What Katie Did Next

Why I’m ripping up my life... and starting over

Katie Glass was engaged, trying for a baby and on the cusp of a TV career. Then came Covid, and the cracks in her life began to appear

1 November 2020

Before the pandemic started, I was living a different life. My fiancé (two years engaged, five of dating), our sweet Labradoodle (Stringerbelle) and I were happily squashed into a London flat, lazily planning our wedding and keenly trying to get me pregnant. Our lives buzzed around the city. My fiancé went off to work in his start-up’s office, while I ran around doing interviews.

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'I’ve decided to leave London and move to the country - but I've got no idea what I'm doing'

Katie has decided to leave London and move to the country

7 November 2020

When I tell friends I have decided to leave London and move to the country they sound concerned. ‘Are you OK?’ they ask. ‘Absolutely!’ I laugh. ‘Is this because you broke up with the fiancé?’ they worry. ‘Of course not!’ I say. I hope I sound more convincing to them than I do to myself...

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What I learnt about buying a 'project' in the countryside

Katie sets off on the search for her new life – but soon hits a bump in the road

14 November 2020

When it is allowed, I start doing house viewings. The only vehicle I have is the Type 2 VW camper van that my fiancé and I planned to honeymoon in. Shiny cobalt-blue with 1970s flower-power curtains and white sheepskin seats, it is the least practical car imaginable for driving cross-country in. It refuses to do more than 50mph and has a panic attack if it sees a hill.

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Should a city-dweller like me risk moving to the middle of nowhere?

Still searching for a new home, Katie is surprised to find herself taking a step back in time

21 November 2020

Days after the VW camper van dies, a friendly mechanic offers me a Honda CR-V for £500. ‘I’ll take it!’ I say. Then google what it is. It’s not quite the Porsche I hoped to get out of my midlife crisis but it does have a fridge in the dashboard. ‘For beers,’ the mechanic suggests...

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I've found my dream house in the country, but it has one fatal flaw

Katie falls for a bucolic property – but may have overlooked a not-so-minor detail

28 November 2020

The Cornish house is an old granite farmhouse beside an orchard with a stream running through it, surrounded by fields. Tanya cannot make the viewing, so I take her seven-year-old son. He is the only other person I know in Cornwall. Still, it’s good to have a second opinion.

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After 15 years I'm leaving London, and it's a bittersweet farewell

Bad memories binned and furniture safely stored, Katie is packing up her London flat for good

6 December 2020

After the far west tip of Cornwall, where life feels relatively sane, London feels wrecked. In Soho, vibrant streets have collapsed into silence. Even Dalston, where hipsters don’t care about Covid, is eerily still...

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I thought I'd have left London and be in my dream country home by now - I was so naive

Katie’s expectations of moving into her dream house have suffered a serious setback

12 December 2020

It is 350 miles from Hampstead Heath (via the ferry at Pembroke) to East Ferry, where one of my bridesmen has offered to lend me his cottage near the Irish coast. I leave my life packed in a 50 sq ft storage unit and head off with a suitcase and enough cash in the bank from the sale of my flat to flee to Barbados. I am a woman on the run. A one-girl Thelma and Louise. It feels like I’ve got away with murder and in a way I have – my own. Except this is better because now I can start again.

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Why the country is no place for a single woman

Staying with friends is fantastic – except when it reminds you of the life you could have had

19 December 2020

To lose your fiancé and become homeless during a pandemic may be regarded as a misfortune; but it is sheer carelessness to move into your friend’s rose-covered farmhouse with her perfect husband and cheeky son so you can confront how badly your own life has gone wrong.

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I hoped dating in the countryside would be hot farmers and sexy fishermen - far from it

As Katie is discovering, dating in Cornwall is not quite what she imagined

26 December 2020

The dating pool in Cornwall is terrifyingly limited. One girl I know here says, in all seriousness, that she has ‘completed Tinder’. Still, the options can’t be worse than the people I dated in London, where I mainly went out with toffs, artists and start-up CEO w­—kers...

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It's not cool to admit you're lonely in London, but in the country it's easier to make friends

With a bit of effort (and a few pottery classes), Katie’s beginning to feel little more at home

2 January 2021

Making plans for the house consumes most of my time: finding furniture on Facebook Marketplace, fantasising about where the hot tub will go, working out what do about the heating ‘situation’.

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I'm finally starting to feel like a local. But my dream of living in Cornwall may be coming to an end

Despite warnings about Cornish winters, Katie Glass is in love with the county. But the sale on her new home is yet to go through

9 January 2021

Everyone told me the real worry was winters in Cornwall. It’s easy to love the Duchy in summer – under cloudless blue skies bright as the sea; swimming off sandy beaches, where surfers sit at beach shacks sharing crayfish pizzas and beers.

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Has my move to the country all been a big mistake?

Legal wranglings over her new home threaten to upend Katie’s Cornish dream

16 January 2021

Weeks pass, waiting anxiously in the tree house with my life still packed-up in a London storage unit. The exchange date I’d hoped comes and goes. I kick myself for being so optimistic. To think that, even in a pandemic with half the country moving house, I could still rush through my sale in six to eight weeks.

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After months trying to buy my dream country house, I'm devastated to be back at square one

Property woes and wheeler dealers are getting in the way of our columnist’s fresh start

23 January 2021

‘How is your new house?’ Friends excitedly ask me. I cannot bear to tell them, far from having moved in, the purchase is in an absolute mess. My attempts to negotiate with the seller through the estate agent are being met – by the agent – with contempt, as he dismisses the issues I raise about the house as if I am causing a fuss over nothing.

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After my house purchase fell through, I’ve finally found a place I can call home

It may be tiny and a rental, but Katie’s new cottage is a step up from her friend’s sofa bed

30 January 2021

After my house purchase collapses, the most urgent problem is that I now have nowhere to live. I feel too old to be sleeping on someone’s sofa and desperate to build a life in Cornwall. So I decide to do what everyone sensible told me to do in the first place and find something to rent. Although in Cornwall, it turns out, that is problematic.

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Am I living the seaside dream, or am I just a cliché?

Now safely ensconced in her Cornwall fisherman’s cottage, Katie is wondering where she fits in

6 February 2021

My fisherman's cottage is every fantasy I had as a child of living in a Wendy house, except it is more tastefully decorated with Farrow & Ball grey wooden stairs, white beams and a large wrought-iron bed, which I can sit in drinking tea looking out to St Clement’s Island.

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Here in Cornwall, women vastly outnumber men. Should I become a lesbian again?

Katie’s hitting a few stumbling blocks in her search for Mr (or Ms) Right

13 February 2021

You can run to the end of the earth to avoid many things, but Valentine’s Day is not one of them. Even here, the pink mist descends. In Penzance, shop windows flash red. My post office displays naff-looking cards: ‘To my darling wife,’ they read. I wonder where ‘To my darling ex-fiancé’ is.

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I thought I was being brave trying to build a new life, but perhaps I should have stayed put

Katie’s Cornish fantasy is faltering – could her adventure be about to come to an end?

20 February 2021

In Mousehole, it’s easy to play fantasy villages: skipping around like Belle in the opening scene of Beauty and the Beast. Except here there isn’t a baker but a delicatessen selling flat whites and hand-crafted coca-nib chocolate, and a restaurant with truffle fries on the menu.

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I'm house-hunting again – but is it hopeless?

Katie is feeling beaten down by the loss of her farmhouse, until strangers come to the rescue

27 February 2021

After the house sale falls through I have panicky nights when I feel like I am drowning and don’t know what to do next. The Mousehole rental is only short-term and even though it is a substantially discounted holiday let, it is still costing me as much in Cornwall as London did, which tells you how irrational the property market here is.

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In the months since I left London, I haven't missed it

Katie ups sticks to a barn where vintage vinyl and the odd friendly local are the only company

6 March 2021

The cottage in Mousehole has building work scheduled, so I have no choice but to pack up my car and move again, this time just a few miles down the coast to a barn I can rent for two weeks.

The barn is built from granite and divided into two. In one half is the vinery where, in summer, the owners produce wine. The other half is my tiny studio, with its small kitchen area, a table, a sofa bed and a record player with a collection of old 45s.

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I’m now feeling closer to the ‘real’ Cornwall

After a short stay in a touristy village while she house hunts, another move gives Katie a glimpse into how life used to be

13 March 2021

If I head from the barn where I am staying and follow the river, past the tree that has been decorated with yellow and red fishing buoys, past the road sign that reads: ‘Caution: Cats Crossing!’, past the fat brown cottage whose thatched roof hangs so thick and low that it looks like a Christmas pudding – and keep walking past the line of allotments and over the stone bridge, I come to Penberth Cove.

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What I learnt about buying a house in the country - after two disastrous attempts

Katie falls in love with a Somerset cottage, but potential problems arise instantly

24 July 2021

I had read about the Dunning-Kruger effect – the theory that the less you know about something, the more you overestimate your own ability at it – but I had never seen the effect quite so starkly in my own life as when I came to buy a country house.

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I ended up in Cornwall because I was in crisis and it was as far as I could run

Katie’s voyage of discovery reveals some unexpected insights about her new home

20 March 2021

I knew little about Cornwall when I moved here on a whim. In truth, that is what attracted me to it. Cornwall is a place with no memories for me. It is not Wales or Somerset or the Midlands, which feel haunted by the years my mother has been ill, going in and out of hospital; not Sussex, where my dad spent his last years deteriorating with Alzheimer’s; nor the Peak District where my fiancé was from, where he proposed and we dreamed about moving.

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I'm regularly told I’m not welcome in Cornwall

Now several months into her search for a new home in the county, Katie wonders whether she will ever be considered a local

27 March 2021

When we lived in Wales, my mum would joke that you could live there a decade and still not be local. Now in Cornwall, I understand what she meant. As I write about falling in love with this place, some people (the minority) seem to delight in telling me I am not welcome here.

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I've finally figured out what I'm looking for in my quest for a new life in the country

The arrival of spring gives Katie renewed house-hunting enthusiasm

3 April 2021

In lockdown, all we have is time, and permission to view houses. I make a virtue of both, booking in viewing after viewing on a newly invigorated mission to find my dream home. Now it’s spring, more properties come on every day. In the mornings, I sit in bed drinking coffee in the warmth of the sun calling estate agents, who explain some vendors have been waiting for good weather to show their gardens off, while older sellers have nervously delayed viewings until Covid numbers dropped.

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I’m surprised by how suffocating village life is

Katie Glass has moved back into her rented Cornwall cottage, but fears the novelty may have worn off

10 April 2021

I feel at home in the barn, the valley and Penberth. Pottering around past signs saying ‘Watch out for ducks’, grinning at warnings posted on the local Facebook group, cautioning that cows have been spotted loose on the road.

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Looking for houses is like looking at men on Tinder - they never live up to expectations

Katie is finding the hunt for men and houses worryingly similar – a bit disappointing in real life

17 April 2021

'We are all worried that you don’t have a boyfriend,’ a friend texts. I wish people were as worried about my living situation. At this point I am seriously considering moving into a camper van.

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My possessions have been in storage for months - and it's led to a life-changing revelation

Being separated from a lifetime of accumulated stuff while house-hunting has made Katie Glass reassess their value

24 April 2021

The first warning sign that people were losing it in this pandemic was actor Gal Gadot assembling a desperate celebrity crew to film themselves singing John Lennon’s Imagine. It wasn’t clear exactly what we should take from millionaires in mansions singing, ‘Imagine no possessions.’ Still, this week, I found myself humming it as I packed my car to move out of Mousehole (sadly not to my dream rural barn – Cornwall’s holiday lets are packed – but to a cottage up the coast in Marazion).

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Why I’m giving my engagement ring away

Months after breaking up with my fiancé, I've vowed to donate my aquamarine and diamond ring to someone who needs it – but how do I decide?

30 April 2021

No matter how much I try to move on after my break-up, almost a year later I still feel sad that my engagement ended. I left my fiancé during the first lockdown, in what seemed to both of us to be a sudden end, as flaming rows became claustrophobic then ultimately unsolvable.

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I'm ashamed of being estranged from my mother

After enduring a fractious relationship from the age of 17, Katie Glass cut her mother out of her life almost 10 years ago

1 May 2021

I do not usually write about my relationship with my mother. I could say that is out of respect or because it is too complex, but mostly it is because I am ashamed of it. Now, on the cusp of turning 40, I have been separated – one way or another – from my mother for most of my life. I cannot remember the last time I saw her. Or even the last time I called her my ‘mother’ rather than by her first name. When people ask me about her, I say we are ‘estranged’, as if one word could sum up a lifetime of longing, hope and pain.

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I joked I was having a midlife crisis. Now I realise I was the butt of that gag

As she celebrates her 40th birthday, Katie Glass has some major revelations

8 May 2021

Today, I turn 40. From that sentence on, there will be no more lying about my age. Although who wants to anyway? Now I’d be better off telling people I’m 60 so they can coo over how great I look.

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The moment I realised my Cornish dream was over for good

A health crisis is the final straw in her long search for a new home as Katie realises she needs help – and hugs – from friends

15 May 2021

The pain started... actually, I’m not sure when the pain started because at first I ignored it. During house viewings it came and went, flaring up on car rides, then vanishing. It seemed to hurt more when I was stressed: when storage bills arrived, offers collapsed, when I moved or Twitter abuse came, the acid gnawed at my stomach.

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I gave away my engagement ring on Twitter - here's how I chose the lucky woman

What Katie thought would be a heart-breaking experience turned out to be an uplifting one

22 May 2021

Among the loose ends of my old life I wanted to tie up, I’d been wondering what to do with my engagement ring. In conversations, my ex insisted he didn’t want it. It seemed too depressing to sell it, so I decided I would give it away. I told my ex what I was doing and, to his credit, he loved the idea. ‘That’s kind of you,’ he wrote.

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After months in the countryside, it's electrifying to be back in the city. So where do I belong?

Katie’s thrilled to be back, but is she ready to give up her countryside dream altogether?

29 May 2021

It's thrilling to be back in London as it loudly wakes up from lockdown. The city is alive with noisy crowds gathering outside pubs, people sharing sunny lunches and buzzing around busy shops. I feel like a toddler under a bright mobile, overwhelmed by so much stimuli.

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Why I’m enjoying my sex-free life

Being back in London has made Katie realise it’s been a while – and she hasn’t missed it

5 June 2021

It's annoying admitting how much happier I feel back in London. Perhaps it’s the oomph of the city, the energetic easing of lockdown or the pure pleasure of being among friends. Or perhaps it’s because I am a bolter, never as comfortable anywhere as I am running.

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I've left my Cornish dream behind – could Wales be the best fit for me?

Uncertain where to go next, Katie decides on a trip down memory lane

12 June 2021

People recommend other places I could try. ‘Move to Norfolk!’ someone writes. ‘Why not Yorkshire?’ someone else suggests. Another emails me about how wonderful the Peak District is. The Isle of Wight is paradise, someone else tells me, while another claims it’s in Northumberland.

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I don't miss my ex, but I'm pining for my dog

The lockdown puppy craze has made Katie miss her pooch Stringerbelle all the more

19 June 2021

They say it’s dogs who get separation anxiety, but I’m starting to think it is us who pine over them.

Since the pandemic started I’ve struggled to build a new life after my engagement collapsed, but the times I’ve sobbed hardest for the end of my relationship was when I realised I would never see my dog again.

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Goodbye Cornwall and all your drama - I'm happy in Britain's corner of calm

Katie puts the tumult of Cornwall behind her to take a breath in a new region of the country

26 June 2021

Now I’ve woken up in so many different places that some mornings I open my eyes and panic because I’m not sure where I am. A Cornish cottage? Rob’s spare room? Up a mountain in Wales? And so, to give myself some peace, I decide to rent in Somerset for a month to look at houses, and breathe.

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Somerset holds painful memories, but it’s home

When Katie is forced to confront her past, she realises there’s nowhere she’d rather be

3 July 2021

I am happy in Somerset, simple as that. Happy running past fields of lazy cows, happy eating slabs of butterscotch-coloured cheese and hearing my Somerset accent seep back, despite my friend Martin teasing me. I’m happy faffing around vintage shops in Frome, booking tickets for am-dram garden operas and getting drunk on cider in the park with friends I’ve known since I was 16. So happy that sometimes I say it out loud to no one. Happy because I’ve come home.

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Facing my mortality forced me to look after my health

A recent health scare has prompted Katie to make some positive changes

10 July 2021

When my life crumbled, I found solace in cake. And red wine and orange Calippos. And lying on the floor of my London flat ordering Deliveroos, as if binge-eating beef pappardelle and coconut frozen yogurt could replace a job and a marriage (although it almost came close).

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I’ve found my Dalston in Somerset – and it's the best of both worlds

With its burgeoning cultural scene and mix of people, Katie’s feeling right at home

17 July 2021

The best thing about Somerset is the mishmash it is. Unlike the Cotswolds, now entirely owned by Jeremy Clarkson and the Beckhams, or Cornwall, where insiders and outsiders are at each other’s throats, in Somerset wildly different groups rub alongside each other, seemingly content.

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What I learnt about buying a house in the country - after two disastrous attempts

Katie falls in love with a Somerset cottage, but potential problems arise instantly

24 July 2021

I had read about the Dunning-Kruger effect – the theory that the less you know about something, the more you overestimate your own ability at it – but I had never seen the effect quite so starkly in my own life as when I came to buy a country house.

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I feel like I’ve woken up from a coma... and I’ve missed out on so much

As she throws herself into Somerset’s social whirl, has Katie finally found her happy place?

30 July 2021

Everybody knows somebody in Somerset. You could play six degrees of Shepton Mallet based on the number of messages I get from friends, readers and random social media folk suggesting someone around here I should meet.

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I've created a secret identity for online dating

Katie’s ready to start looking for love again, but she’s going undercover

7 August 2021

I decide I need a fake name for dating. Martin thinks this is ridiculous. ‘You’re not Madonna,’ he says.

Still, I want a fake name, not because I am famous, but because I want to be anonymous. When I started exposing my private life in this very column, it didn’t occur to me what I’d do if I met someone on a dating website who googled me, revealing my terrible recent personal CV...

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I'm about to be homeless... now what?

Property problems are getting in the way of Katie’s Somerset dream

14 August 2021

I try to spend as much of my time as possible floating around Somerset in summer dresses, eating too much cheese. I go for afternoon tea in Bradford upon Avon, book the Hot Fuzz tour of Wells and get tickets for a Fleetwood Mac cover band playing Frome’s Cheese & Grain. I spend evenings laughing with L and F, and seeing the very tall man.

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I thought I was too prudish for sexting, until I discovered this secret trick

The man she's been dating is isolating, so Katie is getting in the swing of intimate messaging

21 August 2021

I go on a date with a man who gets pinged, which means he can’t see me for a week. I’m surprised (although it’s such a cliché) that not being able to see him makes me like him more. Perhaps this is deliberate? Perhaps he wasn’t pinged at all. Or perhaps the ping-demic is Boris’s plan to reignite romance after all the lockdown break-ups.

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I've got nowhere to live. Could a camper van be the boho dream?

With her house purchase delayed, Katie finds herself temporarily homeless... and dreaming of life on the open road

28 August 2021

I wake up in L’s caravan, fumble my way out to the bright morning light, head throbbing, and collapse in the sun. After a week of tackling my housing problems like a sensible grown-up, by Friday I’d given in and taken a bottle of wine over to L’s place.

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I feel optimistic – my house is within reach

Katie’s on the move again, but this time she knows she’s going in the right direction

4 September 2021

It’s sad leaving my beautiful rented cottage in Butleigh, it’s the place I’ve felt happiest in the past year and where I felt most settled.

I’ve come to love the quirks of this village: the free library cupboard of books on the high street, the terrible scarecrow display outside the school, the mornings when I’m woken up by the bus driver frantically knocking on cottage doors, his engine still running as he tries to find whose car is blocking the road (not mine!).

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I’ve found new safety in my female friendships

Being around so many women has made Katie realise she hasn’t always trusted them

11 September 2021

I’m excited to move to L’s place in Somerset, even though I’m just staying with her for the week. I fall asleep in her bed encircled by the smell of orange-flower and rose oil, under a purple canopy of sheets, thinking about how much my life has changed since leaving the city.

One thing I’ve noticed is that I’m now surrounded by women...

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I am 40, single and going on my first family holiday in decades

During a week at Center Parcs, Katie enters a parallel universe of vacationing with children

18 September 2021

I’m rescued from my precarious living situation by my cool auntie inviting me to join her, my uncle and cousins (boys, 11 and 13) on holiday at Center Parcs for a week. Since I have nowhere to live and nothing to do (except fret about houses), I enthusiastically agree. Only later it dawns on me I am 40, single and going on my first family holiday in decades.

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Life as a house guest is leaving me in limbo

Katie’s gratitude turns to impatience – but an unexpected solution is on the horizon

25 September 2021

As problems with the house arise, I take them in my stride. And by ‘take them in my stride’, I mean I run to a field in the middle of nowhere and scream. Once, while I am doing this, I spot a concerned-looking dog walker watching me, so I stop to call ‘Evening!’ because the only thing worse than being caught screaming in the countyside is being caught not saying hello to your neighbours.

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I've swapped couch surfing for a cosy caravan – who cares if it's on an industrial estate?

It may be small, but my new caravan is somewhere I can finally call home (for now)

2 October 2021

When the caravan turns up it is tiny, much smaller than it looked on the eBay listing, which is the problem with buying things online – like the time I bought a bin for the kitchen of my last flat and when it arrived it turned out to be doll’s house proportions.

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I love my homely caravan – but not all my neighbours are thrilled

My caravan is giving me the best of both worlds – a sense of freedom and a home

9 October 2021

After two weeks of living in a caravan, the Instagram façade of #vanlife peels away. In a fortnight this is what I have learnt: everything in a caravan is multipurpose – my kitchen is my dressing table, my fridge is a desk, my actual desk becomes the bed. Soon I feel my way around so it becomes second nature storing a teapot on top of the radio and exercising over the sink.

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I can't believe my naivety about the countryside when I first left London

It's been one year since I started this crazy relocation journey – and I've learnt so many lessons

16 October 2021

Although it’s funny living among the hipster community of Frome’s industrial estate, when someone offers to let me pitch my caravan on their farm I jump at it – relocating from concrete to an orchard, beside sheep, where I hang bunting from damson trees like I’m glamping or doing a Temperley photo shoot. My new spot is so idyllic I am loathe to leave, but I’ve planned a week in Ireland with my friend Martin.

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After years of digital dating, I've finally met someone special the old-fashioned way

On dating apps, where singletons are displayed like goods in a shop, I missed the thrill of chemistry and mystery

23 October 2021

Yonks ago (2013), an editor called asking me to try this crazy new way of dating: via apps. I was so lo-tech I had to borrow an iPhone to try this novel method which, I rather cheesily wrote, allowed you to ‘find love from the palm of your hand’.

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I've found the secret to a happy country life

Having moved my caravan to a more rural spot, I'm finally able to relish the peace and quiet

30 October 2021

It’s ridiculous that a year after driving away from my old life in a vintage VW camper van – a year stressfully spent trying to buy a house – now I’ve found happiness living in a retro caravan...

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We moved to the countryside in droves – do we now regret it?

An estimated 700,000 people left the capital for the countryside. But have all those fantasies given way to a lonelier, mud-ridden reality?

7 November 2021

A year ago, I left London searching for a new country life. I’d spent lockdown despairing in a tiny one-bedroom flat: mourning the end of my relationship with my fiancé, having lost the job I’d had for a decade, I was gripped by something many of us felt during the pandemic: a sense of my own mortality and a craving for a better life.

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I'm 40 and single – is it too late to consider motherhood?

We women know leaving parenthood late is a gamble, but if we want a life it often feels like our only choice

13 November 2021

I never wanted to be a mother. My relationship with my own mother was so chaotic, I worried I wouldn’t be any good at it. Equally, having mothered my little brother, I didn’t know if I wanted to do it again. Now, aged 40 and single, perhaps it’s too late to be reconsidering motherhood anyway.

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I've realised I was a London snob – the rural arts scene is thriving

I thought I'd miss London’s vibrant scene, but I've been pleasantly surprised by what's on offer

20 November 2021

There’s no culture in the countryside. Once you head beyond the M25 into the unsophisticated green, the arts evaporate and in their place are yokels listening to Scrumpy and Western, hippies dancing around rune stones and bumpkins burning wicker men. Or so some silly Londoners think.

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I've tumbled from one personal disaster to the next, and one thing saved me

I was lonely, bored and slightly depressed – but this brought me so much joy

26 November 2021

There’s only so long even an anxious, self-absorbed neurotic like me can spend worrying about houses and gazing at her navel. I’ve spent almost a year panicking about property, feeling my life was on hold until I’d bought somewhere to live. But now, settled and happy in my silly, twinkly caravan, I finally have headspace to think about something else. And what I begin thinking about is starting a writing course in Somerset....

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I've finally seen my ex-fiance after a year apart – and it's brought up unexpected emotion

For our columnist, glimpses of her past life make the one she’s now living feel all the more real

4 December 2021

The ex-fiance and I started texting occasionally. We send jokes, silly news stories, we ask each other how we are doing – although I’m not sure either of us really wants to know. He tells me he still reads everything I write, but doesn’t mention the things I’ve written about him.

I wonder if the texts will turn romantic – but they don’t and I’m relieved. He tells me he is seeing someone else and I’m surprised how it stings. I don’t mention Alex.

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I ran away from my wedding – now I’ve got cold feet about my new home

As she finally readies to exchange on a house, our columnist's fear of commitment rears its head

11 December 2021

I’ve so relaxed into life in my chintzy caravan that when my solicitor calls to say we’re finally ready to exchange, I panic. I get cold feet just like I did about getting married, and feel the same anxiety attack I felt in Cornwall. Now I’m tempted to do what I did on both of those occasions – run.

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