Happy families | 1 September 2007

My boy’s mother and Adolf Hitler share the same birthday…

My boy’s mother and Adolf Hitler share the same birthday, and, as an astrologer might expect, their personalities are in many ways similar. She can make a long-term plan and stick to it; she’s intensely loyal; and if you get on the wrong side of her you do so at your peril. I’d paid her no child maintenance for five weeks when I called round to see her last week, and I felt ashamed. I was expecting a row about it. But she was unaffectedly pleased to see me. ‘Hello, stranger,’ she said. ‘Sit down for a moment. Tea?’

Since she lost about half her body weight on a crash diet and married her live-in boyfriend in a specially licensed ceremony in the back garden, there’s been a revolution at number 39. I didn’t think it was going to last, but it has.