Maria von Trapp 2.0

Feeling a bit u ok hun/full of burning rage at the moment, when the temptation to dwell upon the much dickishness of the world seems overwhelming, so I thought I’d instead write a list of some of the wonderful things in the world. Yeah. That’s right. Move over Sister Maria, you’ve got some motherfucking competition. 

1. We had M’s school Summer Fete this week, and I was on the cake stall. Parents who buy a 20p cake and refuse change from their proffered £1. They are my fave. We also raised more than twice what we’ve ever raised before. Joys. 

2. Twitter, during things like the Germany-Brazil match the other night. In fact, Twitter generally. It’s such a good thing. You who pour such dismissive scorn upon it, you are geese. And anyone who ever DMs me to say they’re thinking of me on those shittier days. You are magical. 

3. Rereading Peter Pan with the kids. Holy shit, that is such a fantastic book. Have you read it? You should. It’s good. Loopier than I ever remember. It’s so good. 

4. This John Legend video. 

5. I’ve got a chicken roasting in the oven right now. That smell is a beautiful, beautiful moment in a short, dark life (the chicken’s, not mine). 

6. Tiny children who are kind to their tinier siblings. I *cannot* get enough of that shit at the moment. 

7. Pistachio Magnums. The silver ones taste of evil and endless parental disappointment, but those pistachio ones are like perfect synthetic nutfulness. 

8. Playing hide and seek in a public swimming pool. I never get tired of it. 

9. The pile of books I’m building for my summer hols in a couple of weeks. Besides a day’s kayaking, the only thing J and I plan to do on that holiday is read in silence. I actually cry every time I think about it. 

10. My awesome neighbour, who saw me as I came home after a horrific day yesterday and immediately took me on a 5k run. YOU ARE MY MEGA FAVE. 

Now all I need is some Adventure Time DVDs, a stash of Cadbury’s Creations Jelly Popping Candy Shells (goddammit why have you disappeared from every shop in a 5 mile radius?) and an escape fund, and I am golden. 

I can't write this book! FIRE THE CONFETTI CANNON!

Someone retweeted this into my timeline the other day. 

It literally gave me goosebumps. It had everything in there: dystopia, a girl doing a rough tough job, issues of female bodily autonomy and the implied criminalisation of that… I wanted to write that book so much I could taste it. As with all writing-related tweets, I didn’t just favourite it to get buried in the hundreds of articles I mean, eventually, to get round to reading. Instead I emailed it to myself, to sit in my inbox with the hundreds of literary prize details and inspirational snippets I mean, eventually, to get round to making the most of. 

But as it stewed in my brain for the rest of the day, I had a slow, joyful realisation. I couldn’t write that book. Not in a million years. For whomever did get round to writing it, I would be first in line to buy that book by them on launch day, but I couldn’t write it, any more than I could write a nineteenth-century historically accurate thriller, or a hard SF war epic. I’d read the bejeesus out of both of those, but they are simply not in my brain to write. But the joy of that realisation was that the other stuff in my head - the nonfic about my parents’ families, the literary novel, the next women’s humour(ish) fiction book, the children’s picture book - is brewing so nicely, fattening up like the grapes in our back garden grapery (or whatever it’s called), and I know they will all come to fruition. 

It turns out that actually, it’s pretty good to occasionally be reminded of what you can’t do. If only to remind yourself of the wonderful things you can. 

The World is our Lobster

It’s been two weeks now, and I can’t stop daydreaming about going off on some semi-global 9-10 month jaunt with J and the kids. Two flies in that lovely daydream ointment: 1. We add approx £7 to our savings each year. We need between £40-50k to even begin to manage the flights, food and roofs we’ll require. 2. The most number of days the five of us have spent together without childcare, school, work or babysitters scattering our gang is probably in the low single figures.


Still. How would this be for a trip?

London > Vancouver > Honolulu > Sydney > Christchurch >

Then it gets a bit vague. South-east Asia, which I’ve never visited before, and ending in Japan, which I have, and which I’d so like to visit with the kids. And do you know what? If nothing comes of this, it’s no disaster. There are enough adventures on these choppy waters right now that this happy fantasy is a simple pleasure.