How to be a ‘Social Butterfly’ (Part Two)
by Quentin Cockburn

For conversation you are always witty, fresh, entrancing, with the unexpected, immerse yourself in paradox, never repeat the same anecdote, and inject life into the old and tired.

A memory for trivia, and a capacity to alternate between the high and low scale, the worthy and the frivolous must be all encompassing, and the ability to quote with the exultation of anecdote and hyperbolic exaggeration.  No one in your company, “just is”.  They are transformed into living pulsing electrified vignettes, that stir the imagination and whet the appetite amongst us for a vicarious existence that we poor dullards can only yearn for.

There must be an underpinning in this consistency of behaviour, people will know, indeed they will feel content in knowing that as a unit of social currency you will be the perfect catalyst for a dull evening dinner.  As an exemplar of your craft you will not over-awe you audience, rather, with sympathetic nods, and polite admissions you will be everyones best companion in life, and let them know just a little bit how lucky they are to have you amidst their circle.  Never be boorish, and outspoken.  Demonstrate timing and insert the right witticism at the correct point.  It’s all about timing.  You are a person of substance, gravitas when required, but possess a scintillating capacity for turning things inside out.  As for circles, draw the circle round and full, this is the most practised part of the enigmatic inner self.  Never, ever let yourself down by exposing whom you see, and which circle you belong to.  Familiarity breeds contempt, and expectation borne by habit will dull your capacity to thrive in the curious and unfamiliar, and (remember the currency) value- added by your being there.

But all of this is nothing without the elixir of humour.  Humour is more important than appearance and dress, (we’ll deal with dress shortly).  You are non currency without humour.  Humour is that thin red line that separates vulgarity from the witty epithet, the crass from the incisive, and the recondite and studied from the breathlessly irreverent flow of words and images you create.  Each day is new for you, and each day presents a new opportunity for seeing yourself through life’s prism.  Conversation, though light hearted, indicates an inner seriousness, measured by the resonance in your voice.  A voice that suggests education in the broadest possible sense, but not academic.  Listen to Errol Flynn, or Vivienne Leigh for inspiration, both possess voices that oozes with the limitless possibilities inherent in the ‘here and now’.  As a social butterfly you are a ‘here and now’ person, your delight is to alight, arouse and achieve a sort of all encompassing behavioural fission.

For appearances, beauty and some refinement of feature may help, an aquiline nose, a pencil thin moustache and a neat, (but not over-neat jacket), but NEVER a pony tail.  For ladies something of the real personality, engaged, attractive but not necessarily pretty, ineluctable, indefinable, liable to change, theres a touch of Louise Brooks there, or is it Holly Golightly, or Margaret Rutherford, meets Barbara Windsor, you be the judge, and keep the changes coming.

Never ever be seen to be trying to impress, you impress for what you are, and you don’t need to grovel in the cess pit otherworld of gratuitous name dropping, character assassination and ‘keeping up with the Joneses’, because your lightness of step assures you that it’s ‘YOU’ society wants, and they shall get it apportioned according to your dictates.

There are high standards in amongst the bubble and froth.  You are not a teetotaler, not a wowser.  You can drink, smoke and engage In exciting talk at the same time.  You have no limits, you are a polymath of the dining room, an artist amongst the aesthetes, and a diplomat in the drawing room, an enigmatic apparition, (“was it a dream?”) in the bedroom, and an adjunct to any board room.

You are what you are, a social butterfly and like the Ulysses’s Butterfly itself, you out shine, out dazzle, and outperform the mere mortals in your midst.  In doing so you are aware of the one peril, to be ‘caught’, and ‘set upon the board’.

Though irretrievably romantic, long term romantic commitments are hazardous, the same can be said for marriage, executive appointments, directorships.  You don’t need them.  But they think they need you.  It’s all in the thinking.

The possibilities are yours to take.