A Much Bigger World

Today our youngest son, Tom, had his final day at the nursery where he has been going every day since he was 9 months old. After a week’s holiday for half term next week he’ll be starting at a brand new nursery to get him ready for starting school in September.

It is not a move Karen and I have undertaken lightly. It is not a move we make with glad hearts or any sense of victory. But it is a necessary move.

Some of you will remember Tom was going off the rails a bit earlier a year. I don’t mean to go through all that again here. Suffice to say we came within a gnat’s hair of changing his nursery back then but the owner of the nursery (who’d recently retired from the day to day running of the place, handing the reins to a newly appointed manageress) stepped back up the plate and promised us the commitment we both wanted to hear to deal with Tom’s “overly-confident” behaviour. Things improved. But then began to slip again a few weeks ago. The new manageress has her own ethos and way of doing things which, as far as Tom is concerned, just exacerbates the problem.

I must point out here that Tom is perfectly controllable at home and elsewhere. It’s just the combination of this particular nursery environment and he lead to explosions. Though Karen and I feel it is the manageress’s approach more than the nursery that cause the problem: we’ve come to the conclusion that the manageress loves problems that can lead her to acquiring extra funding... And that’s all I’m going to say on the matter.

The care workers are all very sad. So I suspect are Tom’s friends. And so will Tom be when the reality of the move sinks in. ‘Cos here’s the thing. Everybody loves Tom. His naughtiness accounts for only about 5% of his behaviour – if that.

But we can’t leave him somewhere where they seem unable to curb his ebullience. He needs to be socialized ready for school in September. So it was a case of move him now or do nothing at all and see the situation slide yet again until the manageress is calling in “experts” and “specialists” – all of which has been well and truly poo-poohed by our family doctor who told us quite stridently that there was absolutely nothing wrong with Tom other than he’s ready for school right now and is probably bored witless. The manageress actually looked disappointed with this diagnosis. It was at that point really that Karen and I decided that we didn’t want her anywhere near our child.

So Tom will have a trial at the new  nursery next week. Thankfully he is excited by it. It is a smaller nursery which Karen and I think will help and they have a superb sensory chill-out room where the kids can go when they need space. All of which we think will really help Tom. And, as callous as it sounds, we also think a little period of being unsettled might help him too; a period of being the new boy. We’re hoping it will stimulate a little empathy within the maelstrom of his emotional development.

It’s going to be a difficult time. And then in September further upheaval as he starts school. Sadly he didn’t get into the school his older brother goes to (Ben himself will leave in July and start at secondary school) so that too will all be new.

This is Tom’s journey. Already it is not the journey that Karen and I had planned out for him but at the end of the day he’s a kid not an Air-fix kit. His journey is organic and constantly improvised and we his parents spend our days running hard to keep up in order to kick as many of the rocks away from beneath his feet as we can before he stumbles on them.

He’s about to realize it’s a much bigger world out there than he’d ever imagined.

But I think his imagination is big enough to cope with it. Let’s hope so.

What The Doctor Said And What The Director Said

Hopefully this will be the last post on this subject for a while... for the last month it feels like all Karen and I have eaten, slept and talked about is nursery.

However, there has been movement if not resolution.

A visit to the GP on Monday secured us the confirmation we needed: there is nothing wrong or abnormal with Tom or his behaviour; it is all within normal bounds. If anything he is very bright, probably bored stiff and ready for school right now. The doctor’s diagnosis matched many of the comments you guys left on my last post: “the problem is environmental not pathological – change the nursery”.

When we reported this to the manager of the nursery she disgusted both Karen and I by actually looking disappointed. Disappointed that there wasn’t something wrong with Tom; that he didn’t have a diagnosable, pathological problem. She announced she’d make moves to refer him to someone herself.

Karen and I let that go as we were booked in to see the director of the nursery yesterday afternoon. Up until just before Christmas the director, J, was running the nursery day-to-day and had everything, including Tom, under control. Her retirement and the installation of a new manager and Tom’s degenerate behaviour are something more than just coincidence.

J is a lovely “old school” type. And totally got what we were saying. She was, I suspect, appalled that such a hysterical flap had been allowed to develop; that Karen and I had been guilt tripped by the manager on a number of occasions (“I was so worried about Tom I crashed my car”, for example); that the boundaries had been allowed to fall away to such an extent that any kind of authority had broken down. I think she was more disappointed that Karen and I hadn’t been listened to in terms of the effective techniques we employ at home to maintain order – the same techniques that she herself employed when running the nursery daily before her retirement. She was sad that we’d been driven to view other nurseries and that moving Tom was now a definite consideration.

She took it all on board and her response was that her nursery, her staff needed to do more. And if they didn’t like it, tough; it was their job to deal with it. Since J started intervening last Monday the daily phone calls to Karen and I from the nursery have stopped. Tom is getting one-on-ones with the staff to intervene at any flashpoint and guide his behaviour back onto the straight and narrow. The improvement and drop in stress for everyone has been palpable. If they’d only done this 4 weeks ago...

J is so honourable we’ve decided to give the nursery another 2 weeks. Giving up and washing her hands of Tom was so beyond J’s thought processes it was truly heartening and plainly moving Tom really has to be the last resort.

So the nursery have got 2 weeks to re-establish our trust in them and to start to turn things around.

Karen and I have viewed 4 other nurseries – 3 of which we’d be happy for Tom to go to – so we feel like we have choices and a plan B should this not work out. We feel like we’re back in control again.

Hopefully with J back to keeping a watchful eye on the helm, nursery are too.

Which is happy news for everyone. Especially Tom.

Normal scurrilous blog service will be resumed shortly.

Crossing Boundaries

I’ve discovered that it doesn’t take very much to jolt me off track. To so unsettle me that I find even writing – my instinctual outlet since I was 9 years old – impossible.

Problems with my family will pretty much do it every time.

If you’re a regular reader you’ll know from a previous post the trouble we’ve been having with our youngest, Tom, at nursery (or, to put it another way, the trouble our youngest has been having with his nursery) and if you’re not, well, this is probably not a great post to be introduced to me (I suggest you read the one preceding it).

I’m not going to go into detail as (a) it’s not fair to Tom and (b) it’s not fair to the nursery... but suffice to say the last 3 weeks have been hell. Stress overload. Karen and I have not been able to relax for a second as the nursery, once they crossed the boundary of ringing us when Tom was having a “rampage” then more or less rang us every single day. We’ve spent the last two weeks on tenterhooks waiting for the next phone call, not being able to relax, and just generally feeling sick.

Karen had been signed off work, ill, since the beginning of the month anyway so with all this going on any chance she’s had of resting and recuperating has been machine gunned down without mercy. Meanwhile, I’ve had my ability to perform my job impaired as I’ve found myself on call to the nursery. I don’t get paid for time away from my job so I’ve found myself hotfooting it to the nursery without pay to do the job that I pay them to do.

Farcical.

I don’t think Karen and I have slept properly for weeks. It’s been too much. And ridiculous to boot.

In short, a change of management at the nursery has led to a subtle change in ethos and method which has lead to Tom pushing boundaries which bowed and then collapsed leading to a downward spiral in behaviour. Behaviour that is not exhibited at home or elsewhere as Karen and I run a tight ship in the old discipline department. But this has just led to further frustration for us: when we can see how little effort and thought it takes to get control of Tom and yet the “experts” are just not doing it for a whole raft of reasons verging from “staffing levels” to “health & safety”.

Over the last 3 weeks Tom has been gossiped about by staff at the school that the nursery is affiliated to. He’s come home and twice has said something along the lines that “something is wrong / not right with him” – something Karen and I have never even thought let alone said; clearly someone else has said this to him or in front of him which is appalling. It’s been implied that he needs one-to-one help as if he were a special needs child. We were told that a pregnant care worker he hit ended up in hospital – we later found out that she had issues with blood clots; nothing at all to do with Tom but it was nice of the nursery to leave us with that guilt and responsibility for the best part of a week. The manager also pranged her car this week and informed us it was “because she was thinking about Tom”. I wonder how much responsibility a 4 year old can take for the world? The final straw came this Monday when the manager told us that “maybe Tom wasn’t ready for full time nursery care”.

He’s been in full time nursery care at this same nursery since he was 11 months old.

Needless to say Karen and I are not happy and have demanded a meeting with the director next week. For the best part of 3 years Tom’s behaviour has been managed adeptly but since New Year the nursery have allowed Tom’s behaviour to slip and fall and have now exacerbated the problem with H&S rubbish rather than nip it in the bud. The poor kid is confused and wondering what the hell is going on.

I’d like to point out that Karen and I are not excusing his bad behaviour at nursery. It needs bringing into line. But it needs doing calmly and wisely and not with all this hysteria that has been built up – it’s all become about the nursery’s lack of control rather than focusing on teaching Tom the right way to interact. It’s no good Karen and I upholding the rules at home if nursery then go and fumble them during the week. Karen and I are followers of the Super Nanny school of education. But get this – the manager implied that our isolating Tom on a naughty step or a naughty room (where he can’t see us but we can see him) is technically “child abuse” and that “she ought to report it to the authorities”.

Sheesh.

Let’s just say the manager did a child abuse course before Christmas and has the zealotry of a new convert.

It has been yet another straw to break our backs.

So Karen and I have, with heavy heart, been checking out other nurseries – we don’t really want to move him as our master plan was for him to move to the school affiliated with the nursery in September with friends that he’s built up over the last 4 years. This plan is now in jeopardy. Unless there is a massive turn around at our meeting with the nursery director on Tuesday there is little point in keeping him where he is now – Karen and I have completely lost our confidence in the place. Part of what we pay for is peace of mind and a calm, consistent approach to socially educating our children. We no longer have any of that. The manager who announced she was “in for the long haul” a mere 3 weeks ago was the one saying Tom couldn’t cope with full time nursery on Monday. Read that as she couldn’t cope with it. Hence her minor car crash.

The director we are seeing on Tuesday is a lovely lady – grandmotherly and old school. Up until Christmas she was working at the nursery (but then went into semi retirement) and often sorted Tom out when he’d misbehaved. Karen and I have lost count of the number of times she’d shrugged his latest escapade off with “He’s fine – these young girls flap so much!” We’re sorry to be bringing her out of retirement but if anyone can sort it, she can. We’re sure she’ll be horrified at the thought that her nursery can’t handle a 4 year old!

Because at the end of the day the other nurseries Karen and I have viewed this week as possible alternatives have all but shrugged when told the reason we are considering moving Tom. Nothing new. Nothing special. Not out of the ordinary. Normal. Most figure it can be sorted out within a month.

It’s been good to hear. Good to see people reacting measuredly and sanely and not calling for the local priest. Good to know we have choices. But we will still be sad if we have to move Tom so close to him starting school at the end of the year. We want him unsettled as little as possible until then.

It’s been a dreadful month. We’ve had our parenting called into question, the nature of our little boy called into question and all of our plans for him thrown up into the air whilst having parenting leaflets and behavioural training leaflets waved into our faces by those that most need to read them.

Whatever happens next week we can’t go on as we have been. This level of constant extremis just cannot be maintained by any of us.

Something has got to give.

Tough But Cautious Love

We had a letter from the nursery last week asking if we would grant permission for their staff to carefully restrain our youngest when he is in the midst of a huge mega-tantrum.

He is a very wilful, determined little boy, our youngest, and a refusal will always offend. But it’s all part of the learning curve and, if you imagine his behaviour as being on a spectrum, then I’d say he’s smack bang in the middle. I’ve seen better behaved boys and I’ve seen a lot worse.

Of course, any kind of bad behaviour, if left unchecked, will result in delinquency of some kind and nobody wants to see a 4 year old joyriding around town in a stolen BMW and selling crack to the local pool club so the rules have got to be laid down and laid down firm.

Karen and I get that. Totally. Needless to say our little ‘un is far more aware of the boundaries at home than he is at nursery and pushes them less. Which isn’t to say that he doesn’t push them at all because he does. Sometimes with the determination of a bulldozer.

But nursery... that’s a different story. Like any kid, if he senses weakness, he’ll go in for the kill.

So I totally get where the nursery is coming from with this consent form thing.

But I couldn’t help wondering if it was really necessary. Couldn’t help feeling that it’s necessity for the nursery owners belies a little of what is wrong with the world.

Years ago a nursery worker / care worker / teacher wouldn’t have thought twice about carefully restraining a flailing child – especially if he/she was in danger of hurting him/herself or even others.

But the world it so litigious these days that even an arm-grab can be considered GBH. Picking a child up and placing them on the naughty step can be considered an infringement of their human rights.

You gotta get permission to even give a child a stiff talking to lest you find yourself added to some government offenders’ register.

So what were they doing before they asked for our permission to handle our kid with kid gloves? Kettling him with cotton wool? Directing him into a safe corner with brightly coloured paddles like some kind of 1940’s aircraft landing officer? Or leaving a trail of Valium injected Smarties to the safe haven of the Wendy House?

I mean, it’s nice they’ve asked permission and everything. We don’t want him harming himself or others and likewise we don’t want others harming him. But have they asked permission of the other parents too? Or do they wait until one of the other kids goes off the rails with a Duplo brick and a quoit? I mean just what is the trigger for this “ramping” up of tough but gentle love? The kids are only 3 and 4 for Heaven’s sake!

Isn’t being hands-on with the kids part of the job description? I don’t remember them asking permission to change his nappy when he was 2.

I know the alternative is worse – kids beaten with rods and brutalized. But surely there must be some sensible middle ground?

Or do we want a generation of humans who shy away from any kind of physical contact at all?

No wait. We already have that...

To Barter Or To Thieve?

Lord knows we’re all having to cinch our belts tight these days (those of us that can afford belts; personally I’m making do with a bit of string and an elastic band) but I really object to people half-inching my kid’s clothes!

I’m sure it’s not a deliberate act of thievery but it does happen quite often.

We’ll send our youngest off to nursery dressed up like a style guru or a miniature version of Huggy Bear and, in the course of his executive play activities, a little accident of varying moistness will occur. A leaky nappy or a beaker spillage.

Thankfully one of the nice nursery girls will rescue him from whatever puddle he has found himself in and change his clothes (we send him off with a spare set every day for this eventuality).

All well and good.

At this point what should happen is that the dirty clothes should get bagged up and then sent home with Tom when we come to pick him up so that we can get them all clean ready for their next encounter with rogue Ribena.

But what often happens is that they don’t get sent home with Tom at all.

They disappear.

They – and I suspect strongly this is the case – get sent home with another kid whose mum takes a look at them and thinks to herself, “ooh, these Star Wars jeans from H&M look pretty trendy, I wonder how they’ve ended up with my Joey, oh well I may as well hang onto them now.”

And suddenly the fortune my wife and I have spent on nice clothes for Tom finds itself tailoring some other little kid who won’t appreciate the Trinny and Susannah discussions my wife and I had to select that particular item of clothing in the first place. (I am Susannah, thank you for asking.)

Now, I like the nursery where Tom spends his week days. It’s great in so many ways. But this constant trouser drift annoys the hell out of me. Because it is now getting to the point where Tom hasn’t got enough decent trousers to see him through the week. Even though the wife and I spent a lot of money ensuring he would have.

It’s getting to the point now where, when we find mystery items of clothing in Tom’s bag – nice woollen tops and jumpers, the odd pair of socks, etc – we no longer do the honest thing, i.e. wash them and return them back to the nursery. Instead we wash them and keep them and add them to Tom’s constantly yo-yoing wardrobe. He might be poor in trousers but at the moment he’s got more tops than he could feasibly wear in a 2 week period no matter how many times he douses himself in orange juice.

I’m tempted to look on it as a kind of unofficial bartering system. Someone gains his trousers, we gain someone’s hooded top. Fair exchange and all that. I suppose we ought to be thankful he hasn’t come home with a dress or 5 magic beans.

But it isn’t right, is it? Call it bartering all you want but technically it’s theft. Theft by virtue that we and (presumably) other parents are knowingly keeping items of clothing that clearly don’t belong to us. We’re also possibly depleting the nursery’s own supply of spare clothing. Or are they replenishing it by accidentally nicking our stuff? Not that I’m too worried by this as once Tom has grown out of his toddler clothes we’ll donate them to the nursery anyway. But do they have a right to pick and choose in advance?

And what the hell has happened to Tom’s Star Wars trousers? We want them back! There was a Yoda patch on the left knee and everything!

Where the hell is Shaw Taylor when you need him? Help!

Enid Blyton Land

The “terrible twos” as they are known are OK.

By that I don’t mean they are enjoyable – nobody likes having to deal with a tantrumming youngster – but they are acceptable because (and do correct me if I’m wrong) they are age appropriate. They are part of the development process that we all (at some point in our lives) have to go through, where we learn how to handle disappointment and frustration and to hear the “no” word without throwing our dummies out of the pram.

Tantrums are part of a learning curve.

Tom, my little ‘un, has them. Not many. Not daily. But a couple of times a week and more if he’s feeling grotty. We can all sympathize with that surely?

The nursery who look after him during the day – and it’s a great nursery, really wonderful in so many ways – have notified us that they are assigning the equivalent of a case worker to Tom to try and get his tantrums sorted out. Because apparently they feel it is not normal for him to be tantrumming. The intimations are that none of the other kids are doing it or have ever done it in the entire history of the nursery.

Rubbish is my answer to that.

Tom is only 2. He’ll be 3 in October. Like all kids he has issues and personal foibles. For me his tantrums aren’t a problem. If he throws one at home he gets put into the kitchen and left alone. I guarantee he’ll cry for 10 minutes, come and seek comfort (which he is given) and then is instantly calm and accepts the decision that caused the tantrum in the first place. All done and dusted. Sorted. Best of all the tantrums are getting shorter. He’s learning.

For the nursery to suggest that Tom having a tantrum in the first place is somehow not normal just enrages me. It is not normal for a 30 year old to have a tantrum! For a 2 year old it is, believe me, normal. Terrible Twos, right? It’s quite common. It’s part of the developmental yadda yadda yadda. Already said that.

I sometimes think that Tom’s nursery is living in some kind of parallel universe that is loosely based around the novels of Enid Blyton. A world where the kids are all polite, well spoken, silent unless spoken to and outwardly inquisitive but only in an adult and responsible manner. In this strangely quiet land the kids don’t argue or have tantrums. They respectfully enquire if their fellow citizens wouldn’t mind them having their own way for once but only if it won’t cause too much consternation or disapprobation among their fellow peers. All kids are born with an innate ability to manage their anger and emotions in such a way that counsellors all over this land are rendered surplus to requirements. Crime is at an all time low but then so is creativity and individuality and the global birth rate.

*Sigh*

What an awfully sterile place it must be.

To conclude then, do we here in the west try and impose an inaccurate and unnatural and horribly rose-tinted view of childhood onto the very people who are living it – our children? Do we let the pursuit of some nice, idyllic, blanket wrapped ideal impose a framework on our kids which is not only a downright lie but also stifling and unfair and, worst of all, denying them the right to be normal, feeling, reacting human beings?

Or am I just spitting the dummy out of the pram?

The Betrayal

It feels wrong but you do it anyway. After all, there is no other way. It’s unavoidable. It’s just the way life is.

Most of the time Tom is fine about being dropped off at nursery. On the whole he really loves the place and has been as pleased as punch to have moved up to the pre-school group. He’s a “big boy” now.

But then there are days like today. Days when he’s just a little boy who’s a bit under the weather – not seriously ill – just a little bit cuddly and wants to stay at home and have his mummy and daddy stay with him.

And I know how he feels. It’s Monday morning. I don’t particularly want to go to work. I don’t particularly want to be one of the “big boys” myself. But that’s just how life is. The bacon has to be brought home or nobody eats.

So we take him to nursery. And he won’t let go off my hand. He clings to my leg like a Koala bear clinging to a tree. He wants a “big cuddle” (this means a proper lifted up cuddle). He shows no sign of wanting to wander off and play with the “big boy” toys in the pre-school class room like he normally does.

I try persuasion. I try cajoling. I try leading him into the room and expressing an over-egged enthusiasm for a big red plastic fire engine. He likes fire engines.

But not today.

He grips hold of my index finger and won’t let go.

I bend down and give him a hug. I try and reason with him. Give him the grown up argument. Daddy has to go to work. Daddy doesn’t really want to go to work either. Daddy loves him very much and would love to stay at home with him but can’t. Daddy has to go and earn some money so we can keep our nice home.

All true but it rings hollow.

If I love him why am I putting work first? If I want to stay home too why don’t I just do that? I’m a grown up after all; I make all the rules – why don’t I just change them? I know Tom doesn’t think in those terms but the look he gives me tells me this is where his little heart is today.

In the end one of the nursery staff pick him up and carry him over to the toys. She’s being lovely to him – a big hug, lots of coos – but all I can hear is the wail of despondency; all I can see is the mouth turning down and those big brown eyes looking at me imploringly. “Daddy!”

Karen and I hurry out. Out of sight. It’s the best way. Cleanest cut, soonest healed. To prolong it only makes it more painful and more upsetting for Tom.

Out in the corridor, giving ourselves a hug, we can still hear him crying. He doesn’t usually cry for this long. A cry that squeezes the heart painfully. Bless him. He’s under the weather... not seriously ill... I’m so tempted to go back and get him. Tempted to take a sickie and bring him home.

But I don’t. I can’t. If I do that now then Tom will expect me to do it every time he doesn’t want to be left at nursery. Pretty soon I’d end up losing my job. So Karen and I head outside. Back to the car.

He’ll be OK. Within 10 minutes he’ll settle and will have forgotten all about it. The nursery is a good one and will ring us if he becomes really poorly.

I know all this. We’ve done the right thing. The only thing. We have to go to work. It’s unavoidable.

But it feels wrong.

It feels wrong to abandon my son; to walk away when he is distraught. To pull away when he gripping hold of my T-shirt, my fingers, anything he can get hold of.

I wonder if he will remember it. Remember what he is feeling in these moments. Spend time when he is a little older puzzling why – in what seem like to him random occasions – when he was upset and needing his mummy and daddy we walked away and left him. Will he think that he did something wrong? That he was being punished?

All the way to the car I fight the urge to go back and get him.

And that feels wrong too. It goes against my instincts as a parent.

Who am I betraying more, I wonder? Tom or myself?

What kind of world have we made for ourselves when being a parent is at odds with plain ordinary living; plain ordinary survival?

When I eventually get to work I have a sudden yearning for a big red plastic fire engine. But I am glad that Tom has it.

Some People And Me

Three items on the bugbear list this morning.

First off – a flagrant disregard for child safety.

I took the boys into school / nursery this morning as Karen is in Birmingham on an accountancy training course. On the way we passed one of Tom’s nursery mates being walked to school by her dad. Well, I’m assuming it was her dad and not her uncle. Whoever he was he obviously wished he was doing something else. There were frequent exhortations to “come on” and “hurry up”.

Bear in mind his ward is a wide-eyed 2 year old.

Now Tom loves walking. He finds it a great delight and no doubt feels very grown up doing it. Unfortunately, at just under 2 he just does not understand how important it is to hold mummy or daddy’s hand when busy roads are nearby. So he gets strapped into the pushchair. He’s fine with this thankfully. It’s still fun to be out and about even without the ability to perambulate freely. But even if he complained I’m afraid he’d still be stuck in the pushchair regardless.

I’d rather have him crying and safe than laughing one minute and forever silent the next.

So it was with horror that I watched this poor girl almost run out into the road when a car was coming and then get hollered back onto the pavement at the last minute.

For God sake man keep a grip of your child!

This would be bad enough in isolation but my wife witnessed a similar incident with the same family a few afternoons ago when she picked Tom up from nursery. Again the kid ran out into the road and was only hauled in at the last moment. The poor motorist who was almost involved looked ashen as they drove away.

It’s an accident just waiting to happen.

What is wrong with some people?

Secondly – cleanliness.

Due to blocked drains I’ve been flush testing all the toilets in the building this morning. As I was doing this someone came into the toilets after me. Now, I don’t know why, but I instinctively stood still and kept quiet and out of sight in the cubicle. I instinctively became furtive. Bizarre when I wasn’t even doing anything that involved the lesser-loved bodily functions. But there you go. Maybe I was a pervert in another life? Please keep your responses to this to yourself.

Now I know for a fact that, due to the location of these toilets, they are mostly used by the catering staff.

So imagine my disgust when I heard the urinal being used and then the “urinee” head straight back out without even a cursory swill under the taps.

This is someone who literally has his fingers in every pie going. Not to mention casseroles and stews. And a whole menagerie of sandwiches. On a daily basis.

How can you do that? How can you “point Percy at porcelain” and then not even wave your dannies under a bit of running water?

Folks, there’s a lot to be said for preparing your own packed lunch every day.

Lastly – my own self deprecation.

The other night I assisted some work colleagues who were having difficulty alarming their department at the end of the working day.

When such difficulties arise and seem to be insurmountable I always recommend that staff ring the local CCTV guys and ask them to keep an especial eye on the building. It’s a little extra security measure that probably acts as nothing more than a mental placebo.

I was asked if I had the number to hand.

I did. It was in my head instantly.

My head is full of useful numbers and codes and passwords. I make no effort to memorize them. They’re just there. They stick. It’s a natural facility. When I used to work at British Telecom I found I could give out a lot of the numbers to people without referring to the computer records at all. I had them off by heart. Only the frequently asked for ones I hasten to add. I’m not one of these people that make a living (or a living death) out of memorizing phone books.

But instead of just giving out the number I made a pretence of thinking hard about it. Pretending to strain as I fired up the old memory engine. Why did I do that?

It’s like I was embarrassed to have the necessary knowledge so ready to hand. Was I afraid of appearing sad and nerdy as opposed to just damned efficient?

Why hide my light under a bushel?

Some people, eh?

One Foot Out Of The Nest

Karen’s maternity leave officially ends next Tuesday. After a year of being a full-time mum and house-frau she’s returning to work (part-time) with more than a little ambivalence.

Re-embracing the politics and work ethics of your place of employment is never a joyous occasion when you’ve been away for any length of time but this reunion is going to be even harder as it necessitates sending Tom – now 11 months old – to nursery 5 days a week.

I must admit Karen and I are finding the concept difficult to accept. But he’s so tiny... and so cute! He’s too lovely to be out on his own in the big bad world! Even though some parents (I won’t say quite happily) farm their kids out to nurseries from as early an age as 3 months...

It’s all been rather emotional. Tom has now had four “tester” sessions at the nursery over the last 2 weeks to help get him acclimatized to the new environment and to bond with his carer. And to be honest he’s doing ok. A few tears here and there but never for very long and he’s been relaxed enough to eat their strange food and even to nod off for a nap or two...

But despite his easy compliance Karen and I feel like we’re packing him off to Gordonstoun or abandoning him at a train station with a load of other evacuees... each gripping brown suitcases containing their favourite toy and a bottle of Calpol, wondering if the people at the farm will treat them nicely and when will they ever see their dear old mum and dad again?

Tom is developing quite a taste for Vera Lynn.

At the end of the day though Tom seems to be taking it all in his stride. I guess kids are very adaptable. It’s Karen and me who are taking it the hardest. Letting him go. Watching him stumble a few branches away from the nest before we snatch him back into the safety of our arms once more.

Growing up is so difficult. Certainly as a participant but definitely as a spectator...