Your particularly friendly Heyday Friday newsletter

An unexpected conversation about friendship, a friendly Heydayer, a powerful film about a group of surprisingly supportive friends, and some friendly rules you might not know in this week's newsletter

Hello!

There’s no blog to tempt you to click through to this week (which doesn’t, of course, mean I won’t be encouraging you to have a look at the Heydays website along the way). That’s because I want to have a chat with you about something that happened last week, and a conversation I had about it which really took me aback.

I’ll set up the ‘what happened’ bit first.

As I mentioned in the previous newsletter, last weekend it was my birthday (thank you to those of you who sent me such lovely birthday messages). To celebrate I decided to have some friends round to dinner (see no 2 in the list of things I know about myself HERE). My wonderful man (I can’t bring myself to refer to him as my boyfriend - neither of us are 16, for goodness sake. And calling him my partner makes him sound like a work colleague. Any alternative suggestions gratefully received) offered to pay for the meal to be catered so I could relax and enjoy the evening without having to worry about the food.

The enjoying bit went faultlessly well. The relaxing part suffered a slight set back when I went to put the outrageously delicious dishes which the caterer, Adam - THIS is his website, I couldn’t recommend him more enthusiastically - had dropped round for me to simply heat up, into my oven to discover that it had chosen that day to stop working properly, only summonsing the enthusiasm to get vaguely warm, rather than properly hot. (I suppose that beats the Christmas Day when my sister - who’s also a caterer, but is away at the moment and anyway lives in Shrewsbury, so too far on both counts provide her exemplary cooking services - who was attempting to cook the enormous turkey, emerged from the kitchen looking ever-so-slightly alarmed and announced that the oven was on fire. But I digress.)

It meant a rather longer pause between the starter and the main course than planned, but that didn’t seem to bother my guests who were all deep in gratifyingly enthusiastic and animated conversation. I say ‘gratifying’ because rather than inviting my usual, much-loved, relatively regularly convened group of mates, I had deliberately chosen to put together an eclectic mix of couples - all of whom I love equally dearly - from different bits of my life, none of whom knew each other at all.

Seated round the table along with their fabulous other halves (all with their faces obscured in the pic for privacy purposes, making them look, I admit, like a bunch of alarming circus clowns. Sorry guys), were a dear friend I’ve known since my teens; a beloved cousin of my late husband’s; the father of a girl my youngest daughter (now 35) became friends with at junior school, who has become one of my most treasured friends; and two wonderful friends who I have only met in the last five years.

One is an entrepreneur, one is a broadcaster and journalist. One works for a big multi-national corporation, one is a writer and consultant. There were two lawyers, a linguistics professor, a television producer, an artist and sculptor, and a magistrate. They ranged in age from early-fifties to early-seventies.

Written out like that, I can see how it wouldn’t necessarily be guaranteed that such a diverse group would get on. But working on the principle that they all had at least one thing in common (me) and, I believed, enough similar interests, personalities and characteristics that I thought - hoped - they might. Which I’m delighted to say, they did. Hence my gratitude (and relief).

Before I get to the surprising conversation (I will get there shortly, I promise), that needs a bit of a set up too, albeit one which comes with a spoiler alert caveat.

I don’t mention as often as I should/could that I pop up in a weekly slot on David Lloyd’s morning show on the fabulous BOOM RADIO, a station he co-founded with fellow radio veteran Phil Riley (that’s them below. David’s the one with the, for him typically, colourful jacket).

At the risk of ruining the radio magic, I can reveal that our conversations are pre-recorded, not live, as they sound when they’re broadcast every Thursday at 11.30, and that we record them in batches, five or six at a time.

Recording the latest batch earlier this week, I told David about the birthday dinner and how much I, and my guests, had enjoyed it, and how all of them had said afterwards how refreshing and delightful it had been to have the chance to get to know new people. To which David replied that sitting round a table with a group of people he didn’t know would be “my idea of hell”.

There you are - I told you I’d get to the surprise eventually.

The reason I mention the business of our chats being recorded is that I don’t know exactly when that particular conversation will be aired - so you’ll just have to listen every Thursday for the next few weeks to find out (and then every Thursday thereafter because clearly you’ll enjoy it so much). When you do, you’ll hear why David, who is about as far from a grumpy curmudgeon as you can get, is so much happier relaxing over a meal with his nearest and dearest pals than being faced with a group of strangers he has to make the effort to get to know, however lovely they turn out to be.

So here’s my question - do you feel the same as David? That for an evening to be properly relaxed and enjoyable it needs to be in the company of people you know well. Or are you of the view that shaking it up with new introductions brings some welcome fizz to a get-together? Does the comfort of chatter with friends trump the relative effort of conversation with a stranger, however delightful they turn out to be?

I’m truly intrigued to know.

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I really love these

WORDS OF WISDOM

about friendships

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John is a marvellous Heydayer who has a rather unusual way of starting conversations with strangers

There’s a clue in the pic, but you’ll have to CLICK HERE to find out exactly what it is.

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THIS WEEK I’VE BEEN……WATCHING

The Shawshank Redemption unfailingly features at the top of my list of all-time favourite films. But now its position is threatened by another powerfully unforgettable, emotionally-charged, prison-based film.

Unlike Shawshank, Sing Sing is based on real life and is shot in the real, notorious New York state jail itself, which was decommissioned just two weeks before filming began. Focusing on the Rehabilitation Through the Arts (RTA) programme which originated in Sing Sing, the film follows a group of inmates on the programme as they prepare for one of their bi-annual productions and explores the transformative, therapeutic power of art.

In the central role as the group’s unofficial leader, John Whitfield, aka Divine G, a man wrongly imprisoned for a crime he didn’t commit, Coleman Domingo delivers a stunningly magnetic and deeply moving performance for which he has deservedly been nominated for an Oscar. Here’s the remarkable bit though: he’s supported by a cast mostly made up of non-professional former convicts, all alumni of the RTA programme, playing characters based on themselves.

Chief among them is Clarence Maclin, aka Divine Eye, playing himself as one of the most feared inmates on the block who joins the group determined not to relinquish his anger and aggression, but who gradually learns to trust the other men, and in particular Whitfield, and to reveal his vulnerability and capacity to care. Like the other prisoner/actors, he’s compellingly convincing.

Special mention to the score of Sing Sing. In stark contrast to both the setting and the story, the music is melodic and gentle. At first it seems incongruous, but as you come to realise that what we are witnessing is how being part of the programme is giving men hardened to violence and crime, a chance to discover and share their sensitivity, you understand how it not just fits, but encapsulates the story perfectly.

You can watch SING SING on Amazon Prime (where it costs £4.95 to rent and is worth every penny)

And see the trailer HERE

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WHAT’S MADE ME HAPPY THIS WEEK

Unfortunately my lovely mum had to spend some time in hospital recently after breaking her leg in a fall. I’m relieved to say she didn’t need an operation (and delighted to report that her leg is mending remarkably well). It’s fair to say if she had, she wouldn’t have been on the receiving end of the wonderfully reassuring way this surgeon prepares his young patients for surgery. But I bet she would love it if she was!

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FRIDAY FUNNY

When you have a friend - old or new - round for a cuppa you might want to bear this in mind (particularly number 6 if it’s a new friend you’re keen to impress)

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That’s it for this week. Thank you for reading this far (if you have) and, indeed, for being here at all. I think of all you lovely Heyday readers as friends, albeit ones I’ve mostly never met (another category of friendship?) I’m certainly hugely grateful for the support of every one of you. And I very much look forward to reading your thoughts about the whole socialising with new or old friends thing.

See you next time