Four Weeks

"I'm bored!"
"You can't be.  Not yet. There's still four weeks to go."
"But I am.  I'm bored."
"What about all those things you were going to do in the holidays?"
"They're boring."
"No, they're not boring.  You were really looking forward to doing them."
"Was I?"
"Yes."
"Well, now I'm bored and I can't even remember what they were."
"Why don't you read a book?"
"I've read eleven."
"Eleven?  How have you had time to read eleven?"
"I don't know.  I just have.  Sometimes I've been reading two at once."
"It's a lovely day.  You could sit in the hammock and read another one."
"I could...... but I'm bored."
"Okay. You're bored. I get it.  Why don't you do something creative?"
"Like what?"
"Oh I don't know.  You could write a story."
"Yeah.  I've written 5,000  words of my story but I think I'll stop because it's boring. I don't think anyone would want to read it."
"What about some knitting?"
"Yeah, I could carry on with the knitting.  I'm three quarters of the way through a baby jumper but I've got one and a bit sleeves to do and sleeves are..."
"Let me guess?  Boring?"
"Yeah."
"What about making some bunting?"
"I could but the sewing machine is upstairs and I'm too bored to go and get it."
"Well, what about cleaning out those cupboards?"
"Oh, BORING!"
"Yes, I agree but you did say that you couldn't wait until you had time to do it."
"I know but.... cupboards,,,,,, they're just.....boring."
"You could watch the TV."
"But I've watched all of House of Cards now."
"All of it?  All 52 episodes?"
"Yeah."
"No wonder you are bored."
"Yeah, you know I'm thinking I really quite like going to school."
"I'll remind you of that when you are sobbing into your cornflakes crying, 'Don't make me go,' in September."
"Okay.  But I think I miss people. You know, real people who talk to you and stuff."

*Doorbell rings*

"What are you doing?"
"Hiding."
"I thought you said you missed people."
"Yeah but ....."   *picks up book, studies knitting and opens word document* "I'm not ready for real people yet."

Five Weeks

Dear Parents,

Chill out.  You've still got five weeks to go.  That's five whole weeks with your children. I've seen you, in the Supermarket, in town, at the park.  And you are letting it get to you. It will be a very long five weeks if you don't unwind a little.

You will notice us teachers, looking calm, relaxed, twenty years younger than we did last week.  We are the ones sauntering down the supermarket aisle, whistling as we think what we might like to eat tonight.  We could cook something extravagant with our new-found energy or maybe we'll just get some cheese to eat with all the wine and chocolate that you so kindly bought us.  You will see us in town sitting having a coffee, that lasts hours, while you (Dads in particular) drag your children across the road, ignoring the crossings because you just, "don't have time for this!" We will be the one's in the library with a huge stack of books to checkout, smiling at your screaming child, who will not go and tell the nice lady about the book she has just read and who doesn't care about the stupid reading challenge anyway.  Reading challenges are not a problem for us, we've waited seven weeks for enough energy to read more than a page without falling asleep.  We will be the people in the park, whose dogs are genuinely smiling because this is the longest walk they've had in ages and they are allowed to stop and sniff whenever they like.  We will tell your children that they can stroke the dog and watch the relief on your faces when you realise that the tantrum over whether it is legal to have an ice cream before midday has disappeared as quickly as it arrived (By the way it isn't.  Ice creams can only be consumed after noon.  My children are grown up now but it is still a law they stick to).  The teachers are the only parents who aren't stressed in the company of their offspring.  One or two certainly seems preferable to thirty.

When I was in the Supermarket today I saw some very harrassed parents.  Children are unpredictable and difficult.  They have questions that you might not have the answers to.  They want to do their own thing; they have their own ideas and they are unintentionally rude.

I was getting my trolley and  I walked in front of a little girl of about nine who had just collected one for her mum.

"Whoops.  I'm sorry," I said, "I wasn't looking where I was going.  Isn't it a lovely day?  Can you hear that blackbird?  He sounds so happy."
The little girl drew a huge breath, probably to tell me everything she knew about blackbirds when her mum shouted,  "Be careful, Petunia.  I told you to watch where you was going."
Petunia looked at me and sighed, "Technically Mum, it was that girl's fault."
"Girl?" I thought and suddenly I loved Petunia, "It was," I told her mum, "I wasn't looking where I was going."
The mum ignored me, lines furrowed into her brow and her voice the pitch of a rusty circular saw.  "That's not a girl.  It's a lady."
Petunia looked at me, back at her mum and then at me again and put her hands on her hips before pushing the trolley to catch up with her family.
"Oh mum.  I think you need to get your glasses on.  This girl is sooo much younger than you are."

 I saw Petunia again in the bread aisle, where she was sobbing into the rolls because her brother was now pushing the trolley and it wasn't fair.  Her mum looked ready to explode.

The whole shop was gripped with whinging children and shouting, stressed parents. I picked up a cake muttering to myself, "It's an apple turnover sort of day," and an old lady laughed.  She said, "You've just cheered me up.  It's horrible in here.  I was just wondering if I should call Social Services."
The lad restocking the shelves with bread said, "It's just the start. It will get much worse before it's over."

A little boy said to his mum, "It's an apple turnover sort of day.  That lady said so."  His mum looked at him, smiled and said, "What big ears you have Mister Wolf.  Shall we get some for lunch?"
The old lady asked her, "Why?"
"Why, what? Apple turnovers are nice." she puzzled.
"Why aren't you like everyone else?  Everyone else would have shouted, 'not now. We don't have time to think about cake,' and then there would have been crying and maybe a slap."
"Well," the mother said, thoughtfully, "I'm a teacher."

If you are not a teacher and you are finding the school holidays stressful then please remember that it's only just begun.  Try to smile.  Try to laugh.  Your children are amazing and they will be grown up and moving to Coventry before you know it.  Then you will regret all the times you didn't think it was an Apple Turnover sort of day.

Enjoy the next five weeks.

From a former grumpy old woman who is a happy girl (for the next 5 weeks).

A Little Rant

I know I'm getting old.  You get the tell tale signs.  You can remember the first person that did a song, you recognise pictures of people that others have never heard of and you remember your childhood as being idyllic in comparison to the lives children seem to be living these days.

Today, I played a class Greg Patillo beatboxing with his flute. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=59ZX5qdIEB0  I told them that there were 2 tunes; Inspector Gadget theme tune and another.  I was thinking Harold Faltermeyer Axel F but they were convinced it was Crazy Frog!!

Then, working with teenagers at orchestra they were all playing games on their smartphones in the break and when they were stuck they turned to me, "Who's that?" they asked.  "It looks like James Dean to me," I replied
They were very polite but as I walked away someone asked, "Who's James Dean?" and their friend replied, "I've no idea."

And finally, I'm home and reading newspaper articles online and wondering if Mr Gove is actually human.  This evening, several parents of children at the orchestra had a little rant about Michael Gove.  They think he's got the longer days and shorter holiday thing all wrong.  They actually like their children and want to spend time with them.  "It's not the hours you put in but what you put in your hours," one parent pointed out. They were worried that if they had to stay at school until 5.30 how would they be fit to then come out to orchestra at 6, "When will they eat?  Eating is important, you know."  

Even if enough parents jump up and down and make Gove change his mind for now I am convinced that these changes will gradually happen.  It may be a product of my advancing years but I don't remember the kind of pressure that these children face.  I'm sure I started school at 9 and finished at ten past three and had a whole hour for lunch.  There were clubs after school but fun things were also done in school time.  My son starts school at 8.30 finishes at 3.15 and has half an hour for lunch and almost anything fun he wants to do has to be at an after school club or sometimes on a Sunday.  I'm pretty sure holidays were longer and I don't think I'm looking at it in the same way as you remember the sun shining all summer long, but I used to get a bit bored in the Summer holiday and I remember counting down over 6 weeks. This year the holiday is 5 weeks and 3 days.  I don't ever remember going back to school in the new year until after the Christmas tree came down on the 6th January.  Holidays were holidays, as well.  That meant you didn't have to do anything.  We weren't given loads of homework and projects, we didn't have to go into school for extra revision study days, and we didn't get stressed about not having done eleven hundred practice papers.  A friend told me today that her daughter was getting cross about the holidays that were being booked for the Summer break.  She said that she needed to study and if she went away with mum for a fortnight and Dad for a week then she only had 17 days left to do all her work.  Am I idealising my youth or to they just have it harder than we had?

I was cross with Mr Gove for pinching Obama's speech about school holidays being a throwback to our old agricultural history.  He said, "I remember half-term in October when I was at school in Aberdeen was called the tattie holiday – the period when kids would go to the fields to pick potatoes."

I kept thinking, we still do pick our potatoes in the October half term.  We plant them at Easter, we harvest everything, freeze, bottle and give away our produce in the Summer holiday.  We dig the plot over and plant broad beans in the February half term and we weed like crazy in the May half term.  We don't need to go fruit picking to supplement our income, although I am sure some people would love the opportunity to earn a bit extra.    I don't expect Mr Gove was one of the children picking potatoes, I doubt his parents needed the money.  His school holidays were probably as carefree as mine were.  As a child, my summer holidays were spent at the park, helping Alex, the boatman on Lake Meadows lake, cycling to talk to the tramp under the railway bridge at Ingatestone and roaming through farmer's fields, climbing haystacks and making dens.

And while I'm getting cross about Mr Gove I also need to point out that he makes me smile.  I have never seen a man who is such a gift to the picture editor.