I’m no fool; I know the facts (42% of marriages in the UK end in divorce). But – and call me crazy - that doesn’t stop me believing in the sanctity of marriage. I’m an idealist by nature. So, every time I get a bit sad about said stats, I take to the sofa with a glass of wine, a pot of Nutella and the remote control, looking for something romantic and puerile to cheer me up. In my teenage years, I’d just bulk-watch a litany of Richard Curtis delights such as Four Weddings, Love Actually and Notting Hill to get my fix (a foppish Hugh Grant is an instant mood cheerer) but now I find my telly watching habits dominated by ‘structured’ reality TV battlegrounds such as The Kardashians, Geordie Shore, The Only Way is Essex, The Desperate Housewives of Every State in America and Made in Chelsea.
And BOY, was that an error. As now I’m hooked on this guff and I don’t think I’ve ever been more depressed. We all know the truism that reality TV rots the brain, but I’m more worried about the shattering erosion of my rose-coloured romanticism as engagements, marriages and divorces trundle in and out like bovine beasts at a cattle farm.
Let’s start with a current update of the Kardashian Klan, where things are noticeably less perky than usual (and I’m not talking about the post-birth tits: those are magnificent, girls.) A positive note was the blossoming of new life with Kimye’s baby (whose name – Nori West – sounds like a geographical piece of sushi, or a particularly compass-savvy member of the Finding Nemo cast) but there’s an upcoming double split courtesy of the supposedly cheating, supposedly crack-addicted Lamar and Khloe (check out how un-litigious I'm being) and the dissolution of a veritable reality institution, Bruce and Kris Jenner. Plastic fantastic Bruce and the momager of the KK (Kardashian Klan: one more ‘K’ and we’d really be in trouble) have been married for 22 years and one fails to believe that had they not opened up the bowels of their homes and their lives -- and in Kourtney’s case, her actual bowels, after she gave birth on camera – their marriage, already a record for Hollywood, may still be intact. (DARN those 487 cameras and million dollar paycheques). It's a little known fact that the recently engaged Kim, has already been divorced twice; the cameras no doubt accelerating her second, 90-day nano-marriage. I only hope that Kimye stay solid this time, as I’m not sure my tender little heart can face a Kardash break-up triptych.
Over on The Only Way is Essex, engagements are discarded like stale eyelash extensions on an almost daily basis. I think – and forgive me for being so crass – the diamond ring, may be part to do with that. The fact that no-one has a bloody clue what they want from life in their early twenties might also go so far as to explain why all the young cast think that they are desperate to get married. Lucy and Mario were engaged. And then they weren’t. And then they were. And then they weren’t. While they were, both times, he was busily humping most of Essex. Sad face. Meanwhile Sam and Joey Essex – has anyone ever got over that this is his real surname?- were engaged. And then they weren’t. And then they were. And then they weren’t. Sam’s now ‘cuddling’ (that’s another word for sex on the weirdly prim TOWIE) a snaggle-toothed cousin of Jess’s, whose brother, Mark – TOWIE’s ‘breakout’ star – was engaged to fellow previous cast member, Lauren. And then he wasn’t. And then he was. AND THEN HE WASN’T.
I mean Christ alive, can anyone keep up? Stay engaged. Or don’t get engaged (thank goodness Fern and Charlie weren’t, seeing as he’s slept with 20 girls since they broke up 6 weeks ago, eh?) I can’t blame them for breaking up, since they are but a bunch of highly-glossed babies. They may have fake boobs/lips/hips but most of them are under 25 and the language of lurve is still a foreign lexicon. But, as Nanny Pat recently said, “I wish one of these days there’d be an actual marriage” (or words to that effect.) HEAR, HEAR, NANNY PAT. Me too. All this marital Mexican waving is shattering my faith in romance. Though, I can’t lie that the main reason I want there to be a TOWIE marriage is, because, can you imagine the dress? And the Swarovski covered Bolly? And the Vajazzle 2.0: The Wedding Version? The mind boggles at the mere details.
Leaving TOWIE, we venture over to the optimally odious Made In Chelsea, (or ‘Made Up In Chelsea, let’s be honest), where fauxmances abound and ‘who likes who’ proves to be very confusing. Spencer cheated on Louise. Spencer dumped Louise. Spencer went out with Lucy. Spencer cheated on Lucy. Spencer dumped Lucy. Spencer now hates Lucy and loves Louise again. OK, so we all know that this narcissistic breeze block of bleurgh personified revels in his status as the show’s heartbreaker (like Mark Wright, without the easy charm), but come ON, you practically had poor weepy-eyed Louise incarcerated in The Priory last season after she “let [him] cheat on [her]”, including in her own bed. Yet now – in the wake of Louise’s own break-up, of course – he’s busily trotting up to her at various soirees like a rutting corgi. At least there have been no MIC engagements, thus far. Be still my beating heart. I was, of course, thrilled to see that Pro Green and Millie actually made it down the aisle. Most likely due to the fact that Millie had quit the show and gone for a successful rapper rather than a slidey-eyed trustafarian with a skateboard, perhaps.
I’m not saying everyone has to get married and live happily ever after, for ever and ever Amen (although I’d really love that if we all could. Like the Sylvanian family. Please?) But I really wish the donkeys who go on these shows could stop getting engaged in all of a flurry, stop cheating on each other with such aplomb and above all, stop letting an audience - who doesn’t give two f*cks about your mental well-being - into your marriage enough to break it up. They think they are in control of their lives, when they are on these shows, but they're not. Not in the slightest. Fatalities (of the romantic kind) are continually ushered in by the shrewd producers who thinks of ratings, not hearts. After all - and I can see the producers' points - for the most part, the cast are young and they're getting heavily remunerated for their 'efforts'. What's a broken dream, or two, in return? That said, they're breaking their own hearts, as well as my own. And -- uh oh. Breaking news. Just as I conclude this post, I see that TOWIE's love-rat Mario has tweeted MIC's Lucy Watson telling her that she's beautiful. I hear another rollercoaster of the heart coming on... Kris. Bruce. RIP.