Let’s not pretend that life isn’t  chaotic most of the time

Perhaps we dress it up as order and define ourselves as in control ,and sometimes, for long stretches, days roll over and over and we might feel that we are there. We have reached

At this point though there is the possibility that we might become compacent.

The complacency , nurtures the growth of a backlog of tasks which start as scrawls on the side of your desk jotter and spread to the things to do app on the phone. Eventually, you seek to unify them and end up with things to do, compilation 1 and 2.Which you then attempt to plan complete, giving each day of the week a section of the list in the only way you know how

Often the plans just don’t pan out in the way you imagine they used to – they start to stutter and despite your effort, the navigation through them doesn’t feel orderly

I used to think those days were confined to having small children but over here on the other side of motherhood which I shall call –‘mother to another adult hood’ – those less orderly days can be equally prolific – maybe even more so.

Particularly on those days you earmark for getting things back under control. Like today.

I am blessed with fantastic kids-  they are nice, uncontrived, and not materialistic They try hard to accept what we have and have a really healthy and emphatic view of other people whatever their circumstances or their background, they don’t discriminate.

And I am proud of them.

Still, it doesn’t mean that I don’t like my own space away from them, and as life picks up pace, the thought of a couple of hours to myself on a Saturday afternoon was alluring.

After a hectic morning bathroom cleaning, and bike riding with smallest there followed an hour of gentle cajoling as I delivered what middlest decried as my motivational speech

As I pontificated the merits of swimming lessons, smallest edged out of the room, I was left delivering my pearls of wisdom to a lazing teenager who was sufficiently roused by it to pull herself up from her laying position and say,” well that’s motivated me Mum – I’ll go……”.

“Great but you can swim already” I say

She shrugs and I sigh turning in pursuit of smallest who has found refuge in the garden

I continue holding onto the thought of my two hours in the library and continue motivating

My words performing

Like a life raft amongst the waves of a small person’s anxiety

Which he rode on a wave of persuasion all the way to the swimming pool –

and after half an hour of chasing small bobbing plastic animals up and down the pool he decided, that he “liked swimming again now Mummy”.

Job Done.

Dropping smallest off he asked when I am coming back even before I have left and I answer smiling and waving at his still toddler like face before I head on foot to the library parting with middlest at the doors of her favourite charity shop. We embrace and she said ,”you could come in”, and I replied” I have two hours darlin I need to get some work done. I must be self disciplined “,-she nods and I sneak off , at this point, feeling as if I am being naughty

I have work to do and the library seemed the best place to go to concentrate so I walk in and select a spot where I have a view of a tree and I am not surrounded by people and conversations I can ear wig upon.

I sit and smile ,arranging all my bits; laptop, books , pens and drink.  As I log in I inhale- – no kids, no distractions apart from my phone.

• Which then rings-

 I look down

its eldest –” hi love I am in the library I whisper into the handset” –” oh right he whispers back “–” why are you whispering “,I say –” because you are in the library.” I don’t think it matters if you speak normally”, I say – “oh right” he says, I lean back, aware of the time which is passing more quickly than it usually does- and then I look up

My eyes resting on the waving hand

Attached to middlest who smiles and strides towards me

I smile back and give a smile laugh which teeters on the edge of hysteria

Eldest says,” what is it?”

“Your sister has arrived”

“we are nealry all with you”, he says

“arnt you justI sa”, y as middlest announces that she has come to sit with me

“OK love , its your brother”, I point tot he phone – Hiii she says trying to take the handset –

“Hang On let me speak with him” I say and as she sits down I stand up and walk out to talk to him recounting the irony of the situation that has just unfolded

He laughs and after arranging to meet tomorrow, I slide back into the library sitting down to a smiling-faced middlest who has brought her book with her.

She settles in and then looks over – “is that your drink?”, she says nodding at my drinks bottle – “yes”, I say and she leans in and takes it

I grin widely and shake my head , as I get on with the serious business of making my life a bit less chaotic.

                                                                                                ………….   come play my game ill test ya

Prodigy, Breathe 1996

Liam Howlett · Keith Flint · Maxim Reality.

Sometimes hope is just putting one foot

in front of another and facing another day.

It is learning to be in a moment without allowing

A million other potential moments

To come crashing in on you

Imploding the maybes and scattering

the possibility of now.

I remember, 

I couldn’t cope with knowing what you were doing. 

I wanted to give what I knew to someone else. 

‘cause, if it stayed part of me any longer it would rot my insides 

A sin I held onto , 

that felt like the food you didn’t want in you. 

Small bits of information you fed me on paper that 

Bloated my stomach until 

Like you, I wanted it out. 

The words digested from letters we would write 

To each other. Pages and pages of schoolgirl script 

carrying secrets, we just could not say; 

Like who we fancied, who we hated  

And stuff like that which bit into my consciousness, 

swirled around my mind at bedtime, 

sending me on Monday morning 

in a dizzy state towards her office. 

The little wooden box in the main hall with windows  

that stretched to the ceiling, sprouting from walls so high 

you could not see who was in there, if they sat down. 

Your words spewed out and she jotted notes in her book 

 in the way that she did that gave away nothing of what she was feeling; 

And asked questions, like how long and where 

then she showed me the way out, onto the streets of the school 

where I was left To find my way back to you. 

which it turned out was not easy  

After Miss had spoken to you, 

You turned off down a side alley and I was left on the cold 

Hard edge of our group, a cornerstone of betrayal 

Omitted from the chitter and the chatter of life in Year 9. 

Your mum said thanks though through the intercom 

Of the flats when I went to see you  

resolute in my belief I had done the right thing. 

Then months later you said thanks too 

And I said thanks quietly later  

In my head to myself, when I sat with the bags  

Of uneaten food in layers of clothes,

For giving me the heads up on what not to do  

When you have a problem with eating  ,

And you don’t want anyone to know.

You do not tell anyone 

You don’t tell Miss. 

Middlest created this with her boyfriend. I just love it.

I met a lady the other day who has given up her career in health visiting to become a therapist in alternative medicine. . She described her training as, ‘life changing’ and listening to her; watching her speak, her experience is visceral -for her and for me.

The joy she gleaned from learning about something different and it became the impetus for a lifestyle revision and placing it alongside a neighbours recollection of their career change, the disaffection of careers and motherhood was apparent.  They too had become disillusioned by their role, this time in education and sought to apply their craft in its purest form, through drawing for a living rather than teaching others to do so. made over a decade ago, “the move”, she recounts firmly, ‘was the very  the best thing she ever did”. And as she says this you believe her- struck by the notion of a gut decision, regarding something that she knew was right for her and her family.

Each account has been framed as an epiphany type episode , a decision made in an instant after hearing the latest vagal dispatch of unhappiness. They were not happy , they recognised it, they did something about it. If I listen to my gut then perhaps I could make the change too.

The desire to do the same has overcome me on more than one occasion. The dream to write – not to teach others to do it, has run on throughout my life. But I have never tried do so professionally. One reason is doubt in my ability , the other is the children and the impact it would have if I were to take a job that required me to work outside of school hours. So the dream became a hobby, but going back to my teaching role this year ,the idea has wandered back in. It is my gut feeling that I should take the plunge, follow my desire and hearing the  lifechanging decisions of people in my life,  has made me wonder further about my own choices.

There was , of course, another thought cheering them on. Their role as a mother. Certainly , ‘The Artist’ recalls how the travails of motherhood had put pressure on their time , constraining their availability to work and so made looking for suitable work tricky. They said, “Its like having two jobs and being expected to work both full time, you cant do it”.

“Except”, we both laughed, “you have to!”.

And if you are lucky enough to be a single Mum, you may need benefit support; in which case the expectation is that you do do it. You make yourself available for work. Not an issue for most, however the bone of contention for many, is the amount of hours that you are expected to make yourself available. 25 hours a week in my case, with a child of 5 in school. This is fine until you factor in school holidays- to which my work coaches response is-,”well what about childcare?”

Childcare is , extortionate and taking away the economic implications, there is also the fact that, it is , for some of us , it is just not an option. I brought my children into this world to raise them myself not to have someone else do it for me. I didn’t factor in the doing it independently but that doesn’t mean to say that my child should be made to endure childcare because of my failure (if you want to call it that) in having a solid relationship. In June last year, the work coach and I scrolled for employment vacancies together and suitable roles were limited. All were for 48 weeks a year. Most for 37 hours per week. She looked at me expectantly and I shrugged my shoulders. “I cant do that”, I said stoicly.

“Well you need to be a bit more flexible”, she states.

“Right“, I reply, “or perhaps the rules need to include a little more flexibility for people in my situation”.

The coach frowned and I continued, “You are assuming a stalwart of support and suitable childcare availability, neither which I have”.

Silence and she looks at me and then at the screen. Feeling emboldened I decide to continue,” and perhaps a consideration in the labour market of an increase of part time roles for Mums who would like to do something else other than teach. 

“But you are a teacher,” she argues.

“Yes I know that- but what if I didn’t want to teach anymore?”, I finish feeling flustered (as she is right) , and lean back in my chair.

She didn’t respond and I didn’t expect her to as the question was beyond her role – and it was maybe unfair of me to have raised the issue with her.

Instead , I considered all this and with time running out before I received a sanction, I receded – I am limited and it saddens me that I can’t make the change that I feel my gut is demanding.

Of course change is inevitable and so after speaking to another neighbour about her passion for her job a few weeks ago, I decided to take the plunge and I applied for a job as a community reporter. I pushed aside the maternal worries and sent over my CV with the words, “life is too short to be going to a job you dislike”, still rolling around in my mind.

And i waited. And I thought about what I had done and was excited but before long there was something else bothering me. That something else, slapped me in the face when I heard nothing from the news desk. I was disappointed. Disappointment which highlighted to me just how much I want to write but also disappointed that i could even have considered leaving the kids at a point when they and I am not really ready for me to.

Ok, technically I wouldn’t be leaving them, but I would be making the kind of change that, they, especially smallest would struggle with. I couldn’t do that.

So perhaps that was my epiphany.

I too have grasped the messages being communicated by my vagal nerve. The discomfort of chasing something at odds with what I have, was too much for me to bear and so I have turned around and decided to stop seeking change and sit with what I have.

It might not be what I want forever but its certainly where I am happiest for now.