Our lodger pays a third of the mortgage and is always in
Looking for somebody with a door of his own
Our lodger pays a third of the mortgage and works from the kitchen table, so he is in the house roughly ninety per cent of the time and will be for the foreseeable future. That is the single fact that has shaped three years of this for us.
Thirty eight and forty, south east, three years open. Four meetings in that time, all of them somewhere neutral, none of which led anywhere, and we are increasingly sure the neutral part is why. There is a limit to how relaxed anybody gets in a place where all three of you are counting the cost of the evening.
She dates. He knows everything and does not come along after the first meeting. It has never caused a row and neither of us is putting a brave face on anything.
What we are asking for is a man with his own flat or house who does not mind us coming to him. We are aware that puts us in a queue behind every other couple in this city, and we cannot think of anything to offer instead except being easy to deal with, unhurried, and honest about what we are.
Not looking for anyone who suggests we simply get a hotel room, which we have costed and which turns an occasional evening into something we would have to plan our month around. Not looking for anyone who cannot host and thinks we will solve it. We cannot.
Before the first drink Replying goes through the connected platform, so nothing about you is shared until you decide to share it. Take contact slowly and keep identifying details back until trust is earned. Meet somewhere public the first time, with your own way home from it, and if you are a couple then go together. Tell someone outside it where you are going. Never send money to someone you have not met. And if a post or a reply reads wrong, flag it rather than talking yourself out of the feeling.
Before you answer a post like this
Two people wrote this together, and both of them have to say yes to you. These are the three written for the man on the other end of it.
- What makes a single man read as safe
- Vetting a couple: the screening men skip
- The first meeting: a drink, all three of you