Things I Wish I Had Said Yes To at Thirty

A confession first. At thirty I said no to nearly everything that looked like fun, and I called it being sensible. I had a business to build, a lease with a leaky window, and a mother who believed that wanting things was a form of showing off. So I declined, politely, in a nice cardigan, with a casserole in the oven. I would like to go back and shake that woman by the shoulders, gently, and then buy her a drink.

I wish I had said yes to the man with the borrowed sailboat, who asked me on a Thursday and did not seem to mind that I smelled of eucalyptus. I wish I had said yes to the dance in a car park after a reception, the band packing up, the caterer humming along. I wish I had said yes to a kiss offered in a doorway, simply because the doorway was lovely and the light was right.

I wish I had said yes to the man with the borrowed sailboat, who asked me on a Thursday and did not seem to mind that I smelled of eucalyptus.

Notice what these have in common. None of them were grand. I do not regret turning down a great love, because I never turned one down. I regret the small, bright invitations, the ones that would have cost an evening and given me a story. Regret, it turns out, is rarely about the big decisions. It is about a hundred polite refusals that added up to a quieter life than I would have chosen.

So I have made myself a rule for this stage. If the offer is kind, the person is decent, and my only reason for refusing is that I might look foolish, I say yes. Foolish is a fine thing to look. I also like to watch stories about women who finally answer the door. The short drama The Feeling She Can't Ignore, on TheFriend, has a title that could be a motto for my fifties, and I watch it with a blanket and no apology.

You are not too late, and I say that as someone who has checked. The invitations keep coming, they simply arrive in smaller handwriting now, a text, a raised eyebrow across a garden centre. Say yes to one this week. Not the biggest, the smallest. Say yes to the coffee, the walk, the slow song. Thirty-year-old you would be thrilled, and sixty-year-old you will thank you for the story.