Caroline O'Donoghue: If the last two years have proved anything, it’s that life takes the piss

'I've decided that I enjoy being a 1980s magazine editor, so I spent a day declaring what was over, and what was now'

Open plan homes? Over. Still water? Over. Wearing Black? You guessed it.

THE other day, a friend was having coffee at my house and the conversation turned to what conversation always turns to when two people are sitting inside a rented home: namely, how we would improve the property if it were ours.

“I would knock in that wall,” he said, pointing to the dividing wall between the diner and living room. He then pointed to the wall separating the diner from the kitchen: “and that one. Make the whole thing open plan.”

For a brief moment, the spirit of a 1980s fashion magazine editor briefly entered my body. I was suddenly filled with utter conviction on a topic I knew nothing about. “No,” I said firmly. “Open plan is over.”

“Is it?” he asked. Surely not. Our entire lives, the chic thing to do was to blow out and knock in walls. Open lofty spaces with giant L-shaped couches, kitchen islands, bar stools. You’re supposed to want your home to look like it could accommodate an orgy at any moment. Lots of space for lying down and plenty of room for spectators.

“Open plan is over,” I repeated. “The next big thing is rooms.”

“Of course. Rooms.”

“People are sick of living on top of each other. No one wants to see what the people they live with are up to, all the time. The pandemic has changed all that. We need dividing walls. Walls are back! Rooms are back!”

I decided that I enjoyed being a 1980s magazine editor, so I spent the rest of the day declaring what was over, and what was now. Please, allow me to share with you my musings.

Still Water

Still water is over. Sparkling water is now. Maybe this is a mark of age and maturity, but I’ve noticed that lately, whenever I go to a restaurant with someone, we usually order a bottle of sparkling water for the table. This was unthinkable a few years ago; I think the first thing I learned to say in a foreign language was “agua SIN gas”, going hard on the ‘sin’ in case the Spanish waiter tried to sneak bubbles into my water. Now I’m so full of bubbles I’m like Charlie Bucket on fizzy lifting drinks. My friend Tessa is drinking something called “hard seltzer”, which I still don’t understand.

The move away from still water is obvious: no one wants to think about the tap anymore. We’ve spent the last year drinking out of the home tap and we’re beginning to resent it. We need a bit of strange. We need bubble water.

Wearing black

Wearing black is over. Sorry! You can’t have a summer of love if you don’t look up for it. I, for one, now go on clothes websites and immediately filter everything to pink. I no longer have any interest in looking smart or professional. I want to look like Barbie. I want to dress like I’m an ageing billionaire’s latest stripper wife. I want to look like someone who the children fight to have removed from the will. It has been a long 18 months of feeling like a brain in a jar, of tapping out emails, of “nice to e-meet you”. It is time to be corporeal again. It is time to be seen and witnessed. It is time for pink.

Sharing plates

The excuse? Cross-contamination is unhygienic and we shouldn’t all be dipping our hands in the olive bowl. The real reason? I think we’re all just sick of it. Is there anything more disappointing than leaving a dinner feeling both hungry and bloated? Your mouth is dry from all the salt (padron peppers AND chorizo AND focaccia), your stomach is churning from all the cold, oily batter that surrounded the three prawns you ate and somehow paid 12 quid for, you have a stinging headache from the white wine that should have been mopped up by rice, potato, or pasta, and instead was mopped up by the crusty corner of almost-stale bread.

The thing about sharing plates is that, when you meet someone for an ordinary meal, it’s over too quickly. When I meet someone for dinner I ideally want the experience to last three hours. I don’t want to have a steak and then be out on the street 45 minutes later. The restaurant owners know this and they are using it to take the piss. Here’s my suggestion. I think we need to normalise breaking up the dinner experience by going several places, like the fabulous Europeans we all aspire to be. A cocktail one place; dinner at the next place; dessert at the next. Of course, that would require late-night ice cream shops, but honestly, I think that’s doable and the economy needs it.

Predictions

Anyone trying to predict the next thing that’s going to happen. If the last two years have proved anything it’s that life takes the piss, and no one knows anything. Least of all me.