Surgeons and pyjamas

I am melancholy. It must be the rain, reminds me of home. The anxiety and anticipation around starting a new school is beginning to build. The summer holidays are lingering. It has been intense with bells on. I can hear my friends at home ‘I wish to Jaysus they were back at school, they’re killin each other’. That’s not said here but implied, it would never be said that way. I was invited to a coffee morning. I make scones, they are well received. The form isn’t great, there’s only so much talk of holidays and property I can stomach. When I hear ‘my huzzzbind and I got stuck in Egypt during that dreadful ash thingy’, I pine for home, for Galway banter. But for all that bullshit, there are normal, down to earth women I can relate to. Those with the funkiest expensive houses, the coolest clothes and the high achieving alpha male husbands I have found to be the rudest, devoid of a sense of humour. It’s all aesthetic. I am outside the cliques. I do not fit into any of them nor do I want to. Nevertheless, I am not excluded.


The children have made friends and the doorbell rings with new playmates calling for them. This is an awakening. It’s the way I grew up. We went out in the morning and came back when we were hungry. In Galway all their ‘play dates’ were pre-arranged and Mum-taxi-services drove them everywhere. They are occupied and content and it’s X Factor time again, kills that awkward hour on a Saturday evening. As September draws near and the evenings darken, it means back to the books for me also. I too am filled with anticipation but in a perverse sadistic way I am looking forward to it. Keeps the cogs working cause those same cogs have to get me a job soon.

The Small Man is hounding me for new football boots. SatNav set, off we go up the M40 to Bicester Retail Village one of those discount places. The Youngest pipes up from the back ‘I want to be one of those people who do operations when I grow up...their costume looks comfy, a bit like pyjamas’. I nearly crash the car I’m laughing so much. Don’t mind career guidance or psychometric testing, just base your future career plans on a uniform looking like pyjamas. We arrive and for a moment I think I am at the Dublin Horseshow (never been but it’s how I envisage it). I have never seen so many Land Rovers, BMW X5 and Volvo jeeps all in the one place. They have a uniform i.e. jeep – check, Mulberry across-the-shoulder brown leather bag – check, long flowey cardigan – check, skinny jeans – check, long hair pref brunette – check, teenage daughter with braces in tow, iphone stuck to the side of her head – check. This place has all the hits, Dolce & Gabana, Missoni (I couldn’t bring myself to even darken its door for fear of the damage I might do!), Fendi, Gucci, Agent Provocateur (for all your fancy knickers) and the rest. I come away with the football boots, a table cloth and two mugs...last of the big spenders.