149. Start of the year

The Christmas holidays seem to be dragging on. I pause and look around me. I seem to be the only one suffering from winter holidays stuck-at-home-blues syndrome. Everyone else seems to be on a post Christmas high.

My husband is deeply engrossed in his Military LandRover Defender XD Wolf Work Manual and is even making notes. It looks as if he's even writing a to-do list. I thought he hated lists, to-do lists, shopping lists, reminders and post-its. And now he has a two-page one! I get a peek and it involves buying parts in Yorkshire and getting them fitted in Poland, then getting some kind of generator (so we can be modern and plug in our phones) a two-hour drive or so from our home town ... But hey! He's busy and he's quiet so I let him get on with it and I ask no questions.

Baby-of-the-Family is not so quiet. She has been banging away on her drum kit all afternoon. But nobody has been complaining or shouting at her yet. No shoes, no magazines, no pillows thrown in her direction. This also is very promising. 

Even Maths-Head has quit the Maths and is strumming away at the ukulele, sitting at her desk with her poetry book opened in front of her. We can hear her alternating between declaiming a couple of verses, strumming a few chords, declaiming a couple of verses, strumming a few chords, etc ... It sounds as if she is back into childhood, being 8 years old and this adds to my feelings of being at odds with the situations around me.

At least our son is still predictable as ever: off to the rugby pitch to show off his new gear. He is starting to look quite the part: long-sleeved skin-tight black top with a bright flashy pink team shirt over the top. I don't know what team and I've stopped asking as he gets really annoyed because I should be able to tell just by the colour of the shirt. I need to do what my husband does: make a list. Write the names of the teams on a card and draw a little miniature shirt at the back. But all I can think is that this shirt from whatever team is going to come back covered in mud. Will so much mud wash off such bright pink? (Later I will discover with amazement that huge technological progress has indeed been made in the area of sports textiles: pure magic, the mud just slides off! Incredible. I wish they could do the same with the boots. 

Miss Organiser, for once, is not running around organising everyone. She's had to quit that because she has so much organising to do for herself. No-one is saying anything but it actually is quite pleasant not to be ordered around and quite promising for the months ahead.

'I honestly don't know what you're going to do when I'm gone!' She keeps repeating in all earnest as if she really means it, all he while shaking her head and raising her eyes to the ceiling.

'I'm sorry to break it to you but I am the mother and I think we can manage very well, thank you. Actually I think we might have done it before.'

I'm thinking I will get my kitchen back, my washing machine and tumble dryer back, my car back, ...

'Oh! ... Mum! ... By the way, ... I'm not going to take the train to go to Paris. I'll take the car.'

'The car? ... Is that reasonable? It's winter and the roads are more dangerous ... It's more expensive ... you will have to pay for parking too. And the embassy is right in the centre of Paris, imagine driving around Place de la Concorde or around the Arc de Triomphe and then looking for a place to park!'

At the sound of words such as cars, parking and driving my husband raises his head from his favourite book and looks as if he is going to say something. But then decides otherwise and goes back to his book. 

As I had foreseen, Miss Organiser just brushes my helpful advice off and carries on.

'If I take the train I will have to hang around before and after the appointment and what will I do?  Nowhere warm to go and sit and eat and wait. I've driven in and around Paris before. I’ll take the car.'

I mutter some indistinguishable syllables. My husband is plainly making sure he is staying out of the conversation. She goes on. Unperturbed and imperturbable.

'I can take a break on the motorway services, wait in the car when I get there. I'll check for where to park right now. ... It's much better that way. ... Is there fuel in the car?'

'Be careful with our car, it is too high for many underground carparks ...' I dare say as a last attempt at guidance.

'Stop worrying mum!'

I push aside visions and sounds of the roof or our car scraping some concrete ceiling. My husband has stopped turning pages. He raises his head.

'I think the train is better. Only an hour by TGV.'

I look at him and signal he'd better get back to his book. Baby is downstairs now close to the Christmas tree and when I get closer to her I notice she is plucking needles off our tree and sticking them in her mouth, munching away.

'Do you think they're edible? I saw something on the Internet that says they're edible.'

I decide it is time to put the dinner on and to forget about my crazy family ...