By Susannah Conway
Being single seems to require ever more ingenious ways to find a partner these days, and with the fishing pond shrinking as we get older you'd be forgiven for wondering where all the eligible men have gone. Once the workplace/gym/local bars and dance classes (they're only ever filled with women anyway) have been exhausted, and dating websites have been trawled through, perhaps it's better to try meeting a man the old fashioned way - through friends.
Having said that, I've yet to find true love through my friends, but last year I played matchmaker for my friends Rachel, 28 and Chris, a witty 30-something guy I had met through work. When I invited him along to the New Year's Eve party Rachel was throwing, it never occurred to me that they'd fancy each other, but after many champagne cocktails and an impromptu game of spin-the-bottle, it appeared Cupid had my friends in his sights.
After spending that first night together Chris and Rachel seemed inseparable, and of course I was thrilled for them. One of the bonuses of matchmaking your friends is that you get to all stay friends together - friendship cubed if you like. However, my joy for their new-found passion soon dwindled when I discovered it was impossible to see either when they were permanently holed-up in bed together.
[quote]In those heady first months of a new romance, we've all been guilty of seeing less of our mates while we get to know our new beau, but when the two single friends you could rely on for a night out are busy getting jiggy with each other, it's difficult not to feel like the last single girl standing alone on the dance floor.
Thirty-year-old Jennifer had a similar problem when her best friend started dating her flatmate. "Greg had been my first real male friend and I enjoyed his company - he was funny and clever and we always had such a laugh together. But then Steph got off with him at a party at the flat Greg and I shared with some other friends. After that they were stuck together like glue, and I metamorphosed into a jealous teenager seemingly overnight."
When Steph would phone the flat to speak to Greg and not her, Jennifer couldn't help but feel wound up. The green-eyed monster can appear if you feel left out from the couple's lives because they're so wrapped up in each other. "I felt as though I had lost both of my best friends at the same time … to each other! Worse still, it made me wonder what she saw in him that I never did. It felt like something along the lines of 'I don't want him but you can't have him either.'"
Eventually Jennifer got used to Greg and Steph's relationship. "I soon realised how silly my jealousy had been when I saw what an effort they were making to make me not feel excluded. Now we're all closer than ever and they're getting married this year - and I'm going to be the maid of honour!"
When Rachel finally surfaced and met me for dinner, all she could talk about was Chris, but where once every potential new boyfriend had required hours of analysis, now I had all the insider information Rachel could have ever wanted. The question was: should I tell her about his bed-hopping past before he did? "I really think he could be the one," she declared over our main courses - naturally I kept my mouth shut.
The next day Chris phoned me: "She's a great girl and we're having lots of fun," he said. "But I only really want something casual right now." Oops. That was the moment I discovered that matchmaking your friends can backfire when you're stuck in the middle. "Oh she's being really chilled out about the whole thing," I lied.
The other thing they don't tell you when you start playing Cupid is that you may become privy to more information than you bargained for. A few months into their relationship, Chris had succumbed and was well and truly smitten, and it only took a bottle of wine before he started to divulge their bedroom secrets. If I didn't know his girlfriend this would have been titillating, but suddenly I found myself learning about Rachel's oral sex technique - way more information than I needed!
The nicest part of friends pairing-up is that you already know you love your friend's new partner so there are none of those awkward getting-to-know-you dinners when you feel obliged tell your mate her new man's an idiot. Now that they are living together I love the fact that I can spend an evening in their cosy flat with the two people who know me so well. By unwittingly matchmaking them I helped them both find a happy ending - now I'm waiting for them to do the same for me...
