Uncle Dysfunctional Read online

  Dear AA Gill,

  My wife and I went on holiday with her family. Her younger sister came down to the pool wearing a tiny bikini. “Ooh,” I said, “that’s one for the wank bank.” I wasn’t really sure if I said it out loud. The wife went tonto. “Did you just say you wanted to masturbate over my sister?” I tried to explain the harmless concept of the wank bank, that all men have one. But she won’t let it go. She has to know who else is in it, and if she’s there. And every time we go to a restaurant or a pub she says, “I suppose she’s a deposit in your savings account.” And now she’s asking her friends if their husbands have them, and the guys are complaining to me. But the worst bit is, I’m experiencing difficulties taking Captain Picard to warp speed. Where there should be Angelina Jolie in leather or Halle Berry in sweat, I can only see the wife, wagging her finger and shouting, “I hope that’s not my sister in there with you!”

  Phil, by email

  There is a wank-banking crisis. We all speculated and spent, in the biblical sense – borrowed from one ball to pay to the other – on fantasies of body parts we can’t sustain, or pay the interest. The 21st-century wank bank is full of arses and tits we don’t need, and we’ll never use. It looks like your iTunes library but without the sense of rhythm or a Genius button. And does it make us happy, all this ejaculatory aspiration? No, it doesn’t. Tell the wife she’s right. In these straitened times you can’t afford a big, fuck-off-I’m-busy wank bank. So you’re laying them all off except for a couple of tasteful classical statues and that memory of her with the sunburn and the drunken Brazilian on honeymoon, and that from now on you’re placing yourself in her hands or outsourcing to the internet.

  Mr Gill,

  I’m frightened.

  Anonymous, by email

  And so you should be. Frightened is the natural state for all men. There is much to be frightened about and of. What’s more frightening is you don’t know the half of it. The measure of a man’s life is how he copes with the terrible wall of fear. The traditional manly remedies are: rigorous self-delusion (an absolute refusal to face anything remotely akin to reality or even open an envelope); drink; and mood-altering masturbation. And for this you need a really comprehensive wank bank.

  Sir,

  My husband said he had something important to tell me. I could see from the fear it was serious. I’d suspected for some time that he might have been wearing my clothes, so I was prepared for a bout of tearful trannie guilt. Which, frankly, I’d be OK with. We’re about the same size and I didn’t marry him for his dress sense, so I might as well stay married to him for mine. But then he blurted out that he was a nudist. I must say I was surprised. Calmly, I said I thought I might have noticed if he’d been playing volleyball in the garden starkers. He said he didn’t want to be a collective nudist – he was a singular, secret one. And he would like me to be a secret nudist with him. What, just round the house? No, he said. Outside, together. Well I wasn’t overcome with excitement, but compromise is everything in a relationship, and after 20 years of marriage I was amazed that there was anything new to discover about him. I’m going to draw a veil over our sojourn in Hampstead Heath. If only I’d had a veil about me at the time. Never again. He said the deeply humiliating cascade of events was my fault for not being quick enough. He is still sulking. And he says he doesn’t know if we can go on if I can’t join him on his journey. At the moment I don’t know if I can go on if I do. It does seem a very stupid reason to break up what is essentially a happy though dull life with a nice home, a successful business and a secure family.

  Sophie, West Sussex

  He is not a nudist. Nudists are plural. A singular nudist is a flasher. He wants to implicate you in his sad little waggling insecurity. If he gets nicked on his own it’s six months on the nonce’s wing and a lifetime on the register. If he’s got you with him it’s a Benny Hill sketch, and the bobbies trying to keep a straight face while giving you a lift home in a blanket, with a verbal to lay off the Viagra and go on holiday to Sweden. But you’re right not to want to break up a perfectly dull marriage. It’s not that serious. It’s not as if he suggested bridge, or restoring classic caravans. The answer is, introduce him to your nearest art school as a model. He can be naked alone and observed. And you could take up sketching, and thus join in while remaining clothed. Indeed, you sound like someone who might take to bohemian headscarves, smocks, lumpy jewellery and cannabis. And you can’t be any worse at art than he is at being a pervert.

  Dear Mr Gill,

  My husband has a degenerative, incurable illness. We’re both young, under 30. We met at school and have been together since GCSE geography. Now he wants to die and he wants me to help him and assumes I will because we love each other. He says I won’t get into trouble with the police, and courts are sympathetic to spouses who assist in suicides – particularly after Terry Pratchett – and anyway I have no ulterior motive. He’s saying goodbye to all his friends and making arrangements for the big day: drugs, suffocation and Billie Holiday. He’s happier than he’s been for ages. The thing is, I do have an ulterior motive. I’m sleeping with his younger brother. And have been for years. In fact, I was on the point of leaving when he got diagnosed, but then I couldn’t. I’ve just discovered I’m pregnant and obviously it can’t be my husband’s. Oh, and there’s one other thing. It doesn’t really matter but my husband’s father has a title. If he dies it will pass to his brother. And he’ll inherit a great deal of land. I do think killing him is the best option. I have no problems either way, morally.

  Jocasta, London SW3

  Congratulations. Hats off. Respect. You can be in this business for years without getting a problem that impressively screwed up. Where did you all go to school? Webster’s Academy of Jacobean Tragedy? OK, here’s the thing: you’re completely fucked. No, really. Game over. There is just one teeny, forlorn chink of hope, an outside, 100–1 chance. So here is your mission, if you choose to accept it. First you’ve got to tell the husband that he’s going to be a father. Explain the immaculate conception by telling him you judiciously had some of the hereditary custard frozen, way back, just in case. And you’ve secretly been having IVF. You didn’t tell him because you didn’t want him to be disappointed if it didn’t work. So he has to stay alive to see his son. You have to square the brother, carrot and stick. First, keep shagging him, which shouldn’t be a hardship. But tell him if he says anything you’ll deny it and no one will believe him because he’s a younger son, and no one ever believes younger sons. So this way you keep everything, including someone else’s good name. But, and there is a but, the child will grow to be an amoral, manipulative, sensual monster. The two of you will be well-suited until you get old and the last thing you’ll see is his beautiful smile as he gently but firmly holds a pillow embroidered with the family crest over your face.

  Sir,

  I’ve just left uni and have got a lot of job interviews lined up. City, industry, etc. I’m really clever. My CV’s impressive. I’m sure I could do most jobs better than most people but I’m shit at interviews. When someone asks me what my chief fault is, I have an uncontrollable desire to say, “I smile when listening to idiots.” And then smile.

  Gareth, via Facebook

  OK, Gareth. First, remember this is all about the job. It’s not just about your job. It’s all to do with the jobs of the people who are interviewing you. Being on a recruitment panel represents a lot of stress and an opportunity for people in offices. They get to show off or get shown up. There will be one boss-person and then two underling suits, who will be trying to outdo each other. What they’re looking for is someone who makes them look good, and who won’t be a threat. So the trick to interviews is not the dos, but the three don’ts. Don’t flirt, don’t be too keen and don’t be too clever. Remember, the job will always go to the third best candidate. First and second best will be championed by the competing courtiers. The boss will say, “Is there anyone we can all agree on?” And that’ll be third best. Which is ne
ver going to be you, is it? Because the other thing is, you’re a twat. A proper, whiny, pompous, self-justifying twat. I hope The Big Issue thing works out for you.

  AA,

  My girlfriend’s just been diagnosed with bipolar disorder. It’s such a downer. Can I dump her?

  Chinua, by email

  Yeah, course you can. Hey, you didn’t sign up for a mentalist, did you? Don’t feel bad. No reason why you both should. She’ll probably be better off on her own. She can concentrate on lightening the fuck up. I wouldn’t risk a face-to-face. Might make her worse: the begging, the what-did-I-do-wrong sobbing, the suicide threats. Just text her. “Sorry, babe, not working out for me. Moving on. Cheer up. LOL.”

  Dear Uncle Dysfunctional,

  It’s our one-month anniversary and I’m taking my girlfriend to Paris for the weekend. I want to give her some nice underwear for the occasion. I don’t know where to start.

  Tom, Putney

  Jesus. She’s already wearing your bollocks as earrings. No man in the history of shagging has ever remembered or acknowledged a one-month anniversary. Look, Tom, these are the rules for lingerie: don’t. Simple as. Your job is getting it off, not adding to it. That’s all you’ve got to remember. Never, ever, give underwear. You don’t know her size. Her friends will lie about her size. She’ll lie about her size. Take an old bra into Agent Provocateur and the shop assistant will lie about her size. Just going, “Oh, about a handful”, isn’t enough. Men and women see completely different things when they look at bras and knickers. No woman who doesn’t keep tenners in her garter belt has ever worn red underwear. Men put on their Berlusconi heads when they step through the door of Victoria’s Secret. Women grow instantly frigid when presented with a bra and thong set. What they see is a whole night of humiliation and logistical and ergonomic problems. Any man who could choose aesthetic, sensual underwear in the correct size is not the sort of man they’d want to wear it for. Here’s what you need to know about erotic presents and Paris: give her a riding crop. Unless she’s got a horse. If she’s already got a horse it’s not an erotic present, it’s a cheap gift.

  Dear Adrian,

  I’m just starting at a Southern uni. No one from my family, school or estate in the North East has ever been to university. I can handle the work. I get on with the other students. I’m not teased or bullied. I’m popular and everyone likes my accent. It’s all cool except I really can’t handle the dressing up. Why are middle-class, privately educated Southern kids so childishly obsessed with fancy dress? Every Friday night the town and campus looks like a cross between a hen night and MGM’s backlot. The streets are littered with vomiting bunnies and discarded togas. Every event comes with some embarrassing instruction to dress up as your favourite sin or an animal with the first letter of your name. Or there are instructions on what to arrive as, and then find your blind date who’ll be dressed as Wilma to your Fred, or Courtney to your Kurt. I’ve just had another one from my tutor that says, “Dress: smart-casual”. What the fuck is “smart-casual”? Come as an oxymoron?

  Clive, by email

  Clive, you’ve stepped into the pantyhose of class, the last codpiece of the English class system. Everything else – the Empire, the deference, the big house, the cosy snobbery and a gardener with only one name – has been taken away from them. All that’s left are tarts and vicars parties. And if you want to feel really out of place, turn up as a vicar. All posh English boys want to dress up as women. They can’t see a balloon without sticking it up their jumpers. If you want to separate the public schoolboys from the comprehensive ones, just put them in a room with a wig. The reasons for this are many, deep and distressing. Don’t go there. On a fundamental level, the class system was always about fancy dress. A hierarchy of funny hats, ribbons, chains, breeches, riding, shooting, Henley and judges. It’s been pointed out (by badly dressed Americans) that the English ruling class has clothes instead of character. Their whole lives are spent dressing up to be someone else. When they say clothes maketh the man, they mean it literally. They have kit to be brave in, kit to be clever in, kit to be romantic in and pyjamas with flies that don’t work for rudimentary sex. Your best bet is to play to the stereotype. Have a couple of default costumes: a Jarrow marcher; a coal miner; or Rodney Bewes from The Likely Lads. As for smart-casual, no one knows what it means. It’s the garment version of “How are you?” or “I’ll give you a ring.” An empty instruction, a request without emphasis or meaning. It’s just there to stop people phoning up all week asking, “How should I dress for your drinks party?” It means, not a dressing gown or the robes for the Order of the Garter. And in your case, I think the Rodney Bewes outfit will be fine.

  AA,

  I have a large penis. We’re not talking above average. I mean huge. Thick and long. And white. A really, really big white penis.

  Anonymous, by email

  On your shoulders?

  Hi,

  My name’s Gerald. I’ve been in analysis for seven years, but my shrink’s away on her summer holidays and I really need someone to talk to. You look a bit like her and you also look a bit like my dad. I’ve had a sort of OK week. I think I’m dealing with the passive-aggressive stuff, though I did have this moment, an encounter – not so much an encounter, just like a passing thing, not important really – with this woman in a car park at Tesco. She was old, well not old, older than me. But nice-looking in a sort of seen-better-days way. I helped her load the shopping into the back of her car. It was a VW. I still get these pangs of irrational fear around German cars. Then she offered me a probiotic yoghurt as a thank-you. Fucking hell! What’s that all about? I was filled with rage. What did she mean? I mean really mean? Did she see me as a child, a helpful boy with undescended testicles, not a real man? Do I need my bowels opened? It brought up issues about penis length, cleanliness and my terror of sphincters. I mean, she could have given me a banana. She had a bunch. So there was that, which I think I dealt with quite well. The yoghurt gave me wind. The bitch next door, with the cat, the one whose bedroom I can see into and had the minor obsession with, well, it’s been pissing in my garden. The cat, not Laura. I actually caught it spraying the Japanese Maple where I put my dad’s ashes and the posthumous letter I wrote him. This seems over-loaded with significance. Bitch. Pussy. Dad. Writing. Canadian national symbol . . . [The rest of this letter can be read on helpmyanalystisonholidayandihavenoonetotalkto.com]

  The thing with analysis, Gerald – I’m assuming Gerald isn’t your real name; Gerald hasn’t been anyone’s real name since the war – is that analysis is a good thing. Self-knowledge is a good thing. A karmic manicure is a good thing. Here’s the other thing: people who need analysis but haven’t had any can be really fun to be around, because they’re nuts. People who have had analysis can be really fun to be around because they’re not nuts. It’s the people in analysis that are fucking insufferable. They have half the understanding, which is like knowing half the rules of chess. You’re no fun to play with. So while you’re in analysis, that’s a decade when no one’s going to want to know you, particularly your mother. And by the way, she’s not on holiday, she’s moved.

  Uncle D,

  What’s your position on pornography?

  Ava, by email

  Complaining about pornography is like moaning about the weather, though more fun, with better graphics. We are just surrounded by it. It’s bottomless, topless and endless. It’s also very repetitive. Very, very, very repetitive. So I don’t have a position on porn. I’m assuming this is a sniggering pun and you’re not called Ava. You’re probably Gerald. And you’re 14 and your penis looks like the handlebar grips on a midwife’s Riley. What the nuanced social observer, the postmodern moral philosopher has in place of a position is more a voyeuristic, hand on chin, quizzically smiling anthropological interest in particular sorts of pornography. If you are in doubt of what that is, there is a helpful index to the left-hand side of most porn sites. You can choose which ones to take umbrage at. Racial s
tereotypes for instance. Black men, big cocks. Japanese girls, white socks. Fake lesbian exploitation. Unshaven German creampie Milf compilation. Porn is no longer either/or. It’s sometimes and somethings. But don’t let anyone tell you that what you need is to be more open to porn, Gerald. Don’t ever get lulled into sharing it or watching it with your girlfriend (when you get one) as some sort of foreplay. This is disgusting and unnatural. Porn has to be solitary, singular, secret and, above all, embarrassing. Nothing ruins pornography like someone else cranking one out saying, “Can’t we fast forward through this bit? Oh, and the midget’s got a willy just like yours.”

  Mr Gill,

  I’ve got this boyfriend, and on the face of it he ticks every box, some of them more than once. He’s good-looking, solvent, with an indoor, sitting-down job. He’s got a car that’s insured, which is as rare as morris dancers round here. My family love him, and so do I. It’s all lush, until he opens his bleeding mouth. He’s got this accent. He sounds posh. Like off Downton Abbey, or some black and white film. Normally I can handle it because he’s polite and funny. It’s just in bed, his voice does me in. You really can’t talk dirty and sound sexy with a posh accent. It’s like being rogered by a comedy butler or a magistrate. I can’t take it seriously. Every time he says, “Here I come ready or not.” Or, “Good Lord, brill top bollocks, Miss.” Or, “Steady the bus!” (he says that quite a lot), I go off the whole thing. I’m writing to you because I assume you’re posh. How do any of you actually breed? How can you get a throb-on for some bird who sounds like Princess Anne saying stuff like, “Do you have a reservation?”