Making the Most

'They're testing me for lung cancer,' says the young woman at the back of church.
I moan in dismayed sympathy.
She says that she has endured a three-week lung infection that has resisted two courses of antibiotics, so her GP has referred her to Accident & Emergency for a chest X-ray. The poor young woman instantly assumed the worst.

I moan again. In alarm. I too have endured a three-week lung infection that has resisted two courses of antibiotics, so my GP has referred me to Accident & Emergency for a chest X-ray. And cancer never crossed my mind.

I sit out the hours in the hospital waiting room. Rationally, I know that there is nothing to worry about, but as I study the posters reminding me to Wake up to Rape, to report my drug problem, to memorise the signs of meningitis and to bear in mind that more people die from hospital-acquired blood clots than breast cancer, AIDS and traffic accidents combined, mortality seems to edge a little closer.

Nurses wire me up to a heart monitor and clamp me to an X-ray machine. They suck blood from a vein. They suck blood from an artery. They dress me in a hospital gown and order a curtained bed. I am bored and I am sanguine. Then they talk of blood clots and tumours and possible overnight stays and I start to think panicked of my children.

They hate the one day in the week that I commute to the office because I am not at the school gate to collect them.

What if I am not there, ever?

They hate it when I'm not there to give them their tea because the Vicar doesn't understand about potato terror.

What if I am not there, ever?

There is no finer father than the Vicar, but he doesn't:
grasp the importance of chocolate treasure hunts in muddy parkland.
know how to make a foolproof laptop out of a Cornflakes packet.
endure three games of Harry Potter Cluedo on the trot.
understand about the invisible shark poised to bite small toes in the local swimming pool.

So what if I am not there, ever?

The doctor fetches another doctor and they prod and they pinch and they pronounce that I have pleurisy. Mortality recedes. The gown is reclaimed. The Vicar brings the Skoda and I am phlegmy with rapture.

I long for the children's naked bath-time brawls that usually enrage me.
I long for the tea-time rows over the single shiny desert spoon.
I long for the clamorous return from school; the hallway clogged with flung shoes and book bags; the landing draped with inexplicably drenched clothing.
I even long for the nightly game of Harry Potter Cluedo.

This New Year I resolved to be a better mother. To feed and talk to and be nice to my children. Today's fleeting uncertainty has enlightened me. Our children don't need us to be better mothers. They just need us, imperfectly, to Be There. And so I consistently shall be - the minute I can be bothered to rise up off sofa.

Comments

  1. Rachel Selby18 January 2012 at 18:36

    Don't worry about the last bit - they love you just as much on the sofa. Glad everything was OK (except for the pleurisy of course). Get well soon.

    ReplyDelete
  2. A Little Light Work18 January 2012 at 21:21

    Gosh, wish I could get pleurisy; might appreciate my stay-at-home life more!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Kate18 January 2012 at 21:38

    So glad to hear you're not dying. Never mind your kids - what on earth would we do without you?

    ReplyDelete
  4. Kate18 January 2012 at 21:40

    But if you don't take stupid word verification off soon I might have to kill you myself.

    ReplyDelete
  5. The Last Slayer18 January 2012 at 21:57

    You've made me cry with that last paragraph x

    ReplyDelete
  6. fivegoblogging18 January 2012 at 21:59

    *Choked*
    Beautifully written and, yep, shed a tear.
    Thank you x

    ReplyDelete
  7. northernmum18 January 2012 at 22:28

    Sofa is ideal spot for cuddled and group tv watching!
    And I back Kate, for the love of god take off word verification x

    ReplyDelete
  8. northernmum18 January 2012 at 22:29

    Oh its gone! Hurrah

    ReplyDelete
  9. Sarah19 January 2012 at 08:45

    I agree, it's the Being There that seems to make all the difference. That's what keeps me at my unchallenging job because anything else would involved longer hours and travel.

    I think parenthood can be resumed in those two words: Being There.

    ReplyDelete
  10. Singing Angel19 January 2012 at 10:48

    Never mind your children what would WE do without you?

    Sofa's and duvets are excellent cuddle, group hug places and of course, for having those 'special' little chats!

    To spur you on further, imagine all those doe-eyed parishioners just waiting in the vestibule for the chance to offer their services to the handsome, young(ish) vicar.

    I hope he is spoiling you and making you good hearty meals.

    Take care we all ned you.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Adventures of a Middle-aged Matron19 January 2012 at 11:07

      Sounds as though I know you, Singing Angel. I wonder who you are! (Won't tell the Vicar about the young-ish).

      Delete
    2. Singing Angel22 January 2012 at 22:58

      ah ha!

      Delete
  11. Bibsey Mama19 January 2012 at 13:50

    It's a funny thing isn't it. When you are first in charge of your newborn all you can think and panic about is keeping them alive. What would you do if anything happened to them?! And then suddenly it hits you, your own mortality and what the bloody hell would they do without you? Scary stuff.

    Get well soon. And for goodness sake do not get off the sofa, do not pass go, and do not collect £200 and a pair of marigolds.

    BM
    x

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Adventures of a Middle-aged Matron19 January 2012 at 14:49

      Don't worry, have swapped sofa for bed and shall pay someone else to wear the Marigolds for a while! Wouldn't mind the £200 though!

      Delete
  12. Singing Angel19 January 2012 at 15:30

    Ah ha.........

    ReplyDelete
  13. Older Mum20 January 2012 at 13:16

    Firstly I am so glad you dont have cancer and secondly that was a wonderfully written post and you are so spot on - its best that we are good enough mothers and simply are just there with all our impatience and annoyance.

    ReplyDelete
  14. sansserif20 January 2012 at 17:59

    Beautifully written. You say it all so perfectly that I can add nowt - aside from "I am heartily glad it was just pleurisy"...

    ReplyDelete
  15. Unknown20 January 2012 at 23:05

    That is beautiful and so true.. Thank you Snoo and Me for leading me here..

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Adventures of a Middle-aged Matron21 January 2012 at 11:57

      Thank you for allowing yourself to be led. It's a pleasure to 'meet' you!

      Delete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Daily Mail Columnists Should Wear Burkas

Daily Mail columnist Liz Jones has provoked the ire of Twitter with by declaring that mummy bloggers are blinkered dimwits whose lives are spiced by Napisan. I'm afraid I have to sympathise with her, for all of her prejudices echo my own: Writing about my life has pretty much ruined it. Supper last night was an elderly carrot glued to the fridge shelf by a pool of brown mucus and the floor was flooded when I left the bath taps running because Blogger has diverted me from domestic essentials. I've had to shut the children in front of the television when a new post has assailed me and some family members no longer speak to me because Twitter interactions leave me no time to reach the telephone. But there is a big part of me that thinks writing should be hard: you should cringe whenever you press that 'publish' button. Artists – and I'm sorry, I do consider myself an artist – have to wrench the dirtiest, most disgusting part of their inner soul and show it t...
Read more

The Various Uses of Rubber

I have ordered a new pair of wellies from Amazon for the daily walk to school. My current hardly-at-all-old pair has developed a fissure along one toe. I only noticed this when I was wading along the stream that flows brownly past bobbing Argos bags en route to the afternoon pick up, and I was not pleased. They are a glamorous pair with pink spots and white swirls, bought to ease my daughter's pain in ackowledging a wellie-wearing, stream-paddling mother in public. I now distrust wellies with spots and swirls, so order a safe-looking green pair. Better to be waterproof than glamorous. Royal Mail gets them as far as my door, thrusts through a 'Sorry you were out' card, and promptly loses them. Amazon is sympathetic and dispatches a replacement pair. This also makes it to my door and again a card is left. This time I decide to pick them up in person from the Royal Mail depot. The man behind the glass screen makes off with my delivery card and probably has a cup of tea and...
Read more

A DIY Guide to the Middle-Classes

I wonder sometimes what I am. I have lived the last decade on an inner city council estate, amid Oxford academia, in a remote country town and in London suburbia. In the first we were, with our relentless consonants and sagging bookshelves, regarded as aristocrats. In the second, as the 'squeezed middle'. In the third, as city sophisticates and now, sometimes, isolated in my tweed amid the Ralph Lauren and the hoodies, I feel myself a bumpkin. Class should no longer matter. Nowadays, for most of us, it's more a question of perception than birth. But the perception matters. My daughter battles to adjust speech, habits and dress to blend in with each new environment; the political parties compete to woo the amorphous throng they deem Middle England and Melvyn Bragg has started a television series on class and culture. The British, he decides, no longer define themselves by class, but by the music they listen to, the books they read. I listen to Dolly Parton and Beethoven....
Read more