by Jo Middleton
‘Well, get out and walk instead then,’ I said, ‘and we’ll put the shopping in the buggy.’
This apparently was a terrible idea. She started to cry and arch her back, pushing herself against the buggy straps. I told her there was really no need to do that; if she didn’t like the buggy she could just get out. She was not impressed with my logic. As she screeched, she kept tucking her feet underneath, so they dragged along the ground and caught the wheels. I tipped the front wheels in the air to make it like pushing a wheelbarrow but she somehow managed to get her legs behind the footrest, so her whole body was stiff and it looked like her knees might snap backwards, all the while still screaming. I don’t know what the matter was with her – she’s not had a tantrum like that in a long time.
I carried on pushing, ignoring the disapproving looks of the three elderly ladies outside Smiths. Every so often she stopped crying and then looked around, surprised, as though she was trying to figure out why it had gone quiet. Then she remembered and would start again.
We were an absolute picture of a happy family Sunday afternoon by the time we got to Tesco Express. I dashed around for ham and crisps and apples, trying not to jam Jess’s legs against anyone or knock anything breakable off the shelves. Walked home again, the sobs gradually subsiding.
Got home and realised I’d forgotten bread. Left Jess watching Friends with Flo and drove back to Tesco Express on my own.
Monday 5 November
Unfortunate Mooncup-related incident in the queue at the Post Office at lunchtime. Generally, I have been getting on really well with it, and it does seem to have reduced my cramps.
The air in the Post Office was really dry, though, and I kept coughing and coughing. The more I coughed the more I felt things shift. By the time I reached the front of the queue I could feel the end of the trimmed stem nudging its way out.
I was clearly looking uncomfortable because the woman behind the counter looked concerned. ‘Are you OK, love?’ she asked.
‘Oh yeah,’ I said, shuffling awkwardly from side to side, ‘I just have a bit of a cough.’
She looked me up and down sceptically.
‘Honestly,’ I said, ‘I’m fine, just a cough.’ I cleared my throat to make my point, dislodging things even further.
I paid for the postage on my parcel as quickly as I could. ‘Do you have a bathroom?’ I asked as she handed me my change. ‘For the cough.’
‘We don’t,’ she said, ‘but the café next door does.’
I made a sharp exit.
I walked confidently through the café to the toilets at the back (as confidently as I could with a Mooncup half out of my body), to make it look like I was definitely going to be heading back to the counter to buy a mocha. (I wasn’t).
Safely in the toilets, I wasn’t sure what to do for the best. Take it out, start again and risk the mess or just try to shove it back up where it was meant to be?
I went for shoving.
Tuesday 6 November
Jess came home from nursery today, very excited indeed.
‘Mummy, Mummy!’ she shrieked as she ran across the painted hopscotch to where I was huddled for a feeble amount of warmth under the oak tree in the corner of the mini-playground, ‘will you adopt me!’
Jess arrived at my legs with a bump and looked up at me expectantly.
‘I can’t adopt you,’ I explained, ‘I’m already your Mummy!’
‘But what about the children with no mummies and daddies who need our help?’ she asked.
‘Well, I definitely can’t adopt them!’ I said. ‘I’ve got my hands full as it is.’
Her chin was starting to wobble.
‘You have to adopt me, Mummy, or they won’t have anywhere to live!’ Her eyes were welling up, but I was at a loss. I wasn’t about to promise to open up an orphanage just to avoid a tantrum. (Although I was tempted.)
I noticed she was holding a sheet of paper and I bent down to take it from her.
‘Sponsorship form’ it said. ‘We’re doing a sponsored sing to raise money to help build an orphanage in India!’
‘You mean will I sponsor you,’ I said. ‘Of course I will.’
‘That’s what I said, Mummy.’ She took my hand – hers slightly sticky and warm – and smiled at me. ‘You are silly sometimes, Mummy.’
Friday 9 November
Scenes caused in the Co-op – 1. Glasses of wine at home to recover myself – 3.
Stopped in the Co-op on the way home for wine and Oreos (branching out a bit from Jaffa Cakes), and had a really annoying conversation with a woman in the queue behind me.
‘Quiet night in with the hubby?’ she asked, nodding at the wine.
The word ‘hubby’ got my back up right away. I told her that no, I was having a quiet night by myself as my children were away for the weekend with their dad – my ex-hubby.
‘I do envy you,’ she said. ‘It’s like the best of both worlds, isn’t it? You get to spend time with your children but then you regularly get the whole weekend to yourself! What a luxury! I bet you have great fun, don’t you? Spa weekends, popping into London to see a show – bliss!’
I was so shocked by how tenuous her connection with the real world seemed to be that for a minute I didn’t know how to reply. Is that really how she imagined I live? ‘Oh yes, fabulous, another weekend without the children, let me give Bunty a call and we can get out the soft-top and take a trip into Mayfair. Let me just finish with this manicure and have my stylist dress me and we can be off!’
And yes, I do appreciate the time I get to myself – I know plenty of married mothers who struggle to get their husbands to even let them lie in until 8 a.m. once a month – but it’s not really the easy option, is it? I’m not bloody Hannah Montana, living my best mum life all week and then slipping on a glittery wig come Friday night for a weekend of frivolous fun.
Eventually, I found my voice.
‘If only it were all city mini breaks and hot stone massages!’ I said, doing a fake laugh – har har har! ‘I actually find it very difficult making ends meet as a single mother of two, so my spare weekends are normally taken up giving blow jobs behind the Co-op for cash so that I can buy school uniform and pay the gas bill.’
Her jaw dropped.
‘Sometimes, if I’m lucky, I get an all-nighter and with the extra money I treat myself to an anal bleaching,’ I added, ‘which has the extra perk of being a work expense, so tax deductible!’
I smiled sweetly, maintaining eye contact until she felt so uncomfortable that she dropped her basket, muttered something about having left the iron on and left the shop. Behind me in the queue there was the sound of clapping. I turned around to see two women with six children between them of various ages.
‘Oh God,’ I said, looking at the small faces staring up at me, ‘I’m so sorry about that.’
‘Are you kidding?’ said the woman with a toddler on her hip. ‘That was incredible! I wanted to laugh so badly I did a tiny wee!’
‘Best thing I’ve heard in ages,’ agreed her friend, ‘I wish I could be there when she goes home and tells her husband about it.’
Saturday 10 November
Woke up to a washing machine full of pink school shirts. This is what happens when you do laundry drunk.
Generally, I am a fan of housework after a glass of wine or two. It feels like it shouldn’t work because drinking is a fun thing and housework is definitely not fun, but that’s the genius of it. If you can time it just at that moment where the world suddenly feels full of promise, then you can take a fair bit of joy from a shiny floor. Things seem to stretch out a little bit – the washing-up becomes a part of you, you’re in the moment … it’s basically meditation, and everyone knows how good that is for you.
I did once get a little bit over enthusiastic ‘organising’ my filing after a couple of gins, but I managed to get all of the bills out of the recycling box before the rubbish lorry arrived the next morning.
Monday 12 November
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Flo came into the kitchen this evening as I was cooking tea. ‘Mum,’ she said, ‘when are we going to get my prom dress?’
I put down the potato I was peeling.
‘Your prom dress?’ I asked. ‘I didn’t think prom was until you left school?’
‘It isn’t,’ said Flo, ‘but all the best dresses get taken really early.’
‘It is a year and a half away, though,’ I said, quite reasonably I thought.
‘And then there’s transport,’ she said.
‘Transport? Can I not just give you a lift?’
‘Um, no? Last year Tabitha Green arrived in a helicopter, I don’t really think I’m going to impress anyone turning up in a ten-year-old Renault full of empty coffee cups and crisp packets.’
‘I could clean it up a bit,’ I said, ‘or Dad could take you. He has a nicer car than me.’
‘No way,’ said Flo. ‘I’m not having either of you anywhere near it. I’ll need to have a limo or something. Daniel’s dad is a farmer, so he’s coming on a JCB.’
When I left school we just signed each other’s shirts and then got drunk in the bandstand in the park on a bottle of Cinzano we’d persuaded an old man to buy us from the off-licence.
Tuesday 13 November
Times hopes raised at work – 1. Number of times dashed again on the rock that is my job – 1.
Leon beckoned me over to his desk this morning, looking pleased with himself. He had a press release in his hand.
‘How do you fancy having a go at something more challenging?’ he asked.
‘I would love that,’ I said, relief in my voice. Perhaps these last two months have been some sort of elaborate initiation ceremony? Maybe all of the reporters have been chuckling fondly about it over lunch, wondering how many times they can get me to write ‘conveniently located for commuters’ (i.e., you can hear the motorway from the bedroom) before I crack?
‘I’ve got a press release here from the Arts Centre,’ he said, ‘about their latest exhibition from a local group of amateur artists. It’s about 350 words at the moment, but we need it cut down to 250 to fit a space on page twelve. Are you up for the challenge?’
I said that I was and took the press release. Quite honestly, what else could I do?
I lay awake for quite a long time tonight, wondering what I’ve done with my working life.
Wednesday 14 November
We had six people for book group tonight, including me, which I was really pleased with for our first session. Three were parents from the Thursday group but two were people who had seen the poster in the shop – one woman called Hannah, who seemed lovely, and a guy called Sean who had an amazing beard and a rather intense stare.
We drank wine and chatted about recent reads and then I asked everyone to take a few minutes to talk about their favourite-ever books. It was really interesting to hear everyone’s choices and why they loved them. Books can have such a profound effect on lives.
When everyone had had a turn we put all the choices in a mug and pulled them out, giving us a book list for the next six months.
We’re going to be reading:
Tuesdays with Morrie by Mitch Albom
Captain Corelli’s Mandolin by Louis de Bernières
The Social Animal by David Brooks
Cat’s Eye by Margaret Atwood
1984 by George Orwell
Us by David Nicholls
We set our next meeting for 12 December and I messaged Dylan to tell him how well it had gone and he replied, saying, ‘You’re a star, Frankie!’ with a love-heart emoji. Slightly disconcerted by the love heart. Is he trying to tell me something?
Sent WIB a copy of the message. ‘What does this mean?’ I said.
‘Ahhh,’ said Sierra, ‘the classic casual heart emoji.’
‘What’s the classic casual heart emoji?’ I wrote back.
‘I don’t know,’ said Sierra, ‘I made it up.’
‘Maybe he really loves the book choices?’ said Lou. Definitely a possibility.
‘Maybe he really loves you?’ said Sierra. Less helpful.
Thursday 15 November
I think Jess has an imaginary friend. I went up to the bathroom about ten minutes after I’d put her to bed this evening and I heard her whispering in her room.
‘Is that comfy, Barney?’ she was saying. She doesn’t have any ponies named Barney as far as I know. There was a pause, presumably while Barney replied to her. ‘Tomorrow I will see if Mummy can find you a snack, but it’s bedtime now, so we have to go to sleep otherwise Mummy will shout.’
Bit harsh.
‘Don’t run off, Barney!’ she said. ‘You have to stay in here.’
Intriguing.
I was slightly concerned that an imaginary friend might be a sign of parental neglect, but Google reassured me.
‘Compared to those who don’t create them,’ said the internet, ‘children with imaginary companions tend to be less shy, engage in more laughing and smiling with peers, and do better at tasks involving imagining how someone else might think.’
Apparently, children who don’t watch much television are more likely to create an imaginary friend. Ha ha!
Friday 16 November
Jess asked today if she could have some cornflakes for Barney. I said she could and put a few into a plastic bowl and gave her a teaspoon. She gave the spoon back.
‘Don’t be silly, Mummy,’ she said, laughing, ‘Barney can’t use a spoon!’
Clearly the boundary between fantasy and reality is a blurry one.
Tuesday 20 November
Panicky message from Lou to WIB at teatime: ‘Emergency!’ she wrote. ‘Help!’ She used the little red siren emoji so clearly it was serious.
‘What’s the matter?’ I asked. ‘Are you hurt?’
There was a pause, during which I imagined one of the twins impaled on one of those spiky railings. WhatsApp probably wouldn’t be Lou’s first thought in that scenario, but sometimes my imagination runs away with me.
‘I was just making dinner,’ she wrote, ‘and something terrible happened!’
‘What were you making?’ asked Sierra.
‘Oh, it was this new vegan recipe I found online for pizza,’ said Lou, ‘which uses cauliflower as a pizza base. It looks really good – quite a few people in the comments have said it tastes as good as regular pizza.’
I really hoped one of the twins wasn’t on a railing.
‘The terrible thing that happened, though?’ I prompted.
‘Oh yes,’ wrote Lou. ‘So, I was cooking dinner – the cauliflower pizza thing – and I sneezed. Fine. Then I sneezed again – and a little bit of wee came out!’
‘How much wee?’ asked Sierra.
‘I don’t know,’ wrote Lou, ‘I didn’t exactly have a measuring jug ready. Not enough to make a puddle on the floor or anything, but enough to mean I had to go and change my pants.’
‘Gross,’ said Sierra, not very supportively.
‘It’s not gross, Lou,’ I reassured her, ‘it’s totally normal after having babies to get leaks sometimes. It happens to me all the time. And you’ve had twins, so, you know …’
‘Yeah,’ wrote Sierra, ‘it’s probably like the Bat Cave up there.’
‘The Bat Cave?’ said Lou. ‘I don’t want my vagina to look like the Bat Cave?’
‘The secret is the strategic leg-cross,’ I said. ‘The first sneeze is manageable, but if you feel a second one coming on, just brace yourself and cross your legs. Sort of like a curtsey?’
‘Seriously? I have to cross my legs on every second sneeze for the rest of my life? This is why David left me, isn’t it? I bet Sandra doesn’t piss her pants in the kitchen.’
‘Given that he cited “chips” in the break-up, the cauliflower-based pizza would probably be more of a turn-off than the piss,’ wrote Sierra. ‘He seems like a man who appreciates carbs.’
‘But it’s so unfair,’ said Lou. ‘I did all those Kegels! I do yoga! I eat sauerkraut, for
God’s sake. And for what?’
‘I didn’t know sauerkraut was good for your pelvic floor?’ I said.
‘It’s not,’ said Lou, ‘but it’s the principle of the thing. I am a Good Person. I care about my gut health. I use coconut oil. I shouldn’t be pissing myself on the kitchen floor.’
It did seem unfair. Out of the three of us, and without intimate knowledge, I would definitely have rated Lou’s vagina as the tightest. Not that anyone would likely have asked me. But in a quiz or something. Sierra always seems like she might be a bit anarchistic about being told to do pelvic floor exercises and I haven’t been on a trampoline since 2007.
Thursday 22 November
Glasses of wine while cooking – 2. (Doesn’t count when drunk during food prep?) Internal crisis brought on by thoughts about how many times I have made bolognese in my entire life and how much of it I have thrown away uneaten – 1. (Big.)
Chapter One parents’ group busy again today. Dylan came up to see me as I was packing up and shuffled about for a bit, looking as though he had something he wanted to say. In the light of the love-heart emoji, it was a little bit unsettling. I really like Dylan, but I think he needs more time to get over Caitlin and I don’t want to be some kind of difficult rebound relationship. Plus, it would make using his upstairs room all the time a bit awkward, wouldn’t it?
He asked about the group and how the new job was going, and then looked like he had changed his mind about whatever it was he really wanted to say, so he went downstairs. Very odd.
I made pasta bolognese for tea tonight – Jess’s favourite. I say ‘pasta’ as a bit of a cover-all – it was meant to be spaghetti, but I didn’t realise the packet was open already and when I took it down from the cupboard it all fell out on to the kitchen floor in a rather dramatic, depressing version of pick-up sticks. I would have just picked it all up again – it gets boiled, for Christ’s sake – but Jess got into rather a flap about the ‘germs’.