Tuesday, 29th January 2002
Emma’s baby is due today! (no sign of it yet).
Last night your father and I had a bit of an argument about you wanting to be a princess. When I got home from work, you said that daddy wouldn’t let you be the princess in Shrek. When you see a character you like, you ask us if you can pretend to be it. I just said that it was ok, you could be the princess, no big deal. Obviously not, R. got incensed, and said I was just confusing you. Oh, really? So why is it ok for you to want to pretend to be a tiger, or a monkey or whatever animal or person (as long as it’s a man!), but not a princess???? What’s so bad about wanting to be a feisty princess who kicks ass?
I remember as a child I wanted to be people I admired, and that’s all you’re doing. R. turned a normal desire into something bad! He’s so Victorian sometimes, and he reckons I’m undermining him. Well, he’s undermining the whole of womankind. Maybe if there were better male role models he’d want to be them. So far the only man you’ve wanted to be is Bob The Builder… I think that before people have children together they need to sit down and discuss how to handle situations like this, and then they might even decide that they’re not right for each other, because they’re so different. I’m so sick of arguing about everything, Daniel. I’m sick of having to go to work and to leave you behind. I wish you could come with me.
R. went to an agency, looking for some temp office work last week, and already he’s had 2 jobs and is on the way to his 3rd! Although the pay isn’t great (between £6.50 and £10.00 hour), it’s better than nothing! After I had a fit of frustration last weekend with the fact that I didn’t have a penny, and all R. used any money he ever had was to clear his debts, he seemed to wake up and started looking for work more vigorously (i.e., not on the internet).
If you want a job, you’ll get one (especially in London), don’t you ever forget that. Signing on is ok for a little while but the novelty soon wears off. When I signed on for over a year (end of pregnancy and your first 14 months of life), it was great, it gave me the opportunity to spend all that time with you. But for R. to sign on for this long, it’s a mystery to me. I know he was trying to get his business off the ground, but he could do that while working (that’s what Francis did)… Anyway, I’m at work, so I better go.