Author: beckyjo125

In need of a boost…of juice!

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Friday 17 May 2019

I am appalled at how rubbish I am on this Friday’s run and it leads me to commit to a week free from alcohol, free from toast and rich in … juices! Now that could be a real challenge!

It’s our first fine Friday for many weeks. We tough, Lancashire lasses have doggedly run through rain, sleet, snow and gales over the grim and grey winter months. Some colleagues have marvelled at our unstoppable madness, and many have chortled at the sight of us returning windswept and wild from our endeavours. So the upturn in the weather has us giddy with excitement. Many routes are proposed. Reservoirs and valleys are spoken of, as are fields and trails but eventually we settle on a beautiful route through the woods. It should be a glorious treat … but it’s also a three-hill-killer and I am quickly slain. I do get through it, mainly because the one rule of Run Club is that ‘we never stop’, but it is a huge struggle. I am at the back, I am red faced, I am dry mouthed, I am hot, I am bothered and I am slowing down with every step! How can this be, I ponder? How can I go running twice a week and now start to go backwards? It makes no sense and I start to puzzle about what is different.

I am under the weather this week, in fact I do have to confess to a ‘Granny Nap’ today, when I was shocked to jolt back into consciousness from confused doze on my desk at work. Could that be it? It was also an off road route. Is that too much for my trusty trainers? And continuing the doubt in my running shoes, I add, to sound like a bona-fide athlete, that I do carry a permanent and painful niggle in my right ankle. So like the proverbial bad workman, do I blame my tools? Umm …one thing that certainly cannot be helping is that break-time toast at work and wine-fuelled evenings, out and in, have developed into definite guilty pleasures of late! A doctor friend recently told me that he aims for 2 alcohol-free evenings a week … and I’d be struggling to meet that threshold at the moment. Here, at least, is somewhere for me to start, healthier diet.

I have a plan! After a few moment clattering around my kitchen cupboards, I unearth…the juicer! I place it proudly on the worktop, dust it down and then gingerly plug it in and risk the on- switch. It whirrs back encouragingly and I decide there’s no time like the present. I rummage around in the fridge for a few wizened fruits and vegetables and off we go! With in moment I am triumphantly sipping on a glass of green sludge which tastes…pretty good actually. It’s surely giving my weary body the boost of nutrition and energy it needs! I put aside, for now, the chore of of having to clean the thing, and raise my sludge glass , ‘To a week free from wine and toast but rich in nutritious juices! To a fitter and faster me!‘ …

Education – the great leveller?

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Wednesday 15 May 2019

In the week when Prom-dress daughter starts her GCSEs, and half the teenage world shudders with stress and probably more than half of their parent do too, I wonder about the fairness of it all.

Education, as the ‘great leveller’ has been my lifelong passion. I love the fact that a set of top exam grades from your local comprehensive is every bit as good as the same grades from Eton or Harrow. I’ve been intoxicated by the concept of GCSE results day as the one day of true equality on the calendar, when any 16 year old who’s worked hard and aimed high is assessed on the same scale as, and can get better grades than …. even the future King of England.

Education undoubtedly was my liberator, and took me to places and opportunities, that I’d never dreamed possible. I recall on my journey to University, back in the 1980s, being too frightened to open my mouth, as the train headed south of Birmingham, for fear of my Northern accent inviting ridicule. Three years later, I was ready to take on the world! And I was grateful: for the boost of confidence and self esteem; for the privilege of 3 years with like-minded friends; for 3 years of being allowed to be myself and still fit in… and I wanted to give back. I moved into a career in Education.

But how much of a leveller is our Education system in 2019? Here’s the data; and I am, not surprised. but deeply saddened that, in 21st Century England, a well developed country, the progress of disadvantaged pupils falls so far behind that of their non-disadvantaged peers. A Progress 8 score of -0.44 suggests that across this substantial cohort of vulnerable pupils, almost half their results were one grade lower than you should expect for a pupil of the same starting point. If that was your child, and 4 of their 9 grades were lower than other children who arrived at high school with the same results, what you you think? And the actual picture is even starker than that. Research is emphatic that by the time a disadvantaged pupil reaches high school, they are already significantly behind…the gap just continues to widen throughout their school life.

So GCSE results day, “the one day of true equality on the calendar?” We could not be further from the truth! The data dispels my naive utopia and just leaves, as a bad wine on a long awaited night out, a very sour after taste. ‘Disadvantage’ predominantly indicates parental poverty, with the vast majority of the cohort drawn from the population who qualify for free school meals. The data screams out, that despite the same schooling, your family background will still be the key determinant your educational success. It’s a devastatingly far cry from the ‘cultural capital’ and social mobility we aspired to in Butler’s 1944 Education Act.

Does the over- involvement of parental affluence in education exacerbate the gap? Affluence can mean money for private tuition, money to keep your child away from a time consuming part time job, money for technology and a wealth of online revision resources, lack of financial worries so more time for home support. I don’t know if this is the reason. It’s a highly complex issue and one thing is for sure, it’s ridiculous to expect any parent not to do all they can to support their child’s education. I will certainly continue to make Prom-dress daughter ‘porridge and berry’ breakfasts until these GCSEs are over, and to head out for emergency chocolate after any tricky and tearful exam.

No, it remains the job of educators to relentlessly drive this cohort with more ambition and higher expectations where needed; and it clearly is needed, I’d advocate positive discrimination of time and resources too. But it’s not just a challenge for schools. Think Grenfell, media attitudes to asylum seekers, the Jeremy Kyle show, the refusal of all but a few commentators to listen to the 51% of the population who did vote for Brexit, the 51% who do not recognise Britain as a fair and prosperous land at the moment. Does our nation really care about and respect the most disadvantaged in our society? I think we could all strive to do so a lot better….

Somewhere….

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Saturday 11 May 2019

I was once a big fan of the radio DJ Danny Baker, but this week, his tweet about the royal baby, at best seriously ill-judged, at worst shockingly offensive has seen him fall from grace publicly and definitely personally for me too. In a week where, sadly, the divisions between us can still feel stronger than the humanity that binds us, it is poignant that my musical journeys have also drawn upon themes of racial and social tension and the fear and mistrust of any groups who seem ‘different’.

After a morning of our usual Saturday activities we grab a quick lunch, pick up my mum and head into Manchester, destination the Royal Exchange for a matinee performance of West Side Story. It was my Dad’s all time favourite musical, it’s music by Bernstein, lyrics by Sondheim , it’s an epic explosion of youthful energy, sassy dance routines and musical mastery. But at its core, it’s a heart-breaking love story, a 1950s New York setting of Rome and Juliet with rival gangs now divided by race. True to form, I am teary-eyed mess by the end – God the music, ‘I have a love..’ ‘Maria’ ‘Somewhere’ … it’s too much for this emotional girl. I manage to suppress any audible sobs but I see off an awful lot of tissues! Top top production – go and see it if you can!

As the show ends, mum and the teens head off to enjoy a post-performance Italian. I set the Satnav for home, speedily rustle up some pasta of my own. Then I don my little black dress and head out to tootle oboe notes at a concert for a local choral society. It’s an uplifting evening, with several lovely friends in the audience. The second oboist forgets a crucial page turn in my main solo, but no-one but me seems to notice the 2 awkward bars of silence. I even get a bow!

But the music is West Side Story for the second time today, South Pacific, which addresses racial issues in the 1940s, Porgy and Bess, controversial as the first ‘opera’ to feature an all African-American cast and folk/spiritual music in the 1930s, ShowBoat, with themes of racial prejudice in 1920s….. we seem to have been singing and dancing around these issues for hundreds of years and to have learned nothing. Trump’s Wall, Brexit, immigration, Grenfell, The Rohingya, gangs and knife crime rises in the UK, …. more trivially Danny Baker. …

Will we ever learn to live together…somehow, someday, somewhere?

One very scary prom-dress fitting!

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Saturday 4 May 2019

It’s a very pleasant morning as Prom-dress daughter and I set out for an appointment with the seamstress recommended by our dress shop. Armed with our prom-dress and shoes, we innocently enter the shop to find the seamstress busy with another customer.

She gives us a dismissive glance and, with an authoritative Eastern European accent, very similar to Villanelle ( Killing Eve), motions towards the changing area and raps out the instructions ‘”In there! Dress on!“

The other customer has left as Prom-dress daughter emerges from the changing area. She looks completely stunning and I wait for the seamstress to notice. “Isn’t it a great fit!” I enthuse into the arkward silence, “we think just a little adjustments to the length?” the seamstress ignores me completely and views us both with utter disdain. You could cut the atmosphere with a knife as she tells Prom-dress daughter to stand on a circular platform . And then she reaches for the scissors!

” You must stand completely still, otherwise I cut it too short” she tells a petrified Prom-dress daughter, “You get the dress you stand for!“

We are both a little stunned as, with no hesitation, the seamstress starts to snip away and fabric falls to the floor. She is finished in minutes, informs us that she will adjust all the dress to ensure the line and shape is correct and then, as Prom-dress daughter takes the cue to get changed again, the seamstress is gone!

Another, clearly lesser, employee emerges to give us a ticket and a bill for £20. She seems unconcerned whether I pay now or upon collection. I read a foreboding notice about uncollected garments being ‘sold on‘ and timidly enquire when the dress might be ready. With a shrug, the woman suggests in 4 weeks time and I make a mental note NOT to be late.

It takes a breakfast at Morrisons cafe for Prom-dress daughter and I to recover fully. At least we have 4 weeks grace before we have to return to the scariest seamstress in the Northwest!

Good Friday

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Friday 19 April 2019

“Paracetamol…please!” I almost weep as I struggle into consciousness at the start of the long Easter weekend. Getting my pounding head up from the pillow is quite a challenge, but I do eventually manage to stumble downstairs grab a couple of pills and collapse onto the settee with a strong coffee.

There really is ‘no fool like an old fool‘ I conclude as I review, with a distinct queasiness, my decision to mix rather a lot of prosecco with rather a lot of porter on a work night out. I am not a mixer of drinks, never have been and never will be, so why oh why it always seems like such a top idea as I descend into tipsy-ness I will never know!

At least its the start of the lazy Bank Holiday weekend I think with relief, but the relief is short lived.

” I need a haircut!“, Small Boy yells cheerfully down the stairs, ” And we need to get some snacks for ‘The Boys”

With a nerve jangling start, I recall that teenage boys are actually arriving at my home, in a few hours, for …a sleepover! And I hate going to the Barbers- all that queuing and resisting the urge to scream out ” It’s just a haircut, get on with it!” as those craftsmen of the hair-trade coiffe and perfect each ‘Number 2 on the sides and a trim on top’ with a level of care and attention more appropriate to the final touches on a Michelangelo canvas!

Too weak to protest, I give Small Boy a pale grimace, grab my car keys and off we go. The queue, a pitiful 45 minute wait, is actually not as bad as usual. I even manage to shop the snacks as Small Boy holds his place in the line. It’s also a beautiful day and I find that, revived by some fresh air, I am feeling much better as we finally head for home. Whereupon, there’s more good news. A text from my mum bring the glad tidings that both Small Boy and my eldest have passed their recent piano exams. “Hooray!“

I am now totally transformed. From hangover despair to euphoric happiness with the world and my fabulous family in a few short hours. On a bit of a high, I speed back into town and blow most of next months salary on a holiday for us all in the sun – “Yikes!” Is that my best decision? Who knows, but it’s done now!

I spend the rest of Good Friday filling out an application for a place on ‘Tipping Point‘….

All together again

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Thursday 11 April 2019

I am celebrating finally having all 3 kids back under one roof at the end of a hectic Easter Holiday! Small Boy has been to Paris and back, and also spent time away with his Dad. Prom-dress daughter has been revising for GCSEs but also hopping in and out of Manchester with her pals. And today my eldest limped home from a 4 day Duke of Edinburgh practice expedition to Yorkshire.

As she regales us with tales of 50 miles of trekking, freezing tents and surviving on very little sleep or food, I do feel quite in awe, and wonder, not for the first time,’where has she come from?’ My eldest just seems so much more driven and determined than either me or her father. She is also an incredibly attractive girl. (I do recall hooting with laughter once when my boss came into my office, saw a picture of her on the desk, looked at me and asked,
“Do you ever think the hospital sent you home with the wrong baby?!!”) And as I pick her up from College, with her sunburnt nose and blistered lips and feet I think she has probably never looked more beautiful.

She is craving a Macdonalds and so we head to the Drive Thru’ for tea. We end up getting all the food for free, because I take issue with the feeble portions of ‘large fries’ and the fact that we have to go back for our missing ‘mozzarella sticks!’ I don’t even raise my voice to get a full refund, perhaps my ‘Mum the Brave’ reputation is spreading!

Back home , the family re-bond over an episode of ‘The Chase’ and decide that this is NOT the game show for me to try and win my fortune and I settle down to make the most of a rare evening with us altogether. Because tomorrow, I appear to be driving Prom-dress daughter, and half of Year 11, to a party and on Saturday, my eldest has a party, and volunteering and a driving lesson ! Some where in the middle of all of that I even get to go out too, for a meal (hooray no cooking!) It’s a good job I’m not one for a quiet life!

Who wants to be a Millionare?

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Sunday 7 April 2019

That’s it! After one week of stay-at-home holidaying with the teens, I realise that drastic action is called for. Five days of cooking, cleaning and ferrying children around the relentlessly grey North West, to school-trip drop offs and school-trip pick ups, to dental appointments, to piano exams, to College, to volunteering, to friends’ houses and back again, has left me convinced that there has got to be more to holidays than this … for me! In particular, when the Summer holiday arrives, I simply cannot survive 6 weeks of this thankless servitude. We all need to get away, ideally on a plane, ideally to somewhere sunny and definitely to a place where someone else gets my meals ready. There is a slight snag however. My bank balance suggests that a day trip to Morecambe, with a Macdonald’s tea on the way home, is about all we can afford at the moment! It cannot be! I need some funds and I need them quickly. There must be something I can do…

I’ve tried Ebay-ing. It’s been quite successful recently and, my summary tells me, has netted me a profit of … £53.74. Hmmm… would that even pay for the taxi to the airport? I don’t bother with the National Lottery, as the odds are insane. In any case, I choose to support the Asthma Lottery and the Bury Hospice Lottery I’ve never won a penny on either, but I suppose my luck might change? I have a small monthly dabble on a betting site, but when I say small I mean really small. ‘Never bet more than you can afford to lose!‘ is my trusty motto. Wise words as these undoubtedly are, that equates to not a whole lot of money in my case! Whilst my betting summary shows that I am ‘Up‘ in all but one of the last 6 months, sadly it’s never by more than £20.36

Let’s face it, none of this small fry financial activity comes close. A family holiday is a 4 figure sum. I need a new approach. I need … a TV Gameshow? The kids and I discuss various possibilities.

“Apply for them all mum!” cheers an enthusiatic Prom Dress daughter
“Catch Phrase?” suggests my eldest

Now several years ago, I did apply for ‘Bargain Hunt’ and never heard a peep from them, so maybe I’ll just clear out the garage tomorrow. Who knows, there might be some priceless treasure buried somewhere in all that chaos? On the other hand, could Jeremy Clarkson hold the key to our Summer Holiday success? For the rest of this evening I dream of TV stardom, winning my fortune and perhaps becoming a Millionaire …

Becoming ‘Mum the Brave’

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Mother’s Day March 2019

‘Happy Mother’s Day!’

In pings cheery text from Small Boy at 6:37 am …. argggh that’s 6:37 am on the first day of British Summer Time!

My bleary eyes may be struggling to open, but it does make me smile. Small Boy is in France, so probably doesn’t know that our clocks have ‘Sprung Forward’. Equally, however, he is quite an early riser and it is now a family tradition that: Christmas; my Birthday;  Mother’s Day start at some ungodly hour with my boy crashing enthusiastically into the bedroom with a tray of breakfast!

The girls, by contrast, are far keener on their weekend lie-ins and so it’s very quiet house that greets me, as I creep downstairs for a cup of tea. I decide that it’s the perfect time, on this National Day of Maternal-ness, to contemplate life as a mum!

The biggest change is that parenthood, life or maybe just becoming older and grumpier has lead to me being far more… forthright (if I’m being generous), or … confrontational (if I  sprinkle that with a frosting of reality.)

‘Quiet‘ was always the adjective used to describe me at school and I am pretty sure I was a fairly diffident young adult too and started out as a fairly meek and mild mum.

As an example, I recall how, in a, now legendary, family incident my mum took on a grumpy ice-cream seller in Harlech, who was picking on one of the kids. It was she who defended our family honour and earned herself the title of ‘Nana the Brave‘. The name stuck for years and if ever the kids faced a tricky situation I’d advise,

‘”Try and sort it out yourself, but if that doesn’t work …. we’ll send in Nana the Brave!’

But, this morning, I’m struggling to remember when we last called upon my mum to sort out any such issues. She’s still there, as fearless and feisty as ever; but somewhere along the line did I become  ‘Mum the Brave!‘

It is me who was likened to a ‘Tigress defending her young‘ by a teacher when I disputed her comments at Parents Evening. (Let’s gloss over the fact that I have since been banned, by all 3 kids, from speaking any more than is absolutely necessary on future visits to their school!) It is me who takes on any any person or institution who thinks they can mess with us. Hey, I’ve even taken on rodents this month!

So more outspoken for sure but is this is a single mum trait? You certainly do have to tough up and find your voice as a sole parent. Read the incredible Dame Susan Black’s story for true inspiration. Whereas my ‘Mum the Brave’ exploits usually revolve around riding to the rescue of my family, she uses her strength to flourish in her own career too. Perhaps that’s a challenge, I should also take on?

But today is Mothering Sunday, Small Boy now  calls to tell me that,

‘I’m having a star named after you Mum ‘

and I decide that conquering the world of work can wait for 24 hours. Today of all days it feels pretty great just to be a mum!

Stop growing for 5 minutes!

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Wednesday 27 March 2019

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Look what the painters left behind last month! Our treasured pencil marks charting the kids’ heights over time. This year, they record the meteoric rise of Small Boy (AT) from the smallest to the tallest person in the house. Yes, he is now even taller than me!

I’ve had a great day working at home, and am actually feeling more on top of my workload than usual, when Small Boy bursts through the door. I am astounded by how ravenous he is. He simply can’t stop eating! As he pauses for breath, having polished off two bowls of cereal, a bag of nuts and raisins and some left over sticky toffee pudding, we chat about his upcoming school trip – singing in Eurodysney with the school choir.

“Any chance of some new black trousers for the concert, Mum?” he asks.

Glancing at his school uniform I can see what he means. His trousers, new at Christmas, are now hovering in a distinctly ‘half-mast’ fashion above his ankles. I decide I don’t want the Eurodysney crowd thinking that he’s turned up to audition for the part of Oliver Twist and add ‘school trousers’ to m Thursday after-work shopping list.

“Can you just stop growing for 5 minutes!” I shout in mock-exasperation.

Small Boy grins and twirls me around the kitchen, before racing back outside to his basketball hoop. And I am left all alone in the kitchen, rooted to the spot. I’m not thinking about work anymore, because all I am thinking is that he won’t stop growing. None of them will. And soon life is going to start changing for us, in really significant ways. My eldest is already planning visits to Uni Open Days and into my head flashes an image of the day when we head out as a family of 4 to drop her off and return as a family of 3…it makes me feel utterly panic-stricken. A momentary desire to stop time and freeze it right here and now, with us all together in this happy little bubble is palpable. But of course that can’t happen and I actually wouldn’t want it to. It’s the start of the exciting future, freedom and independence I dream of for my kids and a reality all parents have to face at some point. I’m just not at all sure it’s one I’ll be smashing with any kind of dignity and without an awful lot of tissues ….

Hallelujah!!

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Saturday 23 March 2019

What a mad and magnificently musical-March it has been! This week alone, I have performed in 2 concerts and the kids have been in 3. We have careered all over the Northwest, discovering new venues, such as Manchester’s classy Stoller Hall, as well as playing in familiar favourites. We have been offered tea, wine and even, on one occasion, chips! It’s been exhausting, exhilarating and exciting…it’s how to do life!

Tonight was an explosion of joy and sound, playing for a local Choral society who took on every major choral work of the 20th Century. It was truly stirring, if a tad lengthy. (The woodwind section actually took a book out on what time it would finish!) Emotional for me too, listening to the haunting Pie Jesu, which I played at Dad’s funeral and playing in extracts from the Dream of Gerontius, the source of the quote on his headstone “Farewell, but not forever…”

I am winding down, with a well earned G&T, when a worrying thought pops into my head, What am I going to do when it’s all over? The musical mayhem, I’ve juggled since January, comes to a glorious end next Saturday with the mighty Mahler 5. Will I be able to cope as I scale back to one weekly rehearsal and a less hectic life? Then I remember that we have, GCSEs , Uni Open days, Work Experience for both girls and Summer Sun to plan for and fit in …something tells me it’s not going to quieten down at all! Well Hallelujah…