Blackheads Revisited

Secondary school is a world unto itself.

Inhabited by creatures whose brains are being rewired to such an extent that they no longer resemble other human beings on the planet. Fizzing human bombs (© Danielle Dax) whose hormone levels explode like weapons grade plutonium within the space of a few months and then pulse with a seedy half life that lasts for the next 30 years (if they’re lucky).

I remember it as a callous no-man’s land that delighted in alienating the weak or the different or (rarest of all) those who retained a modicum of human compassion. I felt alone and “outside” for most of my secondary school career. Hey. Why pull the punch? I felt dis-included for ALL of my secondary school career.

It could not be changed. It had to be borne. It had to be endured. And it was a horrifically lonely journey.

My eldest boy has suddenly found himself immersed in that same world. Curriculums might change. Teaching methods might be revolutionized. But the world of the geeky teenager remains essentially the same. The rites of passage that you largely walk alone.

He doesn’t make friends easily. He has trouble “getting” other people. He doesn’t connect well. He swings from ultra negative to overpowering positive without touching the middle ground in an instant; switches from totally controlling teen-god one minute to uber-victim the next who is unable to take responsibility for anyone or anything and thus finds himself always hopelessly disempowered.

Karen and I are at a loss as to how to help him beyond giving advice, helpful practical hints and trying to keep home life as secure as possible.

Because the simple truth is, unless you are one of the lucky ones, secondary school life starts off being diabolically damaging and only gets marginally better with each passing year. End of story.

How do you deal with the sniping comments of others? How do you deal with the bullying tactics of the playground – both overt and secretly snide? How do you deal with people who you once thought of as friends but now decide to ostracise you and leave you out in the cold at every opportunity?

What possible advice can I give to an 11 year old to combat all these issues when they are problems that, 28 years after leaving secondary school and now in full time employment, I still come up against and struggle with every week if not every day?

Because the sad fact is, although Secondary school is a world unto itself that isn’t meant to last forever, for some people (both good and ill), it bloody does.

The Road Reluctantly Travelled

Is it normal to take the long way round on your journey to work?

To delay the inevitable?

I can remember, years ago, back when my pass badge was shiny and the photo printed on it featured a young man bristling with enthusiasm and a full bead, that I would march to work with a spring in my step and a skip in my stride. So much so that one day a motorcycle traffic cop, a builder and a Native American Indian in full head-dress accosted me in the street and asked me to join their colourful band of deep throated singers.

I declined but now I’m wondering if that was a wise career move.

Because the spring has been replaced with a shoulder droop and the skip has been replaced with a foot drag reminiscent of someone who’s been hitched up to a chain gang. For those of you who are familiar with the work of Charlie & Lola... I have developed a “Lola walk”. The kind she employs when life is particularly bad. When she’s lost her satchel or ripped her Lelli Kellys.

And I am starting to take the ‘long way round’ to work.

It started with a few detours around the block. Alternative routes that covered more or less the same ground but from a different direction.

But then I started to become more adventurous. I started pushing the temporal envelope, pushing the flexibility of my start time. I started going all round the houses. Started trying to listen to entire album’s worth of music on my MP3 player (bear in mind that the journey at its quickest takes a mere 15 minutes). Started searching for old ladies to help across the road and refusing to go into work until I’d found one. In the end I had to improvise. I had to dress up as an old lady myself and help myself across the road. Have you any idea how long it takes to cross a road when your colostomy bag isn’t properly fastened?

Now, I fear, I am taking things too far. I am booking trains to Manchester and wondering if I can get in a bit of shopping before I head into the office. I am eyeing up flights to New York because I figure that paying my respects at Ground Zero would be an honourable way to start my working day.

Is this normal?

Is this behaviour indicative of some, as yet, unnamed malaise?

Answers on a job application form to the normal address, please.

On The Prowl

You’ve had the same meat, week in, week out for the last God knows how many years. The same meat cooked the same way, with the same sauce. Vanilla vanilla vanilla.

You get to the point where you fancy a change. Something a bit different. Something a bit spicy, perhaps. A bit exotic. Something that resurrects your old enthusiasm for the dish. Reminds you of when you were young and it was all fresh, new and exciting. Before the ennui set in. Before you became over-familiar. Bored. Before you had to fake it.

How was it for you, dear?

Yeah. Yeah. Great. Are we done? Good, ‘cos I really need to sleep now.

And you hit the z’s knowing full well you’ll have to go through the same charade again tomorrow. And the day after. And the day after that.

Unless you do something. Unless you find, I don’t know, ingredient X. A new flame.

Well, I’m on the hunt for ingredient X. I’m on the prowl. And all offers will be welcomed, considered and one might even be accepted.

I’m not quite sure what ingredient X is but I know it has some of these components:

a) A better wage. No point making a change unless I get more money.
b) More kudos. That would be nice. No more poop-scooping or shoving buckets under leaky urinals.
c) Less crap responsibilities and more good responsibilities. Hell, we all want that but that doesn’t devalue the demand.
d) The ability to leave work at the office at the end of the day and not get rung at home, without fail, every holiday and 2 out of 3 weekends.
e) A better class of workmate. Could write oodles here but can’t, if you see what I mean.
f) I’m prepared to bargain-plea with most of the above but a) and e) are non-negotiable.

Trouble is, for all my hunting skills, my flint headed spears are finding scant prey to be launched at. New job opportunities are a bit thin on the ground.

I know that, in theory, this means I should turn back to the bony carcass of my existing job, make peace with it, cuddle up to it like we’re a couple of old spoons and be reconciled.

But. I. Just. Can’t. Do. It.

I’m sick of the same old bitter meat. The same old bitter meat topped with poisonous gravy.

I fancy an Indian. Or an Italian. Or a Chinese. Hell, even a vegetarian moussaka would do the trick. Anything.

Anything but this.

I’m shrivelling up. And I’m going to lose it if I don’t use it.

So I’m on the prowl.

On the prowl for something new. Something exciting.

I just need a decent shot at it.

Just one.