The twins

This is their bed. They quite like it, though possibly not as much as they like flying through the air, swiping at things with their paws.

I think this is Sirius.

The two-headed kitten.

Look at the bird box - one of two that our son made the other day. He's fond of birds and feeds them regularly. I wonder if the kittens will understand this?

We did eventually get out of our pyjamas.

The efficacy of pester power

You think we finally gave in and got a kitten, don't you?

Look more closely.

The house is in chaos. Grandchildren would be much less work.

Also, it's very hard to take photos of black cats.

I think this is Sirius - a Harry Potter allusion, I'm told. On the other hand, it might be Cassie, short for Casseopeia - continuing the approximate constellation theme. Son chose the names. We had a cat when I was a girl who was actually named Dido but always called Pussy. The children point out that we can't call them both Pussy, though at the moment I can't really tell which is which, so it would be less trouble. And I think they're going to be quite enough trouble as it is...

The offspring are very very happy. Son is especially delirious. He says that he'll take them with him when he has a house of his own. Hmm.

We ordered new sofas for our dining room a few weeks ago. They're due to arrive in a month or so. We've had the old sofas for over 20 years and I wouldn't mind them being attacked. But my nice new ones...

I'm not good at being brief

Several days ago, I got tagged by Tanya the Art Butcher (sorry that I still don't know how to do the underlining thing) for that one word response meme, so here I go.

1. Where is your cell phone? Handbag

2. Relationship? Supportive

3. Your hair? Wavy

4. Work? Teacher

5. Your sister? Sadlynonexistent (What? Is that not one word?)

6. Your favourite thing? Family

7. Your dream last night? Forgotten

8. Your favourite drink? Tea

9. Your dream car? Free

10. The room you're in? Study

11. Your shoes? Comfortable

12. Your fears? Accidents

13. What do you want to be in 10 years? Interested

14. Who did you hang out with this weekend? Family

15. What are you not good at? Directions

16. Muffin? Shrug

17. Wish list item? Time

18. Where you grew up? Edinburgh

19. The last thing you did? Gardening

20. What are you wearing? Beads

21. What are you not wearing? Earrings

22. Your pet? Husband

23. Your computer? Precious

24. Your life? Busy

25. Your mood? Calmish

26. Missing? Youth

27. What are you thinking about? Son-in-law

28. Your car? Useful

29. Your kitchen? Pretty

30. Your summer? Scottish

31. Your favourite colour? Blue

32. Last time you laughed? Recently

33. Last time you cried? Slightly

34. School? Boring

35. Love? Lots

As for whom to tag... I can't now remember who's done it and I must go, but how about Beakus, Positively Mom and Yummers - if you're there, any of you!

It's the longest day. Ater I'd visited my mother this evening, I walked home. It was eleven o'clock, and still more light than dark, though twilightish under the trees. I love the long, light summer evenings in Scotland. It's dark now (midnight 02) but in about three hours the sun will start to rise again. Now that's not quite so welcome... birds singing lustily at three in the morning...

By the pricking of my thumbs...

Our college music department (plus a few staff, eg me) is having an extra performance of the “Dido and Aeneas” opera that we did a few months ago.

We’ve had a couple of brush-up rehearsals, and today the young lad who plays the Sorcerer remembered that, in the previous performances, he’d had a big stick that he waved menacingly around. Where was this stick? It couldn’t be found, but someone produced from the props cupboard a Victorian-syle walking stick – not right at all. He took this, but said with a sigh….






“You just can’t get the staff these days.”

Which is the sort of thing I’d have thought of some days later.

Sophisticated toddler in Tesco

In the supermarket today I heard a mother say to her toddler, who was in the child seat in the shopping trolley: “Do you want asparagus tips or baby sweetcorn with your mange-tout peas?” He said, “’Sparagus.”

And I thought: not a question my mum ever asked me, back in the days of austerity. As I trudged 100 miles to school, barefoot, dressed in cast-offs…

I’m exaggerating. But our vegetables were potatoes, carrots, turnip. And cabbage, peas and leeks in season.

Gosh, I’m cold – must go and have my bath and heat up a bit. How can this chilly weather be June?

Mecanopsis

I’ve been away with the family for a long weekend and must go and sort things out, but in brief, to answer a couple of people's questions on a recent blog post: this is a mecanopsis – in the above case, a blue Himalayan poppy.

How kind of some of you, by the way, to admire my infant chubbiness of two posts ago. Alas, the chubbiness is still with me (or at least, it departed for some years but has now returned), but I don’t think I’m at all recognisable from those photos. Hair is still brown on the whole, but with grey streaks at the front - it was never as dashingly dark as it looks in the photo with the bow – and it’s wavy, though the Shirley Temple look has gone, which is probably a good thing. My cheeks are still rosy (yes, I know those are black-and-white photos so you’ll have to take my word for it); I still have two eyes (brown) a nose (unremarkable) and a mouth (small). But I now look like a boring 57-year-old.

I remember Germaine Greer saying that the worst thing about being middle-aged is that you become invisible, but I quite like it on the whole – the invisible bit. It’s quite stressful to be young and self-conscious, worrying that people are looking at you. Now I know they’re not. I would probably like to look just a trifle less boring, though. But not enough to do anything about it.

Oh and - again referring to a comment from a few posts ago - Daughter 2's aspiring-actor boyfriend has done his two years at acting school in New York and has been back in Britain for a year now. But success has not so far crowned his efforts. It's not that he's not a good actor - he really is, as far as I can tell. But I fear it's a crowded profession.

Cats and dogs

I’m a cat person – not a great fan of dogs. Except of course, dear reader, your dog, who is doubtless quiet, fluffy, loyal, obedient, a soothing presence and not too large. More or less like a cat, in other words. Well, all right, cats aren’t really loyal.

The kind of dog I don’t like much is the size of a small horse, with rippling muscles, a bark fit to break the sound barrier and strings of drool swinging from its jaws. Like the one that woofed hungrily at me yesterday as I passed the college janitor’s garden. It was a Rottweillerish sort of animal, but with a bit of Great Dane in there somewhere. Fortunately it was in the garden and I was not, though it was clear by the way that it bounded up to the fence and hung its front paws over that it was just a matter of time till Fido was on the path beside me, munching on my leg. Or indeed my head.

However, the janitor’s wife was in the garden too, digging away. She’s a lady of about my age, though she generally makes a lot more effort with her appearance than I do: carefully blonded hair, a fair amount of mascara and blusher and a lot of gold jewellery. On this occasion, she didn’t look her best - in her shorts - but she was in her own garden, wielding a spade, so shorts were no doubt a practical decision.

Seeing me saucer-eyed with horror, she called the slavering hound back and said, as owners of such animals always do, “He wouldn’t touch you.” Yeah, right.

Just then two lads came towards me on the path. They were eighteen or nineteen and clearly dog-fanciers, because they looked appreciatively at the hound and one of them said to the other in ringing tones, “He’s gorgeous”. Then he glanced at the janitor’s wife, whose gaze had fallen on him. Suddenly his face was suffused in horror as he clearly thought that she thought that he had called out to her that she was gorgeous. He went bright red and said loudly to her, “The dog. He’s gorgeous.” She smiled proudly, in obvious agreement, and the poor lad hurried mortified away.

Sometimes – not very often, but sometimes – I’m quite glad to be no longer young.

PS - by the way, Person from Salford, I dreamt about you last night! We were at a lecture and you introduced yourself to me. You were young and sort of Gothy looking. Most surprising.

Procrastination

At my book group this evening, Susie, a student counsellor, said thoughtfully, “I’ve got to deliver a seminar next week on how to stop procrastinating.”

“Oh yes,” we said encouragingly. “What are you going to say about it?”

A pause. Susie looked slightly worried.

“Haven’t quite got round to working it out yet.”

Memory

I’m currently reading the autobiography of John Simpson, a television journalist, who claims that he can remember things from when he was very small – in his pram, in his cot and so on. And I remember someone commenting on one of my posts that she, too, could remember very far back. I can’t now find the comment; was it Velcro?

I think my first memory is probably of having the above photo taken. How old was I? Three, maybe? It was very exciting because the photographer came to our house. Some of the pictures were just of me, some of my big brother and some of both of us. I can remember clearly what it felt like to stand up and hold on to the back of that chair, which had a fawn, slightly slippery cover. The dress was what my mother called my Coronation dress, because it was white, with red, white and blue smocking and also little tufts of these colours. The Coronation was in 1953 and I was born in 1950, so this figures. My mother persisted in putting bows in my hair for some years, but I always hated them. They kept falling out and anyway I thought I looked silly. I was very shy and a lot of things made me feel silly.

Of course, we had the chairs till I was about ten, and the photos were there as a reminder of the day. So maybe that's the real reason for the memory.

But I don’t remember the one below being taken. I look about two, do you think? The age when it's socially acceptable to be short and plump.

.

Another early memory, though I have no idea how old I was: I was crouching down in the bedroom I shared with my brother and suddenly realised that I didn’t know the word for what I was doing. I asked him, the fount of all knowledge – two years and eight months older. “That’s crouching,” he said. And that was another word added to my vocabulary.

I’ve been told of the time when I carried an opened newspaper while toddling past an electric fire with radiant bars. My mother had to wrap me up in a rug to put the flames out. I wasn't permanently injured, but still, you’d think I’d remember that. But no. Strange thing, memory.

Blue

Well, hallelujah, I’ve finished the marking and can rejoin the civilized world. The poor souls who sat the exams will have to wait till mid-August for the results but I hope that they’re currently enjoying the summer.

Life has been not uneventful in other ways in the Life household. Our son-in-law is still pretty unwell, with only intermittent good spells, which is a huge worry. Daughter 1’s work contract ends in July and there has been nothing to apply for in her field, archivism. This doesn’t help, though doubtless something will come along in due course. Daughter 2’s singer/actor boyfriend came up to stay for the weekend; he has hardly worked this year. You’d think that at least one of our daughters’ significant others would work regularly; but not at the moment. I do wish he would just give up this acting idea and get a proper job!

Just before he became Daughter 2’s boyfriend, or at least before they’d come out as an item, he was our son’s university flatmate for a year (though he’s older than our son). Our son has a lovely voice and he and the chap in question used to be in a university light opera group together. One evening, I remember, after a show that they were both in, I gave them a lift back to the flat, and the future boyfriend said that he was about to go to a theatre school in New York. I remember saying something like, “Oh, how exciting!”

Now, I suppose he might reasonably have thought that I meant this. In a way, I maybe did, in a well-if-that’s-what-you-want-to-do-but-fortunately-it-has-nothing-to-do-with-me sort of way, but really I was just giving a conventional reply. I certainly didn’t mean that it was exciting, desirable or in any way remotely a good thing for the boyfriend of one of my daughters. I have definite double standards here.

What would I have said if I’d known about this burgeoning romance?

“Oh, that doesn’t sound like much of a plan.”

“Well, don’t think that you’re going out with our daughter, then.”

“You do realise that we think salaries are a good idea, do you?”

“How are you ever going to get a mortgage?”

No, I don’t suppose I’d have said any of these things. But ah, the satisfaction of imagination.

More and more I feel like the mamma in some Victorian novel: “And pray, how do you propose to support a wife and family?”

Meantime it’s June. Though the weather is currently not all that summery, little birds are tearing around the garden with beakfuls of unmentionable squashy things, the garden is blossoming - isn't this ceanothus a zinging blue? - and the summer holidays are in sight. One foot after the other, Isabelle, and keep on breathing in and out.

Working hard

Our son has been revising for exams in obstetrics and gynaecology, breast disease, haematology, oncology and palliative care, renal medicine and urology.

It seems no time since he was just a little blob of gynaecology himself. How can he possibly be almost a doctor? I can barely spell these words he needs to write exams on, and I'm much older than he is.

There’s a lot to learn, all in medical language. I don’t know how he remembers it all. He was a bit anxious that he wouldn’t. Here he is, surrounded by books and other marking detritus in our kitchen, looking unaccustomedly stressed. Now that I look at the photo, I rather like the juxtapostion of the half-eaten apple and the Apple computer. Anyway, the exams were yesterday and he seems reasonably sanguine about them now.

My jug cupboard is behind him. I like jugs, as you may guess.

I’ve been marking exams at the other end of the table. Here are my marking “toys” – things that I twiddle with my left hand while marking with my right. It eases the boredom somewhat.

One of the passages that the students have to answer questions on is about libraries and how great they are. The extract – from a male writer - begins: “I have a halcyon library moment. I am sitting under a cherry tree in the tiny central courtyard of the Cambridge University Library, a book in one hand and an almond slice in the other. On the grass beside me is an incredibly pretty girl”.

Question: What mood is created in these lines?

Student’s answer: A dull mood.

Well, I suppose it’s all a matter of personal taste. This candidate might not like cherry trees. Or books… or girls...

… or indeed almond slices.

Big purple allium

Well, I’ve marked 70 scripts so there are just 140 to go, and I’m getting much faster, as is always the case as the passages and questions become more and more familiar. I’d better not mention anything specific about the scripts, although there is one rather nice howler… but I’ll not tell you it yet. I don’t want to get disqualified as a marker and I’m sure that the Scottish Qualifications Authority reads this blog every morning just to check I’m not being indiscreet.

There was a nice example from three or four years ago, however, that I don’t think I ever mentioned here. (Apologies if I have. I don't have time to check.) The passage was about the way we tend to overprotect our offspring, and the writer said that children were in danger of becoming as restricted and unable to cope with the real world as battery hens. The candidates were asked to comment on the effectiveness of this image.

You would not believe how many pupils wrote that it was effective because, just as with the hens, if you took the batteries out, the children wouldn’t be able to do anything for themselves.

The first time I came across this, I read it to my family and we all rolled around the floor in mirth. But then the same thing kept recurring – about a fifth of the papers I marked said something along those lines. Exam hysteria had clearly taken Scotland by storm that year. I know we all tend to be removed nowadays from the source of food, but – come on.

Never mind the hens; wouldn’t small children be perfect if, from time to time, one could just remove the batteries…?

Thank you for your thoughts and suggestions about our son-in-law. It really is kind. He’s had a bad week, though seems better this weekend with Daughter 1 around to administer soothing words and cuddles. Let’s hope the improvement continues.

Sorry I haven’t commented on anyone’s blog – I’ve been keeping myself strictly away from the computer. But I might just have a tiny read now for a few minutes before bed.

Sad

You know when you wake up with the feeling that there’s a cold hand round your heart, and it’s a second before you remember why? Of course other people have far worse things to contend with; for example, the McCanns, whose little daughter Madeleine was abducted in Portugal a fortnight ago. But I’m feeling very low indeed about our son-in-law. And of course other worries creep in as well, such as Daughter 2, who is in herself a total joy but who is maintaining a long-distance relationship with a chap who is trying, not very successfully, to establish himself as an actor. Even if he succeeded, it would be in London, which is 400 miles away. I know it’s perfectly normal for grown-up children to live that far from their parents, but it doesn’t make it any easier to contemplate.

But the main problem is J. Anything is bearable if the children are happy.

Yesterday, Daughter 1, my husband and I dragged him round the Botanic Gardens, which were as usual lovely. The lad cheered up fractionally, perhaps.

Today is a holiday and I’m planning to get my bedding plants into the garden, the pots and the hanging baskets planted up. Which, if it happens, should be enjoyable or at least provide a sense of achievement. But there’s a big stone in my stomach.

And tomorrow is the markers’ meeting for Higher English (Highers are Scottish national exams) which means that between tomorrow evening and June 7th I have to mark 210 scripts, each with two close reading passages – 21 questions per script. To do this, I need to work for 3 hours per evening and 9 hours per weekend day. It’s my own fault that I’m doing this, of course; I do get paid. And there’s a certain masochistic satisfaction in getting through the task, year by year.

However, my blogging time will be severely restricted, especially as I’ll be spending much more time with my mother than I have in previous years. So if I fall relatively silent, this is why.

! expect I’ll be back. Bet you can't wait to read another cheery post like this.

Looking 95

I’ve been tagged by - oh dear, I've forgotten! I will find out! - for 7 random facts about myself. I had to take a class for an absent colleague this afternoon and had nothing else to do while they wrote, so didn’t allow myself time to think, thus making this more random, as specified. This is what I came up with.

1. I’m sitting looking at my engagement ring, which is an opal set in diamonds. Opals are supposed to be bad luck – presumably because they chip easily – but thirty-five years on, all seems to be reasonably well, at least as far as the engagement goes.

2. My lilies of the valley, with which I have a love/hate relationship, are going to need some serious attacking after they’ve flowered. I love love love the scent, but they spread as fast as I can dig them out – these nasty little tangly roots. They’re coming up in the lawn and between the paving slabs. Very bad.

3. Daughter 2 decided to cycle to work today for the first time. We live in Murrayfield, which is about three miles west of the city centre, and she works in Leith, which is about three miles out of the other side. There’s a cycle track most of the way, but Leith is by the sea – so at sea level, obviously – and while it’s downhill there, it’s uphill back again. And it’s unseasonably windy, and rather wet. (PS – She got home exhilarated but a bit exhausted. It’s now 10.03 pm and she’s just come into the study. “I’m going to bed,” she said. “An hour and fifteen minutes of exercise's made me feel 95.” She doesn’t look 95. See above. That was her in Seville a few weeks ago.)

4. I love baths and hate showers. I’m not very technically-minded and showers, to me, are machines. I’m not good at controlling them. Also I’m always cold in a shower – the bits of me under the water are warm, but not the bits that stick out. But lying in a nice, warm bath, with all my aching joints (which seem to be most of them, these days, alas) cooking nicely… bliss. And of course, you can’t read in a shower, can you?

5. I blog in our study. This is possibly rather an elevated name for the room, but it has two desks (my husband’s and mine) each with its computer; lots of bookshelves; various files and other stationery equipment; a chest of drawers containing all sorts of vital things such as programmes from school concerts that the children appeared in and drawings and letters they produced when they were little. There also tend to be little piles of… stuff… sitting around. We keep the rest of the house tidy by popping things into the study. This is not a good idea. Eventually it all gets moved on.

6. I have four names – three and then a surname. This is a bit much, in my opinion. My first name is also the title of what is usually considered to be the first novel written in English, though most people abbreviate it when addressing me. My second is my mother’s – she was named after the month in which she was born. My third is Isabelle, which I like quite a lot more than my first name. Both my grandmothers were called Isabella: one was always known as Isa (pronounced Eye-za) and the other as Ella. I hide behind “Isabelle” just in case - extremely unlikely - any of my students read this. But I do feel quite like an Isabelle.

7. I’m quite interested in science, but realised a few years ago that I’m really much more interested in lots of other things and that therefore the vague idea that I’d always harboured that I would become more scientifically literate wasn’t going to happen, not in the one lifetime. I have real enthusiasm for writing, reading, design of various sorts, gardening of course, and languages – not necessarily in any particular order. I speak reasonable French, bad German, very bad Spanish and Greek, absolutely terrible Japanese and Gaelic – but really enjoy going to language classes and allowing some of the grammar, vocabulary and culture of another language to sink in a bit. I can also claim Latin, I suppose – does that count? I did it for six years at school and it’s amazing how much has stuck, despite my having had the world’s most boring teacher. Nowadays, alas, things tend to slide through my ancient brain leaving little trace.

I'm sure most of you have already been tagged, so apologies if you have - I don't have time to check, since I must get up to my mum's for the night - but how about Rise out of Me, Fifi, Square One and Wifemomchocoholic revealing seven random things about themselves? Sorry that I don't know how to do the underlining thing. No wonder I drown in showers.

(Next day: have just read Fifi's suggestion that my name might be Arthur, Mallory or Morte. I love it! But no.)

Thank you!

Oh, you are all so kind to send your suggestions about our son-in-law. I’m really touched.

I think he reads this, so shouldn’t really broadcast his problems to the world (but it’s a very select part of it, J …). He’s been on every medication known to man, including homeopathy, and none makes any difference, or at least not any good difference. He’s had therapy and the only one that helped (for a while) was Cognitive Behavioural Therapy, so he’s on the waiting list for more of that. And he does exercise, or at least he does when he feels well enough, and you’re all quite right: it does help. He runs and cycles, though I’m not sure how much he’s been doing of these in the last few days.

But many thanks for all your suggestions. I shall follow them up. And if anyone has had success with boiled nettles or vitamin E or cutting out sprouts from the diet … do let me know. All ideas gratefully received. It’s comforting to know that there are clearly so many people out there who’ve had experience, directly or indirectly, of depression – and survived. He’s such a lovely lad and has achieved so much in his life. (Yes you have, J.)

I wonder who it is that reads my blog in Dublin. Sometimes twice a day, which seems very unlikely. Unless it's two different Dubliners. Well, either that or one very bored one. Hello there, anyway.

Not the best day in my life

Lilacs - how I love the scent. Things are not good in the Life household at the moment – various family problems, by far the worst of which is my son-in-law’s depression. Which is intermittent but completely disabling when it strikes. Anyone have a magic wand? He seems to read this sometimes, so - we love you, J, and you're great. Just keep determinedly thinking about the good things.

Also I just don’t have enough time to read all the interesting blogs I keep coming across. I’ve just had a big catch-up, and people have had panic attacks, babies, grandchildren, knitfests, quiltfests, painting sessions and so on without waiting to see if I was watching. So thoughtless.

A while ago I was kindly awarded the Thinking Blogger award (but I have no idea how to put it on my template – if that’s the word). Actually, because I read so many thinkers’ blogs, I can’t now think who hasn’t had it. Most of you have. So give me a few days to pass it on. Also I’ve been tagged for 7 random facts, but – I have to go! I’ll be back- but don’t do anything exciting in the meantime.

I do wish all you bloggy people could all come round for coffee. Including you, J, and Daughter I - oh, and you, dear husband, if you wanted (but you'd probably hide in the study). I don't think Son or Daughter 2 reads this, but they'd be very welcome too. I'd make a cake.

This post is probably full of mistakes because I am in a great rush, and this would serve me right for the odd critical comment which has appeared on these pages (are they pages?). Still, see me dash off....

The full set

Ahh, shucks - thanks for your kind comments on my children. On second thoughts, here's the whole brood. Though I do think in my motherly/auntly way that they're quite nice-looking, the important thing is that they're all lovely, caring young people. The photographer said to me afterwards, "They all get on very well, don't they?" - and it's absolutely true: they do. I think you can see it in the photo. The five of them are more like brothers and sisters than cousins - lots of fun and giggles and in-jokes. It's a pity that my nephew and niece live down south of London.

I have two aunts but no cousins. Deprived.

I always wanted four children, but alas, my husband would never agree. He was an only child, so three seemed quite a lot to him. I shall always regret my missing fourth child - even though I know I'm very lucky to have the ones I do.

My mum took us out for dinner tonight: the three "children" and their significant others, my husband and me. It was a nice occasion, but of course it seemed very odd, and sad, for my father not to be in the party.

When I consider the last few child-centred posts, I don't want anyone reading this who has no children to feel I'm suggesting that life without descendants isn't worthwhile. I love our children with a passion; but on the other hand, children do remove any chance of achieving anything much in the way of other self-fulfilment. Or so I've found it, though some less clingy mothers do seem to manage to write books, star in films, run companies. But most of us just go to work (or not) and wash the kitchen floor and pack the schoolbags and so on. Which is fine. Life is infinitely various and interesting, even if not when one is washing the kitchen floor.

Babies. Mine and other people's.

Our son phoned us yesterday morning to announce that, overnight, he’d delivered his first two babies. He’s been hoping to do this for a while, but had up till then been elbowed aside by eager midwifery students - he’s rather gentlemanly and not particularly pushy. He was all excited on the phone – he’d been up for 24 hours but was still running on adrenalin. Both babies were called Ruby and both of their surnames begin with R – clearly a pattern here.

It seems no time since he was a baby himself with two protective big sisters. See above. How does time pass so fast? (and other clichéd questions).

It was my mother’s 85th birthday on Wednesday. When my dad was 85, we commissioned a cake plate commemorating the day, with his quirky sayings inscribed on it. I then made a cake for the plate and Daughter 1 made a model of him, sitting in his armchair and reading “The Spectator”, out of icing, which we put on top of the cake. As I sat by my father’s bedside for four long days in March, I wondered how we could mark my mother’s 85th.

Then I had an idea. When Daughter 1 got married, a colleague who has a sideline as a photographer took the photos and they were lovely. He’s a really nice person and lives just round the corner from us. I thought it would be good to get some photos of the five grandchildren – our three and my brother’s two. The only available time was the evening of my dad’s funeral, since my brother’s family had to get back down south the next day. Miraculously, the photographer had just decided to set up a studio in his house. So in 15 minutes that evening, the young ones changed into less funereal clothes and popped round to get their photos taken: some of all five, some of our three and some of my brother’s two. I then made up a birthday album of these for my mum, with one in a big frame. She was thrilled. I thought I’d better not blog my niece and nephew, but here are our three.

They've grown up a bit. But they're still my babies.

Iris, clematis and infarctions

Our son and his sweet, slender girlfriend – a very devoted couple for the past four and a half years – have been spending time in (separate) maternity wards.

They were setting the table the other day as I made the evening meal. Chicken for the carnivores, beans for the vegetarians.

Son [with enthusiasm]: I got to see a twin placenta today!

Girlfriend [with rapt interest]: Oh! What was it like?

[He told her but I have mercifully forgotten the details.]

Girlfriend: I saw the placenta of a woman who smoked! It was a funny colour and it was full of infarctions!

Son: Wow!

Me [prodding chicken pieces gingerly]: What are infarctions?

Son: Blood clots.

Girlfriend: That’s really interesting, isn’t it?

[They gaze fondly at each other.]

By then, even the beans were beginning to look a bit suspect. Still, romance is not dead in Edinburgh, which is good to know.

Personally, I prefer flowers.

Doronicum

Thank you for all your comments and helpful suggestions re access to Garrison Keillor. All much appreciated.

I'm currently going down for the third time under a tide of marking so don’t have time to follow up any of these suggestions (but I will). Nor do I have time to read any of your fine blogs or to blog myself. I’m not really blogging even now, despite appearances. I’m just off to mark essays any second now.

I’ve been looking out for some little infelicities in these essays, with which to amuse you before I return to my toil. Unfortunately, after a year of my brilliant teaching (ahem) my students are currently not producing anything very terrible. However, I did find a couple of rather sweet things that I jotted down from my last year’s marking of national exams (which are about to impinge again, alas). I didn’t blog them at the time since the students hadn’t had their marks back and I imagine that the exam board would disapprove extremely. However, after a year I feel the extreme secrecy of the marking process must be a bit diluted.

One of the expressions I noted was just for the spelling: one candidate wrote that a character was suffering from “worrie and panick”, which I felt was splendidly Shakespearian.

The other was from a close reading passage – sort of practical criticism – when candidates were asked to pick out a metaphor from the text and comment on its effectiveness. There were various obvious possibilities, but one candidate ignored all these. For some perverse reason of her own, she picked out “human offspring” and said that she imagined lots of little frogs bouncing about.

Yes, yes, I’m going. See me springing off.

Flowers. And the difficulty of following my own advice.

Edinburgh in general, and my garden in particular, are one huge meringue of cherry blossom at the moment. (I mistyped this just now as “cheery blossom” – quite appropriate, really.) So pretty! And the lilac makes the air smell heavenly.

Fifi commented after my last post that St Cloud sounds like an imaginary place. Gosh, surely not. That suggests that Lake Wobegon might be imaginary too and I want to go there some day: the town where it’s always been a quiet week, where everyone is nice underneath a tiny bit of grumpiness and where things are bound to turn out right in the end. Oh, and Molly – Garrison Keillor has a weekly column? And you get to hear his radio programme? (Or, program, I suppose.) Not fair!

I don’t know quite what came over me in the previous post where I decided to give the world (or a very small part of it) the benefit of my accumulated wisdom, including the part about not handing out advice… . Apart from that little irony, I can imagine a quiet guffaw echoing round Scotland from my dearly beloved children. Well, I did say that I wasn’t actually the best at following my own principles, didn’t I? I’m quite good at biting my tongue for a little while… and then a tiny bit (ok, a great big bit) of advice just tends to burst out like the water from a dam. (Not that I’ve ever seen a bursting dam. But I can imagine.) This advice is usually on the subject of the girls’ significant others: the lovely son-in-law (whom I love to bits, but who has depression (though he currently seems to be improving again, fingers crossed)) and Daughter 2’s boyfriend, who is trying to get work as an actor. Hmm. Nice enough chap but… . Hmm.

Will try to be a better person from now on.

My workmates gave me these flowers

and this hydrangea on Thursday as a sympathy present. How lovely!

Hello, St Cloud

I've just noticed that someone from St Cloud, Minnesota is or at least recently was reading my blog. How exciting! Garrison Keillor country!

Thoughts from this life.

Daughter 2 is in Seville, visiting her last year's flatmate, Danielle. They'll soon be joined by their friend Anna. Here are the flowers she bought me. Have fun in Spain, D2!

Son is in Livingston, a few miles away, on duty in the maternity ward. He hopes to deliver his first baby soon. He's not going to tell the mother that he's never done it before... . The house is very quiet.

There should be some advantages in growing older, because there are certainly quite a few disadvantages. I wouldn’t claim to have acquired wisdom but I thought I might list a few things that have perhaps become clearer to me with advancing years. Unfortunately I don’t always remember to order my life by these little insights at the right times.

1. Most things that upset you will one day be a distant memory.

2. People aren’t thinking about you nearly as much as, when you’re young, you think they are.

3. Your children will never remember much that you do with them before they were about 5 despite the fact that it’s awfully hard work.

4. When they’re little, you need to feed them, cuddle them, talk to them, read to them, sing to them, keep them safe and play with them from time to time. They don’t need ballet lessons, gym classes, music appreciation groups… . Let them play.

5. Emails need to be worded very carefully. You can’t retrieve them from the hall table if you think better of them.

6. Similarly, when in doubt, it’s probably better not to tell people what you think. People don’t really want advice most of the time. Especially unsolicited advice.

7. It’s much easier to get fatter than to get thinner.

8. “Do it now” is a good maxim to apply to filling in forms, washing dishes, writing letters, making phone calls, travelling the world. (Why does America spell this with one “l”?)

9. There some things which, if you postpone them long enough, never have to be done at all. But then, there are others that you’ll never get round to doing and wish you had.

10. Life is short. It really is.

That bloke again

I have marking to do. Naturally, therefore, I'm looking for some displacement activity.



Thank you for your kind admiration of my boy and his elbow. Actually, he sent me three cheering photos in the Some Bloke series, of which I blogged only the one. I now offer you, above:

Some Bloke with Sheepcat (not so good of the Bloke but splendid, I think you’ll agree, of the Cat. Does he have any bones? Or is he simply stuffed? By the way, there is now a Sheepcat Appreciation Society on Facebook).

And finally:

Some Scary Bloke. (He was at a fancy dress party. You may have guessed that. He looks in this photo as if he has a big bulgy nose, but actually he doesn't. The elbow phenomenon again. Neither does he have a tiny right arm. )

Marking, here I come.

Life goes on

I’m feeling a bit – hmm. It’s been a busy week – back to work on Tuesday, feeling that I hadn’t had a holiday. Yes, I know: no one apart from teachers gets two weeks off at Easter. And of course those terrible events in Virginia cast a long shadow over all the world. My heart goes out to all those bereaved parents.

While my dad's life was drawing to a close, our son spent a lot of time at his bedside, and the contrast between my dad - 87 and almost finished - and the boy - 22 and glowing with health -was both poignant and comforting.

His girlfriend took this picture of him on his phone a few days ago. I saw it and liked it, so he emailed it to me, entitled, "Some bloke with a big elbow". He's a cheering lad.

Daughter 2 came home from work with a huge bunch of flowers for me: daffodils and tulips and roses. She's a darling too.

I spent all Monday battling with the weeds in my mother’s garden. It has been much neglected of recent months. She’s supposed to have a chap who comes to tidy it once a week, but he seems to have vanished. Five hours’ work improved about 20% of it. Then I had my evening class after work on Tuesday, choir on Wednesday evening, another evening duty at college last night. Lots of visits to my mum, and three nights spent in her house. Tomorrow I must visit my elder’s district in the morning and on Sunday, the choir is rehearsing all afternoon and performing in the evening.

Haydn’s “Creation”. Glorious music. Wednesday’s practice was the first with the orchestra and soloists. The tenor was a young Oriental chap with a beautiful, soaring voice. I found myself walking up the road beside him afterwards and said how much I’d enjoyed his singing. “Oh,” he said, “I’m really exhausted. It was such hard work.” I’d just been thinking how fantastic it would be to be able to open one’s mouth and hear such a sublime sound emerge. Of course, it should be obvious that anything that wonderful isn’t achieved without effort. But it sounded effortless. Balm to the soul.

I haven’t had much time to read my usual blogs apart from the odd one at lunchtime, at work, and for some reason I don’t seem to be able to comment on them there. I don’t think the weekend is going to have a lot of time to spare either. But I shall get back on track eventually. Hello to all blog friends, and especially to those lurkers in Dublin, Norfolk, Ohio, New Jersey... and of course, Salford.

Goodbye to my father

The day before yesterday was my father’s funeral. It seems very weird indeed to be typing these words. I don’t think that I’ve really taken in that he’s gone. It also seems a bit strange to be writing about him into the cybervoid, but on the other hand, blogging has come to feel a bit like talking to friends. It fulfils part of the need to communicate.

Wednesday was a long day. Mum had decided that she wanted a family cremation service in the morning followed by a thanksgiving service for friends in the church in the afternoon. I wasn’t sure about this – I thought it might be too much – but in fact it worked out well. Somehow the saddest part seemed to be over after the cremation service, and by the afternoon we were able to be much more positive.

My brother, Daughter 1 and I all spoke in tribute. I wasn’t at all sure that either Daughter 1 or I would be able to do so; funerals can be very emotional. But in fact we were all right. And it went very well; lots of people have told me how nice it was. Many people came, from many stages of his life.

Dad was no saint. He could be very unreasonable and difficult, even in his youth. On the other hand, he was a remarkable person. He won a scholarship to a famous school and went on to be dux of it. He then won a scholarship to university to study maths and physics, but after his first year, the war broke out, and he joined the Royal Engineers. He was sent to Egypt as the British Army's first bomb disposal officer outside the UK – he was 20! – and spent much of the war defusing bombs from instruction manuals. He won the George Medal (very prestigious) for his work there, and was later mentioned in dispatches for his work bridging rivers between Normandy and Berlin under heavy fire.

After the war, he returned to university and was awarded three degrees in three consecutive years. He spent his working life with a big electronics company, ending as one of their top managers. In his own time, he did a lot of work for various organisations such as Edinburgh University, who gave him an honorary fellowship.

He was a very hard act to follow.

He was very musical, playing the piano and organ to a very high standard. He was also very interested in words and used long ones to us even when we were small children, which gave us a good vocabulary. He used to make up bedtime stories for us when we were little, draw funny pictures and quote large lumps of poetry. For example, when he came to tuck us in at night, he would declaim, from Gray’s “Elegy in a Country Churchyard”,

“The curfew tolls the knell of parting day,
The lowing herd winds slowly o’er the lea,
The ploughman homeward plods his weary way,
And leaves the world to darkness and to me.”

The “to me” was very dramatic: “TO ME!!!!”

He could continue for several verses. And frequently did.

In the mornings, he would tend to fling open the curtains to the accompaniment of the beginning of the Fitzgerald “Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam”:

“Awake! for Morning in the Bowl of Night
Has flung the Stone that puts the Stars to Flight:
And Lo! the Hunter of the East has caught
The Sultan's Turret in a Noose of Light.”

Again, you have to imagine being asleep and then being woken by a very loud, bass, “AWAKE!!!!!” Quite startling.

He was a character.

This is what I said about him at his funeral:





"Dad was a lot of different things, as you’ve heard. He was a scientist but he was also a musician, a linguist and a very literate man. He could also be a lot of fun. As my brother told you, he made up very fine stories for us when we were little. Many of these were about the Poff family, who had lots of children: Angela, Beatrice, Clara, Dorothy, Ethel, Freddie, George, Henry, Ian and James.

He also used to write – maybe poems would be overstating the case, but occasional verses.

These were written over a more than 20 year period when he and a friend sent each other holiday postcards - in verse. Dad kept copies. We were reading these the other day and I thought I’d let you hear one.

The poem I’m going to read is actually the last one he wrote: the series came to an end in 1999, when his friend died. Mum and Dad went on a lot of holidays to warm places. This poem is called “Mad Dogs and Englishmen” - which tells you Dad’s attitude to hot sunshine. It’s very characteristic of him. It starts with that literary allusion – to the Noel Coward song. Then it’s got science in it, a bit of religion, it’s very logical and – it’s quite forward thinking for 1999 – it ends with a very topical bit of advice.

I also suspect that this may be one of the few postcards ever written to feature the word “sapient”.


Crete 1999

Mad Dogs and Englishmen



Solar radiation may offer benefits
To such as maladjusted hounds or Deeply Southern Brits.

Those of us who favour a climate less intense
Feel long exposure to the sun makes little or no sense.

Sapient creation, when first the Earth was made,
Decreed that when the sun was bright, it generated shade.

Don’t rely on ozone; it’s thinner every day.
Relaxing in the cooling shade is much the safer way.



So that was Dad, getting (more or less) the last word. He would probably have liked that. "

Happy Anniversary, Daughter 1!

A year ago today was such a happy day: the wedding of Daughter 1 to her lovely young man. They spent the day with us today, which was very pleasant indeed. These are our three beloved children on that day. They are such nice young people: kind and loving and funny.

My dad wasn’t very well, but as you can see, he got to the wedding all right. Here he is with my mum. Isn’t she glamorous for a nearly-84-year-old? Unfortunately, I don’t look very like her…

Very good memories.

Dad and other observations

Thank you so much for all the kind comments.

Yesterday I registered my father’s death. This seemed a very grown-up thing to do. Of course, one should be grown-up at my age.

I had to stay in the house in the morning for the gas man to come and try to stop our heating system sounding like an aircraft taking off. Then I went up town. As I got to the top of our street, there was a nice shiny van belonging to a car-valeting service. It was parked half on the pavement, near to a hedge, so I walked round it on the road. The side of the van announced that the company was “commited to excellence”. Though I was in a bit of a daze, I obsessively proof-read this in my English-teachery way and wondered vaguely if it said the same on the other side. Popping my head round between the van and the hedge in pursuit of this thought, I came face-to-face with a startled young man, the car-valeter.

Me (feebly): Oh. I was just looking at the spelling on your van.
SYM (looking at writing): Is it not right?
Me: Umm. Well, “committed” should have two “t”s.
SYM: Should it?
Me: The way it’s written would be pronounced “co-might-ed”.
SYM: That’s my designer’s fault.
Me (wishing I’d never started this conversation): Well, I’m sure your car-valeting is excellent, anyway. That’s the important thing.
SYM: Thanks. (Pause) What does “co-might-ed” mean, then?

It was a lovely sunny day. There were lots of tourists on the bus. One tourist looked at Donaldson’s School for the Deaf – a beautiful, castle-like building - and asked a fellow-passenger what it was. “That’s Fettes College,” she replied confidently. I considered putting her right but then decided I wouldn't.

The registrar was lovely. She must have to register people’s deaths all the time, but she sympathised, asking what Dad was like and how Mum was coping. She told me that her father died when she was 11, and that she was the oldest of six children. Wow. But they had a happy childhood, she said, and have all done well. I asked her if she liked being a registrar and I admired her neat handwriting. She said that it was an interesting job, and that she’s careful to sign the certificates legibly, because she likes to think of people in the future seeing her signature and wondering who she was and what she was like.

Very nice, that’s what she's like. I wished I could add a bit on to the certificate to tell this to any future researchers into our family history.

And then I came home. The sun was still shining. Later we noticed that, since the gas man’s visit, we no longer had any heating or any hot water.

Dad again

My dad died in the early hours of yesterday morning. We were summoned to his bedside on Thursday morning but he held on for several days. His heart was very strong; not always a good thing. It was horrendous seeing him struggle for breath all that time; though he was on morphine and apparently unconscious.

We’re all a bit dazed by the rapidity of his descent from not-very-well to dying; and by lack of sleep; and by sadness. He could be very difficult; but on the other hand, he could be really good fun as well. He was an original; full of good ideas for entertaining little children. And I thought about all this while watching him over three long days.

He was 87 so of course it’s not surprising that he’s come to the end of his life. But it’s still very sad. Life is too short.

Thanks so much to all of you who sent good wishes. It's much appreciated and very kind. I will be back in due course.