Returns of the Day

by Mothership on March 1, 2009

This weekend it was my birthday.

As predicted in an earlier post, I don’t really like them so much anymore. I’m a bit sad about that. It’s like Christmas gradually losing its shine. I have this terrible, sinking feeling that birthdays are losing their allure in direct proportion to me losing mine.
Husband loyally assures me that this isn’t so (the part about my allure, at least), but he’s stuck with me, isn’t he? So he’d have to believe that for both of our sakes’.

This was my day:

6.30am
Awoken by newest member of family.

Traditionally, of course, this would be a newborn baby and an early waking would be understandable due to terrible pangs of tiny-stomached hunger.  As you may or may not know, our latest addition is the rotund, orange and reasonably mature Bagpurrito (Felis catus) who apparently feels so confident and at home after three days that he took it upon himself to play ‘mouse’ with my nose until I grudgingly woke up.

He wasn’t hungry. There was food in his bowl. He just wanted to hang out.
I pushed him away and went back to sleep.

8.15
Woke up later than I meant to due to being allowed an unexpected lie-in.

On any day other than a Saturday this would be welcome, and I would be hugely grateful, but as I religiously go to hip-hop class at 9am, this was cutting it a bit fine, especially as Four and One hurtled into the room just as I was sitting up and rubbing my eyes, shouting at me to open my presents, I had to do it NOW, even before I had had a chance to have a cup of tea. They were quite serious.

Brutal.

I stumbled into the sitting room and the arguments ensued, Four sulking and One having a tantrum over who got to hand over loot first.
Coaxed them out of it (still no tea) and was presented with gifts.

From Four: A cup and saucer commemorating the birth of HRH Prince William c.1982.
She chose it herself.
How she managed to find a piece of Royalist chintz to clutter my shelves with here in Southern California is beyond me. My girl is nothing, if not resourceful.
I wonder if she is going to move on to those dancing shepherdesses in later years and pray not. It could get very awkward. (Note to self: Do not disclose existence of Franklin Mint)

From One: A glass snow globe containing a black and white cat.
He had, apparently, been most definite in his selection and once it was unwrapped refused to let me have it. Spent the next 15 minutes anxiously following him around for fear he’d drop and break it. (STILL NO TEA)

I did not want to open my gift from Husband before I went to class because I had literally five minutes before I had to leave and it appeared to be my last present of the day. Felt it both unfair and sad that I only had three things to open, all under duress and without tea.
I really wanted to do this all later on when I was ready to be older.
However I allowed myself to be pressured into it. 
Mistake.

From Husband: A traditional Chinese silk painting featuring two birds and six peonies. Very beautiful and full of symbolism about marriage, growing old together, new growth in relationships, fortuitous numbers etc. Accompanied by moving tale of how he’d tracked down and had tea with the elderly Chinese artist, trained in Peking in the traditional style, now living with her son in California who served as their interpreter – she only speaks Mandarin, and he had taken great pains to select the right piece for me, etc. etc.
All of this romantic elegy he relayed at high speed while One tried to add personal touches to the canvas with strawberry jam and Four interrupted with competitive comments about her own artistic skills. I tried to edge out the door so that I would not be late to dance, but still look interested and grateful and was clung to by One, wailing and protesting as I attempted to disengage him from my leg.
STILL NO TEA! STILL NO TEA!
Eventually I got away and into the car and was then immediately pursued by telephone calls by certain members of my faraway family which was very nice, but I didn’t dare answer them because I knew I would not be able to get off the phone within the allotted seven minutes it takes to drive to the studio.

Is it supposed to be this stressful?

9.15
Shake my groove thang. Sweat like pig. Am wished happy birthday by several people who then, rudely, ask my age. I avoid truthful answer with witty rejoinder, naturally. 

A pox on Facebook.

10.30
Get home. Husband in kitchen, ambitiously assembling ingredients for his first Sachertorte.  Children on patio, whining.

I cannot make any tea because nobody is allowed in kitchen until cake is finished.
I am promised a cup but I know in my heart it will fall by the wayside.

In my absence, fresh baguette and orange juice has been purchased for family birthday breakfast but Husband, virgin baker, too frazzled by cake attempt to be able to do more than place in bags on table and return, brow knitted, to kitchen. I opt to pretend I have not seen any of this, take shower instead and prepare for hair appointment at 11.30. Greatly look forward to leaving house again and spending blissful hour having follicular dignity restored and reading gobshite celebrity mags.

11.30
I only went in for a haircut, but hairdresser tells me that I need to consider a different approach to colour.

“As we age, our hair gets darker and more mousy. You’re not the blonde you were 10 years ago”

Have brief fantasy about strangling her with blowdryer cord,  but I have to concede she’s right.

Ten years ago I was young, single, fabulous and my long blonde hair looked completely great all the time (or at least in my head it did).
It was, ahem, assisted slightly, but I did it myself (bargain!) and even if it wasn’t quite a colour found in nature I seemed to be able to pull it off. Now I spend a lot of money on stupid highlights where I go in and let them make me look like a tinsel hedgehog every 8 weeks and come out looking so boring that I give myself narcolepsy. Husband, charmingly, likes this ‘natural’ look, but to me, and apparently now to my hairdresser, it just looks like I paid good money to be a middle aged Honda Odyssey driver with bad roots all the time.  Leave with nice haircut, appointment for very expensive colour session later in the week and loss of any remaining self-esteem.

Need a cup of tea. Something, somewhere, has gone very wrong.

1pm
Arrive home.
One is napping, Four and Husband now attempting to make chocolate glaze for Sachertorte. Once again, I am banned from kitchen and not allowed to make tea. Want to cry, but trying to be sporting in the face of such obvious heartfelt effort by family.

This would have been a perfect time to retire to bedroom and ring back my family for reassurances of eternal youth in their eyes, but due to time difference they are all asleep. Feel lonely. Seek out Bagpurrito who gives unconditionally of himself.
Send out pathetic, tremulous request for tea. It is promised. It does not arrive.

Fall asleep.

3.30pm
Wake up.
House is empty. Note on table:

“Gone to beach to give children a run outside. Back at 4 for tea and cake!
Love, Husband”

Very touched.  Decide to wait for them for tea as it’s only half an hour.

4pm
Not home

4.15
Not home

4.30
Phone to ask where they are. They are on the way back, just a minute

5pm
Finally get here. Giant de-sanding project (ugh!), cushions put on chairs outside, table set, kettle boiled (the hope! Too much!) Hiccough while candles are located (“Mummy, how many do you need?” “Four billion, three hundred and ninety five, by now”) Neighbors who are going to take children for the night arrive.

FINALLY cake and, most importantly, TEA is served. Ahhh. Beginning to feel like a birthday.

After this, things improve markedly.

The children happily disappear with the neighbours and Husband and I go out for the evening. He helps me spend that gift certificate that I had not managed to dent with Four – he has a great eye for what will suit me- and we catch dinner and a movie. Then we stay up late (gasp, shock, horror!) and, even better, sleep in the next day because children not there.
This has only occurred twice in the last five years, and was possibly my best present of all.  It  made me extremely happy to be able to laze around in bed with my Beloved until noon (yes, I do mean Husband, not the cat) instead of bartering over who was going to jump out and appease the terrorists.

It made it so easy to remember why I love him, he who buys me unusual, original artwork, slaves to make me delicious, complicated cakes, willingly sits outside changing rooms with endless patience, and tells me I look more and more beautiful as the years pass by. 

Really. What more could a girl ask? Almost worth enduring a birthday for.

‘A mug of tea, a loaf around, and thou’

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Bliss

by Mothership on February 27, 2009

Today was spent bringing the gloriously delicious Bagpurrito home from the shelter. I have been quite overcome by emotion most of the day, alternating between quiet bliss and tearful joy at once again having a cat in the house, and such an incredibly nice cat, at that.

He is so very, very, squishably, loveably, purrably, adorably Bagpuss-like that I can’t believe his former owner gave him away. How foolish and/or heartbroken they must have been.

He spent the first hour sensibly cowering under my and Husbands’ bed while Four cried bitterly. After a while I realised that he couldn’t get out even if he wanted to because he was too fat (our bed is very low) so I raised the legs with four Anthony Trollope Novels (read one, read em all and he wrote about a million) and then he did edge a bit closer to the sides. However, we inadvertantly discovered that he is a complete fool for a song when we serenaded him with a Mexican-Style,  3/4 time, two-liner penned just for him and he came straight out and rolled onto his back, squirming with pleasure:

Burrito, Burrito, the Bagpussisito

Burrito, Burrito, the Marmalade Cat

Of course you have to imagine this with hombres strumming on a nylon string guitar, trumpets playing and senoritas dancing around  in frilly dresses with castanets in his honour.

You get the picture.

Since then he has been languishing on the bed, doling out affection and tireless love with endless good temper.

How lucky we are!

BTW.  If anyone wants to read a proper post from me, not just feline froth, I am writing a weekly column at Bambino Goodies and the first one is up now. Do head on over there and feel free to comment so that they actually think that it was worth hiring me..

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A Toe in the Water of Technology..

by Mothership on February 25, 2009

Dear Readers,

This is a substandard post.

I am merely warning you that I may not actually write anything of note (this assuming that you think I do, anyway) for a day or two while I fiddle around with a new, rather more complex theme for the blog that I am assured will dazzle everyone with its stunning beauty and alluring layout.

It has been brought to my attention, not a few times, that the visual appeal of the current one is somewhat limited, and when I visit other peoples’s blogs I am forced to agree.  

Back in the good old days I could have gotten one of my willing nerd-serfs to do this job for me – always seemed to be some chap about just gagging to come over to do a useful and tedious chore in exchange for the pleasure of listening to me utter insincere compliments and excessive protestations that I couldn’t possibly manage on my own while I fussed around with the kettle and packets of biscuits. Since marriage and children they have dropped off rather and I am forced to do the dirty work myself. Ironic, really. Husband totally uninterested in computers and DIY and would not mind (read notice) at all if I kept a coterie of adoring swains trooping through the house, save the increase in the tea bill  but I seem to have lost the knack of attracting them. 

Anyway, I digress.  My point is that I shall be a little less verbose than usual and the look of the blog might be a bit, for want of a better word, erratic over the next few days. It could well get a lot worse before it gets better.  

But bear with me! I will just be moving bits of furniture about behind the scenes with my pinny on and a scarf tied around my head. Try to imagine me looking pink cheeked with a charming smudge of dust across my nose, instead of dirty haired, furious and sweating, threatening the computer with bits of vicious-looking broken code..

Hopefully we’ll both come out looking much more refreshed.

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All I want for my birthday is..

by Mothership on February 25, 2009

It’s my birthday at the weekend. This is not really cause for celebration. I’m not totally delighted at the relentless march of time upon my person, I don’t like having to reconfigure my year of birth in order to maintain the steady fictitious age I have claimed for some years now (getting too decrepit to remember what that number is, anyway) and no matter how many times I explain to Husband that there are usually 365 days and sometimes more between each birthday, he is always caught off guard and says he hasn’t had time to have bought a present or organised an outing.

However, I do have one loyal admirer who chooses not to identify him/herself that faithfully sends me a large, expensive bottle of perfume each and every year, plus one at Christmas. It comes a few days early in a brown padded envelope with a printed label and is postmarked from central London with no return address. There is never a card and the only clue to its sender is that the scent is one I wore for about two years in 1997 so that narrows it down to about a gazillion people? Unfortunately I don’t really like it anymore – bound up with too many memories – so it’s a huge waste of money for my secret admirer and a bit of a useless gift for me, apart from the leverage in making Husband slightly jealous. I note, though, that it doesn’t always make him quite jealous enough to actually go out and buy me a giant gift IN TIME FOR MY BIRTHDAY HIMSELF.

This year’s parcel arrived today and I pulled it out from our mailbox while the children and I were on our way out for the morning. I ripped open the envelope and saw that there were not one, but two bottles inside this time.

 

“What’s that? What’s that?” Four demanded.

“It’s a present for me.”

“What is it? Who’s it from?!” she wanted to know

” It’s some perfume, from a secret admirer!” I said,  “Isn’t that exciting”

“Wow, he must think you smell really bad.” she observed.

 

I told the children and myself that we were going to the garden shop to buy some plants, but despite my intentions to go there, the car actually drove itself to the cat shelter. 

We have been cat-less since November and this has been very hard on me. I’ve been mulling over getting a new kitten since then, but haven’t really been sure whether it’s right to get a little one as I’m afraid One will squash it.

I said we were just looking. We’re not going to get a cat yet. We’re waiting for the right time.
As soon as we walked in to the cattery, though, I knew I was toast.
There they all were. Big ones, small ones, playful ones, quiet ones, fluffy ones, bony, old things with centuries’ wisdom in their eyes… Four immediately offered to take all of them home. One was so overcome he hid his face and whispered “kitty” in my ear several times.  We took a tour, Four practically bursting with excitement.

Then we spotted him. A huge, portly, deep orange gentleman with crackle-glaze golden eyes rubbing his head frantically against the door of his cage. I immediately felt possessive and wanted to lift him out and cuddle him. What a fantastic specimen!
The lady from the shelter told us he was a very friendly, loving creature, good with children and other animals, not very confident (perhaps he needed to go on a course?) but he adored to be petted and stroked.
Did we want to take him into an ‘acquaintance room’? (What a strange term! Were we in a cat massage parlour?)

We got to hang out with ‘Rio’ (he dances in the sand) in a little room with a bench and a few toys to see how he would react to us. Wary at first, he soon warmed up and even let One cuddle him and purred away like an industrial sewing machine. His one drawback was that he was such a colossal fatso that it seemed unlikely that he would want to play a lot.
Mostly he looked fond of strokes and lunch.

My last two cats had not been much for chasing a ball of string in their later years, and I really wanted Four and One to have the joy of a young, playful cat. I discussed this with the shelter lady and she suggested we also meet at an adolescent black kitten who was going to be ready to adopt in a couple of days. We could look at her in her cage but not take her out and play with her until Thursday, why didn’t we come back again then?
That seemed a sensible proposition. Not as sensible as waiting to get a cat until after we come back from our ski holiday in March, but more sensible than taking all the cats home right then.

Since we’ve been home, despite my cautioning, Four has been talking non-stop about how we’re going to have a big fat orange cat and a little black one and I am actually starting to believe that we already own both of them. She’s even, inadvertently, renamed Rio “Burrito” (she misheard his name) which is perfect – he’s fat, orange and Californian, and I’m already conjuring names up for the little black kitten.

Now, though I’m having anxiety attacks that Burrito will be gone before Thursday. I may have to go back tomorrow morning and just get him. It’s not my birthday quite yet, but I think that both Burrito and I both deserve an early present.

Update: Husband has just come in and told me I should not get Burrito because it is too stupid to get a cat right before we go away – I’ll only be rescuing him from the shelter in order to abandon him again at a heartless cattery for seven days in a fortnight. I’m completely undone by this. If I don’t get him, someone else will. He’s MY CAT! But if I do get him, then I’m going to subjugate him and the other, unknown kitten, now called Marmite, to terrible abandonment trauma.

WHAT SHOULD I DO????

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Snow White, Redux

by Mothership on February 23, 2009

Today as we were driving to school I was subjected to a CBeebies Podcast which I had foolishly downloaded by accident and was then forced to listen to, trapped like a prisoner behind the wheel of my own car while Four imperiously held the remote control like a tiny Tsarina.   The disgustingly enthusiastic and cheerful presenter was reading the story of Snow White to a group of enthralled radio-audience children as well as the live ones in my vehicle and they chimed in all the oohs, boos and hisses at the appropriate moments. It’s been a while since I heard this story. I remember being carried out of the cinema at about age 5 completely gibbering with terror at the Wicked Stepmother in the Disney version, and I also had an illustrated book of the Brothers Grimm fairy tales I didn’t much like either. Not very keen on the dwarves, you see, and even then there was something that struck me as decidedly off about the whole story. Now that I’m a fully grown woman I dislike it even more, and find that my perspective and sympathies have shifted considerably..

Once upon a time, as a queen sits sewing at her window, she pricks her finger on her needle and a drop of blood falls on the snow that had fallen on her ebony window frame. She sighs and says to herself, “Oh, how I wish that I had a daughter that had skin white as snow, lips red as blood, and hair black as ebony”. Soon after the queen gives birth to a baby. They name her Princess Snow White. Then she dies.

Presently, the king takes a new wife, who is beautiful but vain. The queen possesses a magic mirror that answers any question. She asks it:

“Mirror, mirror on the wall, who in the land is fairest of all?”

The mirror always replies

“You, my queen, are fairest of all.”

But when Snow White reaches the age of seven, she becomes as beautiful as the day, and when the queen queries her mirror, it responds:

“Queen, you are full fair, ’tis true, but Snow White is fairer than you.”

Ok, hold on here.

 First of all, what up with the King? He marries some sexy, creepy lady and that’s the last we hear of him? I’m not sure I’m prepared to let him off so lightly. Crime #1: Poor parenting skills.  Crime #2 failure to reassure insecure second wife of her place in his heart and her intrinsic human value so she is left alone to stare obsessively into a mirror worrying about her appearance. Tut tut, King. You have not done your familial duty!

Secondly, we’re making beauty comparisons between a grown woman and a SEVEN year old?! Anyone else find that a little bizarre? Or disturbing?

Thirdly, we’re only into the first paragraph of the story and it’s all about beauty. Beauty. Beauty. Beauty. That’s all that there is. No cleverness, (not for the heroine, anyway), no redeeming social value, no talent, just beauty. We’re still reading this story to little girls in 2009.  Are we going to put Snow White in a bikini on the internet next? (maybe it’s been done, I should Google this, really)

The queen becomes jealous, and orders a huntsman to take Snow White into the woods to be killed and demands that he return with her heart as proof. The huntsman does as he is bid, but after raising his knife, he finds himself unable to kill her. Instead, he lets her go, telling her to flee and hide, and brings the queen the heart of a young deer, which is then prepared by the cook and eaten by the queen.

Ok, so the queen is a demented psychotic killer – she needs to be the prettiest girl in the room at any cost. (I BLAME SOCIETY) .Her pathetic huntsman was actually going to do it, but he can’t. Boo hoo. He’s too much of a wuss to finish the job. So instead of helping the poor SEVEN YEAR OLD CHILD,  he just lets her loose in the forest. Where there are wild boars, bears and wolves. Nice guy! Bet he went home proud of himself.

In the forest, Snow White discovers a tiny cottage belonging to seven dwarves, where she takes shelter and rests. The dwarves come home and discover her asleep on their bed. They tell her:

 “If you will keep house for us, and cook, make beds, wash, sew, and knit, and keep everything clean and orderly, then you can stay with us, and you shall not lack for anything.”

PERV ALERT! PERV ALERT! If you will stay here and be our indentured servant and do all the grunt work for seven disgusting bachelor miners we will make sure don’t get eaten by bears.
There is no direct mention of ‘extra’ required services but my creepo alarm went off even as a small girl and I have to say I’ve had an aversion to dwarves ever since (apologies to any readers who are vertically challenged, I do not mean to offend).

 They warn her to take care and let no one in when they are away delving in the mountains. 
Of course not. Isolation is key in kidnap cases – helps with Stockholm syndrome..

Meanwhile, the Queen asks her mirror once again
“Who’s the fairest of them all?”, and is horrified to learn that Snow White is alive and living with the dwarves.

The Queen visits the cottage while the dwarves are away working, and in the disguise of a farmer’s wife, offers a poisoned apple to Snow White. She eats the apple eagerly and immediately falls into a deep stupor. When the dwarves find her, they cannot revive her, and they place her in a glass coffin, assuming that she is dead.

See, I told you they were creepy! They keep her body in a glass coffin! Why??

Time passes, and a prince traveling through the land sees Snow White. He is enchanted by her beauty and instantly falls in love with her. He begs the dwarfs to let him have the coffin.

Clearly the entire kingdom is filled with necrophiliacs, pedophiles and child-murderers.
I scratch my head in wonder and advise extreme caution before agreeing to marry someone from the land that is now Germany. Oh wait..

The prince’s servants carry the coffin away. While doing so, they stumble on some bushes and the movement causes the piece of poisoned apple to dislodge from Snow White’s throat, awakening her. The prince then declares his love and soon a wedding is planned.

Can’t help wondering if he was slightly disappointed that she woke up.
And let’s not forget he was planning a wedding to a SEVEN YEAR OLD GIRL! EEUUWWW!

The vain Queen, still believing that Snow White is dead, once again asks her mirror who is the fairest in the land, and is confounded by the response;

“You, my queen, are fair; it is true. But the young queen is a thousand times fairer than you.”

She must have been gutted by this – no Botox back then, the young ones were coming up thick and fast and she’d eaten that disgusting, fattening heart for nothing!

Not knowing that the new queen was, in fact, her stepdaughter, she goes to the wedding to see the young bride, and her heart fills with the deepest of dread when she realizes the truth.

As punishment for her wicked ways, a pair of heated iron shoes are brought forth with tongs and placed before the Queen. She is then forced to step into the iron shoes and dance until she falls down dead.

So Snow White, at only seven turned out to be quite the vindictive little minx herself. Not that I think one should feel particularly warm towards someone who sent you into the woods to be killed, only then to be rescued and repeatedly gang raped by a bunch of midgets. But didn’t she suspect that  the very thing that had beguiled her handsome prince – youth, beauty, comatose passivity, might one day not be there any more, and that she’d wake up and realize she’d been sold a false bill of goods? Then she might want to get her own poison apple out and shove it in a few choice orifices..

 The End

 

I kept trying to snatch back the remote from Four, and when that didn’t work I resorted to manually pausing the story and interjecting awkward questions to try to provoke a different point of view.

Me:   Don’t you think there are better things to be than pretty?

Four: Mm

Me: I think it is much more interesting to DO things than just look in mirrors and worry about what other people are thinking, right?”

Four: Mhhmm, shh

Me: Don’t you think that it sounded boring when Snow White had to do all the cooking and cleaning for the dwarves? That wasn’t fair, or fun, was it?

Four: k, mnh

Me: Why did the prince want to marry her without even talking to her? And why did she marry him? She didn’t even know him? He might have had bad breath!”

“JUST STOP TALKING! YOU’RE RUINING THE STORY!” she finally shouted at me.

Fantastic! I consider my mission discharged. Take that, Snow White, you big ninny! Next up, spoiling Cinderella and her stupid, tiny slippers. I, myself, have rather large feet..

 
BTW if anyone has one of those magic mirrors I would like to ask it a couple of more pertinent questions such as where is the car charger for my iPod, and also why were the first cuts in the stimulus package from ailing schools and not failing banks?

And you, lovely readers and fellow writers:

What would you ask the magic mirror if you could?

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All the Rage

by Mothership on February 23, 2009

I had an anonymous email a few weeks ago telling me an old friend of mine, who I have not seen for over a decade, was lying ill in a hospital in Phoenix and had just had a breast removed. The mystery correspondent thought I ought to know.

It was hard to take in, and even harder to know what to do.

I had been intensely close to Zoe for a number of years. She had been like a wild and glamorous elder sister to me. She was a barrelling collection of contradictions, a shimmering, thrumming shout of angry brilliance. She was rage, reason, romance, ridiculousness, and rock ‘n’ roll.

But mostly she was rage.

I met her in the toilet of a pub. She was stark naked except for a pair of opaque black stockings and she was sucking heavily on a joint. I walked in and did a double take.

“What the FUCK are you staring at?!” she demanded.

“I’m looking at your spliff and wondering if you’re going to share it” I answered.

She looked completely taken aback for a moment and then we began to laugh. She passed me the joint, we smoked it together and then she put on some knickers. Five minutes later she went out into the pub and took them off again.

That was how she made her money.

She hadn’t always been a stripper. She had had all kinds of crazy jobs including being a showgirl in Las Vegas – you know, the kind who wears a big feather headdress and glittery bikini. She’d been a model in Japan, she’d been a rock star’s wife and she’d even been a hooker for a while and worked with another girl whose name was Hot Sauce.

I’m telling you, you can’t make up this kind of thing and I couldn’t get enough of hearing about it.

She was a Bad Girl.

I sort of wanted to be a Bad Girl but I didn’t have the courage so I just borrowed from Zoe and she was gracious enough to allow my prurient voyeurism to tag along down her memory lane. She told me that when she was 16 she’d been married to a 6’2″ African American drag queen (she was very good at putting on false eyelashes as a result of this early marriage) and that he had had breast implants. After some months I worked up the courage to ask Zoe what she did with ‘them’ while they were, you know, um, uh, well….

“Don’t be STUPID” she hissed at me, as if I should already know.

“He always wore a bra”

Our odd friendship worked really well for a number of years. She had ambitions to become a music photographer and I was trying to break into the music business as a singer. We went to gigs together, spent endless hours on the phone having long, important conversations about life, smoked tons of weed and compared notes on our various boyfriends and their degrees of unsuitability – mine were usually too stuffy for me and hers were usually convicted criminals. She was there when I got my record deal and my first top 40 hit, and she was always my ‘date’ at parties and events.  She seemed genuinely happy for me when things went well in my career, even though, in retrospect, I can see that it must have been hard for her to watch that happen while she, 10 years older, was still working as a stripper, not settled in a relationship and her career was not moving ahead with any great promise. Our friendship stayed strong through all of this and for a time she even lived in my house until she moved in with one memorable lover, the crack dealer who made a pass at me. He turned out to be the deal breaker in our friendship.

I was very sad at the time when I lost her. She seemed to vanish, quite suddenly, into a haze of bad boyfriend-dom, a downward spiral of hard drugs and domestic abuse. She was unreachable. She did not want to speak to me or to anyone we knew in common.

The next I heard she had gone back to America to live with her mother and I never heard from her again.

So, fast forward ten years and I am happily married with two little children. It’s hard, sometimes, to remember the girl I was who was friends with Zoe. So much has changed and mellowed in me over time.

And now here is the email, telling me she is gravely ill, and a week or so later another one, this time with a phone number and a request to call.

I waited until everyone else was out and I dialled the number. An answering machine:

“Hi, this is Zoe. I’ve just had surgery and nobody gives a FUCK. So don’t leave a message ‘cos I won’t phone you back because I don’t give a FUCK about you either”

I wanted to laugh because it was so very, intrinsically Zoe.

I wanted to cry because it was so very intrinsically Zoe

A whole bunch of things, but mostly rage.

I don’t think that rage helps you live. Not in these cases.

I think it makes you die.

I think love helps you live.

Zoe, I don’t know if you listened to my message.

(I’m going to leave you another one anyway, and another, and another and another and another and another..)

Here is what I have to say to you:

I give a fuck.

I love you. And I’m not the only one.

But what is most important is that you give a fuck.

Not for our sakes, but for yours

Let yourself be loved and love back, hard

It’s the only way to live

Please live.

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Waste Management

by Mothership on February 18, 2009

To Whom It May Concern:

I would like to recommend One as a candidate for a position with your organisation.

During his tenure with us (June 2007 – present) he has demonstrated a growing ability and commitment to waste management.

From the early days of self -evacuation to his recent triumphant disposal of an unnamed executive’s Blackberry Storm in downstairs toilet whilst its owner was foolishly engaged in human interaction, we feel that he has clearly shown where his not inconsiderable talents lie. 

One displays a great capacity for working on his own initiative. He led the team in charge of dumping $300 of prescription migraine medicine in the diaper pail and was also the brains behind the scheme to reduce the nuisance of unopened mail by single-handedly rerouting it directly to the recycling bin. 

One is also a great team player and can often be found with his colleagues usefully throwing essential kitchen items over the garden fence in order to raise morale and establish local brand awareness. We recall one memorable day he and another employee buried the CEO’s car keys as a teambuilding exercise.  It was a huge success! The entire company came along for the treasure hunt. The fact that the keys were never recovered stands testimony to One’s superior abilities.

While we do concede that his written and verbal skills may be slightly below the standard usually witnessed at this entry level, we are confident that he will be more than able to communicate his needs via alternative means such as shrieking, hitting and running away, universally understood in any language. He is adept at following directions, if he so chooses and can be persuaded to do almost anything for a sticky bun.

We shall be very sad to lose him, of course, but his skills now far outstrip any task that we can provide for him here and we know he will be much happier with your company.

Plus we need the money.
Yours Sincerely,

Mothership

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Shopping is a Feeling

by Mothership on February 17, 2009

One of the things I looked forward to about having a girl was being able to go shopping with her once she grew old enough to enjoy it. I saw us cosily looking through racks of clothing, comparing taste, chatting companionably, sharing confidences and pausing for cups of tea as we found fabulous items at incredible prices..

Turns out she’s old enough to enjoy it.

Today was a rainy public holiday and Husband and I tossed a coin to see which lucky parent would get to stay at home and loaf while One napped and which would entertain Four, chomping at the bit for some kind of action .

I lost.

I decided to take her downtown with me to try and spend a large gift certificate I have left over from Christmas at a shop that I like the look of but hardly ever find clothes I want inside. This happens to me a lot. I get shopping fatigue really quickly and become bored of the whole thing and have to go home and lie in bed to recover from retail trauma. I probably wouldn’t have bothered attempting this expedition but in addition to the enormous sum of money I have to get rid of at this particular emporium (a number of returned gifts from different sources) they sent me a 15% off card valid for this, my birthday month only, which pretty much forced my hand.

Four complained that it would be boring to come with me (agreed) but I promised her I would let her pick out some clothes to try on herself – she loves grownup clothes – and also select some outfits for me.

It’s very odd – this child has never seen a fashion magazine (I loathe magazines of all kinds except ones that are about electronic musical instruments and I’m not allowed these because I lock myself in the loo for hours with them in manner of adolescent boy and creepy moans emanate from door). and yet she has an uncanny, if unconventional, sense of style and knows instantly what will go together and what will not. She dresses herself (or rather she stands around and orders me to dress her in the manner of Victorian lady’s maid) in fabulous concoctions from her wardrobe and dressing up box that I would never think to offer her and always comes out looking astonishingly chic. I vaguely remember that I used to look quite stylish and had a wardrobe crammed with alluring and up to date clothes before I was banished to Stepford but now I find it difficult to reconcile my wardrobe to my lifestyle and will wander around shops looking at clothes feeling puzzled.

Is this for me?  Is that piece appropriate to my current life and the climate?  Is it ugly or fabulous?  What age am I now?  What is my name? etc..

 

So having Four along as my personal stylist seemed like a good idea, plus she’s cheap –  a couple of lollipops and a hot chocolate and you’re away.

We selected some clothes together and went into the changing room.

Thinking of a christening we are attending soon I tried on this silk dress.

Four:

“I like the butterflies, but I think it’s made for someone with REALLY fat arms.
 

Next item: A sage green silk dress, Grace Kelly style. Imagine self at polo club with kitten heels, hair up, lightly tanned arms, without children, speaking to dashing men..

 

“I think that dress is meant for a teenager”(sound of slapping and wailing )

 

Next item:, Multi coloured long hippie style dress for beach. Imagine over bikini, long, wavy, sunkissed hair flowing, joint in hand, no kids…

“That makes you look like a jester!” (muffled snorts from other changing rooms plus splintering crash of my pride shattering in pieces on floor).

Pause while I recover, count to ten and force smile at her.

“What is a jester, Mummy?”

 

Next item: Black ruched t-shirt. Great! Breasts look large and perky, waist looks tiny, imagine with jeans and young Marlon Brando.. Still, $118.. Thinks..

 

“Can I have a lollipop now? You look nice in that but only if I can have a lollipop”

 

Next item: White cardigan covered in musical notation that she has picked out for me. Truly heinous like a joke tie from the ‘80s but in knitwear form.

“You look as beautiful as a  piano!”  Um, thank you? (nb.would not wear even if sent to Siberia naked save this item)

 

Give up, return to floor to look for other items.

 

Four renews interest in shopping expedition as she meets another little girl waiting with her father as the mother tries on clothes. She attempts to impress her new friend and draw her close with confidences:

“My mummy has a sofa that smells of fire. It’s really cosy but if you tell lies on it, it will burn you to death. Do you want to come over?”  Surprise when other child demurs.

 

Then she announces in a very loud voice that the dad

“Smells really bad between the legs.”

I have been watching the girls at play very closely so I know nothing untoward has happened, but the poor man must have tried to release a quiet fart while he endured the interminable torture of waiting for his wife to shop and contain his exuberant preschooler at the same time.
Now Four had outed him very publicly and every woman in the store was staring at him as if he were a sex offender. Meanwhile she and his own child lay shrieking with giggles on the floor, pointing at him and shouting

“Smelly between the legs!! Smelly between the legs!!”

I am ashamed to admit that I, too was doubled over, discretely weeping with hysterical laughter and biting my fist in an attempt to contain myself behind a display of blouses and was therefore unable to discipline my child or offer any sort of remedy for this unfortunate occurrence.
Oh dear.

It may not come as a surprise to you that we emerged without a purchase.
My gift card remains unblemished, my discount will doubtless expire unused, but I am quite certain that I shall always mark this as one of my finest shopping trips ever.

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A Room 101 of One’s Own

by Mothership on February 14, 2009

There are so many delightful things about motherhood that I didn’t anticipate.

I didn’t know, for instance, that my beloved firstborn would frequently bring me small tributes from the natural world. Painstakingly selected bouquets of heart-shaped autumn leaves; a knobbly rock from the beach imbued with mythical properties; a leaf from the garden partially eaten by a caterpillar “Mummy, this shows you gave a butterfly a life”

I was as yet unaware that her small brother would make his first intelligible phrase a declaration of love.
“Abubwoo” . And this would be reserved for me and me alone with that special head-on-the-side-beneath-the-lashes shy smile that will be guaranteed to dupe me into any shady scheme he may plan in future.  (If he is anything like me there will be many.)

Oh the dizzy, giddy, desperate, helpless, foolish, besotted passion I feel for these children is near boundless.

Yes, that’s right I said near boundless. But I do have my limits.

I came back from dropping my cherubs at nursery today and decided I would tidy the house before settling back into my office (electric blanket -check, plump pillows – check, plug in laptop -check, change back into power pajamas – check).

It shouldn’t have been too bad, really. Just a couple of breakfast things to wash, groceries to put away, valentine chocolates to hide from myself etc.

BUT

The children had at some point taken it upon themselves to be  ‘creative’ and had thus opened The Art Cupboard of Death while I wasn’t looking. (cue screams, thunder, sound of cackling witches etc)

You could say that I only have myself to blame. What kind of idiot puts crayons and play-doh within easy access of a one year old anyway?
*RHETORICAL QUESTION, DO NOT ANSWER, THANK YOU*

I didn’t want to limit their creativity, you see. I wanted them to be able to do nice pictures whenever they wanted and have lots of lovely fun with cutting and pasting and glue and that sort of activity that good mummies provide for their tots. 
Idiot.

In my defence, Four never ate glue sticks. She listened when I told her not to draw on the walls with markers. I simply don’t understand why she is suddenly giving her brother “mascara” with a laundry pen! And why is that pen in there anyway? HusbAAAANND?!

Today they got the jumbo tub of playdoh open and made a ‘why-end pizza’ on the floor which involves taking a disc of dough the size of my head and jumping on it until it is flat and as one with the living room carpet (did someone say voodoo?)  and then decorating it with bits of detritus that they find in dark corners of the room. Then they offer you a slice and you to pretend to eat it. Yum! (Note: One actually does eat it)

Plus there were stickers. Fucking STICKERS EVERYWHERE.
I hate stickers. How did they open the box that is padlocked with a kryptonite chain and get to the four billion stickers that they then plastered the legs of each chair and the table plus the baseboards of all the kitchen cabinets with? And how did this all happen while I was just doing a wee? Stickers are not even an‘art supply’. They do not encourage creativity, they just encourage the children to affix stupid shapes all over my bottom at Trader Joe’s while I try and pay or else they save them and put them on the inside of my car window where they will remain long after I have flown this mortal coil.

I rue the day these vile things were invented and I curse the seed of their creators!

They must be cast from my life if there is to be room for the golden light of my own pure thought! (nb  Impure thoughts fine too, I’m not fussy)

So today, in honor of three writers* whose lives span as many centuries, I am creating a signature space to store the things about motherhood which I loathe and fear most and also don’t have anywhere else to put because my house is full of ghastly toys and machines that go ping. 
I don’t exactly want to throw them away forever because, frankly, they’re such good material, but on the other hand I don’t want them lurking around my every day life making everything so damn messy while I’m trying to keep up with the Stepfords.
I plan to slip into the room alone, the pen as my foil, and prance about with these horrors until I can successfully write them off. Touche! Then I will emerge calm and triumphant, you can read all about it,  and all that will be left is to check my stats obsessively while I am supposed to be making supper.

There is a slim chance , however, that if I lock enough of my neuroses into the chamber I might forget about them completely and become one of those smug, contented ladies who bore the tits off the rest of us by reporting only the good news (have a nice day!) because that is all there would be left of me.  If this happens, please alert me via nuclear missile and I will unlock the door and eat everything inside.
But I’m getting ahead of myself..

*(Virginia Woolf, George Orwell & Me, obviously)

Mothership’s Room 101 of Her Very Own.

In it I place:

Playdoh, Stickers, Whining, Disney Princesses, ELMO and his song (Husband, are you paying attention?), Vomit, Amusement Parks, Non-washable markers, any toy that makes music not created by the child, books for children written with poor grammar (yes their are lots that are real bad), the visible trauma of pregnancy on formerly stonking bod, Observer Woman, Dr. Laura, Signing Times videos with that lady with the enormous mouth, the endless snot that streams, unchecked, from the noses of small children, and many more..

Oh! Pardon me, I need a break to wipe the froth of remembered rage from my chin..

While I do that, please, tell me:

If you had a little money and a Room 101 of your own, what would you put in it?

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Magic Carpet Ride

by Mothership on February 13, 2009

When I was a tiny girl I used to imagine that the purpose of an aeroplane ride was to take me and my family up in the air long enough for God to roll up England like a carpet and then unroll the country that we were going to next in the same location. I didn’t think the plane actually went anywhere, it was just the backdrop and the extras that were changed while I ate my airline meal and listened to the inflight entertainment. The replacement carpets selected for us were invariably hot, smelly and confusing, required many painful innoculations and contained terrifyingly large, hungry insects.  I wasn’t very keen on them. Why couldn’t we just go to Majorca like everyone else? Or Butlins? That sounded like so much more fun than,say, Somalia..

I did not share my carpet theory with my parents.

I was afraid they would laugh at me.

Not because it was infeasible to curl up a country like a swiss roll, that part was perfectly reasonable, but the mere mention of a deity would cause dangerous equine eye rolling and mind-numbingly long lectures in superior tones about religion being a crutch, a menace to the progress of the worker’s society, illogical, captain, blah blah woof woof moooo zzzzz.

You know, I didn’t really have any serious notions about God beyond what I had heard at school (yes, we had God at school back then!), but someone had to roll up those carpets, dammit, and I had not been given a concrete picture of Science – no mention of her outfit, for instance – and  all the revered figures in the household seemed to be dead (Marx – dead. Trotsky – dead. Mandela, well not dead, but he was pretty much stuck in prison on an island back then with bleak prospects). So it had to be God and he wore a dusty old black suit and he had a watch fob and let me tell you he was kind of grumpy. I was glad to be up in the plane while the big ol’ changover happened and I didn’t particularly want to greet him when I came down.

So as far as I am concerned, while I’m running around rural Kenya picking off bleeding pieces of my acutely sunburned nose (can you say skin cancer?) the goode people of Englande have been temporarily mothballed. It came as a huge surprise to me when I returned to find that they had actually continued their lives and didn’t miss me at all.

How could this be?

This was my first inkling that the world was larger than I had previously thought and my rug hypothesis might be faulty.  I was unsure as to whether I should be comforted or depressed.

 

Here is a scientific breakdown of my dilemma in the kind of chart favoured by Husband:

 

           
   
Center of Universe + Uncomfortable evidence that needs to be suppressed by subconscious.

 
 
Camaraderie + Accept existence of others

 

  
vs.

 
 
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I was quite a lonely child, but I had a rich inner life.

 

Now I do need to point out that I have mellowed considerably with age. I am far more willing to accept the existence of others as long as I like them. (If I don’t like them I need a new post and they need to run away because I have been known to make grown men cry, quite recently, and I don’t mean Husband who would be an easy win.) 

So now we tip the scales in favour of the former and my subconscious gets a much needed break because I think it’s a bit overloaded after all the years it’s been pressed into service with various traumas (also see future posts on a slow day).

I was reflecting this afternoon as I wandered (lonely as a cloud..) across the globe via the blogosphere that it is no longer necessary to get on a plane to be reminded that one is but a tiny drop in the seething stew of human drama.

 Blogging abounds – there are literally millions on every subject and at every level from the superbly crafted to the barely literate. Everyone is there telling you who they are and what they want/like/feel.

And even what they don’t tell you is so very telling, isn’t it?

Like me. Who the hell am I anyway? Why won’t I tell you my real name?

Is it to protect the innocent?

Or the guilty?

And which one am I?

I note that when I think my most gleefully uncharitable thoughts I actually enjoy my own company most and it is  faintly astonishing to me that nobody else in real time seems to feel the same way. 

And you, you who have actually read this far, O loyal one.
Does it make you feel comforted or depressed that there is someone out there thinking the same things as you?
Or if nobody thinks the same things as you do you feel triumphant or just like a giant freak?

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