I’ve turned into a moaner. I know this because I saw the look which passed between my daughters when I said, ‘They’re not happy unless they’re complaining,’ to my mother, about people we both know.
Moaner Lisa
Creeping Out of Lockdown
Lockdown is easing. Yay! I wanted this. So why do I feel anxious all the time? It’s not because I’m scared of getting the virus. Been there, done that, got the tinnitus. I’ve also had the first dose of vaccine, so, in terms of contracting covid-19, I’m in a pretty good position (Sorry if that sounds smug. If it helps, I had it quite badly for a month. Do not recommend)
Adoption – Why I’m Searching for my Birth Mother Now
I was put up for adoption soon after my natural mother gave birth to me when she was seventeen. My adoption was successful and I’m incredibly lucky to have enjoyed a good life. I am happy. I truly believe she did the right thing for me, and hope it was right for her too.... Continue Reading →
Pandemic Production
I Support the Arts and the Arts Support Me. Last night the overture to Jesus Christ Superstar made me cry.
Fifty Years in the Making
I am fifty-years-old and I feel I have been reduced, but not in the way you might think. I have simmered for five decades and I think, at last, I have achieved my desired concentration. I am thick (waist-wise, anyway), rich (in every way that matters) and, even if I do say it myself, really... Continue Reading →
Down The Screen Time Rabbit Hole
First published in http://www.the-motherload.co.uk on 17th January 2020 My eleven-year-old’s face once shone with bright ideas and a willingness to engage with the world around her. Now, if I see her face at all, it’s illuminated with an eerie fluorescent glow. She got a mobile phone for her birthday and that very day she disappeared... Continue Reading →
Mortality Bites
I woke up last night with an intense awareness of my mortality. Have you ever felt that existential dread; hard and shiny as a car bonnet careering for your head? I used to feel it as a child, the sudden and suffocating knowledge that I was alive, in this time, in this fragile, terrifyingly mortal... Continue Reading →
No Need to Shop Around
The Mysterious Effects of Ageing Why have my tastes changed as I’ve grown older? I’m confronted with my teenage daughter’s I don’t get it face so often that I’ve started to think about the choices I make as a middle-aged woman and how they differ from those I made when I was younger, and why.... Continue Reading →
Chalk and Cheese
How Can my Girls be so Different? (First published in The Motherload Blogzine on 3/11/19) ‘It’s another girl,’ said the male sonographer at our twenty-two-week scan, ‘sorry.’ Ignoring the last comment (that’s a whole other article), I remember being delighted that our second, and definitely last, child was a girl. We already had a three-year-old... Continue Reading →
Getting Over the Hump
Why Ageing Doesn't Mean Decline and Fall Ageing is like climbing a mountain but, despite what we’re led to believe, getting to your peak is not the best part. Once you’re over the hump, there’s a whole new world to explore; a world that society and advertisers either ignore or tell us is all downhill.... Continue Reading →
