Yesterday was the 11th anniversary of when I became a mother but nobody noticed other than me. It wasn't anybody's birthday yesterday. I wasn't remembering being in labour or bringing my baby home or wetting the baby's head with a glass of champagne. I remembered instead the day that I brought home my six year old stepson Ben to live with his Dad and me.
I was 22 and he was 6. We're now 33 and 17 and he hasn't lived with me for nearly two years. It doesn't matter; I still consider myself mother, or at least, one of his mothers.
I know in my heart I became a mother that day that my ex-husband and I brought my stepson home. I may not have given birth or breastfed and I may have even missed out on the first five years of this little boy's life, but from that day forward, other than the title, I was a mother. My life revolved around school runs, packed lunches, babysitters, homework, discipline, affection and putting the child of the house first, just as any other mother would do.
The lack of recognition is hard. People look at me with my six year old daughter and assume that she is the entirety of my maternal experience. They don't know that I've been through it all before. My pregnancy left me with stretch marks as proof of my experience, my marriage left me with the label 'divorced' and needing to overlook September 24th as normal day but not my anniversary. However my experience as a full-time stepmother leaves no reminders behind, other than the huge chunk of my heart that will always belong to a little boy who wasn't supposed to belong to me, but does.
My daughter Kiera's birthday is only two days later than that of her elder half-brother Ben so on my anniversary of becoming his mother she is, 11 years on, exactly the same age that he was when he moved in with me. The similarities between them are as noticeable to me as their differences; the contrast as striking as between my experience as a stepmother and as a biological mother.
In the end I had to mention it to someone and so I sent my almost-grown boy Ben a text to remind him of what day it was and to tell him I love him. He texted back that he loves me too and 'thanks for everything'. I cried; it was the recognition that I needed.
Saturday, 19 May 2007
Monday, 30 April 2007
Unusual conversations
I'm not quite sure why I never foresaw that I would have to have the following conversation with my daughter at some point, but I never did consider it.
Kiera: Mummy, what's it like in prison?
Me: Erm... well... did I ever tell you that Daddy was in prison once?
Kiera - with a look on her face equalling the 'expectant gossip' face of my friendly and chatty hairdresser when presented with some fascinating new snippet - NO! Really?!
Me: Yes, before I met him.
Kiera: Why did they put him in there?
Me: Erm.. well... he had some tablets on him that he shouldn't have done and he went into an office where he didn't work anymore (all true to a fashion)
Kiera: Oh. Right. Okay (returns to watching TV).
It's almost as cringeworthy as when she recently exited my en-suite bathroom with my vibrator in hand asking inquisitively, "What's this?"
I'm all for telling children the truth. I faced it recently when my ex-husband sent me a warning text that Kiera had asked him what men did when women had babies. Naturally, we both assumed the worst with this question, but after braving myself for it, I approached her and found out that she meant when the ladies were birthing the babies, not making them. I got off lightly that time.
I couldn't find anyway of dealing with the vibrator issue. Sex is one thing, but masturbation? She's only six! A mother can only take honesty so far. I told her that I couldn't tell her what that phallic object was right now and that I would tell her when she was old enough to understand. Naturally I took it off her at that point and swore under my breath to purchase a nice locked box to keep under my bed. I can only pray that she didn't then ask either her father or her stepmother what nice gadget Mummy had in her bedroom. I've not detected a knowing or pitying look on their face just yet so fingers crossed.
Today's question was, "Why are there people on the planet?" Easy philosophical meanderings followed, mutterings about God, the bible and Adam and Eve followed by much talk of fishes that walk on land and turn into apes then men and women. I finished by telling her that 'why are there people on the planet' is a question that everyone has to answer for themselves.
I can only imagine that all of the questions from here on in get more complicated to answer.
Kiera: Mummy, what's it like in prison?
Me: Erm... well... did I ever tell you that Daddy was in prison once?
Kiera - with a look on her face equalling the 'expectant gossip' face of my friendly and chatty hairdresser when presented with some fascinating new snippet - NO! Really?!
Me: Yes, before I met him.
Kiera: Why did they put him in there?
Me: Erm.. well... he had some tablets on him that he shouldn't have done and he went into an office where he didn't work anymore (all true to a fashion)
Kiera: Oh. Right. Okay (returns to watching TV).
It's almost as cringeworthy as when she recently exited my en-suite bathroom with my vibrator in hand asking inquisitively, "What's this?"
I'm all for telling children the truth. I faced it recently when my ex-husband sent me a warning text that Kiera had asked him what men did when women had babies. Naturally, we both assumed the worst with this question, but after braving myself for it, I approached her and found out that she meant when the ladies were birthing the babies, not making them. I got off lightly that time.
I couldn't find anyway of dealing with the vibrator issue. Sex is one thing, but masturbation? She's only six! A mother can only take honesty so far. I told her that I couldn't tell her what that phallic object was right now and that I would tell her when she was old enough to understand. Naturally I took it off her at that point and swore under my breath to purchase a nice locked box to keep under my bed. I can only pray that she didn't then ask either her father or her stepmother what nice gadget Mummy had in her bedroom. I've not detected a knowing or pitying look on their face just yet so fingers crossed.
Today's question was, "Why are there people on the planet?" Easy philosophical meanderings followed, mutterings about God, the bible and Adam and Eve followed by much talk of fishes that walk on land and turn into apes then men and women. I finished by telling her that 'why are there people on the planet' is a question that everyone has to answer for themselves.
I can only imagine that all of the questions from here on in get more complicated to answer.
Thursday, 1 March 2007
An eventful week
Monday was a fantastic day. I travelled to London and met the woman that I hope will be my literary agent. What an incredible trip - and I refer not to driving to Ruislip and getting the tube to Central London as fun as that was. Eighteen months ago I was essentially the same person I have been since I was five years old - a person that wanted to be a writer. I dreamed of being a writer, I desperately hoped that I could write but other than doing a daily journal and making notes on the occasional idea I was paralysed to start any piece of work; too terrified that I'd find out that I had wasted 25 years on a dream that I would be unable to materialise.
I've not really failed yet, you see. Not in work at least - my love life has been an unmitigated disaster from time to time but even that hasn't stopped me because I try and find a way to turn every negative into a positive, every bad experience into something to learn and grow from.
I didn't study much for my A Levels. I remember walking into college to get my results thinking "today, now is the time where I get found out, where I finally get my payback for spending my study time drinking beer and smoking cigarettes rather than diligently working my books". The relief flooded through me when I opened the envelope to find the A in Spanish, B in French and C in Business Studies.
My parents were pissed as hell when I said I wasn't going to Barcelona for my gap year before university; that I'd move to Nottingham with my boyfriend and work for the year there instead. Looking back 15 years later I kind-of wish I'd had that year over there too, but that first job in Nottingham paved the way for my path through life that lead me right to this moment, so I can't regret it.
My poor, unfortunate parents were to be upset again a year later when I decided to stay in my job at a small software company rather than going to university, but when that job lead to another better job down South I think they forgave me and began to see me as a career girl.
Two years later and I was made redundant and facing doing the same job for another company I decided to set up my own web design business from home. I did wonder what on earth I was doing - tempting the fates for failure yet again. I had the distinct sensation that I was taking the piss out of the universe in a big way. The sensation got worse as during the first quiet months of the business I spent more time watching Jerry Springer than applying myself to making the company an ongoing concern, but call it luck or good timing it all went as it should and 11 years later that company is still running, although without me at the helm.
The writing dream, held dulled by years of copywriting and journal scribbling started to jerk into life when I began having healing and doing meditation daily during 2002. At that point it was a craving, a yearning but I would still only ever write two or three words, perhaps a sentence or even a page before screwing it all up to put in the bin.
Part of my problem, which I believe I may have already mentioned once or twice, was a fear of having other people, namely my loved ones, read what I had written. So in October of 2005 I set up a simple web site to publish the occasional article, mainly ramblings on my own opinions that I hold dear. It worked. I know that only a small handful of people have read what I have written but having my work out there and not having the world collapse on top of me changed me and helped me care less.
A month later and I hit on my big idea. A non-fiction book about my experiences as a stepmother - alongside the experiences that my stepson's mother had watching me raise her child. Right before Christmas 2005 I asked Sam if she'd be prepared to work on the project with me and she agreed immediately. I tentatively mentioned the idea to a couple of writers and editors that I know and they seemed to think it was interesting, which gave me the confidence to start.
The first half of 2006 was spent writing my own part, interviewing Sam and writing her side while home educating my daughter Kiera. Knowing that Kiera would start school in September I took the summer off to be with her and started my proposal when she began school.
I got some encouragement towards the end of last year from an agent friend of a friend. He said he liked the idea and it had a good chance of being sold and so I sent it out to several agents and watched rejection after rejection pile up at home. Funnily enough, I wasn't bothered. I reminded myself of how many times Harry Potter got rejected before being accepted and continued to send out my proposal.
Fast forward to Monday and I have a real-life meeting with a real-life agent to discuss my book. The 45 minutes I spent in her office passed too quickly for me to have absorbed it at the time but I distinctly recall her saying "you can definitely write" and something about me having a strong narrative voice. Having no experience in this area I'm assuming this is all good.
I refuse to say that it's too good to be true or that I don't believe it because I think that's a sure-fire way to invite the whole thing to go wrong. Instead I say that it's amazing and incredible that she wants to see the second third of the book and will be talking to some editors that she knows to judge the market interest for my idea.
I'm not quite confident yet. I don't quite consider myself a writer. When people ask what I do I explain that I do some book keeping and consulting and oh, I'm writing a book. But the fear of failure has gone away - I do feel that I can really do this. I need to keep hold of my dream and take steps towards it every day and I can make it happen in my life just as I've made the other parts of my career happen. Now if I can just figure out how to create similar personal success in my love life...
I've not really failed yet, you see. Not in work at least - my love life has been an unmitigated disaster from time to time but even that hasn't stopped me because I try and find a way to turn every negative into a positive, every bad experience into something to learn and grow from.
I didn't study much for my A Levels. I remember walking into college to get my results thinking "today, now is the time where I get found out, where I finally get my payback for spending my study time drinking beer and smoking cigarettes rather than diligently working my books". The relief flooded through me when I opened the envelope to find the A in Spanish, B in French and C in Business Studies.
My parents were pissed as hell when I said I wasn't going to Barcelona for my gap year before university; that I'd move to Nottingham with my boyfriend and work for the year there instead. Looking back 15 years later I kind-of wish I'd had that year over there too, but that first job in Nottingham paved the way for my path through life that lead me right to this moment, so I can't regret it.
My poor, unfortunate parents were to be upset again a year later when I decided to stay in my job at a small software company rather than going to university, but when that job lead to another better job down South I think they forgave me and began to see me as a career girl.
Two years later and I was made redundant and facing doing the same job for another company I decided to set up my own web design business from home. I did wonder what on earth I was doing - tempting the fates for failure yet again. I had the distinct sensation that I was taking the piss out of the universe in a big way. The sensation got worse as during the first quiet months of the business I spent more time watching Jerry Springer than applying myself to making the company an ongoing concern, but call it luck or good timing it all went as it should and 11 years later that company is still running, although without me at the helm.
The writing dream, held dulled by years of copywriting and journal scribbling started to jerk into life when I began having healing and doing meditation daily during 2002. At that point it was a craving, a yearning but I would still only ever write two or three words, perhaps a sentence or even a page before screwing it all up to put in the bin.
Part of my problem, which I believe I may have already mentioned once or twice, was a fear of having other people, namely my loved ones, read what I had written. So in October of 2005 I set up a simple web site to publish the occasional article, mainly ramblings on my own opinions that I hold dear. It worked. I know that only a small handful of people have read what I have written but having my work out there and not having the world collapse on top of me changed me and helped me care less.
A month later and I hit on my big idea. A non-fiction book about my experiences as a stepmother - alongside the experiences that my stepson's mother had watching me raise her child. Right before Christmas 2005 I asked Sam if she'd be prepared to work on the project with me and she agreed immediately. I tentatively mentioned the idea to a couple of writers and editors that I know and they seemed to think it was interesting, which gave me the confidence to start.
The first half of 2006 was spent writing my own part, interviewing Sam and writing her side while home educating my daughter Kiera. Knowing that Kiera would start school in September I took the summer off to be with her and started my proposal when she began school.
I got some encouragement towards the end of last year from an agent friend of a friend. He said he liked the idea and it had a good chance of being sold and so I sent it out to several agents and watched rejection after rejection pile up at home. Funnily enough, I wasn't bothered. I reminded myself of how many times Harry Potter got rejected before being accepted and continued to send out my proposal.
Fast forward to Monday and I have a real-life meeting with a real-life agent to discuss my book. The 45 minutes I spent in her office passed too quickly for me to have absorbed it at the time but I distinctly recall her saying "you can definitely write" and something about me having a strong narrative voice. Having no experience in this area I'm assuming this is all good.
I refuse to say that it's too good to be true or that I don't believe it because I think that's a sure-fire way to invite the whole thing to go wrong. Instead I say that it's amazing and incredible that she wants to see the second third of the book and will be talking to some editors that she knows to judge the market interest for my idea.
I'm not quite confident yet. I don't quite consider myself a writer. When people ask what I do I explain that I do some book keeping and consulting and oh, I'm writing a book. But the fear of failure has gone away - I do feel that I can really do this. I need to keep hold of my dream and take steps towards it every day and I can make it happen in my life just as I've made the other parts of my career happen. Now if I can just figure out how to create similar personal success in my love life...
Sunday, 18 February 2007
Such a perfect day...
The first result was waking up without a hangover despite being out until 1am. I was most restrained; only a couple of glasses of wine over a superb Italian meal followed by two cocktails. The last being a Caipirinha taken alone in a dimly lit smokey bar that I've been going to for years called 'El Benidorm'. Cheesy name but a great bar; I think the part that I love best is having to ring the bell to be allowed in.
Kiera and I walked to meet our friends Andreu and Monica with a brief refuelling stop at Starbucks. The coffee here is so incredible I usually avoid my regular American coffee haunt but Kiera needed a third breakfast - don't ask - and so in stopping for a muffin I decided upon a take-away Chai Tea latte.
Bumping into our friends we walked down towards the beautiful and elegant church of Santa Maria del Mar, continuing to meet Alex, Eva and their adorably blond but otherwise totally Spanish two year old son Nicolas. Only in Barcelona would we find such a family all dressed as pirates, unselfconsciously sword fighting, oblivious to any onlookers. I know it's Carnival weekend here but really, would any English person ever do this?
We walked to the gorgeous Parc de la Ciutadella, strolling with all the Spanish families in the beautiful spring weather. The children played on the park as we spotted more pirates, some of the dalmations, and most disturbing, a woman old enough to be my grandmother wearing red horns with a red pointed tail poking out from underneath her trench coat. Obviously it's not just my friends who have a capacity for taking any opportunity for outlandish self-expression through costume.
We then spent the perfect Barcelona afternoon eating ensaladilla rusa, chicken and bread while drinking red wine and cava in Alex and Eva's eccentrically beautiful apartment, punctuated only by the occasional cigarette while the children played and we listened to music, laughing and debating and taking photographs of the children and of each other in a pirate hat. It's days like these that make me want to live in this incredible city. There's a relaxed quality to this time amongst friends that differs inexorably from similar-style English afternoons - a difference that I find captivating and nourishing and stimulating.
Of course, after two or three small glasses of red wine and the cava I was little stimulated and more in need of a nap but having run out of time to follow the perfect day with the typical Spanish siesta I shall save my sleep for tonight. It will be deep I'm sure, and my dreams will be of more afternoons like today in my future.
Kiera and I walked to meet our friends Andreu and Monica with a brief refuelling stop at Starbucks. The coffee here is so incredible I usually avoid my regular American coffee haunt but Kiera needed a third breakfast - don't ask - and so in stopping for a muffin I decided upon a take-away Chai Tea latte.
Bumping into our friends we walked down towards the beautiful and elegant church of Santa Maria del Mar, continuing to meet Alex, Eva and their adorably blond but otherwise totally Spanish two year old son Nicolas. Only in Barcelona would we find such a family all dressed as pirates, unselfconsciously sword fighting, oblivious to any onlookers. I know it's Carnival weekend here but really, would any English person ever do this?
We walked to the gorgeous Parc de la Ciutadella, strolling with all the Spanish families in the beautiful spring weather. The children played on the park as we spotted more pirates, some of the dalmations, and most disturbing, a woman old enough to be my grandmother wearing red horns with a red pointed tail poking out from underneath her trench coat. Obviously it's not just my friends who have a capacity for taking any opportunity for outlandish self-expression through costume.
We then spent the perfect Barcelona afternoon eating ensaladilla rusa, chicken and bread while drinking red wine and cava in Alex and Eva's eccentrically beautiful apartment, punctuated only by the occasional cigarette while the children played and we listened to music, laughing and debating and taking photographs of the children and of each other in a pirate hat. It's days like these that make me want to live in this incredible city. There's a relaxed quality to this time amongst friends that differs inexorably from similar-style English afternoons - a difference that I find captivating and nourishing and stimulating.
Of course, after two or three small glasses of red wine and the cava I was little stimulated and more in need of a nap but having run out of time to follow the perfect day with the typical Spanish siesta I shall save my sleep for tonight. It will be deep I'm sure, and my dreams will be of more afternoons like today in my future.
Thursday, 15 February 2007
Drunk posting
Okay here's what I love about Barcelona. You go out with your friends for a quick, post-work drink before, apparently, coming home to eat dinner with your friend's pregnant wife. You meet up with your oldest, and let's face it, favourite friend Monica and before you know it, you've had a couple too many Mojitos. Enough to have a devil-may-care attitude to dinner. Said friend that got you into this mess decides to go home and now it's midnight and you're walking the streets home after several cocktails.
Your friends always insist on walking you home despite a million explanations that you know where you're going. There's always that moment of doubt however because every street in Barcelona has two identities. The day time and the night time identity - defined by a shift in grey metal shopfronts that appear without warning to change the face of every street that you know. I did know where I was, but this freedom of streets that shift their faces is my favourite part of the whole city. Gone are the narrow shops full of fruit and wine and in their place only dingy, smokey bars, unrecognisable shop fronts and scores of foreign-looking people holding six-packs for sale.
This mutation of identity is the best bit of this place not because of the several cocktails that you've consumed that make once familiar places unrecognisable but because the city shifts when you don't notice. It's like going out with your husband and coming home with a gorgeous stud that you can't wait to have sex with for the first time. The element of surprise is overwhelming; each street a potential new lover that consists of unexplored terrain that you can't wait to stroke with your fingers or your tongue.
In England, when I've had a few I can't wait for my bed, but here going home feels like a grief, a reminder of the unexplored territory that lies within reach, a desperation of more, new, now, drunk, don't care, let's keep going beyond all reason.
It's probably a good job my friends decided to walk me home despite my many assurances that I knew exactly where I was. I did; I know this barrio of Barcelona well - I've walked its streets at night and at day and know enough road names to figure it out even if my alcohol consumption makes me choose the long way home. If they hadn't insisted with such chivalry, to see me to my door, I'd have gone in that still-open-since-10am cafe/bar at the end of the street and introduced myself to the cute young men at the bar. I'd have made extra trouble for myself when, god knows, I don't need it.
'Escapamos' I said to Xavi when we left the building at 8pm tonight. I meant it; let's escape. Every trip here is an escape for me, from my life, my language, my loves, my hard times. I love it.
Your friends always insist on walking you home despite a million explanations that you know where you're going. There's always that moment of doubt however because every street in Barcelona has two identities. The day time and the night time identity - defined by a shift in grey metal shopfronts that appear without warning to change the face of every street that you know. I did know where I was, but this freedom of streets that shift their faces is my favourite part of the whole city. Gone are the narrow shops full of fruit and wine and in their place only dingy, smokey bars, unrecognisable shop fronts and scores of foreign-looking people holding six-packs for sale.
This mutation of identity is the best bit of this place not because of the several cocktails that you've consumed that make once familiar places unrecognisable but because the city shifts when you don't notice. It's like going out with your husband and coming home with a gorgeous stud that you can't wait to have sex with for the first time. The element of surprise is overwhelming; each street a potential new lover that consists of unexplored terrain that you can't wait to stroke with your fingers or your tongue.
In England, when I've had a few I can't wait for my bed, but here going home feels like a grief, a reminder of the unexplored territory that lies within reach, a desperation of more, new, now, drunk, don't care, let's keep going beyond all reason.
It's probably a good job my friends decided to walk me home despite my many assurances that I knew exactly where I was. I did; I know this barrio of Barcelona well - I've walked its streets at night and at day and know enough road names to figure it out even if my alcohol consumption makes me choose the long way home. If they hadn't insisted with such chivalry, to see me to my door, I'd have gone in that still-open-since-10am cafe/bar at the end of the street and introduced myself to the cute young men at the bar. I'd have made extra trouble for myself when, god knows, I don't need it.
'Escapamos' I said to Xavi when we left the building at 8pm tonight. I meant it; let's escape. Every trip here is an escape for me, from my life, my language, my loves, my hard times. I love it.
Wednesday, 14 February 2007
Hola from Barcelona
I know, I know, how lucky can one girl get? A meeting with an agent all planned for two weeks from now, a night out last Friday with a gorgeous man and a trip to Barcelona, all within a few days of one another.
I'm glad it's all finally here; that's it's all finally happening. I've been waiting for the shift in my life for several months now. I could feel it beginning to move but it seemed to be taking its own sweet time. I need a few lessons in patience - it's never been my strong suit.
I joke that I allow myself to be bad when I'm in Barcelona but now that I think of it I'm really not as bad as I could be. I arrived at the house of my very good friends Xavi and Mara and he'd specifically bought a bottle of Rioja for me. I don't usually drink at home during the week, but hey, I'm on holiday. I even had a glass with lunch today! I do, however, always smoke when I'm here. Smoking is a guilty pleasure that I only partake of occasionally in England but here it's just so much more acceptable that these days I plan to do it before I even arrive.
I will have to limit my bad behaviour being here this time with my six-year-old daughter. It's her fourth trip to Barcelona if you don't count the fact that she was conceived here. It's my fifteenth trip, or seventeenth or something like that - there's too many for me to remember now. I met my Spanish friend Monica on a school exchange trip in 1990 and over 3am discussions about our virginity (okay hers, mine was gone by then) we bonded for life. I'm aiming for three trips here this year rather than the usual two.
So aside from a little indulgence in fantastic Catalan food, a little too much Rioja and the smoking I'm being quite a good girl really. My real bad behaviour is going on in England; having to confront myself doing things that I never thought I'd do. I'm going with Elisabeth Lesser on this one. In her book Broken Open she says - I'm paraphrasing - that we have to confront and fully integrate the shadow side of our personality in order to release its energy into our life; energy that we were hitherto using to repress that side of ourselves.
Now that I'm going to spend some time allowing myself to be bad or at the very least not seeking the approval of others I can probably think of some really creative ways to make some trouble. Now where did I put the number of that babysitter...
I'm glad it's all finally here; that's it's all finally happening. I've been waiting for the shift in my life for several months now. I could feel it beginning to move but it seemed to be taking its own sweet time. I need a few lessons in patience - it's never been my strong suit.
I joke that I allow myself to be bad when I'm in Barcelona but now that I think of it I'm really not as bad as I could be. I arrived at the house of my very good friends Xavi and Mara and he'd specifically bought a bottle of Rioja for me. I don't usually drink at home during the week, but hey, I'm on holiday. I even had a glass with lunch today! I do, however, always smoke when I'm here. Smoking is a guilty pleasure that I only partake of occasionally in England but here it's just so much more acceptable that these days I plan to do it before I even arrive.
I will have to limit my bad behaviour being here this time with my six-year-old daughter. It's her fourth trip to Barcelona if you don't count the fact that she was conceived here. It's my fifteenth trip, or seventeenth or something like that - there's too many for me to remember now. I met my Spanish friend Monica on a school exchange trip in 1990 and over 3am discussions about our virginity (okay hers, mine was gone by then) we bonded for life. I'm aiming for three trips here this year rather than the usual two.
So aside from a little indulgence in fantastic Catalan food, a little too much Rioja and the smoking I'm being quite a good girl really. My real bad behaviour is going on in England; having to confront myself doing things that I never thought I'd do. I'm going with Elisabeth Lesser on this one. In her book Broken Open she says - I'm paraphrasing - that we have to confront and fully integrate the shadow side of our personality in order to release its energy into our life; energy that we were hitherto using to repress that side of ourselves.
Now that I'm going to spend some time allowing myself to be bad or at the very least not seeking the approval of others I can probably think of some really creative ways to make some trouble. Now where did I put the number of that babysitter...
Sunday, 11 February 2007
How I worship divine timing
It's all beginning to make sense. The struggle to understand my current life high-growth experience may well have been worth it because I seem to have a meeting with an agent to discuss my book. I'm not a superstitious person. I believe that whatever you believe will come true; if you think that walking under a ladder brings you bad luck then it will do so. However, I'm not mentioning this hopefully wonderful agent by name just in case.
Other than my refusal to bring this particular pertinent life-detail into print I have decided that I am no longer going to edit or otherwise limit my writing because of any fear of terrible things happening to me with respect to my personal relationships with any family members, friends or men. Sorry Dad, I may well end up writing about sex; me having sex that is. Sorry Mom, I'll be writing about the life and love choices that I make that you disapprove of and even the challenges in our relationship that make you uncomfortable. Sorry to the men in my life of now or future, I may be commenting on your performance or the size of your equipment. When I end up with an agent or even a publisher - note my determination with the use of the word 'when' and not 'if' - I will have to add them to the list too.
Those of you that have never been the kind of people that worry about what others think may find my teenage-like angst most amusing or otherwise baffling but I assure you that it's very real. If we met in person you wouldn't believe it. I come across as confident and self-assured, which, in many ways I am. I've always been confident about my personality and my work, my intelligence and my social skills, while inwardly not believing I was beautiful or sexy. It's taken a long time and the dumping of a particular husband who kept me trapped in that place - with my 'permission' naturally - to get over that and realise my attractiveness. A big thank you here to the men (I feel compelled to point out of very limited numbers) that have helped me along that journey and to those that were of the same club as my ex-husband, fuck you very much.
Sadly, just as a person may give up an addiction to smoking and replace it with cream buns, I have, for some reason, replaced my lack of confidence in the area of my physical self with concerns of how my writing will be received by those that love and like me. I find writing to be an intimately revealing process; it is where I remove not only all of my clothes but my entire physical self and take my innermost thoughts and feelings and lay them onto a table for the world to peruse. The process of doing this makes such incredible sense to me personally; it feels more right as work than any other that I have done. As such I am giving myself long-overdue permission to follow this path wherever it may lead me and I can no longer apologise, limit myself or worry about the receipt of what I am doing with those people closest to my heart.
Don't even mention my kid - my wonderful six-year-old daughter Kiera. Kim, a writer friend of mine said that it's never bothered her what her parents think about what she has written but do her children really need to know of her long history with anal sex? It was only by the grace of my thankfully well-exercised pelvic floor that I didn't soak my chair before realising that she may well have opened up a whole new set of worries for me. I hadn't even thought what Kiera might think of her mother and what her mother has to say. I think it was Freud that said that children suffer most from the unfulfilled and unlived dreams of their parents. So to Kiera - Mummy is sorry, but this is my dream. I hope that you learn well from watching me reach for it. All I have ever wanted for you is for you to know how to look inside your own heart to find what you love so that you may do it. I hope that watching Mummy now, however embarrassing for you, teaches you how to do that.
Other than my refusal to bring this particular pertinent life-detail into print I have decided that I am no longer going to edit or otherwise limit my writing because of any fear of terrible things happening to me with respect to my personal relationships with any family members, friends or men. Sorry Dad, I may well end up writing about sex; me having sex that is. Sorry Mom, I'll be writing about the life and love choices that I make that you disapprove of and even the challenges in our relationship that make you uncomfortable. Sorry to the men in my life of now or future, I may be commenting on your performance or the size of your equipment. When I end up with an agent or even a publisher - note my determination with the use of the word 'when' and not 'if' - I will have to add them to the list too.
Those of you that have never been the kind of people that worry about what others think may find my teenage-like angst most amusing or otherwise baffling but I assure you that it's very real. If we met in person you wouldn't believe it. I come across as confident and self-assured, which, in many ways I am. I've always been confident about my personality and my work, my intelligence and my social skills, while inwardly not believing I was beautiful or sexy. It's taken a long time and the dumping of a particular husband who kept me trapped in that place - with my 'permission' naturally - to get over that and realise my attractiveness. A big thank you here to the men (I feel compelled to point out of very limited numbers) that have helped me along that journey and to those that were of the same club as my ex-husband, fuck you very much.
Sadly, just as a person may give up an addiction to smoking and replace it with cream buns, I have, for some reason, replaced my lack of confidence in the area of my physical self with concerns of how my writing will be received by those that love and like me. I find writing to be an intimately revealing process; it is where I remove not only all of my clothes but my entire physical self and take my innermost thoughts and feelings and lay them onto a table for the world to peruse. The process of doing this makes such incredible sense to me personally; it feels more right as work than any other that I have done. As such I am giving myself long-overdue permission to follow this path wherever it may lead me and I can no longer apologise, limit myself or worry about the receipt of what I am doing with those people closest to my heart.
Don't even mention my kid - my wonderful six-year-old daughter Kiera. Kim, a writer friend of mine said that it's never bothered her what her parents think about what she has written but do her children really need to know of her long history with anal sex? It was only by the grace of my thankfully well-exercised pelvic floor that I didn't soak my chair before realising that she may well have opened up a whole new set of worries for me. I hadn't even thought what Kiera might think of her mother and what her mother has to say. I think it was Freud that said that children suffer most from the unfulfilled and unlived dreams of their parents. So to Kiera - Mummy is sorry, but this is my dream. I hope that you learn well from watching me reach for it. All I have ever wanted for you is for you to know how to look inside your own heart to find what you love so that you may do it. I hope that watching Mummy now, however embarrassing for you, teaches you how to do that.
Tuesday, 6 February 2007
Such approval I seek
I told my friend Jane that I read somewhere about most writers never writing anything interesting until their parents are dead. She said "I would say that the writer who told you that was a pussy, but I'm not sure I my mother saw anything interesting I had written before she died." Jane's not known for mincing her words. It's one of my favourite things about her.
I'm trying very hard to get a grasp on precisely why I need so much approval from other people on certain matters. It all originates with my parents and while there are many people in my life whose approval I don't seek, I do look for it from certain people other than my parents, although they are the main focus of it.
I'm confused. In some ways I'm completely independent of their approval. I knew they wouldn't like it when I chose a homebirth for my daughter but I did it anyway. They were disapproving of me breastfeeding her until she was nearly three and they certainly didn't like the home educating that I did until she was six, but all of this I handled with very little bother as to what they thought of me.
Perhaps it's because that was all related to me being a mother. I'm prepared to take the flak over my parenting decisions because it's not about me; it's about my child and I have to put her needs before anyone else - including my own need for approval.
Things are much harder when it's about me personally only I can't figure out how much of it is about me needing to love and approve of myself or about having that approval from others. My mother and a friend of mine dislike most intensely that I am seeing this man. I feel tremendously un-guilty considering I've always thought of myself as a highly principled and moral person.
I had lunch with my neither approving-nor-disproving friend Carole in a tapas bar in Windsor last weekend, post new-boots shopping. At the end of the meal I said I may well claim some mileage back (from my own company) on all the trips I'm making down south lately. Carole said that she could never do that, whereas I consider a slight massage of mileage figures to be financially prudent behaviour. I had to reflect afterwards that perhaps my morals are much lower than I've always considered them to be. Perhaps being a highly-principled person is simple something I've always told myself that isn't necessarily true.
I am finding with those friends and family that are judging my current behaviour that they are projecting their own issues and it's all about them and not me. Having this understanding is not stopping me from being affected by their feelings about what I'm doing. I can't figure out if this is because I am conflicted about what I am doing and I'm blaming them for 'making me feel' like that or if I don't like it that they aren't currently approving of what I'm doing.
I could probably live with the whole issue if it weren't for how it leaks over into how I feel about my writing. Even if I were writing fiction I know that a writer puts so much of themselves into what they are writing it can be revealing, but they are able to hide behind it being imaginative and fantasy. My writing so far seems to be non-fiction and it all falls into the most personal parts of my personality and relationships; places where I will have to talk about my ex-husband, my childhood and my sex life. I am not going to be able to do that freely unless I distance myself from the requirement of approval from those that love me. Maybe I simply need to trust that they will love me whether they approve of what I'm doing or not.
I'm trying very hard to get a grasp on precisely why I need so much approval from other people on certain matters. It all originates with my parents and while there are many people in my life whose approval I don't seek, I do look for it from certain people other than my parents, although they are the main focus of it.
I'm confused. In some ways I'm completely independent of their approval. I knew they wouldn't like it when I chose a homebirth for my daughter but I did it anyway. They were disapproving of me breastfeeding her until she was nearly three and they certainly didn't like the home educating that I did until she was six, but all of this I handled with very little bother as to what they thought of me.
Perhaps it's because that was all related to me being a mother. I'm prepared to take the flak over my parenting decisions because it's not about me; it's about my child and I have to put her needs before anyone else - including my own need for approval.
Things are much harder when it's about me personally only I can't figure out how much of it is about me needing to love and approve of myself or about having that approval from others. My mother and a friend of mine dislike most intensely that I am seeing this man. I feel tremendously un-guilty considering I've always thought of myself as a highly principled and moral person.
I had lunch with my neither approving-nor-disproving friend Carole in a tapas bar in Windsor last weekend, post new-boots shopping. At the end of the meal I said I may well claim some mileage back (from my own company) on all the trips I'm making down south lately. Carole said that she could never do that, whereas I consider a slight massage of mileage figures to be financially prudent behaviour. I had to reflect afterwards that perhaps my morals are much lower than I've always considered them to be. Perhaps being a highly-principled person is simple something I've always told myself that isn't necessarily true.
I am finding with those friends and family that are judging my current behaviour that they are projecting their own issues and it's all about them and not me. Having this understanding is not stopping me from being affected by their feelings about what I'm doing. I can't figure out if this is because I am conflicted about what I am doing and I'm blaming them for 'making me feel' like that or if I don't like it that they aren't currently approving of what I'm doing.
I could probably live with the whole issue if it weren't for how it leaks over into how I feel about my writing. Even if I were writing fiction I know that a writer puts so much of themselves into what they are writing it can be revealing, but they are able to hide behind it being imaginative and fantasy. My writing so far seems to be non-fiction and it all falls into the most personal parts of my personality and relationships; places where I will have to talk about my ex-husband, my childhood and my sex life. I am not going to be able to do that freely unless I distance myself from the requirement of approval from those that love me. Maybe I simply need to trust that they will love me whether they approve of what I'm doing or not.
Wednesday, 31 January 2007
Pure exhilaration!
I just got off the back of a motorbike. I've only ever been on one once before and that was about sixteen years ago. I've always had a thing for speed. Travelling at speed that is, not actual speed. In fact my first boss Simon once said to me, "Nikki, please promise me you'll never do speed." When I asked him why, he replied, "Because normal people take speed to be like you; I don't know what would happen if you took it." I'm sure he was right, so I never did.
Travelling at speed though - definitely a sucker for that one. I raced powerboats as a teenager before I ever learned to drive a car. Small boats with an outboard motor, but they did about 65 miles an hour on the water and I was 5th in the British Championships in my class when I was 16.
I remember my driving instructor Bernard. If I so much as drove a couple of miles an hour above the speed limit he would remind me, "You're not in your boat now Nicola." I know he was right, but at least in a car I always feel safe. I know I'm not, but it's not the same as racing along in a powerboat or on the back of a motorbike.
Wow. I thought the two cups of coffee I had this morning gave me a buzz but it's nothing compared to this. I guess I had to trust the policeman I went with - if you can't trust a policeman who can you trust? I felt safe and secure. Perhaps because he's a big guy and I could hide behind him. It was only when he opened it up on the straight that I thought to myself "Oh crap, I forgot to pray before I got on."
I try and drive at the speed limit these days. With nine points a person needs to. It was totally outside of my comfort zone to be on the back of a bike with someone else in control, but that's what my whole life seems to be about lately - pushing the boundaries, changing my thinking, doing new things. Agreeing to go on a bike ride seemed appropriate under the circumstances.
Travelling at speed though - definitely a sucker for that one. I raced powerboats as a teenager before I ever learned to drive a car. Small boats with an outboard motor, but they did about 65 miles an hour on the water and I was 5th in the British Championships in my class when I was 16.
I remember my driving instructor Bernard. If I so much as drove a couple of miles an hour above the speed limit he would remind me, "You're not in your boat now Nicola." I know he was right, but at least in a car I always feel safe. I know I'm not, but it's not the same as racing along in a powerboat or on the back of a motorbike.
Wow. I thought the two cups of coffee I had this morning gave me a buzz but it's nothing compared to this. I guess I had to trust the policeman I went with - if you can't trust a policeman who can you trust? I felt safe and secure. Perhaps because he's a big guy and I could hide behind him. It was only when he opened it up on the straight that I thought to myself "Oh crap, I forgot to pray before I got on."
I try and drive at the speed limit these days. With nine points a person needs to. It was totally outside of my comfort zone to be on the back of a bike with someone else in control, but that's what my whole life seems to be about lately - pushing the boundaries, changing my thinking, doing new things. Agreeing to go on a bike ride seemed appropriate under the circumstances.
Tuesday, 30 January 2007
Why is it that the ones you don't want to hear from call?
I heard from my ex-boyfriend yesterday. The one that I finished with four months ago. Why is it always that the ones that you don't want to hear from are the ones that call? Take my last internet date. It was bad enough to put me off online dating for the foreseeable future.
He had a great profile. We shared loads of common interests, he seemed bright and funny and interesting. We talked on the phone and he had a really sexy voice and we chatted easily considering we were two almost-complete-strangers. In his photo he looked gorgeous; really attractive and a snazzy dresser. In his profile he described himself as athletic and toned and said that his friends call him metrosexual, which to me means 'looks that good you think he's probably gay' because we all know gay men are, sadly for the girls, far better at dressing and grooming than the straight ones.
I was excited about our date. I waited for him nervously outside Borders in new clothes, hoping he'd like me and then he turned up. I could see a slight resemblance between him and the guy in the photograph, but it was like the one in the photo was the younger, slimmer and better looking version of the man standing in front of me. Trade 'athletic and toned' for 'stocky and pot bellied'. Trade 'metrosexual' for 'nice suit jacket over a jumper' and 'too much aftershave'. I couldn't have been more disappointed if you'd told me that Barcelona had just fallen off the map or that chocolate had never been invented.
Nikki, Nikki, only ever meet them for coffee on a first date. Then you can make a quick exit if it all goes horribly wrong. Instead I had to spend five hours with this guy when I could have gone home from the first moment. It soon became clear that he was a bit of a bore on top of everything else, although to be honest if I'd fancied him I have to admit I probably would have overlooked that.
So, I was polite, but not too friendly. I definitely didn't send any signals as it became clear to me over the evening that not only did I not fancy him but actually I found him kind of repulsive. So of course he calls. I was so stunned I didn't even know what to say when he asked me out again. I wasn't prepared. I was sure that he must have picked up my vibe that there was no way he was ever going to get a shag out of me, but no. I put him off and when he called again the next day had to explain that I just didn't feel a spark. It was my nice way of saying what I've just said here.
You see, I don't like being mean to them. I've got girlfriends that are fantastic at it. I'm not adverse to discreetly turning my back on them in a pub to try and get rid of them, but all out rude? I can't do it. I love Lily Allen's take on this:
"Can't knock em out, can't walk away,
Try desperately to think of the politest way to say,
Just get out my face, just leave me alone,
And no you can't have my number,
"Why?"
Because I've lost my phone. "
My friend Nic, when seeing me being chatted up recently by a man I clearly wasn't keen on simply grabbed him by the shoulders, turned him around and forcefully pushed him away. I admire that, I do. I'd even love to be able to do it but it's like dogs. I don't like them but when the vet that I work for on a Thursday (ex-internet date turned book keeping job - see I told you it was legit) said I'd be the perfect person to put down greyhounds for him I had to explain I couldn't do it. I might not like them but neither do I want to kick them while they're down.
Even when I'm provoked I still don't want to be horrible to them. With the internet date I didn't comment on how he'd mis-sold himself. I even managed to not laugh hysterically when he told me he was sure he'd detected signals from me. Up yourself much mate? I got rid of the ex-boyfriend yesterday as nicely as I could too even while I was rolling my eyes at how he assured me he had truly loved me even if he hadn't always shown it in the right way.
Maybe it would do me good to kill a few greyhounds after all...
He had a great profile. We shared loads of common interests, he seemed bright and funny and interesting. We talked on the phone and he had a really sexy voice and we chatted easily considering we were two almost-complete-strangers. In his photo he looked gorgeous; really attractive and a snazzy dresser. In his profile he described himself as athletic and toned and said that his friends call him metrosexual, which to me means 'looks that good you think he's probably gay' because we all know gay men are, sadly for the girls, far better at dressing and grooming than the straight ones.
I was excited about our date. I waited for him nervously outside Borders in new clothes, hoping he'd like me and then he turned up. I could see a slight resemblance between him and the guy in the photograph, but it was like the one in the photo was the younger, slimmer and better looking version of the man standing in front of me. Trade 'athletic and toned' for 'stocky and pot bellied'. Trade 'metrosexual' for 'nice suit jacket over a jumper' and 'too much aftershave'. I couldn't have been more disappointed if you'd told me that Barcelona had just fallen off the map or that chocolate had never been invented.
Nikki, Nikki, only ever meet them for coffee on a first date. Then you can make a quick exit if it all goes horribly wrong. Instead I had to spend five hours with this guy when I could have gone home from the first moment. It soon became clear that he was a bit of a bore on top of everything else, although to be honest if I'd fancied him I have to admit I probably would have overlooked that.
So, I was polite, but not too friendly. I definitely didn't send any signals as it became clear to me over the evening that not only did I not fancy him but actually I found him kind of repulsive. So of course he calls. I was so stunned I didn't even know what to say when he asked me out again. I wasn't prepared. I was sure that he must have picked up my vibe that there was no way he was ever going to get a shag out of me, but no. I put him off and when he called again the next day had to explain that I just didn't feel a spark. It was my nice way of saying what I've just said here.
You see, I don't like being mean to them. I've got girlfriends that are fantastic at it. I'm not adverse to discreetly turning my back on them in a pub to try and get rid of them, but all out rude? I can't do it. I love Lily Allen's take on this:
"Can't knock em out, can't walk away,
Try desperately to think of the politest way to say,
Just get out my face, just leave me alone,
And no you can't have my number,
"Why?"
Because I've lost my phone. "
My friend Nic, when seeing me being chatted up recently by a man I clearly wasn't keen on simply grabbed him by the shoulders, turned him around and forcefully pushed him away. I admire that, I do. I'd even love to be able to do it but it's like dogs. I don't like them but when the vet that I work for on a Thursday (ex-internet date turned book keeping job - see I told you it was legit) said I'd be the perfect person to put down greyhounds for him I had to explain I couldn't do it. I might not like them but neither do I want to kick them while they're down.
Even when I'm provoked I still don't want to be horrible to them. With the internet date I didn't comment on how he'd mis-sold himself. I even managed to not laugh hysterically when he told me he was sure he'd detected signals from me. Up yourself much mate? I got rid of the ex-boyfriend yesterday as nicely as I could too even while I was rolling my eyes at how he assured me he had truly loved me even if he hadn't always shown it in the right way.
Maybe it would do me good to kill a few greyhounds after all...
Monday, 29 January 2007
God grant me patience
This is difficult. I am not, by nature, a patient person. I've been working on it for a long time now and over the years have got better. My road rage has improved and I only now spit out *wanker* when I'm driving somewhere and I'm late, which almost never happens. So...
Patience is one of my new year's resolutions. I have five of them. I developed them with my friend Ian one night when we were a little wasted. They are: Open, Breathe, Trust, Let Go and Patience. In our slightly inebriated state they seemed full of wisdom. "Wow, man, all we've got to do this year is those five things and we'll be fine. Quick, get a pen, we both have to write them down and read them daily."
I find it a little disturbing that I am so wise when slightly off my head - tequila episode aside. Everything that I'm doing right now is shifting and I am having to be Open to all eventualities, remembering to Breathe through the changes, Trusting that everything's going to turn out fine, Letting Go of any outcome and the most difficult thing of all for me to achieve - having Patience in waiting for that outcome.
I've known for a few weeks that big changes are occurring in my life. At first they were all internal events, now outwardly things are moving too. My work is changing; I'm being offered new work and money from my old work is being modified too. But there are a few life situations where I'm still waiting to see what happens, mainly with him and hearing from agents about my writing, and the virtue that I would most love to have - patience - is in short supply around here.
I can't buy it for myself. I can't pay anyone else to do it for me. I can't read up about it either online or in any one of my fabulous books and learn it. I can't even hang around people that have it in the hope that I'll suck some up. All of my usual methods of getting things done are not going to help me become a more patient person. I sit here either drumming on the desk or at my keyboard, pacing the floors or stomping on a long walk around the village. I'm even irritating myself and you know, it's bad when you get like that.
I'll let myself off the hook eventually; I'll channel this energy in a new direction and it'll be great. Until then, I have to wait. Open, Breathe, Trust, Let Go and Patience. Man it's so fucking hard!
Patience is one of my new year's resolutions. I have five of them. I developed them with my friend Ian one night when we were a little wasted. They are: Open, Breathe, Trust, Let Go and Patience. In our slightly inebriated state they seemed full of wisdom. "Wow, man, all we've got to do this year is those five things and we'll be fine. Quick, get a pen, we both have to write them down and read them daily."
I find it a little disturbing that I am so wise when slightly off my head - tequila episode aside. Everything that I'm doing right now is shifting and I am having to be Open to all eventualities, remembering to Breathe through the changes, Trusting that everything's going to turn out fine, Letting Go of any outcome and the most difficult thing of all for me to achieve - having Patience in waiting for that outcome.
I've known for a few weeks that big changes are occurring in my life. At first they were all internal events, now outwardly things are moving too. My work is changing; I'm being offered new work and money from my old work is being modified too. But there are a few life situations where I'm still waiting to see what happens, mainly with him and hearing from agents about my writing, and the virtue that I would most love to have - patience - is in short supply around here.
I can't buy it for myself. I can't pay anyone else to do it for me. I can't read up about it either online or in any one of my fabulous books and learn it. I can't even hang around people that have it in the hope that I'll suck some up. All of my usual methods of getting things done are not going to help me become a more patient person. I sit here either drumming on the desk or at my keyboard, pacing the floors or stomping on a long walk around the village. I'm even irritating myself and you know, it's bad when you get like that.
I'll let myself off the hook eventually; I'll channel this energy in a new direction and it'll be great. Until then, I have to wait. Open, Breathe, Trust, Let Go and Patience. Man it's so fucking hard!
Sunday, 28 January 2007
Tequila is evil
I'm not a person that needs much help in removing my inhibitions, which is precisely why I should never have drunk that much tequila on Friday night. I don't drink much these days. I got out of the habit of my nightly large glass of red wine and I hate being hungover, so I tend to not bother. However, two weeks ago I got drunk on tequila, had a fabulous time and as long as I didn't put my head upside down and try and stand up again was after-effect-free the following day.
I decided to repeat the experience and I'm not sure where I went wrong. Maybe because last time we shared a bottle between four of us and this time it was between three of us. All I know is I'm going to have a great deal of trouble looking my best friend's husband in the face ever again. I'm so embarrassed I can't even explain why. There are things one should never share with another living person but for some reason this boundary doesn't exist between my best friend and me but I never expected it to extend to her husband! I know he's happy, not just for Friday but for life as he can now tease me stupid everytime I see him. I must plot some way to get my own back and regain my dignity.
When I wrote about speaking my truth I meant in writing and in life, but I definitely meant to bare all verbally and not physically. Instead this week I took a communal shower for the first time in my life - something I thought I would never do - and, well, gave my best friend's husband too much visual information.
I'm not sure I'll ever drink again. Or perhaps I'll just never drink at their house again. Perhaps I'll go to yoga this week and wait until all of the other women have finished showering before taking mine. I'd hate to gain a taste for exhibitionism at this point in my life. It seems that having chosen not to play my life by the rules for the first time that I have shifted all of my boundaries. By getting on very well with one woman's husband I seem to have opened the floodgates for sex talk with all of my friends' husbands. i spent a good half an hour today debating with another friend's husband why, when men are often homophobic or terrified of the idea of being near another man's erection that they are happy to all be erect when together at a lap dancing club. The talk is fine, as long as my friends don't mind, but as for the tequila-induced over-share I experienced on Friday, it's probably in my best interests to never repeat it. Not because the best friend minds. I think she enjoyed it as much as her husband did but I'm deleting all incriminating evidence so that I can't be tempted again.
I decided to repeat the experience and I'm not sure where I went wrong. Maybe because last time we shared a bottle between four of us and this time it was between three of us. All I know is I'm going to have a great deal of trouble looking my best friend's husband in the face ever again. I'm so embarrassed I can't even explain why. There are things one should never share with another living person but for some reason this boundary doesn't exist between my best friend and me but I never expected it to extend to her husband! I know he's happy, not just for Friday but for life as he can now tease me stupid everytime I see him. I must plot some way to get my own back and regain my dignity.
When I wrote about speaking my truth I meant in writing and in life, but I definitely meant to bare all verbally and not physically. Instead this week I took a communal shower for the first time in my life - something I thought I would never do - and, well, gave my best friend's husband too much visual information.
I'm not sure I'll ever drink again. Or perhaps I'll just never drink at their house again. Perhaps I'll go to yoga this week and wait until all of the other women have finished showering before taking mine. I'd hate to gain a taste for exhibitionism at this point in my life. It seems that having chosen not to play my life by the rules for the first time that I have shifted all of my boundaries. By getting on very well with one woman's husband I seem to have opened the floodgates for sex talk with all of my friends' husbands. i spent a good half an hour today debating with another friend's husband why, when men are often homophobic or terrified of the idea of being near another man's erection that they are happy to all be erect when together at a lap dancing club. The talk is fine, as long as my friends don't mind, but as for the tequila-induced over-share I experienced on Friday, it's probably in my best interests to never repeat it. Not because the best friend minds. I think she enjoyed it as much as her husband did but I'm deleting all incriminating evidence so that I can't be tempted again.
Wednesday, 24 January 2007
Think I'm in trouble
I don't mean the other trouble; the man trouble. Admittedly, I'm still in trouble there, especially, it seems, with my mother. But I refer to physical trouble. I'm going Ceroc dancing in about an hour and I'm not sure I will be able to manage it. My sickeningly fit friend Ian has been pestering me to go to Bikram Yoga with him for months and yesterday I finally caved.
I didn't feel too bad when I woke up. I could feel it a little in my shoulders and my calves, but overall thought I'd got away with it. Unfortunately for me I think now that it's like one of those hangovers that you don't have first thing but that come and bite you in the arse a bit later in the day. How on earth am I going to spend the evening with either or both of my arms above my head?
Having said that, it might make me a glutton for punishment, but I'm going again next Tuesday. I like yoga. I first did it about six years ago but after my ill-thought-out move back to the Midlands in 2003 I've not found a class that I liked until now. Bikram is the 'hot' yoga. This refers not to sexy but done in a warm room and trust me, there was nothing sexy about me after 90 minutes in sopping wet clothes, my hair straggled about my beetroot-red face.
Yoga is good. I have to be honest, other than dancing I hate aerobic exercise. I despise the gym. I don't think I'd mind it so much if there weren't other people in there but even so exercising on the spot is so joyless. As for aerobics classes - forget it. The only bouncing around I like to do is the horizontal kind. Yoga is perfect. It is a really good workout and makes you feel strong in mind and body but I don't need to wear a very ugly sports bra to take part.
I was amazed how much I remembered after such a long break actually. Only now I'm paying for it. Every vertebra in my back aches and my shoulders feel like I've been strung up with my arms twisted behind my back like the torture featured in 'Waking the Dead' last week. Wish me luck.
I'm also a little freaked out by how much my life is being mirrored by the episodes of Sex and The City that I'm recording on my oh-so-loved Sky + box. Today Carrie went to San Francisco to promote her new book and plans to shag Mr Big, only he's read her book and wants to discuss the intimate revelations that she made about her feelings about him rather than have sex.
My book is with a few agents, not a publisher, and my book tour is still a distant dream. So that's not the similarity. I'm not sure my current lover qualifies as a Mr Big and the only place I write about him properly is in my journal for, well, all kinds of reasons. But I am struggling with the issue of what to say and what not to say, what I can reveal and what I can't reveal, in case 'he' reads it, in case my mother reads it, in case my father does. I'm getting better, to be fair. I used to worry about what everyone would think - even total strangers. I don't worry about that so much. I know most of my friends like my writing, but even if they don't I'm past caring as long as I think it's of good quality.
I'd love an agent who likes what I've got to say and how I say it and soon after getting one of those I'd predictably like a publisher that feels the same way, but outside of that I'm still a little hung up on what those closest to me will think. It's an impossible situation. As a writer all of life is grist for the mill but with many topics I still fear revealing too much of myself; my feelings, my vulnerability.
Unlike Carrie, I'm not in a situation where I'm simply trying to get laid and as I have, in the past, laid out my hurts, I've ended up with my ex apologising rather than shagging me all night. But I do worry about the consequences of putting myself out there and saying what I feel and think and do. I'm sure we've all learned from the Abby Lee experience that blogs are not entirely anonymous. I decided to use my name in mine precisely to get over these fears. I will, given time.
I didn't feel too bad when I woke up. I could feel it a little in my shoulders and my calves, but overall thought I'd got away with it. Unfortunately for me I think now that it's like one of those hangovers that you don't have first thing but that come and bite you in the arse a bit later in the day. How on earth am I going to spend the evening with either or both of my arms above my head?
Having said that, it might make me a glutton for punishment, but I'm going again next Tuesday. I like yoga. I first did it about six years ago but after my ill-thought-out move back to the Midlands in 2003 I've not found a class that I liked until now. Bikram is the 'hot' yoga. This refers not to sexy but done in a warm room and trust me, there was nothing sexy about me after 90 minutes in sopping wet clothes, my hair straggled about my beetroot-red face.
Yoga is good. I have to be honest, other than dancing I hate aerobic exercise. I despise the gym. I don't think I'd mind it so much if there weren't other people in there but even so exercising on the spot is so joyless. As for aerobics classes - forget it. The only bouncing around I like to do is the horizontal kind. Yoga is perfect. It is a really good workout and makes you feel strong in mind and body but I don't need to wear a very ugly sports bra to take part.
I was amazed how much I remembered after such a long break actually. Only now I'm paying for it. Every vertebra in my back aches and my shoulders feel like I've been strung up with my arms twisted behind my back like the torture featured in 'Waking the Dead' last week. Wish me luck.
I'm also a little freaked out by how much my life is being mirrored by the episodes of Sex and The City that I'm recording on my oh-so-loved Sky + box. Today Carrie went to San Francisco to promote her new book and plans to shag Mr Big, only he's read her book and wants to discuss the intimate revelations that she made about her feelings about him rather than have sex.
My book is with a few agents, not a publisher, and my book tour is still a distant dream. So that's not the similarity. I'm not sure my current lover qualifies as a Mr Big and the only place I write about him properly is in my journal for, well, all kinds of reasons. But I am struggling with the issue of what to say and what not to say, what I can reveal and what I can't reveal, in case 'he' reads it, in case my mother reads it, in case my father does. I'm getting better, to be fair. I used to worry about what everyone would think - even total strangers. I don't worry about that so much. I know most of my friends like my writing, but even if they don't I'm past caring as long as I think it's of good quality.
I'd love an agent who likes what I've got to say and how I say it and soon after getting one of those I'd predictably like a publisher that feels the same way, but outside of that I'm still a little hung up on what those closest to me will think. It's an impossible situation. As a writer all of life is grist for the mill but with many topics I still fear revealing too much of myself; my feelings, my vulnerability.
Unlike Carrie, I'm not in a situation where I'm simply trying to get laid and as I have, in the past, laid out my hurts, I've ended up with my ex apologising rather than shagging me all night. But I do worry about the consequences of putting myself out there and saying what I feel and think and do. I'm sure we've all learned from the Abby Lee experience that blogs are not entirely anonymous. I decided to use my name in mine precisely to get over these fears. I will, given time.
Monday, 22 January 2007
My crazy family
I had such a marvellous family day yesterday. After escorting my six-year-old daughter Kiera to her first dance exams I came home to cook a roast dinner for eight. My Dad came with my stepmum and I'd invited the 'other' part of my family, namely my seventeen-year-old stepson Ben, his Mum Sam, his stepdad Chris and Sam and Chris's little boy Dylan.
I know most people think it's weird that my ex-husband's first wife Sam and I are such good friends. There was a time when I found it weird too; when it was all new to us after years of ignoring and hating one another. But I realised yesterday, watching my Dad extend his affection for Sam by teasing her mercilessly and aggressively about Dylan still sleeping in her bed, how normal and familiar we all are to each other now.
There was a time when I thought that my life would only ever be okay if Sam were to fall off the face of the earth and never come back. I forget that when we're together. We don't have family get togethers for the kids' sake or because we're being politically correct as a stepfamily. That is how the get togethers started seven years ago, but now we do it because it's the only right and natural thing to do. Watching my Dad communicate in the only way that he knows how as he does with my sister and me and seeing Sam retaliate as I do; by taking the piss right back, she almost felt like a sister.
It was the book that did it. We had managed to become friends before, but writing Back and Forth and having to share our stories, the lows that Sam went to for her drug addiction, the times that I excluded her from her son's life, has brought a closeness that I would never have believed possible. Sam's son Ben has been my family for eleven years now. My familial relationship with his mother is more recent, but no less strong.
I know most people think it's weird that my ex-husband's first wife Sam and I are such good friends. There was a time when I found it weird too; when it was all new to us after years of ignoring and hating one another. But I realised yesterday, watching my Dad extend his affection for Sam by teasing her mercilessly and aggressively about Dylan still sleeping in her bed, how normal and familiar we all are to each other now.
There was a time when I thought that my life would only ever be okay if Sam were to fall off the face of the earth and never come back. I forget that when we're together. We don't have family get togethers for the kids' sake or because we're being politically correct as a stepfamily. That is how the get togethers started seven years ago, but now we do it because it's the only right and natural thing to do. Watching my Dad communicate in the only way that he knows how as he does with my sister and me and seeing Sam retaliate as I do; by taking the piss right back, she almost felt like a sister.
It was the book that did it. We had managed to become friends before, but writing Back and Forth and having to share our stories, the lows that Sam went to for her drug addiction, the times that I excluded her from her son's life, has brought a closeness that I would never have believed possible. Sam's son Ben has been my family for eleven years now. My familial relationship with his mother is more recent, but no less strong.
Thursday, 18 January 2007
Speak only the truth
Must. Speak. My. Truth. Or write it. Or express it any way that is necessary! Such a marvellously easy sounding spiritual truth that can range from slightly difficult to downright impossible in practice.
A friend reminded me of David Icke yesterday. Yikes! Talk about nearly giving me a coronary. I'm aware I might have some things to write about that might be uncomfortable for me, or my family, or my friends. I even know that I might have to write some confrontational ideas that will challenge even people totally unknown to me. But to David Icke's level? Big deep breath. I am so not ready for that.
Don't get me wrong; I know already that I am highly opinionated and that some of my opinions are unpopular. Take Tuesday and shopping with my very slightly younger sister Lisa. I told her that I'd seen a teenage girl wearing a pair of jeans the day before with a Playboy logo on them. Lisa doesn't like them because, apparently, the Playboy logo is only worn by Chavs. I told her that if anyone ever buys my daughter any item with a Playboy logo on it I'll take her out in the garden and we can burn it together. Extreme? Who knows? It's perfectly logical to me that we really shouldn't be teaching little girls or young women how to be lap dancers or porn stars, but my peers often don't seem to notice these things as I do. Or they think that I make too much out of it. Whatever.
I'm currently hoping that I can bang on about how our society and our government undermine breastfeeding to the detriment of the health of our children, how I despise the over-medicalisation of the process of birth, why I home educated my daughter, why Nuts magazine has got to go and say that we need to see more pictures of naked men around the place because women are too visually stimulated! All of this I am prepared to say and more. It's the finding out if I've got to go as far as David Icke that's fucking terrifying. Gulp.
A friend reminded me of David Icke yesterday. Yikes! Talk about nearly giving me a coronary. I'm aware I might have some things to write about that might be uncomfortable for me, or my family, or my friends. I even know that I might have to write some confrontational ideas that will challenge even people totally unknown to me. But to David Icke's level? Big deep breath. I am so not ready for that.
Don't get me wrong; I know already that I am highly opinionated and that some of my opinions are unpopular. Take Tuesday and shopping with my very slightly younger sister Lisa. I told her that I'd seen a teenage girl wearing a pair of jeans the day before with a Playboy logo on them. Lisa doesn't like them because, apparently, the Playboy logo is only worn by Chavs. I told her that if anyone ever buys my daughter any item with a Playboy logo on it I'll take her out in the garden and we can burn it together. Extreme? Who knows? It's perfectly logical to me that we really shouldn't be teaching little girls or young women how to be lap dancers or porn stars, but my peers often don't seem to notice these things as I do. Or they think that I make too much out of it. Whatever.
I'm currently hoping that I can bang on about how our society and our government undermine breastfeeding to the detriment of the health of our children, how I despise the over-medicalisation of the process of birth, why I home educated my daughter, why Nuts magazine has got to go and say that we need to see more pictures of naked men around the place because women are too visually stimulated! All of this I am prepared to say and more. It's the finding out if I've got to go as far as David Icke that's fucking terrifying. Gulp.
Tuesday, 16 January 2007
It's quite a time
I knew 2007 was always destined to be totally different to 2006 but even I'm amazed at what's happened already in the two weeks since the New Year's celebrations.
Fear and judgement are everywhere and we're all fighting against it. I think we're getting rid of old stuff so that we can move on and are prepared. I'm being judged by my Mom about the man that I'm seeing. My Dad was unfaithful so there's a whole load of projection going on that I'm having to distance myself from in order to live my own life. My friend Carole convinced herself she had cancer last week. She has a bad throat for sure, but a huge fear of dying almost overtook her. My other friend Ian went back to work to have panic attacks - fear again.
I'm scared of all kinds of things but mostly I'm frightened of falling asleep again like so many people are and not being awake to all the wonderfulness that can be found in extreme change. I'm excited. I can feel the shifts happening around us and I know that 2007 is going to be a huge year for me. It's time for us all to stop using our minds to create negativity and bad experiences in our lives and instead, harness that incredible power to create the lives that we truly want and deserve.
I'm going to try my hardest to do that every single day, which is why I'm writing it down, to help me remember.
Fear and judgement are everywhere and we're all fighting against it. I think we're getting rid of old stuff so that we can move on and are prepared. I'm being judged by my Mom about the man that I'm seeing. My Dad was unfaithful so there's a whole load of projection going on that I'm having to distance myself from in order to live my own life. My friend Carole convinced herself she had cancer last week. She has a bad throat for sure, but a huge fear of dying almost overtook her. My other friend Ian went back to work to have panic attacks - fear again.
I'm scared of all kinds of things but mostly I'm frightened of falling asleep again like so many people are and not being awake to all the wonderfulness that can be found in extreme change. I'm excited. I can feel the shifts happening around us and I know that 2007 is going to be a huge year for me. It's time for us all to stop using our minds to create negativity and bad experiences in our lives and instead, harness that incredible power to create the lives that we truly want and deserve.
I'm going to try my hardest to do that every single day, which is why I'm writing it down, to help me remember.
Wednesday, 10 January 2007
Seeing into the future
I read Mr Christmas to four-year-old Dylan last night. He's the son of my friends Sam and Chris. Well, I say friends - it's more complicated than that. Sam was married to my ex-husband Roger before I was. They had a son Ben together, whom I raised from 1996 to 2005 because Sam used to have a drug problem.
So there I was, reading a Mr Men book to my stepson's half-brother. The young son of my ex-husband's ex-wife. Or my ex-husband's first wife. My ex-wife-in-law. We struggle, Sam and I, with what to call one another. At one time, we were enemies, but now that we are friends the use of the word 'friends' doesn't quite cover the incredible journey that we've taken together, how we set aside our problems to share the mothering of a little boy that we both love deeply in our different ways.
Eleven years ago I used to read Mr Men books to my stepson Ben. At that time I had no idea where his mother even was; I simply resented her for not being there. I didn't know that eleven years later we would have written a book together and become so close, that Ben would once again be living with his mother and I would be reading a similar book to Ben's younger brother Dylan, my own daughter Kiera at her dance class, now both Sam and I divorced from our children's father Roger.
Driving home I blasted Madonna's Confessions album at full volume - pure genius by the way - and marvelled at my life and the blessed changes it puts me through. Sometimes hard, sometimes impossible, but always full of growth and amazement. I found myself filled with joy at the wonder of it all.
So there I was, reading a Mr Men book to my stepson's half-brother. The young son of my ex-husband's ex-wife. Or my ex-husband's first wife. My ex-wife-in-law. We struggle, Sam and I, with what to call one another. At one time, we were enemies, but now that we are friends the use of the word 'friends' doesn't quite cover the incredible journey that we've taken together, how we set aside our problems to share the mothering of a little boy that we both love deeply in our different ways.
Eleven years ago I used to read Mr Men books to my stepson Ben. At that time I had no idea where his mother even was; I simply resented her for not being there. I didn't know that eleven years later we would have written a book together and become so close, that Ben would once again be living with his mother and I would be reading a similar book to Ben's younger brother Dylan, my own daughter Kiera at her dance class, now both Sam and I divorced from our children's father Roger.
Driving home I blasted Madonna's Confessions album at full volume - pure genius by the way - and marvelled at my life and the blessed changes it puts me through. Sometimes hard, sometimes impossible, but always full of growth and amazement. I found myself filled with joy at the wonder of it all.
Monday, 8 January 2007
I guess it was always going to be a funny day when you wake up and decide that you're going to tell your mother that you've been sleeping with someone she'll disapprove of. So why did I do that?
You have to understand something about my mother. I was never going to get away with it for very long. We're talking about the woman who, four years after the actual event, told me she knew which boyfriend I'd lost my virginity to and when, despite the fact that it had taken place in another city far from my home town.
Before today she already knew something was 'up' with me so I was running on limited time. I know that the sleeping with a potentially unsuitable man may well be the interesting part, but I apologise because that's not why I told her. I told her because of my writing.
In one way or another I've been working directly on my writing for five years now. It took me until the autumn of 2005 to publish anything for anyone else to read and that was mainly for friends. I spent most of 2006 working on a book that's currently with agents, one of whom is going to call me very soon telling me they are dying to work with me, I just know it.
Part of the writing battle is always worrying about how your work will be received. At first it's a general 'will anyone like it'. After a time you get into specifics. When I started writing about spirituality I was terrified about what my atheist father would think. I was right; he did hate it, but fortunately for me by the time that had happened I had accepted that and was fine with it.
The book that I've written only frightens me a little. It's my story; a true story of a stepmother with custody of her stepson and it's the story of my stepson's mother watching me raising her child. There's no-one to offend - except perhaps the ex-husband that she and I share - but it's all true and as a result I'm not concerned.
After all of this I started thinking about some of the things that I'd really like to say. I want to voice some of my more objectionable opinions. The ones that I've always been told to shut up about. The ones that make me feel that nobody will ever want me to be their friend or lover again.
When I do this, I want to be in a space where I no longer worry about what my parents think. I believe someone famous once said that most writers never write anything interesting until their parents are dead. I don't want to wait until then, so I told my mother about the man. I'm going to put myself in a space where I can be open and vulnerable about everything in my life, especially the stuff that I'm most sensitive about. To write, I have to.
You have to understand something about my mother. I was never going to get away with it for very long. We're talking about the woman who, four years after the actual event, told me she knew which boyfriend I'd lost my virginity to and when, despite the fact that it had taken place in another city far from my home town.
Before today she already knew something was 'up' with me so I was running on limited time. I know that the sleeping with a potentially unsuitable man may well be the interesting part, but I apologise because that's not why I told her. I told her because of my writing.
In one way or another I've been working directly on my writing for five years now. It took me until the autumn of 2005 to publish anything for anyone else to read and that was mainly for friends. I spent most of 2006 working on a book that's currently with agents, one of whom is going to call me very soon telling me they are dying to work with me, I just know it.
Part of the writing battle is always worrying about how your work will be received. At first it's a general 'will anyone like it'. After a time you get into specifics. When I started writing about spirituality I was terrified about what my atheist father would think. I was right; he did hate it, but fortunately for me by the time that had happened I had accepted that and was fine with it.
The book that I've written only frightens me a little. It's my story; a true story of a stepmother with custody of her stepson and it's the story of my stepson's mother watching me raising her child. There's no-one to offend - except perhaps the ex-husband that she and I share - but it's all true and as a result I'm not concerned.
After all of this I started thinking about some of the things that I'd really like to say. I want to voice some of my more objectionable opinions. The ones that I've always been told to shut up about. The ones that make me feel that nobody will ever want me to be their friend or lover again.
When I do this, I want to be in a space where I no longer worry about what my parents think. I believe someone famous once said that most writers never write anything interesting until their parents are dead. I don't want to wait until then, so I told my mother about the man. I'm going to put myself in a space where I can be open and vulnerable about everything in my life, especially the stuff that I'm most sensitive about. To write, I have to.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)