Making It Up As I Go Along (36 page)

Cripes, busy, busy month. I’ll attempt to do
it justice for you. Spent two days in London before going to Toronto – Watford were
playing in the first leg of the play-off semi-finals, where they bate the tar out of Crystal
Palace. Hurray!

Suzanne called over and we had a great laugh, but
then she had to go because approx twenty people had arrived to style me and take my photo.
I’m not sure for what. At this stage, I’m so used to people turning up with make-up
brushes and camera equipment and suitcases of strange clothes that I meekly and unquestioningly
stand still so they can ‘do’ me.

On Sunday, I arrived in lovely Toronto and spent
several days in passport checks – three different times! When did the Canadians get so
suspicious? They are such a kindly people that I was surprised!

Monday was spent doing lady-bits wear-and-tear
– I got waxed to kingdom come, pedicured, had my eyebrows and eyelashes tinted, my hair
blow-dried, all of me fake-tanned (yes, I know you’re not meant to do it the same day as
waxing, but I’m not made of time). All set for work! Time-consuming, though. I bet Philip
Roth doesn’t have these worries.

Tuesday: a big important day – Watford are
playing the second
leg of the Crystal Palace match. Himself has made great
friends with Manuela, the legendary concierge of Four Seasons Toronto who has tracked down the
location of a bar in Toronto where we can watch the match.

So at 2.15 we get a taxi to Scallywags Sports Bar
in downtown Toronto, where the kindly barkeep Sheryl makes both of our days by a) giving the
Watford match precedence over the Roy Keane testimonial, which is on at the same time, then b)
recognizing me. (‘You are the image of Marian Keyes!’)

Watford get a result! Which means they are in the
final against Leeds in two weeks’ time! Himself will be abandoning me mid-tour to see it
in Cardiff.

That night, we go to see
Lord of the
Rings
, the musical. I must admit, I agreed to go to it because I thought it would be
hilarious, then I discovered it was three and a half hours long and thought,
‘
Nothing’s
that funny.’

But we went and it was hugely impressive. An
AMAZING set – a forest extends right out into the audience and the floor changes levels
and the lighting is magnificent and there are times when the wind starts gusting and is blowing
right out into the audience and then bits of black ash (except they’re only bits of
non-ashy paper, it’s just the lighting that makes them look like ash) start flying at us
and it’s all very involving.

Gandalf was bad, though – he had that
stupid beard-and-no-tash combo that I find so baffling. Also his hood kept falling off. But
worst of all, he had all the gravitas and other-worldly wisdom of a geography teacher with
discipline problems. Very, very UNCONVINCING. Also, the music was not the Middle Earth
experience they promised. Indeed, there were one or two Andrew Lloyd Webber moments. However, it
was a great spectacle.

Thursday, Montréal. God, what a FABULOUS
city. Not like
anywhere I’ve ever been before, sort of French, but
not exactly, sort of Canadian, but not that either, but some amazing exotic mix. LOVED it. Also,
incredibly warm welcome. Wonderful readers’ event on Friday night. Just before the
reading, I popped into Lululemon (Canadian yoga wear, even though I only do yoga once a decade,
but the leggings and T-shirts and mini-hoodies are lovely).

Saturday, Boston! Meeting Caitríona,
Seán and Anne Marie, who have come from New York, Eileen, who has come from Dublin, and
Suzanne from London! Thrilling! All of us together. Terrible rain in Boston. We are Irish, we
know about rain, but our jaws are hanging open. Dangerous rain, which could concuss you.

We spent our time shuttling between the hotel and
Au Bon Pain. In fact, we calculated that all during the weekend, at least one of us was either
at
Au Bon Pain,
on the way
to
Au Bon Pain,
returning from
Au Bon Pain or
eating something purchased
at
Au Bon Pain.

Au Bon Pain took on a mythological air, like the
108-minutes computer in
Lost
. We needed someone on the Au Bon Pain shift at all times.

We attempted to go out for dinner on Saturday
night, but the combination of it being Mother’s Day weekend, plus graduation weekend,
meant everywhere was booked out, and with Seán’s friends Danny and Kristen there were
nine of us and so everyone laughed in our face when we showed up looking for a table, so we
ended up in some place called Chili’s, which was very enjoyable in a cheap, dirty-floored
sort of way. Shur, it’s all about the people!

On Sunday morning we woke up to discover that the
governor of Massachusetts had declared a state of emergency because of the rain! I’ve
never before been in a place where there’s a ‘state of emergency’. For a
moment I was quite thrilled! Then I realized
that many, many poor divils
have had their houses flooded and it’s not thrilling at all. Merely wet and miserable.

Caitríona and Suzanne brave the flood waters
to go shopping, and the rest of us sit in my hotel room, eating our stuff from Au Bon Pain, and
the whole thing is like a very slow play. Now and again Anne Marie looks out at the stormy sky
and says, ‘Look at it.’ Then she shrieks, ‘LOOK AT IT!!!!’

Next, Himself wanders over and stares out the
window and says, ‘The flood waters are still rising,’ and Seán says, ‘Try
the phone again, are the lines still down?’ Great fun!

Monday, they all go home and I do Bostonian work.
Brookline Books hosts a FABLISS reading for me on the Monday night, where I have a full house,
despite the rain.

Wednesday, New York! Where I have a mini-meltdown
(I have one on every tour): when getting ready for the Bryant Square reading, I discover
I’ve lost my foundation. I become hysterical, yelling, ‘I have twenty lip glosses!
Three mascaras! Even two Touche Éclats! Why couldn’t I have lost one of
them???’ Then I discover the missing foundation in Himself’s washbag and all is
well.

Excellent events in NYC, sponsored by Clarins
– people were THRILLED with their goodie bags. In fact, even Michael Morrison, very
important person in William Morrow/HarperCollins, was spotted disappearing with a bronzer.

Friday, Washington DC. BEA – a GINORMOUS
book fair. Everyone from US publishing there. On Saturday afternoon, Himself says goodbye
– he’s leaving for Cardiff for the Watford play-off final against Leeds, with a
promise to meet me on Monday in Seattle. Everyone is very concerned about me being left on my
own, as if I’m a half-wit. ‘I am a grown woman,’ I assure them, ‘I am
forty-two and a half.’

‘Yes, but
…’ they say.

‘I’m fine,’ I insist, getting
quite narky. ‘I’m fine, okay? FINE!!!’

Then I return to the hotel, to get ready for the
HarperCollins party, and when I leave, I lock my key in my room …

Mortified.

Even though it was a party, it was actually
extremely nice. It was held at the Smithsonian Castle, which has a garden, and I got there early
and bagsied a seat, a sort of park bench. I was very happy to have a seat, even though the
anxiety that the hotel wouldn’t let me back into my room was gnawing at me like a
toothache.

A buffet was set up, and I hopped out of my bench
and quickly got a plate of food – mostly cheese and crackers – and CRAMMED it into
me because it’s impossible to eat at these things: as soon as you put a mouthful of food
into your clob, someone asks you a question requiring a long, detailed, food-free answer.

I was eating at high speed, covered with cracker
crumbs – on my skirt, my face, in my hair. Then! I espy Dennis Lehane! I’m a big
fan. Lovely Debbie Stiers (head of publicity at HC) says, ‘Oh, Marian, you wanted to meet
Dennis, didn’t you. Dennis! Dennis! Over here.’ And I was frantically waving my
hands to indicate that no, I didn’t want to meet Dennis Lehane, not while my mouth was
filled with food and I was covered with cracker crumbs, but too late, he had arrived and I had
to extend a crackery hand and mumble through a clobful of cheese that I’m his biggest fan.
(He was v. gracious.)

Also, John Connolly shows up (excellent Irish
thriller writer, for those who don’t know him, but I presume everyone does) and it was
very nice to see another Irish person and we laughed Irishly together, making jokes about
potatoes and rainfall, then we linked arms and danced a jig. John knows Dennis. Maybe he might
mention to Dennis that I’m not always covered in cracker crumbs.

Because of Himself not being there, everyone was
kindly and solicitous. Even big cheeses (pun) at HC kept checking in with me, including Michael
Morrison. At one stage he says, ‘Notice anything different about me?’ and does that
sweep with his hands that people do when they are proud of their new look.

Although Michael is always friendly to me, he is
a vay, vay powerful person and it is important to get this right. ‘You did something to
your hair?’ I suggest weakly, and he says, ‘No! I’m BRONZED. I’m wearing
the Clarins bronzer!’ And, of course, once he’d said it, I could indeed see that he
was looking very sunkissed.

Sunday, Seattle. (Hotel in DC
did
let me
back into the room after I’d produced photo ID.) News reaches me: Watford have won the
match! They are now officially Going Up. Everyone is THRILLED and I really must stop being a
doom-mongrel. Next season will be
wonderful
, they won’t have the shit kicked out
of them every Saturday and most Tuesdays, and they
won’t
be relegated.

Monday, Himself reappears and has a present for
me: a yellow memorial shirt of the match.

Five fantastic events in Seattle, including one
at Starbucks HQ, and at Third Place Books the woman who came from Hawaii officially wins the
Person Who Travelled Furthest To See Me prize.

Then back to Canada, to BEAUTIFUL Vancouver and
BEAUTIFUL Vancouver Island, where CBC Book Club and Munro’s Books do fantastic events and
I’m on telly four times in twenty hours.

Then we go home.

Previously unpublished.

Let’s see. I got back home at the start of
month and since then I’ve been trying to get back into a writing routine, which is not
going well and is going, in fact, very, very badly.

I had loads of articles to write, which was good,
because it eased the terror of switching on the computer after a long time away from it. But
eventually I ran out of deflection mechanisms and I had to face the horror of the novel.

I tried to follow the advice which I give to
other authors: put one word in front of another; do a small amount every day; ignore your
crapness. I’m trying to be positive, to do my best, but the default setting in my brain is
Negative, and the arrow always sneaks back there, no matter how hard I try to send it to
Positive.

Now and then I stand at the top of the stairs in
my nightdress, my hair askew, and shriek at Himself, ‘I am creatively bankrupt!’
Then a gardener comes thumping in through the front door (yes, they’re still here, they
will always be here, I’ve accepted it now), pushing a wheelbarrow of bark (or something),
and I howl at him, ‘I am a spent force, a torn docket, a busted flush!’ (He puts his
head down and hurries past with his burden, dying to get home that evening to tell his wife and
family about what a lunatic I am.)

Next I ring up all my friends and family and
screech at them that the gig is up, that the game is over, that my career as a writer
is at an end and do they know of any jobs I could do? Then everyone tells me
to shut up, that I’m always saying that and that maybe I should take a little break and
read some books and do something mindless. But I tell them not to be so silly, how can I take
time to read books when I’m supposed to be WRITING one!

(Although the garden still isn’t finished,
it no longer looks like the Battle of the Somme; now it looks more like the foundations of a
multistorey car park. The house – because we are terraced and all gardeners and their
‘stuff’ must come through our hall – looks like a building site. Filth
everywhere.)

Anyway,
Big Brother
is on – THANK
GOD. It is a marvellous diversion. This has been the evening routine for the past month.
7.30–8.00: the lovely, lovely Dermot O’Leary (more of which, later). Then
8.00–9.00: Himself watches football between two bizarre nations (for example Upper Volta
versus Luxembourg, because the World Cup is on) and I Do Other Things (not really sure what,
remove make-up, sing tunelessly, that sort of thing. Also I do meditation, most days anyway,
except – disaster! I time myself using Shaunie the Sheep kitchen timer (Shaunie from
Wallace and Gromit
). I put Shaunie in the bathroom so his relentless ticking
doesn’t distract me from meditation – I’m perfectly capable of extreme
distraction, left to my own devices. Anyway, one night I was sitting there and sitting there and
sitting there and thinking, ‘Christ alive, this meditation lark is as boring as all get
out! Will it ever end? Well, the short answer is no, not if I was depending on Shaunie to alert
me to Time’s Up. For poor Shaunie was injured – his neck was stuck at thirteen
minutes. Just stopped dead. It transpired I had been meditating for about six hours, and
hadn’t known when to stop because Shaunie didn’t brrrrrring and let me know. (Like
in
What’s Eating Gilbert Grape
, when Leonardo DiCaprio stayed in the freezing
bath because Johnny Depp
went off with a woman and forgot to tell him to
get out.) He hasn’t repeat offended (Shaunie the sheep, not Johnny Depp), but I am nervous
around him now. The trust is gone.)

Then at nine o’clock I fight my way through
the rubble of the hall, the muck, the filth, the abandoned bananas and tabloids and two-litre
bottles of Lilt, and return to The Room, where we watch
Big Brother
, until ten
o’clock. When that ends we watch Russell Brand until 10.30. (Funny how everyone has
radically rethought their opinion of Russell Brand just because a rumour did the rounds that
he’d rode Kate Moss. Everyone now insists that he’s sexy, but many people pretend
that ‘Oh, I
always
fancied him.’ I’ll be honest. I didn’t
always fancy him. But I sort of do now.)

At this point I go to bed and Himself watches the
second half of the match (taped from earlier). A routine is nice. I’ve tried making a few
new dinners – the Goan beef curry was a success, the hot Thai salad less so. But we must
take risks in order to find out what works and what doesn’t, is that not so? When a risk
fails – as it occasionally must, for then it would not be a risk – we must not be
hard on ourselves. We must simply get a pizza out of the freezer and live to fight another
day.

What else? Well, you know the way me and
Caitríona are bridesmaids for Rita-Anne, and you know the way I came up with a cunning plan
to dress us in Missoni coats? As a way of justifying purchase of Missoni coats? Well, plan has
gone awry. But not in a bad way.

Rita-Anne saw some lovely coats in Brown Thomas
which she thought would do for us. The only thing wrong was that they weren’t Missoni
coats. But they were the right colour and had detailing which echoed the detailing on her dress
(I can say no more, I’m sworn to secrecy about her dress, I can say NOTHING which might
give the game away). So I visited said coat and found
it to be perfect.
Immediately I informed Caitríona in New York, who did her best to track it down, and after
many setbacks she located it, tried it on and pronounced it to be excellent, if slightly short
in the sleeves. Done deal! Coats bought for a November wedding and it is still only June! I am
such
a swotty Virgo!

I’ve only one slight gripe: they are
excellent coats, but are from Moschino’s Cheap & Chic range, and while there is no
denying that they are chic – no one could dispute that,
mes amies
– they
were several light years from cheap. But beautiful, undeniably beautiful, and if we like we can
sell them on eBay after the wedding. ‘For far more than we paid for them,’ according
to Himself, who is an optimist. (And can be delusional on occasion.)

My mammy has tried to book an appointment with a
personal shopper in House of Fraser for her mother-of-the-bride outfit but they told her to get
lost and try again in mid-October, that right now is way too early for autumn clothing.

Frankly, I do not know how her nerves can stand
it. If it was my daughter I would have had the mother-of-the-bride outfit bought before my
daughter had even met her prospective husband. My mother waited until a mere six weeks before my
wedding before deciding on her outfit. How can she do it? Clearly, she is a daredevil, a
risk-taker, a knows-no-fear-and-laughs-in-the-face-of-danger-etc. kind of person. That’s
Pisceans for you. (When she gets her appointment we are all going to go along. I will
report.)

Highlight of the month: I touched the flesh of
Dermot O’Leary! (Only his hand, but all the same.) I was on
Big Brother’s Little
Brother
on Friday 23 June. Thrilling! Himself and Suzanne came too, and as it was eviction
day all the friends and family of the potential evictees were in the green room. Suzanne made
many friends (that is her way, she is gregarious). She moved and shook her way through the
friends and family.

I had to maintain a
dignified distance because I was about to slag off some of their nearest and dearest on national
telly. Awkward, undeniably awkward. I saw Davina from a distance. I opened the window and
shouted out, ‘I LOVE YOU, DAVINAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!’ I don’t know if she heard
me.

On the final day of June everything broke.
Himself’s back – it ‘goes’ on him occasionally, but will he go to the
doctor? No. Indeed no. He simply suffers through – you’d swear they had never
invented painkillers. That’s men for you. My dad is exactly the same. Then the SkyPlus
broke. Then the computer got a virus and had to be carted away – terrifying. We
don’t know how bad the damage is, it’s very scary. Then
I
broke.

I’d been wallowing in UNPRECEDENTED good
health and hadn’t had a virus/ear infection et al in MONTHS. But this all came to an
abrupt end on 30 June and now I’m enjoying balmy temperatures, aching limbs, cotton-wool
brain and a conviction that an invisible person is hanging around me and jabbing a hatpin into
my ear at irregular intervals.

Previously unpublished.