Being a Person of Colour in the UK

This past weekend I was in London.  My husband N and I wanted to take our two children into London in order to see some theater on the West End.  It was something we were all looking forward to and was to be a weekend that was one of the highlights of our summer.  It was also a nice time for the four of us to spend some time together and see some sights.  Two things happened over the weekend that I wanted to share today.

The first thing happens so regularly that I cannot even count the number of times it's happened:  The four of us enter a restaurant in a group all at the same time, obviously a family of four.  The hostess takes one look at us and says 'Table for three?'

This photo is to help anybody who might not be familiar with what my absolutely beautiful family looks like.  N is of Indian descent and together with my half Native American heritage everyone else in my family has a darker shade of skin than me.  Because of this strangers all over the place take one look at my family and decide that one of these things is not like the others and I am it.

So, we stayed in a hotel equidistant from the two theaters we were planning to visit.  And we come out of a tube station and go to stand at a cross-walk and we're standing with a group of people who are already there. Within seconds of standing at this cross-walk this older white woman taps me on the arm and when I turn to look at her she says in this loud, exaggerated way, 'If you need to cross the street, you have to PUSH the BUTTON.' then nods her head to check if I've understood her.  She even pushes the button as a demonstration.

I give her two shocked blinks before I say 'I know that.' and she comes across all, 'Well, I was only trying to help' but somehow this time around she manages to speak to me in a normal tone of voice without the unnecessary pauses and emphasis on words. She even manages to look offended when I go to stand on the other side of N, and ask 'Did she just speak to me like I don't understand English?' because I really needed someone else to validate that that was a thing that had just happened. 

These things were just two little things that I happened to remember when I came to sitting down to write this.  Due to the regularity of these types of experiences it didn't affect the enjoyment of the musicals we saw or the time we spent together.  But it does make me a little sad.  That these are still things that I, or other POC, experience on a regular basis.

For these reasons, it's definitely necessary for this book, Why I'm No Longer Talking to White People About Race by Reni Eddo-Lodge to be out there in the world.  She very intelligently puts into words a lot of the thoughts and experiences, things that make me angry about being a POC in this world (but specifically about living in the UK).  I've written a (very) little bit on this blog about some of the racism that I've dealt with in my life and every time I'm more vocal about my opinions or my experiences (especially online) I get (mostly white) people who are there to argue with me, have me explain to them who don't believe it is a thing why white privilege is an actual thing or similar.

This is my long-winded way of saying that I loved this book and that I'm recommending it if you haven't yet read it.

The Sunday Salon: When Books Inspire

I recently had an idea to read books from my childhood. I've challenged myself to read two a month for as long as possible. I chose to read The Face on the Milk Carton by Caroline B. Cooney as the first book in my walk down My Favourite Childhood Reads because it actually inspired me to begin my own novel. I must have been 12 or 13 when I read this book first. I think I bought it myself from own of those children's book fairs they hold at school. I've read the sequel, Whatever Happened to Janie? but HAD NO IDEA there is a third book called The Voice on the Radio. (I'm devastated. I am now desperately trying to locate The Voice on the Radio!)

It's been a long time since I've read this book. I remember being swept away by it the first time, but I am a lot older now. And as I started it this time around, I was all about making fun of it. The first chapter is all about names, and how the main character 'Janie Johnson' doesn't like her name. She tries to tweak her own name while writing an essay and ends up with Jayne Johnstone, decides that's not quite enough, and goes with Jayyne Jonstone, etc etc. She moans a bit about her parents' boring choice of a name and even remarks 'they could have named her Scarlett or Allegra. Perhaps Roxanne.' Which kills me. She then envies a bit on her friends' names and there's a bit about what she was fantasizing about naming her own children (Denim and Lace) which is all a little hilarious to me.

Then we get to the more serious stuff, in that, she sees a little girl on one of those Missing ads on the back of a milk carton at lunch, recognises herself and starts having flashbacks that don't make sense and starts asking questions and doing some investigating of her own. Meanwhile, she starts a relationship with hunky next-door neighbour, Reeve. There is a lot to laugh about in the writing style of this book, but once the story got going, I totally did get swept away again. I didn't even snigger at the silly inclusion of a Hare Krishna cult in the middle of the story. Nope, I just carried on like that was perfectly acceptable.

I managed to finish the story late at night when I should have been sleeping. I was even a little disappointed that I didn't have the sequel to hand. I'm not saying I'd recommend the book to anyone, but it was easy to remember what I liked about the story itself. I liked Janie's struggles with her morality. She finds it hard to forgive herself for walking away from her family for a stranger with an icecream. Even though she was only three. Plus, I always had a next-door neighbour fantasy. I liked Reeve.

Anyway. I had fun reading this one. It was nice to indulge in a little nostalgia. To my story then. I mentioned the bit at the beginning about names because naming characters was very important to me. And me at 12 agreed whole-heartedly with Janie. 12-year-old-me was very much into the soap opera names. I'd even go so far as to say that 12-year-old-me was very into the soap opera-esque story lines as well. Let me summarise the plot of my story for you here. This is completely based on the line in The Face on the Milk Carton where one of Janie's friends is trying to explain why there are so many kids on the back of milk cartons:

'All it is,' said Pete firmly, 'is divorce, where one parent gets mad and takes his own kid, but he doesn't tell the other parent where they're going. It's never actually a stranger stealing a kid, like on television.'

And just like that, a story idea popped into my head. About a girl, 14, who lives with her dad somewhere. She's been led to believe that her mother died when she was little but comes to find out that is not actually the case! She sees a programme on TV (couldn't use the milk carton idea!) calls a number and before you know it, she's back with the mother she hadn't seen in more than 10 years. Around this time my own parents were going through a divorce so I channelled my feelings for that and had many an argument with my main character and her father regarding his new girlfriend.

And of course, because I was absolutely boy-crazy then, there are heaps of boys tripping over themselves for the attention of my pretty and witty and smart main character. And they all had fabulous names. For example, my main character has two names. Her name when living with her father is (don't laugh too hard here): Francesca Eleanora Smitsgerald. Frankie, for short. She comes to learn the name she was born with is actually Francis Elena Simms. She's heartbroken to have such a boring name in comparison. Her best friend's names are Blair Torrence and Zora Birch. The boys circling around her like flies are called: Aaron Archback, Matt Richardson, Jeff Thorny, and Roger Cunningham.

I wrote 20 pages, front and back, about the adventures of my little Frankie. I had everything planned out in my head, I had my characters all formed and ready, but I never got to the main bulk of the story. I dithered over the minor details. The school where Frankie goes, meeting a new family in the neighbourhood, describing a winter formal dance. And where I stopped? A particularly bad argument that Frankie has with her father. It was after this that she sees the TV programme about missing children and decides she'd rather not live with her dad anymore and calls the number on the screen, effectively changing her whole life. And at the time, I wasn't ready for it. I couldn't get past my own emotions of my own circumstances to carry on with this soap opera. So I never did.

But it has been fun to laugh about it all now. The horrendous names, the boys. There's even a little scene where two boys fight it out a bit over Frankie. The new family in the neighbourhood? Total rip-off of Flowers in the Attic by VC Andrews. There's five children, they're all blonde, all have names beginning with A and there are even little twins.

It was all a little funny and sad to read the things I had written at that age. I tried so hard to write through my issues. It may have helped in some ways, but in other ways here I am 15 years later working through the same things just in a different format. I wish I'd carried on writing my fiction. I wrote all the way through high school, had these daydreams about being a successful novelist when I grew up. I think that's still possible, but unlikely at this point. My heart isn't in it like it was as a teenager. And I'm more sad at the fact then you'll ever realise. But I am quite glad that I was able to read books that inspired me, even if they didn't pan out exactly how I pictured it would.

How have you been inspired by reading?

My Mother

I've been thinking a lot about my mother recently. If it seems like she's in the back of my head a lot it's because she is. Part of the reason for this post is a sense of balance, I don't like the feeling that I haven't told the whole story. Part of it is because it was Mother's Day in America recently and I hate that some years I have no choice but to ignore the holiday entirely.

Another (HUGE) reason is the fact that my mother's little sister, my (at one-time favourite) aunt friended me on Facebook, which means I'm one email away from contacting my mother. And a lot of it has to do with a change within myself. My mother had children very young, like I did, and she experiences a great number sad and terrible things. I've been trying to see through her eyes, to reason why she did certain things, why she made the choices and decisions that she did.

I really wish that I knew her better, but I'm afraid as well. Afraid to open a part of my heart that's been shut for so long. I don't want to be disappointed further, I don't want to be hurt again. But is the alternative any better? Is there an alternative to that? I know I don't have all the facts, I know that I have had a negative slant thrown on everything I know about her. But I've grown up believing a certain thing and I wonder how much that knowledge has shaped the person that I've become? There's only one way to find out. Send that email. Get her phone number. Talk to her, ask her questions. Open up and share my life with her. Am I ready for that? I don't know.


I don't have any photos of her before these. There's so much more to this story, but this is what I know that is the truth. I know she grew up on a Tlingit reservation in Alaska as the youngest but one in a family of 11 children. Alcoholism claimed many in her family, including herself. She dropped out of high school (like me). She married at 18 (like me). Her first husband went to prison. She was living in Seattle when she met my dad. He worked in the apartment building she lived in and he fell in love with my brother, David, who was only five months old. She was 18 when she had David, only 20 when I was born.


When the two of us were still young, she went back to school to get some qualifications (like me). She worked in low-paying, unskilled work. Factories mostly, usually the night shifts. She didn't learn to drive until she was in her mid 20s (like me). When I was 10, doctors told her that she may have ovarian cancer, but they turned out to be a huge number of cysts on her ovaries. Her ovaries were removed followed shortly by a full hysterectomy. She was only 30 at the time.



Despite all the things we said and did to hurt each other over the years, I still believe that she wanted better things for me than she had herself. She sent me packages when both of my boys were born. She liked the idea of being a grandma.



She's made terrible mistakes in her romantic partners. Terrible ones, that affected my life and my opinions of her. It'll take a lot for me to get past what those mistakes cost me. Aside from that, she went back to studying, worked hard to get a good job, built a life for herself. She's spent a great deal of time caring for her elderly father. She's taken in her sister's kids so they wouldn't be put into care. As far as I know, she's remained sober for my entire life.

In many ways, I'm proud of her but my feelings about her will always be more complicated than that. Any one emotion will always be connected with sadness, pain and disappointment.

On music that brings back memories...

I walked in the door the other day, having just dropped Elliot off at pre-school to the sound of the radio. In my mad rush to get out the door, I'd forgotten to switch it off. The song playing was 'What's Love Got To Do With It' by Tina Turner. That song for me is one that brings back an intense feeling.

I'm not so great with actual memories. Sounds and smells and all of that bring back feelings for me rather than a specific memory of actual events, and What's Love Got To Do With It reminds me of my mother, and in a good way. I can picture us laughing and dancing in the kitchen to this song. I'm not sure if we ever did laugh and dance to this song, but I like to think so. Maybe my mom just always turned up the radio when this song was playing. Either way, it reminds me of being happy as a child.

It reminds me of a time when I was maybe 6 or 7. During the summer my brother and I would run off and collect wild blackberries and my mom would bake them into a pie for us. It was back when we still did things together as a family and ate dinner at the dining table. My mom would make us dinners of lasagna with spinach or whole stuffed fish with the heads still attached and I'd complain about the bones in the fish or how the spinach ruined the taste of the lasagna.

On the weekends, she'd take me and my brother to a rec center nearby and we'd do Native American arts and crafts. She'd make these pretty little triangle-beaded earrings and let me choose the colours and she was trying to show me how to loom myself a belt and take me to Pow-wows and I always had elephant ears and loved to listen to the drumming and watch the dancers.

I think back on it now and I'm amazed at my mother. When I was 6 or 7, she was the same age that I am now. How would I have coped with a 7 year old and a 9 year old, in a loveless relationship away from any friends or family? She was so young to have so much going on. I see her in a different light now that I have children of my own. That different perspective makes things a little better and a little worse all at the same time. But I can respect that things were hard for her.

It's so easy now, after everything that has happened between us, to look back and only remember the bad times, the nasty things we said to each other, the things that we did. But there were good times as well. And I need to hold on to the good times more than anything.

Everytime I hear this song, everytime Tina Turner belts out in her amazing voice the chorus to this song, I think of happy times.

What songs do you attach particular feelings or memories to?

It's not your fault.

When I was 11, my mom moved out. Some bad things happened. And buried somewhere (not so deep) inside of me is still a scared little girl who thinks that if she was a better person, if she would have said the right things and did the right things that maybe it would have turned out differently. I never had anyone to tell me that I did nothing wrong, that it wasn't because of me. I'm still waiting for someone to tell me those things, tell it to me so many times that maybe one day it might sink in and I won't feel so guilty and bad and unloveable and not enough.

It's not your fault.
It's not your fault.
It's not your fault.

A walk down (bad) memory lane

When I was 16, I started taking classes at a local community college. I was always the youngest person on campus, and I felt so out of place. I tried taking easy classes to ease myself into the whole scene, but it didn't help. I started feeling scared all the time, uneasy. It was like I lost all of my self-confidence and I started having panic attacks. I'd try to walk into class, and my heart would start beating faster, I'd hyperventilate, start to shake. I felt really claustrophobic. And I'd never make into class. I'd run and bury myself in a safe place. And for me, my safe place was usually the library. Surrounded in books, hiding in someone else's story.

Even when I was little, and there were problems at home, I'd dive into a book. I figured any story was better than my own. Like an ostrich sticking his head in the sand. Books can be really therapeutic and helpful ... but they can also be a hindrance. When they're being used as an escape route, when issues aren't being dealt with properly. I find it difficult to tell the difference these days.

More mom stuff

Because of all this baby stuff going on, there is a lot I'm not writing about that I normally would. But this post reminded me of something pretty major that happened. Regular readers will remember that I recieved a package from my mother awhile back. It was the first contact I'd had from her since Oldest was born. She'd moved apartments and changed phone numbers without telling me.

After I recieved her package I wrote her this long 6 page letter pouring out all of my feelings and telling her all the important things that had happened in the last two years and opened up about how I felt about certain things that had happened in my childhood. I never had the courage to send the letter, and it's still tucked into my notebook and buried in a box in my bedside table.

But luckily and surprisingly a month ago, I managed to speak to my aunt, my mom's youngest sister online and she gave me my mother's telephone number. I called for a week at different times and there was no answer. Sometimes it went to voicemail, but I was too nervous to leave a message. Sometimes I got a busy signal, which would send my heartbeat racing because I knew then that at least she was at home. But I didn't get through to her until maybe 10 days had passed and I'd obsessively called her house 10-15 times a day.

And when I did get through to her, it wasn't what I was expecting. In fact, it was really disappointing and I'm still processing my feelings about that conversation. She was happy to hear from me, of course. But she didn't seem upset that it had been two years since we'd spoken.

She spent a lot of the conversation telling me about the problems she was having with her new husband or laughing with her sisters who were at the house with her. She didn't ask me many questions about my life here or much about Oldest, which killed me. I didn't care that she didn't ask about me, how I was doing or what I get up to during the days, we've never had that kind of relationship. We've never had that close bond that other mothers and daughters have, but Oldest is her grandson, and I hate that any problems that my mother and I have may be passed down to Oldest and now to Littlest. That her feelings towards them are affected by her feelings towards me and everything that we've been through.

I am glad that I got a chance to tell her that I was having another child. I spoke to her a few weeks before Littlest was born, and have yet to call her to tell her that her second grandson is healthy and happy. I just can't do it yet. I don't have it in me right now to do that. I will soon, I know that. It won't be something that I put off forever, but I need a little more strength first.

I find my mother to be very strange. And I feel sorry for her, more than anything, especially now that I have my own children. I know she loves me in her own way, but it feels conditional and a mother's love shouldn't have limitations. I was worried, when I was pregnant with Oldest, that I would take after my mother in this way, that I wouldn't be able to fully love my children, that I'd hold back. I remember crying when I was pregnant, crying at the thought of harming my children in this terrible way by having a closed heart like my mother.

And at least now I can look back and realise that my worries were for nothing, because I couldn't love my children more than I do, and I know that I would do anything for them.

New baby worries and a poll of sorts

I've been looking at a lot of Elliot's newborn photos lately in an attempt to remind myself what it was like to have a newborn in the house. I thought maybe it might not be such a shock to the system when I do have this baby. I'm glad we took photos of Elliot every single day, because there's so much I don't remember, even after just 2 years. So many different facial expressions, the way he cried was different, the way he smiled. And he was so impossibly small. But there will be so many differences this time around.

Gone will be the time I used to spend in between Elliot's feeds reading a book or napping. I'm worried that I'll be tired all the time and impatient with Elliot. I'm worried that I'll continuously snap at Elliot and be constantly grouchy and that Elliot will come to resent me and the baby. I worry that I won't have enough time for the both of them and that I won't be able to find the right balance. I worry that I won't be very good at being a mother to two children.

But I try not to dwell on that part too much. I'll cross that bridge when I come to it, right now I'm focussed on delivering a happy, healthy baby. Maybe you want to take a guess with me as to when that will be? It'll be like a competition, see who gets the closest. Here is the backround information:

I went into labour with Elliot exactly one week before his due date. But he was born 6 days before the due date. I was in labour for 4 hours and 5 minutes exactly. My bump measured quite small and I was told Elliot would be underweight - he actually weighed 7lbs 6oz.

OK, so my due date is officially the 1st of April and my bump is roughly the same size as with Elliot, based on that and the above,

1) When do you think this second baby will arrive?

2) How long will labour last?

3) How much will this baby weigh?

I would love to hear what you think.

A random regret

I don't know why I thought of it, but I recently remembered something that happened when I was maybe 15. I was still living at home, but it was a very tense atmosphere. I always felt like there was a clear division of rooms in the house, where each family member could safely go.

My dad has his bedroom and one living room. My brother and I had each of our rooms and the other living room was shared. The kitchen was neutral territory. We steered clear of each other and rarely spoke. I used the computer most often or holed myself away in my room all the time, reading a book. I was already failing school and covering my tracks with a lot of lying.

My dad, bless him, made a last-ditch attempt to revive our ailing father-daughter relationship by suggesting one Friday, that he and I took a road-trip. Why don't we drive down to San Francisco just the two of us and catch a musical? It did sound nice. But I said no.

I didn't like the idea of being away from my beloved chatrooms for a weekend, and more so, I didn't like the idea of maintaining a conversation on the way down there that would inevitably lead to questions regarding school.

I remembered this recently and wondered idly, what would have happened if I had taken that road trip? Would things have gotten better between my dad and me? If we'd talked about school, could things have changed in some little way, enough to turn around my education issues? Was it some major crossroad that I was at, not realising the importance of my decision? Who knows? I could have just been left with a great memory, or it could have been the weekend disaster trip that I thought it might be at the time. I will never know now. But some part of me wishes I could take it all back and have a little faith that things might have worked out.

High school dropout and the lessons I learned

I'm a high school dropout. That's a very hard thing for me to admit. I was always really good at school. I tested well, was in advanced placement classes. Once, for my birthday, I asked to go to summer school. I was never a teacher's pet, but usually the teacher's favourite. I studied a lot, got good grades and generally enjoyed going to school. But I hit a rough patch in high school. I was still reeling from my parent's divorce, I had quite a few abandonment issues, control issues and in my depression, I stopped attending classes. Stopping finishing school projects or doing my homework.

In the fall of 2000, as I was starting my fourth year of high school, I was informed that because of my failing grades I was still considered a sophomore. It was easy for me to lie to my father. It was easy to sneak my report cards out of the mailbox and hide them. It was easy for me to tell my dad I was still getting As and Bs. But what surprised me is how easy the rest of it was as well.

It's not like in TV programmes or movies. There were no concerned guidance counsellors who called me into their office to discuss my grades or where I saw myself in the future. There were no notes from my teachers to say 'see me after class' to discuss my Fs on papers. There was no rallying around of my friends to provide study groups, I wasn't aware of a tutoring programme in my high school for me to fall back on. And I know that it wasn't up to the teachers or my guidance counsellor or my friends to bail me out. It was up to me to ask for help, but I couldn't do it.

When it finally did come to the end of the line, the point where I had to 'fess up and admit that I was failing out of high school to my father, I had a plan. I was going to take summer school, I was going to redo my classes, work after school to complete my missing credits. I wanted to work to solve this mess I had made for myself. I thought my dad would be proud that I wanted to fix this problem with hard work and dedication. Instead he advised me to drop out, get my GED. If I had a college degree, who would care if I recieved my high school diploma or not? he said. He figured it wouldn't be a big deal in the long run and I believed him.

He was wrong, and I realise that now. In taking the easy way out, I learned that it's better to walk away from things that are too messy. Things that are too difficult or that would take much time and effort. Now, with so many things, it's second-nature for me to just bail on the tough stuff, find the exit. I wish I'd stuck with high school, even if I had graduated a year later than expected. It would have taught me the value of hard work, given me something to be proud of. Instead, I'm a high school dropout and there's nothing I can do to take that back. I just hope I can learn from my past mistakes and when I start my university degree again, I hope I will be able to work hard at it, not give up, and finally succeed.

Happy birthday...

Today is my mom's birthday. All week I've been trying to write a post about her life in some way, but everytime I tried I couldn't get it right. I realised this week that most of the things that I know about her, I've learned through my father. And as much as I love my father, I know that he is not the most reliable source, especially on matters concening my mother. I wonder which bits of information I know about her are actually true and if I'll ever get straight answers from either of my parents.

I know that for years now my father, in his own twisted way, has tried to poison any good memories I have of my mom, and I have to admit that in a lot of ways it's worked. Not entirely because of him, but because over the years she has shown me enough of her own poison for the things my dad tells me to sound true. Does that make sense?

But I always feel bad that I feel that way, and as October comes around and it's another year that's gone past where I haven't been in contact with my mother, I always end up thinking 'this year, I'll send a birthday card, or a gift, or at least photos of Boy...' even if it means sending a package to my mom's sister because I don't have my mother's current address. This year I did buy a birthday card. Two in fact, one from me and one from Elliot. It was very difficult though, because most mom birthday cards say things along the lines of 'to the best mum ever' or 'to a special mum, because you mean so much to me' and I couldn't send something that said either of those things. Generic 'Happy birthday mum' is more my style, and more along the lines of how I feel about her right now. Both cards are still in my handbag. I didn't have the courage to send them.

N and I were having dinner the other day, and I felt like talking about her. My mom and dad's birthdays are both in October, just 10 days apart. There's never been a big birthday spirit in our household, birthdays were very low-key and hardly celebrated at all. My parents would get the same presents every year from my brother and I - my mom would get a cashmere sweater, usually gray. My dad would get a bottle of Old Spice. I remember when my mom moved out, she left most of her gray cashmere sweaters behind. I cried when I found them still hanging in the closet, they were presents from her children, I didn't understand why she didn't take them with her. When I left home, the sweaters were still laying about the house, so I took one. I still have that gray cashmere sweater hanging untouched and unworn in my closet. I don't know why I keep it, but I can't let it go either.

One of the hardest posts I've written.

All children need acceptance, love, encouragement, discipline, consistency and positive attention from their parents. Children who are denied these things often grow up thinking they are deficient in some way and that they somehow deserved to be treated badly. Sadly, when they become parents themselves they may emotionally deprive their own children because they don't have a positive model of parenting to draw on.


I took the above from the NSPCC website in their section dealing with emotional abuse. That last sentence, by the way, is my absolute worst fear. But the abuse I suffered as a child is not something I normally talk about, and for good reason: few believe me when I tell them. Isn't that awful? This cruel thing has happened to me, and it feels like something shameful and that I'm to blame for them and if I ever get up the courage to tell someone about these things, I come across disbelief.


My father was very inconsistent in his parenting skills. He was both my most loving parent as well as the most hurtful. And that inconsistency confused me and left me unsettled. I thought of him as two people. The loving father who drove me to soccer games and taught me to ride a bike was 'Daddy' and the abusive father who told me I was stupid and worthless, the one who screamed and hit was 'He' or 'Him'. It was the only way I was able to get through the days.

But this isn't about the abuse. I can't fully form the words yet that are needed to describe how I felt or how I feel now about everything that happened. If I tried, everything would come out muddled and confused and I wouldn't know how to say exactly what I want to say. So I won't just yet. But I do want to write about how difficult I've found it to be to share this with other people. I have told some friends a small part of my childhood, but I hold back telling people about my father.

I feel like I can't tell anyone who's met my father about what I went through. I feel like the people who have met my father wouldn't believe me, and that some people I have told actually DON'T believe me even though it's ME that is their friend and not my father. And the hurt and betrayal that comes from that is crippling. Because my father is generally liked wherever he goes. He's loud and outgoing and can talk to everyone. Children across the world love him and everyone sees him as a big teddy bear or Santa Claus. He's been a mentor and friend to high school students for years. His charm is his defense. It was different with his own children.

Goodnight not goodbye

Remember this post where I said I have an addictive personality? I've never been more aware of that than I have over the last few weeks. Even in this post, I came close to admitting it, but here it is:

My name is Michelle, and I'm addicted to blogging.

And I do mean that, even if it comes across as joking. I check my email 100 times a day in case someone has commented, and I constantly check my site meter to see who's been visiting. I spend too much time reading other people's blogs, writing new entries. It's taken over my life, and it needs to get better. Because for everytime I check my email and don't have new comments, or everytime I see that no one has visited my blog since I last checked, I feel like a failure.

I don't want to come across as melodramatic (god knows I've been called that a million times, and for good reason) but it's just a heads-up, I guess - I won't be blogging as much. I'm sorry I won't be commenting as much either. I'm going to take Stephanie's advice, and review my priorities and re-dedicate myself to what's important in my life. I need to stop looking to other people to make myself happy or to validate me as a person. I need to make this blog less important to my level of happiness and be less hard on myself. I'll still post, even if it's just on Mondays for the new Meet the Guys instalment (because I can't stop now, when there's 14 to go) and I'll still keep updated with all of your blogs as well, just not as often. You can always email me, address in profile - and I'd love to keep in touch that way. Or just sit around and wait for my next entry! Thanks everyone!

Cars and fears

Hey look! We bought a car. Apparently the Ford Focus is one of the best secondhand cars to buy. But I seriously know nothing about cars. I was more interested in the colour and if the car had rear speakers (our other car doesn't and I can never hear the music in the backseat!) This isn't the actual car we bought, just one that looks similar to it. Do you know what this means though? That we have two cars. In a household with two adults. Which means one car per person. I'll have to start driving soon. Good thing it was one of my new year's resolutions.

Let me first apologise to Tasha - she asked a direct question about why I'm afraid to drive and I never responded (sorry!) I have blogged before about it, but it was too long ago. I never learned how to drive in America, I didn't have the desire to. Other people took driving lessons through high school or whatever, I was not one of them. My dad mentioned it once, but when I never brought the subject up again, neither did he. I don't know if it's entirely relevant, but when I was a lot younger I wrecked some woman's go-kart track, and since then my family have always told me I'd be a terrible driver, that they wouldn't want to be in the same car with me. I know it was originally meant as a joke, but it went too far. When I first started driving, I had no confidence in myself. Almost four years ago I started my driving lessons here in the UK. It took me over a year to get to a point where I was considering taking the driver's test. I was so unsure of myself that it held me back. I failed my first attempt (and rightly so - I didn't realise when I was parallel parking that I'd mounted the kerb and nearly hit a tree, I almost hit a cyclist and once pulled out without looking) but the second time I scraped through with the maximum amount of penalties that would still allow me to pass.

I've never driven on my own, even though it's been three years in April that I've had my license. The reason? The responsibility is too much for me. I'm afraid I will seriously injure, not myself, but someone else. I'm afraid of some accident where my son, a pedestrian, a cyclist, another driver, anyone will be hurt because of me. I couldn't live with myself. There are so many risks and so many things that could happen. So much is going on at the same time. Who knows, maybe it's just that I haven't driven enough to feel comfortable. Maybe I just need to spend more time behind the wheel, have more confidence in myself. And I'll have to. Wish me luck.

*******And on a lighter note, Lindsay who did an awesome job designing this template for me, is having a contest to win a free template - head over here and join the fun and win one for yourself! I expect everyone to answer number 9 correctly!

My Little Toddler

It's hard to deny it any longer, I don't have a baby boy anymore.. I have a little toddler. It's kind of scary actually. When Elliot was a baby, he was pretty easy. Not fussy, didn't cry much, was easy-going about pretty much everything. I didn't want him to grow up - he's so sweet and innocent at the moment. But I can feel it all changing, slowly but gradually. He learned how to climb onto the sofas the other day so he could play with all of the items we'd tried to keep out of his reach, like the remote controls. He's down to one nap in the early afternoons, and apart from this, it's all-play all the time. If he sees me eating or drinking something different to him, Elliot will start whining. If things are out of reach, he'll cry, and sometimes he'll manage to get what he wants. We were playing on the floor the other day, and he pushed me from behind, put his whole weight into it. Later that day, he bit me. I wouldn't say he's naughty, but he's into everything and he's so demanding. When I tell him no, sometimes he laughs at me. Other times, he'll start throwing his toys. It's a whole different picture from Elliot as a baby, and I know I'm going to find it difficult to adjust to. I've never had experience with children before Elliot came along, I don't know what's normal, someone please reassure me. On the advice of my health visitor, I've picked up 'Toddler Taming' from the library, but I don't get a chance to read it except at night, when I'm tired. I've only managed the first two chapters, where the author has brought up the issue of the importance of confidence in your role as parent. And I am floundering on this very point! Help!

Resolutions

I've been thinking about this list since mid-December. It's like when I was back in school (before I started skipping classes and dropping out) and I had to have full and correct answers with supporting evidence. I am so sad and can't shake being a goody two-shoes sometimes :)

I've loved this year that I've had with my son. He's a happy, playful little boy. He's learning so much every single day. I know it will be hard for me to leave him, but...

I resolve to finish updating my CV and start looking for work.

In order to do this, I will have to wake up before Elliot (who usually sleeps in until 9:30, how incredibly lucky am I?) I will have to be more organised, and I might just have to...

Get over my fears and start driving on my own.

Ages ago I went to the doctor who told me that I was officially overweight. This scares me. When my father was visiting in December, he was so overweight, he had to stop every few minutes to catch his breath. He'd get winded and dizzy and need to sit down. I fear that he won't be alive for very much longer even though he is only 59 years old. I don't want to miss anytime with my own son if I can help it. Bring on the rabbit food, because...

I resolve to lose 15 pounds.

Though I've mentioned her before, I've only written once about my mother on this blog. This is an issue that is weighing me down, and I need to talk through it some more, get a different perspective. Otherwise my relationship with my mother will end up suffocating me.

I will be less private and open up more about what is bothering me, especially to those who I care about and who care about me.

And because it can't all be work, work, work, I have a ton of books that I own that I've always intended to read, and never have, my last resolution is to read more books (from this collection). Also, I made a yule log over Christmas. It came out terribly. I also resolve to be less critical of myself and carry on with my baking, even though I've had a few disasters.

One of those days

Today has just been one of those days where I wanted to lay down somewhere and cry. It started OK, Boy slept in until after 10... but I decided to take him out to the town centre to pick up some last minute stocking fillers. This was the start of a very bad day. I know this is a long post, and it's all whine whine whine, but I need to let it out. Thank you for your patience.

It's been foggy and cold the last two days, so we bundled up warmly and headed to the bus stop. Of course the bus is 20 minutes late and of course Elliot decides to cry for the full 20 minutes. When the bus does pull up, it's one of those old-fashioned dealies, where instead of a flat platform to step onto, there are two sets of steps divided by a railing. How the hell am I supposed to get my pushchair onto that?! (or a handicapped person or whoever?) I had to take Elliot out of the pushchair, get him to stand in one position without falling under the bus, fold my pushchair down, pick Elliot up in one arm, and drag the pushchair onto the bus with another. The only place in the bus for a folded pushchair is the former luggage rack, which means hauling the damn thing almost over my head. It's only a few minutes to the High Street, and already I'm in a foul mood. I struggle getting the pushchair out and luckily some nice man steps up to help me drag the thing onto the pavement.

Here's where the only good part comes in - Elliot falls asleep soon after, and takes an hour long nap. The bad part is, all the shops in the town seem to suffer from narrow aisles. I understand that it's Christmas, and that there are a lot of shoppers about, but really, do they all have to be so inconsiderate? Every shop I enter, there's some woman (or group of women) chatting in the aisles. And it's never the first 'excuse me' that gets their attention, it has to be the third or fourth. In the toy store, one little boy decides running into me and the pushchair repeatedly is acceptable behaviour. The mother watches and decides it is as well.

In one store things are so busy I forget to pick up my things on the way out, nobody seems to have what I'm looking for (a very last-minute Christmas present from Elliot to his rather miserable aunt and uncle, my sister-in-law and her husband) and my foot was stepped on on more than one occasion. I went into a shoe store looking for a new pair of boots, to find that their adult shoes are all located on the floor above us, with only a steep, narrow staircase to get up there. Isn't there some law which requires shops to cater for wheelchair-bound customers? Isn't it necessary for all shops to have a lift?

By this time I'm hungry, I'm cold, I'm tired and I am so fed up. I decide it's time to go home. Elliot wakes up just before the bus arrives, which is a good thing, because it happened to be the exact same bus I took to get there, with the same unfriendly design for pushchairs. At my busstop, I have a 10 minute hike up a hill - Elliot chooses this moment to start crying again, he wants to be held. He shrieks for the rest of the way home, and when I try to angle the front wheels into the house, the wheel gets stuck and I need to physically lift the pushchair (and screaming baby into the house, and instead manage to nearly topple the pushcair over as the drinks tray falls off.

Now Elliot is crying at the top of his lungs, and he doesn't stop. He's a grumpalump the whole rest of the afternoon. He doesn't want to sit in his highchair, he's upset as I put him on his changing table to change his nappy, he definately doesn't want to eat his lunch or play on his own. At bottle time, he decides he wants to drink in a big mouthful of milk and then spill it down his cheeks. He cries as I try to talk on the phone (I can't have a single moment of normalness chatting to a friend) I try all of Elliot's favourite games .. peekaboo, being chased around the room, stomach tickles - everything seems to make Boy cry. I finally realise what's wrong (god, am I slow!) Elliot has a fever. We cuddle on the sofa the rest of the afternoon and all seems well. Luckily N came home early and I got a much-needed break.

We started to watch holiday episodes of our favourite programmes. Tonight we watched the Thanksgiving episode in the first season of Felicity and if Els hadn't fallen asleep, we were going to watch the My So-Called Life Christmas episode. I needed that. I need something to happen to make it feel more like Christmas around here.

Oh! By the way, a big congratulations to Daniela! I am so happy for you!

(thanks to those who made it to the end, I know it wasn't easy!)

Mothers

I am such a bad mother sometimes. I'll get to this a bit later.

My mother and I have a very strained relationship. She was quite young when she had both me and my (half) brother, David. She came from a very alcoholic family, and was an alcoholic herself for a very long time. She didn't have much schooling, and had an awful childhood. God only knows why my mom and dad stayed together for as many years as they did, they never liked each other. My mom clearly favoured David, and at times I could tell that I reminded my mother of my dad, and for that reason, she treated me differently. The worst treatment I had from her while she still lived in the same house with us was indifference. But all of that changed after the divorce. She had cheated on my father with his best friend, and they soon moved in with each other. She still came over occasionally while the divorce proceedings were going on, but each visit managed to end sourly. Once, after a day of gardening, she called the cops on my dad and the police station sent out a SWAT team (my father is a 'crazy Vietnam vet') we always had some sort of traumatic experience to deal with. My mom never wanted custody of me, but she fought long and hard to gain custody of my brother. My dad settled for us visiting with my mom every other weekend and every other Christmas. When we stayed over, she'd rent the videos that David wanted to watch, and make the food he liked to eat. I had never felt more unloved, but I was still young - 11 or 12, I needed and wanted a mother, even my mother. Until the day that David and I pleaded with my dad to drive us over to where my mom was staying, I still loved her. I knocked on the door with David right behind me, and Greg (dad's ex-best friend and my mom's new husband) answered the door and told us to go away. We asked after my mother, he said she wasn't home. David saw her in the upstairs window. We knocked again. Greg answered the door again, this time with his shotgun pointed at us and told us to get the hell off his property or he'd blow our heads off. I never made much of an attempt with her again.

In a different way, I don't pay enough attention with my son. Because I wasn't watching properly, he fell down the stairs the day before yesterday. It was a long way to fall.