Balancing

Are you feeling the same as me? There’s a sense that we are all balancing on a tightrope over the Grand Canyon. We’ve made it most of the way and we can see the other side. Someone has put the Christmas tree up on the side we are heading to, the sprouts are on the boil and the pigs are firmly wrapped in their blankets. However, one of those springtime winds that they warn hikers of has just got up and the tightrope is swaying wildly. We look for something to grab onto but all we can to is hold the tiny rope we are standing on. Will we make it to Christmas? 

Oh my goodness. I’ve caught the metaphor disease. Maybe I should get into politics.

Metaphors are good for when you are trying to explain the unexplainable to yourself. 

In school, one of our bubbles has popped. It’s been a shock. Somehow, we had been congratulating ourselves on our luck so far and then bang! The wheels came off the wagon, the cushion has fallen apart at the seems, everything’s a bit haywire, we’ve all come a cropper and it’s gone tits up. 

Except that this little shock is just that. We will get over it, just like every other school has done. One person testing positive for COVID, especially when they are not very ill is not the end of the world. We will cope. However, the first, so close to Christmas feels like a double shock. We are all holding our breath, waiting for  it to spread throughout the whole school but it probably won’t and we will all be fine and get on with it. 

The Brexit negotiations are in a similar state, except that we have to watch our Prime Minister clowning around in the photo opportunity. The likelihood of that one getting to the other side of the Grand Canyon is looking increasingly unlikely and I don’t want to watch anymore.

)

On a lighter note there is always the controversy over how Nigella Lawson says microwave (meecro wavé) and the ensuing treats on Twitter of the words people mispronounce on purpose in their families. In our house we say daddycado (avocado), wishdosher (tumble drier - it is in the hole where the dishwasher used to be) and  Lie- sester (Leicester), to name just a few. Weirdly, about 52% of people on Twitter don’t do this and thought Nigella needed to be taught how to correctly say the word. Luckily that’s not the same 52% who don’t enjoy my new favourite Twitter account @catshouldnt.

Life is about balance. If we all liked, worried or got angry about the same things then the world would definitely fall. I’m off to look at cats that are definitely not stuck and consider buying a microwave so that I can pronounce it like Nigella does, with a twinkle in my eye that half the population won’t notice.