Fear Itself: Me and My Maternal Side

My life is punctuated by moments which are, on reflection, rather alarming. I am, as my friends/family/strangers-on-the-street can attest, a somewhat maternal person, which for most people involves a certain need to nurture, a tendency to worry and an inevitable desire to (one day) have children. The fully fledged maternal types are out there with their yummy mummy Bugaboos, their organic, home made baby food and their eco friendly, terry cloth nappies. This is the Western middle class vision of motherhood and it promises beauty, wonder and many, many decaf lattes in the Mecca that is Starbucks. Of course the playdate swapping, bugaboo pushing elements aside, motherhood is notoriously one of the most gruelling, stressful and hardcore things a woman can do. The difficulty of being a mother is not lost on me, though of course these things cannot be truly appreciated until experienced. But back to my original point – my life is littered with WTF moments that suggest my maternal instinct is running about six degrees hotter than normal, and it is really starting to scare me.

I have always been one to coo at a cute baby passing by, or glance admiringly at a pregnant woman’s belly, sighing to myself about the miracle of life. I have always loved looking at my own baby pictures, and picturing myself some day sitting in a rocking chair, babe in arms, looking impossibly gorgeous (soft focus of course) and just being a wonderful mum. I would be part of the latte tribe, pushing my designer push chair around Hampstead Heath, stopping to chat with my fellow yummy mummies about diaper rash, cradle cap and the latest of our various familial dramas. Picture me, wind machine in place, swanning around in a maxi dress (maxi dresses involve an obligatory amount of swanning) with a smiling happy baby on one hip, while I simultaneously make organic salads and grow my own vegetables.



I even have an alternate reality as a single mother, in which I basically live out my own version of the Gilmore Girls, complete with sleepy American town and lovable local characters, raising a daughter who magically becomes my best friend.



At what point did the fantasy go too far..? The salad? You got me there – I don’t even like salad. But I am that scary – I want all of these fantasies so much that I like nothing more than a good long session picturing a dream version of motherhood. I am the scary childless woman that finds herself wondering around Mothercare on a Saturday afternoon; I am the woman who is already trying to decide between Pampers and Huggies; I am the woman who can tell you the name, price and ingredients of most ready made baby foods. And you thought it was bad that you’d already picked your future kids’ names.

At what point did I become this scary? I have worked out a vision so elaborate, so unlikely, that I actively crave it, despite the fact that I am broke, unemployed and to top it off, single. Don’t get me wrong – I have no plans whatsoever to have babies for at least ten years. It makes absolutely no sense in terms of my life plan, my situation… everything. I can only attribute this desire to some strange biological need which surfaces every time I wonder past Mamas and Papas on Regent St.

And it’s not just the scary fantasies, or the freakish knowledge of the baby market – I find myself actively worrying about people all the time. The moment someone is an hour late and un-contactable, I see car crashes, accidents, kidnappings – I work out scenarios of how to react, what to do, how to deal. In worst case scenarios, I call local hospitals to make sure the offending late-comer has not been admitted, because by the time I have wondered if they are there or not, I can’t convince myself to stop worrying. Are my kids going to love me, or what? I might just be the world's scariest mother.



So there you have it – a frightening insight into a scary brain. Don’t worry though – for now, only a tiny part of me is concerned with rocking chairs and baby food. The dominant parts of me are concerned with the grave prospects of finding a job, a place to live… the usual things required for general human survival. There’s no part of me that believes a baby is what I need. No part of me whatsoever.

For now.

Belgium: amusing things I have seen

they have some very tiny pineapples.


...but their peppers are huge.


they have some really creepy maternity clothes.


i have no idea what this is either. it looks like a cross between a melon and a grapefruit.


lol.


ketchup is apparently mexican?


i still haven't found out what this is but it's everywhere.



they add strange things to juice and call it 'essential'. (essential for yoga, apparently?)


they picked a much more apt name for twilight.


they have a sense of humour.

All in all, Belgium is proving to be quite amusing. Dear old Daddy is moving here, hence the slightly random visit. Goodbye Pa for now. Enjoy your time on the continent!

Stella Artois s’il vous plait, or ‘the worst skiing of my life, and why I’m loving it’

Picture the scene: beautiful sunshine, fresh white snow, manicured pistes and a mountain that looks like a freaking postcard. The piste-bashers are out constantly, carving out that gorgeous corduroy snow, and people everywhere are smiling and feeling smug, saying ‘this is what life is all about.’

Yeah, that was last year. Not long ago in sunny Vail, on what was one of the best weeks of my life, I thought I might just be the luckiest girl in all the world – and to be fair, I was probably in the top ten. This year however, minus a quarter of our family unit, I optimistically ventured out with just Ma and Pa to the French Alps for a week of pure skiing bliss.



By the time we reached the queue at Gatwick (note, we were queuing outside the terminal at 6:30am) I started to wonder why we hadn’t picked a different airline. An hour into the queue later, I sat on my 20kg bag of boots and thermals and wondered why we hadn’t gone to Tahiti instead.

A short flight to the world’s most inefficient airport later (thanks Chambery for that thrilling hour), we were on a coach to the mountains. The lack of snow was a little disconcerting, but we figured we would see snow once we got to our resort. Before long we were at the chalet, and shown to a room small enough to rival Harry Potter’s cupboard under the stairs. With three tiny single beds crammed into a tiny room, I felt like Goldilocks meets Alice in Wonderland. Fourteen people staying in a chalet that should probably sleep eight is also rather interesting – I have already made enemies with a fat man that used the term ‘fagotty’ in front of me. If you’re going to be a dick, mate, at least use a real freaking word.

And then there is the snow – slushy, sugary and in many cases non-existant, the snow is the worst stuff I have ever attempted to ski on. Gone are the days of carving gorgeous turns in the pristine powder – now I am lucky to make it down a blue run in one piece without snow plough. And skiing is something I consider myself to be not bad at – pistes that wouldn’t phase me have become ‘too narrow’ or ‘too steep’. Painkillers for breakfast and Stella for lunch is the only real way to make it through the day without crying. Combine the slightly permanent grimace with the French plaits I have been wearing and I look like I have recently enrolled in the Hitler Youth.

But alas, it is not all bad. The three course meals in the evening have been pretty darn good and the endless amount of wine is highly agreeable. We have even played the odd round of Articulate with some of the nicer guests, though I did struggle to contain the freakishly competitive side of me when it comes to board games. And though my legs ache, my feet hurt and my morale is shot to shit, I am having a wonderful week away. Promise.

Aside from discovering I do in fact still speak French, I have also discovered I have completely abnormal posture (thank you lovely French man for sorting out my boots) which makes skiing more painful. Typical – and all that time people thought I was being a drama queen! Imagine! And even though my sister is not here, the fact that Ma and Pa and I are in it together makes it rather amusing. From exchanging looks across the dinner table to sneaking off for a cheeky vino, mummy and daddy dearest have once again proven to be more than your average parents.

Though next time they tell me they’ve booked a really great chalet for skiing, I will think twice about believing them.

Lie #4 - an apple a day keeps the doctor away

*if you don’t like to read blogs about vomit of any kind, best you don’t read this one

I generally consider myself to be a healthy ish person. Ok, so my gym card probably has cobwebs on it, and the last time I went for a run was somewhere in 2007, but I drink orange juice and eat bananas for breakfast, so that counts for something, right? I even take vitamins every few weeks, which I am sure staves off the worst illnesses. I buy plenty of fresh veg and make my own soups, lasagnes, casseroles. Healthy, right? But apparently spending far too much on a cute yoga outfit and a few courgettes does not protect one from the ravages of certain winter illnesses. And for someone who considers their immune system to be tip top, imagine my dismay last week when I discovered I was actually sick.

And I mean sick. Not weepy chick flick sick, but actual fever, actual pain – and dare I say it, actual vomit. Bleugh. Apparently Thursday was not a hangover after all – it was a warm up. And by Friday I was doing full scale stomach pyrotechnics. And sick is not a look I do well. Hello puffy red face, goodbye happiness of any kind. Goodbye desire to eat lasagne ever again. Seriously, you should never, ever have to see that stuff when it’s been in your stomach for 4 hours. It isn’t pretty.



After about 2 hours of legging it to the bathroom every 10 minutes, I began to realise I was actually sick. Some bastard bug had gotten into my system somehow and was turning my insides out. Talk about a digestive system fuck up. A few miserable phone calls to my mum (nurse) and my sister (doctor) later and they had confirmed what Google and I suspected – norovirus. Goddamn.

Norovirus is the one that they get on Holby City when they have to close down and quarantine a whole ward at a time. Quick acting, nasty and as contagious as they come, it is the most common winter vomiting disease. Apparently, between 600,000 and 1,000,000 people in the UK get it every year. Jeez, not only do I feel crappy, now I just feel cheap.

Confined to my bed (under normal circumstances a blessing, in this case not so much), I miserably clutched my duvet and stared weakly at my laptop, willing the sickness to pass. After three days, two rice krispie bars, 40+ hours of sleep, three High School Musical films (stop judging me, I love them) and 17 episodes of CSI (mmm Sara) later, I started to see the other side (of sickness, not life).



And this evening, though my whole abdomen still feels like it’s been tenderised with a mallet, I proclaimed myself healthy.

But why, I ask myself, did I fall sick in the first place? I guess we will never really know. I know my sporadic yoga habits won’t protect me from everything (dude, healthiness is as much a state of mind as anything yaa), and OJ and porridge won’t save you from the worst of diseases, but I totally thought I had some cover from common illnesses. Surely being healthy ish buys you out of a bugs? Clearly the apple a day logic is bullshit – unless I don’t want rickets or something. And who gets rickets in the UK these days anyway!? You don’t even see rickets on Grey’s Anatomy! So yeah, cheers Ma and Pa for your apple logic. I still got ill didn’t I?!

Though to be fair, I did lose a couple of pounds. Goodbye puffy, hello sexy.

Now where’s that gym card…?

Lie #3 - And they all lived happily ever after...

When I was a kid, my biggest fear was that our house would be burgled. That at some point in the night, strangers would break into our house and take the TV and the stereo, before riding off into the sunset in a getaway car, driven by some man with a balaclava and black eyes. It wasn’t so much the stuff being taken that worried me; I came to realise later that it was the shift in power that scared me. This was probably the first sign of being a control freak, and I will forever blame my parents for not shoving me into therapy straight away to nip that in the bud.



Aside from neuroses and a pretty severe case of dramaticus queenicus, growing up has never really frightened me. I have always been a cheerleader for love – right from when I was a little girl I would ask every couple I knew how they met, how he proposed, did they or did they not imagine staying together forever (hey, I was a precocious eight year old). I always imagined I would grow up, meet my future husband at university, get married at 22 and be settled with kids by the time I hit my 24th year.

I am not sure where I factored in a high flying career, but the feminist in me reckons it was in there somewhere. I would then raise my children in a big house with dogs and cats and chickens (yes, chickens) and learn things like ceramics and knitting, while writing my bestselling novel in the evenings while the children were asleep. You can’t say my hopes and dreams weren’t thorough, if a little clichéd.

Now that I am in my final year of university, with my 21st birthday being a mere week away, I am starting to worry I may only have 6 months left in which to find the perfect husband in time to marry them, AND have 2.4 children before my time is up. If only it were that clear cut. No one warns you about recessions when you are a kid. No one tells you that you might never meet the perfect man or woman. No one tells you that nearly half of all marriages end in divorce these days. No one tells you that you can marry a girl instead of a boy (though to be fair to my parents, they have been suggesting I get a girlfriend since I was about 13). No one tells you you might have trouble conceiving and thus may never get your 2.4 children with the Volvo to match. Sorry Mum and Dad, but where is my happily ever after? I am still waiting for the fairy tale to start, let alone end with marriage and babies. If Sleeping Beauty could nab a husband in her sleep, why can’t I find mine in the harsh light of day??



My plan has clearly got a major flaw. Possibly something to do with life getting in the way. Like, seriously. Who knew I would have no time at all to go man hunting when I have a dissertation, a newspaper section and a social life to worry about? I will almost definitely continue to plan out every aspect of my life, but I am starting to realise that I am really not in control of most of it, and that scares the hell out of me. But I have started to realise that makes it a little bit more exciting – you never know who you are going to meet, what you are going to find, what opportunities might come your way. Similarly, you don’t know if you are going to crash your car, have a stroke, get your heart broken. If I could just console the control freak with the dreamer, maybe I would be alright.

Still, getting older and freaking out about it does have its perks. I get to stash away my Disney dreams for a few more months of shameless student life before I really have to worry. And if I haven’t gotten something sorted by graduation, there’s always a Masters…

Wish me luck. I have a feeling I'm going to need it.

Lie #2 - Prince Charming

The hiatus is over; the blog has returned.

Picture the scene. You are wearing your new sparkly party dress, heels you need painkillers to walk in and a smile that says, “I am me. I am incredible. I can take on the world.” You are chatting with your friends as you walk through the bar, you toss your hair back and laugh attractively… and just then some absolute scrotum of a man grabs your head and mashes his mouth up against yours. Delightful.

Now I am not one to deny I have had a fair few (insert shameful number here) cheeky snogs in my time, but none of them involved raping the face of an innocent bloke plucked from obscurity by my vastly exaggerated sense of self worth. It seems the right cocktail of testosterone and trebles can convince any man that we are back in the Stone Age – and I don’t know about you, but I don’t fancy being dragged back to some guy’s cesspit by the hair.

Now before the menfolk start wailing, I am not suggesting women are any better. In fact we are just as bad. We totter around in heels and mini skirts, made up to the nines and drinking fruity little drinks, while eyeing up the talent (or lack thereof) on display. A few drinks later and we find ourselves grinding with some guy nicknamed Banana who does architecture and plays cricket on weekends. And you’re lucky if you get that much information.

A drink or two after that and you will be mashed up against Steve/Bob/Fred/your-best-friend-Helen, furiously making out as if your lives depended on it. (NB: this sort of face-rape is acceptable; non-consensual face-rape is NOT) For some people, the night ends here; for others, it goes further. Regardless of your personal taste for casual snogs/sex/fumbles-in-the-taxi-home etc, it has come to my attention (only now, after two years of uni) that romance didn’t die on its own – we killed it.

When we are little boys and girls, we are taught that when we grow up, we will find someone perfect, marry them when we turn 20 and then have a host of kiddiewinks and live happily ever after. How old are we when we realise that it’s really a load of bollocks? 10? 15? 20? Does romance even exist? It seems to me that we signed up for unicorns and ended up with horses – they get the job done but they can’t fly, they can’t heal wounds and they aren’t even remotely sparkly. We still got the horn but it’s not exactly what we were looking for either.

The beauty of fairy tales lies in the fact that they make children hopeful – imagine how disappointed they would be if they knew what we all get up to on a Wednesday night in Tiger Tiger. And there is nothing wrong with it, but in the harsh light of day, it makes me a tad jaded to think of all the strangers I have pulled – kisses which should be passionate end up as carnage of the mouth, chemistry is just a subject you did at GCSE and the stranger you are locking lips with probably has a hairy back. When did we start settling for hormones and stop thinking about love?

Maybe I’m just old fashioned, but it sure would be nice to get to know a boy before I get to know his tonsils. I would be a hypocrite and a liar to say it’s not fun, but I can’t help but wonder, when do we settle down? When do we stop grabbing strangers in bars and start having conversations that end in a polite, gentle lip-lock at your front door? How am I going to find the right man if my mouth is otherwise engaged with some nobody who just happened to be there? If you have the answers, I am willing to hear them. Seriously.

So thanks Mum and Dad, you promised me Prince Charming and all I got was thirty three (unanswered) booty calls and saliva on my chin.

Lie #1 - Camping is Fun (but only when you're 8 and your Dad gets up at 6am to make you pancakes)

So, as mentioned in my previous blog, I was supposed to spend a week in the loving arms of British hippies, shunning technology and learning about compost and such. But alas, the Big Green Gathering was cancelled for political reasons (!?) and thus I was fated to spend the time visiting family in Cornwall with my friend E.

Fortunately for me, the fates had seen fit to give me what turned out to be a lovely three days with my family – grandparents, uncles and various family I rarely get to see. Blessed with a single day of good weather, E and I explored little towns all over Cornwall and even got to spend an evening with my godson and his brother – Louie and Alfie, two of my cousins. I should add here as a sidebar, that following an evening of playing snap (with postman pat cards), Alfie (who is 6) asked me to marry him, thus making my second marriage proposal of the year, and the third from a cousin since I was about 5… (I was once engaged to my cousin Tom when I was about 5 or 6, until my mother explained that our children might be a little retarded so it was probably for the best that we called it off). I am clearly destined to either marry into my own family or have a seriously underage toyboy. Things are not looking good.

Anyway, I digress. Back to Cornwall. So E and I spent three magical days in which the familial harmony renewed my faith in the goodness of mankind etc, and then decided to go camping for three days, up near Bude. I have been camping on several occasions throughout my life, and despite the doubtful looks I get from friends, I have always prided myself on being good at camping. I view myself as having a sort of reckless abandon when out in the elements – a Pocahontas-esque image of myself standing at a waterfall with the wind whipping through my hair and making me look incandescently beautiful, while a chorus of wild birds sing out some Disney style crescendo. I even got cross with the man in Millets who asked if I was a ‘raver’ when I asked him if they sold glowsticks. “No,” I informed him crossly, “I am a serious camper with a wind up head torch and a special little stove and everything.”

Anyway, you can see where this is heading. Not only had E and I picked the most sorry little campsite in Cornwall, we had picked the worst weather you can possibly imagine. We trundled through the gates in my little Ford Ka (which had already done 500+ miles AND accidently gone to Devon when we were lost) and it promptly started to rain. And it only went downhill from there. Our practice run of putting up our six-man-tent-for-two had been in my quiet little back garden in Buckinghamshire – a far cry from the wilderness we now found ourselves in, struggling with a tent that kept trying to take to the skies in a whirl of beige and green nylon.


So we finally sat down, smug in our giant princess tent while the couple next door wriggled in and out of their standard two man tent, and read magazines and played cards and generally felt very cool and earthy and organic. I even bought a book of crosswords to complete the next day while lounging by the outdoor heated pool (which wasn’t open and looked like a hole in the ground as it was). After an hour of playing snap, the weather had become a force to be reckoned with, and E and I began exchanging glances of concern over our supposedly fabulous minimalistic holiday. Combine that with the fact that we forgot cutlery AND mugs (which led to spreading peanut butter with a three day old wooden chip fork and drinking schnapps from a measuring jug) and things were going seriously downhill. Shouting over the wind to one another, we questioned the stability of our tent, which was bending in a worrying angle in on us. Deciding that we were basically in a hurricane, we prayed for our safety and passed out around 11pm (following an eventful trip to the bathroom 250 m away in the howling wind and rain – sidebar: I was wearing cowprint hotpants and wellies with goretex – not a good look).

The next morning, we were puffy and exhausted and swore blind that camping was not for us. Admitting defeat and throwing away £30 worth of camping fees, we climbed back into my little car and spent 7 hours getting back to civilisation, where we had vanilla lattes and caramel hot chocolates. It seems my Pocahontas fantasy will have to wait until camping can be a little more accommodating… call me shallow, but until I can emerge from a tent without full waterproofs and gale force winds, I am sticking to hostels and hotels.