Colin The Relationship Counsellor

Last night I incurred the wrath of Gabe. I'd promised to take him to town on Saturday and get his ear pierced. Apparently I'd forgotten. This is untrue, and I told Gabriel this - I had been thoroughly willing to take him to have a needle punched through his ear on the day in question, but he wasn't around for most of the day and when I rang his mobile I heard it buzz and vibrate and sound off from the general direction of his room.

This understandably got me nowhere, in the eyes and mind of Middle-Son anyway. Lian has taken the non-appearance of a dangling horse-shoe-thingie from Gabriel's right ear personally, apparently. It is an obvious sign of his lack of commitment towards their developing relationship. Gabriel's perceived unwillingness to have a hole ripped into the soft flesh of his ear-lobe displays that he doesn't like her that much. And it's all my fault.

So I took the hit, apologised, and said I'd definitely, positively take him this Saturday. This did little to placate him, and he demanded to be taken now, although exactly where at ten to six in the evening I had no idea. When I re-iterated my decision of Saturday, Gabriel tried the tact that Lian's mother had offered to do it for him. This still failed to wash with me, so Gabriel backed-down and acquiesced.

This conversation happened within earshot of Colin, who was sat at the kitchen table wolfing done one of those weight-watcher's meals - a tuna pasta bake, I think. The fact he was washing it down with one of those over-sized cans of Stella and supplementing it with two chunky slabs of bread coated with an inch or so of Clover did not escape my notice. Nor did it my unspoken disdain.

Firstly, Colin offered to sort the earring issue himself with a needle, a pair of pliers and the stove (to heat the needle, one suspects), and secondly - once Gabe had declined option a - and most unexpectedly, he agreed with me.

In fact, I am going to record the very words here for posterity: Your dad's right, Gabe.

And what's more, he continued: You're letting Lian twist your melon a bit too much, Gabe. She's walking all over you.

Gabriel frowned and asked Colin what he meant, so Colin asked a very pertinent question: If Lian was not part of your life, would you even consider, for one moment, wearing an earring? Especially a dangling one that looks like a horse-shoe that may or may not be the Burmese- sorry, Myanmarese syllable *gay*?

Gabe thought about that, then admitted, probably not.

There's the point, continued Colin accelerating easily into full flow. She's persuading you to do things that you wouldn't normally do. Now, in this case, it isn't much of an issue, as it's only an earring, which I bet you can't even wear at school, right?

Not allowed earrings, mumbled Gabe, which was news to me. I really must pay more attention.

Colin went on: However, the real issue here is not that she's persuading you to have your ears pierced, but the fact she's pressuring you to do it on her terms - when *she* says, and she's using a little emotional blackmail on you to push you that bit further. It's good for you to wait a bit, to show her she can't just snap her fingers and you jump.

It's just an earring, said Gabe.

It's a woman, Gabe, said Colin. It's never *just* anything. What do you tell her if she says next week it's a Myanmarese tradition to have your nipples chained together? Or your head shaved and a picture of Buddha tattoed on your skull?

I'd tell her to get lost, said Gabe. But Colin didn't seem convinced. He said I bet you wouldn't. Do you love her, or are you more interested in what she keeps under her clothes?

I- blurted out Gabe, his face reddening. I raised my alertness levels, as I thought Gabe might be on the verge of tipping over into tornado mode, but the winds quickly subsided. I dunno, Gabe eventually said. I like her. I like her quite a bit.

Just be careful, is all I'm saying, concluded Colin. She isn't going to respect you if she thinks you're a pushover. Do what she says, but make sure it's done on your terms, okay?

Okay, said Gabriel.

I made an observation: You realise, Gabe, you're taking relationship advice from someone whose marriage has recently broken up?

I sort of regretted the words as soon as they left my lips, wondering how Colin would react.

But he just laughed. Well, he said, I guess your advice to Gabe would be to run away and hide somewhere and never have anything to do with woman again, ever.

And it would be good advice, I added. Colin just shook his head. He asked me if I'd rung that number yet. I told him I had not. He shook his head again. He went back to his paltry meal, and Gabe went upstairs.

Andrew appears to be extremely enthusiastic over my temporary move to vegetarianism. Even if it is purely temporary. And doesn't include Sundays as Sundays do not form part of Lent (I've checked). He claims that a month or so of an almost exclusively herbiverous diet will work wonders for me and I'll be educated upon the errors of my blood-lusting ways. I tend to think a month or so on an almost exclusively non-alcoholic diet is more likely to work the wonders for me. I've left half a bottle of Glen Ord next to the George Formby just to tempt me. If I cannot resist its single malt charms for a month than perhaps I have to consider I might have a bit of a problem.

Andrew cooked me a quorn curry for my dinner, which was perfectly nourishing but hardly a new experience for me as I've eaten quorn countless times before. Then much later we dusted off the old chess board and did a little father-son bonding over the chequered squares. And Andrew beat me for the first time ever, although the last time I played him he was about eight. In fact he beat me in all three games we played, all with interesting knight moves. I could never keep a grip on those perishing little buggers.