Before I share details of my fairy-tale romance and engagement party, please bear with me whilst I describe the events that led to meeting my future fiancé and getting down on one knee with a ring in a little box.

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It would not be totally true to describe Letitia as my childhood sweetheart, because the affection was totally one sided and I doubt she realised that the geeky, unattractive member of the group of four boys she hung around with, dreamed about her day and night. She lived in a large, detached house in a posh part of the town and went to a private girl’s school. I lived in a small, terraced house at the cheaper end of the estate and attended the local Comprehensive School. For three years from age fourteen until I went to college aged seventeen, my friends and I spent all our spare time with her and her friend Penelope. To appearances It was all very innocent, going for coffee in town, swimming in the river, going to the cinema, hanging around in the library and my favourite, listening to records in her bedroom. She was a very pretty girl but seemed to be blissfully ignorant of the lustful intent of her four friends. Michael was handsome carefree and blonde, Gregory was tall and good looking, Neil was boring but posh and I was the ugly one with a broken front tooth. 

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At the end of the summer of 1973, I left Abergavenny, went to a merchant navy college in Cardiff and only occasionally kept in touch with Gregory when I was home for holidays. I did still think about Letitia from time to time but now that we were older, her world seemed even more detached from mine. Sitting A levels in a private school hoping to be a vet, versus, dropping out of school and joining the navy. Strangely I did not see her in town, and I did not have the confidence to phone and suggest meeting. By this time my self-esteem was close to zero and my looks had not improved with age, so I was still awkward and ugly.

 

I completed college and at the end of August 1976 joined my first ship, returning to Abergavenny on December 22nd for two months leave. I was now a very different person, having tasted the delights of foreign ports and endless parties held on the ship. I was immediately bored because life and the people I knew in Abergavenny had not changed, but at 19 I had already experienced a wild life of parties full of available girls (Wrens) in the UK ports and the most amazing nightlife in ports around the world. It was now Christmas Eve, so I got up early and walked into town to shop for presents, but not having any friends and being bored in the small town centre on a damp drizzly day meant that I was back home before lunchtime. I might now have had the courage to call Letitia to see if she was as bored as me, but I had been told that she had failed to get the A level grades that she needed to become a vet, so had moved to Edinburgh to train as a nurse. Much as it was great to see my parents, this was going to be a very quiet Christmas and New Year. I wished I was back on the ship!

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My father came home for lunch and just before he headed back to work, he remembered that a girl had come into his shop and asked where I was because she had heard that I was in the navy. She said that she was bored being home for Christmas because all her friends were in Edinburgh. Palms of my hands already sweaty I tried my best to calmly ask what her name was. ‘Oh, I don’t remember’ he said, ‘something posh’. He fished around in his jacket pocket and produced a piece of paper with the name Letitia and a telephone number on it. I pretended to be disinterested but was nervous and sweating by the time my father went back to work and I could use the phone in the hall. The rest of this story is for another day, but I called, she was bored and fighting with her mother and asked me if we could go out and help her escape for a drink that evening. I am pretty sure that I danced around the hall. I am going out on my own with the girl that had occupied my schoolboy dreams and fantasies, and she asked me! We met at the Lamb and Flag pub, drank far too much Guinness and I walked her home arm in arm under her umbrella to protect us from the ongoing cold Welsh drizzle. A kiss on the cheek when we arrived at her house and I went home, feeling like the happiest man in the world. 

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This post is supposed to be about the engagement party so I will jump to 1978 (I think) and during which I spent all my leave in Edinburgh as well as 8 months sailing on my second ship. 
 

Letitia is so gorgeous, so beautiful, so pretty, has such amazing friends and I still feel that I am not good enough for her or her life so I decided that I must not miss my chance, I could not lose her, I must marry her before she realised that I was not good enough for her. So that is why I found myself on one knee with a little red velvet covered box from H Samuels containing a diamond engagement ring. She said yes!

 

We had to follow tradition, so we travelled to Abergavenny and the next day, I had to ask her father for her hand in marriage. I timed my arrival for his lunch time and stood nervously at the door. I rang the doorbell, and it was immediately snatched open by her truly frightening mother. Future father-in-law was tucking into ham and boiled potatoes in the dining room when I walked in and blurted out that I would like his daughter’s hand in carriage ‘sorry I mean marriage’. He was a wonderful man, he calmed me down and said that of course we could get married. Future mother-in-law had been listening around the corner and I heard her tell Letitia’s sister ‘Well I suppose he is as good as anybody around here’. I sensed her disappointment, and it was definitely a ‘she could have done better than him’ situation. 

I was elated despite future mother-in-law’s lukewarm reception to the news, told my parents and called a few friends to meet for afternoon drinks in a nearby pub. It’s amazing how many friends you have when they are still students, and you are earning a substantial salary. A best guess would be that I drunk about eight pints of beer before staggering home and going to bed to sleep it off.

 

Somebody was shaking me; it was my father who had just come home from work. ‘Wake up’ he said, ‘we are going for dinner to celebrate your engagement’. Future father-in-law had organised a table at a restaurant owned by his close friend just outside Abergavenny. Still horribly drunk, I showered and tried to make myself look presentable, but I was white as a sheet and the smell of stale beer was lingering and obvious. I felt so ill that the thought of food let alone more alcohol made me feel sick.

We arrived at the restaurant, and it was my worst nightmare because old relatives and friends of the family had also been invited and my seat was in the middle of them on a long bench up against a wall. No chance of easy escape for a breath of fresh air or to get to the toilet, and worse still, Letitia’s younger and evil sister Katrina was sitting opposite me. She made my life hell when I was at the house with constant snide comments at my expense and she knew how to get under my skin. I tried to change seats, but future mother-in-law sternly vetoed that because I was positioned there so that I could make a speech. Speech? I could barely function never mind think about making a speech, and even the smell of beer from the bar was making me retch. White, clammy, sweating, and petrified, I took my seat, and we were greeted by the owner bearing cocktails for the ladies and pints of ‘Old Speckled Hen’ for the men. Future father-in-law loved his beer!

 

This was not just a case of feeling a bit queasy because in addition to the afternoon beer intake, I had an anxiety issue that caused me to be sick if nervous and I was now extremely stressed and very nervous. How could I drink my beer let alone eat solid food? Katrina was staring at me with an evil, menacing grin on her face and had obviously worked out the reason I was sweating heavily and looking nauseous. 

 

‘You haven’t touched your beer Stephen’ said father-in-law as he finished his first pint, ‘drink up and I will get us another one’. ‘Good idea’ I responded and gathering all my strength made a big show of standing up, picking up my beer and gulping down half a pint in one go. My stomachs now unstoppable preparation for imminent vomiting commenced, the countdown had started, but I was trapped in my seat by the old and infirm so had an horrendous vision of vomiting all over the mixed starters and elderly relatives.

The end result of gulping down the beer was never in doubt, my body was going to reject it, and it was just a matter of how long I could contain myself. Something had to be done, so with a big, forced smile I stood up, apologised profusely for not using the bathroom earlier and the poor geriatrics complete with walking sticks had to shuffle out of the way for me. It caused quite a commotion and seemed to take forever but I kept concentrating hard, smiling, and apologising, but at last I was free. I sidled out of my seat as if in no particular hurry and in order to further give the impression that everything was ok stopped to give two thumbs up to future father-in-law who was coming back from the bar with another full tray of beer.

It was quite a long walk to the door that led to the corridor and the toilets and I hoped that they would not be occupied. I walked casually but with the feeling of nausea having reached the point of no return. This was going to be messy! Having almost sauntered to the door, I closed it behind me and started running. I had just reached the door to the gents when the eruption began. It was projectile, it covered the floor in the corridor, the walls, the sink, the toilet, and it was even dripping off the mirror. I looked at the scene of devastation around me in horror and then checked my clothes. By some miracle they were unblemished, so I quickly rinsed out my mouth, washed my face, wiped my splattered shoes and feeling considerably better tiptoed back out to the corridor. Nobody in sight so I hurried back to the restaurant and opened the door with a big smile on my face, squeezed past the oldies and took my seat.

 

Anybody who engages in regular binge drinking will know that recovery post sickness is very quick and that was the case on this occasion. The colour came back to my cheeks, I stopped sweating and with a loud, ‘Cheers’ to future father-in-law, finished my pint, heaped my plate with starters and made a big show of how hungry I was.

 

The main courses had just arrived when there was huge commotion and I could see the red-faced owner talking to his staff, excitedly waving his arms, and pointing in the direction of the toilets. I made a huge show of loading my mouth with steak and chips liberally covered in pepper sauce to further bolster my, ‘I am healthy and not at all sick’ credentials. I think it says something about young Mr Jones because I do not remember feeling guilty or remorseful about the disruption to the restaurant or the potential need to redecorate the gent’s toilet, I was only concerned with covering my tracks. My confidence did however ebb when the owner looked directly at our table and started walking in our direction.

 

He spoke quietly to future father-in-law, who looked shocked, shook his head gravely and left the table to talk privately with the owner. My potentially ex future father-in-law returned to the table and told the guests that there had been an unfortunate incident in the gent’s toilet so we would all have to use the ladies. When quizzed by evil Katrina as to what sort of incident, he said that one of the men from the bar next door, probably a young farmer had made a mess of the corridor and toilets. The feeling of relief was amazing, and I did not care that blame was being apportioned elsewhere. I had got away with it! Evil Katrina looked at me and loudly said ‘you are lucky that you went to the toilet just before it happened’. The words could be taken literally but the grin on her face and obvious sense of enjoyment at my discomfort indicated that she knew who the real culprit was. My parents are very quiet and did not comment throughout but my father having seen how drunk I was and witnessed my dramatic recovery must have had his doubts but did not say a word. 

 

Approximately twenty-five years later and father-in-law is staying with us in Edinburgh having just gone through his second messy divorce and as a result been left penniless, living in a bedsit in a small town near Abergavenny. I previously mentioned that he was a great man and I had huge respect for him so I was more than happy for him to stay with us and to help him get back on his feet again. I took him to my favourite pub, ‘The Canny Mans’ in Morningside and ordered two pints of Caledonian IPA. When they arrived, we touched glasses, said ‘Cheers’ and I gulped down half the pint without taking a breath. He looked at me and asked, ‘was it you that was sick all over the toilets at your engagement party?’ ‘Yes” I replied, ‘it was me’. ‘I thought so’ he said.