Welcome to the fun

Welcome to the fun
Christmas Joy

Friday 30 September 2011

Day 58 - Bonkers Conkers

Today was nice. On collecting Summer from school I was presented with a surprise!
She was all sweaty when I got there , so I recoiled when she gave me a kiss- it’s essentially her fault for demanding to wear Ugg boots -sorry Pugg boots (Primark brought) leopard print leggings and a  long sleeve top on the hottest day of the year. We need to stop watching the only way is Essex.
Anyway...I am just heading out the classroom door when the after school club lady stops me. ‘’Oh yes, I need to give you this’’
Shit what is it, another medical slip, an exclusion letter, extra homework, social services letter....
‘’its a note home from her teacher’’ shit shit shitty shit.  I skulk back to collect the note that will ruin my weekend.
But neh, yeah of little faith mummy,  tis but a certificate of achievement ‘’Star of the Week’’ I have heard about these awards but thought them a fanciful piece of fiction, Summer bringing Mr Tumnus home for tea and cake was more likely .
On the back there is a hand written note from the teacher....to me... because I am her mother and I have born a star (see day 56 I told you so) Now I know how Mary felt – not my mate Mary,I mean  Jesus n Mary.
I start to read...
‘’In PE yesterday...’’ oh PE , not Star of Math or English....PE, never mind a star is a star ,more people know Usain Bolt than some Mathalete anyway.
‘’Summer worked well in the group and chose  to .....’’ I love the way her teachers always write ‘chose ‘ to  because Summer will only take part and excel in something she has chosen to do.
‘’Chose to develop a sequence of movements to create a dance’’ errrr isn’t that what dance is ??
‘’She listened very carefully to the music that was playing and kept with the tempo and the rhythm’’ Hell, she is black what you expect woman.
‘’Her dance was magnificent’’ oh do calm down dear
‘’...and told the story of a conkers experience during Autumn’’ ......ohhhh kaaayyyy then, someone picked up the hash cake at the bake sale today.
What does a conker experience during Autumn?  It sprouts, grows out of its shell, drops to the ground and then kids use it as weapons.  Shit she would have to be talented to dance that scene.
When we get home I ask her to perform this MAGNIFICENT dance. She willingly agrees.  She wants me to get involved, Stand like a tree, this I can do. I stand arms out like a tree, she stands underneath my armpit, dramatically drops to the ground in a ball. Then rolls around the floor ( a little bit too proactively if you ask me)
And now as promised many moons ago (thinking that I would never have to) I am grudgingly obliged to buy her a present as she won Star of the Week, for her ability to sexualise a conker.

Tuesday 27 September 2011

Day 58 - I have a dream

‘’you wanna hear about my dream?’’   was the first non abusive sentence Summer spoke this morning, before that was a series of Jamaican abuse and teeth kissing for daring to wake her up for school.
‘’there was a robot with lasers and it was killing people’’
I’m not really listening we have 5 mins to get out the door ‘’thats nice put your shoes on’’
‘’he killed you, daddy and the dog...me and the cat were fine’’  I am listening now because she says this with a smile and I vividly remember hearing her laughing in her sleep last night – now I know why.
On the way to the bus stop she pauses and looks into the fog ‘’this looks just like my dream, the monster is coming mum, he has lasers for arms – everyone is going to die, people will be dead in rivers’’ The people at the bus stop shuffle away from us.
‘’what will we do when it comes for us mum?’’
‘’its ok, Dad will sort him out there is no need to worry about monsters’’  I like to bring up Part time dad in public places, I think it surprises people that one can have a mixed race child and have  relationship with the father. It makes us seem modern and cultured rather than just another statistic. They don’t need to know he is a moron
‘’don’t be stupid mummy, Daddy would just save himself and the pub’’ now people know he is a moron.
All the way to school on the bus – Summer retells her dream at the perfect volume to ensure the whole bus is listening, as more and more people engage with her the more graphic she gets until she is wriggling on the floor gurgling showing how it will sound when the laser melts her belly.
No one is amused – they all look at me in disgust  - how can this small innocent child imagine such horrific scenes.  
‘’There is blood on the roads, there are zombies eating flesh and the only way I survive is by pretending I am a robot too and I must kill and lick the blood yum yum yum ‘’  I pull her down the school path as she screams and howls as the zombies in her mind are gnawing at school caretaker – who looks at her bemused as she whispers  ‘’save yourself, save yourself ‘’ to him.
I chuck her into breakfast club and she strolls into a room full of children eating jam on toast – I admire the new reception kids and remember how that was Summer just last year.
I mention to the club leader as I head out the door –‘’ don’t entertain her if she offers to tell you about her dream’’. They know this could mean trouble, this could lead to an army of kids scared and literally wetting their pants, As I walk away I see the class turn to listen to Summer, she throws her arms up in the air to tell her tale as the assistant leaps through the air to cover her mouth.  I wont be surprised if tomorrow I get a call from the school.

Friday 23 September 2011

Day 57 - Dear Mum

Dear Mum
Today I turned 30! I want to let you know that everything is alright. That like you said the choices I made would mean that life may be a little bit harder than they had to be – but I am doing it, despite your initial doubts.
To be honest I always thought you would be here, not for me but for Summer, like when I played that game when I was a kid, when I would leave you with my baby while I picked my husband up from the airport in the Porsche. I think you would have wanted that for me. Not this life with part time dad and Summer being cared for by strangers 8 hrs a day and me being the breadwinner. God I wish I could just leave Summer with you sometimes.
I was never going to fit the norm mum, but I think you liked that in me, a rebellious streak that you never let live yourself, my fondness for taking the wrong path, the way I always turned out ok in the end drove you insane and I still do it. And we are , we are OK. We would be better with you; Summer would probably be better behaved with you around. But she is healthy, strong and loved.. . . . . and mental, I ‘m not sure you being here would have changed that.
I think you would be proud of me, proud that I didn’t fall apart when you left, that I did things the right way as you wanted and I am glad you instilled that drive within me.  I still try and make you happy with things I do even though you’re not here.
So today I am 30 – an adult, not your baby any more. I didn’t get your card with its neat hand writing and embarrassing message, but that ok, I know you were there. I know you were the one that closed the tattoo parlour when after my third Jaeger bomb I decided to get a tattoo behind my ear tonight, the one who made me get the last train home and text to make sure Summer is ok.
I’m 30 now and it’s time that maybe I stop waiting for you to come back and save me – I still think you died to just prove a point, and stubborn as I am I proved you wrong – but you knew I would.
We still talk about you – we live in your home (thanks for that!)  I cringe when I find myself doing the same nerdy things you did for me as a child to Summer.  She moans about my cooking and singing too.
You would have really enjoyed her mum – she is nuts,
But listen I am a big girl now – so bugger off and have some fun up there, get stoned  or something radical, hell get laid by a black man!! . I’m fine. Don’t worry. You taught me well

Love
S x 

Tuesday 20 September 2011

Day 56 - Lunch

So we made it two weeks this school year before I get the call from the school office
‘’Hi mum, its Miss K’’ – in an instant my gut drops. Miss K only ever calls with bad news. She always starts off with the same line ‘’don’t worry Summers fine’’ you know, for once I wish she wasn’t fine. I wish the school would ring me because Summer is vomiting or running a temperature. At least then I could get a half day off work. No such luck for me – it’s always down to behaviour and I always get judged. Miss K really doesn’t like me. She has been there at the start of all my call ins to the head. She is the one who is concerned first about things like Summers erotic dancing at school and Summers insistence on running into walls to get plasters, she is the one that sees me drop Summer at school late when I am hung-over from a works party the night before (just the once).
. She is essentially the school secretary but she has been put on some half day course and transformed into parent liaison officer. Whatever that means. She has taken this extra responsibility on and with it power above her station and she is desperate to find a social services case. The easiest target so far is Summer.
‘’Summer has made a formal complaint to me’’ says Miss K – quite how a 5 yr old makes a formal complaint I don’t know. Does she do it via alphabetical flash cards or play dough animation ?
‘’She is refusing to eat her packed lunch’’  - so bloody what! make her eat it!
‘’ we here at (insert name of primary school) listen to children’’  she is reading this out of a manual. ‘’Summer is protesting about the quality of her packed lunch, the sandwich was soggy, she says the food is off and there is a funny smell in her lunch box’’ this all coming from a girl who I caught drinking washing up liquid yesterday.
Soggy sandwiches are part and parcel of school days aren’t they? – who has not had a soggy sandwich at least 10 times during their school life. I thought sandwiches were meant to be wet until I was 15!
I am smiling now at the thought of Summer protesting. Standing on a chair in the lunch hall making herself heard, demanding change, throwing her soggy sandwich to the ceiling and starting a petition. This is silly, and the school are calling me about a soggy sandwich. I wait for Miss K to crack, say how stupid  Summer is being, but she doesn’t, she is as appalled by the sandwich situation as Summer. She is taking this ‘formal’ complaint very seriously.
‘’Summer tells me that the lunchbox has been in the fridge for 2 days’’ Summer is a fucking liar and out to get me. I remind Miss K that this is not possible as she had the accused lunch box yesterday thus breaking this supposed  48hr fridge imprisonment.
‘’Summer is demanding school dinners from now on- we had to give her one today as we cant see a chid starve- you owe us £2’’ oh shut up – I now have to pay you £2 because you won’t let a child eat a soggy sandwich! And now Summer has rights to demand school dinners and you want a cheque upfront for £150 to cover the term. Tell Summer if she wants a hot meal at school she needs to get a job and then she can decide what she can and can’t have.
When I get Summer from school later she is looking sheepish, she knows she has done wrong, but she also knows she is victorious.
‘I am sorry they called you mum, I begged her not to, I told them It would make you mad’ yes Summer go on, imply that I beat you
‘’I just don’t want packed lunch anymore and this is the only way you will stop making them’’
And so I get my cheque book out and sign away a shit load of money for Summer to eat the same thing day in, day out – a tuna jacket potato.
Suffice to say on checking the lunchbox I found it empty – she had somehow managed to force herself to eat her lunch at the after school club, soggy sandwich and all.



Wednesday 14 September 2011

Day 55 - Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star

I have become somewhat of an arsehole – a stage school mom.
I started 2 weeks ago when I joined Summer up to a performing arts school – I couldn’t afford it, but they promised to keep her every Saturday for 2 whole hours of dancing, singing and drama. All I heard was 2 whoooollllllleeee hours to myself, shopping, pampering, sleeping. All without the constant nag of Summer and her insistence on following me everywhere.
For her first session I decided to stay and peak through the window to see if she was enjoying herself, because if she wasn’t she would have just walked out, no negotiation, just off down the A2 heading home. A few other mums were there, turned out immaculately, clasping Chanel bags with pink frosted lips and highlights in their hair. I still had morning honey still stuck to my chin. I noticed how very subtly that they would try and push their way to the front to take a peer through the one small A4 window at their little stars, and then smugly turn back to the other mums and profess how wonderful ‘Shiraz’ is doing. One mother whose daughter was in the 6-8 yr old class was moaning about how her (by all accounts spoilt brat) child should be in the next class up on the account of her extraordinary talents (un noticed by me) and that the class was holding her back.  For the next 2 hours I had to listen to the most futile conversation about collagen injections ,Range Rovers, cello lessons and the difficulty in finding cheap eastern European help. I having non of the above tried to stay quiet clutching my bus pass. But they kept trying to draw me in, trying to get information on me as to what Summers talents were, what threat she might be to their own budding myley cyrus’s. I tried, I really tried not to get involved. But half hour before the class ended I cracked.
   ‘’Summer comes from a theatrical background’’ the room gasps, their botox cracks. ‘’I was in the west end as a child myself – a stint with Vanessa Redgrave as lead’’ This is true. ‘’Her father is musically blessed and was an international dancer’’ this is not true, he cant hold a tune or play a note but danced in a few music videos in his day, MC’d at a few raves.....why is this coming out of my mouth, stop, stop, stop. I can see them all pretend to be pleased and intrigued whilst snarling at me and watching Summer with one eye. ‘’Summer was doing dance earlier in the year but she was quite advanced and wasn’t being challenged’’ they all nod in agreement. Shut up, schhhhttttooooppppp. It got worse – I implied ever so slightly that my  new 4x4 was in the garage hence the bus pass. When in fact it’s been a right off sat outside my house with bricks propping it up for 6 months. What have I become, I am thinking about getting a spray tan!! It’s ok – Summer will hate it and we will never have to come back here again – they will just presume she got a scholarship to the Brits.
She loves it – she begs me to take her back, its the best thing ever. I am shitting myself as there is no way I am going to be able to magic up an Audi Q7 by next week – and what about the holiday to the Bahamas I told them I had planned thats only a month away!!!!! Bollocks me.
For the next week I obsess about keeping my own show alive, without making them find me out. Summer keeps irritating by singing this show tune over and over again (badly) ‘’Soft hands, blab la, Gold Curls bla, bla I’m not that girl’.... shhhhhh mum is trying to work out how to get an Audi. But then in dawns on me – if I cant muster these material things I shall make Summer a star, this will in the short term, leave the other mothers envying me, and in the long term score me an Audi (I would naturally take 50% as her manager). What happened next is heinous, its dreadful,....... I type the song words into google, I find the song ‘I’m not that girl’ from Wicked. I play it on repeat to Summer and make her perform it for me, over and over. I stop her midway and push her off the mock stage and show her how she should be doing it, how to punch the air, how to look longingly into the distance, never turn your back to your audience, project Summer Project!!!!! After the 14th attempt she starts to loose interest and the feeling in her legs – no worries lie down and watch mummy do it – see how its meant to be done you fool. I am prancing about the room, singing at the top of my (well ranged) voice, at one point I even let out a tear. (my god I am good) Part time dad comes up to see what the racket is and quickly turns on his heels when he sees me on my hands and knees pleading to the Dress Circle.  It gets worse though. While Summer sleeps I set the song on repeat and play it to her all,night,long....I set my alarm early and wake her up for a quick rehearsal before school – and so it goes for 5 days and 5 nights. And £125 spent on theatre tickets......
Come Saturday ladies I will dust off my 10 year old Louis Vinton bag, put my false eyelashes on, drag Summers lifeless body to the class and death stare her through that A4 small window until she performs it just how I like it.
I will then ask the teacher to put her in the class above, leave late so I can catch the bus unnoticed.
She will be a star, my girl, you just wait and see....for the first time ever I am pleased at the ridiculous middle name Part Time dad gave her... Summer Destiny will be a star.

Monday 12 September 2011

Day 54 - Part Time Dads thoughts

''see this is the trouble with white people''
Oh god here he goes again
''dem tell you a hurricane a come a england and you just sit down pun ya backside and chat bout the weather pon de bus''
what the hell is he on about
''big hurricane a come and no body pon dis bludlart road a go board up der house, no body nah pin down there roof tile''
I swear this man still thinks he is in Jamaica.ignore, he will stop soon, watch the TV, dont look at him.
'' den when the wind come in and mash up de window, dem a just it blame pon Trevor Mc Donald''
What the fuck has Trevor got to do with a Hurricane, I just try and ignore him and ask for the remote.
''wha you tink Summer a go do?''
stop talking to me - I dont care what you think Summer will do should a hurricane come - its not coming its just windy out
''wha you tink she a go do when she find us crush up by a tree on the floor - how long you tink she would survive for''
firstly there are no trees nearby that could cush us should this hurricane come about - secondly this is actually a bloody good topic of converstaion now, how long would she survive for trapped in the house?
We start discussing this in detail.
''she a survivor man , she knows how to shit and piss'' (yeah we were all born with that natural instinct) ''she know how fi cook''  I shoot him a look of dont be ridiculous, ''how ya mean, she makes noodle, tea, dumplin, she knows how fi use the microwave....she does it all the time when she is with me, I try and keep myself to myself you know, so she fi understand how to tek care of herself''' She  is 5 (and 3/4 if you ask Summer, dont forget the 3/4) - I tell him he is an absolute moron and he shouldnt let her do things like that. He goes in to some long speech about being raised bare foot by wolves in Jamaica, sleeping under the stars bla bla bla poor old me, so you didnt have a gameboy get over it.
''If dat hurricane come, Summer will be alright man, me teach her how to survive, dats why she will eat you first when the food runs out''
I'm going to bed

Saturday 10 September 2011

Day 53 - Doctors

So I am ill, actually ill, this time it’s not in my mind.
I put it down to either a kidney infection or pregnancy at first. The constant peeing and lower back pain. Don't be too surprised. Either way both diseases are symptoms of having had sex!
 It happened after the riots, Summer was held hostage in Deptford watching the feral youth burn pound land. Part Time dad had returned home, excited in all his black power escapades of the last 48hrs, so rather than get arrested he looted my womb instead of JD sports. This also keeps his promise to only fornicate with me bi-annually.
I wish he hadn't bothered. The pee, pain and nausea that followed led me to worry about another devil child in my belly. Part time dad would insist on naming him Riot. I'm serious, he wanted to call Summer Ice during my first trimester, and then changed his preference to Cream days before my due date when I was too weak to care. It seems Jamaicans don't have to worry about being bullied in the playground for having a stupid name. Hence his eldest brother is called Fuzzy.
But anyway I am ill, so I book a doctors appt to face this head on. The post arrives as I put down the phone and there is a letter from her, the bitch , my EX therapist. She has sent me a copy of the doctor’s letter where she tells him I am above averagely insane, and that I am a hypochondriac....today of all days when I am really ill. The doctor would have read the letter by now, noticed me on his appointments list and already decided to not care about my pains. Summer is excited about the trip to the doctors, she wants them to pull her teeth out so she can score some money from the tooth fairy. When I am called in, Summer follows. She clocks the doctor, the doctor clocks her...there is tension in the room. Seems neither of them have got over the immunisation incident 3 months ago. Summer snarls at him. "You broke my arm!"she lies
"You didn't hold still Summer"
"You’re just mean you know that, your mum doesn't love you" I ignore them both.
I tell him my symptoms, and he pretends to listen whilst keeping one eye on Summer. I spell out to him that I think I have a kidney infection or that I am P-R-E-G-N-A....
"Jesus Christ your pregnant mum" Summer squeals running around the room, now she decides to be academic! "I knew you wouldn't be just fat" . Still tension in the room. The doctor tells me I am not pregnant- he just looks me up and down- how he can do this without a test?. I insist though and 5 mins later I am peeing into a cup with Summer wondering how I am doing it so precisely. She is on her knees right in front of my vagine. Mouth open watching me perform, amazed at what is going on in the doctors toilets.
With a cup of pee in my hand and jeans round my ankles she opens the door and runs out telling everyone in reception what she just saw, and that I am pregnant. An old lady starts clapping.
The doctor is as shocked as I am to find that for once I am actually ill. Urinary infection. Ha told you!
We go home and I tell Summer to please be good and careful round me because I am ill. She says she doesn't care because I am always ill. She pats my tummy. I climb into bed, a hot shivering pee smelling mess.
 
"I called dad..he didn't know you were pregnant, he gave me a message for you"
Oh shit
"He wants you to have a really hot bath, drink vodka" aww that's nice, yes I need to relax,
"and something about a coat hanger...he said he would be home next month"
Bastard


Wednesday 7 September 2011

Day 52 - The Asylum (Therapy Part 3)

I’ve been dumped...dumped by my Therapist.
I thought we were getting somewhere, her dress sense was improving, she started wearing her hair down. She seemed happier ...... but apparently there is nothing more she can do for me. She just takes all of my style tips and casts me aside because she doesn’t know how to deal with me – maybe this is how Gok Wan felt when he came out to his mum.
She wants to refer me to her colleague, a specialist. Apparently she is low level, I need high level therapy. It will take 6 weeks to get on the list but in the mean time she gives me a manual – as if my mind is some kind of car engine, ‘ if you feel suicidal refer to the manual’. Yes that’s the first thing I will fucking  do, thank god Hitler never had this Northamptonshire NHS PCT manual with the happy tree chart on it, or we would all be giving Nazi salutes – god she couldn’t even give me a manual from my own local authority.
She says I wasn’t improving – that my scores are above that of the average anxiety riddled mother. She scored me?? What was the criteria? If I’d had known I was being judged I would have made more of an effort with my mental health and definitely not spoken about Thomas – the imaginary African man that disciplines Summer.
I am more pissed off that without her and her bland room and wardrobe choices – so goes with it the 1 hr I have to myself each week. A time to talk about me, no work, no Summer, no part time dad. Just me, and her. And now I am on the street clutching a manual.  Bollocks.....
Then later my dad calls and what he tells me starts to put my life into perspective.  Dad is excited, he has found out the identity of his Dads biological parents (my granddad being adopted as a young boy). He has turned into one of those nutters that sit in libraries searching out their family tree and thumbing dusty census records, to replace a sex life he once had without Viagra, and now he has found her , my great grandma.... my great grandma....... who died in a lunatic asylum in Chelsea  age 37.
  Shit the bed, I think. What the fuck could have caused her to end up in the asylum!!! Why me?.... why am I descended from a nutter?,  I now have her Victorian unhinged genes. I am her but in the 21st century. Did she kill herself? Did they crank up the electric shock therapy too high one day, and her bloomers caught alight.  I start blaming her for all my mental health issues...
‘but wait, it gets better’’ says dad.... ‘’your great granddad was a murderer’’.... OK shut up! This isn’t ‘who do you think you are’’ this is some bullshit right here. But no... turns out grandpops had a jealous streak and killed my grandmas lover. To avoid hanging he fled back to Italy. So much to digest.... but all I can think of is how I am descended from lunatics.
I look at Summer – she is seeing how far she can put her head in the dogs mouth whilst milking her nipples (the dogs nipples, not her own) she got the crazy gene alright .... and its all my fault.  For the last 5 years I blamed her craziness on the copious amounts of ganja me and part time dad used to smoke before I knew I was pregnant. But now part of me is relived that maybe this shit is hereditary and I couldn’t have prevented the way Summer is.
Maybe just maybe – my granddad was like Summer – he drove his mother to the asylum , unable to cope, his father in a paranoid jealous rage and left to cope with the monstrous child shoots his love rival..... maybe this will happen to me and part time dad, maybe Summer will push me so far that I am sectioned, and PT dad unable to cope with Summer alone and on discovering my lover (I can dream, and I still have time to acquire one ) shoots him and flees to Jamaica to avoid a 3 yr sentence for murder in the UK.
This is my family curse, every other generation shall sporn the devil child. I look at Summer, she has produced milk (from the dog, not from the fridge) I swear I see her eyes glow red.  I’m getting a head start and booking a room in the priory tomorrow, with or without a lover!





Tuesday 6 September 2011

Day 51 - The Promise

I promise this school year I will be a better mum.
I will get Summer to bed early and wake up on time to do her hair properly.
I will make more of an effort with her school Packed Lunches, they will be  Michellen star level, not Greggs pasty level.
I will never forget her PE kit.
I will clear my work diary and go to each assembly and sports day and fight my way to the front row, I will even squeeze a tear out, so everyone can see I care.
I will ask the head teacher what she has done wrong before going into the office so I have time to prepare my shocked and dissapointed face and not burst out laughing in surprise and secret pride.
I will write to her teachers in pen and not pink felt tip.
I will make sure Summer has her knickers on each day.
I will try and talk to the other mothers....the ones that I can do without feeling the need to vomit on their Jimmy Choo's.
I will do this all. Everyday.  Honest....just not today ......, not her first day back because that totally catches you out the blue.
 I only had 6 weeks to prepare for this day.
 We woke up late, so I scraped her hair up into a lumpy pony tail, I realised that the new uniform I brought her is too small, I make her packed lunch, she wants heart cheese sandwiches, she get penis shaped ones and a box of sushi I found at the back of the fridge. I don't have her PE kit ready so I write her teacher a note in pink felt tip pen explaining. I hope she put her knickers on....... We rush out the door as I give her a pepperami and flapjack that I find in my bag for her breakfast.
-I promise tomorrow I will be a better mum.