Bye, Mum

I wrote this in response to a radio interview I heard.

Bye Mum

As I reach out to open the car I pause.

I feel nothing.

I am aware of the cold air on my face, the chill of icy metal under my hand. In fact I am aware of every individual cell in my body and I know absolutely that there is not one which feels anything at all.

I hear noise. Traffic; the hum of engines and the soft hissing crunch of tyres on wet roads, the squeaks of windscreen wipers. A distant siren. People laughing, chatting; stories tumbling out amidst torrents of giggles. It is all as if filtered through cotton wool. I turn uncomprehendingly to look at these alien beings in a newly alien world.

When I start the ignition, music rings out; a jolly familiar tune from a decade ago, played so often over so many years that it sickens me to hear it. And even though it was a favourite, I will never want to hear it again after tonight. I reach over and turn the dial down to mute. The overwhelming roar of silence invades my head so that my ears ring.

Earlier, only a few hours ago though it seems like weeks, I manhandled the box of Christmas decorations down from the loft while the boys were out. I dusted down the lights, the wreath, the crib; Mary and Joseph and the tiny baby Jesus, whose halo was chipped years back when clumsy little hands played too roughly with him; the three whole sheep and the two-legged one who has to be propped up against a wall of the stable. The angel hair, the tinsel, the tiny Santas, reindeer, Christmas trees, stars; the huge red glitter-moulting baubles and a few tasteful glass ones, left over from the pre-children days when taste was still something we aspired to; the sugar-paper and cotton wool angel with doily wings made by a small boy when we'd given up all such aspirations. The rattan star with gold lights which spent every December propped in the skylight above the door, declaring to passers-by: “Happy people live here''. We love Christmas.

We loved Christmas.

In the city centre there are still people around. Couples arm in arm and loud, jolly groups wander on and off the roads, shoulders hunched against the cold, chins tucked into scarves, warm breath acting as heating, confident of their right to roam - the optimism of youth. And on the roads cars and vans edge through carefully, though one impatient motorist leans on the horn, only to be greeted with a shout of ribaldry. My heartbeat hurts as I edge forward to draw even with the van-driver, a weasly-looking man in a baseball cap who scowls back in response to my curious gaze. “Was it you?" He is unfazed by my stare. He chews steadily, turns and roars off.
I think of ordinary things.

Because I had to leave suddenly I haven't taken the washing out of the machine. After all these hours it'll be creased beyond belief. Rather than take it all out and iron it, hoping to crush out the creases, I'll just run it through another cycle. And then there are the cards. Still on the kitchen table. Only those destined for America and Australia are already stamped and addressed. Everyone else might have to miss out on the card from the Millers this year. Christmas cards are such a nonsense anyway. “Hasn't time flown? It seems only yesterday we were wishing you a happy 2006! We really must get together in 2007!'' I am embarrassed by my own exclamation marks. I've been writing the same thing to the same people for years. I can barely even remember what some of them look like, or I've aged them in my head, probably inaccurately. Every year, as I write their names, it occurs to me that I couldn't care less whether I see these people in 2006, or 2007 or ever again. The people I really want to see I see every day.

An average December 1st.

Outside the house I turn off the ignition and sit for a moment, realising that the silence before hasn't been real silence. This is real silence, but even now I have an inkling that the silence will deepen over the coming days and weeks. And months and years. I turn to look at the house. Ablaze with light, every window a beacon, it mocks me. And yet it has still to afford a welcome. I check my watch. Tom will be home soon. Tom will need a welcome. Tom will still need a welcome.

I open the door and swing my legs out. They are heavy but I force them to convey me to the door, I coerce my hands into turning the key in the lock, cajole my body into the house. And then in the hall I stand and look around me at the normality I left behind - the boot-printed flyers for taxis and pizzas and exercise classes and decorators I should have picked up days ago are still on the mat; clothes are drying on the radiator, mud-encrusted wellies are strewn around, the recycling box hasn't been put away, and there are piles of things to go upstairs on the bottom step. And then there are the Christmas lights. Technicolor normality, as fake and lurid and off-key now as fifties comedy.

A faint bitter scent alerts me to the brisket I forgot about. I remove the neat smoking charcoal block from the oven and put it, still in its pan, in the back garden. I fan the back door open and shut for a while in a vain attempt to expel the smoke and sourness.

Looking around, I see what my life was like four hours ago. Just four hours ago.
Six hours ago I was in the bath when Josh called from the hall.
“Bye Mum! I'll be back before twelve!''

Now the clock shows ten past one and he isn't back. He won't be coming back. I know that, but at the same time I can't know it, because it is preposterous. It is all a horrible mistake. Everyone has been quite mistaken, and any minute now he'll walk through that door and say:

“Bloody Hell, Mum! What have you been incinerating this time?''

And I'll say:

“Oi you, less lip! I've been here slaving over a hot stove while you've been swanning about with your mates. You don't know how lucky you are, having a mum who still cooks every evening and makes spare for all the waifs and strays you bring home.''

And he'll say:

“Cooking? Is that what it's called?''

And I'll try not to smile and I'll say:

“Watch it, you! You're not too big to put over my lap, you know!''

And he'll come over, all six foot of him, and he'll hold me like a wrestler and ruffle my hair really, really hard so it actually hurts and he'll say through a smile:

“I'd like to see you try.''

And then he'll kiss the top of my head and let me go, and he'll amble into the kitchen.

“Well, I suppose Chef Josh had better take over. As usual. Where's the tin opener then?''

And I'll look at him and be unable not to smile because he's such a loveable big old lummox and because he still, after nineteen years on this earth, hasn't learned to brush his own long, brown, wavy, beautiful hair.

And he'll wave me away with French chef gestures and I'll pick up my paper and a glass of wine and I'll go and sit in that sofa over there and put on my glasses while he tells me about the gig he's just been to, about how brilliant it was and how many encores the band came on for and where he and Kit went for a drink afterwards. Probably to the Shakespeare, because they show the football highlights there and he'll have missed the match. And we'll have a good old chat.

Except we won't, I tell myself, because he never even made it to the hall, because some evil fucker in a white van didn't make allowances for the fact that there was a big gig on and crowds of people, kids, my kid, were all heading in the same direction, in the rain, their hoods up, and some of them wandered into the road. And this vile, vile thing leant on his horn and accelerated and ran over my boy. So I know Josh won't be preparing beans on toast any time in the future because I've just seen his still perfect body laid out in the ridiculously and pretentiously named Chapel of Rest at the hospital. As if he's just having a little lie-down as he did when he was a toddler, and he'll get up in his own good time and stretch and clench his toes and come to find me.

Although stranger things have happened. You hear about it. All I saw was a big maroon bruise on his side. No blood, no gore. He was just a little pale.

No. He's not coming back.

But Tom is. I must ready the house for Tom. Things must be normal. Seem normal. Tom's probably bidding Sophie a long, long, long goodbye, his arms clenched around her waist and his lips superglued to hers. And before long he'll come in shamefacedly, waiting for the taunts from his big brother:

“Tom and Sophie sitting in a tree, B-O-N-K-I-N-G.''

To which Tom says:

“Oh bugger off, Josh''

And I say:

“Leave him alone, you horrible thing. Just because you haven't the moral fibre to commit to one girl.''

And Josh laughs and says:

“One day, Mum. One day. Don't rush me. For the moment, it wouldn't be fair to the laydeez.''

And then I hit him with a tea-towel or whatever comes to hand.

And while all this is happening Tom skulks upstairs to think about Sophie and listen to his music.

But we won't be teasing Tom when he gets in. I'm not sure what we'll be saying. And I'm fairly sure that by the time Tom finally goes to bed, he'll feel that he'd give anything in the world, even his signed Nickelback CDs, his Cup Final programme or his Diesel leather jacket, to get a load of abuse from his big brother.
There's no point thinking about it. I can't plan anything. God knows I can't plan anything. Or he would if I believed in him. Oh, I wish I believed in him. I'll know what to say to Tom when he gets here.

I go and fetch the laundry out of the machine. Every item is crinkled and wound as taut as rope and after I've pulled out two pairs of men's jeans and a rugby shirt I decide I can't face it and I push everything back in and turn the dial to set the machine going again. I wait for the click which sets the cycle in motion and then I move away.

Standing in the middle of my domestic haven I think that I will never feel again, but I must. I must for my other son. I must because his father is halfway around the world changing a new baby's nappies and cannot help, and I am all my son has left. And he is all I have left. So I must go with him to football matches which I can't stand. I'll learn to love football, because if he goes alone he will remember that his brother isn't there to go with him, and if he goes with friends he will be reminded that his brother should have been there. I can't go with him to clubs, but I will pick him up outside them, even if I have to see him so drunk that he vomits in the car, because I don't want him to stumble in the street. In the past I have tactfully taken to my bed when the boys are out together, knowing that I won't like seeing them slack and shiny-lipped with drink, realising that I'll turn into that pursed-lipped judgmental harridan who lurks inside me, conveniently forgetting that in my youth I drank until I could no longer move.

And here they are - the first stirrings of guilt lap at me. In the weeks and months to come I will find many things to reproach myself with. So will Tom. I must be strong.

I stiffen suddenly as I hear the key turn in the lock. I look to the door as my younger boy shuffles in.

“Hi Mum.'' he waves, embarrassed to have a mother, and then his demeanour changes. “What's the matter?''

I didn't even know I was crying.

My Cube

I am in a cell of my own making. The curious thing is that although I know, intellectually, that I am in a cell of my own making, for some reason I don’t seem to be able to unmake it. I seem unable to acknowledge that I made the cell, constructed it laboriously, plane by plane, into a cube, a hollow cube with six equal faces bonded indissolubly with six almost invisible seams of glue. In my dreams, I am free. In my dreams, I laugh. In my dreams I run through a cornfield situated improbably on a cliff overlooking a glistening sea. I call gaily to a dog I do not own. I spin dizzyingly and I fall, crushing cornstalks, splaying them in a not quite symmetrical circle. I look down on myself, happy and free, unconcerned by the damage I have wrought, unworried about the dry brown spike which has grazed my thigh, a thin lace of blood stopping an inch from the wound. In my dreams, I roam, I soar, I rise above the everyday worries. I laugh in the face of those minor tribulations which bring down the unliberated. I do not, in conversation with the bright, casual, sparkling individuals I see all around me, retire in search of another can of lager, wondering why I came out when I would have been more comfortable sitting at home, curtains drawn, watching another rerun of The Blue Planet. I laugh my tinkling laugh. I make some insouciant retort to the wholly unintentional conversational barb which has not floored me, has not reddened my face or made me long for my cell. For my cube. For those identical, predictable, blank faces. For those benevolent seals of translucent glue. For the ability to block out the world, to remain unseen within. For imprisonment for my own sake. No, not for imprisonment - for protection. I try not to think about the decision I made, the decision to surrender to him. I try not to think that for a while I thought about what other people would do faced with the possibility of a connection with someone, berated myself, allowed myself to be lured out of safety and into the uncertain open terrain of emotional nakedness. I try not to think that for a while I actually thought that I could do this; that for a while I felt something, something warm and animal and primitive. I try to forget that I surrendered to that feeling, ventured out of my anaesthetising chill to thaw in the aura of a man. I try to forget that I melted. I try to forget how difficult it was, when it all went wrong, to summon back all that molten self and reassemble it, recompose and rearrange it and make it whole again. Fool. What’s important is to know who you are. What’s important is to learn to deal with the hand which life has dealt you. What’s important is not to expose yourself. Life can be wonderful, I know. I’ve seen enough television dramas to know that life can be wonderful, exciting, exhilarating, dizzying. Dangerous. But what’s important is to understand the boundaries, understand how distant a horizon you can cope with. You, yourself, personally. Not other people. And in my case, the boundaries I can cope with are not very far away. I have four horizons, six if I turn, shift, look around. I change position, I look around and I see a different perspective. My cube is reassuring. I can expand or contract it at will. I can change its shape. I can lie down. If I lie down it changes; if I lie down, sleep, dream, some of the borders of my world become utterly different. Utterly. It’s a cube no longer although it’s still... cuboid.

Male attendant

Most of the time I feel like I'm a fairly easy-going sort of person, except when I'm screaming and purple with rage, flecks of my saliva settling on distant objects.... However, I am struck that there are certain things which bother me which don't seem to bother other people AT ALL.

One of these is public loos. Not the loos themselves; I recognise that they are an important adjunct to our existence as fast moving tea and coffee drinking entities. A loo in a service station or an airport is an important place. Not only somewhere to relieve yourself, it's also somewhere to freshen up, restore your make-up, check that you don't have something clinging to the inside of a nostril or staining your teeth. In other words it's somewhere to do things which you don't want other people seeing. It's private. The basins can have a row of women at them grooming themselves, adjusting their clothing, putting things right.

I object therefore quite strongly to the sign that says "Male attendant in attendance". I don't want a male attendant in attendance. I want those idiots who run the establishment to recognise that a women's loo is a WOMEN's place. If someone comes in to clean and sort things out, that person should be a woman. I don't want to be sitting on the loo and hear a man's voice calling out "Hello!" to indicate that he's there. (And he always sounds as if there is nowhere on God's earth he'd like to be less than pushing a mop and bucket around a place where women do their business, and where he knows women might be doing their business while he's there.) It's uncomfortable, and what you don't want in a women's loo is to feel uncomfortable.

Don't tell me that these organisations don't make enough money to be able to a male attendant and a female attendant. Every tine I see the sign I want to go and have an argument with someone. But I'm always on the way somewhere else so I don't have the time...

Don't say sorry.

It's been a while. It's been a year, actually. I got a bit fed up and couldn't be bothered. Might keep my rants a bit shorter this time. It's not that I'm not interested in current affairs or that I've suddenly become tolerant and placid and entered a Zen state of serenity. Trust me on that one.

It's also not the computer-generated spam comments, notifications of which clutter up my inbox on a regular basis, though they have reminded me that this place exists.

But for whatever reason I thought I'd come back and express my irritation and disquiet at the phenomenon that is the celebrity apology. Or actually any public apology.

We were in the US when the Tiger Woods apology was broadcast, all thirteen grovelling undignified minutes of it. It was trailed extensively: why were questions not to be allowed? Was this an infringement of the public's right to know? TOday I see that Mark Owen of Take That has apologised for being unfaithful to his now wife before their marriage.

Infidelity is a matter to be discussed between a husband and wife, surely. He doesn't have millions of wives; millions of people are not entitled to an interest. Maybe Elin wouldn't welcome her husband's infidelity being flagged up to a prurient audience for twelve minutes. Maybe she would prefer not to be depicted as a victim. If I was her or Mrs Mark Owen I certainly wouldn't. Either way, in both cases it's no one's business apart from hers and his.

Just because people like watching one man play golf and think he's a great sportsman, or enjoy the odd Take That album, why are they entitled to think that the object of their admiration owes them aything other than making the effort to play golf/sing as well as they can. They are not letting us down by being imperfect in their private lives. That has no bearing on their abilily, that which they are known for. In the same way I think that John Terry's loss of the England football captaincy is wrong.

It's invidious and it smacks of hypocrisy and schadenfreude. It also means that there is an expectation that the public can demand of anyone who does anything in the public eye that they be plaster saints. Apply that criterion to great figures of history and you'd lose a lot. We'd have no NHS because Lloyd George was well known as an old goat. We'd have lost a lot of politicians who had dodgy domestic arrangements. Art and literature would go out of the window. In fact we'd end up with the likes of, well, let's see, Cameron, Blair and Brown. Nauseatingly moral to a man, but none of the elan and brilliance of some of their flawed forebears.

So shut up and don't grovel. And the rest of us should stop demanding a pound of flesh for misdeeds which are none of our business.

Rant over.