Dear Dave

  Dairy issues

Dear Dave,

Your last letter was very short and covered in interesting stains. It appeared to have been written in a hurry and was barely legible. I take it that life is a little hectic now that Liz has been back at work from maternity leave for a couple of weeks. Nonetheless, the very fact that you managed to write at all implies you're coping marvellously with looking after two children on your own. Reading between the caked blood, sweat and tears, I managed to make out that Liz is continuing to breastfeed Daisy but that it's turned into something of a struggle.

I remember those days. I was constantly washing and sterilising bottles and pumps in order to maintain an adequate supply. The mornings were particularly bad - we needed clean equipment for Sarah to use before she left for work and also some for her to take with her. The first thing I had to do when I got out of bed was go down and switch the steriliser on so that it was finished and cooled the moment breakfast was over. If I ever forgot to press the button until after my shower, I ended up juggling scalding hot beakers round the kitchen in a desperate attempt to get the milking apparatus packed in time for Sarah to leave.

When she came home, I had to estimate how much of the latest batch to keep in the fridge for the next day and how much to stockpile in the freezer. The stuff can stay refrigerated for three days, so I always found it best to keep a little extra handy in order to avoid having to placate a hungry baby while hurriedly trying to thaw out emergency rations.

Ah, the joys of defrosting little plastic bags of frozen milk!

Do you melt the bag containing six fluid ounces and risk some of it going to waste or do you go for the bag holding four fluid ounces and risk running out halfway through the feed?

It's never good having to defrost some more while holding a baby who's indignant that the bottle emptied just as they were drifting off to sleep. They have a tendency to scream, burp all over you and then not actually go to sleep even when they do get the last few mouthfuls they wanted. Eventually the tiredness catches up with them, they pass out face down in their tea and then wake up refreshed just in time for bed.

On the other hand, that's probably a better scenario than having to admit to Liz that you had to pour half a bottle of breast milk down the drain because Daisy drank just enough to contaminate it and then nodded off for three hours. There's so much pumping and sterilising and decanting involved for such tiny amounts, that the stuff quickly develops a status akin to twenty-year-old single malt. Coupled with the limited supply, this makes wasting even a drop seem like failure.

No pressure.

Try not to get too worked up about it. Just remember that any breastfeeding is better than none and you can always add formula feeds if necessary. If you have to go entirely over to formula in order to avoid going mad, then that's what you have to do. Sane parents are going to be better for Daisy's long term health than just about anything else.

Oh, which reminds me, I had a surprise at nursery the other day:

Normally, Sarah takes the kids to school on the way to work but she had to go in early for a meeting, so it was my turn. I dropped the boys off at their respective doors and then walked Marie round the back to the nursery entrance. Getting there on time had been something of a mad rush. I'd made the packed lunches, provided the kids with breakfast and got them ready. Every step of the way, I'd had to goad them all to hurry up. That's always the case, though, and I can pretty much manage it in my sleep now - I certainly don't need to be entirely awake and this was one of those occasions where I was less than fully alert. I was just wanting to get home to have my own breakfast, drink some coffee and check my email. I led Marie inside to the cloakroom on autopilot, and started taking her coat off.

"Ed!" Came a familiar shout from behind me. "How are you? I thought you'd show up."

I was suddenly very awake. It took me a few moments to recover from the shock before I could look round, however. Helpfully, Marie confirmed the identity of the person talking. "It's Karen!" she screeched, grinning. "She's scary!"

"She's not scary," I said, not sure whether to laugh it off or hush Marie up. The indecision resulted in my voice coming out in a strangled croak.

"Yes, she is," began Marie. "You said..."

"So, is Malcolm starting nursery?" I asked, hurriedly talking over my daughter and turning round. Scary Karen was sitting on a row of foot-lockers with her youngest, William, by her side. (He must be nearly two now.) She was, if anything, looking even more top-heavy than usual. Malcolm was nowhere to be seen.

"Oh, yes," said Karen. "I held him back a term. He's such a wee mummy's boy, I didn't have the heart to send him until now. I just hope he'll be OK." Then she wapped out a rippling bosom and shoved it into William's face.

The kid had developed a slight look of wide-eyed fear at this turn of events in the few months since I'd last seen him and he had to keep coming up for air but, other than that, it was just like old times. Karen started telling me about what she and her boyfriend, Trevor, had got up to behind the cheese counter at Tesco.

I developed my own look of wide-eyed fear.

I was stuck. I couldn't get a word in edgeways to make my excuses and beat a retreat. Marie got bored waiting and, in order to get my attention, decided she wanted the toilet. She then proceeded to choose the one cubicle which was in use.

"Malcolm won't be long," said Karen, mercifully breaking off from listing some of the lesser known uses of Brie. "He'll be sorting out his costume. He wanted to dress up for his first day."

"Oh, OK," I said. As if in confirmation, the toilet flushed and then, a few seconds later, the door opened and Malcolm stepped out.

He was wearing a hockey mask and carrying a rubber knife covered in fake blood stains.

"Nice," I said with all the sincerity I could muster and ushered Marie into the cubicle.

She stared at Malcolm and then giggled. "He's got cats on his shoes," she said, pointing at his Pumas and ignoring the costume entirely.

"You're right. Well spotted," I said. I followed her into the cubicle, shut the door and locked it behind us.

I didn't encourage her to hurry up for once.

When we finally emerged, the coast was clear. We washed our hands and I took Marie through to the nursery room. To my dismay, Karen was having an increasingly heated discussion with Miss Nolan and was blocking the doorway.

Miss Nolan is young and pretty and lovely to the children but you wouldn't want to get on the wrong side of her. She's the one who tells all of us parents when we've been bad and haven't handed in the correct permission slips. "As I was saying," she said to Scary Karen, "just come back in an hour or so. We've got your mobile number if there's a problem."

Karen didn't budge. "I thought carers sat in on the first day. That's what I did when I helped out with his cousin Dougie."

"The rules have changed," said Miss Nolan. "Some children get on better without their normal adults around."

This was news to me. "When did...?" I began but Miss Nolan shot me a look that made it quite clear that another word would land me in detention removing Play-Doh from the soles of the children's shoes (probably with my tongue). I shut up.

"I'm sure he'll settle well," she continued. "He seems to be making friends already." Malcolm was showing his knife to a handful of other children as they cowered in a corner.

Karen wasn't having any of it. "He doesn't like new places. I should stay here."

Miss Nolan was half her size but stood resolutely in the way. They glared at each other.

Fearing that I might suffer collateral damage if any wrestling broke out, I decided to intervene. "I'm helping out in the nursery this morning," I said. It wasn't so much a lie, more a subtle attempt to volunteer. "I can keep an eye on him."

Karen stood for a moment, fists on hips, fuming at Miss Nolan, the world in general and even me. Then she relented. "All right," she said. "Just don't let the other kids pick on him. He can be a real softy sometimes."

"Uh-huh," I said, watching him out of the corner of my eye as he played a xylophone by battering it with a teddy bear. I did my best to ignore this, however, and concentrated on reassuring Karen until she eventually left with William. Marie was able to get into the nursery at last.

"Thank you," said Miss Nolan. "I wouldn't normally keep a parent out but..."

"Yeah, I know... What did she do last time?"

Miss Nolan rolled her eyes. "It would be inappropriate for me to tell you the details but we had to dispose of all the jigsaws and the computer still doesn't smell quite the way it should. Now excuse me while I tell Mrs Richards it's safe to come out of the store cupboard."

I nodded and then spent the next hour getting Marie to help me show Malcolm around. I managed to persuade him to take the mask off and put the knife down so the other children didn't run away from him and, after that, things went reasonably well. He's actually a pretty good kid. The only problem came when he tried to drop Karen's taser in the water tray. Still, I caught him quick enough and there was no harm done... The nursery staff made a note to frisk him the next morning.

When the time came, Karen collected him without incident and I finally got to go home and eat my breakfast. I'd hardly recovered before I had to head right back to pick up Marie. It was only later that I realised Malcolm will be in the nursery all morning next week. He'll come out at the same time as Marie.

I'll be there. Scary Karen will be there. I'll get to see her every day.

I'm not sure I'm prepared for that.

Yours in a woman's world,

Ed.

PS I was sitting in the study last night when Marie came up to me and said, sweetly, "Daddy, you're looking really great!"

It was possibly the most adorable and endearing thing that any of my kids has ever said to me.

"Thank you, Marie," I said. "It's nice of you to say so."

Then she laughed and said, "That was just my funny joke," and skipped away, giggling.

Needless to say, she's out of the will...

Labels: nursery, Scary Karen

  9:45 AM - Permanent Link - 0 comments - Post comment - Links to this post

  The mind control is failing

Dear Dave,

How's Sam getting on at nursery these days? Marie really enjoyed it at first. Then, after a couple of weeks, she comprehended it was every day and started complaining that she didn't want to go any more. She shuffled towards the nursery door each morning, shoulders slumped, head hung low, and complained she was tired. I showed very little sympathy. I told her to get used to it 'cos she had another fourteen and a half years of education left to go, and then I gave her a little shove to make sure she made it across the threshold.

This approach seems to have paid off, since she's now much more used to the idea. She comes out a lot less grumpy at the end of the morning. I get to hear about the snack she had and the story and sometimes a few of the things she's learned. They've been talking about health and food recently.

It's nice to listen to what she's been up to but it's a bit scary to realise that even my little girl is no longer entirely under my control. The kids are getting older. Other people teach them things without me being present. I don't get to police the flow of information to their brains and I'm constantly surprised when they tell me things which I didn't know they knew. The other day, Fraser was aware that the Himalayas are the highest mountain range in the world. I didn't tell him that. They must actually teach him stuff at school. What with all you hear about the state education system, this was more than I'd really bargained on. I was thinking of it as free childcare with some added social integration but there's definitely more to it than that. He's not yet eight but he can do simple division, recite information about Vikings and read Harry Potter books without moving his lips. I wonder what else they're teaching him? Actually, hang on a minute, he can read. He could be teaching stuff to himself!

This isn't good. He has enough opinions already. Imagine what it will be like if he has facts to back them up... I'm doomed.

Ho well. Then again, sometimes I'm surprised by what the kids don't know. Usually it's just a simple misunderstanding, like the time Marie asked, "Can I have some more juice please, Daddy?" (At least that's what I think she asked. It's possible she might have said, "I want more juice, slave!" but that's not important.)

"Sorry, Marie," I replied. "The juice has all gone, I'm afraid."

"Oh," she said. "Are you scared of the juice, Daddy?"

Other times, the misunderstanding can be much less simple:

Fraser had to read to me from a book about India for his homework. One passage was to do with fishermen who work at the shore in tiger reserves. The book said that they wear masks on the backs of their heads to scare off the tigers. Fraser read the words fluently but I was suspicious that he hadn't understood their sense when he looked at the picture of the fishermen and said, "What have they got on their heads?"

"Those are masks," I explained. "It means they can keep working without having to look over their shoulders all the time to make sure a tiger isn't creeping up on them. If a tiger sees their masks, it will think they're looking at it. That means it won't attack because it will think they'll see it coming and fight back."

Fraser was puzzled. "What if there's another tiger in front of them?"

"They really will be looking at that one," I said patiently, "so it won't attack them either."

"But what if the two tigers talk to each other?" he said, his face screwed up in confusion. "If they both say they see faces, then they'll know it's a trick."

I suddenly understood the scale of the issue I was dealing with. "Er... Tigers can't talk."

"I know," he said, to my relief. Unfortunately, he then followed that up with, "I mean in their own language."

"No - tigers can't speak at all," I said, regretting having ever let him watch The Jungle Book. "They can only growl. They can maybe tell each other to look out, or that there's food or something, by growling a bit differently, but they can't say anything more than that."

He didn't get it. "Yeah, but I mean in their own language..."

"Tigers don't have a language. Only people have languages." I was tempted to add a caveat about dolphins but decided not to confuse things further. "Animals can't have conversations."

"OK," said Fraser, although he still didn't look convinced, and we pressed on with the book.

There's so much that he knows now, I was astonished by this gaping hole in his understanding of the world. Did he find Ratatouille believable? What else has he not taken in? Are there basic safety issues that he's blissfully unaware of? Does he think the moon is made of cheese?

I'm nervous. I can't possibly 'remind' him of everything I think he should know, though. It would take too long and wouldn't help anyway. I'd be bound to assume too much. It wouldn't have crossed my mind that he thought animals could talk to each other. Who knows what else he's missed?

Then there are concepts he may never pick up. A few years back, we tried out a different translation of the Lord's Prayer at church. It didn't go down hugely well for various reasons, most notably that the new version was neither poetic nor particularly more understandable than the old version. There were those, however, who were angry that the minister was trying to 'change the words that Jesus taught us'. They just didn't seem to get that there can be more than one way to translate things and that all the ways can be equally valid. These weren't stupid people - it was just a subject of which they had little knowledge or experience.

On another occasion, Fraser came home from school having been given the task of finding out what molecules are made of. I sent him back with the answer, 'It depends how close you look,' and a basic grasp of sub-atomic physics. I got called in by the teacher to explain myself. I really thought she'd at least have heard of quarks...

I was in my teens before I worked out that those pictures of our galaxy we're so used to seeing aren't photos. I was thirty before I realised that just because psychologists have given a name to an illness doesn't mean they know how to positively identify it, what causes it or how to treat it. I still think that I graduated recently.

I guess that last one is a concept I simply don't want to learn the truth about. Marie had a similar feeling yesterday. After nursery, she saw one of her friends eating a Curly Wurly. "Anna's having a snack," she said. "It's not healthy."

I nodded. "Yep, you're right, that's not a very healthy snack."

"I'm going to have a snack after soft-play," Marie said. "It will be a healthy snack."

On past experience, this didn't seem very likely. "Really?" I said.

"Yes."

"What's your snack going to be?" I asked.

"A Milky Way!" Marie said, jumping up and down.

"That's not healthy."

She looked at me like I was on drugs. "Yes, it is."

"No," I said, "it's a chocolate bar. It's made of sugar and chocolate, just like the chocolate bar that Anna's eating."

"Oh," said Marie, deeply troubled by this revelation. It stuck in her head, though, because when soft-play was over, she perused the contents of the vending machine carefully. She spotted a Blueberry Slice in the bottom corner. "I want that. It's healthy."

"Maybe," I muttered, trying to work out what is was. It appeared to be a type of cake but it didn't have chocolate and the name implied some level of fruit content. It was almost certainly entirely made of lard and sugar apart from a small smattering of blueberry scrapings. Still, a hint of vitamins is sometimes all it takes to persuade a parent to cough up twice as much money as normal for a snack that explodes into sticky crumbs as soon as it's unwrapped.

More than that, I didn't have the heart to inform her that anything which comes from a vending machine is very unlikely to be nutritious. She wouldn't have been able to cope. She wanted to be healthy but she was tired and needed a snack. Compromise was the only way forward.

While I was busy hoovering us both down after we got home, I got to thinking about Fraser again. I can't possibly teach him everything. I don't know everything myself. There are things he's not ready for yet. There are things he won't want to hear. I may even struggle to convince him that he doesn't know everything already.

All I can do is continue to help him understand the world and try to answer his questions as they arise. The next time I get into an argument with him (or anyone else for that matter), I should take a step back, however. What's the argument really about? What assumptions are we both making? Does one of us think tigers can talk to each other?

It might help life run more smoothly.

Yours in a woman's world,

Ed.

Labels: children, nursery, school

  9:45 AM - Permanent Link - 3 comments - Post comment - Links to this post

  Coffee

Dear Dave,

Thanks for the congratulations. I'm still somewhat confused by the whole situation, though. It's kind of hard to explain. I tried to explain it to Rob yesterday but, between his new phone, the curtains and the... No, hang on, I'm getting ahead of myself. I'll just tell you what happened:

Rob looked around suspiciously. "When you suggested meeting up for coffee, I was thinking Starbucks or Waterstone's. I would have settled for the Debenhams cafeteria or even that dodgy place at the end of your road that does all-day breakfasts. This is... What is this place?"

"It's very cheap," I said, pointing to a chalk board with the prices on. "I thought you were broke."

"Well, you know, wedding and baby and stuff, but doesn't mean I can't drink proper coffee." Rob squinted. "Flip, that is cheap!"

"Exactly. Now quit complaining."

We were in a little community centre housed in a converted Anglican church. It was still all stone pillars, stained-glass and gravestones set into the floor, but the pews had been removed to make way for a cafe, a gift shop and a lounge area where some elderly people were sitting dozing in a selection of tired old armchairs. At the far end, the altar was still intact and the area around it had been left as a chapel. The cafe was empty apart from a couple of mums who were sitting at a table with hot drinks and cake, while their small children played with some battered toys from a tub in the corner.

Rob had the day off work to get organised for the imminent arrival of his first child but, with only a week to go, he was still in denial and more than happy to meet up with me rather than buy nappies. It was ten o'clock in the morning. I had two children at school and one at nursery. I had no children with me. It was strange. I felt liberated and oddly exposed. I was able to leave the house on my own but, on the other hand, I had no young children with me to explain my disheveled appearance, the bags under my eyes, my permanent manic grin nor why I kept inadvertently humming Old MacDonald.

"Would you stop that?" said Rob.

"Was I doing it again?"

"Yes."

"Sorry. It's in my head. Particularly the verse about subsidies. You know, 'With a ching-ching here, and a ching-ching there. Here ching, there a ching, everywhere a...'"

Rob looked at me sadly. "You've finally lost it."

"I'm not sure you're wrong." I sighed and tried to shake the nonsense out of my head. "What are you having?"

"A cup of tea and a doughnut." He looked at the price list again. "Actually, make that two doughnuts and a scone. These prices are just mad."

"Yeah, that sign over there says this place costs £1200 a week to run but I don't know whether we're supporting them, or they're subsidising us. Maybe if you eat enough doughnuts, it'll cost them £1400 this week."

"I'll give it a go."

We went up to the counter and ordered. I had a black coffee and a scone. The man found a mug and immediately put some milk in it. "Ah, you said black, didn't you?" he muttered. I nodded. He found another mug, held it ready to pour water into and then hesitated. "It was tea, wasn't it?"

"Coffee."

"Oh, right, right." He put a spoonful of instant coffee in the mug and then filled it until it overflowed and he had to mop it up with a tissue. He put the mug on a saucer and then had a similar level of success with Rob's tea. He put the doughnuts on a plate and told us the scones would be brought to our table once they had jam on. We picked our way through the sleeping old people and found a table that, according to the inscriptions on the floor, was situated above a particularly large concentration of dead people.

"I think I know why this place is so cheap," said Rob.

"Well, when you're buying, we can go to Starbucks, Mr Two-Incomes-And-Not-Quite-Any-Kids-Yet."

"I do have an iPhone to support."

"Seriously?"

He whipped it out and took a photo of me looking incredulous. Then he uploaded the picture to Facebook.

"Honestly, you have more money than... than... Oh, I don't know..." I grabbed it from him for a quick play. "Than is probably good for you."

"Cool, though, isn't it?"

I shrugged. "Yeah, well, I doubt this will survive being tumble-dried as well as my brick-like one did."

"I'm not going to let the kid near it."

"Not even if it turns out to be the only thing that stops him or her crying?" I asked.

"No," said Rob definitely.

"Yeah," I said, trying to make my derision clear, "whatever..."

At that point, the manager arrived with one scone and informed us that our order had been mis-read but assured us that the other was on its way. Her large and conspicuous name badge was on upside down.

After she'd left, Rob gave me a look. "Don't be too hard on them," I said, handing back his phone, "I'm assuming they're all volunteers."

"Next time - Starbucks," he mumbled through a mouthful of doughnut.

I changed the subject. "You got the bag packed yet?"

"Bag?"

"Kate's bag for the hospital."

"It's on my list," he said.

I couldn't believe it. "Please tell me you're joking."

"What?" Rob said, defensively. "I've been busy. Some of us have work to go to, you know. The weekends are taken up with buying things like cots and buggies and cottonwool, and I've been spending evenings eBaying my stuff after you told your wife to tell Kate to tell me to get on with it."

"You still need to get the bag packed. If you have to do it at the last minute, who knows what you'll end up throwing in. You'll get to the hospital with your Game Boy, two Star Wars action figures and a packet of biscuits but without the TENS machine. It won't go well."

"I..." He stopped as a text message arrived for him. "It's probably Kate. I saw a set of four matching bridesmaid dresses in a charity shop this morning - only a tenner each. I sent her a photo." He showed it to me. The dresses had a muted, floral pattern and an excess of pink ribbon.

"My sister used to have curtains like that twenty years ago," I said. "I always wondered what happened to them."

"Wearing curtains didn't do the girl in Enchanted any harm..." He read Kate's message. "Oh."

"Let me guess," I said. "She wasn't thrilled?"

He pulled a face. "That's an understatement."

The other scone arrived and we tucked in. "How are you doing now Marie's at nursery?" Rob asked. "I bet you don't know what to do with yourself."

I resisted the urge to slap him. "Everybody keeps saying that but it's only a couple of hours a day and I've got plenty of things to do."

He chuckled, as if humoring me. "Still," he said, "you must be enjoying the chance to put your feet up."

"That's another thing people keep saying. It's driving me mad. If you ask if I miss the children really, and then argue when I say, 'No,' I'm afraid I will have to kill you with..." I grabbed the first item which came to hand. "...this!"

"Don't be stupid," said Rob, chuckling some more. "You can't kill someone with a sachet of sugar."

"Want to bet?" I said, waving the sachet at him menacingly. "It's amazing what can be achieved with seemingly limited resources. Remember the time I saved your career with a packet of Polos?"

He rolled his eyes. "How can I forget? I had to hide the flipping things from a Dell service technician only the other week."

"They're still there?" I flicked the sachet at him in irritation. "That was supposed to be a temporary fix. I told you to get it sorted. Haven't you managed to replace one pack of mints in eight years?"

"It's not just the one pack now."

"What?"

He looked sheepish. "It's possible I might have got drunk one night with the hardware support guys and told them about it. They actually thought it was a pretty clever solution I'd come up with and they liked it so much..."

"You came up with? I... No, hang on, I don't think I want to know where this is going. I still have a pension with LBO. My future financial security depends on the IT equipment not dying in a super-heated eruption of breath-freshening caramel."

"Yeah, well," he said, "the hardware guys liked the solution so much..."

"I'm not listening! I'm not listening!"

"...they've gone and used it all over. Every time we get a new server we have to send a trainee to the newsagents to buy some mints. The last guy was useless. He came back with Extra Strong rather than Polos."

I took my fingers out of my ears and stopped humming. "How was that going to work?"

"Exactly!" said Rob. "Too big, too thick and no hole. Never going happen."

We both clicked our tongues and shook our heads. There was silence for a few moments as, in mutual despair, we contemplated the incompetence involved.

"Seriously," said Rob eventually. "How's it going?"

I stared into my coffee. "It's all a bit weird. I had lots of plans as to how I was going to celebrate when Marie started properly but I haven't really done any of them. I guess this is it." I gave a quick sweep of my hand to take in everything from the dubious coffee to the comatose octogenarians. "Not exactly wild, is it? I just got thrown on Friday and I haven't quite recovered. I was expecting to have to hang around in the building in case the girl had a strop. I even took along a pen and some paper to write to Dave while I waited. I wasn't prepared when they said that, since she'd settled so well on Thursday, I could just leave her. They took my number and I got to wander off."

"Except I had to go back to the house," I said, taking off my glasses and rubbing my eyes. "I couldn't remember my mobile number off-hand so I gave the nursery my home number. I spent a couple of hours sitting in the kitchen, feeling confused and slightly ill."

Rob smirked. "See! You do miss them really."

"Right, that's it!" I grabbed a handful of sachets and made to lunge.

"Woh!" He threw up his hands to ward me off. "Sorry! Sorry! Calm down. You were the one who spent the whole walk here going on about how exposed you felt without them."

I slumped back down. "I suppose I hadn't thought about it that way. Maybe you're right. Maybe I do miss them a little. But it's certainly not like I get to the middle of the morning and hanker after a long, complicated explanation of the life-cycle of the monsters living in my child's elbow."

Rob raised his eyebrows.

"Don't ask," I said. "If you want the full story, I'll send Lewis round to explain."

"He's the one that spent two hours telling me about Wario World, isn't he? I'll pass, thanks."

"Good call - I'm glad of the break myself. It's just... I don't know." I drank some of my coffee and tried to think how to explain. "Have you ever lost your ID badge from work?"

Rob nodded. "Yeah, dropped it in a shredder once."

I raised my eyebrows.

"Don't ask," he said. "If you want the full story, I'll send Gerald from Corporate Regulations round to explain."

It was my turn to pass. "Anyway, as I was saying, not having the kids about is like having lost my work ID badge. It makes me feel the need to explain who I am, what I'm doing and why I don't have my ID."

"Yeah, know what you mean," said Rob. "Must be odd not being able to wave them in the right direction and have doors open for you automatically, either."

"That's maybe taking the analogy a little far..." I said.

"Maybe." He leant back and munched on his scone. "So did you do anything exciting on your first day of freedom then?"

"I killed an Action Man in a freak death-slide accident."

"Er..." Before he managed any further questioning, his phone went again. He checked the message.

All the colour drained from his face.

"You OK?" I said.

"I've got to get home." There was panic in his voice.

"Is everything all right, though?"

He opened and closed his mouth a few times before saying, "I've got to get that bag packed."

"Yep," I said, standing to leave. "You'd better go."

"Uh-huh." He didn't move. He continued to stare wide-eyed at his phone.

"Do you want me to call a taxi?" I offered.

"No... No... I'll flag one. I, er... Do you want some Mars Mission Lego?"

"Excuse me?"

"I haven't got round to eBaying it yet," he said, sounding far away. "I haven't sorted through my books, either. Or painted the spare room. Or bought any nappies. Or completed Tomb Raider Anniversary. I can't do them all this afternoon."

Having recently convinced myself that I really wouldn't like some space Lego, even though, in some sense, I really would, this put me in a quandary. Suddenly, there I was, being offered some for free. Being free is always a big plus. Also, Rob has the deluxe set. I was tempted.

Still, really, really...

Ach, I don't need any and I didn't want to take advantage of Rob in his deranged state. Besides, I felt he could do with a happy thought to hold onto.

I made a difficult decision.

"You should probably save the Lego for Squirtle," I said. "He or she might want to play with it eventually. It'll be a few years but I'm sure you can find some storage space somewhere."

"Oh... Oh, yeah. That's a thought. Yeah, we could play with it together. I..." He wasn't entirely in his right mind.

I hauled him out of his seat. "I tell you what, let's go flag that taxi together." I dragged him across the room. He stumbled along in a daze, a doughnut in one hand and a half-eaten scone in the other. Once we were outside, I bundled him into a taxi, wished him luck and sent him on his way.

I made sure to remind him where he lived first.

Hopefully, he'll be OK and didn't try to pay with the doughnut. I haven't heard any news yet; I'll let you know when I do.

Regards to Liz and the kids.

Yours in a woman's world,

Ed.

PS Marie's at nursery just now and I'm still feeling quite strange.

Labels: blokesnight, nursery

  9:45 AM - Permanent Link - 0 comments - Post comment - Links to this post

  Almost there

Dear Dave,

Have I told you that Marie is starting nursery soon? I think it might be that I've mentioned it in passing. You know, in an off-hand kind of way. It's not like it's a major event or anything but it's just possible I might have alluded to it once or twice. I doubt it was more than a sentence or two. I certainly haven't gone on about it.

What? What's that you say?

Really?

Every other letter for weeks?

Oh...

Ho, well, get over it, I'm not going to stop now. She starts tomorrow. Excuse me while I pirouette serenely around the kitchen on tip-toes, showering myself with flowers to the tune of The Blue Danube Waltz:

Yah da da da DAH, da-da, da-da. Yah da da da DAH, da-da, da-da

and then cut abruptly to an energetic interpretation of The Time Warp:

It's just a jump to the left...

only to finish with an overblown rendition of The Final Countdown complete with air-guitar, a straggly mop stuck to my head and fireworks:

Cue big-haired, leather-clad, Swedish men erupting from the cupboards in a blaze of pyrotechnics. It's the final countdown! DUH-duh, duh, DUH! DUH-duh, duh, duh, duh!

DUH-duh! Duh, duh, DUH-duh! Duh, duh, du-du, du-du, duh-duh duuuh...

Actually, no, I think I wandered off into The Flintstones there, but who cares? My youngest child starts nursery tomorrow! I'm not fussed if my kitchen ends up full of European rock stars or Fred and Barney - all that matters is that I'm going to get regular time to myself without children.

Yep, the fabled two or so hours a day, on week days, during term time, when all the kids are well, are almost here. That's over ten hours a week, thirty-five weeks a year, during which I might simultaneously have both the time and energy to achieve something. The very thought consumes my mind. I can barely think of anything else.

Then again, maybe Fred would bring Wilma...





...sigh...






Er... Where was I? Oh, yeah, free time once Marie starts nursery. I'll have some. That's going to be pretty odd.

In the past, I've just laughed at those who've said that I won't know what to do with myself. I have a hundred things I want to get done:

• Clean the house. Obviously I make the house look clean on a regular basis already but there are certain out-of-sight areas, like top shelves and at the back of the TV cabinet, that are so dusty you'd think a vampire had crawled in and died.
• Visit all the poky, little shops in the area in which there isn't room to swing a screaming toddler. For years, I've only dared venture into supermarkets and department stores, unwilling to risk navigating a buggy through cramped aisles of breakable goods. Even then, it's seldom been pleasant. One time, when Fraser was small, I took a wrong turn into the crystal department of John Lewis and he immediately decided the only way to travel was with his legs stuck out to either side as far as he could stretch. Navigating my way to the exit became a nerve-wracking test of skill and concentration, akin to those games where you've got to move a metal ring along a wiggly wire without making contact and setting off the very expensive smashing noise. Since then, colourful little stores selling knick-knacks have seemed out of the question.
  
  I want to go and browse pointless trinkets again. I also want to go into one of the four Polish delicatessens that have recently opened within a few minutes walk of my house and see if anything looks tasty. Hopefully quite a lot will, because, before long, a third of the shops round here are going to be Polish delicatessens and I won't be able to buy food anywhere else. (The other two-thirds of the shops are already internet cafes and barbers. The neighbourhood is obviously now full of Polish people who want to get their haircut and then blog about it.)
• Fix some of the things around the house that have been broken so long that I no longer even notice that they're broken. Like, erm...
• Go round the house looking for broken things. See above.
• Meet friends for coffee... and talk about something other than children and things around the house which need fixed.
• Play some of those computer games I've been meaning to play but haven't. These are mostly PC games I picked up a while ago, only to discover my computer at the time wasn't powerful enough. Doubtless they still won't work for some reason but I'd like to give it a try.
• Zombie-proof the house. If they climb on the wheelie-bin, they'll be in the bedroom window before we know it. I need to sort out a spring-loaded booby trap that will catapult them into next door's garden. The neighbours may not be too pleased when it starts raining zombies on their crazy paving but I assume that will be the least of my worries...
• Have a proper mid-life crisis. I had a little one soon after Marie was born but I never felt I really had the time to get into it properly. I was too busy changing nappies to buy a motorbike; I was too tired to do anything else because I wasn't getting enough
• Sleep.
• Write a novel. I've got a great idea for a haunting Celtic fantasy set in fifth century Scotland, stuffed full of myths and heroes, and played out against the backdrop of the growing conflict between Druidism, the old gods and Christianity. It's totally awesome.
  
  Alternatively, I could just cobble together all these letters I've written to you and see if anyone's interested. Got to be worth a shot...
• Buy clothes. Much less awesome but it has to be done. It's years since I bought any clothing other than underwear. The trick, as ever, will be going to the shops and coming back with trousers rather than a PlayStation 3. Gah, who put GAME next to John Lewis? It's just too tempting. Pretty soon, I'm going to have to fashion myself a new coat out of DVD boxes.
• The list goes on...

And that's just off the top of my head. I'm beginning to understand what those people who said I won't know what to do with myself were talking about. There's so much I want to get done and only a couple of hours each day to do it. The problem is where to start. I don't want to waste any of that precious time and I may find myself paralysed with indecision. How best to maximise my productivity and enjoyment? The planning itself could take weeks.

I'm having to keep a lid on my own expectations. Even tackling one a day, I'm not going to achieve all of the above list in the first week. In fact, I'll be lucky if I manage to do more than lie on the sofa groaning for the first week. The second week, I might manage to lie on the sofa groaning while eating crisps. For the third week, I'm looking at a little light TV, less groaning and maybe some pretzels.

There's no point working myself up to anything more - the week after that, the kids are off school. To be honest, even this schedule might be pushing it. Although Marie starts tomorrow, she's being broken-in slowly. Tomorrow is really only a chance to look around; Friday she'll get to stay a bit longer but I won't be allowed to leave the building in case she has a titanic tantrum. (As if...) Depending how she copes, it could be a few days before I get to leave her at nursery all morning.

The pretzels might have to wait until nearly March.

Let's face it, if I get half the things on my list done before the summer then I'll be doing extremely well. If I get three done, that'll still be pretty impressive. Failing that, even just getting my regular cleaning, grocery shopping and a few chores done so I can pay more attention to the kids the rest of the time will be a result.

Drat. Now I think about it, maybe my life isn't going to change that much. Still, at least I should have enough time to dream about that mythical day, nineteen months from now, when Marie starts school. I ought to go get a calendar and start crossing off the days now!

No, hang on. I'll wait a week and buy one in a colourful little store which sells knick-knacks. Then I'll eat something Polish and get my haircut while everyone stares at my jacket made of DVD boxes.

You never know, I might even blog about the whole thing...

Yours in a woman's world,

Ed.

Labels: housedad, nursery

  9:00 AM - Permanent Link - 2 comments - Post comment - Links to this post

  The disappeared

Dear Dave,

Marie starting nursery seems to have been a tantalisingly close prospect for a long time now. Back at the beginning of the year, I thought there'd be an in-take after the October Week holiday and, since Marie's birthday is late September, I was hoping she'd get in then. Just before the summer holidays, I found out she wouldn't be eligible for a place until after Christmas. More recently, I started to hear rumours of place shortages at the nursery attached to the boys' school. There were tales of kids having to wait months, even though they were already three; accounts of parents having to beg, plead and shout to get their children in; whispers of vast hordes of Polish four-year-olds invading the area and demanding pre-school education; suggestions that Marie might have to wait until August 2008...

I'd got used to thinking it was several months away - just about in sight but too distant to really plan for. Now, suddenly, I know she's got a morning place in January. I'll have a couple of hours or so each day without children. In five weeks. It's actually going to happen. I can hardly believe it. I'm BobBIng UP aNd DOwn aS I tYPe. There are all kinds of possibilities.

I can hardly wait but, now it's all more of a reality, I can't help feeling a little pang of fear. I will no longer have a small child in my care every minute of the day to justify my existence. On occasion, I will have to be a person in my own right. That's going to be strange.

Stranger still, there will be no more parent and toddler.

Admittedly, I've been feeling like I'm serving out my time there for a while. I go along and drink my hot drink, eat some biscuits and stare into space while Marie entertains herself. I chat a bit but, if no one I know is around, I'm not desperate to introduce myself to new people.

The idealised image of these groups suggests I should have a core band of friends to go to the cafe and talk potty issues and sleep deprivation with by now. It's not happened, though. I just haven't collected a little clique of coffee-drinking companions.

Some of this is probably down to being a man. Place thirty mums and a dad in a room and tell them to make some friends, and the dad is almost bound to be at a disadvantage. Throw in another dad, and the two of them will stick together but there's no saying that they'll have anything more in common than being trapped in a room full of sleep deprived women and children with potty issues. This is not necessarily a recipe for long term friendship.

Oh and, chances are, the second dad will just be giving his partner a break on his day off from work and the first dad will never see him again anyway.

Grrr.

Yep, some of the reasons for not having a coffee shop clique are down to being a man but, let's face it, some of them are down to me. I'm quite shy, I struggle to start conversations and I've never been much of a coffee shop person. On top of that, when Lewis was young, I had depression, which is never helpful when making friends. When Marie was small, there simply wasn't time in the schedule between changes, feeds and school runs for any caffeine-based socialising .

It's not like it's been a total washout, though. I have made a few friends who live close by - just not very many of them compared with the number of people I've chatted to. I've made far more acquaintances. Unfortunately, in most cases, at the point I was starting to get to know them better, they disappeared. One week they were at parent and toddler and the next they weren't... ever again.

At one of the groups I attend, the other parents have all changed three or four times. Even the helpers have changed twice.

Often they've gone without me noticing. It's quite normal for people to be off sick or on holiday for weeks at a time. It's only after a month that it becomes clear they're not coming back. And there's no way of contacting them. The organisers aren't allowed to hand out personal details (if they even have them) and, by then, two-thirds of the other parents are liable to struggle to remember who I'm talking about, let alone where they live. (My descriptions don't usually help much. 'You know, that tired looking mum with brown hair and a couple of kids. She used to wear a scarf quite a lot...')

Where have these people gone?

There's no way of knowing. Have they moved house or got a job? Have they fallen out with someone or found a better group elsewhere? Has the kid taken to napping in the middle of the morning? Has the parent taken to lounging around in coffee shops? Are they all OK? Has there been a disaster? Was it anything to do with zombies?

It would be nice to know. Sometimes the family shows up again at nursery or with another child or when the kid starts napping in the afternoon once more. Other times, they're just gone. Vanished. Disappeared.

I wonder where they all went...

New people ask me, "Have you been coming here for a while?"

It's quite interesting watching their reaction when I say, "Six and a half years."

There's nearly always a slight double-take and some nervous laughter. New helpers realise that I know a great deal more about how the group works than they do. New parents realise the length of journey they might have begun.

And now my own journey is about to change course. In a few weeks, I will be one of the disappeared.

I can't help feeling a little sad and, as I said before, a little scared. Where has the time gone? What mark have I left? Will people wonder where I've gone and then struggle to remember my name?

I have to assume so.

Still, I've given plenty of advice and sympathy in my time. Hopefully it's done some good. More than that, parent and toddler has got me out of the house, given me the chance to talk to people old enough not to idolise the Teletubbies and provided me with a steady supply of hot drinks and biscuits. I've been very glad of it... but it's time to move on. I have a different life ahead of me.

I'm kind of hoping that it involves coffee shops and not zombies...

Yours in a woman's world,

Ed.

Labels: housedad, nursery, playgroup

  10:00 AM - Permanent Link - 4 comments - Post comment - Links to this post

  Bleargh

Dear Dave,

We're all suffering from one illness or another, the mice are back and Pirates of the Caribbean 3 was unexpectedly rubbish. I'm pretty fed up.

I've been coughing for three weeks and I'd just like to feel better, thank you very much. Fraser has some kind of virus that's making him tired, achy and argumentative. (Well, more argumentative than usual). I don't think he'll be at school tomorrow. As I write this, it's late at night and, over the baby listener, I can hear Marie sounding pretty choked up. This could be a long one...

Still, on a positive note, Marie has a place at nursery after Christmas. I can hardly believe it - it's even a morning one. I'll have two and a half hours each weekday where I won't have any children to look after (during term-time, at least). The possibilities seem endless. It's not a case of not knowing what to do with myself. It's a case of not knowing what to do first. I hardly dare imagine it.

Interestingly, Marie can't imagine it.

"What should I do once you're at nursery?" I asked her.

"Come and collect me," she said.

"Yes, I'll collect you from nursery but what should I do all the time you're there?"

She looked blank. "Play with me?" she ventured.

"No, I'll be somewhere else."

She considered the thought that I exist when she isn't there and seemed to reluctantly accept it.

I asked her again. "So what should I do?"

She laughed. "Go to work!"

I wasn't impressed.

Yours in a woman's world,

Ed.

Labels: housedad, nursery, sickness

  12:30 AM - Permanent Link - 1 comments - Post comment - Links to this post

  1966 and all that

Dear Dave,

I quite understand the trauma you're going through trying to choose a nursery for Sam. There are so many things to consider: the adult/child ratio, the quality of the equipment and facilities (both inside and outside), the curriculum, the teaching ethos, the discipline code, the evaluation report, the nutritional content of snacks, the colour of the walls and the level of drugs slipped into the milk. We gave up and just went for the one at the end of our road. Seems nice enough.

Marie could start when she's three so I finally got round to registering her the other day. It didn't take long - they copied most of the information from the boys' records. I still had to tell them her nationality, though, and this was harder than you might think. I had three viable options - Scottish, British or English. All were serious possibilities and I tried to peek at the school secretary's monitor in order to see what I'd said last time for Lewis. I hoped I hadn't panicked and told them he was Swiss. Deftly swivelling her screen away from my prying eyes, the secretary looked at me with an amiable smile obviously reserved for the kind of simpleton who doesn't even know the nationality of their own child.

I tried to think fast. It should have been easy - she was born in Scotland, she lives in Scotland, her mum is from Scotland. There's a pattern there. The only thing is, I'm not from Scotland. I'm from the middle of a blackcurrant field in Norfolk and I'm as English as the day is long. Admittedly, I used to describe myself as British but then I moved to Scotland and discovered that in some dialects of Scots this just means 'I'm English but I want your oil and somewhere to keep my nuclear missiles.' It doesn't go well.

British would probably have done for an answer in this context but it felt wrong. It would have been like calling myself European - specific enough if I was in rural China but stupidly vague in central Edinburgh. Britain doesn't have a football team. And, realistically, that was what I was choosing - her national identity, her sense of belonging and her level of expectation for progression to the knockout stages.

Much was made of Andy Murray's unwillingness to support the English football team in the last World Cup. I have to concede that I did find it mystifying when I first moved up here that there are so many fond memories of England losing to Germany in penalty shoot-outs. After all, most English fans are happy to wish the Scotland team well and even to support them if England are already knocked out. Turns out, though, this is quite patronising and annoying. Imagine how Manchester City fans would feel if they made it to a cup final and a whole load of United fans turned up to join in the celebrations. Or how Canadians would feel if Americans started taking credit for Celine Dion.

Not pretty, is it?

I've lived here long enough that I'm not entirely sure who I would support if England played Scotland. Probably England... but if they won the World Cup then it would be the main headline on The Six O'clock News for at least a week. That would do more for the cause of Scottish independence than almost anything. I'd probably vote for the Nationalists myself if it meant I didn't have to hear about 1966 and 20XX ever again. I don't fancy Alex Salmond being in charge, though. Every time the man opens his mouth I want to slap the smugness out of him with a wet fish. Independence would be expensive and a waste of time. It would be far cheaper just holding compulsory classes for English people on how not to irritate their neighbours. Can't see it happening, however, and it would be a shame to break up the Union over football.

As I stood at the secretary's desk, all these thoughts flashed through my mind and I realised that Scotland needs all the support it can get. An extra cheer here or there might make all the difference. "Scottish," I said.

The secretary nodded. "Wise choice," she said and rubber stamped Marie's forehead with a Saltire. The deed was done.

Of course, you won't have this problem. Unless Liz is French. Then maybe you'd have something of an idea of where I'm coming from. If England and Scotland ever do meet in a World Cup match I'll probably just dig myself a hole in the back yard and hide in it until it's all over, slapping myself occasionally with a wet haddock in an act of ritual penitence for being born the wrong side of the border.

That's what I normally do when the rugby's on.

Good luck with the nursery hunt. Have you started looking into secondary schools yet?

Yours in a woman's world,

Ed.

Labels: nursery, Scotland

  11:10 AM - Permanent Link - 0 comments - Post comment - Links to this post