Tuesday 19th of August 2003 – Summer Holidays/Giving up smoking
You had your booster injections yesterday. I took Monday and Tuesday off as Marlene is on holiday. Your grandma is doing the rest of this week (taking you to Wales on Friday and bringing you back next week). On Monday we went to the Lido in Parliament Hill. Never been to one in England before, believe it or not! It’s big! It wasn’t busy, as the heatwave is over (oh, it’s been hot, the hottest day ever was recorded 2 Sundays ago at 38c!) and the temperatures are back down to a pleasant 23 C on average. The water was freezing though and I couldn’t bear to go in, apart for a little while at the end. We were there for 4 hours just people watching and eating.
There was a funny little episode where a girl of about 10 years of age walked over from one side of the lido to the other (where we were) carrying a prosthetic leg. You shouted: ‘Mum, look, it’s a leg!!!!!’. And then said, ‘it’s not a real leg, is it? It doesn’t have any hairs’. Children started gathering around the leg and then a man who was in the kids pool shouted ‘That’s my leg, that is!’. He eventually came out. The stump looked a bit obscene, don’t know why… So he reattached his leg, while you watched intently and I explained to you how a leg can be lost forever.
We went back home at 3, got our socks, changed into trousers and went back to Parliament Hill, to go skating. I’ve been taking you skating lately, and would like to take you even more often, but you’re not anywhere near as keen as I am. It all came back to me, it really is like riding a bike, although the finer tricks I can’t do anymore. Guess I need better skates and more practice for that. Now you have a helmet and you’re improving, but I think it’ll take quite a while for you to become proficient. How strange, I don’t even remember learning how to skate, thought it was something I picked up in an afternoon, but obviously not. Mind you, I was 7… You’re only 4! But that means that once you learn you’ll be the best. (Damn, keep getting interrupted by work, keep losing my train of thought). I’m having troubles skating though, because I put the fast Bauer wheels (which were on the larger skates) into the smaller boots. They are different systems so the whole thing isn’t very stable. Might have to put the slower wheels back on and eventually buy a pair of decent (expensive) skates.
My temper hasn’t been great lately and I’m really having to force myself not to explode every 5 minutes. I really hope this will pass or else I’ll start smoking again, because I really don’t want to be this irritable, on the edge person I seem to be right now. The worse thing is that I’m only that way where family is involved. In every other situation I’ve been ok since I gave up. Very disturbing! I haven’t been as patient as usual with you on a couple of occasions and that makes me really mad at myself. On the whole, though, I do notice that I have more patience, so it might be worth it in the end.
Yesterday we went to the supermarket in the morning. Then I realised that you needed your booster MMR/diphteria, whooping cough, polio, etc injections (that’s why I’d taken Tuesday off in the first place!). So we had lunch and went to the clinic in Essex Road. Not sure why we got a letter from them. We never even been there! The place was packed! You were so brave, didn’t even cry. I told you it was ok to cry but you refused to! You were so brave you got a Winnie the Pooh certificate and lots of hugs from me. We then got the bus home, I ate lots of crisps and I haven’t been able to stop eating since Sunday! (More about giving up smoking later) and we went swimming. We had a lovely time in the pool, but on the way back I think you were too tired. You threw the shampoo lead that you insisted on keeping at me, I got annoyed and just marched down the road while you screamed all the way home ‘I want my lead’ (it had landed inside someone’s garden and couldn’t be reached). Argh! It was awful, at one point I had to drag you home while you screamed. I felt like a murderer or something. When we got home you were dragging yourself up the stairs, step by step, making the biggest drama in the world. ‘Oh, my legs hurt’ ‘Oh, my arms hurt’. I just sat there and counted to 1000. After 5 minutes everything was fine again, we hugged and went to pick you grandma up.
Of course, your grandma has the knack of always saying something to wind me up. In the car she says: ‘Oh, I’ve got this lovely cake that you can have for breakfast tomorrow’. Cake, for breakfast? Doh! On Saturday morning, you came into the room to wake me up and when I saw you I nearly had a heart attack. Your fringe had been hacked to pieces and you looked bonkers. Luckily J was there, otherwise I would have killed your grandmother. (More on J later, it’s been a busy weekend!). So I got her out of bed (she only gets up at lunch time) and made her take you to the hairdressers and fix your hair. Of course, she made me pay for it, because she never has any money. Worse still, now your dad never has any money either (mmm, has he ever had any? I know he tries but I can’t help feeling that he spends all his money on other stuff), so when you go away to Wales I’m the one paying for it, no help from him.
Never mind that I’m buying a place and have money leaking out of every pore in my body. Oh, no, nobody else in the world has money. If I lost my job we’d have NOBODY to rely on financially, except for the government! No pressure then!
Your grandma’s other gem: microwaving bacon. In fact she’ll microwave anything, including bread and butter. Just put it in the toaster for God’s sake! She really drives me nuts, she does. On top of that there’s the constant nagging and criticising and questioning. I really have to stop myself from killing her sometimes. She NEVER does any housework to help me out a bit. She’s never hovered, ironed, tidied up, washed a pan (she only washes plates!!! What is that about???), made up a bed, put the washing machine on, put the dry clothes away. When I come home from work (when she picks you up) I’m the one going straight to the kitchen while she sits down and spends time with you!!! Because she can’t cook (another useful thing she manages not to be able to do) a proper meal……….
ARHGHHHHH! Why couldn’t my mum be more helpful, like Linda? I guess the trade off for travelling when I was small and then ending up in England because of my mum is this? But why does there have to be a trade off? Surely she could have done both? I have the weirdest mother in the whole world. You’ll probably think that about me when you’re older. But at least I’m be able to clean and cook for myself. When she had a job she paid someone to do all the domestic work, I can’t afford to do that, but it would cost her nothing to help me out, cook something or clean up a bit. I know I would if it was me.