Beware the curse of the beach holiday when your partner is decades younger than you, writes LIZ JONES (who has endured summer breaks with four toyboy exes) as President Macron, 45, suns himself in the South of France with wife Brigitte, 70
For me, the photo of Heidi Klum, 50, and husband Tom Kaulitz, 33, vacationing in Capri this week says it all.
She’s in the prerequisite bikini top that fails to defy gravity, but signals hopefully: ‘I’ve still got it. Please don’t eye up anyone else.’
And I note the former Victoria’s Secret model is gripping a beer: the stress of a beach holiday with a much younger man certainly does need numbing. Even for the world’s most beautiful women. Meanwhile, her husband is wearing noise-reducing headphones, perhaps all the better to ignore her with.
It’s a similar scenario with French president Emmanuel Macron, 45, and his wife, Brigitte, 70, both sunning themselves in the South of France, gazing into the far distance, but in opposite directions. He may appear more attentive but wouldn’t he rather be on his jet ski? And at her age, would she? Never mind a lifejacket, has she had her bone density measured?
As someone who has had one younger husband, 15 years my junior, and three younger boyfriends (two before the marriage, one after), you could say I’m an authority on the matter. And I can tell you, never is an age gap more apparent than on a beach holiday.
French president Emmanuel Macron, 45, and his wife, Brigitte, 70, sunning themselves in the South of France
Emmanuel Macron and his wife Brigitte enjoy a boat day in Porquerolles island during their presidential holidays in South of France
Nowhere is the topography of your skin thrown into starker relief than under the harsh light reflected off a glittering sea. Not only does the glare make you squint, deepening lines, but grey hair anywhere glints like a lighthouse. Toenails can thicken and discolour as we age, too. Purple veins bulge on calves, knees wrinkle, thighs dimple and buttocks collapse and spill, like ice cream in the 40c (104f) heat.
Summer holidays are supposed to be about letting go, loosening belts, relaxing. And they are -for those with loving partners of a similar vintage. Not so the much older wife.
The truth is that many women of all ages actually fear a summer holiday, and start training way back in January.
Yes, there are the logistics to worry about – younger men tend to treat older partners as though we’re mummy so booking the trip, making a note of where the car is parked at the airport etc is left to us – but the real hard graft starts once you look down at the wreckage of your winter body with a dismay that says, ‘Where do I start?’
Then comes the honing, the harvesting, the renovation, the holiday wardrobe.
And when you’re actually in situ, there’s the pressure to conjure up topics so you don’t sit in silence over yet another dinner à deux, making even the subsistence-wage waiter feel sorry for you. Once you’re home, of course, there’s the holiday laundry in the case your younger man has just left by the front door until it festers. (Maybe older men do this too; I’ve not been married to one.)
The photo of Heidi Klum, 50, and husband Tom Kaulitz, 33, vacationing in Capri this week says it all. She’s in the prerequisite bikini top that fails to defy gravity, but signals hopefully: ‘I’ve still got it. Please don’t eye up anyone else’
Note the former Victoria’s Secret model is gripping a beer: the stress of a beach holiday with a much younger man certainly does need numbing
It’s all so exhausting you need a mini break – alone – once it’s over.
I might sound bitter, but even when – like me – you’ve broken free, you never forget the hell of holidays with a younger man. Younger men nap, like toddlers. Mine fell asleep in Thailand at 10pm on New Year’s Eve (I hadn’t yet revealed my age so hid my passport in the mini bar; big mistake: younger men like to feast on the expensive gummy bears), thus missing the fireworks.
Younger men go missing at airports. Then they meet you at the gate, breathless, saying: ‘I’ve bought 400 condoms, d’you think that’s enough?’ and you feel your lifeblood draining.
They giggle all the way to Jamaica watching Mike Myers films, and don’t help put your case in the overhead lockers, or ask cabin staff where your special meal has got to.
Instead of sitting with you on the beach, they are off playing football with the resort staff.
On honeymoon in Seville, my new husband was too young to hire a car, so I had to drive up mountains: I’m not even good in multi-storey car parks.
And there are no shared points of interest. On Lake Pichola in India, I said to one younger boyfriend, a mere cub: ‘This is where they shot Octopussy.’
‘Is that porn?’ was his response.
Look at Catherine Zeta-Jones, 53, and Michael Douglas, 78. She will always be young. He will always be grateful
I don’t know how Brigitte, or Heidi, stand it, to be honest.
No matter beauty or dizzying levels of success, an older wife will know instinctively that on the beach we never stand up in a bikini. Are you insane? We are mostly fine lying flat.
I went to Lime Wood Hotel in the New Forest last summer and was saddened by the sight of all the older, successful, dynamic, kind, wonderful women who did a strange reverse striptease as they finally gave in and left their sunbeds to eat or pop to the loo.
A wriggle, wriggle, wriggle, tug, tug, tug as they pulled pareos around their tired, have-given-birth-scarred bodies in case the young men they were with spied a jam-roly-poly stomach.
My younger husband once told me not to look down as it gave me a double chin. And he could barely fit through doors! You see, this is the thing about men. They are as confident in their naked bodies as newborns. Even deep into old age. They believe women are not visually stimulated (we are).
But there’s a lot to be said for turning the tables, age wise. I think a younger woman with a much older man is a great idea. Look at Catherine Zeta-Jones, 53, and Michael Douglas, 78. She will always be young. He will always be grateful.
I loved that my last boyfriend, ten years older, wore spectacles. I trod on them!
Meanwhile, these younger men pretend to love us but they don’t. Not really. They love what we can do for them. Big difference.
So give me Robin Hood’s Bay in North Yorkshire any day.
A place where I can wear a woolly, wave at passing yachts with impunity, and say I’m sorry, I’m not getting on that jet ski or paddleboard – my knees aren’t what they were and it’s too cold. Happy holidays!
Source: Read Full Article
