DOs AND DON'Ts

Lynne is having a glass of wine with an unnamed friend. The friend tells Lynne that her parents gave her a list of Dos and Don'ts when she got engaged. She shows a small piece of paper to Lynne and tells her it is the dos and then 8 pieces of paper which are the don'ts.

This unnamed woman looks very depressed. We would expect that this is a pre-arranged drink of wine, but has the friend called Lynne because she wants to talk to her about the problem she is having at the moment or did she save that information for when she met Lynne? She certainly wouldn't want to scare Lynne off, especially as Lynne has already complained about people telling her their problems. Perhaps this woman is a hairdresser or a barmaid and this is why Lynne has agreed to meet her.

This woman has brought the pieces of paper with her to the bar. Is she carrying them around at all times so she can tell people about what her parents have told her? This is going to get quite tiresome for her friends. People will start not inviting her to events and evenings because they know she will turn up with her trademark bits of paper. Yes it is bad that her parents obviously disapprove of her engagement, but surely if she loves this man then she should rebel against her parents. Unless of course they are threatening her with cutting her out of the will if she does not comply with these rules they have set up. Or even just not pay for her wedding. It must be that her suitor is nothing but a poor mechanic, and her upper class parents do not approve of her marrying out of the family unit.

What on earth are these don'ts that have taken up 8 pieces of paper? If they disapprove, it should just consist of "Don't get married!" but they have obviously gone into far more detail than that. Don't these old cronies know that it is no longer their day. It is 1982 for heaven's sake! The world has changed. These people have no concept of late 20th century life, so much so that they are not writing on both sides of the paper. Or maybe they are. If that is the case that is 15 full sides taken up with writing. And unless they have two different sizes of paper in their house, they have gone to the trouble of cutting down the paper that the dos were written on, just to emphasise how little there is she should do. And I bet they got their butler to do it too.