Girls

One of the great things about a heatwave is being able to relax outside indefinitely. For most of the year this is difficult without getting cold, no matter how many thermals you wrap up in.

I say this because this past weekend I decided to head into Windsor, and opted for the South Meadow route rather than the high street. It was there that I saw plenty of people relaxing on the grass and making the most of the weather. The majority were locals, but there were a few Etonians among them, including a few relaxing with girls who were visiting them for the day. This isn’t uncommon, especially in the summer when the weather’s good, but it was still a surprise to see girls in Eton. It show how conditioned we are to an all-male environment.

Indeed, most outsiders would predict that when it comes to girls us Eton boys are completely inept. That we don’t have a clue. They wouldn’t be far wrong. Having no contact with girls for two thirds of the year means we are bound to be slightly retarded when it comes to the other sex.

Indeed, for people like me with a brother but no sisters it can be difficult to imagine girls as something other than fantasy creatures. It’s true that I know a little bit about them now, but when I arrived at Eton my knowledge was very, very limited. Going to an all-boys prep school didn’t help, and apart from the girl a few doors down I’m not sure I could count any girls among my friends.

As a result, I wasn’t holding out much hope going to an all-boys secondary school, but things did in fact improve. Ever so slightly. Eton doesn’t keep us locked up the whole time and it is possible to meet up with girls. Actually, when I came to Eton I learnt that the word ‘girls’ is extremely rare, the preference being for ‘birds’, ‘minge’ and other probably sexist terms.

Anyhow, in F block I worked out that my best chance of meeting girls would be to hitch a ride on the coattails of my friends. Thus when two of my mates were planning a get-together in Windsor with some girls from Down House (a localish girls school) I made sure to worm my way into the event.

Unfortunately, Runty did too. And even more unfortunately, he didn’t want to deviate from his default bellend mode.

This was evident during the walk into Windsor as we strolled along in our best clothes and our hair perfectly quiffed, looking like a wannabe boyband. As we tried hard to look cool Runty told us clearly how all the girls were bound to fancy him and how he reckoned he could get all their numbers.

It was grating to listen to this verbal diarrhoea, but at least it distracted me from the prospect of actually meeting the girls. So much so that when we arrived and I saw them in my flesh my stomach began to turn, and I started sweating all over. I had no experience of this kind of thing, and despite dreaming beforehand of going up to them casually and making easy small talk I was a nervous wreck.  I awkwardly went to shake hands with one of them, but was pushed out of the way by Runty who gave a hug to each of them. I couldn’t believe it – he didn’t even know them! I might have copied his trick but had nowhere near the courage, so ended up giving them a pathetic half-wave which I’m sure they found attractive.

After this inauspicious start, things got worse as we went to sit down. We had a circle table near the back, but there were four of us boys and only three of them. This, I worked out, meant that two boys would have to sit next to each other, with only one girl in close proximity. Not me I thought, but I was slow off the mark. Everyone else had already realised the same thing and so I found myself next to my friend on one side and next to one of the girls on the other. Better than zero girls at least. But that was before I saw that the other boy my girl was sitting next to was Runty.

I prayed hard he wouldn’t talk to this girl, but distract himself with the one on the other side. But no, he had his eyes on her and didn’t intend to chat with anyone else. More depressing than this was that she actually seemed to like him, laughing at even his worst attempts at jokes. Jokes that back in the house wouldn’t even get a reaction. ‘How could this be happening?’ I thought. So it was I learnt a valuable lesson: Girls are different from Boys. Period.

To cut a long story short, I spent the three hours at Starbucks acting as a kind of seventh wheel, trying to participate in all the conversations around me with no success. It was a shame, not only because I couldn’t claim to have said more than fifty words to one girl, but because they were all very attractive. One was blonde and thin and the other two were pretty brunettes. Unlike me, however, Runty came out like a champion. He did somehow blag all of their numbers, and even succeeded at a later date in getting with two of them (including the blonde), at the same party no less. What a shameless person.

Given Etonians’ general ignorance of the female species, and the testosterone flowing around our bodies, you might think everyone here would be desperate for the school to go co-ed and accept girls. However, the reverse is in fact true - I can’t think of anyone who would seriously want girls here. Sure, it might be fun to have a fumble behind the Art Schools, but if girls did arrive it would certainly be less fun. Many friendships would be obliterated as multiple persons went for the same girl, and it would no longer be possible to crawl into first div looking dishevelled and escape judgement.

Furthermore, it is actually possible to have a girlfriend outside the school. Whilst I haven’t cracked that one yet, several of my friends are currently seeing someone. Somewhat greedily, one of them has had four girlfriends since E block, and even the lothario that is Runty appears to have a girl on the go (although it is still a secret apparently).

For the rest of us though, we can just sit around and hope. Good things come to those who wait, as they say. And in the meantime there are always the birds on the internet.