Friday 10th
I was working - I had worked most of the night, the work had gone slower and more rubbishly than I'd expected, due to increasing tiredness and fiddly diagrams and a few technicals. So we ended up setting off for my mum's just as the rush hour was about to start. Could only afford to go the Ashford way (cheaper than up to Victoria and down) and they run a 2-carriage service on that line at all times. So basically a very packed train and a bit of standing until Eastbourne and generally a tired me and a putting up with things F. F is good at putting up with things as they happen but they tend to build up and when she has put up with too much she explodes, even when the last thing she has put up with is the wrong sock or a lost sweet or something.
So anyway not a great start.
For the first time in my life I really wished I had done driving and having a car. I've considered learning to drive many times, but this is the first time I felt so fed up on the train that I actually really wished... However, I was so tired I'm not sure that would have been a good idea, driving over, anyway.
Then the tiredness, combined with thoughts about the decision not to go the car-owning route and the proximity of so many people around us, had me musing rather negatively about the business of not fitting in.
Most of the time I'm very happy to be the weird person who doesn't eat meat and dairy, doesn't drive, isn't married despite having a child, isn't entirely heterosexual, didn't buy a house till her 40s and doesn't send her child to school. But I found myself thinking how very comfortable it must be to be someone who is quite happy to do the majority/'normal' thing, someone who just happens to 'fit in', because they really do think the same way as the majority on all these things.
If you think differently, then there you are, really, aware that most people see things entirely differently to you, so you do end up feeling slightly alienated. Most of the time I am OK with it, but it can feel a bit wearing if you're stuck on a train with a huge number of random people and their extraordinary largely unspoken mass consensus on various things. Mostly it leaves me with a sense of wonder that they can all have come to the same conclusions about these things. How do they do that? And does it mean they are 'right'?
Mysterious things, you humans.
So those were the rather negative ramblings of my tired brain as we rolled through beautiful Sussex countryside and F read Harry Potter (second book).
Once we'd got a seat, the journey did get better though, and the changeover at Ashford was easy, so we got to my mum's early evening and I'd got over myself by then and was quite ready to watch a bit of Corrie, thanks :)
We were meant to be staying one night at my mum's but we ended up staying three nights. F was very good company for her grandma and I didn't want to end that. They snuggled on the sofa with F's DS, giggled over some game upstairs, F did awful makeovers on grandma, etc.
We went into town on the Saturday as mum wanted to get Christmas presents, but when she got into the first bookshop she felt totally bewildered and overwhelmed and couldn't concentrate at all. After a few tries to help her think what she needed, I suggested doing it all online at home instead. Meanwhile F had found 3 Jacqueline Wilson books she fancied. She had even spotted that they were '3 for 2'! So mum bought those for her for Christmas but letting her have them straightaway.
F went to a Santa's Grotto - very funny, main elf was a total 'Del boy', wearing an elf costume that didn't even meet at the back over his jumper and jeans, and second elf was watching Futurama on her netbook! Oh the atmosphere, eh?
We went to M&S food shop, where I felt like I spent half an hour alternately panicking about losing F and mum and apologizing to strangers for various breaches of etiquette committed by F with trolley and mum with no concentration. F and mum both happily oblivious to other people and me not accepting the 'sensible' role with good grace at all. Probably very funny viewed from outside.
But we did get some delicious food! Which IS The Point!
So it was a good weekend with mum, F did her the world of good and I managed to help her through all her present-buying online, getting everything from Ocado, M&S and Amazon in the end. Left her with a list of what was coming and for who but am still expecting a lot of confused phone calls and can't really control what happens next.
Mum always spends Christmas with an old friend locally, usually staying over 2 or 3 nights.
LOL the phone just rang and mum had received some parcels but didn't realize she needed to open them. Glad things are getting through now, Amazon seemed to grind to a halt at one point.
So we watched lots of Strictly Come Dancing and a few other bits and bobs and mainly just F and mum spent time together, or F would be reading next to mum, snuggling.
Managed to get to Monday group on our way home by very expensive hook or crook. Worth it though as F really wanted to see E and wouldn't be able to go to a Christmas Party the next day as we were going to panto.
I enjoyed sticking stickers on baubles and singing with Kate (Starry Starry Night, in honour of a jar lantern she was making which was rather beautiful, lots of blue with little stars of silver glitter studding it, and carols of course).
Then home, and very nice to be there. J and cats and curry and all home comforts and our tree.
Tuesday was panto day, we met J's mum in Hastings and went to see Jimmy Osmond in Cinderella. F was most indignant that the posters were so focused on JO - 'He's not the main character!'
It was quite good but they were at the beginning of the run, so a bit fast, not quite going with the flow and working with the audience yet. Also no live music, shame. Some very good bits and excellent sets and effects. But not enough warmth, drawing audience in, that kind of thing.
J's mum annoyed me very early on by referring to F's appearance too much. I think she'd love her to look like a perfect little doll really (ain't gonna happen!). Later she made a big deal of how dainty F's friend is and how lovely it is that she does ballet, etc. etc. I got moody.
And of course my mood seeped out, and later on the way home, after all this, F was absolutely awful on the train, pushing and pushing and literally saying 'what can you do about it?' in our faces.
Ugh.
Onwards and upwards...
3 comments:
Urgh for the crappy bits.
Funnily enough I was thinking about car ownership today and how most of the time you simply make the choice not to use a car and alter your life accordingly but there are times when it can be so very limiting. The kids and I were talking about it and whether they'd like to learn to drive etc. They both say they want to be able to drive but not necessarily own a car, I reckon that's a wise option.
I imagine the M&S experience was very funny to watch from the outside. The time spent with your Mum sounds like it did her the world of good and probably F too, just having some 'back to normal' time with her Grandma.
i think M has it about right. Own a car and have someone available to run you about but don't drive yourself.
One of the interesting things for me with C being away is a very definite sense of separation from pretty much all groups. Sometimes I feel I never fit into any group; some HEors find the en famille concept abhorrent and are as negative about it as school using families are to the concept of HE. So my sense of connectivity is reduced. I feel very much a fish out of water at work, tend to seek out other odd fish ;-).
I think I may be a loner who likes the company of friends.
Been thinking about his post all night :)
When M and B were small we had one car. A went off in it at 6am to Macclesfield to work, and I was at home with no car. Everyone else I knew had 2 cars. But I was determined not to get one (anyway - no way we could afford it). I was the worlds expert on moving a baby and a toddler on public transport. When I look back now I don't know how I did it (or in some cases why! - running up steps at Birmingham New Street with a baby in my arms, a buggy slung over one shoulder and a rucksack on the other! What was I thinking?) - but no regrets :)
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