… And here’s why:
This is our shop. Or ‘miracle cure for husband’s anxiety disorder’ as it’s known in our house.
Before: 6 – 10 panic attacks a day, dependancy on dia.zepam, blank expression, monotone.
After: no panic attacks a day, no meds, animated expression, jokes and witticisms.*
*Results not typical, outcomes may vary.
Exciting developments in the Southwood/ Capeling/Capeling-Southwood household!
Some of you might know that we are opening a specialist cheese shop and delicatessen next week. We are having a wonderful, if extremely busy, time. With the 16 hour days we’re putting in I haven’t got much time for blog reading and writing right now (although I have managed to keep up my Art Every Day … so far.) I’m so sorry if I owe you an email or some blog comments, at last glance my reader was up to 104 unread posts. I’m desperate to catch up with everyone and as soon as things settle down I will be able to be more supportive.
With love to you all xx
Dab dab splodge splodge: here’s how I remember and forget all at the same time.
I copy the locket I wear for her. I collect soggy leaves, muddy berries, mossy bark from near her tree and string it together with fuse wire. I carve an ‘I’ into an apple. Dab dab splodge splodge. 18 marks for 18 months. Do we all think in multiples of nine these days? Nine months here, twice that gone.
Art Every Day Month. Or, as David would have it, Argument Every Day Month, as I fend off my terrorizing three-year-old from dab dabbing her marks on my work. I call it Iris Every Day Month. Part of my quest to remember and be happy. The inverse of the Christina Rossetti poem:
Remember me when I am gone away, Gone far away into the silent land; When you can no more hold me by the hand, Nor I half turn to go, yet turning stay. Remember me when no more day by day You tell me of our future that you plann’d: Only remember me; you understand It will be late to counsel then or pray. Yet if you should forget me for a while And afterwards remember, do not grieve: For if the darkness and corruption leave A vestige of the thoughts that once I had, Better by far you should forget and smile Than that you should remember and be sad.
Inspired by Mother Henna’s Day of the Dead Art Swap, I’ve decided to participate in Art Every Day Month for November 2009. I’ve created a new page at the top of the blog where I will be posting my efforts daily.
I’m cringing as I type this because… well… I’m pretty sure it will all be crap and I’m scared of people leaving disdainful comments. Or, worse, silently judging me for my delusions.
Oh well.
Feel free to look and throw rotten cyber-eggs at my pathetic attempts.
Next week we will be attending a parents’ evening at Ava’s school. And by ’school’ I mean the nursery she attends for 15 hours a week. And by ‘evening’ I mean 10.15 in the morning.
I’m not really sure what to expect, but I think it will be something along the lines of ‘She eats everything we give her. She is willing to stick pasta shapes to sugar paper on a weekly basis. She will queue for the toilet without complaint.’ At least I hope so. I’m not particularly worried about anything they’ll say to us. I know that if they had concerns about Ava they wouldn’t wait until parents’ evening to raise them. I’m just a little reluctant to get into a conversation about ‘potential’ or ‘ability’ or ‘milestones’. If I’m honest (and I’m not particularly, but let’s give it a whirl) I think all of that stuff, all those funny little value judgements we place on our children’s development, is a load of bollocks.
Since the age of 6 months Ava has made block towers of various heights and attempted to draw various circles and lines for various groups of medical students. They have watched her play, listened to her speak, tried to coax a jump or a hop out of her to delight their peers and their professor (my dad.) My bright, imaginative, funny, frustrating, happy, grumpy, loving, stubborn, cheeky little girl can be turned into a tick-box exercise with relative ease. Tick tick tick. Ooh very advanced, how lovely. Look at that representational play – Oxbridge material, I shouldn’t wonder. Blah blah blah blah blah.
Next Tuesday, David and I will balance on tiny toddler chairs and listen. We’ll hear about literacy and numeracy. We’ll hear about class projects. We’ll hear about what kind of child our daughter is. We’ll take that away and think about it and talk about it. We’ll wonder what it means for her. We both know what it is to grow up ‘clever’. We both know that ‘clever’ doesn’t necessarily equal ‘Einstein’; potential is not the same as success.
Ava is three years old. I believe that the label she is given now will be with her for the rest of her life, for good or ill. I think that’s a powerful thing; I’m afraid of it.
What do you think? Did you suffer a label growing up? What did it mean for you? Do you think you fulfilled your potential?
I’m celebrating Dia de los Meurtos by taking part in Mother Henna’s art swap and blog fest. Read more about my pieces here and find links to all the other artists here.
Now I know I have a tendency to be a little hyperbolic, but I’m not exaggerating when I say that taking part in this art swap has been an amazing experience. This is the first time I’ve ever done anything like this and it openned up a whole new creative world for me.
Thank you so much Mother Henna. I can’t wait to do the next one!
Three days before I gave birth to Ava I developed Bell’s Palsy. The left side of my face slid downwards like melted candlewax. I couldn’t eat without drooling, or speak without misforming simple words. I couldn’t blink my left eye, so a salty snail-trail weeped down my cheek and was frequently dabbed away.
Strangers would chuckle delightedly into my sling, giddy from her milky aroma and puffy little cheeks then look sharply at my lopsided face as I attempted my 100th grimace-smile of the day. I hid myself behind sunglasses and scarves, ashamed of my quasimodo-like appearance. Everyone could see me, everyone was looking at me, everyone knew that something wasn’t quite right.
It was written all over my face.
Bell’s Palsy was the worst thing that had ever happened to me. The morning that I looked in the mirror and saw the first slight movement of my left eyebrow after 3 weeks of facial paralysis was one of the most intensely joyful of my life. Appalling vanity? Perhaps.
Three days before I gave birth to Iris she jostled and elbowed and wriggled. My face was all expression: tired, happy, anticipation in every pore. But then she died and there was no sling, no milky aroma, her cheeks were blue-ish and chilly. Strangers’ eyes slid over me disinterestedly. No one could see my pain, no one could tell from looking at me, none of them knew that something had gone terribly wrong.
Tash wrote yesterday about being in the “dead baby closet” and it made me think about how often we half-jokingly wish for a My Baby Died t-shirt or forehead tattoo. I thought of this place, our little blogworld, our own Notre Dame where we can hide among all the other gargoyles.
As Halloween approaches we all become ghouls, disguising sweet features with masks and gruesome maquillage. This year I wish I could peel off my skin; peel away the muscle, tissue, fat, bone, organ, blood. Then start on my intellect. Shed the layers of ego, reason, education. So that all that’s left behind is my essence, my soul, whatever you want to call it. Bereft.
I think that would be pretty damn scary. Scare me up some pretty good candy.
In 2006, Wired published a set of six word stories by 33 different authors. My favourites:
We went solar; sun went nova.
- Ken MacLeodMetrosexuals notwithstanding, quiche still lacks something.
- David BrinI saw, darling, but do lie.
- Orson Scott CardIt cost too much, staying human.
- Bruce SterlingWith bloody hands, I say good-bye.
- Frank MillerMachine. Unexpectedly, I’d invented a time
- Alan MooreLonged for him. Got him. Shit.
- Margaret Atwood
There’s something so wry about these stories, so much potential for humour and pathos. I love the way they speak to that incredible human ability to read between the lines (or in this case, the words). I love that they are so beautifully simple, deceptively simple. My own attempts:
Lightning flashed. Glimpsed face at window.
Chocolate biscuits, fifty pounds each? Apocalypse.
Spilt Milk. Cried. Must remember medication.
I’d love to see your six word stories in the comments, and if you’re in the mood for creative writing you should check out Carly’s blog too.
Most of the six word stories featured by Wired are funny, but the story that inspired them hit me like a poleaxe when I saw it. I’d read it before, years ago, and admired it’s truth and simplicity but never fully appreciated it until now. Breathless, winded, I stared at the original six word story by the magnificent Ernest Hemingway:
For sale: baby shoes, never worn.
I just spent an hour of my life reading a message board written by people who hate us. Dead baby mothers. They HATE us. Really, really, really. I mean not me or you specifically, or you, or you… oh wait, maybe you…
I just kept on clicking through. Following the threads. Deciphering the drama. They are furious. Furious. They’re angry about ‘breeders’; the ‘moos’ and ‘duhs’ with their filthy, screaming brats who have the temerity to come in to the same coffee shop as them while they’re reading the weekend papers and enjoying their latte. They’re angry about maternity leave, about the money that’s spent on IVF or keeping sick babies alive. They’re angry that people put pictures of their kids on Face.book or on their desk at work.
I read their hate and I thought: WOW. This exists?
And then I kept reading.
And I felt… kind of bad for them. We all know what it’s like out there. The babies, the bellies, the buggies. It’s everywhere. The Family is writ large on our collective consciousness. And we grieve something they despise. We passionately, vocally, uninhibitedly mourn something they find abhorrent. We often feel invisible in our loss. We want our babies to be recognised, remembered, validated. These people hate us, but their anger stems from exactly the same place. They want to be recognised, remembered, validated. They want to stop feeling so ‘other’ in a world that venerates fertility and parenthood above all else.
I’ve been thinking a lot about tolerance recently, about what I personally find acceptable, about ‘the line’. In a week that the BBC will be giving a platform to the far-right BNP; in a month where celebrities became rape-apologists ; in a year when a doctor was murdered in his church by someone who disagreed with his work I’d like to ask:
How tolerant are you of people who hold views that oppose your own? How do you deal with difference? Do you hate anyone? Has the death of your baby made you more or less accepting of other people’s opinions?
