Version

Both these accounts of my weekend are 100% accurate.

Version 1:
"I hosted a party on Friday in Brixton. Lots of lovely friends came, including a few people I'd not seen for ages. I've lost a bit of weight recently and wore one of my favourite dresses and one girl said I should apply to join the Playboy Mansion, which I think she meant as a compliment. The music was fantastic, people mingled and I am pretty positive that everyone present had a good time. I got home late and went to bed. When I woke up on Saturday morning, I had no plans but Sarah suggested I join her and a couple of others to go for a pub lunch in Westbourne Park, followed by a trip to some studios nearby that were holding a Christmas market. She also invited me to go to a classical concert that night. I went for a run, did yoga, had a bath and then set out to join them for lunch, noticing while sorting out my bag that I had spent a whopping £9 the previous night - £7.50 on a pizza and £1.50 on a cranberry juice. Not bad given that I drank Prosecco pretty much solidly for six hours. Clearly my lovely friends had been very generous with the hostess beverages. At The Enterprise, I had delicious bangers and mash and felt very festive. Her friends were lovely and we laughed a lot. Then we went to the market, and I bought a gorgeous drawing for my flat that I know I will have for the rest of my life. Midway through the afternoon, my friend Fi texted and said she had a spare ticket for a musical in which my friends Anna and David were performing, and did I want to come? I was pleased to be asked, and felt like I should support Anna, so I said yes. An hour later another girlfriend invited me to dinner at her house but I'd already committed to Fi so I turned it down. Felt briefly popular. Fi and I had a lovely drink in Bourne & Hollingsworth, met the others, watched the (brilliant) show, which was based on Diary of a Nobody and was hilarious. Then we had a drink or two with the cast and I went home. On Sunday I did some writing and some laundry, ate nice food, lay around, watched the X Factor and went to bed."

Version 2:
"I had a party on Friday night. As I have decided will be my epitaph, it was "Nothing like I expected but still quite fun." The venue had reserved me a large area with sofas and big, heavy, Henry VIII style tables. A few of us sat round the head of one of the tables, chatting and waiting for the other guests. One girl came in, saw a notice on an empty table saying "Reserved for Jane", scrumpled it up and threw it on the floor. I took some pleasure in telling her that I was Jane and that she was welcome to sit there until we needed the table later on. But I still felt a bit discombobulated. Most of the early arrivals were my school friends and their associated men. They all know each other and joined us at the big table. By 9pm, others filtered in, but there was nowhere for them to sit and I didn't know if I wanted to make a scene by chucking off a group of eight strangers from the other reserved table so that two of us could sit down. I decided to leave it. Eventually, all my newer friends were standing squashed by the radiators mingling away, and my school friends were having a nice catch up with their old friends around the massive wood table. Mixing the two groups would have been contrived and unwelcome, so I decided to stay with the new friends since the old ones all knew each other. And then, suddenly, just as the music was hotting up, everyone came over to say goodbye, and by 1am, it was over. I hadn't danced a step. I went home feeling a bit flat, reassuring myself that parties aren't for the host's enjoyment, but couldn't stop focussing on the fact that one of my favourite people hadn't been able to attend as she had been in Rome on a third date. Yep. A third date. In Rome. The boyban's going well, but even I will happily admit that I was pretty darn jealous of that one. On the walk back from the nightbus to my flat, I slipped on the ice and banged my elbow really hard.

On Saturday I woke up feeling post-party-anti-climaxy. I then went for a run but pulled a muscle in my leg so badly after 20 minutes that I had to hobble home feeling really self-conscious that people would look at me and think I was really unfit because I was injured. Piled on the pounds with fattening lunch in a gastropub and then haemorrhaged my savings on a drawing that I love but that everyone else will think is a complete rip-off. Felt like a bit of a dick but the girl who'd done the drawing was so lovely and I didn't feel like I could change my mind and back out. I do really like it but I could have bought a flight to somewhere hot for that money. I don't know what came over me. I think it was the shopping equivalent of comfort eating. Silly, silly girl. Then Ses and I had a cup of tea in another pub and we started talking about online dating, and I realised that I am still a long way off being ready to face rejection, and that unless you are prepared to be rejected, you shouldn't sign up to online dating. So I'm single, a bit lonely, and yet can't do the one thing that could possibly change that: go on a date. Which sucketh somewhat. Then I went out for a lovely evening as Fi's afterthought because her husband couldn't come, and we sat with Ed and his boyfriend and David and his wife, and then afterwards talked to Anna about her husband. I was pleased to have been asked to the show, and to the dinner that I'd had to turn down, but I was clearly a last-minute choice. And I felt blue. :(

Yesterday I did nothing of any significance. I was invited (as an afterthought but still pleased to be asked) to play football in the afternoon but I couldn't because my leg was still hurting so much that I could barely walk, let alone run. Despite having the heating on all day, my feet never warmed up. My phone didn't ring until the aforementioned lovebird returned from Rome and called me. I did my best to be loving and supportive and excited and then hung up the phone and failed to sleep. This morning was unfun."

Guess which version gets stuck in my head? I've long been aware that life is just a game of selective editing - we all have many stories we can tell about ourselves. I can easily put on a brave face and project a positive narrative to the outside world if I have to, but the Jackanory going on in my head isn't quite so much fun. Shut up, SHUT UP, internal Jackanory!

And she all lived happily ever after.