Wake up and smell the roses

I am handwriting this blog and Craig is typing it up. He is my right-hand man, and left-hand man actually. The only thing he hasn't had to do for me recently is wipe my bum - although he may have done that too - a lot of May and June is a total blank.

A day in the life of me, well they vary - but today I am up and writing - so lets take a day like today, because it's more interesting than the horizontal type days. These include lots of laying down and Radio 4, where the bad drama is funnier than the "comedy" - oh, the "Now Show" - laugh, I nearly did... Today, however I am vertical and I can look forward to a day of caffeine-free fun, with eye exercises (yes really) and pills. I am up at about 9a.m. then into the front room for my morning cuddle from Mikey - who bounces about like a Tigger and generally cheers me up. Then a cup of decaf tea with skimmed milk or, as I prefer to call it, tea-coloured water. Then high-fibre cereal with more skimmed milk (not milk) and a gluten-free, dairy-free, taste-free raisin slice. Next, my exercises. I sit down for these and with the position I have to take and the two stone I have put on whilst lying down for six weeks and retaining a v.healthy appetite, I look like a buddha but with all the wisdom of a lump of coal. These eye exercises are designed to re-educate brain and eye to recognise the difference between my movement and movement outwith my body. Not the sort of thing you would imagine you would have to go back to school for, but there you go - what do I know? If you wave at me I try to move with you these days. My exercises make me look like an idiot and I am reminded of that bloke with learning difficulties who was in a documentary which was probably called "The Mentally Handicapped - why are they all so stupid?" as it was broadcast in the early Eighties. Anyway, this one bloke spent his day quite happily staring at a small piece of wood tied to a piece of string which he dangled in front of his face. 2 exercises require me to do similar using my thumb in the place of wood. Inevitably by 10a.m. I am feeling dizzy, or is it wobbly, or maybe off-balance, or just weirdy deirdy doo. I don't have the language for it - but the medical profession will insist on me offering more than "I feel fucking awful all the fucking time, so stop moving".

At this point I have 2 options, rest or "do stuff". On a vertical day I choose doing stuff - it's not very scientific - but I am much less convinced by science than I used to be and steadily working my way towards blind faith - get lost Dawkins, hello Jesus! Doing stuff is always good for my mental health and bad for my physical health. So even though I know that, I am somehow always surprised and upset when I find myself vertigo'ed up by the end of the day.

This vertical day is the best (touch wood, touch wood, cross arms, legs, fingers, breasts) day I've had since last Thursday when a number of things happened - a too physical massage, hayfever, my first visitors proper for months. It could be that one, some, or all of these factors made the dizzy's return - I wish I knew - but I don't which makes this whole rehabilitation thing a wee bit like guess-work and so once again I turn to blind faith. Which is why I have to believe the words of Dr Surenthiran, my guru, and his caffeine-free, chocolate-free, dairy-free, citrus-free, fun-free diet, his brain and eye exercises which make me look and feel ridiculous, not to say faint, and the tiny white 10mg pill called something beginning with N which doesn't seem to do anything but must be doing something in a magical way which I don't understand.

So that's it, a vertical day, pretty good, so far. No doubt I will play one game too many with the kids and have one too many conversations with more than one person and be horizontal by the end of the day. I am an impatient patient and generally a very bad patient - but, slowly, very slowly, with the help of blind faith, Craig and the kids, family and friends, I am learning to slow down and smell the flowers.

Let it Snow...

Dear Marianne,

On Monday the snow lay thick and flossy on the ground, we woke knowing something was different. I held up Anna and Mike so that they could look out of the hallway window at the top of the stairs. They were excited to the point of hysteria and ran to every window, just to check that the snow was really there. Becky was delighted to read on her school’s website that the building was closed except for those who “needed to be in”. I didn’t suggest that might be her. Half way through the morning she received a text to say that a classmate had died unexpectedly at the weekend. Later she went out with friends and they consoled each other and had a snowball fight in the middle of their shock.

The last time we had snow like this was April when we went to the cricket pitch on the common to “say goodbye” to uncle Mike and play a game of cricket in his honour. Mike had died suddenly of something in his lung. He was a hippy type of fellow and lived up a mountain in California in a log cabin he built with his wife Linda. He didn’t want a funeral, or any fuss really, so his wife and friends scattered his ashes around his beloved meadow on top of his mountain; they drank Budweiser and smoked joints all night.

Half way across the world, we took the kids to the place he had seen his only cricket match, he loved cricket, although his only contact with the game was through the world service, which delivered giggly British schoolboy commentary all the way up there in the woods. We were thrown by the arrival of snow on a mid April morning, and the fact that we couldn’t find our cricket stuff, but determined to see our plan through, we put a badminton set in the boot of the car and headed off to the common. When we got there we made a snowman, threw snowballs, played a game of snow badminton and toasted Mike with Budweiser and Coke.

This snowy Monday I should have been at a funeral, but the “weather event” stopped me even contemplating getting in to my car and heading north. I am still in that dizzy world of disbelief about the death of this old family friend, she was too young and it was unexpectedly sudden. So I think that if she turned up at the door right now, I would be less surprised than I am to find that she is not here at all.

She was like the big sister you can’t have for real - she was kind, she listened to all my teenage angst nonsense, she was fun and encouraging and a constant feature of my teenage years. She was my real big sisters best friend and my big brother’s girl friend.

Later we would meet as adults, and share stories of life after all that stuff, but she is very firmly there in my childhood memories. Small moments, such as when she lent me her new, cool wellies, and wasn’t cross when I messed them up, or the time she came to say goodnight to me and in my sleep I swore at her and she laughed, or the time she bought me a proper grown up present: white musk talc in a shiny black ball the size of my hand, which you twisted to open; it looked so cool, it smelled lovely and it was so sophisticated.

I didn’t get to her funeral, but with all the kids off school, we played in the snow, baked cakes, read stories, cooked a roast and toasted Sally with a ropey wine we found in the fridge. I think it was a fine way to say goodbye.

do the hustle

Dear Marianne,

One very hot June afternoon when I was about seven, my Mum stood on the start line for the Gossops Green Primary School Sports Day Mother's race. On either side of her stood other nervous Mothers hoping they wouldn't fall over, bump into each other, win the race or in any other way embarrass their children and scar them for life.

"On your marks, get set, go!" Twenty or so huge lumbering bodies headed towards us, as we sat confined to our class pens. I can still remember the ground shaking and the sound of forty middle aged thighs thundering down on to the dried, cracked, sun baked "field"; it was a sight you never really forget. My Mother in her tight, knee length blue dress with round cut neck and white trimming, looked great, and importantly, she didn't win, fall over, or bump into anyone else; she didn't even lose. The problem was she didn't start the race at all, she simply stood very still watched the other Mother's hare off down the hill, then put on her stilettos and walked calmly to the side of the painted white track.

In her defense - and it is hard to defend such a cruel and callous act - she was rather bullied in to the race by her colleagues, yes my Mother not only didn't run that day, she also taught at my school. The teachers who had organised the day knew that if they could get one Mother on to the start line others would follow, and others did reluctantly join my Mother, obviously feeling for her situation. I guess she then reasoned that she had done her bit and didn't need to humiliate herself by actually running the race. What she hadn't reasoned was that I would suffer from this act of tyranny and betrayal for years to come.

Since then I have been a Mother at a number of Sports Days and have always refused to take part in this summer madness. I really believe that adults should never run, unless it is a)for a bus or b)one is wearing body tight lycra, racing around a proper track in front of 40,000 screaming fans and there is a very good chance one will win an Olympic medal. There are no other times when running as an adult is acceptable behaviour, the "other times" always end in humiliation...

So when I turned up for yet another Sports Day, this time at Anna's Infant school last week, I knew what I wouldn't be doing, at least I thought I did. I hadn't banked on the guilt trip served on me by my "friends" who all chose to sign up for the Mother's Race. This meant that I was the only Mother in the group who wasn't running, or to put another way, the way Anna was looking at me, I was the only Mother who didn't love her daughter enough to run 50 metres with a bean bag on a bat. So against all my natural inclinations, against my gut instincts and most importantly in direct violation of the vow I made to myself after that painful day over thirty years ago, I stood with other foolish women at the start line, red bat in hand yellow bean bag sat on top stupid grin on my face.

Just before the school bell rang to signal the start of the race, some dummy mummys - I think that's the term - from the BMW 4x4/morning cappuccino at Carluccio's/swim in the salt pool at the spa/subscription to LA Fitness (never goes)/blonde streaks compulsory, crew, got hold of our group for a quick chat. They told us that at the Junior School, the parents' races were really competitive with warm ups and stretches and serious racing - we all laughed and tutted and said "how silly". Then dingaling! and we were off, my group and I laughed, we ran slowly, I pushed other people, cheated, managed to avoid getting taken out by the huge Dutch lady falling heavily in front of me, and generally made it slowly to the other end, remembering to smile at Anna and concentrating only on not taking it too seriously.

Meanwhile the pack of dummy mummys had engaged their 4 wheel drive and set off at a hell of a speed, ears pricked back, Fat Face and Jigsaw linen jackets flying in the wind, Crocs and Ugg boots barely touching the ground. They came first second and third, collected their stickers, feigned surprise at their achievement and headed off to hit the Pimms. The rest of us sheepishly made our way to the our children to apologise for our lack of sporting prowess and try and convince them and us it is the taking part that counts.

When my mate Red got home and told her husband about the outrageous behaviour of our "sisters", he said: "you were hustled" love. I think he was right, we was done. I just wish that having been compelled to stand at the start line, I had remembered the hustle my Mum had employed all those years ago, I think I get it now.

Rx

tooth hurty

Dear Marianne,

I've been very worried about Mike's teeth. He is four and already two of his teeth have gone rotten, another two are on the way, one of them is a front tooth. Mike is my fifth child and they have all had their share of bad for you sweets, chocolate and fizzy drinks - but none of them have lost their milk teeth and although the older ones have fillings this is a rare thing. So what's going on with Mike?
Well, apparently nothing I can do anything about. I took him back to the dentist that had kind of told me off about his, then, one bad tooth. I shuffled in waiting to be branded a bad mother, even though I had been brushing Mike's teeth to within an inch of their life and had banned apple juice and sweets since our last visit.

However, the dentist told me not to worry, that there was nothing I could do, that the second teeth would be fine and that the health of the milk teeth seems to depend on the physical make-up of the child. If I wanted an analogy, he said, then imagine a person who smokes 40 cigarettes a day and lives to a ripe old age and next door someone who has smoked rarely but dies early of lung cancer. I didn't want an analogy, certainly not that one thanks; I was so thrown by this I thought I might have my first ever cigarette there and then.

After the condescending smiles, the sighs, the inappropriate analogies and Winnie the Pooh stickers, I was ready to leave, but Michael wasn't. He had brought Ollie Dog along to the dentist (Ollie dog is named after a friends dog - which is barely alive, despite living on a diet more rich in vitamins, minerals etc. than his owners get - don't tell her I told you, but his food comes with rice and peas...)and Ollie hadn't had his teeth checked yet. So, having already be transformed into an over-indulgent Mother, my fate was sealed by my request for Ollie Dog to sit in the chair and have his turn. To his credit, the big, burly dentist obliged and gave Ollie's teeth the once over with mirror and sharp pointy thing - Michael looked on enthralled and very pleased - Ollie got a sticker on his head and we left.

Outside, I was so relieved, that I could have danced in the street, yes Mike's teeth are falling out, but it's not my fault - I am still a good Mother. Hurrah! We went to town for chocolate cake and coke, well we were celebrating weren't we...



Rx

in your easter bonnet with all the frills upon it

Dear Marianne,

Easter is a tricky time for us, because apart from the 15 tons of chocolate egg we will need to buy, we also have three of our children's birthdays and my Mum's birthday to cater for - so it's like Christmas all over again; for the bank account that is.
I ask the children what they would like as birthday presents, because surprises aren't what they used to be in our day, i.e. surprises. Today, they are just mistakes, things your parents make you have instead of things you actually want. Well, Mike is getting surprises because whilst he thinks he is generally chatting with me about the toys he likes, really I am taking notes and compiling lists - ha ha.
Anna however is not such an easy target, and has been clear that she wants a complete Bratz (why the z?) birthday. So I bought Cloe (why no h?)her favourite, and my God what a tart she is, the whole range is the same, they're not just Bratz they're Slutz as well. Cloe has such swollen lips and cheeks, that she looks like that bloke from Celebrity Big Brother, you know the man/woman ex-singer, Pete whats his name, friend of the Dundonean Gangster MP who ripped into Barrymore and made us all like him again (Barrymore, not the MP, keep up), that's right Pete Burns. Anyway, that's what this doll looks like, so hideous that I yearned for the delicate and oh so lifelike doll we knew and loved as Barbie.
Archie meanwhile is bound to ask for football stuff when he comes next week and Mike will be getting a castle and some robot stuff - sorry about the stereotyping but we really have absolutely no say over our children, we've tried and failed.
Anna's age group are also expected to have the latest in party entertainment - so that means, RUNAROUND, BOWLING, CHOCOLATE PARTIES (don't ask) etc. We have told her she can take one friend to see something funny at the cinema or something educational at the local theatre - well we didn't sell it like that, we worked on the language for her, we're not idiots you know. She chose funny at Cinema followed by milkshakes etc. at local cafe, so clearly over-selling the Theatre gig had no effect.
I won't go on about parties here because I have been down that sad road before and it only ends in tears. The competition round here is too strong I can never compete, you think the Bowling party is in and so you opt for Bowling, and then someone trumps you with an Open Top Bus DO with clowns, jugglers and a petting zoo. So steady and small we go, and as it happens, the weirdness of opting out of the scramble for best party seems to get Anna some unexpected kudos - my advice to Mothers is go minimal ladies, its so this year!
I got a party for nothing myself this weekend, well it was because I am a Mother - which wasn't really something of note unless you were in the room when I gave birth, in which case your ears will still be ringing and the hair on your head still growing back. But I do like getting the home made (nursery and school- made) cards from the children and I enjoy, though don't really heed, the regular cries of "sit down", "rest - it's Mother's Day". Anyway, after Anna and Mike had gone to bed and I was "resting", the three eldest arrived at my sofa door "all done up", to announce that they had come to take me out - which they did after I had been hurried into a clean top, some eyeliner and a quick spray of perfume.
We were shoved out the door by Craig and arrived two minutes later at the local Thai restaurant, it was a good plan which looked like it might go wrong. The restaurant was very busy and they (Craig) hadn't booked, and the staff, who were already looking strained, seemed frightened by the young people. I know I've said it before, but this place really is really small Town; each time the big kids are out after after dark, I warn them to look out for the child catcher.
We were squeezed in, which was fine by us, Becky took control of the menu, ordering, looking out for Archie and paying the Bill. Stan was entertainment officer and regaled us all with stories of life, love, The Simpsons, friends and his recent charity turn at school, where he turned up on Friday dressed only in nappy and over-sized dummy - no really, he did, even after we slagged up comic relief for, well...he wasn't listening either I'm glad to say.
Anyway, back to the meal, Archie chose something too hot and had to take to the toilets to drink a gallon of water from the tap, but seemed to enjoy his coke. The food was brought very slowly, but eaten at lightening speed, the staff stared at us, waiting for something terrible to happen, still suspicious of these young humans. They needn't have worried they are thoroughly restaurant trained having been out on the Town with us since they could sit up straight in those clip on chairs you get at Wagamamas. The highlight of the night was obviously getting two foxes glacier mints each at the end of the meal. Becky paid (well handed over the money - I suspect Craig may have supplied it) and we headed home, too full of noodles, tired and giggly.

Easter will soon be hurtling towards us, it will come and go in a blur of chocolate bunnies, birthday parties, egg painting and egg rolling, motorway trips to relatives and home-made entertainment. And I will be tired out again, and penniless again but I do love this Mother lark really you know.

Rx

don't marry her fuck me

Dear Marianne,

We made a vain attempt at sex this morning - a stab, you may say - only to be interrupted by Anna, shouting from downstairs, (where she was supposedly being looked after by the Cbeebies channel) "What do pigs eat?!"
"Apples!" we both shouted back, with a little more venom than I think was warranted. But we don't get many opportunities for sex, and I do mean sex, making love is just a made up thing you see in the cinema (whatever a cinema is). And we have so often over the years had coitus interruptus from children, though the most spectacular has to go to Becky's phone call intervention from her Dad's house. We had an entirely empty home, but as soon as that phone rang I knew two things, 1. I should have pulled the phone line out before we started and 2. That it would be Becky, her sex radar was amazing - and it didn't surprise me that she had sensed we were "at it" from ten miles away.

I promised myself, and silently Craig too, that I wouldn't mention sex in our correspondence, but it takes up a lot of our lives, not, unfortunately, in a physical sense. We spend a great deal of time talking about how we used to take it for granted, how we used to do "it" a lot, we discuss how often it was simply spontaneous - yes drink induced - and how little of it involved micro planning, unless we were attempting something daring such as an outside moment. If we didn't manage to get it together for a while that was OK we would catch ourselves up over the next few weeks. So today, we discuss sex in the past tense and sex in the future tense, and the future is pictured as small windows of opportunity when children are asleep, at nursery or stupidly, like this morning, just far enough away in our tall house not to notice us.

These windows of opportunity are desperately difficult to organise, but every now and again we pull it off (I know, I know), and feel like adults with a life and a future. It's the same for a friend of mine who manages an illicit fag in her design room (shed in garden)once a day, whilst her sons watch CARS and feed on snacks rich in salt. I have another friend who is working towards a BA in History with the Open University - she's doing it part time so should be done by 2020 and another friend - what am I saying, I don't have three friends I have pre-school age children. The rest of the women I know are all Mothers of other children, not friends, definitely not friends, more like enemies really. Anyway, the point is when your life is hour after hour of monotony filled by children and Fimbles, Runaround ("fun" indoor play park)making castles with bog roll tubes, trying to get the little darlings to eat cheese by offering them something called cheesestring and wet pants (their's not mine - well sometimes mine)then you tend to look on the few minutes without all this as sacred time - time to be spent doing ADULT things. Even if you do just want to eat sweeties and watch Charlie and Lola, you know you can't you absolutely MUST do something grown up - it is your responsibility to all the others who suffer too.

So sex, and fags and rock and roll (hey that would make a good title for a song)and beer and swearing and films with ADULT CONTENT and going to the Theatre to see rubbish and going to the cinema to see The Queen, a film you would NEVER have considered when you felt you had a choice, and getting drunk on two bottles of wine in half an hour on your first night out in four months - and calling the husband of that woman from NCT classes a cunt and not remembering why. This is what we must do, this is what we have to do, until we have life's blood, that is TIME, returned to us. Good luck everybody - go forth and for God's sake, don't multiply.

Rx

are you drinking to get maudlin, or are you drinking to get numb?

Dear Marianne,

I had to go to Welwyn the other day, I thought it would be a sleepy place, and it was. I had a whole hour for lunch so I went in to the village centre for an innocent drink, but was dragged in to a kind of vortex for forty minutes, and only just managed to get back in time for work.

It all started down at the local pub... Now, I have had a number of different pub experiences in my life. The country - you're not from round here - pub experience, the ear bleeding - turn it up - club/pub experience, the city -only time to stand & drink - pub experience, the sports - you can ask us to get off the pool table but we fucking won't - bar experience, the cheeky irish chappy - let's sell them Guinness - pub experience, the faux drawing room - books on shelves, game of backgammon anyone? - pub experience, the families welcome - through the back next to the bogs smiley potato faces - pub experience, the physically dangerous - are you spilling your drink on me! - pub experience, the student - huge black hole beer too cheap desperate for a shag - experience, and the slightly smelly but local - can I cash a cheque - pub experience. But I have never experienced the thanks for your order - but I can't manage it - pub experience. Not until my visit to the centre of Welwyn that is.

This sleepy little village boasts five (could be more)pubs. I noticed a sports pub and a theme/stuff your face with deep fried food for less pub, amongst others, but I wanted a quiet time with a glass of wine and a sandwich. The Black Horse looked happily unassuming from the outside and I thought it might do the trick. It was a bit shabby inside and I hadn't banked on the huge TV screen delivering non stop soft rock videos, nevertheless I carried on.

I odered a white wine spritzer (slightly wanky drink for drivers and people on diets). Then I was lost in Welwyn for a while.

Me:Oh and is there food on?

Barman: I thought you were going to ask me that - no, nothing, but we were thinking of knocking through, but that's no good for you now is it.

Me: Not really, but I'll have the drink.

Ten minutes later the tension in the pub is palpabale. The barman is very red, he is also out of breath, having been up and down the stairs a couple of times.

Me:Everything all right?

Barman: No.(He showed me two bottle openers). This one broke last night and this one wont go into the cork.

He returned to the gently warming bottle and after some more pulling eventually opted for pushing. The cork went in but the wine wouldn't come out. I was running out of lunch time, and, though I hadn't been before, I was now desperate for a drink. The barman looked haunted and embarrassed. I mentioned that I might try another pub, this idea was warmly welcomed along with helpful suggestions on what might be the best place to get a white wine spritzer and a sandwich.

In another pub, the name of which escapes me, I just had time to throw down some liquid and a pie and then run back to work hot and bothered. Next time I go somewhere sleepy, I think I'll keep it easy, visit the local tea shop for a pot of Assam and a tea cake, I should be safe there shouldn't I, they haven't started to theme tea shops yet have they?

Rx