When doing things on your own can be as good as doing them with someone else

It's you, not the people around you you have to convince , , ,

Photo by Denys Nevozhai at unsplash.com

I know, I know. You read this newsletter for food and wine tips and not for my musings about life in general. But I do think the subject of solo living and self sufficiency is important one, particularly for women living on their own so indulge me. (Or delete and wait for the next email 😉) 

Three weeks ago I took myself off for the night at a pub. Rather a special kind of pub, truth be told: The Three Horseshoes at Batcombe in Somerset which is co-owned by chef Margot Henderson, wife of St John’s Fergus Henderson 

I’d been there for lunch just after it opened (scroll down this post) and been swept away by the place, promising myself I’d go back, maybe even spend my birthday there.

But I hadn’t and the right combination of circumstances, the perfect person to go with hadn’t materialised.

So I just booked a one nighter on my own. 

I arrived late on a drizzly December afternoon. Settled myself into my room with a cup of tea and some homemade biscuits then wandered down to the bar, and had a beer. Sat down for dinner (congratulations Three Horseshoes for giving me a really nice table and not tucking me away in a corner*) and ordered grouse and chips. Had a late night bath then sprawled all over the enormous billowy bed. Slept like a baby. (A well-behaved baby.)

*not all hotels do as you can see from this previous post

After a very good breakfast the next day, when I ran into a food writer I used to work with, I went up the road to the Westcombe Dairy shop, loaded up with cheddar, charcuterie and pickles, headed for Hauser & Wirth, walked round the gardens, looked round the exhibitions, bought more stuff at their excellent farm shop including a ham hock (love a ham hock) and drove home. 

Was that really fun on my own? I won’t say there weren’t moments when I questioned what I was doing there and had to give myself a bit of a talking to

The instinct to think ‘what a waste’ when I saw the big bed. Quickly reframed as how lucky I was to have all that space to myself. (They have gorgeous beds)

A spasm of anxiety about what other diners might be thinking of me eating by myself particularly my former colleague.  (But I’m sure she didn’t and anyway why would you judge anyone for choosing to eat on their own?).

So yes it was great. I got to do exactly what I wanted without worrying whether my companion was getting as much out of it as I was.

It was the kind of thing I would have done with my late husband for a special occasion which made me wonder why we only feel entitled to treat ourselves when someone accompanies us? 

OK, I am lucky to be able to afford it but I spent less than we would previously have done going away for a weekend as a couple.

I don’t think women are particularly good at treating themselves. We seem to always need an excuse, that we’re doing it not for ourselves but for another person. But to coin a well-worn cliché we’re worth it.

Maybe it’s because of my age that I’m conscious of not wasting time but if you think of the untimely death of people you know or who in the public eye (Russell Norman and Bill Granger to name two in my field) you realise none of us has unlimited time to do things we want. (Do read Oliver Burkeman’s 4000 weeks on the subject.)

We should all make time in 2024 to treat ourselves. It doesn’t have to be a trip of a lifetime. It could just be taking the time to read, to go to a concert or buy ourselves a bunch of flowers.

So my mantra for 2024, which you might like to adopt, is . . . 

Don’t wait for life to happen. 

Get on with living it.

It’s far more likely to be the things you didn’t do that you’ll regret at the end of 2024 than the things you did.

Happy New Year!

Do tell me what your guiding word or mantra is going to be this year …