Love Is A Thief. Claire Garber
more like a luxury retirement theme park set over 570 acres with its own spa, floating restaurant, dance studio and rock-climbing centre—the final stop-off for the brightest, wisest and most physically capable minds of yesteryear.
3Parkour - or ‘free running’ - is a sport in which participants run along a route, attempting to negotiate obstacles using only their bodies. Skills such as jumping, climbing, vaulting, rolling, swinging and wall scaling are employed. Parkour is most commonly practised in urban areas. It is not commonly practised by pensioners.
—AN ADVERTISEMENT FROM TRUE LOVE MAGAZINE—
WHAT DID YOU MISS OUT ON BECAUSE YOU FELL IN LOVE?
Dear True Love Readers,
This year, as the clock struck 30 years old, I found myself jobless, homeless and abandoned in France by my French fiancé. I had given up everything in a fight for love, and I’d lost, knocked out in the 7th round, sucker-punched.
With absolutely nothing to my name, no home, no money and no job, I had well and truly missed my own love boat. If I had been younger I would have soothed my broken heart through the tried and tested method of boyfriend replacement and/or alcohol consumption. But this time I couldn’t. This time the pain in my heart was too great, the love lost was too huge. For many dark months all I could manage, in between fits of sobbing, was to ponder upon the following:
What on earth do I do next?
Because my One True Love had already been and gone; as had all our future plans, our dreams, our as yet unrealised wedding anniversaries, our as yet unborn children. That part of my life was over before it had even begun. So with no guarantee that love would ever show up again I needed to find out what would make me happy in the absence of love. What could I do with my time until love showed up, if love ever shows up at all. And this is where you come in.
You see, I have started to make a list of all the things I didn’t get to do because I fell in love; a list of all the hobbies, ambitions and secret dreams that were put on the back burner the day I fell in love. And I am going to go out and do all those things. I am going to go out, like a pirate on the giant sea of life, and I am going to take back what love stole. And here at True Love we want to know what you gave up for love. Is there something you always wanted to do but stopped pursuing it when you fell in love? A hobby or dream? What negative effects did falling in love have on your life? What love advice do you have for me? Perhaps some of you are interested in going on your own Love Quests, taking back what love has stolen.
It doesn’t matter if you are in love, out of love, searching for love, avoiding love, married, divorced, gay or straight. True Love wants to hear from you.
Can’t think of anything? Then let’s turn this on its head. Ask yourself the following questions:
‘If you knew you were going to spend the rest of your life alone, you would never fall in love, never settle down, never have children, what would you want to do? What would make you happy? What would fill up your time, your heart, your soul for the rest of your days?’ The answers to these questions are the dreams we need to get back.
I have missed my own love boat. I am loveless and boatless with a whole lifetime to fill. I’m going on a quest, a Love-Stolen Dreams quest, to take back what love stole. So, are you with me? Do you want to join my ship?
Pirate Kate x x
PIRATE KATE
Please send all response letters to: Pirate Kate; PO Box Love-Stolen Dreams, c/o the True Love London Office
NEXT WEEK IN TRUE LOVE: MR PURRR-FECT
—how a feline companion can take the pain out of living alone
BOTOX OR NOTOX
—should you plump and fill for your special day?
AND HOW TO CREATE YOUR PERFECT WEDDING DRESS FOR LESS THAN £69.98
paper towers of paper souls
big red | true love office | london
Jenny Sullivan doesn’t work in a wee pod. That’s how I knew she was important when I first joined True Love magazine; that and the fact that I’d already seen her on a million different billboards, a thousand different TV adverts, a hundred different talk shows. But in terms of my working day, the reason I knew she was important was because she didn’t work in a pod. You see, the offices of True Love magazine take up the entire top floor of a converted warehouse. They are completely open-plan with one large glass room in the middle, the boardroom, then one corner office for Chad and another for Jenny Sullivan. The rest of the office is dotted with enormous brightly coloured pods each standing eight foot tall with a desk inside and a small arch to get in. They resemble giant dinosaur eggs and make the office look like an incubation chamber in an ethically questionable science laboratory—one growing human clones with above-average writing skills and the ability to sell full-page advertising space. And while there is no scientific evidence that working in giant eggs improves productivity Chad did produce a historical document claiming the Incas had done so. His historical document looked suspiciously like a normal piece of A4 paper stained with tea. And the ‘facts’ were un-referenceable on Google. Nevertheless all the staff at True Love were made to work in Work Evolving Egg Pods, or wee pods; everyone, that is, except Jenny. And I had been hiding inside my wee pod, affectionately named Big Red, since 09:15 this morning listening to them fight in True Love’s boardroom.
‘Chad, I’m just saying, Chad, this idea, it doesn’t sound very “us”, does it?’ Jenny said, manically twisting her gigantic wedding ring around her finger, ‘because people here are into love, Chad.’ Jenny drew a heart in the air with her index finger. ‘This magazine is into love, Chad.’ She did it again. She could have just pointed at the boardroom table. ‘That’s why we are called True Love magazine, Chad.’
I’m not sure if you’ve noticed this yet, but Jenny Sullivan likes to overuse people’s first names. It’s a technique she read about in a book called ‘Own it—Take Life by the Bollocks’. She once said my name so many times I disconnected from it entirely.
‘Chad, I’m just thinking of you, Chad.’ You see. ‘Because we can’t suddenly start writing about how shit love is, become love pirates, steal love ships and go on bloody love missions. What will our poor stupid readers think?’ She looked from Chad to Federico, who was standing like a statue in the corner of the room. Chad, on the other hand, was pacing up and down the boardroom, throwing handfuls of Haribo in his gob. ‘Because I have other things I can do if this magazine folds, Chad. I’d just carry on with my modelling career,’ she said, smoothing out imaginary creases in her clothes. ‘Not a day goes by that I’m not asked to endorse some beauty product or fashion brand. It’s such a bore,’ she said to Federico, as if he’d understand such a burden, even though the only thing Federico’s ever been asked to endorse is mouthwash at Paddington Station, and that was more of a general customer satisfaction survey than a traditional celebrity endorsement. ‘And that’s before we take into account my writing career, Chad. My publisher is constantly on the phone demanding I write another bestseller. Or I could just take some time out, spend more time being a good wife, fuss over my wonderful husband and—’
‘Oh, for twat’s sake, Jenny, would you please just shut the fuck up?’ Chad said, coming to a sudden stop. ‘It would be less twatting offensive if you just put all your awards, and your accolades, and your precious photos of you and your perfect Ken Doll husband, and printed them directly onto your twatting clothes, let the fabric speak for you, then my ears wouldn’t feel like they were haemorrhaging every time you start twatting talking.’
Federico clamped his hand over his own mouth, his bulbous eyes whizzing between the two of them.
‘I