Adventures of a Middle-Aged Matron

I'm a mother who does things by the book. If I can't find a book that says what I want it to, I search out another one. When Penelope Leach told me to keep nightly vigil by my crying infants and to permit ice cream when their spinach had been flung at the ceiling, I switched to Gina Ford who allowed me to pour a beer in front of Poirot, while they cried themselves to sleep, and to scoff their Maltesers when they spurned my liver and cabbage stew. When Tiger Mother advised us to drill three-year-olds in arpeggios, I embraced The Idle Parent  which reckons that after-school activities stifle infant creativity. Appalled by the new philosophy of Attachment Parenting, which required me to devote both waking and sleeping hours to anticipating my kids' unmet needs, I signed up to Slow Parenting which recommended herding offspring into the garden and shutting the door on them The notion that parents have to devote their attentions to their progeny, and the guilt we all feel whe...

Legacy is the prompt for this week's 100-word Challenge . The centenary of Captain Scott's fatal expedition to the South Pole is commemorated in an exhibition at London's Natural History Museum. The optimism that drove them onwards, the despair of defeat, the deadly return are as stirring as you'd expect. But the story that struck me most concerned three of his companions who left base, some months before the main expedition started, to seek out the eggs of Emperor penguins. Scientists believed that the study of these embryos could reveal an evolutionary link between birds and reptiles. As the penguins lay their eggs in winter, the men had to haul their sledges over ravines and ice cliffs in perpetual darkness. Two of the five eggs they managed to grab smashed and it's thought that, for five weeks, they endured conditions more extreme than any human had survived before. It was science, not personal glory, that drove them. They called it 'the worst jou...

over at Mammasaurus . This is a very unusual sight - my daughter studiously doing her homework, that is. Your captions could inspire her to continue in the same scholarly vein, so please give it your all...

'Postcode!' drawls the woman behind the counter. I recite it. 'Road name?' I recite it. 'What's the house number there, please?' I hesitate. I would be happy to provide my address if I were renewing my car tax disc. I would be happy to provide it if I were drawing up a will, buying a mortgage or stocking the larder online. I do not, however, expect to provide it when I am buying a top from White Stuff. I have to, explains the woman, so that she can check I'm on their database. And I need to be on the database to ensure that I receive regular postcards of new catalogues and special offers so that my single guilty indulgence can be multiplied into a dangerous weekly shopping habit. Next I visit my bank to pay in a cheque. 'Postcode?' says the woman behind the counter. I recite it. I assume it's a security safeguard. As I turn to go, her face irradiates. 'The screen is telling me that you live in an area that qualifies for a low ins...

Would seven prove to be too much? is the prompt for the latest 100 Word Challenge . It's a question that's been bugging me this summer as I toil to thrill the nation's frogs: Men derive happiness from washing dishes, reveals one report.  Women, says another, achieve it through being women. They are healthier, better educated and less often murdered. And, naturally, they enjoy a blissful routine of dirty dishes.  Different research claims rose-tinted spectacles are an essential ingredient of bliss.  These studies omit one crucial truth. The secret to happiness is digging. Whenever I need a boost, I hack out a pond. The vicarage lawn is vanishing beneath my pickaxe.  During the relentless school holidays I feel my serenity teetering. I know, before August is out, I'll be assaulting the London clay. But would seven prove to be too much? The first of many...

I am sitting on a pew composing myself for the Sunday service when the church sideswoman darts across the nave. She holds out a brown envelope with my name on. It's a note, she explains, from the elderly lay-reader. I assume that it's an acknowledgment sent to everyone who filled out an attendance card at her husband's funeral last week. Or a request for an additional supply of grapefruit segments. At least, I hope it is. The lay reader is a retired deputy head teacher and has a reputation for severity. I'm worried that it may be a reprimand for fidgeting during a sermon, or a summons to bible class. The service begins and I open the envelope behind my hymn book. There's no note inside, just a newspaper clipping. It shows a picture of a ragged bra and a pair of frayed lace knickers. The story explains that these saucy scanties date from the 15th-century and suggest to historians that Ann Summers had medieval predecessors. I'm uncertain whether this is a ...

Here, for me, is the essence of childhood. It's encapsulated in: The sheltering, matching, multi-hued brollies. The childish world is a Technicolored one in which things are more vivid, more vital, more entrancing than in the monochrome landscapes of midlife. Within this rainbow world they are shielded from the colder blasts of reality. And fortunate children in fortunate families are sheltered by the strong ties of belonging; the certainty that they are interconnected and indispensable. The motionless wonderment. A doorbell button, an excavated worm, a snowy walk to school are marvels to minds unsullied by experience. The freedom. It's my problem, not theirs, if they get cold and wet. The trust. In that pause before following the footsteps into wider horizons, they rely on my judgement that they are equal to the adventure and my intervention if it menaces them. This is part of a blog-hop organised by Patch of Puddles  to highlight the plight of West African childre...

over at Mammasaurus . Anyone who knows me twigs that I do not have a sound relationship with telephones. I don't even know my own mobile number. I find the pressure of modern communications oppressive. So, as you can see, do my children: Blog comments are my chief source of gratification, so don't wait for wit; I'll rejoice in any caption here!