Show a little faith, there’s magic in the night

The It’s a Friday evening in summer, but I feel as though it’s Christmas Eve.

Tomorrow morning my fella and I are setting off on one of our most favourite adventures. No kids, a plane journey, a plush hotel, lashings of beer…and Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band.

I am beyond excited. I’ve seen The Boss live twice and each time I have been completely blown away.

There is no one else in the world that can touch Springsteen when it comes to live gigs. The E Street Band is the best rock ‘n’ roll bar band that was ever put together and it is pure, sheer blissful joy to see and hear them in concert.

But I haven’t always felt this way about The Boss. Quite the opposite, in fact.

Like many people I suppose, for most of my life I was of the impression that his songs were either about cars, or girls, or both.  And that’s true. They are. But I didn’t realise they are about so much more.

My husband is a former music journalist, and he has wonderful and wide-ranging musical tastes, not to mention a ridiculously unmanageable collection of vinyl and CDs. I like a lot of different styles of music, but before I met him I was strictly a Greatest Hits kinda gal. It was a new and peculiar idea to me that someone could ever get the urge to hear a certain artist, and then listen to their entire back catalogue in chronological order, over and over.

‘Seriously, this again?’ I would sigh as ‘Darkness on the Edge of Town’ was set down on the turntable once more. ‘Girls, cars, girls…life is so hard….I gotta get outta this town,’ I would mock, in my best Noo Joisey accent.

But one night we were drinking red wine and playing Scrabble and as I waited, as usual, to get a U to go with the Q, I found that, by some weird kind of osmosis, I now knew some of the words of ‘Adam Raised A Cain’’. Slowly but surely, I was coming round.

And then one spring day I was hit with a lightning-bolt epiphany. I remember everything about it. We had been listening to Springsteen’s Live boxset as we drove along the motorway – sorry highway (or is it turnpike?). The sky was beautiful and there were low clouds over the sun, creating radiating shafts of light – just like you’d expect to see if you were having some sort of religious transformation.

So here’s Bruce, talking to fans in between songs at the Coliseum in LA in 1985, telling them about his difficult relationship with his dad. Oh here we go, I thought. YAWN.

But when I actually started to listen to what he said, as he strummed his guitar, my skin prickled with goosebumps. He told the story of how he and his father just didn’t see eye to eye as he grew up, how his dad hated the way he dressed, what he did with his time, and how he hoped Bruce would get signed up to the military so he’d straighten out and make something of his life. This was happening in the late 60s, and the Vietnam drafts were happening all over America. Friends were going, as Bruce says, and some of them weren’t coming back.

He weaves the tale of a broken relationship, paints a picture of a father who just doesn’t care about his son. And then, suddenly, he hits you right in the feels. Big fat tears rolled down my cheeks.

This is the story:

“When I was growing up, me and my dad used to go at it all the time over almost anything. I used to have really long hair, way down past my shoulders. I was 17 or 18, oh man, he used to hate it. And we got to where we’d fight so much that I’d spend a lot of time out of the house; and in the summertime it wasn’t so bad, ‘cause it was warm, and my friends were out, but in the winter, I remember standing downtown where it’d get so cold and, when the wind would blow, I had this phone booth I used to stand in. And I used to call my girl, like, for hours at a time, just talking to her all night long.

“And finally I’d get my nerve up to go home. I’d stand there in the driveway and he’d be waiting for me in the kitchen and I’d tuck my hair down on my collar and I’d walk in and he’d call me back to sit down with him. And the first thing he’d always ask me was what did I think I was doing with myself. And the worst part of it was that I could never explain to him.

“I remember I got in a motorcycle accident once and I was laid up in bed and he had a barber come in and cut my hair and, man, I can remember telling him that I hated him and that I would never ever forget it. And he used to tell me: ‘Man, I can’t wait till the army gets you. When the army gets you they’re gonna make a man out of you. They’re gonna cut all that hair off and they’ll make a man out of you.’

“And this was, I guess, ’68 when there was a lot of guys from the neighbourhood going to Vietnam. I remember the drummer in my first band coming over to my house with his marine uniform on, saying that he was going and that he didn’t know where it was. And a lot of guys went, and a lot of guys didn’t come back. And the lot that came back weren’t the same anymore.

“I remember the day I got my draft notice. I hid it from my folks and three days before my physical me and my friends went out and we stayed up all night and we got on the bus to go that morning and man, we were all so scared.

“And I went, and I failed. I came home. I remember coming home after I’d been gone for three days and walking in the kitchen and my mother and father were sitting there. My dad said: ‘Where you been?’ and I said, ‘I went to take my physical.’ He said ‘What happened?’ I said ‘They didn’t take me.’ And he said: ‘That’s good.’

This isn’t some dreamed –up story about hard times. This is real. This happened, and it happened to him. I got it. I understood. Brother, I believed! Hallelujah, I BELIEVE!

Now I wanted to find out more about his story, I wanted to listen carefully to all the songs – yes in chronological order, over and over! I wanted to read the lyrics and understand all the things I’d been missing out on all this time.

When you read about Springsteen’s childhood, you see he had a pretty shit time. He found solace in music because he was a bit of a geek and a loner and, despite achieving superstar status, I think he still is. He tours not just because he loves it or because it’s his passion. He needs it to survive.

My Born-To-Run-again revelation happened around the time that the Wrecking Ball album had been released and Springsteen was touring in Europe. We were lucky enough to see him at Sunderland and Hampden, and it is not a word of a lie to say those two gigs are among the happiest days of my life.

The songs of Springsteen have brought a lot of meaning and happiness to my life, and sharing my fella’s love of The Boss has deepened the bond between us. The live gigs are big moments in our lives, and I can’t wait for this weekend, where we’ll see him twice, grinning at each other for hours on end like the nerdy superfans we are.

But the thing I love most about my Springsteen story is not the music or the live gigs . It’s this: it taught me that, even in your 30s, you can change. Your ideas and opinions are not fixed. You are not complete, you are a work in progress and you always will be, until you take your last breath. You can suddenly see something that once meant nothing to you in a whole new light, and it can change your life.

I like to think that those rays of sunshine that shone on the day I changed my mind about Springsteen were rays of hope – hope that I will always remain open to seeing things differently and falling in love with something new.

At Hampden last time, Springsteen said: “People ask me why I still tour now that I’m in my 60s. Why do I still write music? And I tell them: ‘The light from the oncoming train focuses the mind.’”

True dat, Bruce.

Life is short, live it mindfully, and do what you love. That’s what I’m doing this weekend, and I can’t wait.

x

 

To my daughter, on the eve of your 10th birthday

I can’t quite believe you are going to be 10 tomorrow. Double digits.

This time 10 years ago you were still all curled up inside my body, one of your wee knees wedged under my ribcage. Not due to appear for two weeks yet.

But, on May 8 2006, you decided it was time to make your way into the world. As I dozed on and off at around 5am, hearing the seagulls squawking on the roof, I drifted awake as I felt some pain coming and going. I began to wonder if this was ‘it’.

After an hour or so I decided to have a shower. As I reached over to turn the controls, my waters broke with ferocious speed and noise but, neatly, over the bathmat.

I had a brief moment of panic, then a wave of calm washed over me. After my shower I went upstairs to get dressed. Daddy was still fast asleep, so I leaned over and said:

‘I don’t think you’ll be going to work today.’
‘Why?’ he replied sleepily
‘Because my waters just broke all over the bathroom floor.’
There was a long pause.
‘Then I’ll need a cup of coffee.’

We made our way to the hospital at around 9am and I spent the day pacing around. Daddy says I made mooing noises like a cow.

I think I shouted a very, very, very bad swearword at the top of my voice just minutes before you were born. I hope you didn’t notice…

At 5.37pm, the pain was replaced with the sweetest and most sudden relief I had ever felt. You were here.

I asked if you were a boy or a girl, and the midwife suggested that Daddy tell me. But he couldn’t see for the cord, which was so twisted it looked like a telephone cable – you were already a gymnast before you were born, turning somersaults in my tummy!

‘It’s a girl,’ the midwife said, as she put you in my arms. Your dark eyes were wide open, and you didn’t make a sound. No screaming, no crying. Just taking everything in.

And that’s still the way you are now. Steady in nature, calm and good-tempered. You see everything that goes on, but you don’t need to be right in the middle of it.

You don’t seek out drama, you don’t need to be at the front of the queue. You never feel the need to be the biggest or best at everything.

I love your sense of humour and fun. I like the way you put your outfits together – every colour and print all at once, like a grenade’s gone off in a paint factory.

You are a kind and loyal friend. You don’t exclude anyone and yet you don’t yearn to be in anyone’s gang. You stand up for people who need your help and you don’t tolerate being told what to do. Apart from by me. Obviously.

You have been a loving big sister right from the second you met your brother. You have never once been jealous towards him. You bring out the best in each other, and I hope you will always stay as close as you are now.

You are also UNBELIEVABLY messy. And stubborn. And argumentative. And sometimes too laid back for your own good. I’d love to see you be brave and push yourself a bit harder, because I know that if you were just a little bit bolder you could achieve even more.

But I hope you never change. Always be a dreamer and keep your love of creating and imagining. Keep seeing things from other people’s points of view. Stay kind and caring, stick up for those who need it, and speak out against unfairness. Keep that infectious laugh and your sparkling sense of fun.

Nurture the feeling I know you’ve got that says you don’t want to be treated differently because you are a girl. Don’t don’t let anyone tell you how a girl should behave. Wear that Batman t-shirt with your Unicorn trousers and eyeshadow on your cheeks if you want to.

Keep cartwheeling across this world forever, and never, ever let anyone tell you that you can’t do something. You can do anything.

But most of all, always be yourself, because you are absolutely perfect just the way you are.

Happy 10th birthday Moonbeam. I love you.

(Also, please tidy your room.)

Mummy.

x

 

We need to talk about periods

Fair warning: what follows is an epic diatribe on the subject of periods.

In the interests of avoiding the most gory of details, I’m assuming that, even if you’re not a woman and in the unlikely event you don’t happen to know any women, you know what menstruation involves. The information is widely available, after all.

The bible, for instance, has a lot to say about periods. All of it shite.

So, for at least 2000 years, opinions on periods have been ‘out there’ yet they are still generally considered an impolite subject. It’s still bad form to talk about them at dinner parties and, more importantly, it’s still frowned upon to admit you’re currently having one or suffering from any of the debilitating symptoms that often occur as one approaches.

For someone like me who lacks the What We Are Allowed To Talk About filter, this makes things pretty difficult.

I don’t understand why, in some workplaces (not my current one I should add) it is acceptable for someone to rise from their desk at the same time every day, shove a newspaper under their arm and stride off to the john for 20 minutes, leaving everyone in no doubt what natural act is about to take place, yet when my period starts unexpectedly I have to surreptitiously sidle off to the ladies with a tampon in my shoe.

When you’re not the sort of woman who wears any makeup to work, never mind reapplies it during the day, it’s a bit of a giveaway to schlep your handbag to the toilet every couple of hours. In the absence of makeup, the only possible reasons for taking your bag to the ladies are a) you’ve got your period b) you have a cocaine habit. I’m pretty sure 90% of my workmates would rather it was the latter if they thought they would have to make conversation about it.

I’ve done some back-of-an-envelope calculations and, at an extremely rough guess, I’d say somewhere in the region of 200 million women in the known universe are having their period every day of the year.

Yet we are supposed to act like it is not happening. We are supposed to be discreet with the equipment on which we are forced to pay luxury goods tax. We are supposed to quietly deal with the mess and the pain.

Teenage girls sit life-changing exams when they are at the worst point in their cycle, their heads muddled and their bodies in pain. Tennis players play in grand slams with cramps, dizziness and nausea and they are supposed to get on with it just the same. And that’s before we even stop to consider that some cultures still separate menstruating women from the rest of their community.

Everything about how we deal with menstruation in society needs to change.

A tiny proportion of women have a 28-day cycle that runs like clockwork. If she’s extremely lucky she’ll have little or no pain, no interrupted sleep, no mood swings or breast tenderness, and her bleeding will be light. It’ll all be over in four or five days and her life is barely affected.

If you are one of these women, then I would like to meet you and touch your hand, because I believe you to be as mythical as a Minotaur.

I have never, ever spoken to a woman who has periods that are both regular and symptom free.

I know women who can’t leave the house because their bleeding is so heavy.

I know women who have migraines so blinding that they have blacked out.

I know women who have been sectioned and ended up having a hysterectomy.

I know women who have cramps so severe they have been sick and fainted. (This is me.)

I know women who gave broken household appliances in a fit of pre-menstrual rage. (Also me.)

What can we do about this delightful smorgasbord of symptoms?

Well, as you would expect when up to half the population are likely to suffer from some kind of PMS in their lifetime, there are lots of highly researched and completely effective treatment options, of course!

I’m kidding. They are all shit.

They range from the mildly patronising – exercise and diet – to the fairly serious – oral contraceptives and implants – and the downright alarming – gonadotrophin-releasing hormone analogues (GnRH).

If you want an idea of how utterly frustrating and hopelessly infuriating it is to seek treatment for PMS, read this. This is NHS advice on dealing with PMS.

Read the whole thing and pretend you have come across it as you desperately seek help for your symptoms. Then you, my friend, will know despair.

‘There are many non-prescribed alternative treatments and supplements that claim to help treat PMS. Some women may find these helpful for easing their symptoms. However, many complementary therapies and supplements have either not been tested or haven’t been proven to be effective.’

What they are saying is ‘we are obliged to tell you about these because some Hippy Helen reckons they work but, actually, we know they are pish so I wouldn’t bother, yeah?’

Don’t get me wrong, I know that each of the treatments listed in that article work for many women. Some are lucky and find something that works straight away. Others persevere with different methods until they find something effective. Many simply do not find a treatment that works satisfactorily for them, and some even find their symptoms worsen.

Exercise has a positive effect on symptoms by helping to release endorphins. However, despite your best intentions as you surf towards the Crimson Wave, when you hit that motherfucker there is literally nothing you feel less like doing than strapping your aching norks into a sports bra and stuffing your bloated belly into some skintight lyrca while blood flows from your nethers.

Ditto for eating steamed broccoli and some grilled salmon. Let’s get this straight, at this point Mother Nature has pinned you to the ground and she has your arm twisted up your back. She wants you to give her chocolate, pastries and as many salted snacks as you can get your hands on. There is no negotiation.

The contraceptive pill is popular as a treatment and I have tried several, each with a selection of delightful side effects ranging from acne to weight gain and loss of sex drive. Yes ladies, the reason the pill is an effective contraception is because you’re fat, spotty and frigid! But at least you don’t have any period pain!

Women are being put on all sorts of hormones to try to iron out hormonal imbalances, but what’s really happening most of the time is they are simply swapping one shite set of symptoms for a set that is marginally less shite.

And that is why, for the last 14 years, I have preferred to put up with my symptoms. At least they are my symptoms, and they are not manufactured.

For two weeks I feel like I could conquer the world. I am clear-headed, full of energy and vitality. Slowly, I slip towards exhaustion and irritability. Some months I get off lightly and feel nothing other than cramps and tiredness. Every so often I hit the motherlode – carb cravings off the scale, exhaustion, anger, hopelessness, irritability, sadness, pain, night sweats, sleeplessness, tearfulness and lack of concentration.

This is my life. This is happening 10-12 times a year, for 40 or 45 years, until Mother Nature decides it’s time to swap those horrors for the fresh hell of menopause.

It would be far easier to deal with all of this if women could be open about their periods. Sadly, many don’t even feel able to share their burden with those closest to them.

Not me. Obviously. I’m not prepared to perpetuate this veil of secrecy into the next generation. I will speak about menstruation to anyone who will listen and even to those who won’t. It is the only way. We have to stop pretending periods don’t happen, we have to stop hiding it when we’re feeling less than our best.

I don’t want my daughter to suffer in silence. I don’t want her to feel shame when there is mess. I can’t bear to think of her doubled up in agony at school and too embarrassed to tell her teacher or her friend.

I want her to stand up and say she needs to leave the class and take some painkillers.

I don’t want my son to feel awkward at the mention of menstruation, or to whisper with his friends when a girl in his class has had to tie her jacket around her waist. I want him to buy her a bar of chocolate.

I suspect that medicine, even if quality research was properly funded (perhaps with the money made from luxury goods tax on tampons), will never find a satisfactory solution to the mercurial problems caused by menstruation. Quite honestly, I could deal with that. I’ve given birth to two babies with just gas and air for pain relief. I can deal with anything.

But I will not suffer in silence. I want to be heard.

Anyone who is suffering wants to be listened to, to have their concerns validated and to feel empathy and sympathy. They do not want to feel shame or embarrassment.

When you’re hot, tired and in pain from your navel to your knees; when you’ve karate kicked the handle off the oven in a fit of rage, when you can’t concentrate and you want to cry about nothing in particular and everything in general, you want to tell someone, anyone. Your colleague, your boss, your dad, your partner, your neighbour, your kid.

You don’t want them to look embarrassed or change the subject, you want them to bring you a cup of tea (pint of vodka) and a hot water bottle without having to be asked, just as you would do if they said they had hurt their back.

You definitely don’t want to have to shuffle to the ladies with a tampon in your shoe.

[Inspiration for this post came from fellow Dundee blogger Holly Scanlan who opened up about the subject so beautifully and eloquently, as always, on her brilliant blog Gigi Bobs Her Hair.]

Image from The Stocks

Dear Library

When I was a child, my little legs would struggle up your steps and into the children’s room. My own room. Even your name was full of wonder – Sandeman. A story by itself.

You held boxes of brightly coloured tales that were just for me. I could pick them out and sit on your tiny chairs and look at the pictures, or pile books up high and wobble to the desk with as many as I could carry, and then take them home! The little orange card that said my name, the lady who briskly stamped the tickets.

Shelves on all sides of the tall walls for the books without pictures, books for older children, books for my future when I could read long words in tiny type.

It was exciting to know there were Other Rooms. Autobiography, Geography, Travel, Romance, History, Crime. Another set of stairs I’d yet to climb. When I peered up the stairwell I could smell the past and one day I’d find there were maps up there, and newspapers yellowed by time.

But too soon the days of devouring books for fun were gone. Far too fast the world of chocolate factories and Swedish diamond thieves and enchanted trees swept by and, suddenly, I only visited you to escape the very stimulation you used to provide.

I used you for endless hours of panicked scribbling, revisiting all I had learned at school as I tried to pass my exams.

‘Another hour, and then I can go home’, I’d promise myself, when once I had begged to stay.

A few years passed and I swapped you for a towering building in another city. It was full of things I’d never understand and, once again, I sat late into the night looking for quotes to illustrate my academic arguments.

We both knew this wasn’t really me, but it was something I had to do. Beaudelaire, Foucault, Leavis, Barthes – these weren’t stories and what they contained left me cold. You seemed to sense that I was lost, and maybe that’s why you lead me to Wilde and Burns, Kelman, MacDougall, Banks, Muir, Morgan and Gray.

But I was tired of reading. Ten books a week was just too much. So many of them seemed cold and empty, and they didn’t stoke the fire that burns within me to hear stories. To read about heartbreak, loss, love, longing and belonging. The human condition.

We didn’t see each other for a while. I turned my back on you when you had done nothing wrong. But you knew I’d be back one day.

Now I help little legs struggle up a different set of steps and watch as they search through boxes of brightly coloured tales and trail their hands across shelves of endless possibilities.

My heart is fit to burst as I watch them settle into tiny chairs and follow words with their fingers, eagerly turning pages as they disappear into worlds that you provide for them without end.

I have fallen in love with you again.

You should know that, even when I left you, I never stopped believing in your power to change the world.

And I never will.

Love, Linda.

A love letter to Eva

The light is fading. A low yellow moon shines over the sea as we turn away from the the main road. Twisting down the steep road towards the village, the bay opens up before us. We weave through rows of small white cottages with tiny windows and brightly painted doors until we reach the harbourside.

We pass fishing boats bobbing up and down in the neat little port until the road becomes the seawall itself, no wider than a car, with the seawater foaming below.

I wind down the window to hear the waves, and the tyres crackle on the gravel as we reach the end of the road. There is nothing beyond but beach.

This is my favourite place in the whole world.

Eva’s Cottage belongs to a friend of mine. A few times each year we pack the car with food and wine and disappear for the weekend.

There’s no phone signal, no wifi. But there is a pub.

It is very heaven.

The sound of the sea is constant. It’s just feet away from the door. When the tide is high and it is stormy, the spray kisses the windows of the cottage. You can lie in bed and see the tide come and go, and watch seabirds swoop into the waves.

And when you’re tired of doing that you can walk to the next village, which is so tiny and hard to reach that the people who own houses there have to park halfway up the hill from the village and take their shopping home with a wheelbarrow.

This village is also home to the most needless set of yellow lines in the country. Who would park here?

At the right time of year you can see dolphins, puffins and gannets. You can fish off the pier and you can search for crabs in rock pools. You can fly kites on the beach and paddle in the shallows.

It is heart-burstingly, soul-soaringly beautiful.

It is noisy, fierce, peaceful and beautiful all at the same time. It is the best things about life all at once. It is magic.

Ah! what pleasant visions haunt me
As I gaze upon the sea!
All the old romantic legends,
All my dreams, come back to me. 

By The Seaside: The Secret of The Sea, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Crochet lessons

In the days before children, I read a lot of books. Evenings stretched out ahead of me like a contented cat and I would curl up on the couch with my favourite fiction. I would knock off a book in a week. Sometimes two.

Nowadays, I’ll be luckily if I’ve read three pages before I’m called upon to referee Xbox Wars or rescue a Lego superhero from oblivion, otherwise known as Down The Side of The Sofa. Even when the children are playing quietly in the same room (that one time), I can no longer concentrate on a book while they’re around. I save the reading for bedtime when, ironically, I will fall asleep after reading three pages.

Once the hard labour phase of parenting had passed, I realised I needed to find an alternative sitting-down pastime. Something I could do while still ‘being around’ the children. Most of the time they don’t need me to play with them, they just want me to be nearby.

My sister is an epic knitter. Her needles click at the same speed as an Andy Murray serve, and she rattles off beautiful cashmere socks and intricate scarves at a dizzying pace. I have tried, but I can’t make head nor tail of the patterns and I can’t even cast on which is kind of important if, y’know, you want to knit something.

One day my sis appeared with a WIP (that’s work in progress for all you yarn virgins) that was unlike any of the things I’d seen her work on before. It was chunky, modern and in vibrant colours. ‘It’s crochet!’ she said, like I was some sort of halfwit. To be fair, she often speaks to me like that.

In a show of patience with her little sister unprecedented in nearly 35 years, she sat down and taught me how to crochet. In stark contrast to knitting, crochet begins with a simple slipknot. The basic stitch was relatively simple to pick up.

I was hooked. Haha, I made a crochet funny!

I watched YouTube tutorials to learn new stitches and techniques, scoured the internet for blogs and pattern sites (Attic 24 is my favourite), built up a ridiculous yarn stash from Wool Warehouse and the frankly awesome Dundee shop Fluph, and I was soon off and running, starting off with baby hats and moving on to blankets, scarves and then amigurumi (the Japanese art of crocheting small, stuffed animals).

I am astounded by how much I have learned in just two years, and it’s much more than simply How To Crochet.

Lesson One: Patience

I have always had lots of patience for other people, but almost none with myself. Crochet has taught me to go slowly, to be methodical and to react reasonably when things go arse over tit, which they do. Often. Look at this Unicorn for instance. Isn’t he beautiful? Hours and hours of painful single crochet, resulting in blisters, to make this fella. From the side he is perfect.

From the front, not so much. This is what happens when you fix the safety eyes on without paying attention to how the head will attach to the neck…

Lesson Two: Perseverance

The average baby blanket takes me around 10 hours to complete. More than once I have been due to visit a lovely bundle of fluffy new baby goodness the very next day and not yet halfway finished a blanket. It is so very tempting to dump the thing in the bin and drive to Mothercare, but the reaction you get when your handmade gift is opened is worth every single minute, every tail-end darned in.

Lesson Three: The joy of creating 

If you’ve had the sort of day where everything you touch has gone to shit, you can rely on crochet to make things right. A rose or a string of heart-shaped bunting takes 15 minutes to complete and you have turned your day the right way up. You have made something. You have won.

Lesson Four: Peace

Far too much value is placed on busyness in the 21st century. Although crafts such as sewing, knitting and crochet are considered ‘cool’ right now, there are still plenty people who will scoff and sneer at a pastime so homely, something traditionally associated with ‘housewives’ and ‘grannies’. Frankly, those folks can ram it sideways. Sitting in peace and quiet (or even surrounded by chimp children who treat your furniture like gymnastic apparatus) hooking repetitive stitches has a soothing effect on your mind and soul. You cannot check Facebook as you keep count of rows. You cannot conjure up a list of things you have to do, or worry about the things you haven’t done. It’s also impossible to watch programmes with subtitles, so if you’re into Nordic Noir you might want to give crochet a swerve.

Lesson Five: Pride

Look at the stuff I have made! Stuff you can wear! Stuff you can cuddle! Stuff you can hang on your wall! Stuff that will give your children nightmares (that poor little Unicorn). The sense of achievement that comes from spending hours hooking a blanket, washing it in non-bio, snipping off the ends and squeezing the squidgy, sweet-smelling softness before wrapping it in a big bow is surely unmatchable. I feel as if I might burst with joy when I see another stripy elephant go off to a new home. Well actually, I want to keep them all and have a herd on the shelf but our house already looks like a crazy old lady lives here so it’s best to let them go.

When I decided to write this post I gathered together everything I have crocheted so I could take some photos. I was blown away as I set it up on the chair. Almost twice as much has left the house as gifts, too.

I made all these things. And you can too.

 

 

 

Insert quote here

Eleanor Roosevelt was a pretty cool dame. A bold feminist and civil rights activist, she often publicly disagreed with her husband’s policies. ‘You might be the leader of the free world, Frank, but you’re talkin’ shit!’ (I’m paraphrasing.)

She was also the first FLOTUS to hold her own press conferences and she banned men from attending them, forcing newspapers to employ female reporters in order to cover what she said. This was the 1930s, mind. That took some proper ladyballs.

She hung out with other inspirational women like pioneer pilot Amelia Earhart and ground-breaking journalist Lorena Hickok. She gave birth to six children even though she didn’t really like babies and, throughout everything, she put up with the humiliation of her husband’s infidelities.

Did you know, according to t’internet, Eleanor spoke entirely in inspirational quotes? Yup. She only ever spoke in bitesize pieces of pithy wisdom that fit perfectly into a meme generator with a floaty font and a meadowful of daisies.

‘Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people.’

Now, I like Eleanor. She seems like a broad who I could get along with. But that quote is bullshit, if you’ll forgive my Anglo Saxon.

I don’t know its exact origins, but I assume Eleanor wrote it in one of her newspaper columns, hoping to inspire wartime housewives to stop gossiping about their neighbours and start thinking of positive ways to embrace post-segragation America.

But just how motivational is it to tell 99.9% of the population that they are ‘small-minded’?

What’s the air up like there on the moral high ground, Eleanor? Can we assume you and your cool pals only ever talked of social reform, the New Deal, the de-industrialisation of Germany? Maybe a handful of times you stooped to talk about the invasion of Belgium, or Pearl Harbor. And there was that one time Lorena let slip that she was a lesbian.

In a massively roundabout way, what I’m trying to say is that most ‘motivational quotes’ are, for want of a better word, shite.

Look at this one.

‘Words build bridges into unexplored regions.’

It’s good, eh? True. Inspiring. Who said it? Ernest Hemingway.

I’m kidding. It was Hitler.

Somehow, we have grown to assume that the words of people we admire carry more meaning than the words of ordinary people or, indeed, murderous dictators.

They don’t.

Furthermore, we don’t use quotes and sayings to challenge our beliefs, only to affirm them. That’s okay if you’re just trying to cheer up your Instagram pals, but if you’re using them to make yourself seem smart, or to mark yourself out as part of a tribe that is somehow better than the rest of humanity (and plenty people do) then, frankly, you’re an asshat.

I think the worst kind of quotes are the ones that urge you to stop at nothing to turn your passion into making a living. I’ve already written about this, and you can read the post here. Ironically, it ends with a motivational quote. I know, I’m a dickhead.

Steve Jobs was King of the Motivational Quote. Check out these nuggets.

‘Innovation distinguishes between a leader and a follower’ = I’m brilliant, a few other people are also brilliant, and the rest of you just troop along behind, much like arseholes.

‘It’s better to be a pirate than to join the navy’ = Sometimes I also steal ideas to be brilliant.

‘The only way to do great work is to love what you do’ = I’m brilliant and, furthermore, I’m quite happy for thousands of people to earn crummy factory wages so that I can do something I love.

Oh, the irony of typing this on my Mac.

I know I have taken every single quote out of context and that’s my point (yes, there is one, and it’s coming right now, you’ll be glad to hear).

As someone who works with words, I often hear people say they’re ‘not good at writing’. They say they don’t know how to express themselves properly, and that makes me sad.

I also don’t believe it to be true.

When you really feel strongly about something, it shows. The best way to make yourself understood is to use your own words, not someone else’s.

Now, can someone put that in a typewriter font and stick it in front of a picture of a sunset?

Dead, at 69

Not once, but twice this week I’ve shed a tear at the death of someone famous.

It’s a curious feeling. I’ve never met David Bowie or Alan Rickman, and yet I feel as if I’ve lost something. I feel as if my life just won’t be quite the same now they’re gone.

There are people who will think this is ridiculous and, in a way, it is.

It is quite ridiculous, if you compare it to the death of a loved one. To suffering and injustice, of which there is far too much.

But this isn’t a competition. It’s alright to be sad about famous people dying. It’s okay to be sad over anything. Your favourite mug breaking (check). An old man walking home with a carrier bag (check). Your cat cleaning her paws (check). Any tiny insignificant thing (check).

There’s no league table of Acceptable Things To Cry About, whatever Twitter says.

Rickman’s Sheriff of Nottingham will always be my favourite role. I went to see Robin Hood Prince of Thieves at the cinema five times. I was 11 years old and that film taught me so much about myself.

1. Yes, you will always think bad boys are totally hot.
2. Torture scenes will make you boak.
3. You can be a feminist and still want someone to rescue you.
4. Socialism for the win.

When you develop an attachment to a film, a song, an actor or musician, they weave themselves through the fabric of your life. They provide the stories and the soundtrack that help shape you, because the films you choose to watch and the music you listen to is as much a part of you as the nose on your face.

I have wondered all week long just why I feel so sad. It’s not just that Rickman won’t be around to make movies, or that Bowie won’t make any more beautiful records. And it’s not because they were the same age as my Dad and I can’t bear to think about him dying.

Okay, it IS that, but that’s not all.

I think it’s because the thing they did for a living – telling stories – seemed bigger than life, and somehow bigger than death.

“We tell ourselves stories in order to live,” says Joan Didion.

Yet, in the end, even the storytellers must go.

 

Tipping point

In March this year I left my job as a journalist after 13 years. It was both the hardest and the easiest decision I have ever had to make.

I wanted to work for a newspaper ever since I was a teenager, and I was never prouder than when I made it happen at the age of 22. I moved across the country to take the job, and in the newsroom I met some of the best friends I’ll ever have, including the fella who is now my husband.

For many years I loved that job and everything it brought to my life. But things don’t stay the same for long. The industry is in the midst of difficult times and all print journalists are facing changes of one form or another.

I knew that it was time to move on. That was the easy part. Systems to simplify newspaper production had taken much of the creativity out of my role and I had become frustrated. The hard part was letting go because, however much you know you need to make changes, it’s easier to allow things to stay the same.

Almost two months have passed and I am still adjusting. I promised myself some time to really think about what I want to do next, but it is hard not to feel guilty about ‘not working’. I realise I have become institutionalised – I just can’t shake the niggling feeling that I ‘should’ be out there, working eight hours every day and earning money.

But it’s really important to me to make the right choices, ones that will support my desire for a simple life for me and my family.

And it’s not easy. Every parent I know is an expert at juggling. You see it at the school gates, swimming lesson drop-off, football practice pick-up, dance shows, doctors’ waiting rooms, supermarkets and birthday parties. Nice work, parents! Keep those balls in the air!

One of the best things about my job was that it allowed me to pick my kids up from school. This means the world to me and I genuinely did appreciate it every day, even though it meant my working day started very early.

So, as I search for a new challenge, this question (among many others) floats around my mind: what if I find a job that is otherwise perfect for me, but the hours are
9-5.30pm?

‘Out-of-school club’, I hear you say, ‘lots of other peoples’ kids go there!’

I have absolutely no problem with out-of-school club. My kids would probably leap with joy at the idea, too, rather than have to go home with me and do homework, set the table, tidy their rooms, visit the supermarket.

Hold up there folks! How much is this club per child, per week? Does my new job pay the same as the old one, plus this new cost? Will we have to cancel after-school activities? Will we even make it to the evening ones when we still have to cook, eat, shop, clean, and do homework?

These issues are not insurmountable, I am well aware of that. As I said, parents everywhere are juggling all of these issues and more every single day. I just want to make sure that whatever I take on next is not just swapping one set of frustrations for another.

In order to make some sense out of all the ‘what-ifs’ and ‘maybes’ in my head, I wrote a list. (For what is life if we do not have lists? I shudder at the thought.)

MOST IMPORTANT THINGS (TM)

• Picking the children up from school.
• Earning roughly the same (or preferably way, way more) than before
• Creativity
• Weekends free
• Work that is challenging

Fair enough sista, I hear you say. Or I hope you do, because I believe you to be a nice, reasonable person.

Sadly I’ve had the distinct feeling from some people in the past that they believe it is NOT reasonable to expect to find a job that allows you to pick your children up from school. And, if you do, you certainly can’t expect it to pay you well, or be creative.

The fact is, young kids need picked up from school, one way or another. It strikes me as completely hatstand that, as a society, we have we got to the point where paying someone to do it is viewed as more ‘normal’ than a working parent asking for hours that allow them to rock up to the gates themselves.

I recently read Lean In, by Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg. And flippin’ good it was too. Lots of great advice and insight about women in the workplace. However, unsurprisingly, a lot of it applied to those near the top of the career food-chain.

With a seat at the Facebook boardroom table most of us would be more than happy to say to Mark Zuckerberg ‘hey fella, I’ve got little Cosmo’s nativity this Friday at 2pm, so I’ll just work from home after that, okay?’

Not so easy if you’re serving Cosmo’s granny on the checkout at Asda, or teaching  Cosmo’s pals at a different school across town, or delivering Cosmo’s cousin in the labour ward car park.

So, while most of us can agree that it is entirely reasonable to want a job that allows you to pick your kids up from school (or go to their nativity), we can probably also agree that it’s not always practical.

So, let’s say I’ve found a job that sounds ideal. When would I ask a prospective employer about flexible hours? Before I apply and risk not being considered? At the interview, and risk not being selected? Once I’ve been offered the job, forever ending my prospects for promotion in the process? At the end of the first month after being found blubbing in the bogs over how much I miss seeing my kids after school? Never, preferring to put up and shut up?

The problem with juggling is that if you take your eye off any one of the balls for a moment, the whole lot is likely to come crashing down. That is why many people carry on in an endless cycle of frustration and exhaustion, simply because it is easier than picking up and starting again.

I haven’t figured out much in my two months off (other than the fact that it’s unlikely I’ll be able to make a living out of crocheting blankets while cakes bake in the oven and then taking pictures of both), but I have come to the conclusion that while I have no option but to juggle, I don’t want to run around like a clown in the process.

Taking the lens cap off

I don’t mind winter. As the saying goes, ‘There’s no such thing as bad weather, only inappropriate clothing’. As someone who has a birthday not long after New Year, I feel a little bit offended when I hear someone say they ‘hate January’. I’m sceptical about the idea of The Most Depressing Day Of The Year being the third Tuesday of the year or whatever.

But – you knew there was a but coming, right? – this year, I have to admit I’ve been close to waving the white flag right up in January’s face and trying to hibernate until March. It’s not the weather – I’ve only had to scrape the car a couple of times and we’ve barely seen snow. I’ve had some early wins – training for a 10k has been going pretty well and I’ve been reading more books.

I can’t really put my finger on it, but I haven’t really got out of the blocks yet in 2015 and, now that it’s February, I’ve got to do something about it before much more of the year passes me by.

A saying that keeps swimming forward in my brain is ‘Do the thing that’s in front of you’. From a literal point of view it doesn’t make much sense unless you’re staring at the dishes or a pile of ironing and, frankly, it could even be a bit embarrassing (not to mention illegal). But, to me right now, it means ‘just do something, anything’ to try to move forward.

Just a few minutes spent musing on the things that are in front of me revealed that I’m ready to return to a passion of mine that I have been neglecting for almost six months. Photography. I broke my favourite lens in August and I hardly picked up my camera after that. But Santa brought me a brand spanking new 50mm prime lens and it is something of a disgrace that I haven’t even taken it out of the box until now.

Kid B does not like getting his photo taken unless he can make a daft face, which is pretty much all he does. Kid A, however, is more than happy to pose. A blanket pinned to the wall in a south-facing room served as a studio since it’s too cold to leave the house, and off we went.

There weren’t many keepers among the first shots I took this year, but it’s a start. I like this one where she isn’t even looking at the camera, as it shows off her ridiculously long eyelashes of which I have been simultaneously jealous and heart-burstingly in awe since the day she was born.

There’s nothing quite like the feeling when you pick up your camera and start shooting. That little shiver of possibility and the promise that today might be the day when you take your best-ever shot. It never leaves you and it never will, because every day it’s completely possible that you might.