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Monday 15 September 2014

Hibernation

Mudmaid in the Lost Gardens of Heligan

Where have I been? What can I tell you? I'd love to say I've been lying in a forest letting moss grow over me.

I haven't. I have no moss. If I did lie still for longer than a moment (I do try: flinging myself on the bed under the guise of putting away ironing, I often get as long as 17 seconds) it's unlikely I would be covered in greenery - more likely I'd be subsumed in bits of laundry, or toast crusts, or a plastic medal for an event no-one can remember attending, or a cardboard box inexplicably painted a lurid green that must Never Be Thrown Away. It's an educated guess, based on the contents of the floor around me.

It was my understanding that as children got older, they stopped being quite so all-consuming. It was toddlers, I thought, that didn't give you two minutes space to go to the loo. Once you had a teenager and a child in KS2 (or Juniors, as it still exists in my elderly head) you'd be able to sustain a meaningful thought process; you'd be able to get through a Saturday morning without feeling that your brain had been violently stirred with a spoon.

Not so. And having searched all summer for a blog post that suggested some kind of personal growth, I gave up. I made a collage. Personal growth; a sense of achievement; clarity on the meaning of life - these things may never come. I best stop waiting, and just start filling the space.


15 comments:

  1. ok, I've tried leaving a comment via my phone... but it doesn't seem to be working... so personal growth... you're having a laugh! the only personal growth happening around here is around my waist.

    Sadly.

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    1. Via your phone? What? Don't you use a big computer that needs to be cranked up with a rotating lever?

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  2. We are KS2ing and blooming heck, if I walk away they kill each other! I am waiting for the parenting middleground

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    1. Ah yes. I can leave each of them for 20 minutes in the house on their own. But not together. They would be bleeding within minutes.

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  3. I've been expecting them to get easier as well, and finding that they are getting harder work. Fights breaking out every five minutes, piles and piles of stuff. I completely identify with the plastic medals and giant junk modelling and never staying still. I'd really like some personal growth too. I do keep thinking that I might get round to it eventually, but I'm starting to suspect it's one of those things that I'll look back at one day and realise it's never going to happen. I'm not there yet though, I'm still dreaming of getting it all together. One day, surely. CJ xx

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  4. My two take way less of my time at ages 10 and 13. And bonus, sometimes I can pop out and leave them at home on their own! I think I'm better off for alone time than maybe you are because I work evenings, so I get the blessed peace of school hours to sip my tea and play on the ipad. I do feel quite razzed by the end of the school holidays!

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    1. Sip? SIP? That sounds very relaxed and unhurried. I don't recognise this feeling at all.

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  5. I shall have to think of something sharper and heavier than toast crusts.

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  6. I thought teenagers would be easier, instead they present you with Impossibly Difficult homework, eat you out of house and home, oh and pat you on the head and say "little mummy".....................
    let's run away and leave them with the dads!

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  7. I very foolishly mis-timed the birth of our children such that I have 1 going to Uni (if she survives interrailing), 1 starting A levels after barely scraping sufficient GCSE's and 1 in the dreaded KS2 (no I do not want to explain every other word of Rumplestiltskin by Washington Irving whilst packing lunches, finding everyone's lost possessions, sorting washing and slurping cold tea). I have not had a restful, stress-free summer and I am up for a little light running away...
    another "small, cute Mummy"

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  8. Can think of worse ways to live a life than by filling in the space. Unless you do so by burning ants under magnifying glasses or stealing from old ladies. For instance. I think keeping useless green boxes is perfectly okay.

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  9. With only the briefest of pauses to regroup and collect my scattered wits, I am now worrying about the grand daughter. But at once removed I'm sure it will be easier and quite different. Ponies and ballet classes perhaps. Only had boys so not sure.

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  10. I only had the one and she was very easy. That's a long time ago now, she recently re-married. I do feel so old. Oh, wait - I am...:-(

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  11. I don’t know how should I give you thanks! I am totally stunned by your article. You saved my time. Thanks a million for sharing this article.

    ReplyDelete

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