Tag: #shy

Note to Self.

Mornings. Generally I love them. I am the most irritating of people, a morning person.

Today however I  woke up to find depression attempting to sneak under the bedroom door and floor me before I even got started. I will be having words.

The rational, fabulous, experienced menopausal woman would like to address you, default teenager who has appeared unannounced, so sit down, shut up and listen!

You can do it!  Yes, you can write, pitch ideas, speak eloquently in public and (whisper it quietly) keep going with the novel. It’s possible you could make  fair fist of running the country given a chance, you certainly have enough opinions. You don’t however have to do it all today. Actually, just make a cup of tea and sit down. Worlds will still be there to be conquered tomorrow.

People like you. You have friends. Make time for them, they are an investment.These friends think well of you, remember you and even pray for you. If they speak about you behind your back it’s because they are concerned,or possibly because those shoes really don’t go with everything. You are actually quite likeable.

Medication. Not a sign of weakness. Yes I know you just watched the BBC programme about overprescribing but you have a sensible GP who knows you and your circumstances. Some people have not been so lucky. Some people don’t make it. Thank Science, God and Big Pharma for synthetic serotonin.

You cannot second guess what other people are thinking about you. Further, you can’t control it and it’s none of your damn business. Some people don’t like you. That’s OK. You do not  have to be universally liked. It’s life, not Miss Congeniality . What would Mrs Pankhurst say ?

Being the universal fixer is a thankless task. Think carefully before taking it on. Just because you can, doesn’t mean you should. Remember being Chair of Governors? Just that. The immigration crisis? Probably not your problem. Brexit? Definitely not your fault. That tax return however…

Other peoples success is not a reflection on you and your ability. It does not make you an abject failure. You think this is the case because today, and only today your self esteem has dried up. Oh and you’re British you have been bred to mistrust confidence and success. Just get over it already. “Rejoice with those that rejoiceth”

The drive to be internationally recognised? May be this is slightly irrational?  Ambition is good, but  not be completely beneficial in this case.The sad truth is you will die one day. People tend to. Enjoy now. Go to galleries and auctions. Read about ceramics. Argue about politics. Run in the fields. Squeeze your children. Make improper suggestions to your husband. Smell everything especially the coffee. This is it. Now. Just this.

Laugh, laugh and laugh again. Watch a comedy a day. Meet up with people who get you. Drink coffee, eat cake and laugh some more. Try to meet up at least once a year with the geographically distant friends who make you laugh so much wine comes out of your nose. Embarrass your teenagers by mispronouncing pinterest, loudly,in public. Swear randomly at your husband, to shock him. Tickle your smallest child until she can’t breathe and then roll around on the floor laughing with her.

Truly some days will be hideous and some glorious. This sadly is the human condition, and no amount of railing  at the sky is going to change it. Roll with the punches and don’t beat yourself (or anyone else) up when you’re just not feeling it. As Mrs O’Hara said “tomorrow is another day” and you have to believe a woman who looks good in vintage curtains.

 

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Take your own advice. Take care of you. Be kind to yourself. How many people have you said that to this week? Wise words for any day of the week. Listen to them, feel them and breathe them in. You are not immune from this advice-in fact you have followed it in the past and it has worked. Remember?

Give yourself a good hard shake. Put the kettle on. Grab a book and put your feet up.

Normal service resumes after the break.

 

 

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Echoes

In which the past though a foreign country, suddenly hijacks me on the Millennium Bridge.

There was a road that led home from my school, a long endless road it seemed to me, although I was much smaller, and my legs much shorter. I walked home down this road every day from the ages of 5 ’til 18, often twice a day when I went home for lunch.

I remember small girls thoughts inside my head. Would I always be walking here?  Did the Jane of yesterday and the Jane of tomorrow walk along here at the same time as me?  Could I one day bump into myself?  ( I was a solitary bookish child).

I recalled this when I hijacked a works trip to London with Father of Pearl.  London was so close to my Essex home, that school trips, gallery visits and teenage forays all started at Liverpool Street station. F o P dashed off to his meeting while I moseyed over the millennium bridge to catch a tube to the V & A.  I found myself face to face with St Pauls, and wondered if a primary aged Jane crept around the whispering gallery, awed, excited, nervous.

I stride, child free and grinning from ear to ear over the Millennium bridge. Briefly I was taken aback and wondered if small girl Jane would believe the world of wheelchairs, special schools and endless fights she would grow up into. Before  I had a chance to feel the sad longing for a ‘normal’ life I remembered.

I remembered the quiet serious, bookish child, who struggled to fit in. The girl who was concerned to keep the peace so her poorly Daddy wasn’t worried into hospital with an asthma attack. The teenager who always wore the wrong clothes, bought at the wrong shops and who was declared” the frumpiest girl in the school” (oh how we laughed) The sixth former who on a trip to this very London threw up in Covent Garden (something I ate?  Nerves? I’ll never know) which triggered a two year battle with an eating disorder which seemed would make her fade away.

And then I think of my ‘non typical ‘ life the profession I had to give up, the hospital appointments, statement reviews and filing cabinets of reports. The tired days the worried nights, and I catch myself.

I’m happy (and well medicated) confident, loved and in love, with life my jumbley, surprising, unexpected children, my fabulous Northern powerhouse of a husband, with this London – and with myself. Truly. And I remember that the solitary, serious Jane always had a huge capacity to love and was always loved in return.

So unexpected though my life has been would I change it? Well some days, yes. On the mornings I wake dreaming Pearl has started to speak I will always feel an aching and a longing.

I bend down and whisper to the skipping infant aged Jane ” it’s going to be alright”.