In which the talk gets cheap...

I’m a lucky enough gal to have people in my life with whom I can discuss pretty much anything. If I want a good debate about the state of the Labour party, there’s Best Gay Friend; there’s Curable Romantic for discussions about aspects of sex that make me die laughing (the lengthy and detailed textual exchange with intriguing metaphors regarding the difference between clitoral and internal orgasms was one to behold); and there’s Best Mate for… well, a list of what she and I don’t discuss would easily fit on a postage stamp. But there are definitely those people with whom certain topics are definitely Off Limits. Of course, the problems arise when they don’t know that.

BM’s father was recently made aware of a phenomenon generally best left out of the consciousness of one’s parents.

“God knows where he learnt it,” BM said last weekend, as we happily munched our way through a packet of Cadbury’s mini Caramel eggs, “I imagine it was at some function in one of the colleges. Wherever it was, I am not happy that my father now sees fit to bring up the subject of dogging at every available opportunity.”

I looked at her. “He does?!”

“Oh, whenever he can shoehorn it into conversation,” she said, attempting to remove the wrapper of the egg in one piece without breaking it. “It’s mortifying.”

And BM’s father isn’t the only parent delving into the murky underbelly of Conversations That Should Never Be Had.

“So, how’s The Voice?” The Mother asked gleefully as she picked me up from the airport last weekend.

“He’s fine, Mother, thank you.”

A brief discussion about how often I see him and what he does for a living turned down the avenue of discussing his somewhat unusual name.

“Hmm. That is very Old Testament, Hannah. Is he Jewish?”

I looked blankly at my mother, not entirely sure where the conversation was going, and slightly at a loss as to her logic, given that my name crops up in the book of Samuel, and I come from a family of fervent C of E jam-makers.

“I have no idea. Why does it matter?”

“Oh, it doesn’t, darling. What’s his surname?”

Slightly baffled, I answered that, along with the grilling as to where TV’s family is from.

“Yes, yes, he could be Jewish. Of course, there is a way of being sure: is he snipped?”

Which was the point at which I started praying every which way, to whatever deity might hear, that I was actually going mad, and The Mother hadn’t just enquired about the penis of the guy I’m seeing. Because some things are just better left unsaid.

Tags: Family, You've got to be kidding