Big issue

December 2002

Another email, the following day:

'Honey, you always tell me that age is not too important in our relationship, I think you remember, right? Now seems like you changed your mind.

Everyone who now me can never guess my age, they all think I am less than thirty. Remember, you think so too, when we first meet. I did not tell you the lies. As I told you, Hong Kong girls never like to admit their age.

So tell me honey, is my age a big issue for us?'

I replied straight away, 'no it is not an issue to me, I was just thinking that we made the wrong decision before'

Despite knowing that I'd behaved pretty badly the day before, I chose not to acknowledge it, by giving any kind of apology. Instead I sought to justify it by claiming to have been upset myself.

Over the months that followed, I would find out just how important age was to Maggie. I simply didn't appreciate at the time how sensitive a subject It could be. And it was several weeks later, when purely by accident, I discovered her true age.

Although that evening, we discussed the point further, it was with considerably less emotion. Generally Maggie would always seek to avoid any confrontation, and so she said 'honey, I understand your point of view, but as we said, we can have a baby when we are more settled, it's not difficult for us, right?'

And since, I was not sufficiently confident of my strength within this relationship yet, I chose to let the matter drop by joking 'you are old enough to be my mother'

We returned to normal. 'Honey, I love you' she said.