Understand? You Have All These People Telling You All The Time How Great You Are, Smart And Funny And Talented And All That, I Mean Endlessly, I've Been Telling You For Years. So Why Don't You Believe It? Why Do You Think People Say That Stuff, Em? Do You Think It's A Conspiracy, People Secretly Ganging Up To Be Nice About You?

Occasionally, Very Occasionally, Say At Four O’clock In The Afternoon On A Wet Sunday, She Feels Panic-stricken And Almost Breathless With Loneliness. Once Or Twice She Has Been Known To Pick Up The Phone To Check That It Isn’t Broken. Sometimes She Thinks How Nice It Would Be To Be Woken By A Call In The Night: ‘get In A Taxi Now’ Or ‘i Need To See You, We Need To Talk’. But At The Best Of Times She Feels Like A Character In A Muriel Spark Novel – Independent, Bookish, Sharp-minded, Secretly Romantic.