Alice Band's Blog: Life of a Naval Wife

Real World Sucks.

2012-01-17T07:05:00.000-08:00

I had to wash that job right out of my hair and send it on its way. Time to reassess and lick my wounds and forget all about corporate bullies and petty rules. Idling my time away in a long queue for the Torpoint Ferry one day, I played with my phone. Having checked all my friends’ Facebook statuses, my emails and my messages my digits turned to Google. A dangerous place for all sorts of reasons, none of which are applicable here unless you subscribe to Hubby’s point of view and consider any type of holiday the work of the devil.
Months ago I had promised my two youngest daughters, once my job came to an end, an adventure to London, on the premise that we could do it in winter before school was fully back in the swing of things. So, sitting on the ferry that morning, I Googled ‘Travelodge’ and unbeknownst to me, there was a sale on. A three night stay at the Travelodge in Covent Garden was £19 per night, per room. Good grief, one can’t even park in the centre of London for that price. Breakfast was just over six pounds with two children eating free with one paying adult. A latte and two muffins in the piazza at Covent Garden would cost more than that. I was about to press ‘Book’ when the Libran in me took over. I had to weigh up the pros and cons; how would I travel? When should I go? Would we fit in a show? Could the other kids do without me for a few days?
I rang Mags. She, like most other people of my age was at work and clearly busy.
“Mmm?” she asked absently.
“Mags. It’s me. Alice”
“I can see that on my phone. What do you want?” I could hear her tapping at her computer; by any stretch of my imagination I did not have her full attention.
“I was thinking of going to London”.
“Mmhmm (then in a loud, stage whisper – ‘Thanks John, I’ll have an Americano. Cold, skimmed’) and when were you thinking of going to London and with whom?”
“Brad Bloody Pitt”.
“Now you are just being silly.”
“The kids”.
“What? All of them?” she asked.
“No, the youngest two”.
“Sounds fun. Thanks John. Yes of course, well he should, we contacted him yesterday. It’ll be on the ISBN file. Ask Charlotte to look it up..”. I waited.
“Ahem”, I said finally, having now driven off the ferry and pulled over on the Devonport side.
“Sorry Alice. Things are a little manic here at the mo. I’ll call in on the way home. Chill some Prosecco and we’ll discuss London at length” and she hung up. I didn’t have time to wait all day; the sale rooms would be sold out. Instead I brought the website up once more on my phone and pressed ‘Book’. I entered in my bank details and within seconds it was all confirmed. We were going on Sunday.
I drove as far as Ealing and left the car outside the house of a very old friend then took a tube and into the bowels of London we sank. The girls were very excited, more so when we reached the enormous hotel which dwarfed the surrounding buildings. The lift and the credit card style key elicited even more delight as did the flat screen TV and pull out trundle bed.
“Come on then, let’s go and explore”. It was beginning to get dark and, as we approached Leicester Square we could see a crowd gathered and quite a commotion. I wasn’t too sure what to expect as the girls jostled their way through the throng, nothing ghastly I prayed. Nothing of the sort. It transpired that it was the premiere of the film ‘War Horse’ and directly in front of us, as we emerged like blinking rabbits from the crowd, was the radiant beauty that is Kate Middleton. My girls both took a sharp intake of breath simultaneously. Being up close and personal with a princess is surely what being in London is all about. We waved and smiled and she waved and smiled before being whisked away to Princessland.
“Well how about that?” I beamed.
We ate our dim sum in China town later chatting furiously about all the things we’d already seen.
“What would you like to do tomorrow”, I asked slurping my noodles.
“Can we go to the Eifel Tower?” asked the Red-Head absent mindedly, focussing her efforts on her chop-sticks and pork dumpling. Her nine year old sister glanced at me and we rolled our eyes to heaven in despair.
Funnily enough we didn’t go to the Eifel Tower the following day but we did however go to the Museum of London, rode several red double-deckers, ice-skated at Somerset House and tried on ludicrously priced children’s clothes in Harrods. I have a rather disturbing picture of my nine year old in a pair of six inch, blue, suede, Jimmy Choos thinking she is the dog’s whatsits.
The following morning, fortified at breakfast, having had the best fun ever and made several rounds of toast in the conveyer belt style toasting machine, we walked miles and miles and miles and, as we watched the changing of the guards outside Buckingham Palace the Red-Head came out with another corker, “Are they German soldiers mummy?”
That night, the piece de resistance was to see Matilda the Musical – courtesy of my very generous dad. It was magical theatre, made even more special by the Red-Head’s insistence that we go autograph hunting at the stage door. The father of the girl who plays Lavender was waiting there too and he made sure that every member of the cast signed my daughter’s programme. It was the icing on a very thrilling, metropolitan cake.
This morning I awoke to face the real world. Laundry, school, unemployment. The Real World is nowhere near as much fun.

Chocolate-gate.

2012-01-17T07:03:00.000-08:00

As yet another year bites the dust, so does yet another career. Ok, so a temping Christmas job hardly constitutes a career, but I have been told that, due to my ‘misconduct’, I cannot ever again be considered for re-employment by the shop in which I worked for the past seven weeks, so in effect, any career in retail is a non-starter.
Misconduct. What would the average Joe, shopping in one of the UK’s most famous store, consider to be misconduct? One’s hand in the till? Nicking things off the shop floor? Telling a belligerent customer where to stuff their fat butt?
None of these transgressions applied to me thank God and even though there were times when I most certainly didn’t want to be there, like dawn on Boxing Day, I somehow, as did my colleagues, managed to smile between gritted teeth, apologise for the long queue and check the customer had the correct size (so many of the hangers are erroneous), and asking if the Sir/Madam will be using the store’s credit card. If not, why not? It has many advantages and so on and so on. Failure to ask if they will be using their store card results in disciplinary action, just ask one of my colleagues.
I also made small talk with many of the customers, went the extra yard in helping them and held their hands or even had a full on cuddle with many who were suffering for all number of reasons. Customer service was the best part of the job. As a customer in my own time I had the odd run in with colleagues on other floors that were a little more obdurate in their methods than I was. Their losing the order form for my turkey caused me great consternation and it was only after the fourth day of my asking when I would receive it and naturally being rather unimpressed with being fobbed off, did I actually have it handed to me, by which time I was apparently ‘rude’. I was most certainly disgruntled.
I was also slightly aggrieved when, on attempting to reserve a coat for Hubby, the customer assistant was unprepared to assist me. She wasn’t allowed to apparently.
“Why not?”, I asked, perplexed. I knew the lay out of the screen that she had in front of her and how to sort out customer reservations.
“You are only allowed to reserve it for 24 hours”, was the reply. Funny that as I’d had a demonstration by one of the managers on my second day on how to precisely change the reservation date on an item to make life a little more convenient for the customer. Anyway, whilst the above may have been instrumental in making a name for myself, I continued to make friendships with other staff members, enjoyed a Christmas staff do and take pride in several members of the public thanking me for my help.
So, why then would I receive a message to visit call the managers office and, a few days later would the same subject be brought up at my ‘exit’ interview wherein I was given the ignominious news that I wasn’t fit to be a shop girl comprise of?
It goes like this. A couple of days before Christmas, the shop in which I worked provided a space for a local, severely disabled war hero to raise funds and awareness for the charity he now works for having left the Royal Marines. He and his colleagues were selling calendars, had collection boxes and were also handing out key fobs and chocolates. As I was adjacent to them in my green, beauty queen sash, meeting and greeting customers at the top of the first floor escalator, I was lucky enough to have a quick chat with the chap in question who explained how he had received his appalling injuries. As a military wife it was deeply shocking. He was flanked by tall, stately Royal Marine veterans proudly wearing their berets and medals. It being Christmas and far from home in Wales, they were happy to talk and offered me a chocolate.
“I’d better not”, I replied shaking my head, “It’s against the rules”.
“Go –on, please, have a chocolate. It’s Christmas!”, one insisted. The injured marine also implored me and so, smiling and thanking them all, I popped a tiny, bite-sized Bounty bar into my mouth and let it melt. And that’s it. The sum total of my misconduct. However, I’d been clocked by a senior, female, fellow colleague who later apprehended me and rebuked me for eating the chocolate.
A week later I was hauled over the coals and had to sign a letter admitting to and agreeing to my misconduct. “This is absurd”, I objected but they were deadly serious. My misconduct had been asterisked – it was as though I’d transgressed one of the Ten Commandments with an 11th written especially for me ‘Thou shalt not chew gum, nor suck sweets on the shop floor’.
“I know that”, I said to one of the many managers, “I do not need to be told this but, one has to be judicious and I accepted the chocolate in the spirit in which it was offered”. I’d have liked to have added ‘to have done otherwise would have been far more damaging to your reputation’ but I was infuriatingly, in tears by now and my vocabulary was distinctly limited although I did try to articulate the inexpressible pettiness and absurdity of the situation but my protestations were seen as aggressive. So, there you have it, ‘chocolate-gate’ was my undoing in my short and appositely metaphoric, shelf life.
There was a tv programme on years ago called ‘In At the Deep End’ which featured Paul Heiney and Chris Searle attempting new jobs every so many weeks. If anyone has any similar bright ideas for ‘Alice Band: All At Sea’, do get in get touch. I’ve nothing to lose.

You Can Keep Your Capitalism.

2012-01-17T06:59:00.000-08:00

With the exception of Third World Country sweat shops. Obviously. Working on Boxing Day must be one of the most soul destroying jobs on earth. By the time Christmas night arrived I was already agitated and unable to relax because of the prospect of getting up so early. Downton Abbey was taped for me and I went to bed well before any other members of my family. The following morning as the alarm sounded at 4.45am, Hubby gave me a ‘There, there’ tap on my bottom as I hauled my body from under my gorgeously warm duvet, then mumbling “See you later”, he rolled over and went back to snoring. I sighed as I pulled my socks on in the dark. This really was the pits.
It’s not as if I were a doctor or nurse or indeed anyone with a worthwhile job with the satisfaction of knowing one was making a difference to someone’s life. Whereas I? I was just going off to work in a shop to take more money off senseless people who had probably spent more than enough already recently.
I tiptoed downstairs in the dark and was surprised to stand in something warm and squidgy. I grappled for the light, let my eyes adjust, looked down and then groaned in disgust. The dog hung his head in shame. Poor sod. It wasn’t his fault. The rather rhythmic and frequent farting the night before should have been a warning of things to come. I told Hubby not to give him the leftovers. The dog’s tummy is only used to dry dog food; it is no wonder then that it found turkey, sprouts and Christmas Pudding intolerable. Hell, most of the humans in the house were sitting in their own cloud of noxious fumes. There was no hope for the dog. I peeled off my sock and walked on my heels into the kitchen, lifted the lid on the Addis bin and chucked the sock inside it. Then I gave the dog a jolly big cuddle, just to let him know there were no hard feelings and then went about cleaning the carpet and my foot. Ten minutes later, after scrubbing with kitchen paper, Oust and Fabreze, both carpet and foot were shiny, clean and sweet smelling and there was no evidence to suggest that my dog had suffered chronic, Christmas incontinence.
I removed a fresh pair of socks from the tumble dryer. That’s another thing. Having to put a wash on on Christmas day was not very festive, but without which I wouldn’t have had a polyester uniform to wear to work. I then put a layer of cling film over a mug of tea, a slice of toast into an envelope of kitchen paper and got into the car; two minutes later and I was parked on the Torpoint ferry feeling very sorry for myself indeed.
If I was feeling sorry for myself though, God alone knows how the little children who were being dragged around Drake Circus shopping mall at 6am were feeling. It was all I could do to stop myself from going up to their mothers’ and demanding to know what on earth they were thinking. The children I saw ranged from babes in arms, to toddlers in pushchairs to five year olds, who, with eyes as big as saucers as it was so early and I’d like to think after an exciting day the day before, were being dragged, bottom lip quivering, by the arm by fierce mothers, hell bent on acquiring a bloody bargain.
I was appalled. How on earth was I going to do my job? How on earth was I going to give excellent customer service when I resented each and every customer? I can vividly remember how shocked I was when we lived in America and the whole huge business of being America never seemed to pause for an instant. The shops never shut, the tv never closed down, transport kept chugging, schools barely took a break. I remember seeing Tigger being killed in a parade at Disney World and someone else getting into his costume and the show just going on. I remember driving past a bank open for business on Good Friday and thinking to myself, ‘It won’t be long before it’s the same at home’. Mark my words, I’ll bet within a decade the shops will be open here on Christmas Day.
Nothing could have prepared me for the number of people who came through our shop doors on Boxing Day though. Well, they didn’t come in, they ran. And piled their trolleys high as if Dale Winton were lashing them in a frenzied, festive edition of Supermarket Sweep. It was, quite honestly, rather unnerving. People seemed to have a look in their eye that suggested they were unhinged. One woman emptied two large trolleys onto my counter whilst beside her, her little girl with big puffy eyes stared up at me. In one hand was brand new, shiny, Barbie doll, in the other, a family sized tube of pink Smarties. Most of the pink colouring decorated her face. She looked a very sorry little mite. She should have been in her bed in her new pyjamas, waiting to get up soon to play with undoubtedly the very expensive presents that she’d unwrapped only the day before.
Behind me a battle broke out over a beige blouse. Two women tore over it. It was a situation only King Soloman could have handled. “Someone is going to get hurt”, said one bystander rather prophetically. I returned home to the news that in London, a young man had been stabbed to death over a trainer.
At the staff briefing today the manager told us that trading on Boxing Day was a huge commercial success and that they’ll be doing it again next year. They can fill their boots. I only have two shifts left. I’ll raise a glass to that. Happy 2012!

Time of Life.

2012-01-17T06:57:00.000-08:00

I sat Hubby down with a stiff drink.
“I’ve got something to tell you”, I said, holding in my hand what looked exactly like, a pregnancy test.
If ashen is descriptive of a complexion devoid of colour, then it does not accurately describe Hubby’s waxen skin tone.
“Alice. What. The. Hell. Is. That?” his voice was staccato, and bizarrely soundless, as if he had lost the ability to speak coherently.
“This, my love, is a menopause test. It is in fact a complete antithesis to my previous pregnancy tests which were indications of my fruitful, fertilized loins. This, however faint a line” and I demonstrated to him the line in question which was spitefully presenting itself in the positive, plastic square window, where only a few years ago, it had told us that we were once again about to be parents, “is proof positive that I am officially getting old”.
His relief was palpable; he was immediately cheery and downed his drink in one.
“Is that all?” and he laughed uproariously, “Oh, ah, ha-ha, ha-ha”. I was not amused.
“’Is that all’ you ask? Is that all you have to say to me? All these decades there has been a monthly, if at times inconvenient, reminder of my fertile femininity and now it is apparently on the wane. No fanfare, no thanks for the good times. Not so much as a, by your leave”.
“But that’s a good thing isn’t it?”, asked Hubby, pouring himself another, seemingly celebratory, drink, “You can do as you wish now and not worry”.
“Worry about what?” I asked.
“Well, for a start you can go swimming whenever you feel like it”.
“I’m not Sharron Davies for God’s sake. I’m not in the pool at the crack of dawn on a daily basis, only to be stymied once a month by my…”.
“Ok, Alice, I get the picture, you don’t need to spell it out in black and white”.
“Aren’t you at all concerned?” I asked him, most indignant that a significant milestone in my life as a woman was being trifled with.
“Concerned about what?”
“Well, it’s not meant to be plain sailing you know? I could become moody”. Hubby at this juncture, raised his eyebrows rather suggestively and most irritatingly.
“Ha, ha, very funny. I am not a moody woman. But the menopause is meant to make you collide with an emotional wall. Tears regularly, you know that sort of thing, because the finality that I can no longer bear children can apparently, drive me insane”.
“Alice, face it. The kids have been driving you insane for a long time. In fact I would go so far as to say that you have not been able to bear children for years already.”
It was hopeless talking to him about it. Hubby obviously couldn’t empathise, but I thought at the very least he’d be a little more sympathetic. I dealt him a trump card.
“It’s meant to make me go off sex”.
“In that case you should have done that test years ago. You’ve obviously been menopausal for a lot longer that you give your womb credit for.” I stormed upstairs as moodily as I could muster, just to prove a point that if living with me had been challenging before, then he didn’t know what was going to hit him. I threw myself on my bed and rang Mags.
“Merry Christmas!”, she carolled down the phone.
“Bah, humbug”, I replied.
“What the hell is wrong with you, oh domestic Christmas goddess? If you aren’t Christmassy Alice, what hope in hell have we mere mortals?”
“I am officially old”. And I explained the positive menopause test. I could hear the water running from her kitchen taps.
“I’m just washing my hands”, she explained, “I was in the middle of making sodding sausage rolls. Right”, she added, obviously having made herself comfortable, “Tell me more”.
“There is nothing more to tell”.
“Well then, why did you do the test in the first place?”
“Things weren’t as regular if you get my drift”.
“For God’s sake Alice, we are grown and now it seems, officially old women, do you still need to talk about this euphemistically?”.
“Not really I suppose, but perhaps it goes with the territory. Perhaps I will begin to speak like an old lady now and find things ‘rude’ and keep a budgie and start taking a keen interest in my herbaceous borders.” Bloody hell, I’d just remembered that I’d just bought a Perry Como CD. The writing had been on the wall.
“Alice if it is really, genuinely true and not a duff test, try and remember the good bits of being old. About wearing a purple and a clashing red hat and not giving a hoot and making a noise to make up for the sobriety of your youth. Old age is not a time to sit back and wither and wane. It is a time to rage, rage against the dying of the night”.
“Very poetic. Jenny Joseph and Dylan Tomas in the same breath”.
“You know what I mean; old age is a state of mind”.
“Like osteoporosis and facial hair?”
“Exactly. Come on Alice. It’s Christmas Eve. You have five gorgeous children, a delicious husband, a dad, an uncle, a brother, sister in law, niece and nephew depending on you to provide them tomorrow with all their hearts desires. Not to mention that in a few hours time my family, as well as scores of others will be walking through your front door expecting the annual Family Band eat, drink and be merry Christmas Eve party. Now turn the wireless up and get on with it”.
So, if you’ll excuse me, I’ll do just that. Merry Christmas xxxxx

Bloody Good Eggs.

2012-01-17T06:53:00.000-08:00

I met Mags for a coffee during one of my breaks. I was not a happy bunny. Mags was consulting a Christmas list and I knew that I did not have her full attention and boy, did I need some attention.
“Will you listen to me please?” I asked her, “Or I’ll get up from here in a right huff”.
“Sure”, she said, ticking off the people she’d bought presents for.
“Talk to me!”, I said, rather more loudly than I’d have preferred, given that those around me thought I was addressing them and more than one, who had their hazelnut lattes raised to their lips, placed them back in their saucers. I lowered my voice.
“Mags, please, I’ve only got half an hour and I have a lot to say.” She finally got the hint and folded her list and put it in carefully back in her handbag.
“Ok”, she said, “I’m all yours. Spill the beans”.
“Well, I um, am cheesed off”.
“Go on”, Mags replied, her chin resting on her hand which was resting on the café’s table, her eyes and face so serious and intense that she reminded me of a psycho-analytic therapist and I had to laugh.
“Bloody hell Mags, it’s not that bad, I just want someone to ‘drip over’ as my dear husband would say”.
“Drip away”, she said.
“Well, you know this ongoing debacle that we’ve had with the Christmas trees?”
“Of course I know about it Alice. I have dined out several times on the story that my best friend has managed to get herself banned from a Christmas tree nursery!”
“Yes, well, and you know that we need really tall trees, because, well ,that was the tradition we started with when we moved into our house and now the youngest children obviously don’t think it’s really Christmas unless we adorn both hallway and sitting room with 14 foot trees”.
“But they look magical”, she added.
“That’s the point. Of course, it costs a lot of money and all that but, as we don’t go in for ludicrously expensive gifts, then I like to still indulge them with the trees”.
“So what are you going to do?”
“Well, I’ve Googled tall trees and unless I want a couple shipped from Norway, then I’m out like trout. It’s almost Christmas Mags and we don’t have so much have a bloody card up. It’s not exactly festive.”
“I see where this conversation is going”, said Mags, her face now covered with her hands.
“The thing is I may as well get hold of a menorah at this rate and celebrate Hanukkah.”
“Oy vey”, quipped Mags.
“I think it would be rather lovely to be honest. I like the idea of the miracle of olive oil.”
“Huh?”
“The Jews were having a tough time of it and there was only enough olive oil to light a lamp for one night, but, miraculously, it lasted for eight days, until new supplies could be found. That’s what Hanukkah is all about”.
“Well I never. Not exactly a virgin birth though is it?”
“Mags!”, I was horrified, “For God’s sake!”
“Well it’s true!”
“They are completely different scenarios. I wasn’t making a comparison between which religion has the best miracles for crying out loud”. Mags looked suitably mortified.
“Besides”, I said, “I’m sure that if I went on that, Who Do You Think You Are programme and they did some digging into my geneaology, I think they’d find that I was Jewish”.
“Why on earth do you say that?”, asked Mags. I explained to her that as I was down-to-earth, intense and funny and pressed huge amounts of food onto any passing visitor and had a very healthy interest in my children’s private lives, then, from what I’d seen of Woody Allen films, Jewish mothers and I have a lot in common .
“Anyway”, I went on, “whether I am Jewish or not, it does not help with the tree situation and I wondered, dear sweet Mags, as they recognise us, if we have your kids for a couple of hours, whether you and your beloved husband would go undercover and buy two trees on our behalf?”. It goes without saying that she agreed to the terms of the espionage I had planned even if I had to bribe her with a glass or two of mulled wine when she and her husband returned: mission accomplished. I went back to work, relieved that within the next day or so, trees, fairy lights, Lilliput villages and other such festive décor would indeed trim our house from the coving to the carpet.
I did not however,account for apocalyptic weather. They were turned away on the first attempt due to severe gale force winds and on the second attempt there was no-one there due to the aforementioned conditions. By the third attempt my children had stopped being excited; Mag’s boys were no longer a novelty and I believe that they never thought they’d see a tree this side of Valentine’s Day. On the third attempt, when it was yet again pouring with rain and blowing a hoolie; when the skies where pitch dark and most normal people were in front of the fire, Mags and her husband opened our front door and, dripping wet, lugged two, vast , comedy trees through our house.
“Oh. My. God”, I said. The girls squealed, the dog went mental, the cats hissed and Hubby went pale.
“Two Christmas trees, duly delivered”. There were pine needles sticking in Mag’s usually sleek coiffure, her cheeks were red and her hands filthy, her husband’s glasses needed miniature windscreen wipers, his nose was dripping as was his scarf and Barbour.
When your friends go out in a storm for you to make you and your kids happy, whether you celebrate Hanukkah or Christmas or Diwali it matters not a jot; what does matter stood shivering in our hallway. “ To our best friends”, toasted Hubby. Hear, hear.

Throng.

2012-01-17T06:50:00.000-08:00

The excitement was without bounds on the 1st of December . Five children, two small, one sixteen year old and two, in the eyes of the law at least, if no-one else’s, officially adults - impatient to undo the little perforated windows and dig out a chocolate behind the flaps of their advent calendars.
“Mummy, I’ve got three advent calendars to open” said the Red-Head.
“So have I”, screeched the nine year old.
“I’ve only got one”, said the 16 year old in dismay.
“Me too”, said the 19 year old.
“Me too”, said the 18 year old. I was beginning to empathise with The Little Red Hen.
“You big kids only have one because I bought you all one each -with your names iced on them. Rellies have sent one each to the girls and a benevolent God-mother has given one to your youngest sister, her God-child and, as the other one is only nine, I felt it incumbent to fill the wooden advent calendar with choccies so that she wouldn’t feel left out.”.
“But we feel left out?”, they refrained.
“Deal with it”, was my rather abrupt reply.
“Don’t you have an advent calendar Mummy?”, asked the Red-Head, chocolate already coating the outside of her mouth.
“Yes”, said my son, “It’s called Citalopram. It’s how she counts off the days”. I sighed heavily. So my anti-depressants are now a family joke. Cheers kids.
“Hilarious”, I replied, grimly, “As a matter of fact I don’t need a daily chocolate to remind me of how many days there are left until Christmas, I can feel it”. I left it at that, I wasn’t going to explain to them what I meant. I wasn’t going to explain that the sense of hysteria as the 25th of December approaches is palpable in my shop. There are queues as far as the eye can see and in it are all and sundry. Dear old souls who have a couple of bars of soap and some bath salts to buy for an equally elderly neighbour; a woman hell bent on buying something gorgeous for herself having been ‘left’ on Valentine’s day last year and indulgent grannies buying coats and party frocks for their grand-daughters but mainly, the line is made up of frazzled women.
Hundreds and hundreds of women in all shapes, sizes and ages queuing for ages in yet another shop to provide the family with the wow factor. By the time they snake around to my till, I am all for providing them with a stiff sherry, so knackered are they. The purchases from other shops dangling heavily from their wrists, cutting through the skin – so much for retail therapy, retail suicide more like.
Every now and again a lone male pops up. Smug. Pleased as punch with himself that he’s queued with the rest of the throng. Thing is, he’s only buying a couple of things, a gift for his wife and another for his mother. Usually it’s the same thing if indeed a different colour. I find it hard not to scowl at these men. One man bought ‘the wife’ a pair of slippers.
“Do you have these in a size 5?”. We did not. “Give them to me anyway. At least it gives her something to open on Christmas Day”. What I wanted to do with the infernal slippers cannot be printed here.
Other men just feel so proud of being ‘out there’, shopping. “It earns me brownie points” say, rather depressingly, more than one or two men, “and we need to acquire as many brownie points as we can”. This statement is, more often than not, is followed by a hearty laugh.
Some men, those whose brownie points must already be either banked or indeed are now being totted up again, traipse after their wives, the Christmas pack horse, carrying the goods as ‘the wife’ pauses every few feet to sniff a soap or spray a perfume.
“This’ll be alright for Glenda won’t it?” ask the wives. The husbands merely nod, not giving a toot if Glenda gets a fragrance gift set or a tin of shortbread biscuits or indeed bugger all. Don’t you see, dear women, they don’t give a damn. We want them to; oh boy do we want them to. We want them to share the load and not just physically, but mentally too, all the infernal list making and Christmas card writing and wrapping and cooking and planning and posting and, not to put too fine a point on it, the magic making. We want them to help decorate the tree with as much smiling benevolence and loving tender glances as Bing Bloody Crosby; we want them to peel the sprouts with us in the kitchen on Christmas morning in harmonious companionship whilst from the wireless, the angelic voices of the choir boys from Kings’ College wafts in the air, blending with the scent of a roasting free range turkey. We want them to grasp our hands from time to time and every now and then catch our eye as if to say, ‘my darling, this wouldn’t be possible without you’ whilst, in another room, a parallel fantasy room, our darling children in crisp white nightgowns read their new books or play with their dollies.
It is hardly surprising then that Christmas, after all the build up and the choosing and the spending and the sheer unrelenting hard work of it all, it is such a crushing disappointment for so many, and dare I say it, the many will mostly be women. If, from what I’ve witnessed it is true that women have planned everything from the food to the cards and gifts, then Christmas morning for their men is going to be a lovely surprise both in terms of presents and what they are going to put in their bellies.
Comfort and Joy? Not for the poor bloody cow whose slippers aren’t going to fit her.

Filty weather, fishy hors d'ouevres.

2012-01-17T06:42:00.000-08:00

“I’ll pick you up at 6pm. On the dot?”, said Hubby earlier in the morning. A few hours later after I’d finished my shift, Hubby was true to his word and was waiting for me, engine running.
“Did you remember my clothes?” I asked him, suddenly anxious that I’d have to attend this swanky bash in my polyester uniform.
“Yes”.
“Shoes?”
“Yup”.
“Damn, I forgot to leave my make-up out for you to bring”.
“No worries, I remembered that as well”. And he’d fed our five children, I was impressed.
“What did you cook them?”
The windscreen wipers were going like the clappers. It was a filthy night. Hubby indicated right.
“Eggs and ham”, he said absently, concentrating on negotiating the roundabout by the bombed out church. Hubby hasn’t driven through Plymouth in months, let alone in the dark and, let further alone, in the dark and rain.
“Just eggs and ham?, I asked
“Mmmm”, he answered.
“Sounds like a supper Dr Seuss would cook up”. I thought that was a quite a witty retort and I harrumphed.
“Where the hell is this road going to?” he asked out loud.
“It’s a new one”, I sighed, “Recently built”.
“Bloody hell, they could have told me. Honest to God, Plymouth is going to the dogs”. I wanted to point out that a new road, whilst causing chaos initially, was surely for the better in terms of congestion and his discombobulation was scarcely a reason to class Plymouth as a city going to the dogs, but it hardly seemed the appropriate juncture. Hubby was frowning intently and a little tic had developed in his cheek.
“Take the next right”, I instructed, “Then around the roundabout. First exit”.
Hubby eventually reached the Barbican without any further ado.
“Why are we here?” I asked.
“A friend lent me the key to their apartment so that you can get changed, or did you want to strip off in a public lavatory somewhere?” What friend? Hubby parked on the wet cobbles and I gathered my stuff from the boot, the rain dripping down my neck.
“Where do I go?”, I shouted through the driver’s window. Hubby wound the window down, ever so slightly. He evidently didn’t want to get his midnight blue, velvet jacket, even ever so slightly damp.
“See that gate?”, he asked. I peered through the rain, then nodded.
“Use this code…” and he handed me a Post-It note, “Then take the lift to the third floor, apartment number 36.” I was astonished. There is nothing that Hubby likes more, than nosing around other people’s houses, especially a posh one. Had he been here before? Oh my God. Is this where he comes for some clandestine tryst?
“Don’t be bIoody daft Alice” replied Hubby wearily, “Look you are getting wet, but FYI, I would love to come with you, however, there is no-where to bloody park and we have to be at the venue in five minutes, now get a wiggle on”. I smiled, turned on my heels and attempted a wiggle a la Marilyn Monroe, unfortunately I tripped over one of the cobbles, which put paid to any efforts of me trying to imitate an iconic Hollywood starlet. Not of course, that I’ve seen that many 46 year old starlets in a big and baggy shop assistants uniform, clinging to one nonetheless due to the nature of the fabric and thus its static-causing tendencies.
I let myself into the flat but didn’t even have time to have a look around as I could hear Hubby hooting his horn at me. I threw my ‘going out’ clothes on, scrabbled my other clothes together, let myself out again and jumped in the car.
We pulled into the Royal William Yard a few minutes later after I’d giving Hubby explicit instructions on how to get there. He was astounded.
“Good God”, he said, looking around at the old buildings, “I can remember getting stores from here when it was still a victualing yard. See that building over there..” But this wasn’t the time and the place for salty, sea dog reminiscences of days of yore; I needed a drink and a very posh nibble or two.
We weren’t disappointed, The River Cottage Canteen did us proud; the Cambodian Wedding Dip I could have eaten all to myself with a spoon and was most miffed with having to share it with everybody else and my, oh my, who that everybody else was! All the movers and shakers of Plymouth, gathered under one roof and hosted extremely well by Destination Plymouth, Plymouth University and the National Marine Aquarium.
“Remind me why we are here?” I asked Hubby chewing on a slice of crab and chilli pizza, “I feel we’re gate crashing”.
“My boss couldn’t make it”, he replied. I thought as much. We were last minute stand ins. Oh well, I may as well make the most of it and helped myself to another flute of elderflower champagne.
Then came the speeches. No such thing as a free hors d’oeuvres. I braced myself. I needn’t have. The news is that Plymouth 2012 is going to be genuinely exciting; marine city festival along the waterfront, art, culture, boat shows, Olympic flame, food, the list goes on. Even the university is to be awarded the Queen’s Anniversary Prize for Higher and Further Education in recognition of its world class marine and maritime research, teaching and training. It’s come a long way from being Plymouth Poly.
“Well, I stand corrected” said Hubby, to some chap in a tie that meant something significant “This is most definitely not a city going to the dogs. Plymouth is at last, on the up. I’m left eating my words”. He may well have been eating his words, personally I was eating a mackerel bap. Locally sourced and, 'respecting their seasonality’, of course.

Early.

2012-01-17T06:31:00.000-08:00

I am in a perpetual state of jet lag. Not, of course, because I have been jet setting around the world’s time zones but more because of the hours I am keeping. Waking up at 5.15 every morning, sitting shivering on the ferry at 6am and locking the car in an eerie, subterranean car-park, whose only other life forms at that time of the morning are urinating drunkards, mass murderers and minimum wage maintenance staff is a timely reminder that I have been protected for years from the harsh reality of what life is life for the marginalised, although I hasten to add, that I am not comparing alkies and murderers with the poorly paid. As I zip up my fleece and snuggle into my snood, I am struck by the lonely figure of a middle aged woman, bent over her broom, deep in thought, seemingly a million miles away from this dirty, hostile car-park. She is black. Time seems to have stood still. I am shocked to see such a stereotypical figure. In 2011, are menial jobs still being doled out to people of colour? Is this Mississippi or Plymouth? I want to acknowledge her as a human being, to make her feel valued and not invisible, so I wish her a chirpy, “Good morning”. She barely looks up. I am embarrassed. Perhaps she thought I was patronizing her. Was I patronizing her? Oh my God. I hurry to work, telling myself that she is probably earning a little extra cash, either to pay for college or like me, for Christmas. It cannot be surely because this is the only job available to her. Can it?
I enter my secret code for the door and enter the shop. At this time of the morning, much like the car-park, but with fewer drunkards, it is very quiet. I grab a coffee before my shift starts. There is no-one around, I look into my plastic cup and yawn. I haven’t felt this out of sorts since I was breast feeding every two hours throughout the night. My diet isn’t helping me either because I’m eating at irregular hours, as one might when flying long haul where you eat in the middle of the night when you shouldn’t, then extra snacks at peculiar times so that your body clock has no idea what on earth is happening to it. Because I leave the house so early, I am eating an extra meal a day that my waist line could well do without.
Words cannot describe therefore, when looking at my diary after I’d risen, showered, dried my hair, applied my body butter and my make-up, eaten some toast and had a cup of tea, and saw, to my immense distress, that I needn’t be in work until 10am. It felt like the reverse of being late for something, only worse, much, much worse. Instead of losing a bus, I’d lost sleep, a far more precious commodity. I raced around the kitchen, desperately trying to work out what to do and acutely aware that my prevarication was, as every second ticked by, depriving me of any more stolen sleep.
Just as I was turning out all the lights and about to fling my uniform off and dive under the covers, Hubby got up.
“Hiya”, he yawned, not giving a fig that my dressing gown that he was wearing wasn’t covering him adequately. A fig leaf, would in fact have been most expedient at this particular juncture, “You still here Alice?”
“No, I am a figment of you imagination”. Stop it with the fig motif Alice, I said aloud.
“Huh?” he asked.
“I was just saying that I’d got my hours mixed up. I thought I was starting work at six thirty. Turns out, it’s later than that, much, much later”.
“Plonker”, he said softly. Not.
“Oh well”, he added, “saves a bit on the school breakfast club for the girls and you can take them to school as well. Result”. I tried to slink away from him and ease myself quietly up the stairs.
“Alice, as you’re up, do me a favour and iron a shirt for me will you please love?” I must have looked stricken because he quickly added, “Oh, don’t worry, not if you’re going back to bed. It’s just that I have to drive to Dartmouth in the next half hour and an ironed shirt would be really useful. No worries. I ‘ll do it once I’ve had a shower and walked the dog”.
What’s a girl to do? Wearily and with much sighing, I opened the ironing board and switched on the iron. I boiled the kettle again whilst I waited for the iron to heat up. I looked at the clock. It was almost 7am. If I quickly ironed this shirt, I’d still have an hour’s kip before the youngest girls woke up. As I smoothed the last bit of the left arm and thought longingly of my feather pillow, my teenage daughter walked into the kitchen.
“Mum! I never see you in the morning anymore! Great, a parent to make me breakfast like they used to in the old days. I’ll have a marmite bagel and a cup of tea…” and just as I was about to protest she added, “Please, please mummy darling. I’ll just go and get my art folder and then we can bond”. Bond? I think we achieved that after sixteen seconds, let alone sixteen years.
No sooner had I made her bagel and handed Hubby his shirt than the little ones woke up. I sighed. Breakfast. Round three.
“As you’re at home, can you be an angel and whip the dog around the block before you leave?” asked Hubby.
Jeeze, it might be exhausting, but it’s easier and more peaceful to go to work at the crack of dawn than to look after this family. Perhaps that’s what the black, car-park cleaner thinks too. Perhaps.

Medication. (This post is out of synch and was written after 'Empty Nest'

2011-11-23T13:39:00.000-08:00

I came home from work a couple of days ago to find my son waiting for me in my bedroom. He looked very sombre.
“Sit down mum”, he said gravely. Oh God. I steeled myself for whatever bombshell he was about to drop. Gingerly, I sat down next to him on my bed.
“What is it darling?” I asked.
“What are these for?” and he handed me a packet of pills. Oh boy.
“Well, they, I mean I…”, I struggled to find the right words.
“They’re anti-depressants mum”, he said, his voice heavy with emotion, “They were hiding at the back of the paracetamol draw with your name on them. What’s wrong mum? Why are you depressed?”
“How do you know what they are?”, I asked him quietly.
“I Googled the name”. We sat silent for a moment or two.
“Are you going to kill yourself?” he finally stole himself to ask. I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.
“Oh my darling”, I replied and I wrapped my arms around him, “Of course I’m not going to kill myself. I was never going to before, I am not going to now and I will never in the future.”
I then went on to explain as best I could that it wasn’t a case of unrelenting sadness or a deep black hole that I was plunged into that was the reason for my prescription.
“Well why then? Do we make you unhappy? Do I? Does dad?”
I did laugh then. “No, none of the above. You drive me crazy. All of you. Your mess, your reluctance to tidy up after yourselves, your need for constant feeding, but you never ever make me unhappy. I couldn’t live without you all”.
“Well then, I don’t understand. Why do you need anti-depressants?”
This was going to take time. I needed to get comfortable. I peeled off my tights and then lay on my bed and snuggled him close to me.
“God ma”, he said, “Couldn’t you warn me when you are about he remove your hosiery. Can I open my eyes now please?”
“Yes, I’m perfectly decent”, I replied. He unscrewed his eyes.
“So, you were saying?”. I took a deep breath.
“I am not a psychiatrist my darling, so couldn’t tell you the inner machinations of my soul, but what I do know is that when I take my, for want of a better word, happy pills, I seem to feel less anxious than when I don’t. My anxiety sometimes gets the better of me and stops me from enjoying my life as I should. I fret and worry to such an extent that all rational thought goes out of the window”.
He was quiet and I could hear my heart beating.
“But dad worries. He worries about money and his job and redundancies. Is he on them too?”
“Not that I’m aware of but dad and I are very different characters and were he to feel that his health would benefit if he were on them, then that would be the sensible thing to do”.
“Do you feel ashamed?”, he asked in a small voice.
“There is a certain stigma attached to mental health and some people find it very difficult to disclose that they need medicinal help to cope with life’s challenges. I don’t exactly shout it from the rooftops, but nevertheless, I don’t see the point in pretending. I am more matter of fact about it. If I had asthma but refused to use an inhaler what would you think?”
“I’d think you were an idiot”.
“Exactly. Similarly if I had tonsillitis or a chest infection, I would be foolish not to take antibiotics. Therefore it stands to reason to me, that if my mind is playing up that I should take the appropriate medication to make it better. Am I making sense?”
“Kinda. I don’t understand why you feel anxious without the tablets though. What can you worry about so much that it makes you unable to function?”.
“Well, that’s the big question and one I’ve asked myself a thousand times. I’m older and wiser now though and I refuse to beat myself up about it. No doubt it has something to do with one of my closest relatives being killed when I was a child and, it has affected me since then by worrying myself sick about something tragic and shocking happening again. Of course, what I’ve come to realise is that you can’t control things outside of your control and, whereas perhaps a person without my experience would just not even imagine the unimaginable , I was wasting happy times in my life by just preparing myself, just in case. It is very wearing and a complete waste of time. It was stopping me being in the here and now”.
“You’ve felt like that all your life?”, my son asked me, aghast.
“No, not always, although I spent from that terrible day as a girl until the day grandma died, desperately trying to keep her safe, but it was always out of my control and in the end, she died anyway, when I wasn’t looking, when we were thousands of miles away living in America”.
He squeezed me. I carried on.
“The thing is, I want to enjoy your growing up, and that of your sisters. I don’t want the choices you make or the journeys you go on, blighted by my anxieties. That’s not to say, even if I were on intravenous valium that I won’t worry myself sick until I know that you are home and safe and sound.”
Just then Hubby walked into our room.
“What are you two in cahoots about?”, he asked. We told him.
“Oh, don’t worry about your mother”, advised Hubby waving at me dismissively, “She always was and always will be, as mad as a sh*t house snake”.

Invisible Me.

2011-11-23T13:31:00.000-08:00

My feet were soaking in a washing-up bowl of Epsom salts when Mags came calling. She plonked herself next to me on the sofa.
“Hard day then?”, she asked.
“You could say that”, I replied, wincing as the dog came to greet her and knocked the washing-up bowl, stubbing my tender tootsies inside.
“How long was your shift?, she added, stroking a very excited dog. I extricated my feet from the bowl, better safe than sorry.
“Eight hours”, I said, “And as if that weren’t bad enough, there was no bus, so I walked from the city centre back to Torpoint”.
“Bloody hell!” exclaimed Mags.
“My thoughts entirely. I walked pavements that I’ve never walked before”.
We were quiet for a moment, both of us trying to remember a dim and dubious past when we might, as young women, have zig-zagged home in the early hours after a dancing the night away in some Union St night club. I was relived that I could not recall even one time.
“Thing is Mags, as I walked, I had plenty of time to think and walking in the dark, in my polyester uniform, I was completely invisible.”
“You mean it was so dark, no-one could see you?”
“No, I don’t mean literally. I mean …” and I felt a little embarrassed to say the next bit.
“Go on”, Mags prompted.
“I felt poor”. There I said it.
“How do you mean?” Mags asked.
“I’m beginning to loose my identity as me, middle class mum, commander’s wife, graduate.”
“Why?”
“Because what we do for a living and what we wear so very often defines us. Hubby goes to work and everyone knows he’s the commander. His uniform, lest anyone has any doubt, tells them so. Similarly when I was a teacher, my clothes suggested I was a teacher because I looked professional. Students lent their respect. A white coat and stethoscope suggests a doctor. What we wear has a certain gravitas, or not as the case may be.”
“So?” asked Mags.
“So when is the last time you held any particular regard for a shop girl?”.
“Well, I’m always polite to them”, replied Mags, defensively.
“Always?”, I queried.
“Ok, not always, but some are hopeless and sometimes I’m in a rush, but Alice love, they are just sales assistants. Hardly educating the nation, or healing the sick or commanding the Royal Navy for that matter”.
“Just sales assistants? ” I said, “Which is why, as I sat rather dejectedly at the bus stop before deciding to travel by Shanks’s pony, I realised just how invisible I was. For want of a better word, I looked working class and thus not worth the time of day. Honestly Mags, I walked through parts of Devonport which were very rundown and dodgy, but I looked as though I fitted right in.
“Don’t be ridiculous”.
“Straight up. My make-up had waned, my hair was pulled back; if I’d walked into Iceland to get a few frozen provisions, the sales assistant there wouldn’t have bothered with me because I am now one of them. I can truly understand how you start believing how others perceive you. No wonder the unemployed feel so worthless. It’s how we’ve made them feel, ditto single mums and immigrants”.
“I never thought a Christmas job would have made you so political”, said Mags, sounding rather nervous.
“That’s the other thing”, I added, “I know in my heart of hearts that I’m earning a crust and busting my ass to earn some extra cash for a family Christmas, which rather ironically, because of the gruelling world of retail, I won’t even be a part of, but I’m also, after only a couple of weeks in the job, beginning to believe that I am not capable of anything more. Perhaps my colleagues and other low paid workers share that feeling”.
“But I thought you enjoyed it?”, said Mags.
“I the words of Abba, I do, I do, I do, I do, I do. I love the customer service, and helping old ladies in the changing rooms especially. In fact, I think department stores should specialise in services for the elderly. Have you ever given a thought to how knackering it is for old people to shop?”
Mags assented that she had not.
“Well, it is. Exhausting. For them to buy any new clothes they have to negotiate the crowds, find the item they want, queue to try it on, get undressed, put the new thing on and then, if it doesn’t fit, well suffice it to say that they are very relieved to find me. They hold my arm and we take time gathering several items, then I carry the things to the fitting rooms and stand outside the curtain whilst they undress. In a couple of cases, where the poor dears have been arthritic, they have asked me to be in there with them to help them dress and undress. It may be a drop in the ocean compared to teaching and medicine, but I get a wonderful sense of satisfaction that I have made one old lady’s day a better one.”
There is no time for personalised customer service these days though. Much like teaching, it is all about targets. Although I am delighted to help my old ladies, I am aware that I ought to be selling, selling, selling and with every sale, offering store credit cards, which for many families, especially at Christmas, will be a descent into the ravages of debt. Hubby walked in.
“Alice, sweetheart, whilst it is commendable that you feel pimping a credit card immoral, please keep your gob shut and hang onto this job. For once in your life, just smile and say to your superiors, ‘Certainly, Sir’”. Mags looked doubtful.
It was a phrase I’d have to practise; I reinserted my feet in the Epsom salts and mulled the rather obsequious, proposal.

A Brief Interlude

2011-11-23T13:29:00.000-08:00

So, before I donned my polyester uniform and started my new role as shop girl, it was Hubby’s birthday. I surprised him by taking him away for the night to Center Parcs.
“Alice”, he said, “We can’t afford it”.
“Yes we can”, I answered imperiously, “I’ve been saving my two pound coins for it. Besides it’s only an over night spa break”.
So, with little more than a clean pair of knicks, a toothbrush and a pair of pyjamas, which elicited the most predictably lecherous comment of “You won’t be needing those, nudge, nudge”, from Hubby, we got in the car and left the small children in the care of the big children.
It was only mid afternoon when we arrived, but almost dark yet, having been to Center Parcs once before with the children we knew the routine, or so we thought.
“You’ve come to the wrong entrance”, said a bookings clerk with a clipboard, “You should have come in through the ‘Spa Break’ entrance”.
“Oh, sorry”, I said apologetically.
“You passed the sign further down the drive. It’s hard to miss”. Hubby and I looked at each other and giggled. She was very strict.
“Turn around and go back down the drive and then enter through the staff entrance”. We nodded meekly. Finally, after a lot of “No, up there”, “No, turn left”, “No. Stop. That’s only for bikes”, we found our accommodation. It was an apartment which was more than adequate for our needs. I had no plans in cooking.
The bath was deep and the bed very comfortable.
“But this is two single beds pushed together” said Hubby, much chagrined.
“Well that’s ok”, I replied, attempting to hide the relief in my voice, “I won’t be far away”.
After unpacking our small overnight bag, we walked to the swimming pool. We were at a loss.
“It’s weird without the children”, said Hubby. I nodded.
“Let’s go down the rapids”, he suggested. Really? Did I have to?
“C’mon, don’t be such a spoil sport” and without so much as a by your leave, Hubby hurled himself over the wall and into swirling water beneath. I attempted the same leap but, never particularly athletic, got rather mortifyingly stranded with one half of my body dangling over the wall and the other half dangling the swimming pool side. Try as I might, I could not engender the oomph to get over it. Thankfully, an elderly and rather well built gentleman saw my predicament and chucked me over the edge and into gushing water. I screeched and screamed and choked and coughed most of my way around.
“Wait for me”, I kept calling out to Hubby as though my life depended on it, “Please wait for me. Glug, glug, glug”. Every time I caught sight of Hubby, decorously going along the rapid in front of me, he was helpless with laughter.
It finally ended with me being deposited rather unceremoniously in a deep pool, sideways. When I looked up, Hubby was waiting for me looking like a tall Daniel Craig, dripping, sexily wet, his hair raked back from his face. I emerged from the pool like the Kraken, hair plastered to my face, swimsuit barely covering the essential areas, bruised with eyes bloodshot from the prolonged dunking in chlorine.
“Glass of wine?” Hubby mouthed. I shook my head vigorously.
“Huh?”, Hubby hunched his shoulders in disbelief.
“I’m not saying no to wine”, I shouted back over the noise of screaming children and rushing water, “I am ridding my ear canals of the last vestiges of white water rapids”.
Fifteen minutes later, having visited the shop and bought pretzels, wine and a bath bomb, I was wallowing in far more agreeable bath water. It was bloody hot though and I emerged later, poached, looking not unlike an expensive and rather fragrant crustacean; Rick Stein would have put me on the menu.
“Hello lovely lady”, said Hubby in his best James Bond voice and he got up off the sofa and whipped my towel away before adding, “Bloody hell Alice! I can’t make love to a lobster”. That’s where all similarities with Daniel Craig terminate.
The following day was sunny; we booked into the Aqua Sana. And once within its calming, soothing environment, enveloped in a snuggly white robe, it’s as though real life has been transcended. We spent hours wallowing and sweating; steaming and meditating until finally we were called for our massages. Sublime. No sooner had I peeled myself from one treatment bed than I was led to another. Facial time.
The next time Hubby and I faced each other our skin shone and radiated, having been sloughed to within an inch of our lives. “I must drink more water”, said Hubby in all earnestness, “My therapist said I had very youthful skin and that’s all I needed to keep it looking young”. Did she now? Mine suggested a very expensive but delectable box of vials full of elixirs to keep ageing at bay. A bottle of Perrier would have been far cheaper.
“Shall we go home then?” Hubby asked. Reluctantly we dragged ourselves away from the utopian bliss that is a day in a luxury spa and headed home. We arrived with a bang. Literally. Our children were waiting for us at Mag’s bonfire party.
The contrast was too much for me. Only hours before I’d been lying on a banquette in tropical heat, wearing little more than a swimsuit and a towel as a turban, now I was in an anorak and a pair of wellies on a boggy lawn with a baked spud in one hand and a chilled glass of wine in another. I lasted an hour.
“Sorry Mags, I can’t cope with the cold. I need my bed”. It took him less than a nano second.
“C’mon then Mrs Band”, said Hubby, whipping the potato from my hand before gripping it, “Excuse us Mags, we have some unfinished business to attend to”.

The truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.

2011-11-23T13:27:00.000-08:00

“I don’t know how you do it?”, said some; “I don’t know how you cope”, said the others. Well, truth be told, it transpired that I could do neither and so, after much soul searching and wringing of hands, my teaching career has come to, for the second time in a few months, a rather abrupt end.
Scores of bulging ring binders now litter the house like little tombstones and I feel inclined to inscribe upon them in my much used highlighter pen, R.I.P ‘Miss’. A library of hugely expensive teaching texts book gathers dust in my bedroom and my computer is a constant reminder of what might have been with its memory almost full with the assignments, resources and homework that I have written, researched and marked.
A debacle at a placement school back in March was undoubtedly the writing on the wall. Entirely at fault, but entirely without intent to injure or hurt, I erroneously wrote a few lines about one of my students. A delightful student who had made me laugh, I repeated what he’d said to the public at large. It was a grave mistake and one that cost me dearly. I was out on my ear. And suspended from my university college forthwith.
The shock was immense. My children were at once anxious, outraged and no doubt, although they spared telling me, embarrassed. My dad was so very, very sad about it. He knows his daughter is no villain and has looked after the hearts and minds of more children than Maria Von Trapp and Mary Poppins combined. He knows where my heart lies and it almost broke his to see me lost and suspended. Suspended it such a perfect term. I liken it to hanging in mid air. A floating sensation that leaves one confused and nauseated. In those first few days, when I suddenly had nowhere to go in the morning and no students to prepare and knowing that I was being discussed by tutors, teachers college lecturers, it was hard not to lose my mind.
Hubby poor soul, hoping that soon I would be in a well remunerated job with career prospects, a rising pay scale and a pension, looked terrified. Assuaged for one brief moment of his pecuniary angst by hoping that his burden of being the main bread winner would be shared. His dreams of one day ‘pottering’ were dashed. He didn’t blame me once. He may have wanted to, but not once did he articulate his inner demons which might have gone along the lines of “What have you done? For God’s sake Alice, what have you done to us?” I will be eternally grateful to him for biting his tongue.
My uncle, a head-teacher in another part of the country drove down to see me. He saw my predicament in a less emotional light than those directly attached to me. He read the notorious words I’d written and scratched his head, before saying “Oh Alice”.
“But it was meant to be funny”, I refrained, “I was quoting such a lovely anecdote. I made a mistake…”.
My friends, each and every one of them, from those I see regularly, to those who now can only communicate remotely via Facebook, remained devoted and loyal, reminded me who I was and kept me going and chivvied me along.
My university, who, after agonising months of uncertainty, finally met me for a disciplinary hearing in June. The ignominy of such a phrase. A disciplinary hearing. Cheats, thieves, liars and bullies get disciplined and now here I was: one of them. I survived it and they allowed me to continue my course, but that I would be ‘at risk’.
I’m sitting here, searching the thesaurus of my brain, but I genuinely cannot find a suitable word to describe how disgusting that little phrase sounds in my ear. At risk. To whom exactly? The most notorious child killers and murderers have been at risk to all of us. Whatever anyone may say, I cannot subscribe to the point of view that, a well meaning if hopelessly misjudged sentence, computes with any of the above.
And so, metaphorically battered and bruised, I returned to my teacher training in September. But my natural ebullience and chutzpah has gone. I feel like Winston Smith. I had committed the crime of committing my thoughts to paper, leaving all those in power to scrutinise me. It was untenable to work under the pressure of such surveillance. No matter how hard I tried, I had a nagging feeling in the back of my mind that my lecturers would never tick all the boxes and pass me. It was an overwhelming ask. I think perhaps they knew that. And to be honest, at the great age of 46, the last thing I need is to hate myself, to think myself a despicable character. I have had to constantly remind myself that I am not. I am good old sort, far from perfect but a good and could have been, a great teacher.
The colleagues, with whom I have worked, especially most recently, have been an excellent bunch of people. I can only thank them for their advice, guidance, inspiration and support and of course to the children, too many to mention for being fabulous by their patience when I faltered and their excellence when my teaching produced from them work which made my peacock feathers splay out and shiver with pride and anticipation of the endless possibilities of what lies ahead for them.
I have taken a job in a supermarket. I start on Monday. Filling shelves will pay the bills, essays will not have to written, maths worked out on a till but the need to share my passion for my literary heroes and my resolve for correct grammar and spelling prevails, ergo, for those who need a little boost of confidence and oh boy, can I empathise with that, I am availing myself for private tuition..

Guests of honour?

2011-11-23T13:25:00.000-08:00

Were she not already there, my mother would have died and gone to heaven.
“Guests of honour! Guests of honour mind you!” I can hear here telling her darts team. I was more than a little surprised myself, it must be said.
“Who will be at the Trafalgar Night dinner?”, I murmured through tightly zipped lips which were concentrating on gripping a needle, lest my internal organs be harpooned by it.
“The usual crowd of mayors and ex-service members. The locals from our town”, replied Hubby equally intent on bulling his dress shoes. I peered though the needle’s eye and pulled a length of black cotton through my lips, hoping for a stiff point to thread the needle with.
After several attempts, the thread went through the needle’s eye, “Ta-da”, I exclaimed jubilantly, “Who’s the guest of honour?”, I added, head bent, hell bent of mending my one and only navy coloured posh frock which had split under recent duress.
“We are”, said Hubby. I stopped sewing.
“What did you say?”, I asked, looking at him with a bemused smile. He was having me on.
“We are the guests of honour, or to be more precise, I am, but they wanted you to tag along”.
I scratched my head quizzically which, under the circumstances, made me yelp, as I was still clutching the needle.
“Are you making a speech then?” I hadn’t seen him writing anything.
“Yes, Alice, I am making a speech”. My heart sank. I thought this was going to be a fun night out away from Hubby’s work, where I could drink to the memory of Nelson, who for once, God bless his soul, had not scuppered any of my birthday plans as all events to commemorate his memory where held either before or after the 21st of October. For once in a long time, I had no beef with the esteemed Admiral and would instead, be eating it.
“Well keep it short then”, was the supportive, wifely advice I gave Hubby.
The venue was within a stone’s throw of our house and yet, because I had my very lovely, very expensive and very high heeled suede court shoes on, I could only take baby steps, much like a Geisha in a tight Kimono.
“Please wait for me”, I called plaintively in Hubby’s wake, “I really can’t go any faster”.
“Why did you wear such ridiculous shoes then?”, he replied, walking back to retrieve me, clearly irritated. Men are such hypocrites. Would he have preferred me to have worn a pair of Birkenstocks then, or a nice flat, comfy pair of wide Van Daals?
Puffing, as he had my elbow in a vice like grip and we were striding uphill, I posed the above question to him.
“Of course not Alice, I hate you in flat shoes. I just always forget to add an extra half hour to any walking that may be necessary… Hello, good evening”.
We’d arrived; it really wasn’t very far at all. A lot of hand shaking went on, and a large glass of wine was thrust in another. Some people were strangers, a couple were old friends and the rest were my community. The people I see on a day to day basis, in the bank, in the library, on the street, in the WI market. I felt very much at home.
Later, more than replete after a hearty dinner, Hubby cleared his throat and got up to speak. Oh, God, I thought, here we go. Apply rictus smile and look on supportively. Well, hush my mouth.
His speech was fantastic. Goose flesh ran up and down my body. I don’t often praise the poor sod, but fair dos. The speech was rousing and heartfelt; it was stirring and patriotic; it was passionate and persuasive. You could have heard a pin drop. Hubby’d made Nelson, the Royal Navy, me and his community proud. As he lifted his glass in toast to the Immortal Memory, I swear I had to use every fibre of my body not to stand up and whoop and cheer.
The applause went on for quite a while. Our old friends looked on at us at the top table with tears running down their faces, mouthing “Your mother would have been so proud”. It was a very emotional moment. To be among our community like this was incomparable with any other naval do we have been to before. I felt truly honoured.
More was to follow. Hubby was presented with a fine, engraved pewter tankard and then, leaving me rather lost for words, I was presented with a fabulous wicker basket of flowers. Me? I felt like Alice, Duchess of Cornwall. I’ll say that again as it has a certain je ne c’est quois –Alice, Duchess of Cornwall.
With the formalities over, we could relax and enjoy what was left of a wonderful evening. Later we teetered back the way we’d come. I hung onto Hubby’s uniformed arm.
“That was an amazing speech”, I said to him, standing on my sore tippy toes to kiss him, “I wanted to sign up immediately and whup the Frenchies’ butts”.
“Darling, I appreciate your loyal support but the Battle of Trafalgar was over two hundred years ago. You may find the French are our allies these days”. And there’s me thinking he was a rugby fan.
Two days later, I drove onto the Torpoint Ferry. The ferryman beeped my tag.
“Insufficient funds”, he said. Had he looked at my bank account recently?
I rummaged through my purse. It didn’t contain so much as a ten pence piece. Dammit. I apologised profusely but was quite unprepared for the ‘violation’ ticket they thrust through the window at me.
Good job I’d already been given my basket of flowers. I doubt a ferry felon would have been bestowed with such an honour.

Ship-Shape and well, what is Bristol Fashion?

2011-11-23T13:22:00.000-08:00

From the furious screaming, hissing, spittle and fur that resounded from the landing, I thought the cats were having a vicious fight to the end. I ran upstairs two at a time to boot one of them away only to find my youngest daughters in the middle of a pugilistic brawl.
Tearing them apart, I demanded to know what on earth was going on.
“I hate her; she’s really mean”, squawked the youngest.
“You started it”, spat the 9 year old.
“No, you started it”, screamed the 7 year old, attempting to free my grasp and launch herself upon her sister once and for all.
“Well everybody knows how to add two to a number. You’ve just got special needs”. There was a sharp intake of breath and if I thought for one minute that the youngest one was going to capitulate and cling to me in a sobbing, self-pitying heap, I was very much mistaken. Instead she pulled herself up to her full four foot four and delivered her coup de grace, “I hate your personality”, she said icily, before adding, “Oh, wait, you haven’t got one”.
Before blood was let, I plonked one in front of the t.v and the other with a box of Barbies. It was before nine on Sunday morning and I had a houseful of young guests, all of whom had ‘crashed’ after our Lost Boy’s 18th birthday party. By all accounts no one had died of alcoholic poisoning and there was only one vomiting victim, who mercifully, had made it to the lav. In just over an hour, having fed the various teenagers, hosted family and dressed to the nines, I had to be present and correct at a Freedom of the Town parade.
I put in another load of washing, emptied the tumble drier, fed the dog, turned the bacon under the grill, buttered some baps, boiled the kettle and laid the table. Hubby had already gone to work for one final debrief, so he wasn’t available for scullery maid chores. I waited for the bacon to crisp, laid the rashers in the baps, squirted ketchup, poured boiling water into a teapot, carried the tray in to the dining room and then bellowed for all to ‘come and get it’.
The warring daughters had now forgotten all vows of enmity and were dressing up as St Trinian’s girls. The teenagers emerged from various bedrooms, looking undeniably worse for wear. The Lost Boy’s family ding-donged the bell and were shown in, made welcome and given tea and breakfast and that is where I left them. It was finally 10am, that hour when Sunday starts - the shops are finally unlocked. I needed nude coloured tights and lunch for all my guests.
My usual Sunday morning routine is to groan my way through a particularly gruelling keep-fit class. Today, I had been excused. My fellow keep-fitters, on the way to class, were in line outside the supermarket’s ATM presumably getting cash to pay for the agony. They were shocked to find me there.
“I thought you had a parade this morning?” asked one.
“I do, I do”, I said, undeniably in a bit of a flap.
“What are you doing here then?” asked another. They were all beginning to snigger. I felt a little uncomfortable.
“I need tights”, I explained, even though I have so very often been advised to, ‘never apologise, never explain’, “To go with my outfit”.
“What are you like?”, said the first again.
“You are so disorganised!”, laughed the other. Oh, am I? Really? I could have reeled off the list of jobs that I’d already achieved this morning, but at best that would just have seemed peevish, besides I didn’t have time. I still had to hare around Sainsbury’s, fill a basket, drive home, empty the shopping bags, apply my makeup and the ruddy tights and slip on a posh frock. A ritual that I have performed a thousand times. Suddenly, as I pinned on a ‘sweetheart brooch’ to my jacket, it dawned on me that this Freedom of the Town parade would be my last.
I reiterated my sentiments to Hubby an hour later, after he and the Royal Marine Band had led the parade of sailors through our town, for one final time.
“Bloody hell Alice”, he said, choking on the Mayor’s dry sherry, “You sound as though we are about to pop our clogs”.
“Metaphorically speaking we are”, I replied. The mayor came to shake my hand.
Later, over a splendid lunch, Hubby asked me what I’d meant by metaphorically speaking.
“It’s a comparison between two things, saying one thing is the other”.
“For God’s sake Alice I know that. But figuratively speaking, what did you mean’?”
“Our days of doing this sort of thing” and I waved at the company gathered, “Are numbered aren’t they? You’ll soon be in another appointment and then crash, bang, wallop, you’ll be on your terminal leave. Even that expression has more than a ring of mortality to it. All this” and I waved again, “will soon be a distant memory”.
“For crying out loud Alice”, Hubby replied, downing another sherry.
“It’s like the countdown clock to the Olympics; my days as a navy wife are counting down too”, I said.
“It’s fair to say being married to you has been quite an event. I’m happy to stand on a podium to receive a medal”.
An elderly lady sitting next to Hubby, intervened, “Once a navy wife, always a navy wife. It’s a way of life isn’t it? Ship shape and Bristol fashion. It’s taught me order and discipline. Loyalty, self-reliance and organisation. Surely you agree?”
“You’re asking Alice?”, guffawed Hubby, “She didn’t have tights to wear an hour ago”. I kicked him under the table.
“But that’s quite a skill” he added hurriedly, “to appear outwardly hapless when in essence you are methodical maestro”. And don’t you forget it shipmate.

All At Sea

2011-11-23T13:09:00.000-08:00

I clicked the red, off button on my mobile phone and sat down. Poor bugger. Hubby walked in from the kitchen.
“Who was that?”, he mumbled, a chocolate Hob-Nob protruding from his mouth.
“Sue. Her husband’s ship has been turned around. She doesn’t even know where he is in the world or when the hell he’ll come back. It’s just open ended. She’s just had a two minute call from him. She’s really upset”.
“Life in a blue suit”, added Hubby, helpfully.
“I’m going to see her; the girls’ school uniform needs pressing and our Lost Boy needs to change his sheets and generally muck out his bedroom. At least it was a bedroom, I haven’t seen any evidence of a bed for weeks”.
“But I thought we were going to watch Strictly and X-Factor and Downton together?”, replied Hubby, overtly crestfallen for a strapping, heterosexual man.
“For heaven’s sake, Sky+ it and I’ll watch them with you tomorrow night”.
“We won’t have time then, you’ll be busy, I’ll be busy. It just won’t happen”.
“Well then, you have two alternatives, either you put on James Bond and get your son to watch tv with you, or, you ask any one of your three daughters if they’d like a girly tv fest on the sofa with their big, butch dad. ”
“I’m not watching that rubbish”, said our teenage daughter, “Honestly, I just don’t understand how people can watch such crass, cruel television”.
I am delighted that this girl is very much her own woman, I’m proud of her stellar achievements and thrilled that she stands out from the crowd and doesn’t blithely follow fashion magazines and celebrity gossip, but there are times when it wouldn’t be as wearing if she could just enjoy a little popular culture, which is by dint of its name, popular.
“What are you going to do this evening instead then?”
“I’m writing an essay on quantum mechanics”.
“Come again?”, I asked, scratching my head, “What subject is that for?”
“You’re not doing Mechanics A level are you?” asked Hubby, as baffled as me.
“God, you two are so thick”, she said emphatically before flouncing in the direction of whence she came. Hubby and I looked at each other and shrugged.
“As I was saying”, I said, “I’m popping out to see Sue, lend a shoulder to cry on, that sort of thing. Any wine in the rack?”
Two hours later and I was exhausted, as was a mansize box of Kleenex tissues.
“It’s the not knowing that I can’t cope with Alice”, a refrain that she had sniffed, repeatedly.
“I know, I know”, I replied soothingly, patting her knee.
“I mean, will he be home for Christmas? Can I book a winter holiday? Can I get pregnant? We were considering another baby, Alice. Think of all the eggs I’ve wasted.” Her tears started anew. My patting on her knee became more rhythmical.
“I’m knocking on”, she added, gesturing at her womb, “I only have so many eggs left”. It was like comforting a depressed Easter Rabbit.
“There, there”, I soothed, my free hand shaking an empty wine bottle as though it were lying that there wasn’t so much as a dreg left. Sandy bottoms as Hubby would say.
“He’s been away for months already. He’s missed everything, GCSEs, camping in Dorset, a benign lump, his parents Golden wedding anniversary. I can’t bear it any longer”.
“I’d like to say, just be strong a little while more,” I advised, “but it’s futile. Our husbands didn’t marry Sherman tanks, they married women; soft, squidgy women with bosoms and feelings and the romantic idea that marriage was about two people sharing a life, a home and family. It’s no wonder then that when we are separated for long periods, there are milestones that they miss and then, we miss them ”.
“He couldn’t cope on his own”, snivelled Sue, “I went to Center Parcs before he went with some friends and there was a message on the tannoy system for me to call home. I thought someone had died”.
“Had they?”, I asked
“No, one of the kids had to go to a birthday party and he couldn’t remember where it was or what I’d done with the present”. We laughed. A second later and her twin girls walked through the front door.
“Oh no, mum”, they said simultaneously, rushing to her side, “What on earth has happened?”
Sue explained that their father wouldn’t be home for another few months. I was expecting them to be stricken and, as we were out of tissues, to have to employ a roll of toilet paper to mop up the tears. I was much mistaken.
“Hey mum, that means we can watch all the chick flicks we want!”, said Anna.
“And Strictly all the way until the Christmas show”, added Ava. Their father is an Alpha male and unlike Hubby, not in tune with his feminine side, he is thus very unlikely to condone viewing marathon episodes of sequins and spangles on a Saturday and a Sunday night.
“Besides”, said Anna, more gravely, as her sister held her hand, “He won’t be here to rant and rave. Because…”, there was a pregnant pause. “I think you should know. I’ve had a tattoo”
“I’d better leave”, I said, getting up, remembering my own breakdown when my son disclosed his.
And this is where Sue surprised me. She slowly and very dignifiedly, stood up. And, undid the buttons on her blouse.
“Beat you to it love”, said Sue, revealing an ample bosom decorated with a small anchor and HMS Love entwined on it, “Got it done on the way back from Center Parcs. I was trolleyed”.
The shoe was on the other foot. Tears and tantrums, the ‘how could yous?’, the ‘but you are old!’ even, ‘mum you slapper’. This was a milestone their father would have been delighted to miss.

Empty Nest.

2011-10-06T12:17:00.000-07:00

It’s as though the Pied Piper has been and, having done with the rats and the children, has now returned for the eighteen year olds. All around me are weeping mothers, sitting on empty beds, in tidy rooms, posters hanging on the walls of deserted bedrooms. Fathers, attempting a stiff upper lip, are at a loss with whom to watch Match of the Day with, stay up late with and talk man stuff with. Siblings, initially ecstatic at having the run of the house to themselves, a full biscuit barrel and a monopoly on the tv remote controls are slowly realising that being the one and only is not all it’s cracked up to be. The long for undivided attention of their parents, has in fact turned into a nightmare because, devoid of their elder sibling, the parents’ attention is undiluted, resulting in what seems like twenty four hour surveillance and an unhealthy interest into their very private, social lives.
I mustn’t complain too much, my Lost Boy was after all only borrowed for a year, but nevertheless the absence of his energy in this house is palpable. His room is eerie, on the one hand it’s as if no-one has ever been there and yet, when you look closer and find an overflowing waste-paper basket, a half full can of deodorant and a guitar propped against the wall, you are reminded that only a week ago this room was loud, messy, colourful, vibrant and a love nest for him and his lovely girlfriend, also gone. He never really belonged to me and so I am not allowed, apart from the odd sigh and a food parcel sent to Belfast University, to mourn his loss.
The same cannot be said for my friends. For some, this is their first experience of an empty nest; their chicks up until now having never flown away, yet, within weeks of receiving their exam results, the chicks have not only flown, but soared, taking their feather duvets with them. Mothers and fathers up and down the land have been seen in various supermarkets buying ‘value’ toasters, kettles and microwaves as well as bedding, towels and lots and lots of food. They have driven to universities, brave and stoic and the once rowdy teenager in the back of the car is uncharacteristically subdued as the destination and the severance from parental binds becomes ever more inevitable.
I have had many emotional telephone conversations this week with mothers who literally do not know what to do with themselves. For the last 18 years they have been defined by the fact that they have had a child to look after and be home for, similarly a child who must be remembered about and fed and watered and occasionally, nag. It was at times a bind and a bore and now all of a sudden, there is no-one to rush home for, no-one to make dinner for and no-one’s mess to complain about. It is as though they have been made redundant and, all the times in the past when they wished to come home later from a party, or go away for a weekend on a whim they can now do whenever they like. But it isn’t illicit anymore and therefore not as much fun.
Apparently, the teenagers themselves from the odd letter that I’ve received, haven’t all sprung from the family car without so much as a by your leave either. For many of them, they have been left in their rooms as bewildered as any 11 year old boarder, their pillow under one arm, their laptop under another, congregating in the corridor and trying hard to make as many new friends as they can, exactly like that day their mums left them in the playground of infant school. Whereas in infant school a packet of sweets to share might have helped them stand out from the crowd, at university the sweets have been replaced by rapacious drinking and many students are now hoping to survive Fresher’s Week without suffering the horrors of alcoholic poisoning. God knows what sort of friendships are forged in these first inebriated, early days away from home, but from what I’m told, they are life-lasting.
I asked my son, who has steadfastly refused any idea of higher education whatsoever, if he feels jealous of his friends for spreading their wings and jumping the family nest.
“Nah ma” is as profound as the conversation got, before he kissed me on the forehead and helped himself to three Mr Kipling mince pies. I wonder what it is that makes him want to stay. It’s a chaotic household, you have to shout the loudest to get the most attention, myself included. For him, dinner is an ad-hoc affair due to his shifts and band practises, so you couldn’t really call it cupboard love.
“Of course you could Alice”, ripostes Hubby, “Just because you don’t dish it up to him on a plate night after night, doesn’t mean that he doesn’t have full access to the contents of the freezer, cupboards, bread-bin and fridge, wherein lies, rather conveniently, my beer”.
“Do you think he’ll be here forever then?” I asked nervously.
“Probably. Unless some woman is daft enough to take him on as a challenge, because let’s be honest Alice, he won’t be able to look after himself”.
“What on earth do you mean?”, I replied defensively, “I bought him a Panini maker and he can make”, I thought hard, “chicken fajitas! I’d hate him to be unhappy and run away”.
“Run away?” laughed Hubby, “He can’t even run a bath”. Ah, yes, the infamous bath that I’d asked him to run for me; the one that had been running for fifteen minutes. With no plug.
“But you never said to put the plug in”, had been his defence. University, my dear boy, would have been more than just an academic education.

Duty.

2011-09-25T09:36:00.000-07:00

It is a truth universally acknowledged that I am completely and utterly rubbish at maths. The innumerate gene has, through great luck, bypassed my first three children. Our son and daughter both got excellent GCSE results in the subject and the nine year old seems to ‘get it’ and is slowly and surely mastering her times tables – but my poor darling little Red-Head is as mystified by mathematics as her mother.
Just the other night, as I was patiently trying to show her how to do taking away on her fingers, she explained how she felt.
“My head feels like a waterfall inside Mummy”, she said, rubbing at her temples.
“How so darling?”, I asked her.
“Well you know how the water in a waterfall falls down?”, she continued.
“Yes?”
“And it’s like the water is falling off?”
“Yes?”
“Well, my inside my head feels like that. Like the information is falling out of my head like a waterfall and I can’t remember anything”. Luckily I was squeezing her so tightly that she didn’t see my tears fall into her hair. I had to pull myself together.
“That was beautifully explained sweetheart”, I said, wiping my nose on my sleeve, “In fact few people could be that creative when trying to describe how they are feeling. Perhaps you will be a writer and write wonderful stories?”
After some consideration she seemed happy enough with this idea and we returned to taking six grammes away from ten grammes. It took a while. I feel so sorry for her. No-one in the world can understand her bewilderment as much as me. All those bloody lessons and extra lessons and tutors that I’ve had. All of them to no avail, all of them resulting in making me feel thoroughly stupid, my self esteem plummeting through the floor. Well this is the 21st Century. She needn’t tolerate as I did, being kept in at play time because she is ‘slow’. She needn’t suffer the ignominy as I did, of seeing her friends go to art whilst she is left with, God bless them, the smelly kids and even more sums to do until we got it right. We never did. Nope, if she carries on in this vein I shall have her assessed and if she is, dyslexic and dyscalculic then everyone shall know and she will get all the support she needs. Hell, if The Fonz can receive an award from the Queen for raising awareness of these special educational needs then his hard work may as well go towards making her life mathematically speaking, a little sweeter. Anyway, no sooner had we done sums, then spellings then reading, I very quickly had to throw off the mantle of mother to adopt the role of Commanders wife. These two posts cannot be done simultaneously for fear of shaking hands with my children and wiping the gravy of the face of a Naval officer. I daren’t risk it. So, ensuring all children were fed and watered, I ran upstairs to chuck on my trademark look of pearls, posh frock and pashmina.
Hubby and I had been invited to Truro for HM Lord Lieutenant of Cornwall’s Annual awards ceremony. We got there by the skin of our teeth and took our seats, panting. Now my back, has, much like mathematics, been the bane of my life. At any given time, on a scale of 1-10 of pain, it is an 8. I look like a wizened old woman much of the time, especially getting my knickers on in the morning, getting out of the car and up from a chair. I have seen all manner of doctors, chiropractors, osteopaths, physiotherapists and masseurs. Apart from having to be peeled from the ceiling at the end of my treatment, little else occurs and my back continues to hurt. Very much indeed.
As I sat there then, shifting my bottom from one cheek to the other and rubbing the small of my back and stretching my legs out in front of me and generally fidgeting to the point that at the same time the woman on one side of me tutted and Hubby hissed, “Keep still”, as one might to a child during a long sermon.
Don’t get me wrong, the ceremony was inspirational. It showcased the very best of our reservists and cadets from the South West; the young people’s achievements bringing a lump to the throat due to their terrific hard work and commitment they show both their detachment and community.
What struck me though and why I mention my back was the image of Lady Mary, who has for the last 17 years been Her Majesty’s Lord Lieutenant for Cornwall, but who will be retiring next week. She, I sincerely hope wouldn’t mind my saying, is an indomitable figure. Tall, strong and stately. As she stood up to present the awards, a gentleman offered her a chair on the dais. One look from her made it immediately obvious that she had no truck with a chair whatsoever and stood resolute for over an hour handing out awards and shaking hands. I looked on in wonder.
Not only would I have needed a chair, but I would also have needed someone to help me out of it. On the journey home I had to recline my seat and, as I lay there looking up at the Cornish Night sky, I mulled.
“Penny for your thoughts?” said Hubby, yawning. He rarely demands conversation. It must have been a ploy. Not to fall asleep and crash.
“I was just wondering how my life would have turned out had I been more supple and better at maths”.
“That’s a mad combination of thoughts Alice”, he replied, the indicator was flashing, we were almost home, “Is there that much call for a numerate gymnast?”
“The sad thing is”, I replied as we pulled into our road, “Is that it’s too late to find out”.

Regal Regale.

2011-09-25T09:35:00.001-07:00

“Aren’t you going to get up with me then?”, I asked Hubby last Saturday as the alarm on my mobile phone went off at 5.20am. There was a text.
“Mags’s hubby has made her a cuppa”, I read.
He mumbled “traitor” from beneath the duvet.
“I’ll take that as a no then”, I answered tip-toeing as quietly as possible around our bedroom whilst looking for my underwear. I’d laid everything out the night before, but couldn’t for the life of me now locate my bra. I lifted various other garments off the ottoman at the foot of our bed and felt beneath them for the tell tale silkiness of my M&S 36D and shrieked in disgust as my hand felt something cold and yucky.
“Aargh, what the hell?”, I wailed and ran over to the light switch. As my eyes adjusted to the light I realised that I’d put my hand through a mound of cold, cat sick.
“Oh dear God”, I shivered, “That is bloody revolting, how long has it been there?”
Hubby was by now most aggrieved that the light was on and that his wife was making far too much noise this early in the morning and that, now he was awake, he’d have to go to the loo.
“Flaming Nora Alice, how many times have I managed perfectly well to go to work in the pitch dark and never disturb you?”, he said pulling my dressing around him.
“You can’t go to the loo yet”, I said barging in front of him, “I have cat sick on my hand, I’ve got to wash it off”.
“Can’t we do both simultaneously? Kill two birds with one stone”, he offered.
“Eww. No thanks, besides the way I feel I’d rather kill two cats with one stone”. I patiently waited on the landing as he relieved himself, my hand at arm’s length as though I had some ticking bomb in it. Infernal cats.
The doorbell rang.
“That’ll be Mags then?”, said Hubby as he exited the bathroom yawning, “Is there any more noise you can muster between you? You may as well put the radio on”.
“There’s no need to be sarcastic is there.”
“Hello mummy”, said the Red-Head, emerging from her bedroom and rubbing her eyes, “Why have you got sick on your hand?”. The doorbell rang again.
“Well?”, I said to Hubby, “You’re going to have to answer it, I can’t stand it any longer, I’ve got to wash my hands”. Looking utterly beleaguered at not only having been woken up before dawn but now having the added encumbrance of going down and back up the stairs and then persuading the Red-Head back to sleep, Hubby sighed very heavily indeed.
The Red-Head sat on the loo as I scrubbed away at my hands.
“Will the queen be at her Palace mummy?”, she asked.
“No darling, she’s at Balmoral”.
“What’s that?”
I dried my hands. From downstairs Mags’s excited chatter could be heard. Hubby was going to be less than thrilled.
“It’s a castle sweetie, where she has her summer holidays”.
“It’s a bit greedy of the queen to have lots of palaces and castles isn’t it? Why can’t she have a holiday in a caravan?”
“I don’t suppose Queens go in for caravanning that much”, I replied lifting her up and carrying her into our bed.
“Why not? She’s got a Range Rover. It could easily pull a caravan”. The image of HRH Queen Elizabeth II and The Duke of Edinburgh towing a six berth Bailey up to the Highlands made me laugh.
“Or”, added the Red-Head, seriously contemplating alternative holiday destinations for our monarch, “what about Center Parcs? The whole family could go then; all the grandchildren and the corgis. There would be plenty for everyone to do. Nobody would be bored. In fact they could go horse-riding like we did. They like horses don’t they, the Royal Family?”
A further image of Zara Phillips, Olympic horse jumping hopeful and dear nonagenarian Philip, fellow champion equestrian embarking on a gentle pony trek, being led by a rope by a teenage girl around the country lanes of Wiltshire made me laugh even harder.
“Ah but which corgi would they chose?”, I said, wiping my eyes as I tucked her in, “There is only one dog allowed per lodge”. I left her cuddled up considering this canine conundrum.
I passed Hubby on the stairs.
“She’s in our bed”, I explained kissing him, “Will you pick us up from the train station later?” Hubby nodded.
“Please just go now”.
For once, the railway journey was entirely without incident, it even pulled into Paddington early. Mags and I had a coffee in Fortnum and Mason’s and then strolled across the park to Buckingham Palace.
“Do you think we should have worn a hat?”, I asked Mags as we approached the Palace.
“Alice, this isn’t a bloody garden party we’re going to; think of it as a super-enhanced National Trust Property”.
Not bleedin’ likely. Not with the Faberge exhibition, the priceless private art collection and Kate’s wedding dress, shoes and cake, well, Cotehele it ain’t. We walked around gawping like kids in a sweet shop and like every kid on a school trip, we had the best time in the gift shop. Where Mags plans to use her gold plated teaspoons with carved, royal dwellings at the end of the handle, God alone knows. At least my God Save the Queen tea towel is practical.
Hubby met two weary women off the 22.41 train. His delight that we weren’t laden with shopping bags and thus hadn’t spent any money was palpable.
“No shopping then girls?”, he asked brightly.
“We didn’t have time” said Mags, “Too much to see”.
“I only bought this”, I said and showed him the tea-towel.
“Oh God Save the Queen indeed”, cried Hubby, as though praying, “God Save the Queen”.

Poor at the Palace.

2011-09-25T09:32:00.000-07:00

Well, I have polished the chrome on my barista coffee machine for the last time this season, the café will soon follow suit and go into some sort of caffeine hibernation; school uniform is in the process of being labelled, there is a great preponderance of colourful stationery, pencils, rubbers and fluffy pencil cases adorning the dining table; plimsolls have been Sharpied; hair has been cut and the nights are drawing in. All this can only mean one thing - the summer hols are over for another year.
I feel the most sorry for Hubby. He’s only just started to relax, his face has finally lost that pinched, scrunched up look and he remains resolutely under the duvet in the morning instead of jumping out of bed expecting ‘reveille’ to sound at any second. ‘Rounds’ have finally been dispensed with and he is now accustomed to living amongst many, many messy young people without swearing. As often. He opens a bottle of wine, sometimes as early as 5.50 and has taken to sitting outside in the garden, a rug over his knees, a wine glass to hand, a book in the other, a fire in his fire pit.
“What the hell do you mean I’ve ‘taken to sitting in the garden with a rug and wine?’”
He must have overheard me telling Mags. “I did it once Alice. Once when the flipping kids allowed me five minutes peace……in fact they didn’t even do that. They weren’t even here if I remember correctly, they were on a sleepover! Besides the image of me in the garden with rug, wine, book and fire makes me sound decrepit”.
Mags winked at me.
“Hey! I saw that”.
“Well you are getting on a bit”, Mags teased him, “Forget wine it’ll be cocoa soon”.
The rest of the evening past in jovial banter and as I served up a chilli con carne and sparkling champagne, or in this case, cheap Cava, Mags handed me a large envelope.
“What’s this?”, I asked, holding the envelope between my teeth as I sprinkled grated cheese onto the chilli.
“It’s a present”, she answered. I mumbled something incomprehensible, dribbling onto the envelope as I did so and carried three plates into our dining room. Pushing the fluffy pencil cases further up the table to make way for dinner, I took a big slurp and removed the envelope from my teeth.
“Open it now”, she implored. I looked at Hubby’s face and it was like looking into the face of a drooling Labrador.
“Let’s eat first ok?” I asked apologetically. She shrugged and picked up a fork. The conversation soon turned, once Hubby had steamed through three quarters of his chilli, to the Red-Head’s birthday treat.
“Build-a-Bear my arse”, said Hubby in his inimitable way, “Build-the-Buggers-a-Bloody-Fortune more like”.
“Why, what happened?” asked Mags. It has to be pointed out at this point that Hubby did not accompany our two youngest daughters and our niece to Build-a-Bear, rather he dropped us off outside and went ‘to park’, as though he were doing me a huge favour.
“It cost ninety quid, that’s what happened”, replied Hubby. It was a huge amount of money and I must admit that when the member of staff had put the items through the till and wished my daughter a ‘beary nice birthday”, that even I blanched at the total.
I stood outside waiting for Hubby, whilst three little girls hopped deliriously up and down with their Build-a-Bear boxes and looked through the receipt to see if there had been a mistake. No such luck.
“He only found out how much it cost after I’d confessed on Facebook.” Hubby grimaced.
“Why didn’t you tell him then and there Alice?”
“Because”, I said pointedly, “we still had lunch and the movie Mr Poppa’s Penguins to pay for and I didn’t want to ruin the birthday girl’s day”.
I didn’t bother to tell her that the next day Hubby had marched me down to our bank, demanded a meeting with the bank manager where I had to endure the most humiliating hour where the bank manager and Hubby tooth-combed my account. Most of it was pretty kosher.
“Do you want to cancel these direct debits Alice?” asked the bank manager kindly.
“What the hell are they for?” asked Hubby peering over my shoulder at the computer screen.
“My charity contributions”, I said quietly.
“Huh?” Hubby exhaled. The bank manager looked a little discomfited, after all this was impartial financial advice she was offering, not Relate relationship counselling.
“I pay a monthly direct debit to some very worthy causes if you must know”.
“I would like to know actually”. In for a penny in for a pound.
“Well, there’s the NSPCC, Macmillan Nurses, The British Heart Foundation, Greenpeace and Amnesty International”. Hubby twirled in his chair.
“God almighty Alice”, he roared.
“Okay, okay, I’ll cancel a couple”.
“You will cancel them all”.
“No way, that is very bad karma”. In the end I hung onto the Macmillan Nurses. Just in case. The others, when I am in serious employment, will once again benefit from my patronage.
I put my fork down.
“Yipee”, said Mags, “Now open your envelope”. I wiped my fork on a square of kitchen paper and tore it along the envelope and removed from it a shiny, glossy brochure .
“Can you tell what it is yet?”
“You sound like Rolf Harris”. I turned the brochure over. A gold crown was emblazoned upon its front cover.
“It’s an advance souvenir programme”, explained Mags, “We are going to London to see ‘the dress’”
“You’re kidding?”
“No! We go on Saturday. I’ve bought the tickets!” For a card carrying lefty, she was very animated.
“But Mags, I’ve always had you as flag waving Trotskyist?”. Well she’d been to Greenham Common in her youth and fancied Billy Bragg.
“Sssh. I’m putting it down to my hormones".

Success.

2011-09-25T09:31:00.000-07:00

I’ve been vindicated. At last, after all these years of selfless mothering, the worry, the nagging, the curfews and the tantrums – mine not theirs. The insistence that the 16 year old was to only read books with any literary merit; the lofty disapproval of the viewing of chavvy t.v programmes, the expensive theatre trips, the traipsing around museums when I’d have far preferred the shops. It all paid off. It was a good investment. Her GCSE results were outstanding. So outstanding in fact that the press wanted to take ‘one of those pictures’ of her. The one where grinning girls jump into the air, holding their stellar results aloft.
I did in fact, tap the press photographer on the shoulder and say, “Oi, take one of me. Us mothers should be recognised for our children’s success and not just given a hard time when they riot”. I was serious. Unless he has teenagers himself then he has no idea what these last 18 years have been like. Most of my friends are now breathing a well deserved sigh of relief and patting themselves on the back. Their eldest are off to university, the youngest having passed GSCEs and so the future looks bright. They are off the hook. They can at last take up golf or watercolour lessons, or darts.
As I stood in my daughter’s school hall as she read her results and beamed, I wept. Not only because I was so very proud of her, but because I still have to live through this again. Twice. And not only the GSCEs but the journey there too. The 11+ coaching, the 11+ mock, the 11+ itself, the results, the studying thereafter, further GCSEs etc, etc. Hubby is 50 and his son and he can still enjoy shared enthusiasms: music, football, beer. Normal young man, middle aged dad stuff.
When the youngest receives her A levels though, her father will be an OAP and her brother in his 30s. What were we thinking? Will we still have the energy to enforce the sanctions that were imposed on their elder siblings or will we, exhausted by our previous efforts, give up the ghost and allow our youngest, second set of children a more lax childhood? I fear the latter. Already the youngest are a lot more lippy than either of the previous two. They have a precocious attitude which makes me wince and they whole-heartedly believe that models and pop-stars are to be revered. Books are used to pose with, high heels to impress. Hello! Magazine is the new Michael Morpurgo and even Harry Potter is a film star; a celebrity and not a school boy wizard who lives in a thick book and thus one’s imagination.
I despair for the next generation. My eldest two, looking back on it, enjoyed the last of the age of innocence. Admittedly they rarely went out to play on their bikes and almost never got dirty, neither did they spend incalculable hours watching trash TV and looking up to people who are the living incarnation of Ken and Barbie. They like to Facebook regularly enough so that they are not social pariahs, but the 16 year old is just as likely to be creating something on Photoshop or writing a story, whereas her elder brother is most often found, if he is home at all, in his room either writing lyrics or organising a gig for his band. Their imagination has already been fired. Me and Hubby must have had something to do with that surely? Just as we have as much to do with two younger children, who, although quite active, have yet to demonstrate any lingering interest in a novel or gold standard BBC programme which is why they think that Daniel Radcliffe genuinely is Harry Potter and that Britain’s Next Top Model is as fascinating as anything that David Attenborough had to say. So, as much as I can feel a certain vindication for my eldest children’s academic accomplishments, must I not equally share the ignominy of my youngest’ liking nothing better than dressing up as baby sluts and regarding academe with scorn and derision, the realm of geeks and nerds?
How do I put the brakes on this mind-set? They have excellent role models in their sister and her equally high achieving friends, who are as beautiful as they are brainy; the two lost boys are absolutely no trouble whatsoever and their brother, whilst hardly flying the flag for an university education, is enviably dedicated and loyal to his band and their music.
I can only deduce therefore that their rather defiant attitude is the fault of their mother and father, who having been parents for so long are knackered with the whole process and, instead of reading hours of endless bedtime stories and trying to inspire their young minds are just as likely to go sleep before them.
Watching them cavort around the sitting room to some god awful pop-music, dressed in wholly inappropriate apparel, I saw Hubby’s face twitch nervously. I read his mind.
“You know that empty nest syndrome? The one where people learn golf and painting and go on cruises and such like?”
His eyes had that far way look of an unattainable fantasy.
“Well, it’s also when couples start to have affairs, because their raison d’etre, i.e their kids, are no longer there to keep them together”. Hubby considered this analysis for a moment.
“That would be too cruel to bear Alice; the idea of putting up with this… this shenanigans” and he gestured at the posturing progenies, “only for you to bugger off with the milkman the minute I get my bus pass”.
I squeezed his hand reassuringly, “I’ll be past my sell by date by then as well love” and we drank our wine together, contended in our entrapment.

Milestone.

2011-09-25T09:29:00.000-07:00

A few weeks ago, Hubby showed a smattering of VIPs around his place of work. I was allowed to tag along, “As long as you behave yourself Alice. No wisecracks, no flirting, no wandering off”.
“But you always forget about me”, I pouted.
“What the hell are you talking about now?”
“Whenever we go to one of your dos, you just abandon me to talk to some Captain Bligh or other; I’m left to peer miserably into the bottom of my G&T”.
“Well, as this event is during the day there won’t be any G&Ts for you to have to peer miserably into”.
“Usher me then”.
“Huh?”
“I’ve watched other Officers and whenever they are about to embark on a walkabout with their wives they always put a gentle yet guiding arm almost imperceptibly behind their wives backs as if to say, ‘This way love’”. Hubby looked utterly bewildered.
“So imperceptible that I’ve never seen it”.
“Wills does it with Kate all the time as does Obama with Michelle as does David with Samantha or David with Victoria for that matter”. Hubby scratched his head. I helped him out.
“All I’m trying to say is that when we go for this walkabout and are about to move on, don’t stride off down some corridor with the VIPs or pop into another room with them without your hand being on the small of my back ok?”
“Ok”.
Famous last words. We were barely off the mini bus before Hubby set about proudly showing off his department. Now I, who in the entirety of Hubby’s naval career has only really been to ‘dos’ that require a semblance of formality, was at a loss as what to wear. Hubby was already at work when I pitched up and, when I’d phoned him was unavailable for comment, which meant that when I eventually stepped off the mini-bus in kitten-heeled sling backs and a smart skirt and blazer, I was already impeding his tour. He scowled impatiently at me.
‘It’s alright for you’, I shouted silently, ‘You have an uniform to wear’. The other wives, appropriately sartorially briefed, hopped off the bus in their smart casual slacks and Clarks sandals. I click-clacked behind them, desperately trying to keep up.
The terrain couldn’t have been worse for kitten heels. As Hubby strode onto the playing fields to introduce the VIPs to some young, active, sport playing sailors, paces behind him I’d actually got stuck in the grass and, whilst my shoes stayed sunk into the turf I kept on going and performed what can only be described as a forward roll. I staggered up and gathered myself together with as much panache as is at all possible when around 50 young sailors, your Husband and his VIP party have been privy to your gusset. Hubby glared at me. I extricated my shoes from the grass, slipped them on and hurried over to him on my tippy-toes.
We were given a demonstration of teams running very fast around an obstacle course and whilst carrying a very heavy log. Practise for when called to do so when on active duty. The log presumably would be an injured comrade.
I’d seen this before somewhere and racked my brains as to where.
“Blue Peter!”, I suddenly hollered excitedly, “That’s where I’ve seen this before”.
“Oh yes”, said another wife and then whispered conspiratorially, “Gethin Jones. I would”.
The demonstration over we walked quickly back to the minibus. This time I hung on to Hubby’s arm. Our next stop was a state of the art firing school. Yet again I’d click-clacked down a corridor attempting to keep up with the others. An uniformed chap mercifully waited to show me in. It was a state of the art room. A chilling reminder of what our men and women are expertly trained to do. We were given a demonstration in shooting the enemy. It was like being in a 3D cinema experience only this time you were surrounded by baddies and not Pixar animations.
“Ma’am”, said a chap handing me a gun, “Would you like to try?”
Bloody hell. Another ignominious example of how Alice Band could make a tit of herself.
“Well, I…”
“Come on Alice”, said the Gethin Jones fan. Once again I removed my shoes and lay flat on my tummy, although this time it was a little less accidental. The gun was indescribably heavy. My heart was in my mouth. It was pitch dark. God alone knows where our troops find the endurance, tenacity and sheer courage to do this for real. Suddenly from out of nowhere, the enemy emerged. I pulled the trigger, again and again. More insurgents. Bang, bang. It was over.
The light came on. A Petty Officer who had been following events on a computer, showed me my score. Not only had I shot a few, but they’d been ‘double taps’. There was no way these baddies were getting up again.
“You are a natural born killer ma’am”, said the PO dourly. Hubby’s expression seemed to imply that he didn’t need million pound equipment to tell him what he already knew.
Another double whammy featured large and looming in the Band household this week. Two milestones were reached. My son’s A level results and my eldest daughter’s 16th birthday. Pow-pow. Both on the same day. An emotional rollercoaster that saw me oscillating between the party girl, her guests and her presents, my mobile which was continually receiving texts with friends’ kids’ results and Hubby, who was in the kitchen pacing, furious with a son who, by some miracle, passed his A levels with fairly decent grades.
“He didn’t even read the books”, I said. We were in mourning for the grades he could have achieved had he actually applied himself. My mobile vibrated. A text.
‘Nicky got 3 As. Reading biology at York. Yours?’ My fingers texted back: ‘3 Cs. Reading Music Magazines at Torpoint’.

Dizzy.

2011-09-25T09:27:00.000-07:00

“I feel as though I’ve been in a car crash”, I said to Hubby the following morning, proffering him my bottom to rub.
“More fool you”, he replied.
“Do my shoulders next”, I instructed before he got too carried away with my bottom. I winced under his strong hands.
“Ouch. Don’t worry about the massage; I’ll take some ibuprofen instead”. My back hurt, my shoulder blades felt as though they had bruises on then, my neck felt as though it could do with a brace and my brain still felt as though it had been shaken thoroughly within its cranium, which of course it had.
The nine year old walked downstairs and into the kitchen, “Mummy my head still feels wobbly”, she said, but with that extraordinary capacity that children have for an unending gusto for thrills and spills, added, “Can we go again?”
“Again? Are you crazy? You’ve only just stopped being sick”
“I still loved it though. What did you like best about Speed mum? My favourite bit was when we tipped over the edge”.
“Your day out almost tipped your mother over the edge”, quipped Hubby. What did he know? He didn’t even come with us.
The day out in question was a visit to Oakwood theme park in Pembrokeshire. We were once again in Wales as part of our annual pilgrimage to visit our friends. The annual pilgrimage that involves, without fail, getting to know your fellow M5 motorists so well, that after 5 hours on the same patch of asphalt you are sharing personal information with them and inviting them to be your Facebook friends. This year was by no means an exception, but due to engine failure which meant we only took one very packed car and not the usual convoy it was an even more keenly charged atmosphere, especially as it took over 8 hours to get to our friends’ house.
Oakwood theme park is just over a five minute drive from our friends’ house and for years, every time we’ve driven past its flags and precipitous roller coasters, the youngest girls have begged to go. Now, as I have always known that I would have to go alone – Hubby just doesn’t ‘do’ coasters, it just hasn’t been practical in the past to go. Height restrictions an all that. I think it might have been frowned upon if I’d tied the Red-Head up at the foot of the rides as her sister and I stood in queues for hours and then looped the loop above her head. This year though, after quite a growth spurt, I felt the Red-Head might just be tall enough and so, I did my research, visited the website, got out the measuring tape and was pleased to tell the youngest that she now qualified for Megaphobia and all the other ‘thrill’ rides. There was no longer an excuse.
I’m not sure that ‘thrill’ is quite the word I would use. I am thrilled when the car passes its M.O.T; I am thrilled when my children get good school reports and I am thrilled when there is a BOGOF on loo roll in Morrison’s – being catapulted into the ether in a wooden carriage, with only a lap bar to restrain me from certain death, is not thrilling. It is in fact petrifying. Made much worse by the fact that weren’t any queues ergo no respite, we didn’t even have to get off; we just went around and around and around. And up and down of course, oh and upside down. Now, having lived near Hershey Park in Pennsylvania, USA, I got used to a few scary rollercoasters and rather blasé, but years have past since and I am decidedly more creaky than I was and it is not without reason that they write at the entrance to the ride a litany of cautionary advice just in case one should suffer from heart complaints, be pregnant, have high blood pressure or back and neck problems. By the end of the day, apart from being pregnant, I am sure that I suffered from all of the above. The ride Speed was quite honestly, speedy. Thank God. At least it was over with quickly. That’s why my shoulders hurt from where my harness had held me in as I was hurled hither and yon and upside down and in screwdriver fashion for all of 10 seconds. My face at the end of the day had settled into a rictus of fear, like some bodged botox job.
By the time we walked back to the car, feeling decidedly worse for wear, the 9 year old was pea-green but managed to make the journey back to our friends’ garden before vomiting. To hear her asking to go again then made me shudder.
“I can’t take her back for years”, I whispered to Hubby, “A paediatrician would think she was suffering from shaken-baby syndrome”.
The rest of our break was far less adrenaline based; none of the children or Hubby for that matter wanted to move away from our friends’ garden. I on the other hand had to pop to Tesco’s from time to time in Pembroke. From Pembroke one can catch a ferry to Ireland. There are ‘embarkation’ directions in the town. I love the word embarkation. I find it far more exciting than any roller-coaster. Wherever I am I almost feel compelled to follow its instructions. Embark. It’s the start to an adventure. Be it a train, or plane or a ferry. Who knows what might happen on the other side of the journey?
“I can give you a clue” said Hubby as I explained this romantic streak to him on the drive home, “Just had a text from our son who wants to know what time we’ll be home and where we keep the bin liners. Shall I tell him we’ll be ‘dis-embarking’ the Torpoint Ferry soon?”

Nightmare.

2011-09-25T09:25:00.000-07:00

It was the deep dark night of the soul. 3 a.m to be precise when the Red-Head walked into our bedroom and clambered over me and snuggled down between me and her father.
“I’ve had a bad dream”, she said.
“Have you angel?”, I asked her in whispers, “What was it about?”
“A boy drank all the sea in the world.” I cuddled her tight.
“Through a straw”, she added. A gruesome image for anyone to have to imagine, let alone subconsciously invading your slumber.
“He got bigger and bigger and all the sea creatures were dying on the sand”.
“Hush now”, I soothed, stroking her hair, “It was only a dream”. Nightmares are not only the scourge of infancy, I still have the most alarming dreams that literally make me writhe in bed, sweating and breathing fast.
“That’s just after you’ve been dreaming about Mr Lover-Lover”, said Hubby, squeezing my bottom the following morning as I was trying to explain the previous night’s dramatic events.
I slapped him off. “Seriously. It’s awful. I dreamt there was a cliff falling down on people, only it was as hot as molten lava and I had no alternative but to keep driving towards it. There were no road closures. Charred bodies lay everywhere”.
“Bloody hell Alice”.
“I know, it was horrific. What does it mean? And what does it mean that our little Red-Head is having shocking, apocalyptic, ocean dreams. It makes wonder whether Jacques Cousteau is communicating with her beyond the grave.” Hubby looked at me askance.
“Don’t be mad Alice. I’ll tell you what that dream meant”. He is not renowned for his dream interpretations. Joseph of, Joseph and his Amazing Technicolour Dreamcoat fame, he is not. So I waited for his verdict. This should be interesting.
“Cheese”.
“Come again?” I asked, blinking at him.
“Cheese. It’s a well known antagonist where nightmares are concerned. It gives you the collywobbles”. He said the last word with as much gusto as one who has just discovered some rare and virulent disease.
“Oh good grief. You sound like my great-aunt Bessie. Collywobbles indeed and that is your scientific analysis is it?”
“Yup.”
“Well, thanks all the same, but I shan’t be accessing Dr Band’s encyclopaedic knowledge of dreams and rare disorders any time soon”.
“Suit yourself but you mark my word, a bit of cheddar before bedtime plays havoc with your psyche”.
I went to work. A world away from family and nightmares and the confines of the domestic kitchen, is that of the kitchen of a café, which in summer, allows me to escape mine. It is as far removed from a familial kitchen as can be imagined. At least for me it is. The food that emerges from the metaphoric swing-doors has been previously carefully selected by the customer, and expertly cooked by the chef. At no point does anyone ask, with sullen attitude, “What’s for lunch?” or riffle through the shelves and biscuit tins and sigh. Then, when the food is served, no-one, absolutely no-one whines, “Oh but you know I don’t like crab salad/smoked fish platter/bacon, avocado and mozzarella sandwiches”. In fact, when I put their plates in front of them, the customers, without fail, remark, “Oh thank-you! This looks delicious” and then, as if that weren’t enough, they remind their children, “Darling what do you say?”. “Thank-you very much”, the little, beautifully, brought up darling remembers.
In a commercial kitchen neither are you on your own, forgotten about whilst your family sits in other rooms, waiting for you to chime, “Dinner’s ready”. The chef is not brow beaten and defeated, attempting hundreds of tasks singlehandedly, yes, she may be very, very busy but, at least she is producing food that people are going to enjoy and, ultimately pay for.
Maybe this is where I am going wrong. Vive la revolution I say. Imagine if you will, a world where our children and spouses are given a daily menu, a simple table d’hote where there are a few items on it. Sausage and mash; jacket spud and cheese and beans; spag bol/chilli con carne. The last two items are easily interchangeable - just add kidney beans and chilli powder. Off that list they can order what they want. I often cook various meals to suit different palates so that would be no particular challenge, then, when their plates are empty, which they will be because what they ate was after all what they chose and not, what was after all their mother’s whim to cook that day, I would present them with a bill. The eldest have part time jobs, the youngest pocket money. They can afford it. I cannot believe I’ve never thought of this before. Like I said, it’s revolutionary.
And so, as I pirouetted around the café, making coffees and milkshakes and serving English breakfasts and cream teas, I relished every moment. My heart sank as I turned the open to closed sign on the door and after cleaning up, went home. It sank even further on seeing Hubby’s face.
“Hiya”, I said, kissing him, “I didn’t expect to see you here. Where is the car?”
“At the garage. The AA man spent three hours trying to fix it. To no avail”. That night Hubby sat bold upright in bed. He was dripping in sweat and his heart was pounding.
“Bloody hell what’s the matter?”
“Jeeze, I just dreamt the car was knackered.”
“We haven’t had it long have we, it’s bound to be a spark plug or something.” That something was a new engine. A new engine? You’d have to eat a wheel of cheese to give you these kinds of collywobbles, only it’s a thousand pound living nightmare and no bloody dream.

Septic

2011-09-25T09:21:00.000-07:00

For one with the constitution of an ox, the fact that it hurt my arms when wallowing in Cawsand Bay should have been a warning to me. I didn’t expect it to be the balmy seas of Kefalonia but neither did I expect the sensation of such frigidity that I might have been ice-hole diving.
“C’mon mum”, shouted the kids, “Don’t be a wimp. Just go for it”. They frolicked, adults swam, kayaks swept silently past me, but I felt as though I were participating in a New Year dip. “It’s absolutely freezing”, I said through chattering teeth.
“It is not”, laughed my daughter, as, with orange goggles on her head, she delved her head under the sea like a cormorant. “See?” she said, emerging again, equally orange hair dripping down her face.
I didn’t see, no. All I knew was that my blood and bones were quickly becoming immobilised, so after a very brief doggypaddle, I waded out and wrapped all our towels around my shivering body.
All around me were sun-worshippers sipping cokes or licking ice-creams; I, on the other hand unscrewed the Thermos and poured myself a coffee. Cupping the plastic cup as though my life depended on it, I wondered how long it would be before I could suggest going home.
I soon found out. The nine year old ran over to me, bursting with excitement, dragging a familiar little girl in her wake.
“Look who I’ve found mum. Stacey”. I said hi to Stacey, before she informed me that she had her own kayak and that, would it be ok if my girls went with her on it around the bay. Before I was able to utter any remonstrance or words of warning regarding deep water and subsequent drowning my daughter had said,
“Oh Cheers mummy”, and without so much as a by your leave, she’d gone, still dragging Stacey; the Red-Head was waiting for them in the shallows. She is bright enough to realise that the further away she is from me the less likelihood there is of capture. By the time I had heaved myself off the pebbles and strode down to the water’s edge, they had paddled away and all that was left for me to do was wave rather pathetically.
It goes without saying that they eventually returned safe and sound and very happy with their adventure, I by this time, had packed our bags, folded towels and beach mats and was waiting for them. Not very patiently either as I was still shivering uncontrollably.
Walking back to the car, the youngest asked why I was being so quiet. It hadn’t occurred to me that I had been and it wasn’t until I started to then enter into conversation that I realised that it hurt to talk.
“Ouch”, I said, rubbing at my neck, “My throat hurts”.
Later that evening, once spaghetti had been served up to the masses and I’d swallowed, with some difficulty, a couple of enormous ibuprofen, I went to the local pub to meet Mags for a drink and a catch up. She was in the corner, sporting an oversized Amy Winehouse t-shirt.
“Holy karumba Alice” she said, standing up to kiss me, “you look like the proverbial poo”.
“Thanks”, I replied dolefully, “I feel like it too”.
“What’s up?” she asked, throwing wasabi peanuts into her mouth.
“I’m not sure, but I ache and have a really sore throat”.
“Sauvignon blanc will do the trick”. Now, for most hum-drum everyday glitches such as a crap day at work, children playing up, marital disharmony etc. etc., then an enormously large, chilled white wine and the company of a best friend invariably makes the issues of the day seem suddenly less significant but, tonight it just didn’t work. I took a few sips of my wine, resolutely refused any offer of wasabi nuts and tried to sound interested in Mags’s condemnation of energy bills but, I was very aware that I was being very much a wet blanket.
“I have to go home”, I admitted.
“Home? Sorry, am I boring you that much? We’ll talk about Zara’s wedding if you prefer?”
“Cheeky cow”, I said slapping her with a beer mat, “I’m not that vacuous!”
“Well don’t go home then”.
“I must. One minute I’m shivering, the next I’m having hot flushes”.
“Menopause?”, she asked quietly.
“Maybe, and I know that there are a myriad symptoms of menopause but I genuinely can’t recall that a sore throat is one of them”.
An hour later and I was in bed. Hubby came up a little while later.
“My God”, he said, “You must be ill. I’ve never known you party poop on a night out with Mags before”. I didn’t even have the wherewithal to reply. Instead, I buried my head into my pillow and went out like a light. At 4 am, I awoke, choking on my own spit. Disgusting. My throat seemed to have closed over, my neck and ears were throbbing and it was difficult to move my tongue. For the next four and a half hours I lay propped up in bed whimpering, and willing the to time to fly so that I could ring the doctor’s surgery.
“Have a Strepsil” yawned Hubby some time around dawn. Something frothed in my throat as I tried to reply that he could shove his Strepsil, but he was already asleep again. I got up and attempted to drink some water. It was impossible.
By 9am I was at the surgery with a torch being shone down my throat.
The doctor shook her head, “Nasty case of tonsillitis. You must be in a lot of pain” and she wrote me a prescription for penicillin.
I know that it may have been through accidental discovery, but as I swallow each little tablet of penicillin and every hour I feel a little better, I can but salute you Alexander Fleming. Thank-you for your miracle mould.

Camp.

2011-07-28T14:34:00.000-07:00

School, is once again, out for summer. Please let it be so. Summer that is. Let the sun shine gloriously upon all parents and their children for the next 5 weeks so that we can turf them out into parks, picnics and beaches, where, apart from a few sarnies, some crisps and a daily lolly, the rest of the excursion incurs no further costs. Rain is not only depressing, it is also costly.
“What are we going to do for the next few weeks?” asked the 9 year old when I picked her up from school on the last day of term.
“What do you mean ‘do’?” I said, chucking several, overflowing carrier bags into the back of the car. My heart sinks on the last day school day of the year. Not because I have five long weeks in which to entertain my little darlings, but because of all the ‘stuff’ they bring home with them. Every drawing, poem, mask, sword, clay modelling, maths book, spelling book, writing journal and painting is stuffed into a Tesco bag, ready for mine and Hubby’s delectation. I can’t get away with chucking it away for weeks; old cereal boxes, glued together haphazardly, representing Camelot or whatever, sit on my sideboard until sometime in September, looking like the junk they literally are.
Several times I have extricated these works of art from the bin, where Hubby, in a fit of clearing the decks has thrown them in. They must have a few weeks reprieve. There is no choice. These childish works of art, mathematics and literature have to be valued and pored over. Our youngest daughter’s spelling is nothing if not a little creative and it takes hours to decipher her stories but, decipher them I must. However painful. The Red-Head insists on climbing onto my lap and going through every single page of every single book, painstakingly explaining every arithmetical working out and every poem and story she has every penned. Not content with academia, we must remark, appreciate and applaud all the drawings and colourings and cutting out and gluing from the past school year. It cannot be endured without at least two, very large glasses of wine.
To show disregard for their masterpieces would crush their efforts and speak volumes. One can almost hear them on the therapist’s couch twenty years from now, wailing, “My parents never valued me”.
I therefore welcomed with open arms this week my friends from Brooklyn and their children. Their children kept my children highly entertained, but then we got to talking about what they were doing for rest of the ‘vacation’, not forgetting that they have been out of school since the beginning of June. But, not for them the every day waking on a boiling hot day and the wondering what to do with their little darlings. These kids and all their peers are in organised activity from dawn until dusk. At Camp. Period.
Given how American culture has infiltrated the British psyche over the last few decades, I am astonished that ‘camp’ hasn’t caught on here. We have all their tv programmes, their food and their music. End of year proms are now de rigeur for all high-school kids with many teenage girls sporting orange spray tans, meringue frocks and stretch limos to get them to the dance, the boys look a little more ill at ease having watched fewer chick-flicks than their female counterparts so are uncomfortable in the role of tuxedoed suitor. Wedding and baby showers are also gaining popularity. It is most surprising therefore that we have not adopted that fabulous American institution of, ‘summer camp’. I start back in my café on Saturday and am at a loss with what to do with my cherubs. Were I living in America, I could choose from Skateboard camp, riding camp, swimming camp, Jewish Camp, Christian camp, tennis camp and glee camp. You name it; there is a camp for it. No doubt in fact that there is a camp for those that are, well, camp. Not all of them are big bucks either but, from breakfast to dinner time you can rest assured that far from sitting in front of a tv or computer game, your child is being actively encouraged to participate in wholesome activities by the boundless, inexorable energy of the American teen counsellor.
Our British, older teenagers just aren’t that way inclined. Of all the myriad ones that I know very well indeed, I can’t name one that would have the effervescence of a Mickey Mouse club entertainer to quite happily give up their summer of festivals, drinking and casual sex and, for very little pay, to play for hours on end: baseball, basketball, cheerleading and goodness knows what else with little kids. And that is where the problem lies and why ‘camp’ will never take off here. Kids, especially young kids, love hanging out with big kids and older teenagers. They idolise and worship the ground they walk on. My own children would not want to spend their entire summer being entertained by a middle aged mum who can hardly get up a Cornish cliff without an iron lung let alone play ‘soccer’ with gusto. Tough luck then that they are landed with me and which is why my youngest are already fretting as to what the next few weeks hold for them. They need assurances that they are not going to be bored rigid when it does rain by helping mummy with the housework, or if the sun shines, that they will not once again take the dog and a picnic to Mount Edgcumbe.
Therefore, if there are bouncy, wholesome and hearty American teenagers out there who would like a summer job making crafts and bushfires; or who love nothing more than to put on shows and dance, I would be more than happy to receive their references. Current, resident teens need not apply.

Hellenic Heaven

2011-07-28T14:32:00.002-07:00

My sinuses are not what they were. I am helped to smell and taste through a variety of daily antihistamines and steroid nose drops. Flying therefore is torture and the pain of the pressure as the plane starts its descent makes me cry.
“Excuse me”, I asked the Thompson stewardess, my head sandwiched between my hands, my face screwed up in agony, “Could you please give me a boiled sweet to help me swallow?”
“Sorry, we’re not allowed to provide sweets. Choking hazard”. I uncapped my ear in an effort to hear her properly.
“Huh?”
“Choking hazard”, she repeated.
“Choking hazard? But only half an hour ago you brought a trolley around and offered me a bag of peanuts. Forgive me, but on a choking scale, I do believe peanuts are notoriously more apt to get stuck in your lung than a Fox’s Glacier Fruit.” She only shrugged her shoulders and repeated the advice to swallow.
My 9 year old daughter held my hand, “Don’t worry mummy. We’ll be there soon. Try this. It really helps” and she opened her mouth as wide as Maria Callas in full aria and then, stuck out her tongue, far, like a Moari Warrior and wiggled it around. Surprisingly, it was very comforting and much to the great embarrassment of my 15 year old daughter who thought I looked like an imbecile, I continued these facial exercises until the plane touched down in Kefalonia.
Within less than an hour burst ear drums were a distant memory as we had disrobed and were frolicking around the pool at our accommodation. Now, most normal people, especially those with young children in tow, would have stayed put around that pool for the week, perhaps occasionally venturing to the beach or a local tavern when the sun finally set and it had become slightly cooler but, as has been demonstrated year after year, I am not particularly normal and the minute my little red, Hyundai was delivered, we started on an odyssey that would have made, well Odysseus want to unfold a sun lounger in surrender and take a siesta.
I drove over a thousand miles in the last week but, had I not, we would never have experienced the white knuckle experience of driving down the precipitous hair pin bends of various mountains to reach the deep phosphorescent turquoise seas beneath.
“Bloody hell mum”, said my daughter, her throat constricted in fear as the passenger seat overlooked hundreds of feet of nothing as we made our descent down to Myrtos Beach, “Stay in the middle of the bloody road”.
Had I not driven, neither would we have found the most exquisite little town of Assos, and bought honey from a weathered, ancient old man, who sits at a picnic bench under an olive tree, selling his jars of home produced honey day, after day, after day. We wouldn’t have meandered late at night, around the narrow streets of Fiskardo, licking our ice-creams, our sea-salty, bedraggled hair and sweaty, cheap cotton clothes a million miles away from the clientele of this very glamorous town, who looked at as disdainfully as they sipped their fancy cocktails in the fancy restaurants that twinkled around the little harbour.
Had I not hired the Hyundai, we would never have found remote beaches where, liberated from the eyes of other, more conservative bathers, we removed our cozzies and went skinny dipping, the fish scurrying past, mortified by our luminescent, white bodies.
Greece is a wonderful place to go though if, in a bikini, one does not strike the iconic look of Ursula Andress emerging from the waves. The Greek diet of oil, pastry, cheese, and bakeries selling all number of cakes steeped in sticky syrup and stews of stifado, kleftiko and gyros has put paid to Greek ladies being the skinny cows that one might find in other holiday destinations. Sure, there were several tourists who looked sculpted and brown in their itsy-bisty bikinis, but on the beach, surrounded by locals, great big hulking women with equally itsy-bitsy bikinis, I cared not a jot in my British Home Stores, stripy tankini.
The latter part of the week, saw us drive further afield again and for the first time, utilise the air conditioning in the car. For days we had endured the intense heat but had driven with bottles of cold water to keep hydrated and the windows fully open. The windows open option, not only isn’t particularly effective when the temperature is 41 degrees but it also plays merry hell with your coiffure, so that hair that is already matted and salty, once it has been blown dry by the elements of the Greek sun and wind, ensures that by the time you reach your destination and you emerge from the car, you look slightly deranged and not a little unattractive.
We refreshed ourselves with a dip at the beach in Katelios and, later, sipping an ice cold beer at a beach tavern, I remembered that I knew a lovely Cornish woman who owned a villa near by. Texting her wildly in excitement, she responded immediately and insisted, even though she was at home in Cornwall, that I find her house. We went in search and minutes later were knocking at her door. Her guests couldn’t have been more charming or better mannered. We must have looked quite a sight, four dishevelled females gate-crashing their dinner but this other Cornish family welcomed us with open arms, an infinity pool and chilled white wine. It was perfection; a movie star house, nestled on a hill side, the sea down below, the island of Zante far in the haze on the horizon.
As we drove back to our very basic apartment later, my eldest daughter, in awe of the company we had just kept, said “They had a cook! Mum, we haven’t even got a cooker”. All the better to eat out my dear.

Cor blimey trousers.

2011-07-28T14:30:00.000-07:00

“I don’t know whether I’m coming or going?”, I whimpered, listlessly and literally throwing the towel in.
“Now, take a deep breath”, suggested Mags, removing the beach towel from the suitcase “and be systematic”.
“I’ve tried, I really have. I’ve written a list as long as my arm, yet no sooner have I ironed a pile of t-shirts then I remember about Euros. I’m half way to the Post Office and then I remember the after-sun lotion. I go to Boots, only to remember prescriptions that need repeating, so then I run to the surgery and return to the ironing having left all the previous jobs unfinished.”
“You are only going on holiday”, reminded Mags, “You are meant to relax”.
“Relax! Are you having a laugh? I’ve myself and three daughters to wash, iron and pack for; four other men to provide meals for and of one of those men, I have to dance around as he is seriously cross that I am going on holiday in the first place”.
“Nothing new there then Alice”. Nope, my holidaying without him is nothing new. Poor Hubby though, I do feel for him, left alone with big work commitments and three teenage lads to keep in line having been abandoned by a wife who threw caution to the wind and booked, albeit as long ago as January, a weeks holiday in Kefalonia.
“Thing is Mags”, I confided, “I thought I’d have a job lined up by now and so, a week away was not going to be as much extravagance as it seems now”.
“Well ,don’t worry about that”, she said laying her hand on my arm, “that will all work itself out and I have no doubt that by Christmas you will be in gainful employment”. I appreciated her comfort and neatly folded the beach towel and laid it flat at the bottom of one of the suitcases.
“Speaking of gainful employment”, I said, running my finger down my list of To-Dos, “Your god-son is gainfully employed”.
“Really?”, she said, helping fold other items of clothing, “What’s he doing?” Now, having been a grammar school boy with a good brain but, who has spurned the idea of university, one might naturally assume that he would be looking for a full-time and ultimately, prosperous career. This is not so, it would seem.
“Ma and Pa, I have something to tell you”, he had sat us down and looked very grave. Hubby and I swallowed hard. Were we about to become grandparents? I clutched Hubby’s hand. It was clammy. Our son read our minds.
“No guys, it’s not what you think! Jeeze, why do parents only ever have sex on the brain?” I knew that Hubby was about to quip, ‘Perhaps because we never get any’, but I squeezed his hand. Code for, ‘keep your gob shut’.
“What is it you want to talk to us about then darling?”, I asked as gently as was possible in a tone that would engender a confession.
“I don’t want to work in an office ok? I want to work outside. In the fresh air?” We nodded, I think both of us had an understanding of what fresh air meant.
“And I want to work earlier in the day ‘cos it leaves time then in the late afternoon for band practise”. We continued to nod. He looked at us, from one to another and then came out with it.
“So, I’m going to be a bin man”. I wiggled a finger in my ear. Had I heard him properly? A bin man as in, refuse collector? Hubby looked quite calm.
“It’s a tough job son”, he said, “Hard, physical graft. Very early hours, long day, lots of walking. I’m proud of you”.
I was more, how shall I put it, pragmatic?
“Tampons, pads, filthy nappies, dog mess, maggots, bin-juice, stink, seagulls, vomit…” Oh my god. Proud? If he said he’d got into Oxford I’d be proud, or, given his love of his band and was on Top of the Pops, then I’d be proud.
“Top of the Pops isn’t on any more Alice”, said Hubby softly, rubbing my knee.
“I can honestly say that when I wrapped you in a hand crocheted shawl for first time and inhaled your gloriousness, I never once thought to myself, ‘one day this perfect creature will be a bin man”.
“Well, I never saw that one coming” said, Mags, after I’d recounted the story, “So, how is he getting on?”
“It’s only casual labour”, I explained, “But he’s been getting up at five and cycling across Plymouth, hoping that on that day they need an extra pair of safety-gloved hands on their wagon.”
“He’s only a kid Alice; credit where credit is due. Most lads his age are just loafing around doing sod all”. I still can’t bear it. I don’t want him to work that hard.
All afternoon we checked off the list, item by item. I had stopped flapping around like a headless chicken and was very pleased with myself that my list, whilst having initially sent me into a spin, was at least, most comprehensive.
“Dried mixed herbs?” asked Mags.
“Very light to pack”, I explained, “and adds incomparable flavour to any pasta sauce”.
“Had you not considered, that, as you are after all going to a Greek Island, that they may possibly have fresh herbs in abundance?” I hadn’t considered it, no.
“Oh, well, plonk them in anyway.”
At about six, after Mags had left, my son had returned and thrown himself onto his bed before starting his waiting shift and the girls were literally bouncing with excitement, Hubby came home from work. He handed me an envelope. Inside were three, crisp, 20 Euro notes.
“For a Greek salad and some calamari”. I threw my arms around him, who needs Captain Corelli when you are married to Commander Band?

Mutton..

2011-07-28T14:27:00.000-07:00

Hubby looked most disapproving as I got ready to go out for a night on the town with a bunch of twenty-somethings.
“You are not going dressed like that are you?”, he asked. I looked down at my dress.
“What’s wrong with what I’m wearing? I look alright”.
“Hmm. Mutton and lamb spring to mind”. I was most affronted. There was a bit of cleavage on display and a little flash of leg, but nothing outrageous.
I ran upstairs for some sartorial advice. My eldest daughter, having now finished her exams, is oft to be found in bed, where she is languishing as her brain is bored. In fairness to her, she is not idling the day away in that torpid sleep that only teenagers and hibernating wildlife assume nor is she flicking through the inane pages of celebrity magazines; instead she whiles away the hours watching documentary after documentary. I knocked and walked into her room; she pushed a button to pause her computer. I raised my eyebrows.
“World War Two. The Complete History”.
“I thought you watched that yesterday?”
“No, that was Mysteries of the Amazon. You look nice”.
“Do I?”, I asked, scrutinising my appearance in her full length mirror, “That’s what I came to ask you. Dad thinks I look like mutton dressed as lamb”.
“He’s a bright one to talk; he took the dog for a walk earlier wearing a Paul Weller t-shirt and a pair of red Converse. I nearly died”.
“So, you won’t die if I go out dressed like this?”
“No, but you may need to change your knickers, you have a serious case of VPL.” I turned around and looked at my bottom in the mirror.
Bugger. That’s the problem with tight pants, they may hold you in, but other parts of your flesh have a disconcerting habit of seeping out elsewhere. My daughter handed me a scissors.
“Make a snip in the leg elastic”, she advised.
“Bloody hell ma, what’s up?” asked my son, walking in. I must have looked rather odd hunched over with my dress gathered up, wielding a large, craft scissors and attacking my knickers with it.
I let go of my dress.
“Oh, hello. I’m getting ready for a night on the tiles. How do I look?”
“Better now I can’t see your knickers.”
“You are not embarrassed by me then?”
“Ma, I am often embarrassed by you, but rarely by what you wear”. I gave him a playful clip around the ear.
“Well, I’m off then. See you guys later”.
Forty minutes later and I was in a beer garden on the Barbican. It was rather nippy and I was glad I had my pashmina. My friends however, being decades younger than me and thus more inclined to wear less apart from skimpy numbers in thin, silky fabrics, shivered. Maternally, I offered my pashmina. They looked aghast. You’d have thought I’d offered them to cover up with an Orlon cardigan. What is with young people and their abject horror of being warm and dry? You see hordes of them walk to school in torrential rain, either utterly coatless, their hair and school sweatshirts clinging to them, or, more queerly, a raincoat draped over their arms. I shrugged my shoulder and took a sip of wine.
If my attire aged me, then my choice of drink made me look positively prehistoric. The culture of sweet, lurid drinks has, mercifully, passed me by and apart from a few ill-advised sweet Martini’s when a teenager and the odd G&T at a cocktail party, then wine has been my usual tipple for nay on thirty years.
“What on earth is that?” I asked, somewhat taken aback by the neon blue liquid in my friend’s bottle.
“This Alice”, she explained as though I were her elderly, confused patient, “Is called a WKD”.
“Is it blue curacao?”
“Isn’t that some sort of parrot?” asked another friend, sipping some equally vivid alco-pop. The girls and I had a few more drinks and then, rather unwisely, started a drinking game. A sort of post-modernist twist on Truth or Dare. The nature of the game was in revealing secrets and, had you a shared experience in the activities disclosed you were to take a swig. Having led a sheltered life, I can report that I only watched, eyes ever widening in amazement at their exposés.
Being on the Barbican, I was quite comfortable with our choice of venue and, even though I was in the company of beautiful young things, there were at least, a handful of other middle-aged codgers milling about. All that was to change. Whereas by now Hubby and I would be yawning, looking at our watches and fretting about what ferry to catch; for this lot, the night was yet young and the earlier drinking was only a precursor of what was to come. Before I knew what was happening, I was bundled into a taxi where it deposited us outside some bar in the student quarter of Plymouth. There were kids here younger than my son. There was no-where to sit, the music was indescribable and the wine non-existent. Besides, why would young people buy a £5 glass of Pinot, when they can buy jager-bombs for two quid a shot? For those unfamiliar with a jager-bomb – it is glass of Red Bull with a shot glass of Jagermeister wallowing at the bottom. Its effects are no doubt as explosive as its name implies.
I didn’t quite know what do to with myself and found myself ultimately hanging onto the girls’ handbags as they got their groove on. I felt like hat-stand. An antique one at that. To add to the ignominy of the situation, the Smiles on the Tiles photographer of the local paper turned up and, whilst the girls beamed their bright smiles at him, he asked them “Do you want your mother in the shot?” I caught the next ferry home.

Memories are Made of This.

2011-06-30T09:26:00.000-07:00

“It’s about making memories”, was how I sold it to Hubby, “The eldest ones will be leaving home soon”. I read the far away look in Hubby’s eyes to imply ‘in my dreams’, but I forged on, “It will be a lovely way to celebrate the end of their exams”.
And so, last Friday, having waved a fond adieu to the Lost Boys and the dog we drove to Center Parcs, Longleat. Now, as one who is oft disappointed by the shortcomings of others and other places I wasn’t sure what to expect, but from the customer service desk, to the bike hire chaps, to the waiters, pool attendants, checking in staff and housekeepers, every single one of them was not only courteous, helpful and knowledgeable but, ‘cheerful’. They must be trained by Americans because, having lived there and witnessed the culture of ‘anything is possible and we will make sure that we can help you’ attitude, my experience of that mind set is, that positivity engenders confidence and I knew the minute we unpacked in our Woodland lodge, whose kitchen was better equipped than ours, that we were going to have a wonderful time. Even the cleaner had left a cheery message on a blackboard wishing us a lovely time.
But if Hubby and I thought for one moment that we would take it easy then we were deluded. Not a moment passed without some activity or another. We rode bicycles for miles, swam and rode currents and flumes; wallowed in the hot water, outdoor pool for as long as we could get away with it before the children once again insisted we throw ourselves down the white water rapids with them. That first night and subsequent nights, Hubby and I slept like the dead.
The following morning dawned wet, soaking wet. Torrential rain was fleetingly interspersed by rainbows and a bashful sun. My son and I looked at each other and gave one another a friendly punch on the arm to signify, “It’ll be alright; I’ll be right behind you” and so, an hour later, the first of my many personal challenges was attempted as the climbing instructor fixed a harness to my thighs. Hubby and the girls came to watch, the eldest of whom wielded a camera.
“Ok then, are you ready?” By this point, my son and I had traversed slippery wet logs, walked along a high wire, climbed up poles to higher points, traversed further slippery logs, walked backwards, climbed higher still and walked another pole whilst attempting a silly dance and singing; this final challenge though was something else and we had already been briefed that, when the instructor called up ‘are you ready?’, we were in turn to shout out, commando style, “I was born ready”, kiss our biceps, make a grrr sound and then jump. Into the ether. My son had successfully completed the challenge and had been repelled safely to terra firma. It was my turn. To be honest, by the time I was asked if I was ready, it was a relief. I have never been called a scaredy-cat in my life and so throwing myself into the abyss wasn’t about to stymie my previous efforts but, boy oh boy that previous effort was a killer. Climbing the telegraph pole wasn’t so bad, but by this point I was fatigued and soaked to the skin, my hands were giving up their slippery, grip and my body was aching from head to toe, to get to the top of the pole then and have to haul myself onto no more than a tea tray which sat atop it, took Herculean effort. Looking at the pictures my daughter took, I resemble a knackered bear cub at the top of tree and not as I’d hoped, some Lara Croft type fantasy figure. As I landed safely on the ground, much to the cheer of my family and other onlookers, I felt, it must be said, for a fairly sedentary, middle-aged, middle-spread woman, justifiably proud.
There was no time to rest on my laurels though, in fact there was barely time to rest for a coffee. The next activity was booked. Hubby and son went quad biking; the girls and I, horse riding. Now, for the previous activity, all that I’d had to rely on was myself, oh and the quality of the ropes and safety harness, but apart from those essentials, I was in charge. The thing about horses is that they are bloody big beasts with minds of their own and it is not so much a question of who is in charge, but the fact that they may well just charge – off. I clung to the reins, gripped my thighs and prayed that mine wasn’t a temperamental and unpredictable equine beast, happy to fling me onto the unyielding, slippery stones beneath, rendering me a quadriplegic.
Togetherness is what family hols are all about though and, when confident enough, I looked behind me and the expressions on the girl’s faces were priceless. When we all reconvened in our warm and cosy lodge later, the boys too had had a blast. We hung our wet gear up, changed into our jammies, snuggled up on the sofa together, opened a family bag of crisps and watched a movie. A deer peered in through the French door.
Another day dawned. This one initially less strenuous. Hubby and I divvied up a day at the Aqua Sana Spa – our eldest daughter and me for the morning session, the boys in the afternoon. Bliss, bliss, bliss. Short-lived perhaps but, luxurious to the point of decadence. A breather before an afternoon of wall climbing, pedalo pushing and more white water rapids.
As we drove home the following day, the 9 year old said, “It was the best holiday, ever. When can we go again”. My son added, “Yeah, thanks guys, I’ll never, ever forget it”. Hubby caught my eye. It spoke volumes, namely, “See? I told you so”.

Midas Touch.

2011-06-30T09:19:00.000-07:00

Over the past twenty years, in my role as consort to Hubby’s naval officer persona, I have met the great and good and occasionally notorious - it isn’t often one goes to dinner where Cynthia Payne is the guest of (dis)honour. I have shaken hands with Admirals both Rear and Vice on this side of the pond and their American counterparts, I have imbibed with Brigadiers and Generals, Lord High Sheriffs and Air Marshalls. It has been a giddy, social whirl and I have done my best to look presentable, eat what is put in front of me, be polite to stewards and staff, use the silver in chronological order, sip the port after ‘The Queen’, pass it to the left, not leave the table until ease springs, keep my shoulders covered throughout dinner etc, etc, etc. I have yet to fall down drunk. It was an accident on the dance-floor. My killer heels literally lived up to their name.
Nothing though, absolutely nothing could have prepared me for the exalted company that I kept last weekend. I’d never even heard of them until last Saturday and even then, it wasn’t until I was introduced to a few guests that the full implication of what it is to be a member dawned on me. Bless my innocent, provincial ways.
It was the usual refrain before we went out with Hubby, running around like a headless chicken, insisting I get ready for an 18.30 assignation barely after we’ve cleared the table after lunch.
“You must be ready in time Alice”.
“Aren’t I always?”, I demanded, brushing the bread-crumbs into the gaping jaws of an expectant dog. Hubby remained silent.
“I don’t like your tone”, I continued airily, “Unlike several other couples who go to these mess dinners, few have to feed the five thousand before they do their hair and put on their glad rags and…”
“Yada, yada, yada. Change the record”.
“Humph”, I humphed.
“Anyway, I’m going to work for a while. I need to check things are ticketyboo for this evening”.
“But it’s a Saturday”.
“You’ll be surprised to hear that most peoples’ working week doesn’t cease to exist just because it is the weekend Alice”. I felt that murderous gall rise in me when he adopts that intolerable, imperious air but, instead of plunging the bread knife into him, I called him an ugly but, very satisfying name and walked away, my head held high.
A while later Hubby returned, buzzing.
“It’s looking good. Staff are briefed. Presentation is ready. Are you?”
He looked at my dishevelled hair and remarked, “Evidently not”.
“Listen mate, with this sort of canvas, it doesn’t take long to create a masterpiece”.
“I’ll agree with that. Jackson Pollack?”. Bloody cheek. I didn’t utter another word but, had a quick shower, applied the curling tongs, some make-up, a long frock and voila. I issued instructions to the children as to what was available for dinner and then Hubby whisked me away.
It was still very early but, after six so at least I was able to have a drink. Hubby wanted to run through his presentation one more time and check for all technological glitches. I sat back in an arm chair and let him get on with it. I sipped my wine and relaxed.
Suddenly, some guests turned up. Then another and then, another. Hubby, trying desperately to shake hands and at the same time calm some temperamental acoustics, looked a little torn. I jumped up from my chair and introduced myself. By now, I was aware that members of the Royal Yacht Squadron were our guests. It sounded grand, but then, having been associated by marriage to the Royal Navy for almost twenty years, and never once having even glimpsed one, I don’t hold much truck to the ‘royal’ bit. I mean, how often has one had to negotiate around the lap of the Queen in the stalls at a Royal Shakespeare Company’s performance or waited to be rescued by the side of the M4 because the Royal Automobile Company are otherwise engaged in recovering the Queen and her Land Rover? Never.
Similarly, on this occasion there was little actual blue blood to be seen, but by jove, it was a close run thing. Sir this and Lady that shook my hand. I tried terrifically hard to remember all their names but, as most were called Charles, or Caroline, George or Elizabeth it was relatively easy.
“Do you sail?” asked one, politely.
“No, not really”. He looked a little disappointed that we’d drawn stumps, so I helped the conversation along.
“We are members of a sailing club though”.
“Really?”, his face brightened, “Where?”.
“The Mosquito”.
“Massachusetts?”
“Er, Torpoint”. I wanted to add that a pint of beer was very reasonable there as was a basket of cheesy chips and by the way, Pete Goss cut his sailing teeth there too but, when a castle on the Isle of Wight is your club venue and you have to be invited to join, I thought it prudent to keep my mouth shut.
Once at dinner, I had the immense pleasure to meet a terribly charming, gentleman.
“I’ve led a sheltered life”, I said, “And underestimated our guests, who are you all?”
Conspiratorially, he leant in and told me.
“Good heavens? Really? He’s here? And she’s here too?” My mother would have been beside herself.
I couldn’t help but wonder how they had all achieved such enormous professional success. What was the secret? Wouldn’t it be fabulous to be given the formula? Especially, given as my new ‘best friend forever’ (I wish) added, waving his hand at the gathered company, “These people are wealthy beyond the dreams of avarice”. Leaving me only to dream on.

Swot.

2011-06-14T04:27:00.000-07:00

Exam season has hit. It is very trying and the divide between the girls and the boys has never been more apparent. My daughter, in the middle of her GCSEs has to be dragged away from her studies to eat and breathe. When I picked her up from her maths exam on Monday she was in floods of tears.
“What’s the matter darling?”, I asked, alarmed. This is a child who has had 99% correct answers in all her practise tests and who was, very oddly, looking forward to her exam.
“It was really, really hard”, she sniffled, “It’s knocked my confidence.”
“Sweetheart, couldn’t you do any of it?” I felt very sympathetic, remembering my own maths ‘O’ level exam which took me precisely ten minutes: Three to write my name in my best handwriting and another seven jotting a letter to the examiner apologising for my ineptitude.
“Of course I could. What do you take me for?” she answered crossly. I was driving through Plymouth at this particular juncture, not the most stress-free of situations presently, and so I felt it best to drop the subject and make soothing noises instead.
“I’ll pass” she added, “But unless I get an A* I won’t feel as though I have and my teacher will be very disappointed in me”. Blimey she doesn’t half exert pressure upon herself. Contrast to my son, who far from worrying about getting an A* will be delighted to have found that he’s made it to the hall. I have seen little evidence of burning the midnight oil unless his ‘A’ levels are not, as I thought, in English, History and Politics but are actually in Facebook, YouTube and the bass guitar. If that is so, then his results will be fruitful. The other two young men also seem to have a rather laissez-faire attitude to their studies and do not at any point seem to share my daughter’s zeal and graft. One of them in fact dragged himself from his pit and was out of the door in less than five seconds. No breakfast, no coffee, no hair brushing. I was therefore not all that surprised when he returned an hour later looking rather sheepish.
“You ok?”, I asked
“Um, the exam is this afternoon”. I threw my hands up in despair but at least he’d got it that way around and not missed it. “Let me make you a sandwich”, was all I said.
And so whilst I know, generally speaking, the whereabouts of my eldest offspring and Lost Boys, the youngest two, who, having just learnt to ride their bicycles, have become feral. Various children are ringing the doorbell asking for them to come and play and various children are to be found in my kitchen drinking gallons of squash, hot and bothered by the aforementioned play. Part of me feels that I mustn’t complain; I’d rather them be friends with the kids in the park than hanker over a virtual, make-believe friendship with Hannah bloody Montana but they do seem to be becoming rather streetwise though and the language of the older boys in the park is rather too Anglo-Saxon for the tender ears of two little girls.
The other evening was such a case in point, having languished in bed all day with an appalling migraine that saw me physically sick, I was doing my utmost to recover in time for a Commander’s Wife Official engagement – namely a Mess dinner. I’d thrown some sausages in the oven and then gone in search of them and found them, in the park, long hair flying madly, ill-matching outfits on, bruises up their legs like extras from ER, sitting in a circle trading contraband chewing-gum for God only knows what. Well ok, not exactly contraband but not available in this country either, so I suppose it must have seemed illicit to them. Mindy my American friend had sent a package containing scores of weird and wonderful flavours of chewing-gum. Mint chocolate chip ice-cream to name but one. I broke the syndicate up and dragged them indoors. Various other stragglers arrived to the table and I went upstairs to get ready.
I was not my perky self all evening. I could never be a teetotaller. It’s very dull – all that lovely wine I passed up as I really didn’t want to mortify Hubby by throwing up as he made his speech, but a migraine is a killer, its grip leaves you in a malaise for hours, so I nibbled at my dinner, loyally laughed in all the right places during Hubby’s speech and resolutely adhered to my tumbler of water. The Queen would be proud that, even green at the gills, I did manage a sip of port to toast her with and to wish her husband a happy 90th birthday.
When we withdrew to the dance-floor, it is I who generally suffers from NSDI (non specific dance injury) as I hurl myself around with gay abandon but, this evening would have resulted in a very different hurling had I even attempted a mild jiggle.
“How are your son’s ‘A’ levels going?” asked a woman whose son I know is destined for great things.
“Oh, you know”, I replied breezily.
“They’ve got history tomorrow haven’t they? Mine has been fretting and swotting about it all week. No doubt yours has too?”
“No doubt”, I answered, grimly.
Beside me, shaking a mean hoof was Hubby. I tugged at his sleeve.
“We have to go”, I shouted over The Smiths, “Our son and heir, I have been reliably informed, has an exam in a few hours. I need to make sure he’s in bed.”
At this point another dancer, who had obviously not had a migraine that day but you could bet your bottom dollar would have in the morning, was turning rather green. It was definitely time to leave, but not without thinking, “There by the grace of God go I”.

Squash.

2011-06-14T04:25:00.000-07:00

‘Let the train take the strain’ indeed. What hapless copywriter came up with that slogan? They evidently haven’t ventured on one of National Rail’s trains in recent times, that’s for sure. To be honest I had to Google British Rail to find out what our railways are called these days as no-one I spoke to had any idea.
A simple day out with the kids should have been just that. The sun was shining and, with the teenagers professing an unnatural desire to study for their exams, I felt it was the perfect opportunity to take advantage of my rail card and take the younger girls for a trip to the sea-side by train. No parking, no worries. I arrived home though a few hours later and took to my bed with a cold compress to get over the strain of taking the train and not, as is advertised, the other way around.
We were in plenty of time at St German’s station and met up with Mags, her children, her parents, their foster children and a very elderly grandfather. When the train pulled into the station, ten minutes late, our mouths dropped open. It was the type of train where one would expect to see Michael Palin, in a panama and furrowed brow, leaning out of the window. It was only two carriages long and its destination was Penzance. Penzance? All that way on a train that seemed to have been derailed from Calcutta? We were herded in, squeezing and apologising as we pushed past people who had been standing from Plymouth and, given the number of passengers on board, it looked as though they would still be there as the train pulled into St Erth. It was diabolical.
Of course, the corralling of us onto the train delayed us, especially when Mag’s grandfather got stuck in the door. The train driver did offer him a taxi to our destination, but to be honest St German’s is hardly Manhattan and I think that it would be fair to say that taxis are rather thin on the ground in a Cornish village. The poor chap looked a little distressed and desperate to stay with his family who were by now, squished down the other end of the carriage with no chance of getting out. So, having been shoe-horned in, the train eventually and with a little laboured ‘chuff’, pulled out of the station. We arrived at Liskeard not much later and decamped to the branch line that would take us to Looe. Between us and the other passengers we were laden with rucksacks, buckets and spades, several children, the odd double buggy and a few, very tiny babies. The atmosphere was mutinous with the realisation that we’d missed the bloody connection to Looe and there was nothing for it other than to sit it out for 50 minutes until another train came to collect us all. We had such a short turn around time that the foster children especially were very disappointed, not only had they never been to the sea-side before, they’d never been on a train; so much for this being the highlight of their half term holiday.
I felt so sorry for them and decided there was nothing for it other than to make a complaint at the station. Evidently it was not the employees of National Rail Liskeard who were to blame, but really, you think that there would be some sort of communication between a branch line and a national network line, especially when one of the employees said to me “It’s like this every half term. We know it’s going to be, I have no idea why they don’t put on a bigger train from Plymouth”.
I was not the only one with a grievance, another woman on the platform making her point both vociferously and emphatically succeeded in persuading the customer services chap to call his supervisor; some big-wig in charge of this area of Cornwall apparently. He, unfortunately, couldn’t speak to us as he was ‘just about to go to a conference’. One has to feel sorry for the employees in these situations, Mr BigWig was able to hide behind a telephone call, yet those working for him were on the front line, having to deal daily with disgruntled customers such as me. No-one could help us and by the time I’d re-joined the party, Mags’s grandpa was puce, had a square of kitchen towel on his head and was sitting in a large flower pot, looking very glum. There was no shade, no refreshments and it goes without saying- there were no spare benches. Mad dogs and Englishmen are not the only ones who go out into the midday sun, so do stranded rail passengers.
By the time the next train arrived and had delivered us to Looe, we had time to unwind our crab lines and shove a sausage roll down. There was hysterics when, on the run back to the train, less than an hour later, the little foster boy’s ice-cream fell out of his cone. We had no time to cajole him or buy him another as the train was already in the station. We’d abandoned Grandpa there. It was all too hot and too much for him. All in all, it was an unmitigated disaster brought about by the incompetency of National Rail. It could have taken me twenty minutes to drive there and with no limitations on when we had to get connections home again. As it transpired it took three hours of journey time for less than an hour of quality sea-side time.
I would not recommend it to the most earnest of rail enthusiasts. The silver lining? Because all four trains were so crowded, the conductor couldn’t get to us and so at least the whole, nightmare journey was free.

Retreat.

2011-06-14T04:21:00.000-07:00

Generally speaking I am the dutiful wife and devoted mother, available at all hours to apply balm and nourishment to the body and soul. Occasionally though, I find myself in the position where, for a brief few hours I can shake off the sometimes repressive mantel of maternity and carve out a niche for myself as someone other than wife and mother. This last weekend saw such an opportunity and, not wanting to waste a moment, I applied myself to it with bohemian zeal. Well that’s not entirely true, but in my mind’s eye that is how I saw myself as I climbed the ancient, higgledy-piggledy steps up to the house in Polperro, my pashmina wrapped around my head and billowing in the wind, as I liked to imagine myself, the French Lieutenant’s woman, and not, as I am so often reminded, an English Commander’s Wife.
I paused before I knocked at the door. If I were to walk into a room full of people evocative of the Bloomsbury set, then hadn’t I have a witty one liner to introduce myself with; something droll and intellectual that would create an immediate impression? Unfortunately, I am not that au fait with the wit and wisdom of Virginia Woolf, well apart from, ‘A woman must have money and a room of her own if she is to write fiction’. To be honest that would have seemed rather a pretentious introduction especially if they were all men and so I thought it best to play safe, so all I said as I pushed the door ajar was, “Hi”.
Once inside I was more inclined think of Channel 4’s Big Brother than anything that Bloomsbury produced. We all rather nervously eyed each other up, gave brief biographies, cracked a few self-deprecating jokes and drank vats of tea. Luckily, as we were hosted and taken care of very well, the awkwardness was only fleeting and soon we were chatting like old friends; the jokes got bawdier and the banter bawdier still and the wine had yet to be opened. I went upstairs to my room and unpacked. The stillness and quiet was extraordinary. For any of us, it is a great privilege to depart our normal milieu for a couple of days, take stock and genuinely look in wonder at our surroundings, and as I turned from putting my make-up on a dressing table, I caught my breath by the view outside my bedroom window.
Rather than have to make the bed, pick up toys, the dirty knickers, the sweet wrappers and other detritus of childhood and teenage life, I just stood and stared, as suggested by that wise old fellow William Henry Davies in his poem ‘Leisure’. He wasn’t kidding. It really is a leisure activity to take time out in the day to stop and just think. Polperro lay beneath me, the closed-down church, the narrow arteries of little interwoven streets, the ancient rooftops and there, in the background of this natural canvas, the harbour wall and the sea beyond. I gave a slight shiver. The sun was shrouded and the sea was rough and flint grey. The sky above looked dark and moody, but this time it did not echo my frame of mind. I just saw it as, if I remember correctly from the media lesson I once taught, a pathetic fallacy – how the weather is used in a movie to suggest emotions. Pouring down for sad bits, stormy to suggest anger and violence, sunny and bright for happiness and love. Well, the pathetic fallacy above Polperro could remain that – a pitiful mistake, I was on a writer’s retreat, emancipated from my regular world and I was not going to let a few storm clouds ruin my mood.
I carried my lap-top downstairs. The earlier banter had quietened. All the other writers were huddled over their own work, lost in their own worlds, kept company by the characters within their imaginations. The only sound that could be heard was the occasional rattling of a sash window by a particularly insistent gust of wind, the gentle tap, tap, tap of the keyboard, or the scratching of head as we all, from time to time searched for the perfect word.
After a few hours of intense writing, we all took time out from our magnum opuses to either chat and learn a little more about each other, or take in a little sea air. By the time we had reconvened our brains were once again salivating with creative juices and we all returned to write until dusk.
Over dinner, wine and a walk to the pub, we got to know each other better still. All of us different, all of us with very different writing styles, but each of us sharing the same faith that after this weekend, we would be buoyed with the confidence of our conviction to submit our novels to various agents.
We left The Blue Peter Inn after only one drink; all of us by now too exhausted for witty repartee and were quite happily walking back to our house, when another of our party saw a door open.
“Let’s gate-crash!” she suggested. The more sedate of our gathering hurried away, whereas I, uplifted by my new found confidence strode into this house as though a legitimate guest. The fourteen gentlemen who sat around the dining table looked up in astonishment to see three unfamiliar women in their midst.
“Hello”, I said, smiling.
Recovering their manners they jumped up and within seconds our glasses were charged with wine as robust as they were: a veteran football team from the outskirts of London, on tour.
If I had come away for the weekend to find inspiration to write then I had not discovered it in the little coves and caves of the Cornish coast, but in a room in a holiday cottage. Fourteen fit, footballing men? Nothing more inspirational for my kind of writing.

Second Skin.

2011-05-27T01:52:00.000-07:00

To be honest, when Hubby emailed me and told me that I was to be his Plus One in an invitation that addressed us as ‘distinguished guests’, I rather hoped that perhaps some minor royalty might be involved and, hence the need for a new titfer.
Nothing mad, I continued to ponder. No Princess Beatrice configuration, just a large, sweeping brim. I made a mental list of what I might wear and realised, that, if I were to wear the navy ensemble, then I’d need to buy some stomach flattening knickers. Perusing the lingerie department in M&S, I was baffled by the endless interpretations of knicker available to a woman with a stomach which has accommodated four, rather large babies and a lifetime of good food and excellent wines.
“Excuse me”, I asked an assistant, “I’m looking for some deceiving undergarments”. The girl, who couldn’t possibly have been older than 16, looked at me with pity. She was stick thin and as needy of hold-me-in pants as I am of a belly-button piercing. I held my gaze and reluctantly she led me in the direction of some rather, alarmingly large, pants.
“These are our magic knickers range”, she said.
“Magic eh? Does my bum transform into Pippa Middleton’s the minute they are pulled up then?”
“They are not really magic”, she said, poker-faced.
“I see”, I replied, fondling the heavy-duty material. These things squeeze your innards from your navel to your thighs, much like a tube of toothpaste, “A guy could die trying to get into those”, I laughed conspiratorially.
It was obvious that the idea of me having a sex life and the subsequent image of a frisky man actually attempting to get into the aforementioned drawers was very disturbing and the girl gave a discreet little shudder.
“How much are they?” I asked, looking for the label.
“Twenty-nine pounds fifty”, she replied. I reeled.
“Bloody hell! Gastric surgery doesn’t come in at much more”, I exclaimed, “Can you suggest something else?” Before the poor girl could actually utter, ‘gastric surgery wouldn’t be such a bad idea’, her supervisor appeared on the scene. More mature and rather more, how shall I put it? Shapely.
“Can I be of assistance?” she asked.
“Yes, I hope so”, I said, “I have to attend an official function with my husband, and the dress I am thinking of wearing is rather unforgiving, therefore I need some underwear that will give the illusion that under all this,” and I waved in the direction of my tummy, “I have the body of a svelte teenager”. The lady in question held on to the stainless steel display racks and racked with laughter. It wasn’t that bloody funny.
“The thing, thirty pounds is a lot to spend on a pair of pants that (and at this point I crossed my fingers) I doubt I shall ever wear again”. The lady wiped tears from her eyes, and led me down the escalator to the hosiery department.
“I have just the thing for you”, she said, “Ultimate Magic, 10 Denier Secret Support Waist Shaper Tights. And only eight pounds”. Golly. Eight quid for tights. Still, a darned sight cheaper than the knickers.
“Thank-you for all your help”.
“My pleasure, but be careful and remember…” at this point I thought she was going to finish her sentence by saying, ‘and remember to be home by midnight otherwise the magic tights will suddenly give up the will to live and your tummy will once more resort to being a pumpkin’. As it was she only advised me to remove all my rings before I put them on.
Having pushed the boat out on expensive hosiery, I dropped the hat idea. Instead I bought lunch. Well, to be fair, Uncle Dave bought lunch. I found him on the ground floor, also buying pants. It’s not an issue for men. By a certain age they know how much support they want ‘down there’ and just buy in bulk thereafter. Uncle Dave was no exception. Bundling several pairs of large, black y-fronts in an M&S bag, he was delighted to see me.
“Alice! I’ve got the day off. Let’s do lunch”. It is common knowledge that when he puts his mind to it, Uncle Dave, gastronomically speaking, goes for it. Cue two hours later and I had to be virtually shoe-horned behind my steering wheel, so full was my tummy. When I got home, it was all I could do to crawl upstairs, down half a bottle of milk of magnesium and have a very dyspeptic lie down. Hubby rang at 5pm, promptly.
“Get your glad rags on Alice, I’ll be there to pick you up in ten minutes.” I could have cried. My tummy was still as swollen as a Highland haggis and now I somehow had to persuade it into a very, very, very tight pair of tights without laddering them.
Our destination was a Mayor making ceremony, so going hatless was a good decision as the only ones worn were of the tricorn variety and accessorised by a plume of feathers and a mace bearer. I found it hard to concentrate on proceedings. My inner machinations were under great duress and I was terrified of passing wind every time we got up and down to pay respects to the past mayor and then the new incumbent. Were my tights to give up on me now then I had appalling images of me as some human balloon whose knot has been released; and I could see myself flying around the room getting smaller and smaller whilst simultaneously making very rude noises.
I thank God that the new mayor was a magnificent speaker and by the end of his speech I had almost forgotten that Vesuvius was grumbling dangerously under my dress. It was only at the reception afterwards when Hubby handed me a platter of pasty, scones and saffron bun that I baulked and ran for my life.

S.O.S

2011-05-22T05:41:00.000-07:00

For reasons which will become apparent all too soon, I have, unexpectedly, found myself with a bit of time on my hands. It is a double edged sword. I am now available at all hours to pour oil over troubled waters. This has meant that I have been more visible to my family and able to be there for various crises, which, when you have a large brood, happens daily to one or another of them.
Hubby as loyal subject and employee of her Majesty and acutely aware that his wife is now once again ensconced in the home can not, I guess it is fair to say, be called upon to talk to primary school teachers at 8.30 in the morning to discuss that bloody legendary King, Arthur and why it is that I have found my best Sabatier knives plunged into bits of rock and earth in the garden as my youngest decides she wants to re-enact ‘The Sword in Stone’. This will account for the dog’s mortified expression and reluctance to play as he is made to wear a wizard’s hat and draped in a towel “for a cloak, because he is Merlin”. Neither does Hubby need to have tricky conversations with Heads of sixth forms, who call in grave voices to let you know that ‘A’ level course work, “despite promises”, has yet to be handed in. It is my place to apologise and to placate them and to renew promises that essays will be handed in poste haste and beg them not to let whatever child it might be, fail. I am acutely aware of the nightmare it is for teachers at this time of year having to spend more than half their time chasing their students to make sure they hand in outstanding work before the deadlines set by the exam boards. Simultaneously attempting to quell my fury at errant teenagers, who have been very opportunity to be far better organised, I replace the receiver and, using my best text language, communicate to the teenager in question, my wrath.
Anyway, having dealt with the above and driven back and fore to Bristol Airport to retrieve my eldest daughter, I awoke on Tuesday morning feeling rather blue. Recent events have made it hard to feel motivated to do anything other than the usual domestic drudgery and because of it, the Black Dog has returned to plague me with his persistent barking. Luckily I can read the signs these days and for now he is metaphorically chained up in the garden, where although he can get on my nerves, he is at least far enough away to do too much damage.
I was washing up a few dishes and staring aimlessly out of the kitchen window, when the door-bell rang. Wiping my hands on a tea towel, I went to answer it. It was Mags, smiling, very hard.
“Do that much longer and you’ll get rictus”, I said.
“I was just trying to jolly you along”, she replied still beaming and thrusting a present into my hand.
“What’s this?” I asked, squeezing it.
“A bloody football”, she replied, “What on earth do you think it is?”
“A book?”
“Bravo. Well, open it then”, she said urging me along by undoing a square of wrapping paper.
It was a copy of Ruth Saberton’s new novel, ‘Ellie Andrews Gets Second Thoughts’.
“It only came out today”, continued Mags, “and I thought, seeing as you knew her, you’d like to read it. I ordered it from Amazon”. Dearest Mags, she was trying very hard to be bubbly and elicit some enthusiasm from me.
“Thank-you”, I said, “That was really thoughtful. I’ll read it soon” and I put the book on the sofa beside me.
“You will not read it soon, you will read it now. Take some time out, go for a drive somewhere, pull over and relish every sentence”.
“Ok, I will”. Mags wasn’t convinced that I would, and neither, believe me, was I.
“C’mon Alice, you must pull yourself out of this. Things will be sorted out, you’ll see. In the meantime, you have got to stick your chin out, throw your shoulders back, whistle a happy tune and just get on with it”. I smiled, you had to admire her tenacity.
“That’s more like it”, she said, giving me a hug, “Now, the sun is shining and you have petrol in your tank. Here are your sunglasses, car keys, your handbag and ‘Ellie Andrews’. Go and find sanctuary somewhere and not too far away”. I was ushered through the door before I could, with Garbo-esque style utter, “I vant to be alone”.
The next minute I was sitting in my car and the engine was running. Where to go? Fifteen minutes later and I was in the lounge of The Cawsand Bay Hotel. The manager Dan is new, but our friendship is old and he was very attentive, making sure that I had everything I needed.
“Coffee”, he said, putting a steaming cup next to me on a squishy sofa overlooking the bay. I sighed and pulled out my new book from my bag. An hour later I lifted my head. The sun was dancing on the little waves that were gently flopping onto the sand, the Ferry had arrived and instead of tourists tripping off it, fishermen with lobster pots jumped onto the sand. It was an idyllic scene and the book was everything you need when trying to escape your own mind. It is very funny and I found myself laughing out loud. Dear old Ruth, if her characters are anything to go by, she’s had as many scrapes as I have.
After another hour of idling the day away drinking coffee, reading chicklit and watching the sea, I felt renewed and as buoyed as the little red balls out in the bay.
There was no need to write an SOS in the sand after all. Mags, Ruth and Dan had saved my soul.

Inspiration.

2011-05-12T03:52:00.000-07:00

“What’s for dinner?” as I have said before, is singularly the most irksome question a child can ask. This is the first thing they enquire as they walk through the door. Never a ‘hello’, or a, ‘how was your day? It wouldn’t even be so bad if, when I inform them of the menu du jour, they replied approvingly, tapping their tummies in anticipation of a culinary delight and laying the table without having to be pressganged into it. Unfortunately with so many palates to placate, one of them invariably groans in disappointment whilst another groans ‘but it’s not my turn’.
When I just had two children and they were little, it was fairly simple and very much nursery fare: fish fingers, sausage and mash, fish pie, that sort of thing. They went to bed early and Hubby and I ate, in fairly civilised companionship, a fairly civilised and sophisticated diet. They grew older and two more children came along which also coincided with us living in America. Soon, sophisticated dinners a deux were a fond memory replaced by the regular ding-dong of the pizza delivery boy or trips to noisy, ‘family’ restaurants and ‘take-out’.
More recently two more young people have been added to the family inventory and any dreams whereby the younger children hanker over the simple pleasures of fish fingers and chips or the teenagers an Indian take-away or where Hubby and I long for a nice steak are truly, delusional. With eight mouths to feed, I must be thrifty but considerate of nutritious value. I am more of a dinner lady than domestic goddess.
If I make spaghetti bolognese one or two offspring will complain, ‘that’s boring’, or, ‘I’ve gone off it’, or worse, ‘I’ve gone off mince’. Puts paid to - Tuesday: chilli, Friday: Cottage Pie.
Soup is met by the youngest with, ‘It tastes funny’, presumably because it is not characteristically orange-red and from a tin, but because it is instead freshly pulped tomato and basil. Leek and potato soup was eyed up dubiously by at least three of the six children, whereas my son voted it, ‘lush’.
Spaghetti carbonara is, my eldest daughter insists, ‘too squelchy’ and salad, Hubby protests, ‘is too vegetarian’. The tines of my fork pick out the chicken and bacon on his plate, but he is not appeased, ‘Salad is a side dish, not a main meal. Just ask the French’.
The newest members of the family it must be said are a little easier to please or perhaps they are still being polite. No-nos though are beetroot, bananas, coffee and kidney, but as I have yet to find a recipe that incorporates those ingredients then they are happy to give most menus a go. And so it goes on and if there anything more tedious in eating the same dishes week in, week out than it must surely be in the shopping for and preparing of them.
Beuof bourgignon and mash; lasagne (this was before the mince embargo) and chicken and pasta has been done to death this winter, along with burgers and chips and toad in the hole. The odd occasion where I pushed the boat out and made chicken enchiladas complete with sour cream, guacamole and salsa accompaniments was met with such a ravenous chorus of approval that I thought that at any given moment a Mariachi band would burst through the front door all ruffled sleeves and sombreros to serenade me.
So, what with the unrelenting tedium and monotonous routine of auto-pilot supermarket shopping and the unenthusiastic response to my dinners something had to be done; I had to finally break out of menu malaise and be more pro-active. Jamie Oliver’s 30 Minute Meals has been sitting with innumerable other cook books on my kitchen book shelf for months. Greasy and unread. Nonetheless, I love Jamie Oliver, I admire his enthusiasm and his integrity, so if anyone was going to inspire me to get back into cooking it was going to be him.
30 minutes though? Perhaps, if you have a bevvy of sous chefs to do all your chopping and picking and counter cleaning. It could be argued, that with four teenagers in the house they could be called upon to help in a supporting role, but curiously, once they have enquired what it is they will be eating for dinner, they scarper lest they are asked to assist towards its denouement on the dinner table. Still, shopping for ingredients has been more appealing, instead of just robotically visiting the fruit and veg aisle and chucking chicken into my trolley, Jamie has provided me with a list to follow. Now, where all other cook books ask for fennel seeds and star anise and you never use them again, finding Schwartz’s herbs from circa 1987 in the back of your cupboard, Jamie asks that you make dishes using the ingredients time and again, so nothing goes off. Take egg whites for example. I cannot remember the times that having made meringues I have been unable to throw away the yolks, intending to make mayonnaise with them. Two days later and they are still in a dish in the fridge, shrivelled and congealed. Such ‘waste not want not’ shame is not an issue in this book, the egg yolks are all used up for the Wonky Summer pasta recipe which is on the same page as the meringue.
I have cooked my way through several pages, some with more success than others, but generally speaking there is a hushed and reverential silence as my family eat.
“I’ll get the yogurts”, said my son, clearing the table, replete.
“No need”, I replied, beaming proudly, “I’ve made pudding” and there was a collective gasp as I laid it in front of them.
“What is it?” asked Hubby.
“Warm, individual frangipane tarts with a dollop of crème fraiche”. Mention of the word frangipane and dollop in the same sentence and you’re onto a winner.

Happy and Glorious.

2011-05-05T07:31:00.000-07:00

As I write there are only hours to go, by Saturday morning it will all be over. The bunting will be drooping, the balloons deflated, children will have been lost and hopefully found in various crowds, military members will have breathed a sigh of relief that they no longer have to bull and polish, the outfits and who wore what will have been scrutinised by countless fashion police forces and ‘the dress’ will have been metaphorically taken apart, stitch by silk threaded, stitch.
At the moment though there are just a few hours to go and I am very excited. I can’t wait to pour my first flute of pink cava and nibble the first, of what I hope will be a many and varied, bridge roll. Hubby has given up rolling his eyes and instead of asking “but why?” just Sky Plusses any Will and Kate type programme. I have studied Hello, Ok, Country Life and a plethora of newspaper articles regarding the nuptials with more dedication and zeal than my son has shown towards his ‘A’ levels – but then that is not a good analogy to illustrate commitment to a cause. My more republican friends, of whom there are far too many, all think I’ve gone potty.
“You’ve lost the plot Alice; all that recent studying has made you a little bonkers”, they say.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about”, I reply imperiously as I simultaneously re-arrange my tiara until it is just so.
“What a waste of money”, they continue.
“How so?”, I answer them, “The mood of this country has been nothing but doom and gloom for over a year; all we ever hear about is war, natural disasters, government cuts, redundancies, fear, cancer and heartache. I’ve had it up to here.”
“But the taxpayer?”
“The taxpayer will always pay tax. The powers that be will always find ever more ways of making us pay it. I am not in the slightest bit bothered that some of it is going towards paying for a show that only we Brits know how to put on. How can you be so dour about pomp and ceremony and cavalry-men and military bands and golden carriages and princes and princesses and frocks and morning suits and wedding breakfasts? How? Isn’t it so much better than hearing that yet another business has gone into liquidation or yet another poor sod has lost his job or that planned equipment for a hospital has been shelved?”
They look defiant.
“I for one”, I continue, “am looking forward to a reprieve from what has come to be the norm of pessimism. A few brief hours of fun and frivolity. All that serious stuff will be just as serious next week.” And that is all I have to say to these party-poopers. Miserable gits all of them.
On that note, this afternoon was fabulous kick start to the festivities. My youngest daughters’ school PTA decided, like many schools in the area, that it would be a lovely idea to hold a street party for them complete with queen, party frocks, bunting, sausage rolls and wedding cake. Now, when you are sitting in the pub, chewing on the end of a pencil and coming up with ideas for the PTA’s involvement, bright ideas are just that and I got quite carried away with the notion of cakes and jelly and balloons and bunting and, “Oh and we could wear hats and make bridal favours!”, I remarked.
“This is not your wedding Alice”, added the secretary. Oh yes, I forgot. The point is, sitting in the pub making lists and being creative is a far cry from the actual doing. I should have learnt this now given that I have been involved with the PTA for eons. And whether is it the Christmas or Summer Fair, the coach trips or indeed a Royal Wedding, it is always the same faces that one sees cooking, carrying, ferrying and cleaning up. The children would not have had anywhere near as much fun if the PTA secretary had not schlepped around Wilkinson’s and stuffed her car full with paper plates and bunting and cups and flags and god knows what else. It would have been a meagre party without the help of another member and her husband inflating dozens of helium balloons or another full-time working mum who made hundreds of individual jellies or the Chair, who with four children and a part-time job, found time to bake three wedding cakes and me, who ran around Plymouth this week like a headless chicken, buying icing and ribbon and little silver balls and little silver horseshoes to decorate the cakes. I may never be Jane Asher, but they turned out rather well.
This morning found me up to my neck in cocktail sausage fat which clogged up my sink and sausage rolls that burnt my tongue – well I had to check they were properly cooked. I made a thousand and one trips back and fore to my car filling it up with all the stuff I’d either bought or made.
The Chair and I then spent ages weaving the bunting in and out of the school fence, before the cavalry arrived by way of other staff to help us heave tables and chairs, make gallons of squash, lay tables with red, white and blue napery and arrange the balloons, the flags, the cups and the plates. The school playground looked suitably resplendent and as the children paraded outside in their Sunday best with the Head as the queen in a very fetching gold crown, we were all moved to tears. We had toasts and best men speeches, the Queen cut the cake and prizes were handed out. I doubt they’ll ever forget it.
“Not much chance of forgetting it anyway”, whispered the Chair to me.
“Why?”
“Diamond Jubilee next year. We’ve got to do this all over again”.

Skin Deep

2011-05-05T07:28:00.000-07:00

For one reason or another I have done a lot of crying lately, the latest bout brought on my bloody son.
“But we raised you to be such a nice, middle class young man. Hell, your father and I paid for every type of class that little boys who are on the way up could possibly need to further their social connections. Look at the forthcoming nuptials, with the modest background you have, well, you could have easily married a Princess. No bloody luck now is there?”
“Ma, get things in perspective will you? I am not going to prison, I am not on drugs, I am…”
“It can only be a matter of time!”, I yelled back, ferocious tears flying onto every surface. Hubby was attempting a there, there dear approach and keeping quiet, but I knew that even he was upset.
“How can you equate a tattoo with prison and dugs mum, I mean, come on”.
“Oh don’t me so naïve”, I continued to bawl and wail, “You’ve seen Jeremy Kyle. All you need now is the debt, a dodgy dog and a baby and you’ll be sorted”.
“It’s a tattoo”, my son repeated, bored with having this conversation, because, “Everyone else who’s seen it likes it and thinks it’s tasteful”.
“Tattoos tasteful? Well that’s an oxymoron in itself, and you”, I added with a flourish, “are the moron”.
“It’s just a tattoo”, he opined.
“Can’t you understand”, said, blowing my nose into a tissue, “that when you were a baby, my first born precious boy, I dreamt of you growing up illustrious not illustrated?”
I felt Hubby wince behind me. This was hurting him as much. I couldn’t bear it a moment longer. It was very late; our daughter should have been home from her waitressing job by now. I’d go and meet her and escort her home. Sobbing I left the two men to discuss the ‘design’.
I picked up the dog’s lead and, as he looked back at me puzzled to be taken out at such a time, clipped it onto his collar and walked down the road to the pub. I tied the dog up outside and went in. It was completely empty except for the bar-man who stood at the bar, like some latter day Shylock, counting the takings for the night.
“Fifteen, sixteen, seventeen…”
I threw myself on a bar stool and howled anew, “My beautiful baby boy has gone and got a tattoo”, I howled.
The bar-man paused and lines of deep concentration ploughed themselves across his forehead, “..eighteen, nineteen, twenty, twenty-one”. He bagged the pennies.
“Alice”, he said, as patiently as was possible given that the poor chap genuinely just wanted to cash up and shut up shop for the night, “It’s what they do these days”. That was all the solace I was getting.
It’s at this point that I felt like some old timer in some run down bar, somewhere south of ‘Frisco and I almost felt compelled to demand, “Scotch, straight up”, as though my life and my marriage depended on it. This isn’t California though, it’s Cornwall. We do things differently and you sure as hell don’t demand hard liquor once the bar man has balanced the till and cashed up. Besides, my bar-man may not have seen the same movies as me and then we’d have been in a right pickle.
My daughter, it slowly dawned on me, was not in the building. She must have taken a different route to mine. I peeled myself off the bar stool, said goodnight to the bar-man, who had now turned his attention to the bank notes and was counting those. Without pausing in his addition, he nodded his head to acknowledge my departure and carried on as though it were nothing unusual to have weeping, middle aged women in his bar, late at night, even on a Wednesday.
I untied the dog, who slowly and sympathetically walked next to me. He seemed to sense that I was in no mood to be pulled along the waterfront. It was a beautiful night, utterly still and warm. The tide was in and the moon was reflected on the inky blackness of St John’s lake. I sat on one of the benches and looked upriver. Little boat lights twinkled mesmerizingly. It should have been perfect.
“May I join you?”. Luckily I recognised the voice to be my husband’s and not some drunken nutter so tapped the space on the bench next to me. Hubby sat down and put his arm around me. We sat in silence, both recalling periods of our son’s charmed boyhood.
“Beautiful, golden ringlets framed his gorgeous face” said Hubby wistfully. It’s now raven black.
“I sat for hours on village hall floors when he could barley sit up, with other mothers, who had also been sold the lie that circle time and musical instruments and running under a parachute canopy whilst simultaneously breastfeeding and singing five little speckled frogs was going to ensure an education at Oxbridge and a career in medicine”.
“He doesn’t want to go to Uni and doesn’t want a career in anything. The only chance of working in medicine will be a part-time job in Boots”.
“He’s had drama lessons, swimming, tap and ballet, guitar and driving lessons”.
“The guitar lessons paid off I suppose”, said Hubby.
“That was classical; he plays bass”.
“Good point”.
“It’s only a tattoo”, I said but we both knew that I didn’t really mean that. For 18 years we have tried our damndest to ensure that nothing hurts him. When he cut himself we picked him up and soothed him. We have applied ointments and balms, plasters and bandages. It is unsurprising therefore that we feel the pain that our baby’s skin has been branded, acutely.

Patriotic.

2011-04-22T02:48:00.000-07:00

“But I just want to get on Alice”, whined Hubby, rubbing his ‘leave period’ unshaven chin in frustration.
“Carpe diem darling, carpe diem”.
“Huh?” Latin is not one of Hubby’s strengths and were I utterly truthful, neither is it mine. I went to an average comprehensive and was put in a stream where the teachers felt that our little brains would fry if, along with science and algebra and our rampaging hormones, Latin verbs were thrown into the mix. They were probably quite right. I for one had bigger fish to fry than my brain at that age, snogging my 6th form boyfriend at break-time being one of them. Still, carpe diem is a Hallmark card classic. Surely everyone knows what it means?
“Seize the day darling, seize the day”.
“Your dad has just invested in a state of the art lawn mower and strimmer. I want to get on and cut the grass. The garden looks like the upper reaches of the Limpopo and to use your proverbial parlance, I want to ‘make hay while the sun shines’”.
There were many points that I wanted to make here, namely, a state of the art lawn mower is an oxymoron unless it’s a tractor; the upper reaches of the Limpopo is a river and is thus not analogous to an overgrown back garden in South East Cornwall; and lastly, to make hay while the sun shines is metaphoric . This last point I articulated.
“It does not literally mean to cut the grass and make hay just because it is a sunny day. What it actually implies is ‘Go to the beach with your wife and family as it’s a glorious day and, as this is England, tomorrow the weather will probably be crap. Ergo, perfect for lawn mowing, less ideal for a bucket and spade and a beer in the Devonport, Kingsand’”. This last point had the most effect and within half an hour a bag was packed and we’d spread out our rug on the pebbley beach, the children were in 7th heaven as was Hubby waving at me from the railings outside the pub, a pint of Skinner’s latest brew in his hand, fashionably named, ‘Kate loves Willy’.
The following day was grey. I detest the colour grey. Other than a warship and a marl, cashmere dressing gown that I wish I owned, the colour has little to recommend it.
Hubby however, on leave and an eager beaver, was out of the house just past the crack of dawn and keen to play with Dad’s new toy. ‘State of the art? My arse!’ As soon as he pressed the on switch it sounded as though CORMAC, the asphalt and macadam specialists were laying a B road in my garden.
We all vibrated in our beds. A sleepy Red-Head walked into my room rubbing her eyes,
“Is there an earthquake mummy?”, she asked.
“No sweetie”, I replied, “Just daddy cutting the grass”. He was like a man possessed. It was pointless trying to sleep.
We all got up and dressed and by the time most normal people during a holiday period are contemplating the first coffee of the day, Hubby had advanced from mowing to strimming, which, if at all possible, was even noisier. Bits of wood and bark were of no consequence to him. With that tool in his hands he was indomitable. The girls were too scared to go outside lest they be floored by flying debris. The cats and the dog cowered behind the cat-flap peering through it, wondering what on earth had possessed their master to brandish a machine that was destroying their natural habitat faster than any multi-national conglomerate with little regard for destroying swathes of the Brazilian rain forest. And me, a card carrying member of Greenpeace.
Eventually and with an Errol Flynn style, thigh slapping, flourish, Hubby desisted. He looked very pleased with himself. “There”, he said, hands on hips, surveying his bald lawn. The children and I looked at each other nervously. Hubby was obviously a man on a mission. His ability to relax when on leave is notoriously unmanageable. The man needs a project. Before you could say B&Q, I heard myself uttering, “The bathroom needs decorating”.
Already blue and white, we meandered around that orange DIY superstore looking for paint and decided on scarlet for the walls. To ‘dress’ the bathroom , I picked up a red, ‘Keep Calm and Carry On’ cushion for the Lloyd loom chair and on the way home insisted on stopping at TK Max for red towels. They didn’t have any, but what they did have and what I found I couldn’t live without, was an enormous, distressed style, union flag mirror. Debenhams provided the towels, a red bath rug and some red, pillar candles. I was very pleased with my purchases. Hubby less so. He’d stayed in the car with the girls, assuming, rather erroneously as it transpired, that buying a bale of red towels would take approximately seven minutes. By the time I’d lugged the mirror and the other wrist cutting carrier bags up Royal Parade my arm had seized and Hubby had to unclasp the mirror from my crooked clasp.
A day later and the bathroom was finished. It is dressed to perfection. I invited Mags to the official unveiling. She was very quiet.
“Don’t you like it?” I asked, hurt.
She surveyed the red, white and blue; the union-flag mirror, the patriotic propaganda cushion and said, “In the words of Lloyd Grossman, ‘Who lives in a house like this?’”
Nick, who is very much at home here these days, popped his head in and quipped “Alice, it’s over to you”.
I’ll concede that with a bit of bunting it may well look as though I’ve taken the Royal Wedding pageant to heart, but one can’t argue though that it gives the euphemism, ‘on the throne’ a far deeper resonance.

So Many Children She Didn't Know What To Do..

2011-04-22T02:40:00.000-07:00

Our house, the first thing in the morning, is not for the faint hearted or for anyone of any nervous disposition. It was rather disconcerting then to discover that my 9 year old fits the former description to a tee. I’m surprised as I have always maintained that is the 6’ 5”, loping, long haired brother who is the most delicate of all my children. As a reminder, he is the one with fire-pants by the side of his bed, just in case the house goes up in flames one night and he finds himself on the pavement, modestly cupping his credentials. He is also the one who is quite literally terrified of wax mannequins, the type found in any tourist attraction where there are tableaux illustrating days of yore. Generally speaking these mannequins have by this time been there almost as long as the historical period they are depicting, their glass eyes glassier, the moustaches lopsided and years of dust having gathered in every crevice and fold of their fake skin, hair and costumes. To say these tableaux give my son the hee-bee-gee-bees would be an understatement. The thought of Flambards Victorian Village still has the capacity, 12 years on, to bring him out in a cold sweat.
And so the other morning, whilst he lay in his bed, his pants carefully by his side, Hubby and my eldest daughter having left for work and school respectively, all hell broke loose. Nick, our latest lost boy, who is a lot less lost of late, was running up and down the stairs as I prompted him with things to remember – books? Damn. He ran to his room before remerging from the basement.
“Glasses?” He looked at me before slapping his forehead.
By the time he’d found them I was making his packed lunch.
“Right then Nick”, I said handing him his lunch and his breakfast bagel, “Are you sure you have everything?”
He nodded, chomping .
“You’ve got your money, your books, your glasses and your phone?”
He looked stricken and once more ran to the basement. Up he came again. At this point other events had taken over. The younger girls had got up and were sitting at the dining table duly awaiting their breakfast. The 9 year old was excited. It has been exactly six weeks since she had her ears pierced and therefore this was the day that she could officially change them for another pair. She had been crossing off the days on her Dog Breeds calendar and now handed me a bottle of Claire’s ear care disinfectant and some pretty dragonfly studs.
At this juncture Jacob, who has just returned from checking out various universities, also emerged form the basement, in a fury.
“Flaming hell Alice”, he said, running his fingers through his hair, “I am going to be blind and uncontactable for the next few weeks”.
“Why?”, I asked simultaneously pulling at my daughter’s stubborn earring back.
“Because I bloody well left my glasses and charger at a friend’s house and now he’s gone back-packing until the end of May.”
Nick ran back up the stairs, waving his phone at me.
“I really am off this time”, he smiled.
“Really?”, I replied pointing at his feet.
“Daaarh”. I think he may just have had the micky taken out of him if he’d turned up at assembly with black, towelling slip on slippers adorning his feet. And this kid was expected to live alone in hostel?
Whilst all this toing and froing was occurring and Jacob was grabbing himself a hot cross bun, the 9 year old had gone a distinct pea-green colour.
“Oh mummy, I don’t like this sensation in my ears. I feel dizzy”, she said, before flopping onto the sofa and without any warning, vomited. Holy hell, I didn’t anticipate that one coming, neither did I anticipate that at that precise moment, the doorbell would ring. Nick, having now once again re-emerged from the basement, really was going to school and opened the door to our visitor. The first thing the man saw was a peculiarly coloured child throwing up onto a rug at the foot of a sofa, two hot and flustered teenage boys and a middle aged woman in a scarlet dressing gown and little else, bent over the aforementioned, puking child.
“Um, hello, Mrs Band”, he said, clearly terrified, “The Commander sent me. My ship deploys tomorrow and he said that it was ok to borrow a pair of tartan trousers?”.
It was the most random if not surreal comment to make and it stopped us in our tracks. Why on earth would he need tartan trousers was only one of the questions I could have asked him, but this really wasn’t the time nor more specifically, the place.
Nick, shrugged his shoulders and I’m sure that, albeit fleetingly, his expression seemed to imply the thought that, a hostel could be quite comfortable after all. Jacob took over the role of nurse, before I finally recovered my manners and said “Tartan trews? Of course, of course”. I hurried to Hubby’s wardrobe, dragged the trousers from the hanger and ran back and handed them over. The 9 year old was still heaving. Our visitor was shifting nervously from foot to foot, before the Red-Head, in her own inimitable fashion, offered her unique, view on the world,
“Do you think the Queen likes chavs?”
I motioned to the tormented trouser borrower that he did not need to answer this question and with one had on the door handle and the other thrusting the tartan into his chest, showed him out.
“Will there be chavs at the wedding mummy?”
“I don’t think so sweetie”. Lily Langtry, who had recovered from her fainting fit, elaborated.
“Dad shouted at the telly that Wayne Rooney was an effing chav”.
“Yes, well the Roonies aren’t going to the Royal wedding whereas the Beckhams are”.
“Is that because she’s Posh?”

Ooh La La.

2011-04-22T02:12:00.000-07:00

I have been called a lot of names over the years. ‘Fat Cow’ springs to mind. It is therefore hard to accept this new moniker of ‘Angel’ which does not sit at all comfortably upon my shoulders. Surely the definition of angel is a celestial being put on earth as God’s messenger. Pure and perfect. Divine. Spiritual. Superior to man in power and intelligence. Anyone who knows me well would read the preceding words and laugh. Uproariously.
The more I think of it, the name Angel Band has a certain je ne c’est quoi to it, alas I cannot claim it as my own as I am as flawed and as imperfect as every other human being on this earth. Hubby and I haven’t even done anything particularly kind, in fact as functioning members of the human race, I consider looking out for our fellow humans as a moral obligation. It is the right thing to do. It is as simple as that. And so the situation is this, a mum at my children’s school died last month. We weren’t best friends, but I liked her. She was very young and had four lovely children: a baby, a boy of 6 and a girl of 7 and a lovely lad of 17. They have different fathers and have thus all gone their separate ways, all except the 17 year old, who has no relationship with his father and, given his age - social services in their infinite wisdom, deem a grieving schoolboy of 17 needing the comfort, love and security of a big family, superfluous and so the lad has found himself, homeless.
Actually, I think that I can count the seconds of how long he was literally without four walls and a roof, around 180, or however long it was for his belongings to be driven from his old address to ours. The rest of the time was spent setting up his room for him, unpacking and plugging in his lovely telly. His mother had splashed out, with weeks to live, I guess you would. Given the trauma he has suffered over the past few weeks, losing his mum, his siblings, his home and a lot of his ‘stuff’, he is bearing up extremely well. I am proud of my children and my other lost boy for having welcomed him with open arms and treating him like a well used piece of furniture – albeit one that needs a little TLC, lest any more stuffing fall out.
I like to think that having him live with us has given him a chance. A chance to save his soul. God knows how embittered and angry he might have become if, when he needed to be shown comfort and human compassion most in his life, he’d been shunned. What gives me the greatest comfort is hoping that by holding out the hand of friendship, it has made him realise that the world is not such a bad place, and that he will grow up a fine young man and in turn do his bit. Lead by example, I was always told, although when one’s daughters strut around in high heels and make-up, that particular idiom does not work necessarily work in one’s favour.
And so that’s where we’re at, a great big family ever more like the Waltons than before. The house is filthy, the washing is piling up, ironing is now a number of items folded; food is served as though in a canteen, conversation is loud and opinions are vehement and emphatic. Nothing new in other words.
Getting out, I must admit, when Hubby wants me suited and booted by a certain time, is more of a challenge. Supper takes some planning. There are, depending on the menu, a lot of vegetables to peel, meat to cook, pasta to boil and bread to butter. My tea bag consumption has, since October, increased almost one hundred fold. A packet of biscuits lasts no more than 5 minutes, a tray of yogurts is eaten at one sitting and cocoa-cola is rationed, along with orange juice.
“There’s plenty of water in the tap”, I say, echoing my mother.
Of course, when one is in a rush because one’s husband wants you to look vaguely presentable, garlic butter has the habit of stymieing your efforts and last night was no exception. Lasagne, salad and garlic bread were the dish du jour, but as I retrieved the bread from the oven, the butter ran off the baking tray, down my sleeve and into my bra. It was hot. It was smelly. All I needed was a Gauloises hanging from the corner of my mouth and a jaunty beret atop my head and I would have looked and smelt, stereo-typically Francais.
Hubby was incensed, “For Pete’s sake Alice, there are four perfectly able bodied teenagers in this house. Two of them are legally men. Couldn’t you have delegated just this once?”
I ran upstairs whipping off my top and oily bra as I went. Luckily, as all the kids were chowing down, all were spared that sight. I mopped and scrubbed away at my skin until it was raw. I bent my head down towards my cleavage and sniffed heartily. Damn. I still smelt like a sodding salad. I threw on a clean bra and different shirt and all the time Hubby was roaring at me. It was a very fancy occasion, we couldn’t be late. I slipped my feet into killer shoes and for good measure, liberally sprayed some perfume over the offending odour. Hyper-ventilating, I ran downstairs and into Hubby’s arms.
“Dear God Alice, you smell like a French prostitute”.
“I most sincerely hope that you are not speaking from experience”, I replied loftily as I made my way to a waiting car.

Streets of London.

2011-03-29T02:27:00.000-07:00

It was the tonic we needed. Two full days. No work. No household chores. No cooking. No kids. Well, for Dad that wasn’t exactly true as he had his daughter either trailing behind, gazing longingly into designer shops, or blazing forward, A-Z in hand, leading the way.
First things first, having bought the train tickets, we arrived at Plymouth railway station at some utterly ungodly hour in the morning and, after a restorative coffee, made our way along a snaking train before we found our carriage. Dad looked at our bags. He had a wash bag, a posh shirt that I’d bought him for Christmas and some clean pants (at least I assumed he’d brought some clean pants). I, on the other hand, had a weekend bag which held, a few frocks – just in case, not quite sure in case of what, a hairdryer, various shoes of differing heel height, make-up, jewellery and nightwear. That was nothing compared to a handbag, a laptop and a Morrison’s, heavy duty, carrier bag which held so much school stuff that only a trainee teacher could comprehend. Dad was certainly stymied by it.
“Sweetheart, did you really need to bring this?”, he asked, huffing and puffing in my wake. I waved him to hurry up.
“Course Dad, loads of work to do. Long train journey is the perfect opportunity”, I wasn’t really concentrating on his needs as he wheezed behind me. My mind was set on finding our seats. I held the tickets at arms length and was most disappointed to find us squished into a tiny space.
“Where’s the table?”, I pondered out loud, “I need a table. I can’t do all this work on a…flap”.
Dad dropped the bags.
“No Alice, you can’t. Let’s upgrade”. My eyes lit up. Upgrade? I didn’t hesitate.
“Yes, let’s”. We made our way up the train to the pointy end, the one the other side of café and sprawled in big, comfy chairs. A big smile animated my face.
“This is the life Dad”, I said, slipping my shoes off and opening my lap top bag. I plugged the charger into the ‘wall’ and started to work.
“Good on you Alice”, said Dad, approvingly, “And we haven’t even got to the big Sainsbury’s yet”.
Seemingly 24 hours later and a journey I’m sure that went via Aberdeen, we arrived in London.
Two country bumpkins, we heaved luggage to the taxi stand and waited in line. They’ve got queuing for a taxi down to a fine art in London and it wasn’t long before we were hurtling up Park Lane. Bliss. Until it dawned on me that we shouldn’t be anywhere near Park Lane. Shizer. I checked my friend’s address. Balls. I’d given the driver the wrong address, worse, Dad would think I was an incompetent buffoon. I moved out of my seat and attempted a subtle discourse with the driver along the lines of “I’m terribly sorry, but we’re going the wrong way”.
“What was that Alice?” asked Dad. Drat. He’s deaf as a post most of the time, I won’t fall for that next time, it must be bloody selective.
“No worries Dad. Slight GPS malfunction, that’s all”, I explained, tapping him reassuringly on the arm. Within a second, the taxi had turned 180 degrees on a sixpence and we were, at last heading, towards our destination. Dad was in his element, sitting back and enjoying the view, humming quite contentedly, ‘The Streets of London’.
“Oi, Ralph McTell”, I said to Dad, “We’re here”. Dad tipped the taxi driver generously for having an incompetent daughter and, then after a few steps, we unlocked the door into the flat.
“Well, well”, he said, looking around, “This is very London I must say”. I never really ascertained what ‘very London’ was as we had to hot foot it almost immediately across Hyde Park to the Royal Albert Hall.
“All sorts of types up here isn’t there?” announced Dad as woman boinged her way past us, like a latter day Zebedee on what can only be described as stilts with springs; one attached to each foot. Air-trekkers, by all accounts.
Dad was further impressed that far from yet another cramped seating situation, I’d pushed the boat out and we had a box at our disposal. There was a Moet & Chandon bar behind us, which dad rather infuriatingly seemed to ignore rather than acknowledge. Never mind, it was a wonderful concert. A real Classical Spectacular, although, I must admit, HM Royal Marine Band at HMS Raleigh are just as impressive if with fewer pyrotechnic wizadry.
It had been a long day. By the time the matinee performance had ended we were both pooped, but it is so rare that the two of us have time to hang out together that I was determined we would keep going until we dropped, which is why it was, that an hour later, as dusk began to settle over the West End of London and an enormous moon seemed to have trouble staying in the sky, we meandered around Soho, one hand holding on tightly to my A-Z, the other clutching Dad’s.
“C’mon”, I said for the hundredth time that day. It’s not that he couldn’t keep up with me, but that he just kept lingering in front of shop windows that were nothing, if not a little indiscreet. I do not mean that he peered into the more seedy of these windows, good lord no, but it would be fair to say however, that to him a gents outfitters is exactly that, he was a little surprised then when the very gay shop assistant gave him a little camp wave, before the salutation, “Bonjour matelot!” We hurried on, laughing, “It must have been your Jolly Jack Tar tattoos that gave you away Dad”.
Not for the first time that day, Dad shook his head with the refrain, “Well it is very London I must say.”

Superhero?

2011-03-29T02:24:00.000-07:00

So, first things first,. We have two new cars. Well, not exactly new, in fact one might go so far as to say they are quite old, but, and this is the crux of the argument- they go. From A-B, without hiccupping, without kangarooing and without the all too familiar, ominous noise of banging or rattling. This is more through luck than anything else, because, no sooner had Hubby and Dad been across country to purchase the second, more large family accommodating, car and had driven in convoy back to the wardroom for lunch to celebrate Dad’s not insignificant birthday than it all went, horribly wrong. I have been regaled thus: Hubby got half way out of the new car, too late to realise that the handbrake hadn’t been applied hard enough to secure it to a parking spot. Being on a slight incline, the car started to move, and rather horrifyingly it moved with Hubby’s leg sticking out of the door. Dad’s car was parked right next to Hubby’s and as Hubby frantically tried to apply the handbrake- which, Hubby realised rather too late, is placed on the right hand side of the driver, a rather alarming and in this case calamitous revelation given the vulnerable position of Hubby’s leg, the two cars rather predictably scraped together and Hubby could not get his leg out of the way fast enough to prevent it being crushed between the cars. How Hubby didn’t lose his leg is a miracle. The metal inside the driver’s door is buckled where his leg got in the way.

It was a bad start to the new car that my dear husband had been so chuffed to find. Not only that, but it was after all Dad’s birthday, and not only that, but the poor guy had only just had his car returned from the garage where it had been rebuilt after a drunken driver had smashed into it late one night. It’s another story, that after the impact, which I heard from my bed, I’d hurriedly pulled a dressing gown around me, and ran outside to see what was going on before desperately trying to make the miscreant see sense and stay put at the scene of the crime. It’s a further story that the whole family were now also in their nightclothes out on the pavement; Hubby on the phone to the police, the teenagers looking on open mouthed and poor Dad, standing there bewildered, scratching his bald head, as I, naked under my dressing gown, ran up the street, hell for leather after a swaying drunkard, the whole while pleading with him to stay put. I didn’t stop until it got very dark and I could hear Hubby imploring me to come back. You’d have thought that the sight of my nether regions flapping under my dressing like some pornographic super hero would have been enough to apprehend the chap, but on reflection, it was probably more of an impetus to keep on running.
Suffice it to say then , the last thing that Dad needed on his big birthday was his car to be once again damaged, but as is Dad’s style, he was very magnanimous about it and I was very glad that I had spent a small fortune on four foot, silver, helium balloons that signified his age.We spent a pleasant evening, regardless, eating party food, drinking champagne and dousing Hubby in Arnica ointment.
The following day, a long scar disfiguring my nice, new car, I drove to my ‘Placement B’ school. The children are delightful and one can understand how teachers, however knackered and however disenchanted with the goings on in education, stick with the job. The kids are what it’s all about. I am surprised by how much I thoroughly enjoy standing at the front of the class and teaching my students. I am very enthusiastic. The trouble is, is that I tend to go ‘off script’ and my mentor, whilst being very positive and encouraging, had to point out that in an hours lesson on creative writing where the ‘learning objective’ – oh yes, the students must have an agenda these days – was to ‘explore genre, setting and characters’, I had spent fifteen minutes spouting on about Lent, Jesus in the wilderness and sacrifice.
“Rein yourself in Alice”, she advised, “Or you will never meet your objectives and when the head honchos come to call they will criticise you”. But it had been so apt. I’d provided pancakes and syrup and napkins, hell I’d even had the wherewithal to buy baby wipes for sticky little fingers. I felt it needed a little clarification as to why we gorge ourselves thus. I felt it just as pertinent to point out that in Mexico, Shrove Tuesday is referred to as Fat Tuesday and regale them with an anecdote of when we lived in America and how it was celebrated there. No doubt I see myself as some modern day Miss Jean Brodie, hell bent on given my students extra curricular information, to be the ‘crème de la crème. It doesn’t go down well with OFSTED apparently, they like ‘focus’ not imagination. Pah.
I sloped off to my next class, entirely made up of high achieving girls, who are up to debate against a class of equally bright boys. Printing information from the internet about girls versus boys, they found statistics about female incarceration.
“Are you familiar with that expression? Do you know what it means?”, I asked.
Rows of big eyes looked back at me, “Is that where they get burned miss?”.
Regardless of wounded car and wounded husband, I laughed all the way home.

A Warm Embrace.

2011-03-29T02:20:00.000-07:00

“Must you go gallivanting at every given opportunity?”, enquired Hubby beseechingly.
“Must we have this conversation every time we have a holiday?”, I retorted.
“Some of us are not on holiday”, he replied. I sighed. Here we go again. Hubby had better get used to the holiday situation if I pass this teaching course and find myself, every six weeks or so with a week or so off.
“The petrol will cost a fortune to Wiltshire you know”, Hubby added.
“I understand that, but once there I will spend a lot less on the kids as they’ll be happy to run amok in the garden with the other children and the free range chickens, the trampoline and the Avon and Kennet canal.” Hubby raised one eyebrow.
“For heaven’s sake I was using hyperbole for dramatic effect. They will not be going anywhere near the canal unless they are tethered to me. Ok?” For one fleeting moment I’m sure I saw a faraway look in Hubby’s eye that seemed to suggest, rather murderously “What if?”
“Ahem”. Hubby pulled himself together. “And I have no plans for mid winter bathing”.
The following day, I packed the Passat. Hubby was not best pleased about that either as it meant that I was leaving him with the clapped out, leaking like a sieve, Fiat.
“I’ll be bloody lucky if the car make sit as far as work.”
“Well it’s not going to make it to Wiltshire then is it?”. This was met with silence.
“Just take it easy Alice ok? Driving fast is not economically efficient regarding fuel consumption, nor is it responsible. I don’t want a phone call to say you’ve dented the ruddy thing because you drove into the back of another car. Remember, ‘two chevrons apart’”.
Prophetic words indeed. Driving along the M5, approaching Weston-Super-Mare, the car suddenly issued a directive from the warning light panel to STOP, STOP, STOP – it being German, it would have felt more comfortable to yell, HALT!, HALT!, HALT, but it was no less intimidating in English. Driving at 75mph and singing away to Buddy Holly, I was cut short in my tracks.
“Bloody hell”, I yelled.
“What’s wrong mummy?”.
“It says to stop because we are out of oil”. My mind raced, what to do for the best? Pull over on the hard shoulder and stand by the side of a terrifyingly busy M5 with two little girls and a dog or, continue until we were safe? I chose the latter. Soon, we were in the petrol station of a Morrison’s supermarket. I bought a container of oil, opened the car bonnet and looked at the engine. Hmm. Which one of these screw lids was the correct one, I pondered. As is often the case in these situations, the age of chivalry is proven to be far from dead. A chap appeared as by magic, gallantly rolled up his sleeves, unscrewed the oil cap, poured fresh oil into the thingy, checked my dipstick a couple of times and wiped it off with his hanky, before slamming my boot shut and checking all was well before leaving me to it.
The girls were impressed, “Who was that man mummy?”, the Red-Head asked.
“I don’t know, but he was very kind”.
“But if he was a stranger you shouldn’t have spoken to him. He could have kidnapped us.”
“Listen sweetheart, it would take a special sort of man to want to kidnap a middle aged woman, two little girls, a large hairy dog and a crappy car. Just ask your father.” We continued our journey, but on the M4 just before the Bath exit, the car, rather alarmingly started to squeak and make kangaroo jumps. I swore out loud.
“What is it now mummy?” asked the 9 year old.
“Bloody, bloody car”. The next services weren’t for miles and miles, I had no choice this time, but to pull over onto the hard shoulder. If I’d thought the M5 was busy, then by comparison to this race-track it was a drive in the countryside. We piled out of the car. Ensuring the girls were safe, whilst at the same time retrieving a golden retriever from the boot was hair raising. We clambered over the crash barrier and in the rain and wind, huddled together on tiny strip of grass verge. The lorries shook us as they trundled past in their droves. I called the AA.
“One of our patrol cars will be with you very shortly Mrs Band. Try not to worry”. Worry? I was terrified. The Red-Head was crying and clinging to me, both shivering from the cold. The dog was trembling and whimpering. Suddenly, the elder one started to sing, ‘These are a Few of my Favourite Things’. We picked up the refrain and by the time we’d worked through the whole of the Sound of Music and were about to embark on Doh- a-Deer again, the comforting, flashing, orange lights of an AA van hove into view.
My reaction on greeting ‘Mark’ was perhaps a little too welcoming. It was as though he had returned from war.
“Oh thank God”, I said, over and over, hugging him, “Thank God you are here. It is so wonderful to see you”. It must be a rewarding job. He bundled the girls into his van and towed me and the dog back to Bristol, waited until all the admin had been sorted and a hire car had been allocated before leaving us.
The garage ran a diagnostic test on the car. The prognosis was terminal. It was a write-off.
Hesitantly I dialled Hubby’s number. “You there safely?” he asked.
“Not quite. Remember you said you didn’t want me to ring saying I’d dented the car? Well…” He took the news as well as any man. As well as any man who has been told his ‘good’ car is now a worthless piece of scrap.

2+2

2011-02-25T12:05:00.000-08:00

“I could have cried Alice”, she said, pouring a hefty slug of chilled white wine into one of my nicer glasses, “I mean, really cried”. I wanted to be sympathetic. I wanted to share the bottle, put my feet up and agree, that yes, all men are bastards. Thing is, not only did Hubby rise to the occasion and pre-order me a personalised Valentine card from Moonpig.com, but I honestly haven’t got time to ponder the misgivings of thoughtless husbands. So, whilst poor Mags described her mortification on receiving, with great excitement, an enormous box of flowers from the postman, only to realise they were for the woman next door, I chewed my pencil and intermittently made sympathetic noises.
I was concentrating hard. I raked my fingers through my hair and bit the rubber off my pencil, jumping feet into the air as though electrocuted because the metal underneath had made contact with my fillings.
“Bloody hell”, I winced, rubbing my jaw.
“You can say that again”, added Mags. I’d forgotten she was there. I had hoped that, had she not been given the attention she craved, that she’d have downed her wine and gone home, unfortunately she was still tamping mad with her husband’s floral disappointment, so she stayed put to help. The point is, unless you are maths teacher trained to work with students with special needs you can’t assist me because I only respond to specialist help. In the end, I just had to be blunt.
“Mags, my love and dearest, bestest friend, whilst I fully sympathise, nay empathise with your disenchantment in the male species, I have a maths test in a couple of days time. You know as well as anyone how utterly useless I am at it and yet I have to pass this ruddy test or alas, no matter how hard I work at teaching and planning and assessments, targets, behaviour management, global dimension and safeguarding of the little darlings, I will not qualify. Therefore, I need you to go home that I may give changing decimals into percentages my utter devotion”.
“Well, if that’s how you feel”, she said, sticking her chin rather defiantly into the air, “Then I won’t hinder you another second”.
“Mags love”, I soothed, “Please don’t take umbrage, but it’s ok for you and Hubby and all the youngsters on my course who can simplify to the lowest common denominator with impunity. Trouble is, I never got it when I was five and I still don’t get it now I’m forty five”.
“Well what’s so hard?” she asked, adjusting her pashmina.
“All of it Mags, all of it”. I’d resorted to raking my hair again. And, like all those before her who have absolutely no grasp on what it is to be numerically challenged, she kissed me before airily adding, “Oh you’ll be fine”.
The door shut and once again I turned my attention to my book: QTS Numeracy Test, Pass First Time. I’ve been having private tuition since September by a local maths teacher and in fairness to the lad, he has been patient, kind and has enlightened me on many aspects of previously, nightmare inducing sums and yet, processing certain aspects of arithmetic, eludes me still. To genuinely struggle with a subject that most people can do on two hands, literally, is a horrible feeling. It makes me feel dumb and stupid, not helped by having often been the butt of jokes. Some so called friends have found it a spectator sport to goad me by throwing unreservedly random problems in my general direction. I have sat at dinner tables or in bars when the topic of my apparently hilarious handicap has reared its mortifying head and the company therein have found it highly entertaining to shout, “Go on Alice, what’s seven times eight; what’s eight times nine?” and I’ve had to mentally trawl through my tables searching for the correct answer.
“What’s twenty three per cent of seventy three?”, they titter, knowing I have no capacity whatsoever for finding the correct answer.
“Um”, I start, “Well, 20% would be, um, let me see, er..” They give up on me at this point, smug in their consensus of opinion that the woman in their midst is a thicky. Do you know what really gets my craw? Were I dyslexic they wouldn’t be half so cruel. I very much doubt they’d throw multisyllabic words at me and wait for me to stutter and stumble. They would never chuck a book at me demanding, “Go on, read it”. Why then is it ok to take mick out of my maths?
I’ve brought the subject up at Uni and all they can do is wave at me dismissively and advocate practise. It’s frustrating to say the least. Surely they want me to pass my course? They are helping a fellow student with dyslexia and what really cheeses me off is not the fact that he gets extra time to sit the literacy test but the fact that he gets recognition. I’ve heard staff speak to him in muted, gentle tones, offering all manner of ‘extra sessions and coping mechanisms’.
It could of course be argued that unless we can pass the basics in numeracy, literacy and ICT then we don’t deserve to be teachers. I disagree. Given time, I’ll eventually get an appropriate educated guess at an answer that isn’t too from the correct one. I would concur that for primary teachers, it is obviously essential that they know their times tables off by heart but when I am let loose in the classroom with John Donne and Andrew Marvell for example, I can never foresee an occasion when I say, “One moment whilst I get my calculator”. Similarly when I’m in Monsoon and there is 75% off a dress, I know I am getting a bloody bargain.

Hirsute.

2011-02-25T12:02:00.000-08:00

There is an old saying, which we are led to believe and which, like many sayings penned over the years, is a load of old cobblers, that is: children keep you young. Balderdash. Their very existence is a daily reminder of your own immortality, your straight ways; the values you realise never knew you had, but lo and behold, which you actually hold dear to your heart and which when discussed amongst the mocking youth of today, are it seems, hilarious.
Never have I been made to feel more of an antique, a relic from bygone days than I have this week. It started off innocuously enough, chatting to the lovely Kat, who has been a Godsend in coming to the house early in the morning, taking the youngest girls to school and them reversing the process in the afternoon. She is only 18, and I have known her family for years. Over a coffee one afternoon, I asked her if she was courting. I might as well have been talking to one of my past, international student lodgers. Kat just looked at me blankly.
“Sorry, Alice”, she said, “I don’t know what you mean”. Luckily, my teenage daughter, who has finally finished her sponsored silence, offered her assistance.
“It’s ok Kat”, she soothed, “My mum wants to know if you are going out with someone”. They both giggled. Not because I’d intruded into the secret life of teenagers but because I’d used such an obsolete expression. Kat had genuinely never heard the word, ‘courting’ before. I was as astounded.
“Really? Never?” I asked her.
Still giggling, she shook her head.
“Well what does you mother ask you then?”
“She just asks whether I’ve got a boyfriend”. I was astonished. My daughter could tell and was a bit cross with me.
“Not everyone lives and speaks as though they are residents of Downton Abbey you know mother”.
Indeed. “Just answer me this then, what on earth do you think William said to his father Charles, after a succession of ‘dates’ with Kate? ‘By the way dad, I’m seeing this girl’? I can’t imagine that”.
“Mum, for heaven’s sake, you cannot hold up the way the House of Windsor may speak to one another as a modern example of family discourse”. She is a bright one to talk.
Kat was looking increasingly confused.
“So, courting is when a boy and a girl are going out?”
“Yes”, I replied.
“And what’s that thing when someone has to go with you every time you want to see your boyfriend? That’s really old-fashioned too, ‘shepherding’ I think it’s called”. I rolled my eyes.
“Chaperoning. Kat, my love, unless you are gypsy or from any other ethnic minority , I doubt it is something you need to worry about”. It was enough for me; I picked up my coffee and left them to their contemporary, and in my opinion linguistically undernourished domain.
The following day however and you must pardon the expression, but for literary emphasis it must be employed, the modern world literally grabbed me by the short and curlies. I was at Uni. It was lunchtime and we were in our room, chatting. Three of the group have already been for interviews and have secured jobs for September. They were sharing the horrors of being interrogated by a student panel when one of my fellow female students tore the foil from a packet of Ibuprofen and gulped down a couple with a few swigs from her Pepsi Max.
“Are you ok?”, I asked, “Nasty headache?”. She let out a feminine belch, “No, off to get waxed after Uni. The pain-killers help”.
Turn away now, anyone who may be squeamish because what follows will be a shock to some, but, here goes. It is now deemed fashionable, no, I’d go so far as to say, de rigeur for any young woman, or in fact any woman who finds herself back on the market, to have to remove all bodily hair, ‘down there’. When I say remove, I am not talking about a nice trim, lest you should horrify fellow swimmers at the local baths with an unruly mane escaping from your swimsuit elastic but a full on excisement of all pubic hair. I forget how this torturous approach to depilation came into my consciousness I only remember being so shocked that I felt the need to share it with my son. The conversation went something like this:
“Very soon now you may come into close contact with a young lady’s parts. If you do, you must be very appreciative of it and hold it in reverence and whatever you do and whatever you find down there, be it hairy or be it not, just be grateful for it at all”. The idea of him recoiling in horror because she had not felt the heinous peer pressure to follow ‘what everyone else does’, very much concerned me.
And so, it seems, this fashion is now the norm. When I mentioned, that lunchtime, that I favoured the more natural method and tucked any stray hairs into my bathers, I was met with cries of disbelieving horror.
“That’s disgusting”, shuddered more than one.
“You have hair there?” asked another, utterly amazed. Now, although by the end of our ‘sharing’ session we had laughed so much we had tears pouring down our faces, it’s not actually funny at all.
To be honest, I find it depressing and ultimately deeply distressing that years after ‘women’s lib’ did their damndest for us, is to realise that it can only be the preponderance of easily available pornography that has led a generation of girls to now routinely visit a beauty salon to suffer almost intolerable pain in the name of being sexy and normal. Worst of all? That for a grown-up, sexually active woman, normal and sexy is looking like a little girl. Germaine Greer, it seems you burned your bra in vain.

Human Rights.

2011-02-09T01:09:00.000-08:00

My daughter mumbled something utterly incoherent from behind zipped up lips, stamped her foot and flounced out of the kitchen.
As is often my wont, I slumped onto a kitchen bar stool and sighed deeply. Having been around teenagers for many years, whether rearing them or teaching them, their behaviour rarely shocks or surprises, but boy does it wear me out. I thank God, or indeed my innate mothering skills for having raised young people who are, on the whole, socially acceptable darlings in whose company I am very fond. There are times however, that I find the causes young people take to heart, whilst terribly worthy, are also be terribly irking.
There are moments for instance, in the past, when my eldest daughter has flown the flag for any number of organisations and charities, which, as a family we have been pressganged into supporting. I have an extra large Leprosy t-shirt which is hauled from my knicker draw every time I need to bleach my hair; a very colourful Gay Pride one, which I wear to festivals (I’ve been to one) and a very small Greenpeace one that I shrank once and now use as a duster. As a family we have been more than generous. From my dad to my brother to various aunts and uncles, we have unanimously opened our purses or wallets; signed sponsor forms or cheered from the side-lines, whatever in fact it was that was desired of us to demonstrate solidarity for this child’s selfless and unstinting act of charity.
This last campaign though has found me, and I quote my 15 year old, “demonstrating a profound lack of patience”. In turn I can only nod my head because for 120 hours, she has taken a vow of silence.
Undoubtedly to most, the idea of a silent teenager is most appealing and I cannot argue that when she is out of sight and mind, it poses me no problems at all until I attempt to communicate with her. Then, for instance, calling up the stairs to inform her that dinner is ready and being met with silence drives me to distraction as there is nothing for it but to huff and puff up the stairs to make sure she is there. I am not overjoyed on being confronted by an extremely cross young woman, murmuring something along the lines of, “I heard you the first time: there is no need for you to barge in here”. I assume that’s what she’s saying anyway. It could be worse.
It’s a bloody long 120 hours, we are only half way through it and I have lost all empathy for the work of Amnesty International.
“Just tell me what you mean?” I demand as she tries to write a sentence in the air, “I don’t read oxygen”.
“Hmm-um-mm”, she replies, eyes flaring, voice deep and growly.
“For God’s sake, you sound like there’s something mentally wrong with you. JUST SPEAK! I won’t tell anyone. You can still have your sponsor money.” Once again she shakes her head emphatically and furiously scribbles, ‘I have moral integrity’ on a scrap of sticky paper.
“Suggesting I don’t, I suppose?”. With that infuriating insouciance of the young, she just shrugs her shoulders.
“Can you not understand how maddening this is?” I shout after her as, once again, she stamps her foot in fury and flees. I continue to shout:
“I’m telling you now young lady that I cannot tolerate one more bloody mumble, mutter or Post It note”.
That is where I slumped onto the kitchen chair.
My son walked in on me as I sat, there, heart pounding, tearing the lilac Post-It into itsy-bitsy shreds.
“What’s occurring ma?”, he asked, helping himself to some very expensive, Fox’s biscuits, “You’re looking stressed”. As he had no real interest in my health or well being, but instead needed an excuse to walk into the kitchen and pilfer chocolate biscuits, I was less tolerant that I would normally be of his between meals snacking, especially as he had no intention of eating one or two but secreting the whole box to his room for me find in a few weeks time and ultimately clear away.
“Given your level of involvement with your sister this week, you may or may not have noticed that she is mute; that muteness is causing me some consternation”.
“Rave on ma. Don’t sweat it. She gave me a cool badge and a groovy sticker and this”, he removed from his school blazer a bright pink pamphlet and handed it over to me. It was a passport, only not just any passport; this was a, My Rights Passport. I guffawed at the irony. Apparently all human beings are born free and equal.
“Until they start having kids”, I yelled. Alone, I flicked through the booklet. It contained the universal declaration of human rights. Of the 30 articles one or two seemed particularly pertinent. I sighed again.
I filled the dishwasher, scrubbed the pans that wouldn’t fit in, swept the floor; heaved an overflowing bin-liner out of the bin, tied it together, put it outside, Dettoxed the floor where baked beans had escaped from a hole in the bin liner into a gooey, cold, lumpy puddle on the kitchen floor. Then, with pen poised and Post-It notes at the ready, I opened my Human Rights Passport and wrote: ‘Article 4: No one shall be held in slavery or servitude. Nobody has the right to treat anyone as their slave. Not even teenagers’.
Evidently I added the final caveat before climbing the stairs and adhering both Post-its to the very surprised foreheads of my teenage children.

Origin of the Species.

2011-02-04T09:13:00.000-08:00

And the week had started so positively. I hadn’t expected it to. Being sent by Uni, back into the depths of Cornwall, this time to a primary school, I couldn’t see the point. Hubby was most unimpressed.
“I hope that they are going to reimburse you the petrol costs”.
“They are not”, I answered emphatically.
He was cross, “Well then, why can’t you go and observe at the girls’ school? It’s only up the road”. I had wondered that too. It did seem a little mad to have to travel over 70 odd miles, when surely, I could have found the same information locally, but, as I have learnt from experience, there is little point arguing. It gets you nowhere in education: they just see you as a belligerent trouble maker; instead I accepted the gig, packed my bag and drove.
It was wonderful! Truly wonderful! The school and children made me feel so welcome, but apart from that, it utterly revised my opinion on how children should be taught in their first two years at secondary school. How can a child be expected to go from a nurturing, positive environment where they have a close and warm relationship with one teacher and where, every forty minutes or so they change the topic of learning into, an alien school where, all of sudden, they are at the bottom of the heap, lost, out of their comfort zones and in some cases, expected to sit through 100 minute lessons? It’s barbaric. That could be the reason it dawned on me, that the attainment levels at Key Stage 3 drop so dramatically. These little darlings still desperately need the same secure, environment that they have known for the last six years in which they can flourish and garner confidence, before nasty teachers like me, start to ‘assess them’ and make them work solidly for an hour and forty minutes on a topic that, should they find challenging, makes their self-esteem plummet. If we lose them then, their interest and enthusiasm for learning is a dead loss.
Michael Gove would hate me but I’d relish the opportunity of a chat. And now, before I become disillusioned and beat. When I still have the energy to give him what for. When I can explain to him that in Year Two, there are six year olds in pith helmets, exploring a school, pretending for all their worth that they are on HMS Beagle and accompanying Darwin as he discovers the world around him. That they wander around the corridors pretending to be seasick, unearthing (carefully planted by their teacher) octopuses and coral and ants and heaven knows what and that the children are enthralled and fascinated by the whole experience. I want to say that on our return to the classroom the teacher told them that Darwin had been ‘exhilarated by his first observations’. The teacher then asked the little sweeties, what they thought exhilarated may mean. Now, not forgetting that only weeks before I’d been picked up for using the word ‘naïve’ with students four years older than them, I was astonished. On several counts. That a) this delving into vocabulary was encouraged and b) that so many kids gave it a go. “Extremely happy”, said one; “So excited”, said another. Darwin wasn’t the only one exhilarated. I was euphoric.
There it was. Proof, that at a very tender age, if children are encouraged to have a go and they in turn don’t feel intimidated or ‘thick’ or overwhelmed or switched off or whatever it is that happens to them when they go to big school that they learn without thinking about it. Surely it begs the question therefore that we should do as they do in America and in some counties of the UK – and provide a middle school education?
The literacy and numeracy levels of the 10-11 year olds that I met was impressive. Nothing had put them off. They were just encouraged every day to be fabulous. Why, when they move school should their rewards be stopped? A sticker in a planner cannot compete with the whole class giving them a rocket. A rocket was when the teacher and classmates made ‘blast off’ rocket noises and punched the air in triumph to recognise excellent work. I for one, would relish receiving a rocket at the end of the day. It would raise my self esteem inestimably.
And so it was that I waved goodbye to Year Six and returned to Uni. Within hours I was thoroughly depressed again. We spent the day trawling from one workshop to another being lectured by experts whose expertise was special educational needs. We were told again and again that it was our RESPONSIBILITY to ensure that our classrooms were inclusive; to ensure that we value diversity and are prepared to teach in increasingly diverse classrooms, thus ensuring that our SEN students are engaged and happy and will ultimately achieve economic wellbeing. I don’t need to be told that. I’m going to be a teacher. These are my hopes and aspirations for all my students. I do however need to be advised on how to achieve the impossible. How can one ordinary woman and oft harassed mother of four who can only work for so many hours a day, ensure that from the Gifted and Talented, to those on the autism spectrum; visually or hearing impaired; dyslexic, dyspraxic, discalculic; EAL or ADHD let alone all those in the middle get a properly inclusive, differentiated lesson?
So I asked. Someone had to. Apparently the ‘government underpins a move to inclusive education’. Thought as much. Like I said, I want a chat with Mr Gove. Now.

Red-Neck or Toff?

2011-01-26T10:42:00.000-08:00

A friend of Hubby’s recently invited me out. It was not some clandestine rendezvous involving dinner and a drink or even the pictures and a packet of chips. Nothing could be further from the truth. The conversation Hubby had with this chap, for I vaguely remember it after the Christmas ball, one night at the mess and it was along the lines of:
“Mate, next time you go out, take her with you will you? The old girl needs some fresh air”. I stood there in my finery, feeling for all the world, like an old horse. I must have said this last bit out loud for Hubby quipped, “More like an old nag”. The two men obviously found this hilarious enough to chink their glasses together. As if suddenly overwhelmed to attempt a modicum of discretion, he lowered his voice, “Seriously mate, she’s driving us all crazy. Assessments, assignments. A Saturday away would do us all the power of good.” He cast his eye in my glowering, direction, “Only got your best interests at heart Alice love”, he added in a most jocular fashion, slapping my sequined if bristling, behind.
A week ago I got an email from the aforementioned friend to dress up warmly, bring some wellies and to meet him and his friends on Saturday at an address, miles away in the country. I was most intrigued but couldn’t find the location on any map, so my dear old lovely dad, leant me his dear and not so old car and, more importantly, his Satnav. I have never driven by satellite navigation before, preferring to rely on research, maps and asking strangers if research and maps did not suffice. It takes a little getting used to therefore to put your trust and faith in a computerised woman, one whom you know for a fact has never been to the place you are now hoping to arrive at in an hour’s time and you can only blithely follow her insistence to turn left at a particular junction and right in so many, point whatever of a mile.
Unbelievably, even though the route had to be recalculated twice as doubt got the better of me, I arrived in a muddy farm yard at precisely the time anticipated on the Satnav. At this point, I still had no idea what sort of day out I’d agreed to but, knowing that he was an outdoorsy sort, anticipated that it must have something to do with horses. As I got out of dad’s car and pulled on my pink Hunter wellies and was introduced to the others, I knew immediately that horses were not going to be on the agenda. There were so many Barbour jackets shaking my hand that to be honest I half expected to meet the Queen. Under the green wax jackets the men wore tattersall check shirts tied at the neck with silk, bird motif, sharp, Windsor knots. On their legs they wore breeks (I was put right when I referred to them as pedal pushers) and tasselled garters. All wore a tweed, flat cap.
The women wore a similar, if jauntier combination. Thank God Hubby had leant me his Barbour, it may have drowned me and I doubt that The Filed magazine will be asking for my services anytime soon but at least I was dressed in the right colour. Or so I thought.
“Trying to frighten the pheasants to death Alice?” laughed my host, “Pink wellies will do the trick!”
“Pheasants?” My eyes were as wide as saucers.
“Yes Alice. Pheasant. Don’t look so horrified. Come and have a drink”. I’ll say this for the huntin’, shootin’, fishin’ community, they’re a convivial breed. It was 9.30am as Hubby’s friend ushered me into the barn; immediately his wife thrust a glass of sloe gin into my hand, “Or would you prefer a port?”
Within ten minutes I was starting to tremble. I’d only ever used a spud gun before and even then the potato was dead. A very dashing young man called Ade, followed faithfully by several black Labradors, was to show me the ropes. We took our places at our ‘peg’. I have a glossary of new words at my disposal. Ade taught me how to load my gun and how to break it, this has nothing to do with actually breaking it. I wasn’t confident and so, as we walked, I felt and looked like Private Jones in the closing credits of Dad’s Army, clutching my gun, eyes darting hither and yon for the enemy. Ade explained the safety procedures. All I had to do was spot a bird, aim and fire. We heard the beaters in the distant copse. I held my breath. Suddenly, a mighty flap of feathers flew overhead. I shut my eyes and fired. I didn’t expect such noise nor recoil.
A bird fell at my feet. I gulped.
“Did I?”, I barely dared ask.
“Shoot it?” asked Ade. I nodded.
“No”. Thank God. They put me on beating duties after that and out of pity, handed me a brace at the end of the day. Nothing like knowing the provenance of your quarry. I couldn’t keep it quiet though. The photos are on Facebook along with the rather ignominious comment, ‘Bloody hell! It’s Sarah Palin!’

Curriculum Vitae.

2011-01-20T09:28:00.000-08:00

“That’s it”, I said, slamming down the lid of my laptop, “I’m never going to get a job”. Hubby, who had only been home a matter of minutes and who was no doubt, looking forward to snuggling on the sofa with a daughter or two before the evening’s onslaught began, sighed deeply.
“What is it now?”, he asked wearily, taking off his coat.
“This!”, I spat, lifting the lid again and gesticulating furiously at my computer.
“What has it done to you to make you so cross? It is an inanimate object”. I could, at this point, have thrown that last comment back in his face given his severe lack of humour two days previously when the new tv we’d bought in the sale had not fitted into the cubby hole in the sitting room where the tv resides. This meant that Hubby had to apply hammer and saw before he could sit back with a beer and gaze at his new, flat screen. He was very grumpy. Very grumpy indeed.
Instead I bit my lip and pouted a little. Hubby looked over my shoulder.
“So, what’s the problem love?”. His tone was decidedly more delicate. Perhaps he had remembered his contretemps with the MDF shelf and a 32 inch Toshiba.
“I’m unemployable”, I groaned, “I’m trying to write my CV but it’s a joke. I don’t know where to start. Who’s going to give a 45 year old woman a job who, for the past, almost 20 years, has been out of the serious job market? Making cappuccinos in a cafe doesn’t count and neither does the not, inconsiderable task of raising four children. Besides, I can barely get them to write their Christmas thank-you letters, so they are hardly likely to write their old mother a reference”.
At this juncture both my eldest children and Jacob the lodger, walked in.
“I’d give you a reference ma”, said my son, “You are a great cook and bon vivant!”
“Very kind of you my love but I’m not going for a job as a dinner lady”.
“Good point”.
“You are good at spelling mummy” added the 15 year old, “and you like poetry”.
“Yeah and look how you’ve taken me in Alice. Surely that comes under pastoral care or something?”
I smiled, “Listen kids, this is terribly sweet but there’s a little bit more to it than that. It has been quite a job bringing you all up and whilst the jury is still out”, I looked rather pointedly at my raven haired rocker of a son, “on how you may eventually turn out, you are at least not drug taking, little old lady attacking, car-jacking ASBOS. Unfortunately that means for knack all on my CV”.
“But mummy”, interjected my 15 year old daughter, “ if you have inspired us to read all sorts of works of literature and care about punctuation and grammar and how we construct a sentence, then I’m sure that you can inspire other young minds too”. I could have eaten her.
“Thank-you darling, I’ve also taught you all about persuasive speeches if that was anything to go by, I’m just not quite sure how to include that on my CV. Present teenagers recommend? I don’t think it would wash with the Head.” The Red-Head came looking for me and once found, climbed onto my lap.
“How was school?” I asked her, burying my face into her newly washed hair.
“We are learning all about the ancient Greeks”.
“Wow! That’s interesting”, I said.
“Yes but why were they all ancient? Wasn’t anybody young?” I looked at her askance. Her siblings laughed. The eight year old wandered in.
“I’ve tried explaining it to her mummy but she doesn’t get it” and as if to prove a point she came right into her sister’s face and said, very pointedly, “ These people lived a long-long-long-long-long-long-long-long, long time ago. That’s why they are ancient and not because they are all extremely old. Duh!”
We were all now in the dining room, seven humans, a dog and three cats. Almost everyone arguing with the other about some subject or other. The youngest were discussing the chronological intricacies of historical anthropology.
“So, you see after the Ancient Greeks came the Romans, followed by the Anglo-Saxons, followed by the Vikings. Then there was the Victorians..”
“When was baby Jesus then?”, asked the Red-Head. The eight year old scratched her head.
“Not sure”, she said, “After the Vikings maybe”.
There was a knock at the door and dad walked in.
“Alice dear” he said, waving a newspaper at me, “I’ve almost finished the crossword. Stuck on the last one. With whom was Yeats in love?”
“Maud Gonne”, I replied perfunctorily.
“Mum”, asked the 15 year old, “Can you help me with my essay? I need to analyse forms of love in Romeo and Juliet”.
“Yeah ma and I need help with The Great Gatsby and…”
“The decline of the American Dream?” He looked amazed.
“It’s always about that”, I said. Passionate about my subject, I can simultaneously inspire young minds and help old dads. Where oh where, can I insert that into my Curriculum Vitae?

Canned Laughter.

2011-01-20T09:27:00.000-08:00

Is it any wonder that we embark on a New Year beset by the nastiest of bugs and germs when the last few weeks has seen such a contrast in temperatures? Only a few days ago, the pavement outside my house was as frozen as the northern tundra; its ice as slippery as any glacial counterpart if the countless cartoon like scrabblings of pedestrians, desperately attempting to stay upright before they fell on their bottoms, was anything to go by. Now that the temperature has risen by almost 15 degrees, the bacteria are procreating like spring time bunnies; consequently, the rubbish which is piled outside our back door and which when frozen, only looked objectionable, now smells offensive too.
If only what happens outside would stay outside, unfortunately, the indoor viruses are spreading through this family as quickly as God knows what through the decaying and defrosting turkey carcass in a black bin-liner.
There is so much to do and I am running out of hours in which to do it. By Tuesday, I have to write a pretend letter of application for a job, in order, I presume, to demonstrate to our uni tutors that we have the wherewithal to string a decent sentence together whilst selling our skills as young bright things, intent on inspiring young minds. The being young thing is proving to be a bit of a challenge.There are other tasks even more onerous to complete that I cannot actually face and have thus shoved them all to the back of my mind. At least I thought that’s where worries were stored, however, given the gnawing feeling gripping my tummy very early, every morning, one must assume that all one’s demons and inner conscience has little to do with the mind and an awful lot to do with the gut.
Hubby has been a dead loss. For over a week now he has been dressed in the most appalling of garments, coughing, spluttering and nose blowing, resolute in not moving from in front of the fire or his armchair, a blanket over his knees, his glasses perched on his sweaty and snivelling nose, as he peered through them at the television set. I have lost count of the number of ‘social engagements’ we’ve missed out on.
Fortuitously, I have until these past 24 hours, been hale and hearty. How could I not? There was 44 metres of wrapping paper to get through – I counted the empty cardboard tubes. Eleven rolls, each four metres long. That’s a lot of paper and even more sellotape, revolutionised this year by a contraption on my wrist that dispensed sticky tape at the rate of knots. Good job really as it was a one woman show. As was the Christmas Eve party, the day itself, the cooking for 13, the magic, the madness, the mayhem. The parties, the pantos, the games, the sausage rolls. The sales, the shopping and the charades and not only the parlour game but the whole metaphor for happy families. It is no wonder that I have finally crashed and burned.
Even Mags, whom I depend upon to rouse my spirits, has herself been in the depths of despair. Frozen in time in a village cut off from the rest of polite society, trapped in the company of a far less polite mother-in-law, she made a heroic effort to reach me on Christmas Eve. She is evidently less well read than she professes to be otherwise she would have known the recklessness of venturing out into the icy wastes and that slamming the door of her 4x4 in a fit of pique and yelling “I’m just going outside and may be some time”, would have only scarified the car, nothing else. And so it came to pass. Only a couple of hundred yards into her polar expedition, the car and all of its four by four, flipping useless wheels, hurtled into a wall. Her car and wall are dented. She is unhurt. Her marriage less so. Her mother-in-law has, it goes without saying, taken every opportunity to tut-tut and gang up on her with her husband, calling her fool-hardy, selfish and irresponsible. In turn and I have it on good authority as Mags rang me on her mobile from the far corners of a frosty field to tell me so, that she screamed back with, “Not as irresponsible as when you had unprotected sex the night he was conceived”, simultaneously jabbing her until then, smug husband in the arm with a hot, oil-filled turkey baster.
“Shizer”, I replied, “What happened then?”
“The old boot demanded on being taken home, but the car is, quite literally, off the road and the trains aren’t running either, so we have no alternative other than to endure each other until such time as a thaw occurs, either in relations or in the weather, whichever comes first”.
The main difference between modern life and its sitcom counterpart is that it would be infinitely more bearable if only we could hear the studio audience laugh once in a while.

Observation.

2010-12-27T05:46:00.000-08:00

“What the hell is it now?” asked Hubby as I came in from work, ran through the dining room and threw myself onto the sofa and buried my face into a silk cushion, my shoulders heaving.
“I’m a hopeless teacher”, I sobbed. Hubby diplomatically removed the silk cushion and replaced it with an old chenille one. The one the dog favours. Amorously.
“There, there love”, he said, passing me a bit of used, stiff tissue, “I’m sure you can’t be that bad”.
“You have no idea”, I hiccupped, “I’ve been observed so closely by so many people this week it’s unbelievable. Fred West wasn’t under as much scrutiny. He couldn’t have been. He was left alone long enough to top himself”.
Hubby heaved me off the sofa and guided me into the dining room. He plonked me onto a chair and poured me a sherry.
“Right. Tell me all about it”. I was about to, when Mags walked in.
“Coo-ee”, she called, “So, how did it go?” My blotchy face and puffy eyes spoke volumes.
“Ah”, she added, helping herself to the Harvey’s Bristol Ceam, “Not so well I take it?”
Tears started anew as I tried to explain the last couple of days. “And I’m so tired”, I sniffed, “It’s been such a drive every day and I’ve been in school by ten past seven for a week and I put so much effort into that bloody lesson. I can’t believe I was being formally observed. I mean, how hard can it be understand a ballad?”
Hubby shrugged his shoulders. Ok, so he was the wrong man to ask.
“What was the problem?” asked Mags, now emptying a bag of Sensations Peking Spare Rib crackers into a bowl, “Did you go with the Johnny Cash idea?” she munched.
It is no longer considered teaching these days if one just stands at the front of the class and spouts knowledge at kids. Reciting a poem, getting the children to open a poetry book, annotate the poem and then write their own is so last century. So, to illustrate the lyrical, story-telling form of a ballad, I downloaded a Johnny Cash number, had a Powerpoint slide show attempting to define what a ballad is, followed by an example of a ballad written by Robert Graves. After that, I read them a Christmas story with such expression and animation that I’d have given anyone on Jackanory a run for their money and then, having prepared the next task by already writing the four first stanzas of a ballad based on the story I’d read them, (these days referred to as differentiaton) all the little darlings had to do in turn was finish it off.
“What was the issue then?” crunched Mags.
I read my lesson observation notes, “Not all students engaged. I didn’t differentiate enough”. Hubby scratched his head. “Huh?”, he asked. Bless him. He went to school even longer ago than I, in the days where one was expected to sit up and shut up, else a bloody great big, hard, blackboard duster would be hurled in the general direction of your conk. He is also the Commander of a training establishment and, whilst he would never condone the blackboard duster method of discipline, neither is he into what he considers to be, namby-pamby ways.
“It’s such conflicting advice”, I said in a little voice, “On the one hand I was told that I’d been creative, well prepared and resourceful and the next that not everyone had got it. I was also advised that I’d done too much for them but yet that it was too difficult for some. Short of holding their pens and guiding their hands, I really don’t know what more I could do.”
Hubby kissed me and Mags hugged me and we polished off the crisps and most of the sherry. Two days later on my final day at my first placement school, I felt like Peter O’Toole in Goodbye Mr Chips. Who would have thought that I’d be so attached to Years 7, 8 and 9?
“Goodbye, my dear children” I started, “It has been a pleasure and a privilege to teach you. Make me proud by having high expectations of yourself and being successful as you move up through the school”.
“Cheers miss”, said one, until another, rather mortifyingly, started a Hip-hip-hooray chant. As they filed out of the door, one or two students held back. A little girl approached me with a hand made card, “Thanks Miss, I’ll really miss you”. In a civilised society, I would have given her a big hug, unfortunately all that was allowed was a thank you. Not even a shake of the hand. I’m not sure who was the most bereft.
A young boy, one of the ‘disengaged’, pressed a sheet of A4 into my hand. “My ballad Miss that you wanted us to write for homework. I hope you like it”. It had the theme of the book I’d read them, it rhymed, it told a story and it had several, four line stanzas. Where’s an official observer when you need one?

Wherefore art thou?

2010-12-27T05:43:00.000-08:00

I remember vividly winters of yore. Those biting, early mornings where Hubby would groan at the sound of his alarm and hit it, until the clock’s silence indicated its defeat, before dragging his exhausted body out of the marital bed, to shower, shave, get into his uniform, get in his frozen car and get to work at FOST before being briskly helicoptered out onto a ship in the English Channel whereupon, he would oft put the fear of God into Captains and crew whose careers were on the line, should he and the FOST staff find, whilst examining every area of ship, that they were unsatisfactory.
At this point in time of course, I was oblivious to it all. I was still deeply snuggled under the duvet. I doubt that during the 18 months of Hubby’s appointment at FOST, I barely spoke to him, let alone get up with him, make him a flask of tea, defrost his car and turn the engine on, so that when he eventually got in it to drive to work, it was toasty warm inside. How humbled therefore am I to be in that position. Hubby does not spit “Shush” at me from under the heaviest tog rating for daring to make the slightest noise. My cheeks redden at the memory of my callousness.
Dear Hubby has been my hero these past frigid days, getting up just before me to make my life a little more pleasant before I embark on my polar express journey ‘down Cornwall’. How feeble we are in this part of the world. My electric blanket is ratcheted up to such a temperature at night that come the morning, my bottom is regularly poached and, when I arrive at school I am one of many staff members whose body is swathed in swaddling cloths of thermal intensity.
To hear Sally Traffic therefore, on the radio on my drive home, warn of the dire situation on the M8 and snow gates and desperate souls stuck in their cars in snow drifts for hours on end, makes me shiver as I know that in 45 minutes I’ll be in a warm house in the company of a warm dog who is more than amenable to sitting on me to thaw me out.
Snow drifts or not though it has been a perishing week made worse by the hunt for two acceptable yet elusive, Christmas trees. I have travelled what seems the length and breadth of Cornwall sourcing trees tall enough to grace our house. I almost gave up at one point after the car just about seized up and my chilblains, in the words of Johnny Cash, ‘burned, burned, burned”.
“Can’t we just forget bloody Christmas?”, I whimpered to Hubby down my mobile from the car park of a rapidly darkening, garden centre the other side of Bodmin, “Let’s celebrate Hannukah instead. All we’d need is a few candles”.
“Don’t be so faint-hearted Alice”, answered Hubby from a centrally heated, electric lighted office, “Grab yourself a couple of trees quickly and shove them onto the top of the car. You’ll be home by six thirty”.
“I’m not Geoff Capes you know”, I replied sulkily. Mr Capes perhaps not but Chevy Chase, from some over-the-top, Christmas movie, yes, having followed Hubby’s remote instructions and did as I was bid. Ergo, I pulled up outside the house with two, massive, trees dangling over the windscreen, impeding my vision not just a tad. The children were thrilled.
“Bloody hell Alice”, groaned Hubby, slapping his head.
“Don’t even go there!”, I interrupted, “You are not in a position to criticize these trees if you did not play a part in their humping nor lashing.”
“Know what I’d like to hu…”
“Really darling! Not in front of the children.”
The following morning, stressing and a fretting over a lost memory stick and thus, every resource I possess on Romeo and Juliet, I was in a dark, cold staff room by 7.20am frantically looking for it. It was found, but the resources I needed for a lesson on an Introduction to Shakespeare, was not. I searched every file and folder to no avail. I looked at the clock, it was now 8.15. The lesson was to begin in 35 minutes, there was nothing for it but to ‘fess up and come clean.
It doesn’t matter whether one is four, fourteen or forty odd, when another adult looks upon one with that grave look of disappointment and dismay, you know you have nowhere to hide other than on the naughty step.
I was lucky this time, another teacher, perhaps moved by my dripping tears and snotty nose, lent me his Shakespeare PowerPoint just in the nick of time and, minutes later, Year 10 were utterly ignorant of the fact that my all singing, all bells a’ringing lesson was, if not exactly plagiarised, then most definitely rented. “Shakespeare was born an awfully long time ago”, I embarked “Hands up who knows when?”
“After World War Two Miss?” asked one. Sir, if you don’t mind, I will be holding onto that Powerpoint just a soupçon longer.

Snow?

2010-12-07T14:52:00.000-08:00

‘Snow is falling all around me, children playing having fun’. Shakin’ soddin’ Stevens didn’t know what he was singing about. Night after night I pray, I cross my fingers, I do little rituals, anything, just anything to have an extra day at home. Just an extra few hours in the week to address issues that are being exclusively ignored. Basket ball sized Golden Retriever hair-balls, dinners that take more than ten minutes to cook, dirty laundry walking to the washing machine by itself, life endangering toys upon the stairs, revolting lavatories, my children and last, but most definitely not least, bloody lesson planning.
No-one is happy. The fifteen year old has sat her mock GCSEs with barely a good luck from her mother and though I hardly deserve it, has made me very proud. My son, that long haired lover, is eating food reheated in the microwave far too often and is going about in this perishing weather in exactly the same garments as he wears, if pressed to go, to the beach. Ludicrously overdressed for August, suicidally underdressed for minus zero temperatures. I am not there to nag and insist upon hats and scarves and vests.
The littlest ones are starting to notice my absence. For the first time ever I was not one of the token mothers at their annual, Christmas craft day at school. Long faces met me on my return from work.
“Why couldn’t you come mummy?” asked the Red-Head, burrowing under my arm as I attempted to type a Powerpoint slide on Haikus for Year Seven.
“Where, sweetie?” I replied, half listening, the other half of me attempting to think of a five, seven, five syllable, three line poem.
“To our craft day? I made pretty things. Chloe’s mummy was there and Sam’s and...”
“But darling, you know why. You know that mummy is learning to be a teacher isn’t she? So I work in a school all day. Just like you go to school all day”.
“It sucks”, was her succinct reply. Her elder sister was not quite as pithy in her reply.
“It’s emotional neglect actually”. Oh God. Being this close to Christmas, Childline must have visited the school, just in case.
“I think that’s a bit harsh darling”, I remonstrated, “Emotional neglect is when you don’t get any love or cuddles or compassion or comfort”. I made a mental note of the alliterative word triplet I’d used. ‘Must use for Yr 9 lesson on persuasive writing’. The eight year slammed my computer lid shut.
“It could also be emotional neglect when your way of life, the one that you are used to, is whipped away and you never see your mum anymore and when you do, she doesn’t listen”.
“I am listening sweetie, really I am. Tell me what’s going on”. She didn’t want to. Who could blame her? She’s very cross with me. My mantra, “I’ll have a good job at the end of all this and we’ll be able to go on holidays in a plane”, is meaningless to her. As far as she’s concerned she has everything her heart desires. My earning more money is insignificant. What is significant is the here and now and, the here and now is a life bereft of the relationship she once had with me.
Once in bed after a story and a very big cuddle I rang Mags in despair.
“I can’t cope with this guilt”, I cried, “I’m a crap mother who is deserting her family. They feel abandoned and to make matters worse, I’ve made nothing home made for them for Christmas”.
“Like what for God’s sake?”, asked Mags. I could tell she wasn’t really interested. I’m a Celebrity had her undivided attention. I blew my nose.
“Well, by now we’ve usually stirred the Christmas pudding and made a wish. This year it’s a five minute wonder job. There is no cake, no mince pies yet. I haven’t pickled so much as an onion, let alone a shallot in balsamic vinegar. I haven’t bought any cards. I haven’t written my round robin. The sausage meat for the sausage rolls has gone past its sell by date. My shopping is far from covered. My Good Housekeeping lies by my bed. Spruce and unread. I….”
“That’s what it’s like for most women Alice’’.
“Huh?”
“You’ve been complaining for years how those bloody magazines, featuring shining, sparkly families have always made you feel so inadequate. And yet every Christmas, whilst the rest of us beavered away at the office until the last minute, we’d turn up at your house on the way home only to walk into a winter wonderland that the style editor of Conde Nast could only dream of”.
She had a point. But I had a confession.
“I don’t even know where to go for a tree this year”.
“Same place as always?”, she asked.
“I’ve been banned”. Silence.
“From the nursery, Alice go elsewhere for your trees, the letter said, please”. Hang on, 5, 7, 5. I may not have a tree but, would you believe it, I’ve got a Haiku.

Day Out.

2010-12-07T14:51:00.000-08:00

Compared with taking 40 grown women on a coach trip, which generally results in tears and tantrums and that’s only the driver, my first foray into the organising of a school trip was a breeze. There was a certain amount of paperwork to do, namely booking a coach with the best quote. Done that hundreds of times. A letter of courtesy had to be drafted to the manager of our destination so that he could psyche himself up for the onslaught of 31 teenagers and of course a letter had to be written to parents asking for their consent to take their little darlings out of school. The rest of it was plain sailing as, apart from issuing instructions to the children, I had other people to do things for me. Various offices at school collected the money and did the maths and paid the coach company. Someone else wrote a list of names. All that was left for me to do was photocopy the list and pin it up around school. I doubt very much if anyone missed little Johnny, but had they, then at a glance, they would have been rather relieved to find that he was not in school but indeed sitting at the back of the bus making rude gestures at Ginsters’ lorry drivers.
“Johnny!” I rebuked.
“Sorry miss”
I glanced at my checklist and then glanced out of the window. McDonalds was at the bottom of the hill, we were nearly there. I stood up and held on.
“Right then everyone. We are almost at Kingsley village. Can you all make sure that you look vaguely presentable. Smarten your ties, tie up your shoelaces.”
They all stopped chatting and looked out of the window.
“Alright miss! We’re going to McDonalds”. A chorus of ‘Old McDonald had some burgers’ ensued, along with an appeal for thirty Big Macs. The head of English who had accompanied me, looked solemn and wrote some notes on her clipboard.
Bugger. I had to get control. Fast.
The bus pulled up and the driver switched off the engine.
“As you know we are not going to McDonalds”. Cue a chorus of groans. “We are however going to look around Kingsley village. I expect impeccable manners. We will split into groups and we will take notes whilst we are there. Look at the marketing, colours, brand, logo and design”.
We trooped off the bus and an hour and a half later trooped back on. There were no incidents. I’d even managed some surreptitious shopping whilst the Head of English turned her back. No-one had lifted anything, or broken anything. No-one had been arrested. Everyone in fact had listened and exhibited impeccable manners and some staff there even approached me to tell me so. This was nothing like taking ladies to Cardiff for the day. There I had lost a proportion of them on the coldest day of the year, and as for last year’s trip? Well, I still come out in hives thinking about it. Was it my fault the bus broke down or that the rain was relentless? Was I honestly going to compensate everyone for jumping ship early and making their own, very expensive way home instead of waiting for the mechanic? Given the general level of aggression aimed in my direction, they evidently thought so.
I arrived home that night to find Hubby lamenting. I was tired. I was hungry. I had mouths to feed and young minds to inspire but somewhere in my day, I had also to find time to pat the dog and let my husband feel like a lover. When one is up to one’s elbows in washing up gloves and suds, mentally planning the following day’s lesson, a plan that should have been submitted 12 hours previously, the last thing one honestly wants to do is kiss like a film star. Hubby had other ideas and after a full on five minuets of snogging I really had to protest.
“Unhand me!”
“But I never see you”, he pouted. At this point I could have gone down the avenue of marital discord and said “I’m a navy wife. Welcome to my world”. Instead, which probably wasn’t any more soothing I reminded him that the next day, I wouldn’t be home until 11pm.
“Why?”, he asked stricken. I sighed.
“Because I am accompanying four 6th form students to Exeter”. He still looked blank.
“They are in a public debate competition against three other teams. It’s the south west semi- final”.
“What schools are they up against?” asked Hubby, hell bent on seducing me. I pushed his hands away.
“Posh ones”.
“Good luck to them then”. Oh ye of little faith. What with expert coaching from their teacher and me, their natural talent, ebullience and enunciation, they bloody well won! I was the crazy teacher screeching and clapping like a sea-lion at the back. My colleagues looked at me askance. I looked back. Hey, I’m trying to follow the party line in all things ‘teachery’ but don’t try and knock my inherent enthusiasm. It’s like believing in fairies, say you don’t and one will die. Ask me to be un-animated and so will I.

Congratulations

2010-12-07T14:48:00.000-08:00

I drove home from school a few days ago, my head throbbing. Not only did my head throb from teaching all day but my foot was crying out in defeat too. Last week, after another long day at school, I’d arrived home at 6.30, removed from the fridge items that were to be, in twenty minutes, a delicious, nutritious meal for my family and arranged them on the kitchen counter whilst giving instructions to Hubby as to what I anticipated the final dish to be. I then ran upstairs, changed into my keep-fit gear, ran back downstairs, kissed everyone, got in the car and drove the very short distance to the gym. Running late for my BodyMax class, I stumbled down the precipitous stairs to the dance room and landed in a howling heap, at the bottom.
My roars could be heard from upstairs and within seconds the proprietors of the gym were upon me, issuing me not only with ice but advice. My fellow gym mates, alarmed at the noise at the bottom of the stairs, also ran to see who was making such a racket. They were all talking to me at once and, not wanting to be rude, I tried, valiantly to describe what I was feeling.
Was it broken? No, I smiled reassuringly through gritted teeth. Could I stand? Just give me a minute, I wanted to scream. Just leave me alone to concentrate on the pain. Like when in labour, one does not want to be lambasted by 20 questions but to get on with the job of trying not to die from the pain. That takes concentration.
“It just bloody hurts”, I wanted to shout, “Leave me alone”. But no, they got me to my feet. I felt terribly pale but it was bearable. I was able to walk. I might be able to do the class after all I thought. I stepped gingerly into the weights cupboard and chose my usual kilos and then I stepped oh, so gingerly into the dance room, set up my aerobic step and then thought, ‘What the hell are you doing Alice?’ A weird and alarming vein was bulging over the trainer on my right foot. It was time to go home.
I made my apologies graciously to the others more intent on squatting rhythmically with a bell bar over their shoulders, went slowly back up the stairs, bought milk from Sainsbury’s on the way back to the car and drove home.
By the time I reached the sofa and Hubby had tenderly removed my trainer, I was a funny colour. “I’ll get you a glass of wine”, he said.
An hour and the best part of a bottle of Pinot later and I was feeling much better. My foot had been elevated and the edge had been taken off the pain. I went to bed. At some point in the middle of the night, I needed the loo. I went to the bathroom but on my way back that morbid feeling when one is about to faint overwhelmed me and I fell to the floor with a thump. Hubby was by my side in seconds and heaved me back onto my side of the bed. I clutched the duvet like a man drowning. The rest of night passed restlessly. I could hardly bear an inch of duvet cover resting on my foot let alone the full on tog rating.
By the time dawn broke, I was more tired than I’d been when I got into bed. I stepped onto the carpet and a searing pain ran up my leg, “Yeoaw”, I yelped. Calls were made and within half an hour, Mags was in the building.
“C’mon”, she instructed formidably, “I’m taking you to hospital”. We drove to Liskeard where she found me a wheel-chair, and wheeled me into the waiting room. It was still very early. The x-ray lady had yet to put in an appearance. I waited. I was x-rayed.
“It’s not broken but you’ve torn a ligament”. I breathed a sigh of relief. “Which is worse”, she added.
“I have to go to work Mags”, I said, “I must show willing”. She drove, her lips set in a very stern grimace. She dropped me off and I hobbled, now accessorized by very fetching crutches, into school. I barely made it to reception before I was ordered off the premises, “Health and safety”, said a very uncompromising fellow. Mags zoomed us both home in a fury.
I stayed put for three days. It bloody hurts but it is not a torn ligament. My attendance at the cenotaph on Sunday will attest to that.
My efforts at going to work this week have been further stymied by the adverse weather conditions. It took 3 ½ hours not to get there. Thank God for Prince William. Had he not got engaged this week we would not have a Royal Wedding to look forward to and without the promise of bunting and street parties and a day off in the Spring, I might have thrown the teacher training towel, well and truly, in.

Dettol.

2010-11-15T12:59:00.000-08:00

Who would have thought that sharing a tin of Welshcakes could be incorporated into an English lesson on poetry from other cultures? Well it can and very successfully. I was rather sceptical to start with, hell, when I was at secondary school, the way they got us to understand poetry and I use the term ‘understand’ loosely was to learn it off by heart. It never occurred to me that people around the globe were penning their own verses. Our teachers doled out antique, dusty tomes of the Romantics. Wordsworth, Blake, Keats and Coleridge were almost daily torturers and most of the books had vulgar graffiti written inside the dust jacket that implied the previous student had not particularly enjoyed Tintern Abbey or The Ancient Mariner either. Imagine our delight, when occasionally, to be edgy and alternative, the odd Roger McGough poem was thrown into the syllabus. That was about as unconventional as English teachers got in the early 80s at my school, either they didn’t ‘get’ African poetry or they felt that there was enough talent in this country so, why bother our impressionable little heads with anything vaguely foreign. I’d imagine there was more truth in the former and so the Irish W.B Yeats was about as international as we went.
The teaching of poetry has changed significantly over recent years, and whilst some children will still groan, “Oh Miss. Not poetry” and put his head on the desk in despair, a lot of the learning is through what is now termed as ‘active engagement’. Henceforth children are not droned on at for hours on end but are expected to be active learners and find things out for themselves, or in other words to work as a group within the confines of the classroom or adjacent corridor.
The week before, I had demonstrated rap music and the rhythm therein. I had the words in front of me and decided to just ‘go for it’. I adopted some sort of ‘gangsta rapper’ stance, put on a bit of an accent and ‘made it real’ or some such expression. I looked up from the paper at one point to see a girl in the second row with tears coursing down her cheeks.
“Oh miss”, she tried to say, breathlessly whilst laughing, “That’s the funniest thing I’ve seen for ages. You’ve made my day”. Three tiny little boys at the back of the class looked more shifty. I’m not naïve. I confiscated their phones and later gave them a stern telling off about filming teachers and did I really deserve to be plastered all over YouTube? This was not the sort of active engagement that I’d had in mind.
Apart from the three errant boys the lesson was a joy. The other boys immediately got into character and not only wrote some fantastic rap songs but were at pains to rehearse their performance. I was apprehensive about making the decision to allow them to practise their routines in the corridor but, they were so engaged in the activity, they were as good as gold. It was a far cry from sitting in serried ranks learning, ‘Tyger, Tyger burning bright’, but I must say, far better for it.
So, with one lesson on poetry from other cultures under my belt, by Monday, I was brimming with confidence. I’d made a pile of Welshcakes, had brought in my great-great grandmother’s ancient bakestone, had designed a PowerPoint presentation on Welsh culture and which had a group photo of me reciting poetry as a little girl and they had to guess which one was ‘Miss’. We had a lot of fun. Imagine such a thing? I can vividly remember one master roaring at me when I got the giggles once, “You girl! Stop this silliness immediately. See me for detention. You’ve come to school to learn not to have fun”. I might have learnt more had I been terrified a little less.
I looked at my watch. There was only five minutes of the lesson left. Time for my piece de resistence. I handed around the tin of Welshcakes. No sooner had I turned my back and headed to the front of the class when projectile vomit shot past my right shoulder and splattered the interactive whiteboard. Oh my God. What had I done? I hadn’t checked my special needs roster first. Was there some poor child with a severe allergy to wheat and raisins? What if they went into an anaphylactic shock? Could an innocuous scone kill a kid? I swung round. It was easy to determine which child it was. He was green and looked like Moses in the Red Sea, the waves of children on either side of him had parted in revulsion.
“I’m so sorry Miss”, he said, nose dripping and still retching, “I never had one of your Welshcakes and they looked so nice. I just haven’t been feeling well” and to prove a point, he puked, rather profusely, once again.

Mrs Robinson. Not Really.

2010-11-12T02:44:00.000-08:00

I am suffering birthday fatigue. The balloons have been burst, literally, not metaphorically and the banners folded away. The metallic confetti have disappeared up the Dyson and the glasses have been washed, dried and stored. The party is well and truly over. It was good fun, but my, oh my, good fun takes a lot of effort and organising. Invitations must be sent and replies counted; decorations must be applied to walls and ceilings; menus must be agreed upon, the band’s equipment has to be roadied for and the disco and PA has to be erected and a sound check, checked although, it goes without saying, that I had little involvement in the latter, other than stepping over the drums and guitars and various other musical detritus that was abandoned in my porch afterwards.
Musical instruments were not the only trip hazard in this house last weekend. At 1am, after a bloody good boogie and several glasses of wine, we wobbled up the road, closely followed by various teenagers who were staying the night along with other party animals, hell bent on continuing to carouse into the small hours. I haven’t the stamina for all-nighters these days, it could be very well argued that I never have and, by the time I’d stepped over a mature guest sitting on my kitchen floor sharing a fag with a few teenage boys, I’d had enough. Without saying a word, I crept upstairs and left them to it. I brushed my teeth and decided that, if I wanted to avoid a row with a drunken sailor in the middle of the night, we ought to spend the night apart. Due to some advanced planning, the two youngest girls were on a sleepover, consequently their beds were free and so, jamming a couple of dressing gowns against the door, I snuggled down under a Hannah Montana duvet and waited for sleep to engulf me. I tossed one way, I turned the other. I plumped my pillow; I pulled it over my head. I huffed and puffed, but I still couldn’t get to sleep. To make matters worse, the teenagers’ bladders, having had to deal with far more alcohol than was responsible, were protesting and the cistern went more frequently than the lavs at any social club during half time at an England game in the World Cup.
I saw 4am come and go and then, with a pitiful groan, saw it come and go again as the clocks went back. Finally, at some time just before breakfast, I did fall into a deep sleep, if only briefly. God knows what time he’d stumbled in, I hadn’t heard him then, but I did now. I painfully opened my eyes on hearing the sound of heavy, boozy breathing in my ear. Actually I didn’t just hear it, I felt it. With a yelp, I bounded out of bed, and there, dead to the world and still in the shape that had been spooning me, was one of my son’s teenage friends. I assumed it was one of his friends. He had scuzzy black pants on and a rock’n’roll t-shirt and his hair was obliterating his face, so to be fair it could have been one of many. They all look like Slash, although I can bet your bottom dollar that he’d have nicer knickers. Then, like any mother worth her salt, I wrapped a duvet around him, placed a bucket adjacent to his head ‘just in case’, and left him sleep it off. I could embarrass him later.
I picked my way gently down the stairs, wondering if and when my brain would start pounding inside my skull but remarkably, it was very sprightly. I didn’t feel I could justify a couple of paracetamol let alone ibuprofen.
A mass of bodies littered every sofa and floor space. One lad was curled up with the dog. They are both blond with curly hair, so I did hope that, emerging from a drunken stupor, he wasn’t going to wake up disappointed after thinking he’d got lucky.
As I walked into my dining room, more bodies in various states of slumbering inebriation were scattered hither and yon. I shrugged my shoulders and continued my perambulation. I was astonished to find Hubby in the kitchen whistling and washing dishes. The last time I’d seen him he’d been enjoying a very expensive, birthday bottle of scotch and singing Flower of Scotland.
“Mornin’”, he quipped.
“Same to you”.
“Sleep well?”
“Not really”. I thought it best to remain discreet and not mention my sleep had been gate-crashed.
Later, after I’d returned from BodyMax and made lunch for all and sundry, a vaguely familiar young man, with unruly hair and a t-shirt that I had read only hours before, walked gingerly downstairs.
“Ma”, said my son, “This is Jacob. You said it was ok for him to come and live here.” That’s right, I did although I thought it probably best not to disclose that he’d slept with his mother.

Coming of Age.

2010-11-12T02:42:00.000-08:00

And so it came to pass that the baby in a shawl, the first born, the one with golden ringlets that weren’t cut until he was three, the infant who didn’t sleep a full night until he was two and a half, the boy who thought for all the world that he really was Harry Potter, and spent literally hours trying to get his broomstick to fly; the young lad who, for reasons still inexplicable didn’t go to school one day but absconded with a pal who was running away from home and got on a National Express bus to London, is now the handsome young man hell bent on realising his dream of rock stardom now that those of being Harry Potter have been dashed. This same man, this same boy, this same mother’s son has just turned eighteen.
It hardly seems possible, given that I have chronicled this family’s ups and downs, week in week out, that over nine years seems to have slipped through my fingers since I started my dairy. Were this a television series, this week’s episode would be a retrospective, a highlight of all the ‘good bits’ with a focus on my son’s occasional errant ways. The most errant being having a revolting bedroom, insouciance towards his A levels that make me and his father want to pull out our hair in tufts of frustration and a refusal to consider a back-up plan should the drum roll at the Mercury Music Awards for Best Rock Band, elude them. Along with the misdemeanours, this particular TV episode would also re-run all the funny bits, the bloopers that would make him squirm in embarrassment as the viewers howled in their armchairs. Who wouldn’t find it funny that the rather intimidating, 6’ 5” man, with a Russell Brandesque fashion sense, long black, hair and brooding expression, keeps a pair of underpants by his bed ‘in case of a fire’, now commonly referred to as his ‘firepants’ or that, far from being to cool to care, gets up when everyone one else has gone to bed to recheck the house is secure for the night. This is the same lad who, upon finding a bath full of water yet to be drained, immediately removed the plug lest his littlest sister went for a nocturnal wee and accidentally fall into the bath, “Didn’t you know that drowning is known as the silent death mum?” he warned me, the morning after he’d drained the bath, “There’d be no splashing about. She’s just slip quietly in”. That was me told.
There is no denying that it has been an emotional week. The baby photo albums have been wept over. The curly golden locks have been carefully removed from their plastic bag and fingered lovingly. Hubby and I were a dead loss for most of Monday and at any given moment embraced him tightly.
“Ok Ma, you can let go now. You’re hurting my ribs”, he said on more than one occasion. Hubby kept kissing him and calling him, “my son”. It was like a scene from the Lion King. My brother showed up and hugged him manfully and then Dad turned up too, watery eyed and managed with a wavering voice, “Your grandmother would have been very proud of you”. And then we let him go. With money in his pocket to burn and an ID card informing the world that he was old enough to drink, he and seven friends, left the house. Hubby and I squeezed each other’s hands. He was gone.
Precisely 55 minutes later he called, “Can you pick us up please?” Oh my God, what had happened. Was someone needing their stomach pumped?
“Where are you?”
“We’ve had dinner at the Wilcove Inn. Lovely, but we’ve finished now and ready to come home”. If this is the new rock’n’roll that I very much admire it. When I was 18, well it was a far messier affair. Hubby and I got into our respective cars and retrieved them and they continued to party in our basement, not in some club or some insalubrious dive but just downstairs. Phew.
The worst that happened that night? His fellow band-mates thought it would be a great prank to remove from his drawer, whilst he was asleep, well, his drawers, every single pair of them. They then stuck them in a Tesco’s carrier bag, soaked them and put them in the freezer. They took two days to defrost. Longer than a large turkey.
The fun, games and emotional rollercoaster doesn’t end there though. We’ve a party to get through first and not just for the eighteen year old, for, following fast on his heels in terms of milestones is my beloved, Hubby. He is about to be 50 any second. I have loved him since he was 27 years old, when the next 23 lay before us, unchartered. My final thought then must be for my mother-in-law. If 18 years has left me a reminiscent wreck, 50 years of looking back must wreak havoc. I realise that these last 18 years are only just the beginning.

Mug.

2010-10-27T10:43:00.000-07:00

Having spent twenty years watching my husband as he emerged like a military butterfly through various ranks, from fresh faced Petty Officer to sage old Commander, I always admired his capacity to get up at ungodly hours to get to work whether it be to drive back to Portsmouth on a Monday morning, join a ship or be behind the various desk jobs the Royal Navy appointed him to. I can only now, genuinely appreciate how truly hellish it must have been as by some perverse karma, it is Hubby who is now seeing me off. It is he who is making me a cup of tea in the morning whilst it is still pitch black outside and he who is waving and blowing me kisses farewell as I drive off down the road, far, deep into the bowels of Cornwall as I wend my merry way to my first ‘placement’ school.
I wish I could say that it is only what I deserve, but in the last twenty years, I have been conscious only a handful of times when Hubby has crept out of the house at the crack of dawn and I’m sure that was when I was breastfeeding. So, I am truly grateful that he has not decided to throw a nasty two fingered gesture at me from under the duvet as I put on the ‘big’ light and fling open my wardrobe and deliberate what to wear, or indeed curse me for having my hairdryer on maximum speed. Indeed he has been gracious and good natured and in fact only too glad to get a morning cuddle that he would otherwise forgo were I back to my, never to be seen again, pre-teaching days.
The fact that I am up to my eyeballs in paperwork and a learning curve so steep that it is quite literally vertiginous, has perhaps made me overlook the fact that the poor man himself if not without his degree of stresses and strains. The defence review has been made public and for once, I am not glad that he isn’t a rufty-tufty WAFU. Those poor sods have had a real rum deal and our senior service alas, will not be what it was. Hard to believe that Britannia once ruled the waves. Ironic that I have been studying the Timeline of the English language and that the Jutes, Angles, Danes and Normans after invading us, all had a part to play in our language and the results are in our every day vocabulary. God only knows, without a significant armed force to protect us, who will invade us next and what country’s language will influence ours next. Where is Alfred the Great when we need him?
And so it was with my windscreen wipers going like the clappers, that I drove away on a dark Monday morning, past Liskeard, along the Dobwalls bypass, past Trago and on past the crematorium roundabout at Bodmin. When I finally arrived at the school, I was ready for bed and never fully recovered all day. Bad ju-ju when one has to look slightly more engaged with Steinbeck than your average 15 year old and by the time I embarked on the last lesson of the day and had to seem sufficiently au fait with Orwell and Animal Farm, I was hard pushed to keep my eyes open let alone talk profoundly on why a pig was a metaphor for Josef Stalin.
The next day, having ensured I was in bed before ten, saw me perform slightly better with Frankenstein, although when I say perform, I actually mean, support, as I have yet to go solo and teach a class alone. So, no sooner had the bell gone and the children dismissed, that I ran, gasping for a reviving hit of caffeine. Easier said than done. In previous schools, where I worked as a teaching assistant, I often complained to Hubby of the pedancy revolving the ‘coffee boat’. Woe betide anyone who did not contribute to the coffee coffers whilst helping themselves. In my current school though, I am horrified. Even I, whose kitchen and refrigerator often elicits raised eyebrows from those more familiar with the Cilit Bang, cannot comprehend how a staff of over one hundred can let mugs and lunch plates and spoons and forks gather and pile up in a festering mass of campylobacter. The offending crockery and utensils that I saw stacked sky high on Monday were still there at the end of the week. Enough. With very little hot water, an amount of washing up liquid so minute that it made a rude noise as I squirted the bottle and paper towels instead of a scourer, I set to work.
Thanks? Nope, just a cafetiere emptied of its coffee grains poured onto my sink-ful of meagre warm water with the following advice, “I wouldn’t make a habit of it”. To be pedantic and demand a quid a coffee, or to threaten, with a visit from Environmental Health? That is the question.

Birds and Bees.

2010-10-24T05:52:00.000-07:00

It’s been another heavy week. The weekend disappeared in a haze of research and essay writing, re-writing and referencing. On Tuesday evening, looking like something the cats regularly drag in, Hubby had had enough.
“Alice, you look like…”.
“I know, I know”, I said quickly, did he really have to kick me whilst I was down, “I haven’t had much time for poncing myself up recently.
“I don’t care whether you had ponced yourself up”, he said, shaking his head in wearied disappointment, “I was just hoping that you might change out of your pyjamas occasionally and rake a brush through your hair.”
“I looked very smart at college earlier if you must know”, I said, hoitily, “I had no choice. I had to meet with my mentor”.
“Mentor or dementor?” Visions of me wandering around a school corridor, a shadowy, Harry Potteresque thing, sucking my very soul out, made me shudder.
“Oh don’t darling, that’s not really the pep talk I need right now. No she seemed very nice. Organised and supportive.”
“Anyway, go and get your glad rags on. I’m taking you out on a date”. Really? We hadn’t been out together for weeks. I jumped up.
“Fab!”, I said, kissing him, “Where are we going?”
“You’ve forgotten haven’t you?” I racked my brains. What had I forgotten? Damn it. Think. Think. We’d just had our anniversary, it’s not my birthday until next week. Nope I didn’t have a clue. I shrugged my shoulders.
“It’s the PTAs AGM. You are the vice-chair Alice for God’s sake. Haven’t you prepared anything?” I put my head in my hands. Of course, the AGM, it had completely escaped me. I looked at my watch, it was 6.50. We had ten minutes.
Hubby waited for me in the car whilst I ran upstairs, tore off my pyjamas, pulled on some socks, a pair of jeans, a sweater off the back of the chair, which I’d meant to wash but which still sported egg yolk from a soft boiled egg I’d had at the weekend. I scraped my hair back into a ponytail, kissed the children, gave babysitting advice to the eldest and dashed down the stairs and into the car.
“Shoes?” asked Hubby, his fingers, drumming the steering wheel impatiently. I looked at my feet.
“Sh..”
“No, shoes”, Hubby interrupted, anticipating some vulgar, scatological utterance. He could talk.
I ran back inside, picked up my boots, ran back to the car and, as though chasing robbers, said to Hubby, “Drive”.
Luckily the pub where the AGM was being held was far enough away to give me the time to struggle into my boots and zip them up but when we finally entered the pub, flustered, we needn’t have rushed. There were eight people there. In other words, the current committee. My shoulders slumped. I think, given our present commitments, that most of us had planned to step down, instead we once again proposed and seconded each other’s positions and briefly discussed the Christmas fair. Then, the gavel came down and I relished a large Kir courtesy of the treasurer and a couple of ham sandwiches, courtesy of the pub.
We left soon after as I had yet to plan for the next day. Walking into the house, I heard screams of laughter upstairs, emanating from the youngest girls’ bedroom. I crept in.
“Ahem”. They both looked up but instead of looking guilty and diving under their duvets because they should have been fast asleep, they were delighted to see me.
“Mummy”, said the youngest, squeezing me tightly, “It’s so nice to see you” and then, right out of the blue the eight year old said, “Can you tell us about sex?”
Oh bloody hell. Not tonight.
“This is kissing isn’t it?” asked the Red-Head, gently planting a kiss on her pillow.
“It is darling, yes”, I concurred.
“And this is snogging” she added, burying her face into the very same pillow with all the passionate fervour of Rudolph Valentino. Her elder sister was hysterical.
“Do, it again, do it again!”, she goaded her.
“What? Snogging?” and once again she attacked her pillow. It was getting out of hand.
“Come on now girls, bed-time”.
“Have you stopped having babies?” asked the 8 year old.
“Yes, darling”, I replied, tucking her in.
“Because of sex?”. Oh God.
“Sort of”.
“Why?”
“Daddy had an operation”.
“Did they cut his willy off?”
“No they cut his tubes”.
“His pubes?”, said the other child. There’s something about that word that unhinges the dourest child, ergo mine were almost distracted with hysteria. This was impossible.
“Not pubes darling, tubes. Men have tubes inside”.
“Where the worms come out?” My God, my previous sex education talks had evidently been an outright disaster. Where was that glass of wine? I tried my best to go over it again. A sort of Bite Size revision version, but as I Ieft the room, turning the light off and blowing them a kiss, one whispered to the other, “Mummy’s been sexed four times”. Their father would probably agree.

Delinquent.

2010-10-24T05:50:00.000-07:00

“So, does the role of grammar raise attainment in writing at Key stage 3?” I have asked myself this question over and over again. I have posed the question to many friends, many of the friends being teachers who, rather worryingly answered, “Dunno. Kinda”. Then again, as they are teachers, they are all too knackered at the end of the day to actively advise me on my next assignment.
“Have you no opinion on this matter?”, I have demanded.
“You know which school I work at Alice. Do you honestly think I lose sleep worrying whether the kids know how to construct a complex sentence? I’m just glad that 8x turn up.” I tried another source.
“S’pose. Depends”. For heaven’s sake, depends on what?
“Well, what’s your opinion?”, asked Hubby, doing his best to engender interest.
“It doesn’t matter what my opinion is. I have to write a review of already published, learned work on the subject and what those scholars think”.
“And, what do they think?”, he pursued. God bless him, he was trying to sound attentive but I was interrupting the 9 o’clock news.
“Well, that’s the point. I really don’t know; one report suggests the formal teaching of grammar is paramount, another, that it is as inherent as learning to walk. I’m going round in circles and I have three thousand words to write on the subject.”
“Best crack on then love”. And that was the end of his indulging me.
I rang Bianca, fellow PGCE colleague, who terrified me by quoting all sorts of references that she has downloaded, highlighted and used in her already written, 1,800 words.
“How do you make sense of all that stuff”, I asked, quite literally grasping at the roots of my hair.
“Read it all last week mate. It’s been churning around for a while”, she replied. Utterly dejected, I rang Mags.
“Bloody hell. They are all such whizz kids around me”, I wailed, “They may look blonde and fluffy but when push comes to shove they have the upper hand”.
“Well, you know why that is?”
“No, why?” I asked.
“Because they haven’t done any pushing and shoving have they? How many of these bright young things have had their brains and bodies addled by raising four kids? How many of them look knackered in the morning, not because they’ve been up half the night breast feeding or dealing with vomit or bad dreams but because they’ve spent far too long ‘pulling’ at the student union bar?”
“I guess you’re right”, I said, “Still doesn’t help me with this bloody essay”.
I returned to my study to pore over ever more research on the subject. They were all inconclusive and finally I climbed the stairs to bed in abject defeat.
I arrived at Uni the following morning to a packed timetable. We spent hours in large groups discussing assessments. It was mind-numbingly tedious. My new found friends and I were thrilled when lunchtime arrived and we could muster together and groan.
“No wonder kids can’t stand school”, I said, “It’s all so serious. What wouldn’t you give for a moment of levity?” Prophetic words. We finished our lunches, drained our coffees and re-joined our carrousels, a word, up until now, that has been synonymous with all the fun of the fair, candy floss and a gaudily painted, wooden horse called Phyllis. Nowadays it indicates which groups I must join and which classroom I will find them in.
A few of my friends and I returned to our appropriate carousel, where we were given a lecture on inclusion and how terribly important it is that we embrace every child, for as we all now and, as the previous government kept reminding us, whether little delinquents or not, every child matters and we must be delighted to include them in our classes. To hit this point home, we were sent to yet another room to learn to juggle, the end product demonstrating, I assume, how awful it is when one feels they can’t do something as well as one’s peers. We regrouped 15 minutes later to evaluate our experience. How had we felt if we hadn’t succeeded? Did we feel marginalised? Did we feel excluded? None of us felt any of those things. We’d had just had fun. None of us cared a jot whether we were about to join Billy Smarts circus or not.
The tutor then asked, “Do you think you might have done better if you’d had bigger balls to play with?”. It was instinctive. Call me childish, call me puerile, but I challenge anyone not to have let out a schoolboy guffaw. I most certainly did.
“Is someone being silly?” asked the tutor, sharply. I went rigid and tried to suppress any more giggles.
“I think you should leave this room until you have calmed down”, the tutor instructed. There was a deathly silence as I got up from my chair, left the classroom and went to stand in the corridor. No more giggles were released and the irony of having been excluded from a lecture on inclusion didn’t escape me either.

Observation.

2010-10-11T15:11:00.001-07:00

“Is my absence as home-maker extraordinaire making you develop OCD”, I asked Hubby the other evening as he polished his work shoes with an intense ferocity.
“Ah you wish Alice my love, you wish. Actually, it’s very quiet in this house with you beavering away in the basement”. Oh.
“What gives with the polishing then? You hoping for a Genie to spring out of your shoes?” I went rather sulkily into the kitchen, opened the fridge and poured myself a large glass of wine. It felt and tasted exquisite.
“Don’t you remember anything Alice?”, said Hubby who had followed me and was now brandishing a shoe polishing brush in my direction.
“What? Do you mean apart from your parents’ birthdays, all our children’s birthdays, their friends’ birthdays, PTA meetings, ballet, tap and swimming classes…”
“Alright, alright you’ve made your point”, he looked impatient, “Don’t you remember me telling you that royalty was visiting tomorrow?” I choked on my wine.
“Bloody hell I forgot. Don’t I get to come and meet him too then?”
“No Alice, you do not. You have lesson observations to attend and well, whatever it is teachers do”.
“Two things mate, one, I bet I am invited, you just don’t want me to spend any more money on a new dress, shoes and hat do you?”
“Of that there is no doubt my dear but that notwithstanding, you are still not invited”.
“And two”, I continued, “What the hell do you mean ‘and whatever else teachers do’?” By the look on his face and the fact that he’d started to back out of the kitchen he’d realised that he was treading on dangerous ground.
“I’ll tell you shall I? Well? Shall I?” I chased after him. I backed him into a corner near the sofa which he very conveniently fell into and chucked my horribly heavy, briefcase onto his lap. Pulling out my lever arch file which after only three weeks at college is already groaning, I extracted from a plastic pouch, a list of ‘activities expected of teachers in an academic and pastoral role’.
I kept him pinned down until I’d read out all 28 of them.
“There, that’s what the hell teachers do”, I finished, slapping my hands together.
“Ok love”, he said awkwardly, “I was out of order. Teachers work very hard indeed”. I pulled the bag off his sternum but kept it hovering only an inch away, where, by dropping it again, I could easily have compromised his breathing.
“And?”, I said.
“And I’m really sorry”. I moved myself and my briefcase out of his way. He got up and went and poured himself a glass of wine too.
We sat down together. “I’m just really nervous Alice”, he said, taking a big slurp. “It has to be perfect tomorrow; there is no room for cock-ups. We’ve all been rehearsing like crazy. Even the chefs have been practising”. I’d have liked to have pointed out at this juncture that I doubted very much that the Prince would give a toss what he was about to eat, that in fact he probably had hundreds of military lunches every year and I would bet my bottom dollar that he’d never once sent his food back but, to have articulated these points would have seemed rather cruel, especially given the polishing, painting and marching that had been worked on so hard to perfect.
“Anyway, how are you feeling about tomorrow?” Hubby asked.
“A little anxious but we’re only observing, it’s not as if I have to teach a class. That joy is to come.”
The following morning, far too bright and early I drove myself with my fellow student Bianca as navigator, deep into the heart of Cornwall. Nearing our destination we were a little lost.
“Where has the school disappeared to?” I asked Bianca accusingly. She rather sheepishly, shrugged her shoulders.
“Sorry, I’ve never been any good at reading maps; I think maybe we should have turned left a little earlier”. It was almost 8.30, we were going to be late. I pulled over and suddenly we spotted some teenagers in school uniform. I wound the window down on the passenger side, leaned over Bianca’s lap and hollered, “ ‘Scuse me love?”
With trepidation the students approached the car.
“Are you going to school?”.
“Well duh!”, one replied.
“Great. So are we. Do you want a lift?” As soon as the words were uttered I knew I’d made a right clanger. The children scurried away as though the local paedophile had just attempted to abduct them.
“Nice one”, laughed my colleague. We dumped the car and ran, arriving seven minutes late, our teacher training co-ordinator tapping her foot.
“Before I take you to your classrooms word has got to me that there are a couple of women loitering near the school. They tried to pick up a couple of students barely minutes ago. Be vigilant for a red Fiat”. There was no fear of that. I knew exactly where it was.

Homework Sucks!

2010-10-04T22:48:00.000-07:00

My neck was aching, my eyes were stinging, my shoulders were stiff and I still had an assignment on grammar to write. I’d already read a tome on ‘issues in effective learning’ which introduced me to some new playmates, namely Piaget and Vygotsky and their respective theories on cognitive constructivism and social constructivism, although if I’m honest, I don’t feel very respectful to them at the moment, given that they’d just ruined my weekend. Who’d have thought there was a theory to teaching and not only one but several? And there was I, naively assuming that once I’d gathered a few poems together, got the gist of them, made sure that I covered the objectives in the National Curriculum that I would be able to stand there, chalk, or its technically advanced alternative in hand and wax lyrical.
Hubby walked into my study and rubbed my shoulders. “How are you getting on love?” I looked at my watch; it was 10.10 on a Sunday night. The youngest girls had gone to bed hours before. I’d barely kissed them.
“Tired”, I said in a little voice, grasping the big hands that massaged my shoulders.
“I’ve taped X-Factor for you.”
“Thanks”. He looked over my shoulder at the few words that I’d written on my laptop.
“Subordinate?”, he queried, “I wouldn’t worry about your pupils being subordinate Alice love. Good grief no. Start as you mean to go on. Don’t take any nonsense. Insubordination is taken very seriously in the navy you know. Very seriously indeed. In fact…”
I had to stop him in his tracks before he got on his vertiginously high horse.
“I’m not talking about insubordination in the classroom, although God knows, someone should. Your average Comprehensive classroom is light years away from standing to attention with ‘yes sir, no sir’. These days we are all ‘learners’, sharing and exploring together”. He looked at me pityingly suggesting that one day, disillusioned by my caring, sharing ways, I’d have kids on report and in detention before you could say, “My dog ate my homework miss”.
“So who’s subordinate then?”
“Not who but what. Subordinate clauses are grammatical”. I replied.
“What are they?” A week ago I probably couldn’t have told him, so I was proud to hear myself utter,
“A sentence is broken up into clauses, the main clause and the subordinate clause. The latter doesn’t make sense by itself”. His gormless expression made him look, well, gormless.
“For instance”, I explained, “ ‘He was very loyal to the Royal Navy – main clause?’” Hubby nodded. I continued, “ ‘so that I always felt second fiddle to Nelson, subordinate clause”.
“Oh I see”. I don’t think he did. He is still going to Trafalgar night on my birthday. He kissed the top of my head and went to make me a cup of tea. I returned to my assignment. It was very trying. My experience of grammar, being a school girl in the 70s and early 80s centred on three key terms: adjectives, nouns and verbs. All that was expected of me was to write the most interesting sentence incorporating those terms. So that for instance, ‘The Cat Sat on the Mat’ was transmogrified into ‘Regally reclining on a Persian rug, lay a feline of such majestic attitude that he seemed to rule the household who regularly attended to his every whim, which often included fresh, line caught tuna and filtered, ice-cold, spring water.’ I worried not a jot about clauses and modal auxiliary verbs. What worries me is that few teenagers still won’t worry about them and yet I have to teach them.
Two hours later I inserted my final full stop and went to bed to read a précis of Bloom’s Taxonomy. Hubby was snoring gently as was the cat at the end of the bed. My eyes felt as though they had grit in them and yet as I extinguished the bedside light, my mind raced. I tossed. I turned. I pulled the duvet cover hither and yon.
“Bloody hell, keep still”, came a very sleepy but grumpy retort from under the duvet. I doubted very much that it had been the cat. So, getting up again, I dragged a dressing gown around me and walked onto the landing. A chink of light glinted from my son’s room. I opened his door. He was sitting at his computer writing.
“What on earth are you writing at one in the morning?”
“My politics essay”. I wanted to put his pyjamas on and snuggle him up in his bed with his teddy but those days are long gone. He’s eighteen next month.
“Darling, it’s so late. Please go to bed”. I was a bright one to talk. I crept down the stairs, threw a throw over me and picked up the Sky+ controls. In seconds Simon Cowell et al were in my sitting room.
Almost instantaneously I forgot brain aching words like pedagogy, hegemony and paradigm and lapsed into the accessible vernacular of pop culture. It was lush and I was asleep in minutes.

Meltdown Number 1

2010-09-29T02:08:00.000-07:00

I blew the steam from the mug of tea that I cradled in my hands.
“My life has been stolen Mags”, I said, my eyes sunken, my shoulders slumped.
“Jeepers Alice, keep things in perspective will you?” she replied.
“Try living with her”, added Hubby, “It’s been like this since day one. How the hell am I going to resist strangling her before July God alone knows.”
“Have either of you scrutinized the National Curriculum for English Key stage 3 recently?” From the blank expression on their faces I made the assumption they had not.
“Well it’s not exactly a riveting read. Shall I tell you the key concepts?” It was merely a rhetorical question because I didn’t pause a for a reply, “Well, within their programme of study for reading, writing, speaking and listening, we expect our 11-14 year olds to be competent and creative and to have a critical and cultural understanding in every task they undertake”. Still no response. I pressed on.
“And then we have to give them attainment targets. For instance, there is a considerable gulf between a level four piece of work and a level 8. You see..”
“Spare us the finer details Alice, please”, implored Hubby, “dear God and you tell me I’m boring”. Boring? This did not bode well. I was training to be a teacher, someone who was hopefully going to inspire young minds to greatness and yet, after only a few sentences I was being asked to shut up. It’s difficult to shut up though. For fear of sounding like Tony Blair I’m eating, sleeping and breathing, education, education, education. Apart from driving to Uni, I haven’t seen the light of day for over a week and when I get to Uni, I sit through lectures with such gripping titles as Strategies and Standards and Scaffolding and Modelling. This it turned out, had nothing to with the building trade or indeed, posing and pouting but was again another educational process, this time offering challenges that encourages pupils to know what they are aiming for and supporting them with ideas by providing tools to accomplish the task. It’s about as sexy as it sounds.
I have had a sheaf of handouts handed out to me all of which I have had to read, digest then annotate and write about. I have my own subject group of novels, poems and plays to read as well as my first written assignment to compose, let alone all the educational theorists and practitioners with whom I’m meant to be au fait. It’s a big ask, especially when I’ve had blood to give, food to shop for and cook, attend a PTA meeting and, before I forget, occasionally engage with four children whom I seem to be forgetting. I am beginning to lose not only my sense of perspective but my everyday vocabulary.
“Well I’m sorry you find me so bloody boring!”, I sobbed, jumping up, my hot tea spilling down my shirt, “And now look what you’ve made me do”. I ran out of the sitting room, furious tears spilling down my cheeks. By the time I’d reached my study, my shoulders were heaving and my brand new laptop that my college had so kindly provided us all with for free, was in grave danger of being dripped upon.
Hubby followed me, put one arm around my shoulders and used the other to diplomatically push the lap top out of harm’s way.
“There, there now love. Don’t be such a non-handler”. Ever the sensitive soul.
“I feel so overwhelmed already”, I tried to explain, “I’m intimidated not only by the amount of information we are meant to absorb but by the bright young things who feel no fear and whose fresh, dynamic brains have the capacity to absorb masses of alien information and who are then, infuriatingly, able to file it away, in some sort of thematic order. Why is it? Oh thanks”, Mags had appeared carrying the kitchen roll, “that since I was at school I always seem to sit next to the kid who likes her highlighters and her plastic pouches and ring binders and rulers and knows instinctively when to use bullet points or spider-grams”, I blew my nose, “By the end of a lecture their work is organised and tidy and filed in the correct pouch. Mine on the other hand, is a ream of A4 paper with a series of sentences scrawled on it?”. Hubby tapped my shoulder in an effort to be comforting.
“I’ll get the hang of it”, I said, attempting an optimistic grin, “It’s just that after all these years of academic torpor, it’s rather a steep learning curve.” They both nodded and smiled benevolently at me like two nurses in a mental hospital who have just managed to stymie a major incident.
“Anyway I’d better crack on. I’ve got to get off my A.S.S”. They looked quizzical.
“Applied Subject Study”. The world of acronyms does not it appears, apply exclusively to the language of the Armed Forces.

The Making or Breaking of Miss.

2010-09-18T08:19:00.000-07:00

This is a confessional. I have been living a lie. Not a huge one. I’m not married to an RAF officer and I do have four children who, in their own, charming, individual way, ensure the grey hairs are not stymied but creep through my highlights, however hard I attempt to stem the flow.
No, what I have kept hidden all these years is the fact that I am not a qualified teacher. I was in fact a teaching assistant and should have a red badge of courage for my efforts, as should the army of TAs out there, who do a sterling job in keeping kids in their seats as the teacher sets about attempting to teach the little darlings.
I do have a degree in English literature and have harboured the dream of writing my own novel. As yet it hasn’t happened and, with Hubby leaving his beloved Royal Navy in a few years time, it has become more and more apparent that I have to consider a more serious career than the one I have loved. Who would have thought that chronicling my life and, making coffees and paninis for visitors to our ‘forgotten corner’ of Cornwall and, for my beloved regulars, the lattes and flapjacks I would comfort them with when, in the bleak midwinter, they came for a chat would have given me so much satisfaction? But there it is. It has.
Three days ago however, I embarked on a new chapter in my life. That of fully fledged teacher training. To say that I am terrified is an understatement that bears no immediate analogy. It is something that I have put off for years, for many reasons, the most pressing if I’m honest, apart from my dream of novelist, is my utter ‘special needs’ in mathematics. A test has to be passed in maths before I can qualify. Yes, even to be an English teacher. I girded my loins at the weekend and had a go. There are practise tests online. I couldn’t do one. Not one.
Hubby, in his inimitable manner, strode in, shoved me, albeit gently out of my swivel chair and, with a macho, “Tut, tut, how hard can it be Alice?” was himself subdued in seconds, and this is a man who can compute, in his head, in a matter of seconds, all manner of mathematical gymnastics.
“Gee whizz, Alice love”, he said, after completing it, successfully, forty eight minutes later, “You’ve got your work cut out for you”. Thanks for the moral support.
So, it was on our 19th wedding anniversary that I walked into our local University College and took my place beside eleven other wannabe teachers, all of whom should apparently, “Be congratulated on getting this far. The competition was ferocious”. Really? I looked around at my fellow students and not one of them jumped out at me as particularly leonine. To be honest, I thought we seemed quite ordinary. Time will tell.
Our first day was fairly mind boggling with information overload on a number of subjects, primarily the help and support available to us. Immediately after one lecture by the study skills, support team, I hurried to register my ‘disability in maths’. Dyslexia is taking very seriously indeed and there is a wealth of support and finance out there for those who find spelling hard. There is little available to help those of us who find, ‘express 2/5 as a decimal’ or indeed a percentage. The support staff were very kind but had no leaflet to give me. I’ve made an appointment to discuss my ‘issues’ at a later date.
Later, after seeking out a cafeteria, difficult when most of ‘Uni’ has been reduced to rubble, okay, not exactly rubble, but a lot of building work which has demolished the dining hall, our group went in search of lunch. The kids, those youngsters to whom this is just another milestone in their unadulterated lives, went to the pub; a more studious, mature student and I stayed on site and shared an empathic, “My God, what are we doing?” moment. She, having locked herself away these past few years, between school runs and family life, in the solitary confinement of her box room, beavering away at an OU degree, is glad finally, to be released and walk among the living.
So we have been set our first assignment. To create a name badge. I was thrilled. Whilst the other young things groaned, I knew that I had a secret army. Two little girls who can think of nothing better than to get the felt-tips out, some stickers and the glitter. How can I fail? A mature student, hoping one day to inspire the minds of future generations is surely one who, through strong leadership, is one who can delegate and get those subordinate to her to do all the ‘admin’. To be continued...

With a knap-sack on my back...

2010-09-07T02:58:00.000-07:00

Pens and pencil cases have been carefully mulled over in WH Smith before the much desired Hello Kitty range was finally opted for. School uniform has been purchased and name tapes have been, albeit clumsily, sewn in. That sinking feeling is much upon the household. The youngest, amid much enforced bonhomie from their mother along the lines of “Yay, school in a few days time! Yay! You’ll see your friends again”, has been met with stony silence.
So, before the hamster wheel of school, homework, ballet, tap, swimming, Rainbows, musical theatre, after school clubs, spelling practise and homework starts rolling and the eldest two embark on their GCSEs and A levels respectively, we have tried to take full advantage of lying in bed until after nine, not minding that the youngest are watching Hannah Montana before breakfast, eating dinner at odd hours and basically wallowing in the calm before the storm.
This hasn’t been quite fulfilling enough for Hubby who is now, after several weeks of downtime, eager to get back to his recruits and what better example to these determined, young people than if their Commander were to do a little ‘exped’ of his own. So, as soon as it was decently possible after the Red-Head’s sixth birthday party, he downloaded a map from the internet, borrowed all manner of walking gear from a more roister-doistering friend and then, went about the challenge of embroiling our nocturnal, lounge lizard of a son, to accompany him.
Of course Hubby had to be patient and await the emergence of his son from his bedroom, which was approximately two hours after lunch. By this time Hubby had packed and was champing at the bit.
“This is really important Alice love”, he said, tying his boots, “Our lad will be eighteen in a matter of weeks; it’s high time we spent some quality time together and what better way than walking the coastal path”.
I didn’t want to rain on his parade but were they physically up to it?
“I mean, you take daily drugs because of the arthritis in your knee and our boy, well, the most active thing I’ve ever seen him do is take a shower”.
“Alice you forget his bass playing. He comes off that stage drenched in sweat”.
“I appreciate that, but that takes a different kind of stamina. I can’t think off the top of my head of any rock-star sports men. Keith Richards is hardly renowned for his charity walks is he? Whereas Ian Botham, is”.
“What are you getting at Alice?” I wasn’t entirely sure, other than I didn’t think either of them were particularly enviable specimens of masculine perfection. I didn’t articulate that last bit though. They didn’t need my negativity. Instead I silently made up a first aid kit of Savlon and plasters and Ibuprofen.
Hubby began to pace, then paused to re-check his rucksack for a torch, a map and a compass.
I was bewildered by the last item. “I may not be Shackleton darling and I’ve done few mega walks. None to be honest, but I would have thought that as I long as you had the sea to your left, you were, well, going the right way?” Hubby looked slightly sheepish but I think that he just liked the compass as an artefact. It’s synonymous with adventure.
Eventually he could stand it no longer and went to wake our son. It came as bit of shock to him to find that he wasn’t going into town with Jim to search out some gigs, but was in-fact, going to walk from Looe to Mevagissy with a rucksack on his back. “Oh Fal-da-ree man”, came his only comment.
Before they left I took my boy to one side and, after giving him an enormous hug, tried to explain the significance of this father/son time together. “You see dad has always hankered after a father that would have done something similar with him. Someone to look up to, to depend on, to learn from, you know that kind of thing that you, having dad for a father, take for granted”.
“It’s cool ma, I get it”. And with a bagel in his hand, he, his father and a very loyal dog were whisked away by Mags who dropped them off in Looe for the start of their awfully big adventure.
And it was awfully big. By the end of the second day they rang from Charlestown.
“I surrender Alice. Our blisters are bigger than our toes. The dog is half dead. We are drenched in sweat and knackered. We won’t get kicked off the course if we don’t finish the next eight miles”. I drove to rescue them. They were upbeat, suntanned and beaming. When we arrived home, Hubby emptied the rucksacks and I drew a bath for my boy.
“Know what Ma?” he said, sitting on the edge of the bath, as I whirled his bubbles, “This trip meant a lot to dad and it was great being with him. He’s a good guy. He really is”.

Streets of London.

2010-08-31T09:42:00.000-07:00

To the wonderment of my now 15 year old daughter, her birthday present was a trip to London. With her mother. She took the train tickets out of her card.
“Oh wow mum! How fab! When are we going?”
“Read the ticket”. She scrutinised the information written on it.
“Tomorrow? Oh wow, oh wow, oh wow”. Hubby was less than enthusiastic.
“Alice”, he hissed, “How the hell can we run to it?” Not wanting to spoil the moment of gift and card opening, I hissed back in whispers.
“Tickets were bought with my rail card; Mag’s parents have gone away and not only offered us the use of their flat but they’ve also lent us their Oyster cards.”
“Their what?”
“Oyster cards you dim, provincial hick. You can’t actually hand over money on London’s public transportation service anymore. You have to use an Oyster card. You swipe it before you ride a bus or a tube train.”
“Well I never”.
The flat was stunning, especially given the fact that it had an old fashioned lift where one has to crank two metal, concertina style doors open and shut. I could have ridden up and down it all day.
“C’mon mum” called my daughter after the fifth time, “And you had the temerity to call dad a provincial hick”. She had a point.
We walked miles and miles and miles. We visited every market. It both heartened and depressed me at the same time. The quality of produce was stunning. Each little market stall run by a ferociously proud artisan. At Borough Market we sampled every imaginable foods. The fish stall was breathtaking. Why can’t we have the same here? Do we care that little what we put in our mouths in the South West? Must our fish be fried and served with chips? At Spitalfields we meandered around stalls selling inconceivable quantities of handmade shoes, hats, bags and witty, sloganed t-shirts. At Covent Garden we marvelled at the performers and yet more gorgeous shops. My daughter drew the line at Camden Market.
“There will be too many people mum. Let’s do a museum instead”. I groaned. To my eternal shame I have come to the realisation that I’m not cut out for museums. We had nipped into the National Portrait Gallery on our way from the London Eye, via Westminster, St James’s Park, Horse Guards Parade and Whitehall. By the time we’d arrived at Trafalgar Square, my legs were columns of lead. I was looking forward to a few minutes peace and a bit of a sit down. My daughter was having none of it.
“C’mon” she said, heaving me up from a wooden banquette. Whilst I marvelled at the works I was secretly longing for an extra large glass of wine. I finally got my way after searching for and finding a portrait of every teenage girl’s favourite pin-up, Tom Daley. Even in my advanced years I could appreciate what all the fuss is about.
Sitting outside the Soho Bar, twenty minutes later, I was kicking myself. A large glass of wine and a coke had cost three quid. I thought the bar girl had made a mistake until I realised it was happy hour and all the drinks were half price. Damn it. I’d denied myself a cocktail for fear of Hubby’s wrath. After being chatted up by a dubious young man who loved the idea of a mother/daughter combination we fled, only to run across a gay, pole-dancing bar. The men were in the window, winking at us. It was hard to avoid.
Still giggling, we had dinner in Chinatown before meandering through Shaftesbury Ave to Piccadilly Circus and up Regent Street where we capitulated and took a tube to Baker St and finally the lift to the flat where we literally fell into our beds.
So, when the idea of a museum was bandied the following morning I was less than enthusiastic. I’m not quite sure what it is about them. I’m obviously aware of the rare treasures held therein but to be honest, they leave me cold. Perhaps because it’s all so static? But, not wanting to be like the heathens depicted in the museums dioramas we caught the bus to the Victoria and Albert. Nice.
“Nice? For God’s sake mum”. I shrugged my shoulders. After an enormous ice-cream of appeasement across the road in Harrods, I promised I’d take her to the British Museum. The building was impressive but I was disappointed by its contents.
“Disappointed? Mum, you beggar belief”.
“The British Museum was a misnomer”, I said with certain haughteur “More like the bloody Egyptian Museum”.
“That was the Rosetta Stone”, she said aghast but then, and not for the first nor last time that weekend my daughter, in ever exasperated tones of role reversal, shook her head and said, “Let’s take you to your favourite Museum. Selfridges”.

And....Relax.

2010-08-31T09:40:00.000-07:00

I am relaxed. I mean really relaxed. The sort of relaxed that involves the hedonistic pleasure of reading a few chapters of a novel. In the afternoon. On a lounger. The sun may be playing hide and seek but nevertheless, even its elusiveness has not put the dampeners on things. We are on holiday and we are having a good time!
Hubby to his credit had a surprise in store for us. I had only just emptied the suitcases from our consequently abortive attempt at camping and was filling the washing machine.
Hubby came up behind me and slapped my bottom, “Quick turn around on all this laundry love. We need to pack again”.
“Pack again? What do you mean?”
“You didn’t think our summer holiday was going to be two nights in a dingy campsite did you?”
“If I’m honest, I didn’t even expect that”.
“Now, now Alice love, don’t be spiteful”, Hubby replied, a little hurt.
“For someone who doesn’t do holidays as a rule, I find it hard to believe that you’ve got yet another one up your sleeve.”
“Well neh-neh-neh-neh-neh, I have”.
“God Dad, you are sooo mature”, said a passing daughter rather haughtily.
“Before you criticise your father too severely he has just dropped the bombshell that he is taking us on another holiday”.
“Will it require a passport, inoculations, litres of factor 25 and foreign currency?”
“Um, no”
“Knew it. Something lame and water logged and British. As usual.” And off the ungrateful little Miss sloped.
“Really? Are we going somewhere in this country? Don’t tell me it involves the bloody tent again?”. I genuinely couldn’t face wading through a shower-block full of verrucas for a second time in a week.
“No, No tent required”
“A hotel? All inclusive?”
“No, I can’t promise that either”.
“A gorgeous cottage with sea views?”
“Bingo!” The sly old fox. He’d spent the last fortnight, moaning on and on about money and all along he’d booked a self catering holiday for his family. I was so touched. Immediately I gathered ever more armfuls of laundry, made a few more lists, planned menus, went shopping for the ingredients, vacuumed and, organised Dad to feed the cats and water and harvest my tomatoes. The following morning I was ready and raring to go.
“Right then. Where are we going? Suffolk, we’ve never been there..”
“Bit closer to home than that Alice”, Hubby answered, squeezing my sun lounger through gritted teeth on top of a pile of stuff in the boot.
“Not Cornwall again dad?” groaned the 14 year old, slapping her forehead, “Don’t tell me I’m going to spend my 15th birthday in Cornwall again”.
“Afraid so”. Curiouser and curiouser. Where on earth was he taking us? Fifteen minutes later we found out.
“Cawsand?” asked my eldest daughter.
“Pier Cellars?” was all I was capable of.
Hubby hopped out of the car and withdrew a set of keys so enormous that they would have made even the most sadistic jailer lose heart. He unlocked an enormous padlock, pushed open the metal gates with an ominous rusty, scraping sound, drove the car forward, jumped out again to shut the gates and drove down to the cottage. We were going to spend a week in accommodation generally reserved for young, Royal Naval recruits whilst undergoing outward bound training. Had Hubby finally lost his marbles?
“The trainees stay in the long huts Alice”, said Hubby, once more fiddling with the set of keys, “Whereas we are here. In the Senior Rates cottage”. I tentatively stepped inside. It wasn’t bad. A bit municipal what with various memorandums on the walls and pussers old married quarters furniture but, you know what? I was instantly charmed.
The view is magnificent. My lounger, once erected, looks out to Plymouth Sound. It affords seclusion that A-list celebrities can only dream of. The children love it, they have their own exclusive little harbour, even the soon to be 15 year old, judging by her Facebook page is having an ‘awesome’ time, helped along by the company of her best friend. They’ve even built rafts. Rafts for God’s sake. It’s like being in a chapter of Swallows and Amazons.
Friends, desperate for a nose around, have dropped by in their droves every evening and they too have been captivated by the place.
“Jammy buggers” said one teasingly “perks of the job Commander?” Hubby is more aware than most of the brutal cuts in the MOD and was immediately defensive.
“Perks of the job? You have to be joking. I have paid the going rate to rent this place for a week and it’s been worth every penny”. He topped up our friend’s wine glass, threw another log on the bonfire and settled back in his folding chair. For the first time in a long time his forehead looks as though it has been ironed out. He has, to coin our son’s retro vernacular, ‘taken a chill pill’. It has a far reaching effect, which is why, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going back to my book.

Gate-crasher.

2010-08-19T09:57:00.000-07:00

THIS IS OUT OF SYNCH. Sorry.

“One week left Alice” said Hubby resting his silver topped cane on the back of the sofa, “and then I’m on leave”. He hopped from foot to foot kicking off his black, shiny, shoes and peeled off his socks.
“Must you?”, I asked, my nose wrinkling in distaste.
“What?” asked Hubby playfully, dangling an offending sock in my face, “fresh as a daisy darling since you bought these posh socks”. Marks and Spencer’s Freshfeet finest.
“Yeah? Well I think poor Marksies have bitten off more than they can chew”. The idiom unfortunately provided an image of said feet and socks being snacked upon and a sudden sense of revulsion overcame me and I shuddered and escaped to the kitchen. Hubby, sensing a moment of high-jinks, chased after me. The back door was locked; I had no-where to go.
“Stop!” I screamed, covering my face and mouth, “Stop it you pig!”.
“Look Alice, I haven’t got the sock. Look. I promise”. I peeped through a crack in my fingers. His hands were waggling in front of me. Empty. I relaxed.
“That was mean”, I said, pouting.
“Darling, as if I would ever shove a sweaty sock in your beautiful face. Come here”. My back was pressed up against the kitchen door. He lifted my chin and kissed me. For what seemed a very long and lingering time.
“Ahem”, said a voice. We looked up. It was our son. Behind him, another tall young man, indistinguishable apart from tribal tattoos dancing up his forearms. He too sported a long mane, mildly unpleasant facial hair, black jeans, a dead rock band on his black t-shirt and beads around his neck and wrists.
“Ma, Pa, this is Louis. Lead singer of The Mighty”. I pulled my top down rather self-consciously. God knows why. I’d been kissed, not molested.
“How do you do Mrs Band?” asked Louis very politely, holding out his hand, “..Mr Band”, extending his manners to Hubby, “It’s very kind of you to let us stay here tonight. It’s difficult to find lodgings on tour, especially for six. I hope we aren’t putting you to any trouble”.
“None at all”, I managed with what I thought was an air of gravitas, before my son, silently indicated to the top of my head. My hand flew up and there, like some grotesque, Grayson Perry style bow, was Hubby’s discarded sock. I chose to ignore it. Instead I put the kettle on to boil as though I oft wandered around in a distracted state, my lipstick smudged, a size twelve sock flopping atop my hair. It seemed more rock’n’roll to appear a little mad.
Louis, our son, two of our son’s band members, our 14 year old daughter and two of her friends departed soon after.
Hubby mentally counted the number of people staying under his roof that night, “Six of us and twelve extra”, he sighed defeated, before finally going to change out of his uniform. The phone rang.
“I’ve got a ticket for the Port Eliot lit fest. Come with me?”
“Mags, I’m not paying forty quid for a couple of hours to watch some yuppies float around drinking mimosas”.
“Don’t be such an inverted snob. At least come to the pub for a drink”. She twisted my arm. Hubby was taking a trip to Lords to watch the cricket in a couple of days so did not protest too much.
I got to the pub first and ordered myself a glass of white wine. I was still reeling when Mags turned up. “Four pounds ninety five!”, I said, brandishing the glass at her.
“Get it down your neck and come with me”, she implored, a wicked glint in her eye. “You can gatecrash. There’s a spot in the fence you can negotiate”. I looked at her as if she were mad.
“I’ve a silk dress on and high heels Mags”.
“All the more reason; you won’t look out of place. Meet you there.” Minutes later I was wedging my body through a very, very narrow gap. At one point my right bosom was harpooned by a bramble.
“Ouch” I yelped.
“Who goes there?” At least I think that’s what I heard. I felt like a fugitive. I remained stock still, my heart beating audibly. I could see the headlines, ‘Local Commander’s wife scales festival fence’.
“Do you need a hand?” I accepted the offer, and the hand extricated the bramble from my bust, gave a little pull and a second later I was in. Music thumped, people floated, food sizzled, and fairy lights twinkled. Hell knows where Mags was.
“Drink?” my rescuer handed me a cocktail, “Come and meet Grayson Perry” and taking my hand he led me through the revellers. Good job I’d removed the sock. Wouldn’t have liked him to think I was taking the mickey.

Camping it Up.

2010-08-19T09:55:00.000-07:00

First week of summer leave and it’s good to know that some things never change. There arepeople in this world who are so reliable that one can almost second guess what they are going to say next. It was no surprise therefore when Hubby walked through the door fairly early last Friday afternoon. If I’d expected him to be beaming, with a little jaunty step in his walk, I’d have been most disconcerted but year in, year out, it is exactly the same scenario. He walks through the door, flings himself onto the nearest sofa and sleeps for a couple of hours, before waking and informing me that “We need to talk”.
My heart sank this year as it does every year, not because the phrase, “We need to talk” was, as is often the case in melodramas, a pre-cursor for disclosing an affair, but because I know the discussion we are about to have will not be about his mistress but about his money.
“So, Alice”, he said, delving into his briefcase, “I’ve looked at our bank account. It’s far from healthy which, it being leave and all that, is a bit of a bummer but, there it is” and he handed me a printout from the computer which did indeed indicate a certain brutal deficit.
“But we’re going camping tomorrow for a few days”, I protested.
“Only to Whitsand Bay. I took the liberty of buying a couple of disposable barbeques on the way home; we’ll chuck a few snorkers on the fire and we’re good to go”. Are we indeed? I couldn’t wait.
The next day in relative sunshine, I remembered why it had been, from the gold, felt-tipped pen graffiti in one of the tents, precisely three years since we’d last been camping. It took a list as long as my arm to remind myself of all the necessary equipment required for a couple of days under canvas. Basically, as much as one needs for a fortnight. So a few hours later we arrived at our destination about 15 minutes from our own front door. By the time we had unpacked, pitched the tent, laid it out, and put things “where they should be Alice, let’s start as we mean to go on, i.e ship-shape” and inflated beds, I was all ready for lying down on one. But there was little time for relaxation. The dog, delighted to be in an open, unexplored field with his glorious family, was wildly excited and it took all of our tenacity to retrieve him from our neighbour’s caravan and tether him to a special spike I’d bought, when I thought, oh so foolishly, I would take him with me to my ignominious days as allotment owner. The youngest girls too were irrepressibly thrilled being of an age to relish the adventure of sleeping on a blow-up bed, inside a sleeping bag, under canvas and have no qualms whatsoever regarding the sanitary conditions. Even our 14 year old joined us.
“It makes me nostalgic”. I’m eternally grateful that she didn’t follow that up with, “For better times”.
Finally, as the evening sun began to fade, the familiar tones of “Co-ee”, were heard and Mags and Sue appeared, gesticulating madly. Mags it must be said looked a dead ringer, apart from the beard and ruddy complexion, for Sherpa Tensing what with her Uggs and enormous haversack on her back.
“I knew it would be terribly basic”, she said, before adding, “Step aside Commander Band.” Hubby looked aghast as with one flick of her arm, which would have intimidated any Moroccan salesman, she unfurled a Kelim rug.
“There”, she said, “Take that look off your face”, she directed at Hubby, “There is no need for my friend and God-children to camp as though they are naval trainees” and she continued to decorate our humble pitch. A table cloth was flung with the same aplomb as the rug, bunting was draped and tea-lights and fairy-lights were lit.” From her bag she also removed an I-pod and speakers, a jug and some wild-meadow flowers. Plaid cushion pads were applied to nasty plastic seats. Whilst Mags styled us fit for a ‘Cool Camping’ editorial in Country Living, Sue emptied her bag. Out of it she withdrew, olives with feta, a live basil plant, rustique bread, runny Camembert and several bottles of red wine. Whilst the 14 year old was beside herself to be in the company of the Trinny and Susanna of the great outdoors, Hubby looked genuinely crest-fallen.
“But what about my sausages? I bought beans and corned beef as a surprise. We could have had pot-mess”. His eyes suddenly glazed and I realised that it wasn’t just my daughter who was feeling nostalgic. An ex-ped on Dartmoor, bivouacs, a camp fire and the camaraderie of other sailors were all visible on Hubby’s expression. Camping a la Royal Navy had not only provided him with a pot-mess but his salad days too.

Excess.

2010-08-19T09:52:00.000-07:00

Shamed by Mags into cleaning the bottom of my fridge, all I did before filling it up with the morning’s recent supermarket shop was empty the shelves and give the interior a bit of a Cif-fing. No big deal. It was a bit awkward; I was crouched and leaning in and reaching uncomfortably but really, it wasn’t exactly hard manual labour, nevertheless I have been left with crippling back pain which has resulted in my taking to my bed. I haven’t taken to my bed for an awfully long time. Not until recently anyway. Now suddenly this is the second time in a week. The first time was, I suppose, my fault entirely but it was such a good summer ball. Hubby looked as ever, immaculate. I felt movie star glamorous in my evening dress, my hair turned out alright, my shoes were comfortable without being ugly, Dad was sleeping over to keep an eye on the teenagers, which also meant Hubby and I could stay ‘on board’. We were, to coin a rather vulgar, Mancunian phrase, ‘up for it’. Our joie de vivre was helped along by summer drinks beforehand with the Captain, his wife and our friends. We continued with our merrymaking by way of pre-dinner champagne, continuing throughout dinner with copious bottles of wine.
After leaving the table all sorts of entertainment was provided and my prowess on a simulated surf board was not humiliatingly awful, neither was my shieing of a ball at the coconuts, my having to carry two for the rest of the evening, evidence of my success. We danced and danced to the phenomenal Freshly Squeezed, boogied to the disco and finally at 3.30am, went to bed. I will accept that up until dinner I had not heeded the government’s advice to drink responsibly and, had I continued in that vein, would no doubt have disgraced myself by either falling over or being sick, or God forbid, doing both simultaneously. From 11.30pm until 3.30am however, I only drank water, gallons of it, so that when I eventually went to bed, I was in high spirits and full of beans having attended the best ball, ever. When Hubby woke me at 9am however, to join our friends for a post ball debrief over breakfast, I thought I was going to die.
“Leave me alone” I moaned, “Just leave me rest in peace”. But he was having none of it. Dragging me out of bed and applying a variety of garments to my body, my whining all the while, Hubby then took me by the hand and pulled me along various corridors and stairwells until we finally reached the dining hall.
Mags, who had had to be carried to bed hours before me was tucking into black pudding and fried eggs, a broad grin on her face.
“Mornin’ Alice. Fantastic ball huh?”, she said with obscene chirpiness. I sat down and, whilst terribly bad manners to do so, put my elbows on the table and then with undoubtedly far worse manners, buried my head in my hands.
“Mornin’”, I groaned.
“Full breakfast mam?” asked a steward. I shook my head and shivered.
“Not on your nelly”, I said with a very small voice, “Just toast and tea please”.
“Non-handler”, said Hubby, dipping a large, greasy sausage into his egg yolk. I was feeling increasingly queasy.
“Hello Alice”, said a passing parson, slapping me across the back with characteristic bonhomie, “Excellent dancing last night not to mention your fine pair of coconuts!”. Not wanting to crush his feelings for not laughing at his saucy joke, I managed a weak smile.
“Not feeling your usual self old girl?”, he asked, roaring with laughter.
“You could say that”, I replied. I nibbled on some dry toast, and then left the table. Hubby and I gathered our belongings and drove home in silence. I offered my thanks to Dad, gave him a hug, relieved him of his duties, climbed the stairs, stripped off, then burrowed under my duvet and stayed there, all day. It being a Saturday Hubby, although feeling rather jaded himself, was at least at home and capable of walking both dog and daughters.
Today though he is at work and once again I am confined to bed. Perhaps it is God’s retribution. A question of ‘You want to stay in bed all day? Then I’ll show you my girl”. I am in agony and frustrated. The aforementioned dog and daughters were going stir-crazy until Mags saved the day, she also drove me to the doctor, who, left perplexed by my symptoms could only offer hard drugs. Plenty and of an astonishing assortment: Valium, codeine, ibuprofen and paracetamol vie for my attention. It remains to be seen what happens next; I’ve dallied with the drink and the drugs this week, all that remains in the sex and rock and roll. With my back in its current state, one of those recreational activities is out of the question. I may as well just listen to my i-Pod.

Terminus.

2010-08-02T02:30:00.000-07:00

“Alice, please lock the door and don’t let anyone else in”. We had just hugged and kissed another guest a fond farewell.
“Darling”, I said, soothingly, “It is almost over, the last of the guests will be gone in few days. Keep smiling”.
“Keep smiling? Bloody hell Alice. I’ve started to dread the doorbell ringing. Every time it does there is someone standing there with a suitcase”.
“Sweetheart”, I continued gently, “It’s not for much longer I promise. We’ve done the Swiss and the Norwegians, so that’s Europe taken care of. Just got to get through the Americas and we’re done until next summer”.
Begrudgingly Hubby followed me to the basement where we changed yet another set of bed sheets, scrubbed the shower and Parazoned the loo.
“So how many are arriving later”, Hubby asked.
“Five of them. Two adults and three children”. Hubby’s shoulders visibly slumped.
“You’ll be at work for most of the time”, I answered, “All you have to do is open the wine for dinner and then talk animatedly for a couple of hours.” Unconvinced Hubby was quiet and in silence we carried the dirty linen up the stairs and filled the washing machine. The poor thing looked genuinely frightened at another heap of laundry it was expected to wash.
Finally I spoke. “Just pray that the sun shines”. God must be rushed off his feet at the moment as he most certainly didn’t hear my prayers. The first few hours in the company of my American friends was pleasantly warm and sunny. We sat in the garden and chatted amiably over a pot of coffee. The children did as children do and just ran off to play as though they’d known each other for years and our 14 year old daughter awkwardly took their 13 year old son for a stroll around Torpoint. We were just about to go the pub near the beach when the skies darkened and the heavens opened. We ran inside and the teenagers ran home.
Outside, the decibel level of four young children, two being exuberant Americans had been diluted. Inside, the noise level was insufferable. They crashed up and down the stairs, banging doors almost off their hinges. They bounced my exercise ball with all the gusto of Serena Williams along my hallway, even though the difference in circumference between a tennis ball and an exercise ball is like comparing planet Earth with the Sun. My nerves were so much on edge that my teeth were involuntarily grinding. My eight year old was in 7th heaven. I think she genuinely thought, if her accent and mannerisms were anything to go by, that she had landed a part in an American tv show. Hubby looked at me beseechingly. I shrugged my shoulders and poured him another glass of wine.
Then armed with a golfing umbrella, he went to light the barbeque. “Hey, before you go to too much effort”, said Bill, “We ought to let you know we don’t eat meat”. Hubby looked confounded.
“None at all?”
“Only of the feathered variety”.
“Oh and we don’t do gluten” added my friend, “I brought rice cakes with me”. Hubby looked at the pile of Sainsbury’s Taste the Difference beef-burgers and stack of Tiger Vienna Rolls and wondered what to do with them. Luckily I’d bought four, 2 for £5 chicken tikka kebabs, so at least there was something to feed our guests. They are all very thin, so they didn’t seem to mind. The children nibbled half-heartedly at a rice cake, turned their noses up at the coleslaw, made a pukey face at the tomato and mozzarella and insisted that “this stinks” at the Indian flavour and thus alien tasting, chicken. They went to bed eventually, leaving the adults to chat. My dear husband, mostly urbane and articulate around his type of men i.e in the Navy who preferably support Crystal Palace and Paul Weller with equal fervour, was literally at sea with Bill. A professor in Cinema and Media.
“Have you seen Apollo 13?” asked Hubby eagerly, certain that another man would share his passion for macho movies, “It’s brilliant!”
“Who’s the cinematographer?” asked Bill. Hubby looked utterly lost.
“Dunno”, he said, “But Tom Hanks is in it” as if that offered a satisfactory reply. Hubby was relieved to go to work the following morning and spend a working day with real men. The sky continued to drown us and we spent a fraught day with sweaty, noisy children in an indoor play centre. It was far removed from Manhattan. It continued thus for a couple of days and finally they too embraced us and departed.
Hubby retreated to his armchair with a glass of Calvados, the Tour de France and a happy sigh. I received a text from my son, ‘Ma, the support band we are watching need lodgings. I said you’d be cool with them kipping here’. This was not the time to share that information.

Plus One

2010-07-23T09:33:00.000-07:00

The last time I came within hat admiring distance of the Duchess of Cornwall was about three years ago, in a deluge, in Cawsand Square with a party of schoolchildren. I wore a bright blue Kagoule and thrust a soggy box of fudge at her Highness. She kindly accepted it, smiled benevolently at me and got into a minibus. When Hubby told me on Sunday that he was going the next day to a ceremony at Truro Cathedral where the Duchess was going to be presenting awards, I was quite excited.
“What’s the rig?”, I asked.
“My uniform”, he replied, “What else? A fascinator?”
“Droll. I know what you’ll wear because, give or take a few medals and the odd cummerbund, it’s always the same thing but what should I wear? Hmm, let’s see, I’ve got that lovely, navy blue two piece suit and my court shoes, or the pink, floral silk dress, or the Hobbs spotty number? What about a hat? It’s a bit short notice to find a hat.” I was merely thinking out loud, not genuinely asking for his advice.
“Alice. You are not invited”, Hubby said, flatly. I threw my hand up to my chest as though I’d been shot.
“Not invited?” I gasped, it hardly seemed possible.
“No love. Not invited. I’m standing in for the Captain as it is”.
“But surely the Captain was expected to have a plus one. Can’t I be your plus one?”
“No” and that was the end of the discussion. The next day, as Hubby rubbed shoulders with Royalty I decided to have my own adventure.
When I got to Taunton Dean, I pulled into the service station and texted the after-school club to book my girls in until such a time that Hubby had finished schmoozing and could retrieve them. That done, I texted Hubby to inform him of my plans and his involvement therein. Immediately, my mobile buzzed, informing me of a new text message. It read, DO NOT SPEND ANY MONEY. Like that, in capitals. Funny how he could shout at me via a text. I put my phone back into my bag and continued my journey until I got to IKEA in Bristol.
I had a pleasant lunch, resisted the temptation of meatballs and gravy, mooched about and then, funny old thing, but bit by bit my trolley filled up. Eventually, when I could no longer push the trolley lest a Health and Safety officer should apprehend me, I went to the check out. I paid, refilled the trolley and humped an enormous shelving unit, with ‘Two People Must Lift This Item’ emblazoned on it, under the trolley. Rubbing the small of my back, I stood up straight very gingerly, made my way to the Swedish shop, bought a few Scandinavian comestibles, a coffee and an ice-cream and leant against a bar top to eat and drink them before loading the car and driving home again. It was at this juncture that uncharacteristically, I checked my receipt. The fitted sheet that I’d bought in a peculiar chartreuse colour that had been thrust into my hand by a mature shop assistant with, “It’s been reduced from £19.99 to £3.25” had been charged to my account for £19.99. I can put up with chartreuse for £3.25 but not twenty quid.
“I say, excuse me”, I said to the check-out girl, “There seems to have been a mistake with a price here”.
“Customer returns”, she said, not even looking in my direction. Customer Returns was like Argos. I had to get a number then wait until my number was called. I was feeling rather weary at this point and still had a drive, now during rush hour, to contend with. Finally my number was called.
I went up to the desk. “I am a little aggrieved”, I said very calmly, “That I have to go through this process when it wasn’t my mistake. I have a long journey ahead of me and could well do without this rigmarole”. The woman in question said not a word but tapped, repeatedly with the end of her biro, at a sign on her desk. It was one of those you see everywhere these days in places where customer dissatisfaction is rife which elicits verbal abuse and how they don’t have to put up with it. I agree, no-one should feel threatened at work, similarly, surely we as customers, whether in a bus, hospital, airport or IKEA have the right to express that dissatisfaction?
“But I’m just trying to say that this isn’t my mistake. I would like a refund” I was exasperated but not angry. She pressed a button. “Violent customer”, she said into a microphone and before you could say Gravadlax, a surly supervisor materialised.
Later that evening as I fitted my £19.99 chartreuse sheet to my mattress, Hubby walked in. “You know Alice. That’s not a dissimilar colour to Camilla’s suit”. Hubby wished he’d had a panic button to press thereafter.

Ennui.

2010-07-13T06:30:00.000-07:00

It is a common enough sight these days. Hubby sprawled on one sofa watching football whilst I lie on the other. To untrained eyes we look like any long married couple watching an evening of television sharing a cosy, harmonious silence that comes after many years cohabitation. Those in the know though, would sense great dissatisfaction. As Hubby whooped and blasphemed in equal measure at the screen, I lay there conjuring up ever more elaborate ways to kill myself. I genuinely and obviously naively thought that, once England were out, there might be a chance of conversation or an evening walk with the dog to the pub. No chance. Hubby seems just as enthusiastic regarding his support for the World Cup -although this may have something to do with the fact that he stands to win 90 quid if Spain win. Viva Espagne. Many might criticise me and say it is only 90 minutes of my life and that I ought to let my poor, hardworking husband enjoy his football and would I not be better employed washing down the skirting boards or addressing the ironing? And I would answer, they can go to hell. I do more than my fair share and at the end of the day also like to throw myself with gay abandon onto an adjacent sofa and zone out. What has exacerbated my annoyance is that once the football is over, the Sky+ has been working overtime and is poised ready to play, at a second’s notice, The Tour de Bloody France. What I don’t know about a peloton then neither does Lance Armstrong.
So there we were. Our son out with ‘the band’, the youngest girls in bed, our eldest daughter in her room working on a bizarre piece of art homework and Sandy the Swiss girl, perhaps inspired by the Tour de France or more likely, desperate to get out, had gone for a ride on our son’s bike. It hadn’t been in use for a number of years but, after a liberal spray with WD40 it sprung into action.
Hubby cheered, Spain had got through to the final and Geraint Thomas was currently saddle sore but in second place with his bike. Hubby was in 7th heaven and I was thwarted in my plans of putting my head in the oven and gassing myself because a) after Sylvia Plath’s toxic exit it is no longer poisonous and b) being eye-level it would be a very uncomfortable way to die as I’d probably get a crick in my neck first so, I continued to lie there, staring at the ceiling thinking, any more of this and I wouldn’t have to make any effort to kill myself as I’d be bored to death within the hour. Suddenly the sitting room door opened and Sandy stood there, flushed, panting and shaking. I jumped up.
“Sandy! My love! What has happened to you?” Within seconds all sorts of horrors entered my mind most of them involving drunken sailors or local youths, hell bent on getting their hands on a pretty Heidi as she free-wheeled down the dips, her blonde plaits flying behind her. Nothing could have prepared me for what she was about to say.
“I have killed an eagle”, she said. Even Hubby looked up.
“You’ve what?” he asked, inserting a finger into his ear and wiggling it vigorously.
“She said she’s killed an eagle”. I didn’t want to contradict her but swooping eagles are few and far between in Torpoint.
“Um, are you sure Sandy love? Are you sure it was an eagle?”
“Why yes, of course” she answered in her formal English, “It has very sharp... what do you call these?” and she gestured with stiff, gnarled fingers.
“Talons?” I said, with eyes ever wider.
“Exactly, of course. Please come”. Wild horses, let alone wild eagles couldn’t have stopped me.
“But that bloody race on pause”, I said to Hubby, “Let’s go”. We drove to the Raleigh dips, where in late dusk, the trees, heavy with summer foliage, made it a very gloomy place indeed.
“Where is the eagle darling?” I asked, feeling to be quite honest, rather creeped out. She put a finger to her lips and lifted a pile of bracken. We all held our breath, expecting to see the cadaver of a great bird of prey with gigantic talons, stricken. Instead, still in a very tight ball was Mrs Tiggywinkle, a rather rotund and some might say, not a little aggrieved, hedgehog.
Sandy did the stiff talon thing with her fingers again. Only they obviously didn’t signify talons but more the spines of a small, nocturnal woodland creature.
“It is still alive!” she cried, “The igel is still alive”. Igel being now, oh so evidently Swiss-German for, hedgehog.