Things that never happened to me…

Now that Jimmy Saville has passed on to the great jewellery gallery in the sky (and reminds us of several glittery, jangly reasons why men shouldn’t wear chains. Not even one. Two looks like Jimmy Saville. Three looks like Mr T. Don’t do it) I’m reminded I have a small grudge against him. I believe I wrote him a letter, back in 1980, asking for the opportunity to do ballet with the Bolshoi. He didn’t arrange it. I hope St Peter knocks a point off his score.

There are quite a lot of other ‘fixits’ I’d like doing, so I’d like to write a letter from the 38-year old me, not the 8-year old me.

Dear Jimmy, who art in heaven (or hell, depending on several rumours and your weird, psycho-like love of your mother/ a non-denominational afterlife of your choice/reincarnated as something else/dead in the ground with no comebacks) please can you see fit to sort out some things.

Firstly, as I am now too old to dance with the Bolshoi, and my legs hurt like a lot, please can you fix it for me to have the English rugby team to oil themselves up in front of me? It’d be really nice if you could do that as a favour for having not fulfilled my dreams of dancing with the Bolshoi.

Secondly, I’d really, really like it if you would give me a two week holiday on a Caribbean island of my choice, accompanied by the oily rugby team who would wait on me hand and foot.

Then it’d be really nice if you could send Sean Bean across in a nice suit. He looks good in a suit. Barefoot in a kind of casual suit, without a tie. That’d suit me. And then if you could get him to propose to me, that’d be great. I might say no, since he doesn’t have a very good track record, but it would be nice to be asked.

I’d then like to go and live in (on?) Cape Cod and be like a younger, more vibrant Angela Lansbury in Murder, She Wrote. I’d like to be an internationally-famous novelist of the murder persuasion, and I also like Cape Cod. And I like righting wrongs. And writing about wrongs. Sean and the England rugby team can come along and live in my pool house. I’d like to have some horses as well please, and a vet on call so they don’t get sick. And then can I have Sean put on jodhpurs like he did in Sharpe and ride around without his top on?

Thanks.

Emma Lee (age 38)

In fact, my letter would go a bit more like this:

Dear Jimmy,

Please could you fixit for me to have someone get rid of all the convolvulus in the vegetable patch. I f%^*in hate that stuff.

Best wishes and all that,

Emma Lee.