let it all go
Sometimes I feel like I can’t relax. I feel like I have to be sensible and organised, at home, at work, in life generally. I’m the responsible one, I worry about money and I make the dentist appointments, I do the shopping and I sort the many insurances out. Sometimes I think this is just the way I was made. I’m the first born, the oldest, the only girl, the sensible one and because of this there were expectations that I wouldn’t fuck up. I wouldn’t chat back, I can’t say that I was really ever naughty enough to be grounded (but I am sure my Dad will leave an appropriate comment to disprove this). I basically did what was asked, I helped with stuff, my room was clean. I looked after my toys, I had good school reports, I was well mannered to teachers, I didn’t get in trouble. Basically, I was boring.
Then my brother came along and that’s when the trouble began. I think all my easy going and make no mess behavior lured them into thinking a second child was a good idea. But he was trouble, he was into everything, he made messes and he got away with murder. Some of the memories I have of my brother include occasions where we all headed off to hospital because he swallowed a penny, his toy hammer being confiscated because he battered me with it and, the one time when he wrote ‘fuck off’ all over the hall wall. He was maybe about six or seven at the time and as a mother now, I look back on this moment and wonder how he even knew the correct spelling for ‘fuck off’ at that age.
Today, I think I still live with that boring stick stuck up my ass. I can’t relax, I can’t dance and move around and feel free. When the kids sing ‘Shotgun’ in the car with their Dad I am secretly desperate to join in but my mind can’t make my mouth work to do this. I can’t leave dishes to sit or jobs to be done and if the washing machine isn’t going I am looking for stuff to put in it even if the washing basket is empty. I have this thing, like my Grandad, it involves me picking bits up off the carpet all day long and then still vacuuming on three separate occasions. I find it difficult to switch off or relax or act like a crazy person. This isn’t because I don’t want to, it’s because I don’t know how to. It’s a bit sad really.
I often make a New Years resolution, usually to myself, I do this in my own head and I never tell anyone, this helps to avoid the need to explain any potential (and likely) failure. This year I told myself to do more stuff that would let me have fun, to let my hair down and just be ‘fun Mum’. A bit like ‘fun Dad’, except when the kids paint his birdhouse the wrong color or go over the lines, then he’s crazy mental Dad with shaking and loud breathing and everything. My aim for 2020 was to be someone who is easy going and able to let loose a bit. Obviously, in lockdown that’s going really well (not), but I did manage to dance around the living room, just me, the girl and the little one going crazy to ‘Shotgun’. This is their current favorite tune and she kept saying ‘again, again, again’, so I must have done something right.
