The myth

 'I won't buy any more books until I've made a good dent in the TBR collection on top of the bookshelf,' I promised.

'Except the book-club book,' he reminded me, winking.

'Of course. That goes without saying. Of course I'll buy the book-club book.'

'And anything that comes out that you can't live without?'

'Well, obviously.'

'What about the books that people have recommended?'

'No. I'm definitely going to hold back on those.'

I was doing well. Honestly! The pile might not have shrunk much but it wasn't growing. I was reading more than I was adding to the stack. Not buying recommended books but noting them on my phone meant that the mental load of books I might not live long enough to read was expanding but at least they weren't threatening to topple the bookshelf. Over the Easter holidays, I spent a good couple of hours putting all these lists into one place. Some books had been recommended several times and were on more than one list but one book appeared on eleven lists. 

I told myself that it was a sign and that if I saw it in a bookshop I would buy it. For some people that might take a long time but as a bookshop is my safe haven; the place I go to breathe when I'm out and world is overwhelming, I was expecting it to be a day or two. The scent of books and a gentle caress of their perfect spines brings me back to a place I can cope with. Obviously, if I'm having a really bad day, the angst of there not being enough time to read all the books can make even a bookshop feel unsafe but this is rare. So, as I go into a book shop most days I didn't think it would be long before the most recommended on my list was in my grubby little mitts but it was never there.

On Thursday, I started a book from the pile. one I had bought in 2019 when it was on the Women's prize list. Circe. It was one I had picked up and put down more times than seemed reasonable. The feminist retelling of Greek myths is a relatively new genre that has excited the book world. It is something I should have been interested in but I held back. 

Greek myths push my buttons for two reasons.

The first is that they are inherently misogynistic. They are written to keep women in their place. Cautionary tales about what happens to you if you tell the truth, talk about anything or dare to be more intelligent than the men. They are designed to make women fearful. The idea that we can embrace these stories to make feminist literature grates.

My second problem comes from posh people. Don’t they wang on about Greek myths? The way they talk, you’d think they believe they were actually real, rather than stories about the most dysfunctional families you can imagine. And then they laugh at you if you mispronounce the names, which often are a collection of random vowels.  

It all started when I was skipping PE lessons to hide in the library. I was flicking through the Beano, which is true literary genius but I felt the guilt. If I wasn’t going to run round a field and have my shins bashed in by a vindictive hockey teacher then at least I should be using my brain, so I picked up the Iliad and I quite liked it. As a war story it wasn’t quite as good as Sharpe, which I’d borrowed from my dad but it did have some bonkers gods and the poetic nature of it was something I enjoyed. The bloody gore of eye gouging on the battlefield was worse than any X-rated film that I was still banned from watching. However, it did start with a woman being sold into sex slavery and after a plague caused her to be swapped for another woman, we were supposed to believe that that one (that I called Brian’s - because pronunciation) liked it. The pages and pages of names were also a bit of a turn-off.  

Armed with my new knowledge I went to play (and by play, I mean, to lie on a bed and sing into a hairbrush while OMD played in the background) with a friend who I had met through playing the flute. They had a huge house and bookshelves to die for. It wasn’t quite the stack of Reader’s Digest we had in our bathroom and they had a whole set of the Encyclopaedia Brittanica. I read along the spines. 

The Feud of Diomedes and Aphrodite jumped out at me. 

‘The fee-ud of Deeo-meds and A- fro-dight, I read about that in the Iliad,’ I said excitedly.

The family erupted. The dad snorted his tea through his nose. The mum placed three dainty fingers to her lips and hiccoughed. My friend’s brother said, ‘Don’t they teach you anything at that school?’ My friend, quietly whispered the correct pronunciation but the damage was done. I felt stupid; put in my place. So, I decided that Greek myths weren’t for me. 

Recently, however, I listened to Natalie Hayne’s Stoneblind on audio at the same time as I read the proof copy I had been given but never read. I thought it was brilliant and having the audio at the same time helped me not worry about the names. It was the first time I didn’t feel that someone who liked Greek myths was ‘up-themselves’.

Circe, Seer-say not circle with the l missing, was not as enjoyable, even with audio help. I spent the whole time wondering if I could stop. I was reminded of braying poshos and wondered why the ‘tele’ is said differently for Telegonus and Telemachus. It hasn’t cured me of my dislike of Greek mythology. 

I fell into the bookshop, feeling the panic of a book I hadn’t enjoyed. The panic of knowing I was too stupid, too poor, too uneducated to understand these ‘very important’ works. The myth that a bookshop would comfort me was the only one that mattered.

It is the only myth that is true. They had the recommended book that was on eleven lists. Of course I bought it. It was meant to be. My reward for slogging all the way to the end.

A successful long marriage

 When my parents were my age, I was still young. ‘Well, obviously!’ you say, not unreasonably but the point is, I’m still young. In my head I haven’t become the old person I thought my parents were at my age. However, the signs are there.

I have noticed that a long successful marriage settles into something that looks a little like thanking each other for doing domestic chores, asking each other what you want for dinner and sexual innuendo.

‘Thanks for doing the washing up.’

‘What shall we have for tea?’

‘Oh, I don’t mind, you choose.’

‘I chose last night but we have got those sausages.’

‘Have we. I don’t remember buying sausages.’

Goes to fridge. Finds keys.

‘Oh my. Look at the size of those. That’s a mighty fine sausage you have there.’

Spends all of dinner time being asked, ‘Fancy a bite of my huge sausage?’

I notice that the viral clip of the male gorilla tweaking his partner’s nipple and getting a slap for it, is doing the rounds again, with women sharing it with a caption that it perfectly describes a long marriage. If they showed it to their partners then the men would be irritated. ‘Is that how you see me? I’m not…’ but they are and it is with affection that their wives are pointing it out. There is something comforting in the familiarity.

I remember a year when my mum bought my dad an anniversary card with an old couple on the front. The woman had bent down to pick up her glasses and the man was saying, ‘While you’re down there!’ I must have been a grown up with my own children at the time but I remember being mortified. These old people might still be at it and were worse still, putting it on their mantelpiece. 

I was never going to become that embarrassing old person but here I am, blogging about the phenomenon before going to ask the LSH what we’ve got for tea tonight. 

It’s been a while

Write every day.

That’s what they tell you. 

I don’t know who they are but I think there should be some sort of punishment for them because this is what happens.

1. You write every day. In a journal, notebook or pages that you never show anyone. It’s fun. You can write things you’d never say aloud. It feels good.

2. Your child decides they want to write for a living and so to encourage them you write rubbish publicly. It’s ok. The world doesn’t open up and swallow you. If you can’t be a good example you can, at least, be a terrible warning. 

3. They read your public ramblings and say, ‘Have you ever thought of writing a novel?’ You think, ‘That’s a novel idea.’ You laugh at your own wit. 

4. It’s not the first time you’ve done this. A few words on a page every day and you get a story. People emerge from your head and talk to you. Life is a little less lonely but because you’ve never shown anyone it still feels good. You can nod along sagely when men (and it’s always men) say things like, ‘Oh, everyone thinks they can write a novel but it does take a special kind of person to make it.’ Weirdly, they always think they are that special kind of person. 

5. This time, though, it feels different. Buoyed by people having read your words before you decide to edit the thing until you can’t read it anymore. You let a few other people read it and then, really stupidly, you send it to 7 literary agents.

6. The first symbolic dream in years appears. Your male dog is going to have puppies. There are 6 or 7 but two slip out as you are crossing a zebra crossing. You try to pick them up but they squash in your hands. You wake in a cold sweat and wonder what on earth you’ve done.

7. You wander, lost and lonely, reminding yourself that 1% of books that get written are published and asking yourself, ‘What were you thinking? Who do you think you are anyway?’

8. You feel a bit sick. You wish you hadn’t done it and you are missing something. You are not writing everyday.

9. You go back to writing rubbish publicly but you really don’t have anything to say. You want to apologise to anyone reading it but you can’t help it, writing appears to be an illness. I blame ‘them’: the people who say, ‘just write every day.’

10. You console yourself with the fact that Liz Truss has written a book, with less self-awareness than a lettuce and she can’t even hold it up the right way. 

I propose

 Leap year: As a woman I can propose today.

Don't get to excited. For the other 365 days it takes a man. I could whisper suggestions but unless they are repeated by a man they won't get listened to. It's the law. Don't feel too sorry for me because I'm quite good at the whispering but today I can legally propose, so here goes.

I propose that any extra days are better in the future. If we have to have an extra day in the year then it should be a day free of troubles or conflict. Ideally, the 366th day every 4 years will be a non-day. A day similar to one of the 12 days of cheesemas. A day where you can lie in bed, read books, go for a long walk with the dog.

That is my leap year proposal.

How’s your hole?

 Blogs have been  thin on the ground lately. The truth is that I have been in a bit of a hole. A writing hole, that I am reliably informed is called ‘THE PAIN.’

THE PAIN (always in shouty capital letters) is the hole that you fall into when you have written ninety thousand words, typed End, read it through and understood that ‘end’ means beginning. There is almost as much work to do as you’ve done before you dare show it to anyone else. My ‘THE PAIN’ hole is filled with signs in colourful, beautiful script. Posters that proclaim: “Who do you think you are?” “What made you think you could do this?” “Why are you bothering?” “No one will want to read this trash anyway.” This hole is zapping my brainpower and making me grumpy and I doubt this blog is a valuable use of anyone's time. It is not even as though I ever wanted to be a writer, I just don’t seem able to help myself. It’s like an illness. 

If I had been writing the blog regularly then I suspect there would have been a hole theme. Life is all about holes. Don't snigger, I'm not talking about those holes, although if your life giving or maintaining holes are playing up then you have my full sympathy. 

If you work in the public sector then you will have got very used to the holes. They are everywhere. There have been too many years of a government that is not interested in funding public services and so gaps turned into craters and are now caverns. Every day you try to plug those holes. 

The magical properties of the wet paper towel are well known. It has to be blue and if run under some cold water it can heal anything but only if applied within a school setting. Knowing this, it's easy to get into the mind of Jeremy Hunt. There's no need to fund everything, send the little blighters to school and they can fix everything there. 

Never mind that the poor kid has been on a waiting list for a tonsillectomy for 3 years and the smell of pus from its mouth means no one wants to sit next to it, just slap on the blue paper towel. 

You think I'm joking but the holes in public services are so huge, entire schools and their crumbly concrete are liable to fall into them and disappear forever. 

The other kind of holes that are ever present in life are the grief holes. My brain is still a bit holey (I refuse to even discuss trauma holes) and as I watch people around me suffer from the loss of their parents my heart breaks all over again for them. Counsellors talk about loss as being like a hole in your life and how the hole never changes shape but you add more life around it. When you are younger, life happens quickly and exciting things surround your grief more quickly. Although it is natural that your parents won't live forever, it can be completely surprising to find that you don't bounce back as quickly as you thought you would and children have a knack of saying stupid things like, "I miss my mummy."

I was talking to a colleague about the holes and out of nowhere she announced, "My hole is fine. That would be a good title for a blog."  So, even though I'm in my own hole of pain, I will step out for a moment to ask you all, "How's your hole?"

I don’t suppose I could have one of those: socks, funerals and fantasy farming

 It was my uncle’s funeral yesterday and I forgot to show everyone my socks. 

I say that as though lifting a trouser leg is some kind of family ritual. It’s not but I do wish I had.

I’ll be honest. I’d got myself in a bit of a tizz beforehand. Funeral dress code used to be so much simpler when it was smart black. Nowadays people mention colour and the lines of etiquette are blurred. I understand, though, they want their person’s life to be remembered with the full vibrancy that they lived it. I might have hysterically thrown a few clothes around the bedroom before deciding that a grey jumper was the most colourful I could manage. It wasn’t about clothes, though. Not really. No one wants to go to a funeral and the first of my mum’s family to die since my mum felt as though it might be difficult. My nod to colour came with my silly socks.

I needn’t have worried because convention gripped us all. The crematorium was packed (quite a testament to a 80 year old man) with smart dark colours and, according to the celebrant, colourful socks. 

Funerals are quite nice, though, aren’t they? You say things like, “I’m so glad to see you. Whoops. Sorry. I mean it would be…in better circumstances.”

You smile and hug and wish you didn’t leave it until death to meet up. This becomes especially frightening when you might be the next one. I mean, I’m not getting any younger. After the service you shuffle out and stand in the cold for a while before heading to the pub for a much needed drink and a plate from the beige buffet. Then you chat and reminisce and life is good.

The next day is harder. You wake with cramp because you decided to wear heeled boots . You feel bereft and have a writing commission.

“Don’t let me down now. You promised,” were my cousin’s parting words. “I loved the 12 days of Cheesemas. There was one every day.”

“Oh, I don’t know. What shall I write about?” I feigned a lack of ideas.

“Just say something funny and she’ll write it,” said my sister rolling her eyes, having been the victim of that more times than she cared to mention. She is naturally funny. Oh no. I’ve done it again.

“Write about the farms,” my cousin said.

It was one of the brilliant conversations you have a funeral when you are examining your own life for it’s worth and wondering what would be said as a eulogy for you. We considered our regrets and my cousin told us hers.

“You know what I’d really like do?”she said, “Go off somewhere and have a farm. “

Fantasy farming.

We’ve all thought it. Especially at times when life feels to busy to bear. Chuck it all in, go off grid, have a collection of animals to stroke and let all your worries disappear. My Aunt and I talked about how when you want to do adventurous things like that you don’t have the time or money and then when you could run away you don’t have the energy.

My friend at work has this fantasy all the time. We send each other pictures of cows after a very tough day.  For me, it’s fantasy farming; I think of the reality of cold and shit smells but my friend was a young farmer so maybe she will swan off and commune with the cows. 

If my cousin was to make fantasy farming a reality I think she’d have pigs, which is why I wish I’d shown her my socks. Relatives tend to stay a particular age in your mind. This cousin is about 6. She was our bridesmaid and we saw quite a lot of her at that time. My parents took her to Marsh Farm and she pointed to the pigs and said, “I don’t suppose I could have one of those?” This is her legacy. We all say that now, whenever we see a pig. I say it every time I wear the socks. 

Mud sticks, shit stinks

 I’ve woken up with this phrase in my head: mud sticks, shit stinks.

My brain can’t trace it. Usually these little aphorisms came from my dad or, more often, his mum, Big Nan. However, this time I can’t place its root. It is the kind of thing he would say when cautioning me not to blame other people. In his opinion, people who blamed others did so because they had skin in the game. Those people who had nothing to do with a situation that had gone wrong had no need to do anything except sit back and watch the mud-slinging with wide-mouthed interest. I’m not sure I agreed with him because there are just some people who love a fight, whether it affects them or not.

This phrase is how I feel about what is going on at the moment over the wonderful Post Office drama that has, miraculously changed laws and policies overnight. The politicians are jumping up and down with excitement hoping to score points over each other by slinging the mud that has fallen around this issue. But it’s not mud, is it? It’s shit. A cesspool of poor decisions, incompetence and a justice system that was always designed to protect the rich. It has been going on for so long now that almost every living politician, post office executive, lawyer, computer company has defecated in the dung pile that they are now slinging at each other.

I’m pleased for the Post Office workers but it’s not enough and they know it isn’t. So politicians will, like captive monkeys in a cage, keep flinging their shit at each other in the hope that they’ll make us like the least smelly one the most.

I wish they wouldn’t. 

Banksy might have been right